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 IPARKMAN CLUB PUBLICATIONS 
 
 No. 7 
 Milwaukee, Wis., June 9, 1896 
 
 
 Eleazer Williams-His Forerunners. Himself 
 
 WILLIAM WARD WIGHT 
 
 LOS ai^'geiles 
 
 (Copyright, 1896, by William Ward Wight)
 
 H 
 
 I 
 
 f'l 
 
 V 
 
 i.
 
 Eleazer Williams.
 
 ELEAZER WILLIAMS— HIS FORERUNNERS, HIJMSELF. 
 
 Until within a recent period it had been supposed that the claims 
 
 lor royal descent for Eleazer Williams had been abandoned, that they 
 
 were, in truth, as 
 
 "Dead as the bulrushes round little Moses 
 On the old banks of the Nile." 
 
 The publication, however, by a reputable London house, of The 
 Story of Louis Xl'II. of Fraticc} and the appearance of many news-, 
 paper screeds relying upon that volume as authority have re-directed 
 attention to these extravagant pretensions and justify, even if they do 
 not demand, this present writing. 
 
 In the parish church of St. Nicholas in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, 
 Robert eldest son of Stephen and Margaret (Cooke) Wilyams was 
 baptised on December ii, 1608. Robert's wife, Elizabeth Stalham, 
 was a year or thereabouts her husband's junior. Robert was a cord- 
 wainer and plied his trade in his native shire from 1623 until he de- 
 serted his ancestral shores. On April 8, 1637, he with his wife and 
 their four children Samuel, John, Elizabeth and Deborah, was exam- 
 ined preliminary to emigration to New England. One week later the 
 family sailed in the Rose of Yarmouth for Boston. Others of the 
 same sirname from the same neighborhood followed their example. 
 Forthwith Robert made permanent settlement in Roxbury where in 
 1643 his household, now augmented to six children, dwelt upon an 
 estate of twenty-five acres. As a member of the church of the Rev. 
 John Eliot, and as otherwise qualified, Robert was made a freeman 
 May ID, 1643.- 
 
 He was a personage of strong fibre — a rigid Puritan. Self-exiled 
 for conscience's sake, his conscience was his constant mentor. A single 
 incident will picture his character: The magistrates of Massachusetts 
 Bay sent letters to the several towns in 1672, re<[uesting pecuniary 
 
 1. The .story of IjouIs XVII. of France. By Elizahoth E. Evans. Sw:in, Son- 
 no-scliein & Co., London, 1893. 
 
 2. Williams' Robert Williams, :ulili'n<l;i Hotten's Original l!sts, 230, 292: L'^t- 
 t<M-s of Edward H. Williams, jr., of BcthlPhem, Pa.; New England Historical and 
 fionoalogical Register, II, 53; III, 190; XIV. 325: XXXV, 2J7: XI.IV. 212; XLVII. 
 :i(>3. This last set will hereinafter be abbreviated to Register. All authorities cited 
 will l)e onuniprated with fuller titles in Appendix I. 
 
 1 U 051;;
 
 134 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 assistance for Harvard College and inviting criticisms upon the con- 
 duct of the institution. Roxbury, while not refusing the aid, replied 
 on March 5, 1672, complaining of an evil in the method of education — 
 that the youth were brought up in pride ill fitting persons intended 
 Jor either the magistracy or the ministry, and particularizing their 
 wearing long hair, even in the pulpit, to the great grief and fear of 
 many godly hearts. Prominent among the endorsers of this indictment 
 were Robert Williams and his son Samuel." 
 
 Both Robert and Elizabeth Williams died in Roxbury — the former, 
 September i, 1693, the latter, July 28, 1674. ^They were the progenitors 
 of many distinguished and honored Americans; not a few of these, 
 despite the capillary criticism, were graduates of Harvard, and one, 
 Colonel Ephraim Williams, was himself the founder of a college.^ 
 
 Samuel Williams, the eldest surviving son of the emigrant, whose 
 age at death allows 1632 to be computed as his probable birth year, 
 was, like his father, a cordwainer. He was a deacon, and from Decem- 
 ber 9, 1677, ruling elder, in the Roxbury church. On March 2, 1654, 
 he married Theoda, born July 26, 1637, the eldest daughter of Deacon 
 William and Martha (Elolgrave) Parke of Roxbury. There Samuel 
 became a freeman in March, 1658, there he died September 28, 1698, 
 and there his widow died August 2, 1718.'' 
 
