Treaty of Big Tree

Treaty of Big Tree was a formal treaty, held from August 20, 1797, until September 16, 1797, between the Seneca nation and the United States. The delegates for both parties met at the residence of William Wadsworth, an early pioneer of the area and Captain of the local militia, in what is now Geneseo, New York. A meadow between Wadsworth's cabin at Big Tree and the gigantic oak by the river, which gave the place its name, was the site of the conference.

In attendance were nearly three thousand Seneca and other prominent members of the United States government; Captain Charles Williamson and Thomas Morris, representing his father; Robert Morris; General William Shepard, representing Massachusetts; William Bayard, representing New York; Theophilus Cazenove and Paolo Busti, representatives for the Holland Land Company; Captain Israel Chapin, representing the Department of Indian Affairs; Joseph Ellicott, land surveyor; and James Rees as acting secretary. The official interpreters were Horatio Jones and Jasper Parish.

All of the treaty delegates for the United States were housed in William's log cabin and new cobblestone house. A council house was erected by the Seneca and the proceedings were held there. The treaty was signed on September 15, 1797, after nearly a month of, at times heated, back-and-forth negotiations. This treaty is substantial as it opened up the rest of the territory west of the Genesee River for settlement and established ten reservations, perpetual annuities and hunting and fishing rights for the Seneca in Western New York.

References

“A History of the Treaty of Big Tree, and Robert Morris” by Livingston County Historical Society, O. Burnell Print, 1897

“Red Jacket; Iroquois Diplomat and Orator”, by Christopher Densmore, Syracuse University Press, 1999

"Robert Morris and the Treaty of Big Tree", by Norman B. Wilkinson, Organization of American Historians, 1953

“The Wadsworths of the Genesee”, by Alden Hatch, Goward-McCann, Inc., New York 1959

Laurence M. Hauptman, Conspiracy of Interests: Iroquois Dispossession and the Rise of New York State (2001).

External links

Treaty of Big Tree
http://www.pbs.org/warrior/content/timeline/opendoor/roleOfChief.html

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Treaty of Big Tree