- This topic has 14 voices and 106 replies.
-
Posts
-
Deb.
Funny that you mentioned Twigg. I have seen that surname near Mounts/Mountz later on in western Maryland. I think a John Mounts was a witness in a Twigg murder trial once, and see the below :
John Mountz signs this land deed as J. P., or justice of the peace. The document supplies the names of some neighbors of the Allegany County Mountz family.
“Allegany County MD Archives Deed…..Wagoner, Christopher R. – Twigg, Sr. Et Ux, Griffin December 17, 1850
************************************************
Copyright. All rights reserved.
http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/copyright.htm
http://www.rootsweb.com/~usgenweb/md/mdfiles.htm
************************************************
File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Susan King susanking@carolina.rr.com March 28, 2005, 3:32 pm
“Frog Hollow”, “Chance”, “Evening Tide”, “Noon Tide”
Written: December 17, 1850
Recorded: December 28, 185?
Examined and delivered to Samuel L. Wagoner
August 5th 1851″
“….the Land lying west of Old Town, and nearly adjoining Tracy’s Land, and
commonly known & designated as Frog Hollow, in hand paid and conveyed by the
said Cristopher Wagoner and his wife to the said Griffin Twigg & Elizabeth his
wife, …”
” Jno W. Mountz J.P. Samuel L. Wagoner J.P.”
Additional Comments:
Book 6, page 625
Land record from Allegany Co. Courthouse
http://ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/usgenweb/md/allegany/land/twiggwagonertxt
.
I just searched for Twigg. There’s an Abraham Twiggs in New Castle County in 1758, a Mary Twiggs in 1778 and a Daniel Twigg in 1789.
Techteach
Yes, Deb, I am looking for Steels. My lst proven link is a George Steel who shows up for the first time on paper on a Charles Co. MD rent roll abt. 1773. He marries Elizabeth Ratcliff. His descendants go to the SW VA frontier where my bunch winds up first in Russell Co. & Tazewell Co. VA, then on to Logan Co. VA, which becomes Mingo Co. WV– the Tug River Valley.
We are suspecting due to circumstantial evidence that George Steel may be related to a William “Steal” who was married to Rachel, daughter of Edward Poynter whose will was probated in Worcester, MD in 1753. William & Rachel left some records in Sussex Co., DE and then we can’t find them anymore. Rachel Poynter Steal’s sister Mary was married to a LOWERY– don’t know who yet. The Lowery connection and the Worcester area is suggstive. It was my grandpa Harrison Steele that passed the Blackfoot stories through our family. He said his ancestors were Blackfoot AND Cherokee, and Irish.
There are SO many Steels and they all have the same names it seems!!!!!!
Brenda,
That’s so weird to me, in my family I have heard Blackfoot, Cherokee and Irish…..the exact same three. So far, I haven’t been able to prove any one of the three! Ha! So far the only proof I have is English. I know there was a William Sankey that was a master of the ship ” Samuel” that left Bristol, England in August 1680 for Barbados, Maryland, and Virginia. There was one passenger for Barbados, 2 for Virginia, and the rest for Maryland. Sankey as a ship master could take indentures to America without paying passage. He was still a shipper in 1696 on the Primrose. A William and Elizabeth Sankey witnessed a will in 1726 of a Peter Cartwright of Norfolk Co, VA. So they were in Maryland and Virginia early on and the info Cindy led us to last nite proves all the families they married into were in those same areas also. So they were in VA before Rev Richard Sankey and his father in law got there. Cindy feels there is a connection with the Rev’s and I agree with her.
Deb
TeachTech,
You found the Twigg’s too. Wow, every single family is represented then. Now we have to connect the dots. There was a Richard Sankey in 1693 (not the Rev Richard) in New Kent Co., VA and William and Elizabeth were there also. So there must be a generation between them and the William and Richard that show up in PA. I have to check the dates….don’t think they show up in PA until 1756 or there about.
Deb
Brenda,
Rountree, Helen C. and Thomas E. Davidson: Eastern Shore Indians of Virginia and Maryland. University Press Of Virginia (December, 1997).
Amazon has the paperbacks at $13.57 and the hardbacks at $47.67.
I see you already found my Revell post from 2-9-2002 and re-posted it under “Share Genealogy Research.” Thanks. I was going to do the same in response to your 9-28-2005 Revell post.