 The second son of this pair, John, over whose strange, sad history 
 the veil of human sympathy has long and fondly hung, was born in 
 Roxbury December 10, 1664.'^ Educated by the generosity of his 
 grandfather Parke he graduated in 1683 at Harvard College,*^ doubt- 
 less without long hair, and entered the ministry. He married July 21. 
 1687, Eunice, born August 2,t 1664, daughter of the Rev. Eleazcr and 
 Esther Mather of Northampton, Esther being the daughter oi the 
 Rev. John Warham of Windsor. Mr. Mather, who was born in Dor- 
 chester May 13, 1637, and died July 24, 1669, was a brother of the Rev. 
 Increase Mather and a son of the emigrant the Rev. Richard Mather 
 (born 1596, died April 22, 1669). '-• Upon tlie premature death of the 
 Rev. Eleazer Mather, his widow Esther (who died aged ninety-two 
 years February 10, 1736) married Solomon Stoddard of Northampton. 
 She thus became the mother of Captain John Stoddard, born Feb- 
 ruary 17, 1682, who figures briclly later in tliis narrative. 
 
 :r lU'si-ftov XXXV, 122, 12;?. 
 
 4. Uesistor XXXIV, C9. 
 
 .">. 'J'hc Itev. Ml'. Van Iteiisselacr. in liis Ilisturical l>isc.iuise, 54. sa.vs. of tlio 
 foiiiKlri- ui AVilliaius College, "Kplu-aiin WJllianis \vas <li sei-'iided from the liesi Pu- 
 ritan anee.sti'.v." 
 
 C. .Slieldon's Duertiekl It, SHi: Williams' Koliert Williams. 7; \\il]i,ims' Wil- 
 liams I'amil.v. 3:_!; Kegi.stor XXXIV, G!l. Shclil.m piiiils .\imn^f 2i;. ITIs. in-lrad oi' 
 .\ugii.^t 2. 171S. 
 
 7. Williaius' Uolieit Williams. S; .Sbeldoirs Dccrlield. II. .'!7r,. 
 
 8. Williams' Kodeemed Captive, 'M\: Sildi'.v's llavvaid -iMdnates. HI. 24!i. 
 0. r.eiijsler VI, 20.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 135 
 
 Minute, perhaps tedious, have been these genealogical details — yet, 
 purposely minute, that it might clearly appear how gentle the flower 
 of saintly New England growth that was forcefully transplanted from 
 Deerfield into the wildernesses of Canada to bloom, and fade, in exile 
 there. 
 
 Deerfield, or Pocumtuck meaning High Rock Place, ^'^ was on 
 the outskirts of the Massachusetts world when the Rev. John Williams 
 began to preach there in June, 1686. His little following was formally 
 organized into a church and he ordained its pastor October 17, 1688.^^^ 
 Here he faithfully ministered to a loyal flock; here were born the 
 eleven children of his marriage with Eunice Mather.^^ Yd in much 
 disquietude was his life passed. 2\lore than once in the circling years 
 tlie dusky prowler surprised the sleeping village; more than once the 
 ruthless hatchet and the pitiless rifle wrought their ruin among its 
 brave inhabitants. These pathetic events pertain not to my theme; 
 yet of one, brief mention is necessary. 
 
