p105  V

Indians — and the Building of Fort Nassau

The Indians with whom the Dutch explorers and colonists were thrown into contact belonged to two different language groups. Among those speaking the Iroquoian tongue were the members of the strong, aggressive League of the Five Nations — the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca, living in upper New York state — and the so‑called Minquas, occupying the Susquehanna River and its tributaries in eastern Pennsylvania. The second linguistic group, those speaking the Algonkian language, comprised the tribes on Long Island, Manhattan Island, and in the territory drained by the Hudson River and its tributaries. Also included among the Algonkian-speaking Indians were the natives of New England, as well as the Lenni Lenape, whose principal villages were in the area of the Delaware River system.

The Algonkian and Iroquois peoples differed in cultural traits as well as language, an important consideration in understanding Dutch relations with the Indians. The Dutch minister, Johannes Megapolensis, recognized the linguistic difference when he wrote of the Mohican (Algonkian) and Mohawk (Iroquois) that "these two nations have different languages, which have no affinity with each other, like Dutch and Latin."⁠1

When the Dutch arrived in America, the Five-Nations Iroquois had conquered and were exercising an overlord­ship over some of the neighboring Algonkians and were intimidating others. The Minquas had also been attacking villages of the Algonkians,  p106 particularly those situated on the west side of the Delaware River. To further complicate a situation which was difficult for the newly-arrived Dutch to understand, the Five Nations had been sending war parties to raid the Minquas villages in Pennsylvania.

This inter-tribal warfare was characterized by many native practices unfamiliar and strange to the Dutch: the paying of wampum tribute by a subjugated tribe to their conquerors; the feminization of certain of the defeated Lenni Lenape by the Five Nations, symbolically depriving them of male accoutrements; the Mohawk acquisition of lands on the upper Hudson through conquest of the Mohican; the Minquas proprietor­ship, also by right of conquest, over the homeland of the Lenni Lenape; the loss, some years later, by the Minquas of their own territory to the conquering Five Nations, who settled thereon other tributary nations; the influence of matrons in the Five Nations councils; the functions of war chiefs in Indian society. Not only were the Dutch and other Europeans ignorant about these and other native customs and beliefs, but they evidently had little interest in enlightening themselves.

Misunderstandings, such as occurred at Swanendael, were often at the root of Indian troubles. Yet, with few exceptions, the officers of the West India Company and its employees had no desire to devote serious study to Indian customs, nor did other Europeans during the period of exploration and settlement. The Indian way of life seemed primitive, in some phases barbaric, when measured against European standards of living, and the whites saw no reason to study a patently inferior, unchristian race. As we reread the journals of the early explorers we find only brief notes, based on superficial observations, about the Indians. When they referred to the Indians as "heathens," for example, Dutch scribes reflected the naïve attitude of most Europeans toward Indian religion. They obviously did not know that there existed among the natives a well developed pattern of  p107 religious beliefs, practices, and ceremonies based on a pantheism as sacred to the Indians as Christianity was to the whites. De Laet illustrated this lack of understanding when he wrote: "They have no sense of religion, no worship of God; they indeed pay homage to the devil."⁠2

The regulations for the colonists who accompanied May in 1624 enjoined them "by their Christian life and conduct seek to draw the Indians and other blind people to the knowledge of God and his word. . . ."⁠3 Verhulst was also instructed that "by the example of godliness and outward discipline on the part of the Christians the heathen may the sooner be brought to a knowledge of the same."⁠4 Jonas Michaëlius, the first Dutch minister in the New Netherland, wrote in 1628, soon after his arrival at Manhattan, that he hoped "to keep a watchful eye over these people [the Indians] and to learn as much as possible of their language, and to seek better opportunities for their instruction than hitherto it has been possible to find."⁠5 However, he found the Indians difficult to teach and later described them as being "stupid as garden poles, who serve nobody but the Devil." Moreover, he was occupied with the problems of his Dutch and Walloon communicants at Manhattan, and in writing letters complaining about Director-General Minuit, that time did not permit him to conduct missions among the Indians.

Megapolensis, who arrived at Rensselaerwyck in 1642, patiently learned the language of the Mohawk in order to preach to them, but he was not very success­ful in winning native converts to the Reformed Church.⁠6 He spent two years teaching one Indian novitiate to read and write the Dutch language and instructing him in the Bible. The young fellow "took to drinking  p108 brandy, he pawned the Bible, and turned into a regular beast, doing more harm than good among the Indians."⁠7 Unlike the Jesuit priests, certain of the Swedish Lutheran preachers, and the later Moravian missionaries, the ministers of the Dutch Reformed Church were not success­ful in spreading the Christian gospel among the Indians. So far as the West India Company was concerned, their commercial interests in the New World took precedence over spiritual redemption.