Thanks a bunch for the reference. I see now that I really need to read that one.
Bess has already sometime ago given us a reference that there were Tutelo among the Maryland Indians, although we don’t know how they got there. The Indian River Indians, mostly known as Nanticoke today, at one time were an amalgamation of various groups. Is it possible after all this time to tease out more information on this “Blackfoot” strain? Here, too, the destination is probably not as important as the journey. What an opportunity to learn!
You have probably already seen Ned Heite’s excellent work, but I will list it here as I think it is an excellent example and the area he is talking about is very close to the area of our interest:
Historical Analysis
Delaware’s Invisible Indians, Part 1 (Dr. Louise B. Heite)
Delaware’s Invisible Indians, Part 2(Edward F. Heite)
Mitsawoket, the Community on Pumpkin Neck
The quote below is from Part 2.
Ned Heite passed away earlier this year. He seemed to be not only a great scholar, but a very sweet, nonassuming, helpful man.
“By about 1718, Southern Maryland Piscataway had established Conoy Town on the Susquehanna in Pennsylvania, near the present Bainbridge as a refuge from the advancing frontier. To this location came other Piscataway from the present Washington metropolitan area, as well as other Maryland Indians. By 1742, there is mention of Nanticokes among them.
In the next year the Conoy and the Nanticoke moved to the mouth of the Juniata, following advice from the Iroquois with whom they had become associated. By 1753, the Nanticoke and Piscataway were a single people. During the Revolution, 120 Nanticoke and 30 Piscataway took refuge at Fort Niagara. Thereafter some went to Canada, while others left to join the Lenape on the trek that eventually took them to Oklahoma.
A native community remained here in Delaware, outside the organized tribal group that moved to the west. Those who stayed behind melted into the dominant culture, but they retained ties with the emigrants, sometimes for generations.
Some Delaware community members evidently retained connections with the emigrants. In 1892, a Philadelphia newspaper reported that a man of the Cheswold community born at Cheswold in 1811 had lived as a young man among the Lenape emigrant group in Indiana. He claimed to be a full-blooded Indian from the Nanticoke area of Sussex County, nearly forty years after Lydia Clark had testified under oath in court that none had survived except herself.
Most of the surviving Native Americans along the eastern seaboard live outside the “recognized” or “reservation” groups. More than a hundred identifiable tribal groups are not recognized by the Department of the Interior. Without government recognition, tribal groups have had little success in asserting their Indian identity. Ironically, the “non-reservation” Indians, descendants of “removed” tribes along the east coast, probably number more than 115,000.
Indians in the east are here because their ancestors consciously renounced their native culture. During the removal period, Indians who chose to retain their traditional way of life were packed off. Those who chose to stay in their home territories adopted European ways as quickly and completely as possible. Rather than live on tribal reservations, they acquired property in the European system, and became landowners indistinguishable on the record from their white neighbors.
Because it was not prudent to proclaim Indian identity, remnants allowed themselves to be called “mulatto” or even “negro,” but more often “colored.” Until 1830, free nonwhite communities were tolerated or ignored in most localities by the dominant European culture.
The late John Witthoft suggested that, in the Penn colonies, native groups survived on the personal manors of the Proprietors, which were effectively baronial estates exempt from local political forces. There was a manor, called Frieth, on the upper reaches of Duck Creek, in Kent County, Delaware, immediately northwest of the area where the progenitors of the Cheswold community lived during the eighteenth century. This tantalizing clue deserves to be followed……”
Brenda
Following are some things I have collected about Peter Monk and the Indian River Indians. Peter is in one place identified in the archives as a Nanticoke and in another place as an “Indian River Indian” and not Nanticoke. Does this imply that at that time the Indian River Indians were a combination of remnants????
PETER MONK, INDIAN RIVER INDIAN
ARCHIVES OF MARYLAND
VOL. 31; p. 355
“May it Please your Excellency
At the Request of the Nanticoke Indians I take the Liberty
to acquaint your Honour that I have been Acquainted with
the aforesaid Indians Forty two years (my Place of Resi-
dence being a part of their Town) and very well know
George Pocatehouse or Pocatous as some call him to be a
Decendant from the family of old Panquash one of those
Indians to whom his Lordship gave the grant for the Nanti-
coke Town Lands and Likewise that William Cohonk is a
Descendent from the Aforesaid Nanticoke Indians, Cohonks
Mother lived with me from a Girl and I was Acquainted with
her until her Death and that she was the Daughter of old
Panquash as aforesaid and farther that Peter Monk is a
Descendent from the Indian River Indians in Worcester
County, and no ways allied to the Nanticoke Indians as I
have been Informed by the old Nanticoke Indians who I have
Often heard Speak of Monks Family. Thomas Hackett I
have Often heard speak of the same Indians and to the same
Purpose of what I have Related, I am about Seventy Four
years of age and am unable to wait on your Honour but will
at any Time if Required make Oath to the Above Contents
and am.