 Early in the morning of leap-year day, 1704, three hundred and 
 forty French and Indians^^ under Major Hertel de Rouville attacked 
 the slumbering inhabitants. A few happily escaped, more were slain, 
 still more — chattel property for their greedy captors — were taken pris- 
 oners. ■ The narrative of that fatal morning of February 29, 1704, may 
 be read in many histories — in Penhallow, Hoyt, Dwight, Parkman, 
 Sheldon;"^ 
 
 Seven children of the Rev. John Williams were sleeping peace- 
 iull3' at home when the assault began. Two of these, John and a babe 
 Jerusiia were killed; five, — Samuel, Esther, Stephen, Eunice and War- 
 ham were captivated. These last with their parents and more than one 
 hundred other prisoners were started without delay upon a cold and 
 dreary journey across Vermont to their future Canadian abodes. Upon 
 the second day of their wintry tramp, March i, Mrs. Williams, whose 
 confinement had been recent,^^ -with failing strength was fording Green 
 River five miles northwest of Greenfield. No friend was near to 
 assist her, for the captives had been sprinkled here and there among 
 
 10. Ilegi.ster XXVIII, 2S(!. CousuU as to Deeillel<l New Y.rk Col.juial Docn- 
 in.;ut.s, IV, 1083, 1099. 
 
 11. Sheldon's Deerfield I, 97; Williams' Eedeem^B Captive, yii; KugisUT. \'I, 74. 
 
 12. The names and vital statistics of these children form Appendix II. A ped- 
 igree of uiemljors of the Williams family lu'nlionod iu this paiirr form.s Aiipondis III. 
 
 13. Two hundred French and the remainder Indians— ijartly Eastern Indians 'n 
 native costume, partly Mohawks or Maecjuas (c-alleci Maquass in N. Y. Col. Docs. IV, 
 S03) of Caughnawaga, probably in civilized attire. Sheldon's Deerlield I, 294. 
 
 14. Penhsllow's Indian wars, 24; Hoyt's Antiquarian Researcbes, 186; Dwight'a 
 Travels II, C7: Parkman's Half-century of conflict, I, 52: Sheldon's D.'ei-field, I. 9.!. 
 An alnioist contemporary account is mentioufd Itiglsttr IX, 161. A wood-cut of .lean 
 Baptiste Hertel, Seigneur de Kouville can be seen in Wins ir's Narrafve aul ciit'cal 
 iiistory V, IOC. He was thirty-four years of age at the tln:e of tin- i-aid. 
 
 15. Hor child .Teruslia was horn January 15, 1704. Re.gistrr XLIV, 315.
 
 136 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 the scattered savages. Her Indian attendant, perceiving that she would 
 prove unprofitable for sale or exchange, tomahawked her as she was 
 staggering up a hill just after crossing the stream. Her body, found 
 by pursuing whites, was reverently returned and now sleeps in God's 
 acre in Deerfield, and a monument to her memory, dedicated August 
 12, 1886, adorns the slope where she fell.^" 
 
 After many privations, terrible to suffer, thrilling even to read. 
 the remainder of the Williams family, although in separated bands, 
 reached their different destinations. All of them except one eventu- 
 ally returned to their Deerfield home. The father was exchanged, 
 reached Boston by water November 21, 1706, was recalled to his pas- 
 torate in Deerfield and died there June 12, 1729.1'' His The Redeemed 
 Captive Keliiniiiig to Ziou, relates in quaint language the story of 
 the Indian attack, of the inclement march, of the life in Canada. ^^ 
 
 One of the Williams family, it is repeated, did not return to the 
 Deerfield home. This one, Eunice, her mother's namesake, the de- 
 scendant of two deacons and three ministers of Puritan New England, 
 the far away child of m.any paternal supplications and bitter tears,^^ 
 frail solitary maiden among many stalwart Indian braves, claims now 
 our sole attention. 
 
 Upon the divison of the captives Eunice fell to a chieftain of the 
 settlement which the French called Sault St. Louis but which in 
 sonorous Iroquois is Caughnawaga.-" This village, the namesake of 
 a Mohawk hamlet west from Albany, was situated four leagues above 
 Montreal on the south side of the St. Lawrence. As early as 1636 the 
 spot was considered sightly for habitation but it was not uniil ibl, ) 
 that the first Iroquois went there. These Iroquois, largely Mohawks 
 with a few Oneidas, had been converted by Jesuit missionaries to 
 Catholicism and to the French interest and had been induced from time 
 to time to abandon their ancient seats in New York for homes near 
 Montreal where they would be under the wing of the Church. Thus 
 dwelling they served both as a bulwark against the English and as 
 allies of the French in war and in marauding, while they enriched 
 themselves by lucrative contraband trade between the lower Hudson 
 and the St. Lawrence. .A.t about the period of the Deerfield massacre 
 two-thirds of the New York Mohawks had been persuaded to deport 
 themselves to Caughnawaga, so that about three hundred and fifty 
 praying Indians were then living there. In 1750 the entire population 
 may have been one thousand souls. But notwithstanding the religious 
 