The Dutch ministers — as well as their countrymen — disparaged what, according to their moral standards, appeared to be loose marital relations and censurable conduct on the part of the Indian women. They also belittled the Indian husband who left the chores of the field and other menial tasks to his seemingly overburdened wife while he hunted and fished. In so doing, they showed further misunderstanding of the basic relations between the sexes in Indian society, the necessary division of labor, and the place held by women in the family.

The Dutch also failed to understand the tragedy of introducing the Indian to strong drink. They did not know the resultant sensations would be new to the Indian, who had never tasted alcohol; they did not realize that the Indian had been disciplined from childhood never to display his emotions in interpersonal relations; they did not realize that these inhibitions would suddenly be released, and with unpredictable results, by a cup of spirits. When a drunken Indian went berserk he was berated for not being able to hold his liquor and behaving like a beast. Social drinking in moderation or raising of a glass to seal a bargain or to cement the bonds of friendship were European customs which were never properly taught the Indian. He drank to become intoxicated. "They are great lovers of strong drink," Denton wrote, "yet do not care for drinking unless they have enough to make themselves drunk; and if there be so many in their Company, that  p109  there is not sufficient to make them all drunk, they usually select so many out of their Company, proportionable to the quantity of drink, and the rest must be spectators."⁠8

Differences in the concept of land tenure between Indians and whites also caused mutual misunderstanding. The Algonkians, for example, did not grasp the Dutch institution of land owner­ship and sale. Land to them, like air, was everywhere and freely accessible to those who wanted to make use of it; like the ocean waters, it could not be disposed of by sale. If Dutchmen were generous enough to want to enrich the Indians with articles of value to acquire "use" rights to the hunting territory or other lands occupied by the Indians, that was evidence of the white man's good faith expressed in the best aboriginal manner. In transferring these "use" rights in exchange for the gifts, the Indians never intended permanently to dispose of land and exclude themselves from its use. This would have been suicidal to a people whose subsistence came from the forests and streams. Yet, when the Dutch "purchased" property from the Indians, they expected to possess it exclusively, as they did in Europe, and to deny the Indians further access if it so suited their purpose.

Like most Europeans, the Dutch were basically selfish in their relations with the Indians; traders sought furs which the native trappers and hunters could supply; military men were after allies; preachers wanted converts; others had different interests and aims. When they got what they wanted, the whites were inclined to regard the Indian as an intelligent and cooperative friend. When they did not get what they wanted, the tendency was to call the Indian a savage, a heathen, and refer to him in other uncomplimentary terms.

The Indians, who also had selfish interests, were not blameless  p110 in their conduct with the Dutch, and frequently they were guilty of starting trouble. They usually took the law into their own hands, failing to understand the peaceful, legal process for a redress of wrongs. They often misinterpreted actions taken by the whites and turned against those who were trying to befriend them. They made promises they did not keep, and were known to lie, cheat, and steal. Nevertheless, as we look into the past from the perspective that the years have afforded, certain facts must be recognized. It was the Indian whose homeland was being invaded, and the invaders brought such unwelcome evils as whiskey, guns, powder, and diseases to which the Indian had no immunity.

A trait in the culture of the eastern Indians was that of extending hospitality to visitors. Wassenaer wrote, "They are extremely hospitable, and one lodges with the other without thought of compensation." Denton added that if a white man chanced upon an Indian town, "they shall give you the best entertainment they have."⁠9 Not only would a visitor be given a comfortable place at the fireside, but he would receive food and other presents, and under certain circumstances he would be invited to share the wigwam and the favors of one of his host's daughters, or even of his wife.⁠10 The Dutch did not always recognize such warm hospitality as being offered in good faith; to them it seemed to conceal treachery. Not to be taken by surprise, the Dutch visitor kept his gun loaded and within reach, and the Indian naturally assumed that the visitor intended harm. Thus, what was meant as a gesture of genuine friendship on the Indian's part became a cause of mistrust.

When Henry Hudson sailed into the river which now bears  p111 his name, Juet wrote, ". . . wee found very loving people, and very old men: where wee were well used."⁠11 But when the Indians came to visit Hudson on the vessel, Juet said they "came aboard of us making show of love, and gave us Tobacco and Indian Wheat . . . but we durst not trust them."⁠12 The words italicized typify the suspicious attitude characteristic of the Europeans in their relations with the Indians.