Your Excellencys most Obedt Hble Servt
her
Mary M Cratcher
mark
April 3d 1759
p. S. Solomon Wright who is Son to old Edward Wright
who was the Indian Interpreter in the first Setling here
knows the same as is abovesaid.
Which being Read and considered of and upon hearing
what the Indians Present had to say on behalf of Peter
Prince and Pocatehouse This Board are of Opinion that
Pocatehouse has the best Right to be made Chief Man of the
said Indians, with which Opinion his Excellency Agrees and
Acquaints the Indians thereof and they seemed Well Pleased.”
There was controversy as on page 298 of same Vol.:
“To his Excellency Horatio Sharpe Esqr Governor of Mary-
land.
The Petition of the Nanticoke Indians of Dorchester County.
Humbly sheweth
That your Petitioners and their Ancestors ’till of late Years
have constantly been governed by Emperors, but as we have
no Person at present among our Tribes invested with such
Powers of Government we beg that your Excellency would
be pleased to appoint Peter Monk to be Emperor of the said
Nanticoke Indians and your Petitioners as in Duty bound
shall pray.
Abraham x Bishop
Thomas x Joshua
Anne A Cohonk
Thomas x Bishop
Marv x Bishop
Amey t Prince
John C. Williams
Naomy x Prince
Anne x Bishop
Mary X Pincher
June 3d 1758
May it please your Excellency
The Death of Peter Prince has given Occasion to the
Nanticoke Indians of making their Application to your Ex-
cellency in Favour of Peter Monk as may appear to your
Excellency by the inclosed Petition, he passes for a Man of a
fair Character, and as the Indians inform me is lineally
descended from Annotoughcan one of the Grantees men-
tioned in the Act of 1704: in the Body of Laws Fo: 39.
I am with great Regard your Excellency’s
most dutiful and most obedient Servant
Henry Hooper.
On reading the foregoing Letter and Petition, it is the Ad-
vice of this Board, and his Excellency is pleased to order
accordingly that Peter Monk be appointed Emperor of the
Nanticoke Indians.”
WILLIAM MONK, INTERPRETER
Vol. 25, p 392
At a Council held at the Council Chamber at Annapolis
Octr 20th Saturday 1722
The Choptank Indians being sent for and examined upon
what Account they came over at this time to Annapolis de-
clare by William Monk their Interpreter that they Came to
Complain of Isaac Nichols who had bought Land of them
f or twenty pounds Current Money and twenty Gallons of
Rum but who had wrong’d them of part of the Money; they
came likewise to Complain of Mr Howell who would have his
Land without paying for it, and Captain Trip, John Anderson,
Philemon Lecount Iames Foulks William Foulks and John
Forster who refused to pay rent to the Indians, though they
livd or had Quarters on their Land, and finally of Doctor Mur
ray who had bought Land of William Monk Above six years
since and had not paid for it the same of Govert Lockerman
Upon hearing these several Complaints and taking them
into Consideration the honble Board acquaint the Indians by
their Interpreter that all those who have bought Lands on the
other side of Choptank River shall be Compelled to pay the
Indians but that they must not sell Land on this side of the
River and that their other Grievances should be Redressed
but that in Consideration thereof and of their having their
p. 50 Lands Secured to them by the Lord proprietor they are to pay
to his Lordship six Beaver Skins yearly as an Acknowledg
ment to the Conditions the Indians Consent”
Brenda
Bess has already noted the reference to Tutelo in the area of Blackfoot Town that is found in Scharf. Here is another little quote to highlight that find.
From:
Scharf, Thomas J., History of Delaware, 1609-1888.
