History of Western Maryland. J. Thomas Scharf
and a fertile soil and a milder climate yielded them an ample supply of maize. Skillful boatmen, their war-fleets descended the Hudson, the Delaware, the Susquehanna, and carried fire and slaughter among the coast tribes, many of whom they subjugated, and among the rest the once powerful Delawares, whom — probably in mockery of their proud name of Lenni Lenape, or " Manly Men" — they reduced to the condition of " women," — that is, forbidding them to undertake wars, meddle with military matters, or alienate the soil. Some confusion has arisen from the various names they bore; they were called Mingoes in some regions, and in others Nadoues, Nattoways, or Nadowassies, a name said to signify " cruel." Smith mentions one of their nations, probably the Mohawks, under the name of Massawomekes.
"Beyond the mountains, from whence is the head of the river Patawomeke (Potomac), the Salvages report inhabit their most mortall enemies, the Massawomekes, upon a great salt water, which by all likelihood is either some part of Cannada, some great lake, or some inlet of some sea that falleth into the South Sea. These Massawomekes are a great nation and very populous. For the heads of all those rivers, especially the Pattowamekes, the Pautuxuntes, the Susquesahanocks, the Tockwoughes, are continually tormented by them: of whose cruelties they generally complained, and very importunate they were with me and my company to free them from these tormentors. To this purpose they offered good conduct, assistence, and continuall subjection."
The importance of the Iroquois was so great that they were included in all the early treaties made by the white colonists. During the English and French wars they were almost constantly allied with the English, who sought their friendship to use them against the Chippewas, Ottawas, Shawnees, and other tribes of Algonquin stock who were the firm allies of the French. Although the Susquehannoughs, the most powerful tribe in Maryland, belonged to this stock, they were not members of the Iroquois confederacy, but, on the contrary, were their fiercest enemies.
It is probable that the Susquehannoughs separated from the Iroquois about the time when the latter migrated eastward from the far northwest, and coming south, established themselves on the fertile and well-wooded shores of the great river that still bears their name. The Susquehannoughs being hunting Indians changed their abodes as game grew scarce, and so scattered themselves over a large extent of country. When Capt. John Smith in the summer of 1608 penetrated the territory of Baltimore County, he found it inhabited by the Susquehannough Indians, whose chief settlement was about twenty-one miles northward from the mouth of the Susquehannough River. At this time the tribe numbered about fifteen hundred fighting men, and exercised dominion over a considerable part of the eastern and western shores of the Chesapeake Bay, being the lords of some and the allies of other tribes and confederacies. The Susquehannoughs were one of the fiercest and most warlike nations on the Atlantic coast, and kept all the tribes within their reach in a state of almost continual alarm. Their warlike appearance, grave and haughty carriage, and sonorous speech seem to have strongly impressed the early voyagers, for Smith describes them as very noble specimens of humanity. He speaks of them as a race of giants. " Such greate and well-proportioned men are seldome seene, for they seemed like giants to the English, yea, and unto their neighbours." He speaks of them as in other respects the " strangest people of all those countries." They were of a simple and confiding temper, and could scarcely be restrained from prostrating themselves in adoration of the white strangers. Their language seemed to correspond with their proportions, " sounding from them as a voyce in a vault." They were clad in bear and wolf-skins, wearing the skin as the Mexican his poncho, passing the head through a slit in the center, and letting the garment drape naturally around from the shoulders.
" Some have cassocks made of beares' heads and skinnes that a man's head goes through the skinne's neck, and the eares of the beare fastened to his shoulders, the nose and teeth hanging down his breast, another beare's face split behind him, and at the end of the hose hung a pawe; the halfe sleeves comming to the elbowes were the necks of the beares, and the armes through the mouth with pawes hanging at their noses. One had the head of a wolfe hanging in a chaine for a Jewell, his tobacco pipe three-quarters of a yard long, prettily carved with a bird, a deere, or some such devise at the great end, sufficient to beat out one's braines."
Smith has given us a spirited sketch of one of these gigantic warriors, " the greatest of them,"' thus attired:
"The calfe of whose leg was three-quarters of a yard about, and all the rest of his limbes so answerable to that proportion, that he seemed the goodliest man we ever beheld. His hayre, the one side was long the other shave close, with a ridge over his crowne like a cock's combe. His arrows were five quarters long, headed with the splinters of a white chrystall-like stone, in forme of a hearte an inche broad, and an inche and a balfe or more long. These he wore in a wolve's skinne at his backe for his quiver, his bow in the one band and his club in the other, as is described."
All the territory now comprised in Cecil, Harford, Baltimore, Howard, Carroll, Frederick, and Montgomery Counties was the favorite hunting-ground of this formidable tribe, which scoured all the country between the Delaware and the Potomac, and spread terror and dismay through the distant and less warlike tribes of Southern and Western Maryland and parts of Virginia.
About the year 1621 the pinnace ''Tiger" with twenty-six men, was sent from Jamestown, under the direction of an experienced trader named Spilman, to trade for corn with the Indians near the head of navigation on the Potomac. Arriving opposite the present site of Washington City, Spilman left five men on board of his vessel, and with the remainder landed among the Nacostines, or Anascostan Indians, who lived in that vicinity. Soon after, he was attacked by the Indians, and all of his party were either killed or taken prisoners, and among the latter was Capt. Henry Fleet. Remaining in captivity for several years. Fleet returned to England, where a contemporaneous writer thus mentions him:
"Here is one, whose name is Fleet, newly come from Virginia, who being lately ransomed from the Indians, with whom he hath long lived, till he hath left his own language, reporteth that he hath oftentimes been within sight of the South Seas; that he hath seen Indians besprinkle their paintings with powder of gold; that he had likewise seen rare precious stones among them, and plenty of black fox, which of all others is the richest fur."
By his flattering representations he induced, in September, 1627, William Cloberry, a prominent merchant of London, to place the pinnace " Paramour," of one hundred tons burden, under his charge. He returned to the Indian town of Yowaccomoco (afterwards St. Mary's City), where he had lived with the Indians, and traded largely with them for furs. He made a number of voyages across the Atlantic with cargoes of fur, and, with Gov. Leonard Calvert, before landing his company, made a reconnaissance of the Potomac as far as Piscataway. From his "Journal of a voyage made in the bark 'Virginia' to Virginia and other parts of the continent of America," it is evident that his trading operations brought him into communication with many of the most powerful Indian tribes of Southern and Western Maryland. Arriving at Yowaccomoco, he learned that one Charles Harman had been trading with the Indians of that region for furs during his absence, and had succeeded in securing three hundredweight of beaver-skins by representing that Fleet was dead.
"This relation," he says, "did much trouble me, fearing (having contrary winds) that the Indians might be persuaded to dispose of all their beaver before they could have notice of my being in safety, they themselves having no use at all for it, being not accustomed to take pains to dress it and make coats of it. Monday, the 21st of May (1632), we came to an anchor at the mouth of the river, where hastening ashore I sent two Indians in company with my brother Edward to the Emperor, being three days' journey towards the Falls."
By the 26th of May he " came to the town of Patomack" (Potomac Town, supposed to be, at the mouth of Potomac Creek, in Virginia), and on the 1st of June, "with a northwest wind, we set sail, and the 3rd we arrived at the Emperor's." There was but little friendship. Fleet relates, between the Emperor and the Nacostines, he being fearful to punish them, because they are protected by the Massomacks, or Cannyda Indians." The 13th of June Fleet
"had some conference with an interpreter