Even on the initial contact between the crew of the Half Moon and the natives, there was serious trouble. John Colman was killed and two other of Hudson's seamen wounded; a number of Indians were wounded or slain by the sailors during their explorations. The facts behind these assaults are not fully known, but an account of Hudson's voyage appearing in a Dutch history in 1648 stated candidly that Hudson's crew "lived on bad terms with the natives of the land, taking their things by violence."⁠13 Hudson himself acquainted the Indians of New Netherland with their first taste of Dutch liquor when he invited them into his cabin on the Half Moon "and gave them so much wine and Aqua vitae that they were all merrie."

When Hendrick Christiaensen (Corstiaenssen), who made a total of ten voyages to America, and Adriaen Block explored the Hudson River several years later, they persuaded two sons of one of the Indian sachems to return to Holland with them for a visit. Many of the Dutch merchants, as well as government officials, had not previously seen American Indians and the two natives were no doubt the center of attention. After returning to New Netherland, one of the lads, named Orson by the Dutch, killed  p112 Christiaensen, according to Wassenaer, but he "was paid in like coin; he got a bullet as his recompense."⁠14

Wassenaer did not give any further details, but in the notarial records at Amsterdam there is reference to this incident that promoted suspicion and mistrust between the Dutch and Indians. It appears that Christiaensen (in the Dutch records he was also called "Hendrick Carstiens") was in 1618 in command of a vessel, de Swarte Beer (The Black Bear), owned by two private merchants on a trading mission in Hudson River. While bartering in the Hudson, the vessel was attacked by Indians (the native named Orson may have had something to do with the attack), with the result that "said skipper and majority of the crew had been murdered in the said ship by the Indians." Only five members of the crew were left unharmed, including Jacob Janss Wit, the ship's carpenter, and Jacob Mayer, the cook, who told the story of the attack when they returned to Holland. Luckily, Adriaen Jorissen Thienpoint was trading in the Hudson River at the same time, in command of a small vessel from Vlissingen. He put several members of his crew aboard the crippled de Swarte Beer, repaired her, made the former carpenter the first mate, and brought her back to Holland safely.⁠15

Two years after Christiaensen's death another of his fellow explorers, Cornelis Hendricksen, made the report to the States General mentioned in Chapter 2. The report included this passage:

On the "Figurative Map" accompanying his report, the following legend appears:

What these legends seem to mean is that a Dutchman named Kleytjen (sometimes spelled Klienties) and two companions, who had all evidently been stationed at Fort Nassau on the Hudson, made their way inland for reasons that are not clear. Hendrickson did not say what was the nature of their employment with the Mohawk and Mohican Indians, but in the course of their travels they made at least two sketch maps of undiscovered lands. When they reached the headwaters of the Delaware or Susquehanna Rivers they were taken prisoner by the Minquas Indians. In the meantime Hendricksen had sailed up the Delaware River on an exploring mission, and in the process of trading with the Indians he learned of his countrymen being held as prisoners. He effected their release by paying the Minquas a ransom in European goods. The Dutchmen then gave Hendricksen their sketches and notes, which he incorporated on his "Figurative Map." Apart from the relevance of this incident to the entries  p114 on the map, it further shows that long before the Dutch sent colonists to New Netherland their representatives were in trouble with the Indians.

Reference has already been made to Kriekenbeeck's indiscretion at Fort Orange when he violated the neutrality the Company tried to maintain by siding with the Mohican Indians in their war with the Mohawk. Krieckenbeeck and three of his men were killed, many Indians were slain, and Dutch-Mohawk relations were badly strained.⁠17

As the Dutch population increased, clashes with the natives became more and more frequent, culminating in the Indian war. During Kieft's administration atrocities were committed by both whites and Indians.⁠18 Following a truce in May of 1643 there was a temporary cessation of hostilities, but within a few months the Indians were on the warpath again, attacking farms and committing acts of terror against the colonists on the Hudson. The Dutch sought allies from the English in New England, and the war culminated in an attack by joint English and Dutch forces against the Indians, resulting in the death of more than five hundred men, women, and children.⁠19 Bad relations with the Indians continued through the Stuyvesant administration when the natives arose again and attacked the Dutch settlements.⁠20

To the credit of the West India Company it must be said that the directors, desirous of keeping on good terms with the Indians, realized the importance of the Company's employees treating the natives with honesty and kindness. The articulbrieff dated March 28, 1624, instructed the colonists sent out on the Nieu Nederlandt that:

The instructions to Willem Verhulst contained a number of rules to govern his conduct with the Indians. He was directed to "see that no one do the Indians any harm or violence, deceive, mock or condemn them in any way, but that in addition to good treatment they be shown honesty, faithfulness, and sincerity in all contracts, dealings, and intercourse, without being deceived by shortage of measure, weight or number, and that throughout friendly relations with them be maintained."⁠22