 16. SheUlou's Deeiflekl II, 37T. 
 
 17. Sheldon's DeeiUeld I, .338; Williams' Williams family, 6li. 
 
 IS. For tbe editions of tliis little book see Williams' Redeemed captive (Noitli- 
 
 .Tnipton, 1853) page iii; Allibone's Dictionary III, 2741; Sheldon's Deerfield II. 377. 
 
 19. Williams' Redeemed captive, 17ii, 171; Will'nms' Williams family, 93. 
 
 20. P.akor's Eunice Williams, 23.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 137 
 
 intluenccs these mission Indians still continued savages. Although 
 baptized and wearing the crucifix they yet hung their wigwams with 
 scalps, yet wielded their tomahawks against feeble women and innocent 
 children. 
 
 Remnants of the Caughnawaga mission still exist and travelers 
 down the St. Lawrence peer curiously at ungarbed pappooses sporting 
 about the shore and at tawny braves stalking aimlessly under the 
 arching trees. -'^ 
 
 Eunice Williams, born September 17, 1696,-- was between seven 
 and eight years of age when her captivity began. Once or twice 
 during her father's stay in Canada he was permitted to visit and con- 
 sole his daughter. At these occasions he conjured her to the remem- 
 lirance of her prayers and of her catechism and warned her against the 
 desertion of her faith. Strenuous yet futile efforts were made to secure 
 her return with him to New England; persistent j'et vain endeavors 
 for her release were afterwards pressed by Colonel John Schuyler 
 of Albany and Deacon John Sheldon of Deerfield. Gradually her 
 susceptible child-nature yielded to her environment and to the gentle 
 demeanor of her captors. She became an Indian in dress and man- 
 ners, a Catholic in religion. Her conversion was consummated by 
 her re-baptism with the name of Margaret. She forgot her English 
 and her catechism. Her lapse from the ancestral creed was to her 
 father the keenest torture.-^ 
 
 After the treaty of Utrecht in 1713 brought brief peace to America 
 alike with Europe, the father of Emiice and Colonel John Stoddard 
 were appointed by the government of Massachusetts Bay to negotiate 
 the redemption of New Englanders who were in captivity in Canada. 
 The commissioners left Boston November 5, 1713, and spent more 
 than a year in parleyings which were characterized by earnestness and 
 skill on their side and by extreme disingenuousness on the part of the 
 French authorities. The commissioners finally sailed homeward with 
 twenty-six redeemed captives. Eunice however was not of the num- 
 ber although her father saw her and had discourse with her "and her 
 Indian relations.'' How tantalizing such an interview must have been 
 to the now impatient and angered father the dry tone of Stoddard's 
 
 l!l. Authorities concerning Caugbnawaga: N. Y. Col. Docs. IV, 87, 747: V, 742; 
 VI, 582. G20; X, 301; Relation des Jesuites, 1636, 42; I.ettres 'difiantes et cniieuses 
 1, 665; Parknian's Half-contury of conflict I,. 11, 12; Parkiiian's The old legiuie In 
 Canada, 368; Parkinan's Montcalm and Wolfe, I, 64; II, 144; Letter, May 15, 1896, 
 from the Rev. Arthur K. .Tones, S. J., of St. Miiry's CollPge, Montreal; Ba.xtor's New 
 Fiance in New England, 327; Stone's Sir William' Johnson I, 30. Caughnawngu means. 
 Cook the kettle. Documentary history of New York III> 1108. 
 
