Wyandanch

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Wyandanch (* 1571 on Long Island in New York , † 1659 on Long Island) was a sachem of the Montaukett , an Indian tribe that lived on the eastern tip of Long Island in the 17th century. Wyandanch was best known for his friendship with the English officer and settler Lion Gardiner .

biography

Wyandanch was born around 1571 into a family that belonged to a recognized chief lineage of the Montaukett. First information about Wyandanch comes from Lion Gardiner's report on the Pequot War (1636-1637): Relation of the Pequot Warres , which he wrote in 1660, however.

The Pequot were one of the most powerful tribes in the south coast of New England and had subjected the Montaukett and other tribes of Long Island and forced them tribute in the form of wampum to pay. The growing demand for wampum and its increase in value forced the Montakett to give up their seasonal migrations and to concentrate almost entirely on the collection and manufacture of the shell pearls. Every year they had to deliver canoe loads from Wampum across the Sound as a tribute to the Pequot.

After the Pequot War of 1637, which ended in a crushing defeat for the Pequot, Sachem Wyandanch took a canoe across the Sound to Fort Saybrook , Connecticut , to meet the fort's commander, Lieutenant Gardiner. He wanted to talk to him about trade relations between the English and his people after the common enemy had been defeated. Wyandanch promised Gardiner to make similar tribute payments to the English in wampum as before the Pequot. This began a friendship between the English officer and the Sachem of the Montaukett, which would last until Wyandanch's death.

In May 1639, Gardiner's service in Connecticut ended. He had previously visited Wyandanch in his village on Long Island and bought Manchonake Island , later called Gardiners Island , from the Montaukett . The island has a size of around 13 km² and the purchase price consisted of some blankets, a rifle, powder and a large black dog. It can be assumed that Wyandanch also gave the island to Gardiner out of gratitude for the destruction of their enemies.

Stephen Talkhouse was a descendant of Wyandanchs and lived in the 19th century

In 1642 Sachem Miantonomo of the Narraganset , accompanied by 100 warriors, visited the Montaukett on Long Island. He wanted to win Wyandanch for an alliance against the English. Wyandanch declined to participate and warned his friend Gardiner, who alerted the Connecticut magistrate . The uprising was suppressed in the bud by the colonists before it began. The news of the Montaukett betrayal spread at lightning speed and resulted in the tribe being temporarily isolated.

In 1653, Narraganset warriors crossed Long Island Sound and raided the Montaukett village. The site of the battle, in which more than 30 Montaukett were killed, is near Montauk Manor and is now called the Massacre Valley (Valley of the Massacre). But the campaign angered the English, who had settled on the south coast in Southampton in 1640 . They threatened the Narraganset with war and so they withdrew again across the sound, not without taking a number of prisoners with them. Wyandanch's daughter was among them. Gardiner went to Rhode Island to rescue the girl for a ransom. In gratitude, the Sachem gave Gardiner another large piece of land, which is now the town of Smithtown . A series of smallpox epidemics in the late 1650s struck the Montaukett in such a way that ultimately only a third of the tribe survived.

Wyandanch died in 1659, leaving a 19-year-old son named Wyankanbone , whose guardian was Lion Gardiner. The cause of his death is still unclear. Rumor has it that he was poisoned for selling all of the tribal land to the English. However, hundreds of Montaukett died of smallpox in the same year. The place Wyandanch in the state of New York was named after him.

Individual evidence

  1. a b c History of the Montaukett
  2. a b Steve Wick: Wyandanch, Ever an Enigma ( Memento from August 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive )

literature

  • Lion Gardiner: Relation of the Pequot Warres , 1660 (again: A History of the Pequot War or, A Relation of the War between the Powerful Nation of Pequot Indians, once inhabiting the Coast of New-England, Westerley from near Naraganset Bay, and the English Inhabitants, in the Year 1638 , Cincinnati 1860) ( Online ).
  • John A. Strong: Wyandanch: Sachem of the Montauks , in: Robert Steven Grumet (Ed.): Northeastern Indian Lives, 1632-1816 , University of Massachusetts Press, 1996, pp. 48-73.

Web links