The second set of instructions cautioned Verhulst to maintain good Indian relations "without however forcing them thereto in the least or taking possession by craft or fraud lest we call down the wrath of God upon our uprighteous beginnings, the Company intending in no wise to make war or hostile attack upon anyone, except the Spaniards, and their allies and others who are our declared enemies."⁠23

Despite these injunctions, the officials and other employees of the Company failed to keep on good terms with the Indians. There were many factors contributing to this unsatisfactory situation, which had its inception in the days of exploration, worsened as settlements were established, then became critical as they grew larger. Some of the major cultural differences basic to the misunderstandings have already been cited, and to these must be added grievances and specific acts of aggression on record. The cattle of the Dutch farmers roamed the woods and trampled down the Indian cornfields, which were unfenced; the Indians retaliated by killing the cattle, and the whites then punished the Indians; traders persisted in selling rum and brandy to the  p116 Indians despite efforts by the authorities to prevent or control the liquor traffic; Dutch traders bartered guns and ammunition, putting a new and terrible weapon in the Indians' possession; Indians employed as domestics stole from the households where they worked; whites stole corn and furs from the Indians; unprincipled traders and soldiers took advantage of the Indian women; traders cheated the Indians; the Indians broke their solemn word to trade exclusively with the Dutch by taking their furs to others when the Dutch were temporarily out of goods in trade.⁠24

Against these clouds that darkened Dutch-Indian relations on the Hudson and immediate vicinity, let us now see what happened on the Delaware River when the two peoples were thrown together.

The Lenni Lenape, who were later to become known at Delaware Indians, were divided into a number of small groups, or bands, known to the whites by local names. These names were often transferred to the streams on which the Indians lived. In the seventeenth century, European writers and cartographers made references to the following Indians living on the east bank of the Delaware: Sanhickans, Kechemeckes, Manteses, Little Siconese (or Sikonesses), Asomoches, Eriwonek (also given as Armeomeks, Armewamese, and so on), Ramcock, Axion, Mosilian, Sewapois, Narraticons, and others.⁠25 On the Delaware such names as Passayunk, Okanickon, Minguannan Indians, Brandywine Indians, and the like were used by whites to refer to particular Indian bands. In the Swanendael area dwelt the Great Siconese, to whom previous reference has been made.⁠26  p117 Although these scattered groups were affiliated culturally and spoke dialects of the Algonkian language, they maintained a certain autonomy, having their own villages and chiefs. It was perhaps this loose organization that made them easy prey when the Minquas war parties invaded the Delaware Valley. There were two major groups of Minquas, the Minquas proper (also known as Andastes and sometimes as White Minquas) and the Black Minquas, so called because they wore gorgets of black stone. The Minquas were not only aggressive warriors, but they were skilled hunters and trappers, as indicated in the following passage from a Dutch contemporary account:

The term "Southern Indians" was an inexact one, applied to Minquas proper, probably because they lived in the territory south of Manhattan Island. The Algonkian word for southerners, suwanoo, sauwanoo, sauna, is shown on a number of seventeenth‑century Dutch maps.⁠28

The war between the Minquas and the Lenape was in progress when the Walloons first settled on the Delaware River, as was pointed out in Chapter 2. Some of the Indians living in villages on the west bank had deserted their home and moved to the opposite side of the river to escape their enemies. Not only did the Minquas loot the Lenape towns and burn their cornfields, but they also stole their women.

When the Dutch began to trade with the Indians the Minquas apparently intensified their pressures on the Delaware River Indians. The cause of this war has never been satisfactorily explained, but it seems clear that it was prolonged because the  p118 Minquas were deliberately trying to eliminate the Lenape as competitors in this profitable commerce so they would have it to themselves. This is what prompted de Rasière to say of the local Indians living along the Delaware that they were "afraid to hunt in winter being constantly harassed by war with the Minquas."⁠29 Unless they hunted in winter, when the best pelts were obtained they had nothing to trade with the Dutch.