Volume One- pp. 8b-23,
CHAPTER III, THE ABORIGINES
http://www.accessible.com/amcnty/DE/Delaware/delaware3.htm
“While the domain of the Lenape extended from the sea-coast between the Chesapeake and Long Island Sound back beyond the Susquehanna to the Alleghenies and northward to the hunting-grounds of the Iroquois, it seems not to have been regarded as the common country of the tribes, but to have been set apart for them in more or less distinctly-defined districts. The Unamis and Unalachtgo nations, subdivided into the tribes of Assunpinks, Matas, Chichequaas, Shackamaxons, Tuteloes, Nanticokes and many others, occupied the lower country toward the coast, upon the Delaware and its affluents. The Unamis were the greatest and most intelligent the Lenape. They were a fishing people and to a larger extent planters than the other tribes, and equally skilled in the hunt. They had numerous small villages under minor chiefs, who were subordinate to the great council of the nation. They were less nomadic and more peaceable than the other tribes of Delawares.”
Wonder what his sources were?
Originally posted by Forest
I’d particularly like to know why he believed the Nanticoke were part of the Delaware Tribe.
I can’t understand if it is a misprint in the transcription or an old assumption that every group except the Susquehanna and Iroquois were a subdivision of the Delaware [some of these old county/area histories are a bit muddled on where to classify it seems sometimes. I just saw one that classified the Minquas as a a subdivision of the Delaware!], or if it refers to the Delaware and Nanticoke who preportedly banded together in New Jersey…… What do you think, Forest?
As to the question of Tutelo presence in eastern Maryland in the 1740’s, do you have any thoughts about that possibility?
Thanks,
Brenda
Brenda:
Guess who else lived in DE in the New Castle Hundred. Have a look:
“Nearer New Castle, and on the Delaware, a large tract of land was disposed of by a Dutch patent as follows: “Alexander D. Hiniyossa, in behalf of the Right Lord Burgomaster of the city of Amsterdam, Gov. of Del. River, together with the Council, &c., grant unto Garrett Von Sweringer a piece of land consisting of meadow, valley and woodland, lying and being on the other side of the first Marsh, on the south of this fort of New Amstel, consisting in breadth along the Strand 1600 rods, and in length stretching S.E. & N.W. 2000 rods, upon condition to improve, fence, &c., and hold fealty to Lord Burgomaster of Amsterdam.” “Signed by Hiniyossa at the forte Nieu Amstell, 3rd July, 1664.”
http://www.accessible.com/amcnty/DE/Delaware/delaware42.htm
Techteach
A ha! Thanks.
I knew I had Garrett stored in my memory bank for some reason as being close to the area where the Swedes/Finns were, but couldn’t remember where or in what book I had seen him mentioned.
Brenda,
My best guess would be that he places the Nanticoke with the Delaware by mistake, making an assumption based on geographical proximety rather than culture or language.
The Nanticoke of Indian River Hundred are pretty likely descendants of both the Nanticoke proper as well as smaller groups, perhaps including Choptank and Assateague ancestry. My thought is that in 1750, there was little differnce between any of the Lower Shore communities.
I also tend to think that if the Tutelos were ever on the lower Eastern Shore, they weren’t there very long or in large numbers.
In 1941 C. A. Weslager interviewed an elderly Hitchens man in Sussex Co, Delaware, who claimed his father was “Blackfoot” (his mother was a Nanticoke Norwood) Weslager regarded it as possibly deriving from the old Blackfoot Town designation for Dagsboro, or as simply being a misunderstanding on the part of the informant.
Brenda:
Found this at : http://www.accessible.com/amcnty/DE/Delaware/delaware43.htm
(14*) Dr. John Boswell Spottswood, from whose excellent discourse on the history of this church much of the matter in this sketch has been obtained, was born February 8, 1808, in Dinwiddie County, Va. He was a lineal descendant of Sir Alexander Spottswood, Colonial Governor of Virginia, from 1710 to 1723, and John Spottswood, Lord Chancellor of Scotland. After graduating from Amherst College, in 1828, and Princeton, in 1832, he entered upon the active work of the ministry, being licensed as an evangelist October 21, 1832. Three years later he was installed as pastor of the Sussex Church, in Virginia, and November 9, 1842, he became the pastor of the New Castle Church, and continued for forty-one years. His failing health compelled his resignation, in 1883, and he died on February 17, 1885. His remains were interred at New Castle, where his family still resides. He was also active in promoting various educational projects, serving as trustee of Lincoln University and Lafayette College, of Easton, Pa.
Techteach
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