The consuming desire on the part of the Dutch for furs, particularly beaver pelts (principally used in the manufacture of men's hats), was no less than that of the American Indians to possess what to them seemed priceless merchandise offered by the white merchants. Beads, hatchets, clay smoking-pipes, inexpensive jewelry, combs, mirrors, iron pots, jews'-harps, and household utensils were greatly in demand by the natives. One of the European products sought after by all the Indian peoples was the coarsely woven wool cloth known as "duffel cloth" or simply "duffels," named for the town of Duffel near Antwerp. Lindeström wrote that the Indians held this cloth "in as high esteem as the finest scarlet."⁠30 Prior to white contact the natives wore "a deer skin or mantle, a fathom square, of woven Turkey feathers or peltries sewed together. They now make great use of duffel cloths, blue or red, in consequence of the frequent visits of the Christians."⁠31

Denton explained how the duffel cloth was worn, the Indians taking about a yard and a half "which they hand upon their shoulders; and half a yard of the same cloth, which being put betwixt their legs and brought up before and behinde, and tied with a Girdle about their middle, hangs with a flap on either side."⁠32 Duffel cloth was also used at night as a bed covering in  p119 lieu of blankets. Some white traders, according to Lindeström, cheated the Indians when measuring duffels, "the savage taking hold of a corner of the frieze and the Christian on the edge, whereupon they pull the hardest they are able, stretching thus the ell [about two yards] for the savage, so that he for three ells barely gets more than two; which the savage thinks should be thus, and does not understand himself cheated in this."⁠33

The aboriginal medium of exchange was bead "money," known as sewan or sewant to the Dutch. In New England it was called wampumpeake and abbreviated to wampum or peake. Among the Indians this sewant actually meant more than money meant to the Europeans, for it was used ceremonially as well as for personal adornment. When engaged in barter with the Indians for pelts, the white trader had to have a supply of sewan. For a time, the bead money was used by the inhabitants of New Netherland as a medium of exchange instead of Dutch money. Four beads of sewan on a string was valued at one stiver about two cents. Six loose beads were of equivalent value.⁠34 The manufacture of these shell beads required much patience, labor, and a marked degree of skill, since the Indians, having no metal tools, worked with implements of bone and stone. The beads were wrought mostly by women and were of two colors, purple and white; the purple or dark-coloured beads were considered more valuable than the white. The beads were strung singly on strands of sinew or were fabricated into belts in which symbolic figures were often neatly and deftly wrought.

With the intention of cheating the Indians, the Dutch were accused of manufacturing sewan in Holland and bringing a large quantity to New Netherland. The Indians saw that it was counterfeit and refused to accept it.⁠35 In the fur trade a beaver pelt was  p120 worth seven to eight florins in sewan, a florin being equivalent to twenty stivers, or approximately eighty cents per  skin.⁠36

Perhaps it was the competition to supply the white man with beaver pelts that was the cause of hostility between the Black Minquas and the Minquas proper. War broke out between them about 1653, at which time Governor Johan Printz wrote that the fur trade had been seriously affected because, as he said, "the Arrigahaga [Black Minquas] and the Susquahannoer [Minquas proper, or White Minquas] from whom the beavers come begin to fight one another."⁠37

Arrigahaga seems to be a Swedish rendition of the Iroquoian word Eriga, with its variants Rigué, Rike-haka, and so on. These terms refer to the Indians who were known as the Cat (panther) Nation and were also called the Erie.⁠38 A legend on Augustine Herrman's map of 1670 states in part ". . . formerly those Black Mincquas came over as far as Delaware to trade but the Sassquahanna and Sinnicus went over and destroyed that very great Nation." Since the Susquehanna Minquas and the Seneca were enemies, and not allies, Herrman's note can be taken to mean that they independently warred against Black Minquas.

Owing to the loss of the West India Company's records, there is no account of Indian relations on the Delaware during the May-Thienpoint and Verhulst administrations. It is quite likely that land, doubtless including Burlington or High Island, was purchased from the Indians on behalf of the Company. Verhulst's instructions were clear that if any Indians "be living on the aforesaid Island or make any claim upon it . . . they must not be  p121 driven away by force . . . but by good words be persuaded to leave, or be given something therefore to their satisfaction . . . a contract being made thereof and signed by them in their manner."⁠39

Since the West India Company's objective in the New World was to promote commerce — and since the Walloon settlers had been withdrawn from the Delaware — there was no reason for the Dutch to make extensive land purchases there from the Indians; at least, this seems to have been the reasoning of the director. The Company wanted animal pelts, and it did not require real estate on the Delaware River for the promulgation of this trade. From the time Hendricksen, May, and others had started to trade in the river, the Dutch enjoyed what amounted to a monopoly in the fur business there. All that was needed was a storehouse as the base of trading operations and, as de Rasière wrote, "having a fort there, one could control all the trade in the river," and it was for this reason that Nassau, a fortified storehouse, was built in the first place.

Many historians have stated that Cornelis Jacobsen May was the builder of Fort Nassau. Apparently the documentary evidence on which this assumption is founded occurs in a report drawn up in 1644 containing the following passage:

The date 1624 given above is incorrect for the building of  p122 Fort Nassau; it was erected in 1626 after May had returned to Holland. The writer doubtless confused it with the trading post on Burlington Island, which was probably built in 1624 and whose builder was undoubtedly May. We now know from an unpublished Bontemantel document that this trading house was "provided with palisades and battlements though afterwards abandoned."⁠41 There are other factual errors in the above 1644 report which make it inadmissible as valid historical evidence.

After Fort Nassau was built, the Dutch found that it was needed only at certain times of the year. In the winter season (when the best animal pelts were to be had) the Indians roamed the forests trapping beaver and otter and hunting other game. Instead of maintaining permanent employees there, it was less expensive for the Company to send sloops from Manhattan at designated times to meet the Indians when they returned from hunting and were ready to barter their winter haul. Wassenaer wrote in 1628 that the Company was then retaining only one vessel in the Delaware for trading purposes.

In describing his visit to Fort Nassau in 1631 (see Chapter 2), Peter Lourenson mentioned a "trading house" and the presence of ten or twelve Company employees; this was one of the occasions it was occupied. Following the Swanendael massacre, Fort Nassau remained the only Dutch post on the Delaware, and although it was occupied intermittently, the Company considered it the stronghold of their southern frontier. The boast made in an official report that it was "maintained with a constant garrison until the year 1650" is, of course, an exaggeration.⁠42 On the other  p123 hand, it was never actually vacated in a permanent sense, as some writers have surmised.

This post on the Delaware should not be confused with an earlier trading post, also called Fort Nassau, built on Castle Island near present Albany, and the predecessor of Fort Orange. The first Fort Nassau was destroyed by floods,⁠43 its first commander, and probable builder, was the aforementioned Hendrick Christiaensen who lost his life in his vessel on the Hudson during an Indian attack. The use of the name Nassau for two forts commemorates the family of a Dutch hero, William the Silent, Prince of Orange, Stadholder of Holland and Zealand, and champion of the provinces in their revolt against Spain, who was from Nassau. Assassinated by an agent of the Spanish king in 1584, William was considered a martyr to the cause of freedom. One of his sons, Maurice of Nassau, became almost as popular as the father by gaining victory after victory over the Spanish until the twelve-year truce was signed in 1609. Maurice's younger half brother, Frederick Henry, was also popular with the people, and the latter's son, William, fell heir to the title of Prince of Orange.

Maurice, who died in 1625, was at the height of his popularity during the period of Dutch exploration of New Netherland; his name was given to the Hudson River, usually Latinized as Mauritius. Fort Nassau on the Delaware was probably named in his honor, as the first Fort Nassau, built before his birth, had honored his illustrious father. Although it is difficult to relate the name of the specific individual intended, many of the geographical names in New Netherland, as well as names of vessels and forts, honored members of the family, e.g., Nassau, Orange, William, Willems, Wilhelmus, Hendricx, and so on. Sometimes the person's title appeared in the name, e.g., Prince  p124 William, Prins Maurits, Prince Hendricx, and the like.

No contemporary description of the southern Fort Nassau is on record, but it was probably constructed along the lines of other forts built by the Company or the patroons. Usually a central building of wood or brick was erected within a palisaded enclosure to serve as office for the Company's agent, or commis; it was also used as a storehouse for pelts and for merchandise used in the Indian trade, and as a barracks for the soldiers. The palisades were logs sharpened at tops and set closely together to form an enclosure, usually with bastions at the corners where cannon could be positioned. A site was customarily selected along a natural stream. The traders and soldiers lived within the palisaded area; colonists could reside outside the palisades and fall back to the fort in the event of attack. At Fort Nassau there were no colonists to consider during the early years of its existence — they were to come later when competition with the Swedes for possession of the river grew keen.

Historians have long held divergent views about the site of Fort Nassau, and a joint effort by committees of the New Jersey Historical Society and the Pennsylvania Historical Society in 1852 did not settle the question. Their investigation was occasioned by the finding of an unidentified log structure at the confluence of Big Timber and Little Timber Creeks in Gloucester County, New Jersey. There was general agreement from a study of maps and documents that the fort belonged somewhere in this general area. After examining the log structures, the committees did not feel "warranted in expressing a belief that the ruins in question are a part and mark the site of Fort Nassau."⁠44

Edward Armstrong, a member of the committee representing the Pennsylvania Society, prepared a paper outlining his observations during the search for the fort site. As an addendum he presented testimony of an elderly informant who stated the fort  p125 had been situated on the south side of Big Timber Creek and "that the remains are still to be seen in a bank of earth of horse-shoe form, which have been pointed out as those of Fort Nassau. And further, that a number of Indian relics, and Dutch bricks, with letters upon them, were found at different times on the spot."⁠45 Armstrong agreed that this location deserved more thorough examination, but there is no record of such investigation ever having been made. Armstrong also suggested that information would probably come to light at some future date permitting the site of the fort to be placed with exactness.

Such data have, indeed, become available, and it is now possible to fix the location of Fort Nassau. The most convincing piece of evidence is a map made in 1643 entitled Kaert vande Suyd Rivier in Niew Sweden (facsimile in F. C. Wieder, Monumenta Cartographica, plate 79) on which the fort is indicated. It is shown on the east bank of the Delaware south of a stream called Timmer Kill and north of the Verkeerde Kill near the latter's point of junction with the Delaware.

Another contemporary map, c. 1630 (C.Pl.39, in Iconography, vol. 2) shows Fort Nassau immediately south of the Timmer Kill.

When these seventeenth‑century maps are compared with modern maps it becomes clearly evident that the Timmer Kill is the stream now called Newton Creek. The stream now called Big Timber Creek is none other than the one shown on the old maps as Verkeerde Kill which means "wrong creek" or "turned about creek," probably from its course.⁠46 In terms of modern geography, Fort Nassau was situated on the east bank of the Delaware River on a point between Newton Creek and Big Timber Creek; the site is probably covered by the present city of Gloucester. If one rereads that section of de Vries' journal describing his visit to  p126 Fort Nassau in 1633, the relation of Timmer Kill to the fort becomes immediately apparent. He went past the fort on his way upstream to enter the Timmer Kill.⁠47 The Timmer Kill, however, was not present Big Timber Creek, as Myers would have us believe, nor was the fort, as he said, "near the south side of the mouth of the present Big Timber Creek."⁠48 Armstrong's informant also erroneously placed it here, a consideration which may have influenced Myers. The confusion between old Timmer Kill and the modern Big Timber Creek has caused this mistaken identification of the fort site.

Although Fort Nassau stood on a point of land close enough to the Delaware to challenge vessels coming up the east side of the river, it could by no means command the river. Its location, as the next chapter will reveal, proved to be both a commercial and military blunder.

De Vries' journal gives us a clear picture of the way the Indian trade was conducted at Fort Nassau. The Indians were accustomed to meeting Dutch trading vessels from Manhattan, and when they saw de Vries' yacht, The Squirrel, at anchor, some forty-two or forty-three Indians paddled out in their canoes and climbed aboard with quantities of beaver pelts. The fort was a sort of market place where Indians from both sides of the Delaware, as well as more distant places, came with their furs to await the coming of the Dutch. For the first ten years of their commerce in the Delaware, Dutch traders had practically no competitors; they held the upper hand, and the Indians came to them. When the Swedes and English decided they ought to share in this profitable trade, the story was a different one! Of course, the Dutch did not anticipate this rivalry, which was a serious mistake in judgment, and equally serious was their misunderstanding  p127 of two factors in Indian affairs. By overlooking these two things, the officials of the West India Company permitted Fort Nassau to become almost valueless as a trading post when other nationalities began to compete for the beaver trade.

First, the Minquas' war with the Lenape had a disruptive effect on the bands living on the Delaware, particularly those forced to flee from the west to the east bank. Displaced from their hunting territories, unsettled, and living in fear of their enemies, these local Indians were unable to produce the large quantities of pelts sought by the Dutch. What good was a trading post set in a land of defeated and impoverished people?

Secondly, the source of the highest quality beaver pelts was in the Minquas' homeland, ninety to one hundred miles west of the Delaware. When they came from their country bringing pelts to trade, the Minquas followed canoe routes and ancient land trails or portages, one of which led from the present-day Bohemia River to Appoquinimink Creek; another brought them to the Christina River; still another — and of especial importance to Fort Nassau — terminated on the southside of the Schuylkill River. The terminal points of these trails were on the western side of the Delaware River; to make contact with the Dutch traders at Fort Nassau, the Minquas had to cross the river to the opposite shore. They could be expected to tolerate this inconvenience only until such a time as trading posts more accessible to them were erected on the western side of the river or somewhere nearer their homes.

Although Dutch vessels from Nassau sometimes crossed the river and sailed into the Schuylkill to meet the Minquas at designated points, the Company failed to see the importance, until it was almost too late, of protecting the Minquas trade routes by erecting strong posts on both the Christina and Schuylkill.

---

The Author's Notes:

1 Narratives, Jameson, p172.

2 Ibid., p57.

3 Van Laer, p2.

4 Ibid., p36.

5 Narratives, Jameson, p129.

6 Ibid., p172.

7 Ibid., p399.

8 Daniel Denton, A Brief Description of New York (1670), Gowan's "Bibliotheca Americana," New York, 1845, p7.

9 Narratives, Jameson, p70; Denton, op. cit., p11.

10 "The men are not jealous," de Vries wrote, "and even lend their wives to a friend" (Narratives, Jameson, p218).

11 Ibid., p21.

12 Ibid., p20.

13 Verhael van de Eerste Schip-vaert der Hollandsche, etc. trans. Brodhead, Colls. N. Y. Hist. Soc., Second Series, 2: Part 1 (1848), 369. Van Meteren also wrote of Hudson's crew that they "behaved badly toward the people of the country, taking their property by force . . ." (Narratives, Jameson, p7).

14 Narratives, Jameson, pp78, 81. In 1614 Christiaensen was named a skipper (NYCD, 1:11); he was one of the first Dutch sailors to enter the Hudson (Narratives, Jameson, p78).

15 Iconography, 6:5. A lesser-known skipper, Pieter Fransz, and two of his crew were killed by Indians in 1614 while attempting to trade in the Hudson in the vessel De Vos (ibid., 4:41).

16 This translation, and the legend, are Stokes' version (Iconography, 2:73). A slightly different translation appears in NYCD, 1:14, where the map is reproduced.

17 Narratives, Jameson, p84; Van Laer, p212.

18 De Vries gives details of this warfare (Narratives, Jameson, pp213‑216, 225‑234). Father Jogues (ibid., p263) says sixteen-hundred men, women, and children were slain in 1643‑1644, "which obliged the rest of the Indians to make peace."

19 Narratives, Jameson, pp282‑284.

20 Ibid.

21 Van Laer, p17.

22 Ibid., p39.

23 Ibid., p106.

24 See Narratives, Jameson, pp273, 274, 277, 303. An Indian name for the Dutch was Swaneckes, or Swannekus (NYCD, 13:47, 85). The form Swannekens was also used. The meaning of the word is uncertain.

25 C. A. Weslager, "Robert Evelyn's Indian Tribes and Place-Names of New Albion," Bulletin 9, Archaeological Society of New Jersey, Nov., 1954.

26 Cf. Chapter 4.

27 NYCD, 1:588.

28 A. R. Dunlap and E. J. Moyne, "The Finnish Language on the Delaware," American Speech, 27, No. 2 (May, 1952), 87.

29 Van Laer, p211.

30 Lindeström, p226.

31 Narratives, Jameson, p270.

32 Denton, op. cit., p13.

33 Lindeström, p226.

34 NYCD, 1:344, 425.

35 Lindeström, p232.

36 Ibid., p224.

37 Inst. for Printz, p188.

38 Bulletin 30, Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, D. C., 1907, 1:431; see also C. A. Weslager, "The Minquas and Their Early Relations with the Delaware Indians," BASD, 4, No. 1 (May, 1943), 14‑23. Johnson (Swedish Settlements, 1:190) errs in saying the Black Minquas could not be the Eries.

39 Van Laer, pp51‑52. These instructions may have also applied to Manhattan Island, which is relevant to the question as to whether it was purchased by Minuit or Verhulst.

40 NYCD, 1:149.

41 New Netherland Papers, Manuscript Division, New York Public Library, being the papers of Hans Bontemantel, sometimes known as the Bontemantel papers, which Victor H. Paltsits was in process of translating at the time of his death in 1951. The above is quoted from the document entitled "Extract from the general letter from New Netherland dated Oct. 30, 1635."

42 NYCD, 2:137.

43 Brodhead, p35.

44 Proceedings, New Jersey Historical Society, 6, No. 4 (1853), 160.

45 Edward Armstrong, "The History and Location of Fort Nassau upon the Delaware," ibid., pp187‑207.

46 It is identified in Weslager, "Robert Evelyn's Indian Tribes," p8.

47 Narratives, Myers, pp18‑22. Hudde is authority for the information that the fort was on a "point" (NYCD, 12:370).

48 Narratives, Myers, p18, fn. 3, and p19, fn. 2.

◂ previous						next ▸
Images with borders lead to more information. The thicker the border, the more information. (Details here.)
UP TO:		Dutch Explorers in the Delaware Valley	Readings in Dutch History	European History	Home
			American History	History of the Americas
A page or image on this site is in the public domain ONLY if its URL has a total of one *asterisk. If the URL has two **asterisks, the item is copyright someone else, and used by permission or fair use. If the URL has none the item is © Bill Thayer. See my copyright page for details and contact information.

Accessibility