 22. Sheldon's Deerfield II, 377; Baker's Eunice Williams, 20. Williams' Robert 
 Williams, 15, prints September 16, 169G. 
 
 23. Baker'.'i Eunice Williams. 23, 24: Williams' Kerleemed Captive. .'iG: Park- 
 man's Ilalf-cciitiiry of iMjutlid. I.. 77.
 
 138 ELEAZEB WILLIAMS. 
 
 Journal-* leaves to inference and imagiit&tion. Mr. Williams never 
 saw his daughter again. 
 
 The date of her marriage is imknown. From the reference in 
 Stoddard's Journal to her "Indian relations,"-^ from the earnest pro- 
 test of her father to the governor of Canada against marriages be- 
 tween Indians and minor white girls^s and especially from a memorial 
 of Colonel John Schuyler to the governor of Massachusetts, it appears 
 that Eunice was already a wife when the commissioners arrived in 
 Canada. The last mentioned document shows-^ that the marriage oc- 
 curred before May 25, 1713- — before she was seventeen years of age. 
 Her husband was Amrusus, a name roughly civilized into Roger 
 Toroso, a full-blood Caughnawaga Indian. -^ 
 
 Of her life among her adopted people there are but few glimpses. 
 She never forgot her ancestral home; she never entirely lost the New 
 England spirit. Her husband assumed the sirname Williams; her 
 only son was called from her father, John."^ In 1740, by the solicita- 
 tion of Colonel John Scliuyler,^^ who hoped to accomplish her volun- 
 tary return to civilization, she and her husband visited Albany. Here 
 by prior arrangement were present her brothers Eleazer and Stephen 
 and the Rev. Joseph Meacham, her brother-in-law. Yielding to their 
 entreaties the visit was extended to Long Meadowy where her brother 
 Stephen was minister.-"*! Finding that no force was used to detain 
 them Eunice and her husband returned in 1741 with two children, 
 tarrying at Mansfield,^^ Boston and other towns and remaining several 
 months. Public interest in these visitors is attested by the fact that the 
 legislative assembly of the province offered the family a tract of land 
 m Massachusetts for their settlement — a gift which Eunice refused, 
 fearing its acceptance would endanger her soul.^-"' In 1743 a third visit 
 
 24. Stoddard's Journal is printed at length in Register V, 26. Miss Baker's 
 Eunice Williams is an interesting account of tbe el^orts made for the release of 
 Eunice. 
 
 25. Register V, 33. 
 
 26. Baker's Eunice Williams, 33. 
 
 27. Baker's Eunice Williams, 28, 29. 
 
 28. Sheldon's Deerfleld I, 347; Letter, April 6, 189G, from Edward H. Wil- 
 liams, jr. 
 
 29. Parkman's Half-century of conflict I, 87; Baker'.s Eunice Williams, 37. 
 
 30. Colonel Schuyler was born April 5, 1668, and was grandfather of General 
 Philip Schuyler. N. Y. Col. Docs. IV, 406; Lamb's New York I, 153. 
 
 31. But she would not lodge in the house; a wigwam was constructed in the or- 
 chard and she slept there. Longmeadow Centennial, 74. 
 
 32. An extract from; a sermon preached in the presence of Eunice Williams, at 
 Mansfield, Connecticut, August 4, 1741, by her remote 'elative, the Rev. Solo^rion 
 Williams of Lebanon, Connecticut, is preserved in Williams' Redremed Captive, 170. 
 
 33. Statement of Jerusha M. Colton, a descendant of the Rev. John Willinms, 
 dated May 26, 1836, printed in Williams' Redeemed Captive, 171.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 139 
 
 was made.•''* On all these occasions her New England cousins unavail- 
 
 ingly endeavored to persuade the renunciation at least of her Indian 
 
 dress and customs. 
 
 In 1758, fifty-four years after her forcible abduction from Deerfield 
 
 she visited this home of her infancj'. By her civilized kindred she 
 was rehabilitated in English garb to attend the Sunday preaching in 
 
 her father's church. Bur neither the sacred associations of the occasion 
 nor the memories of the past, nor the tearful entreaties of her friends, 
 could restrain her from resuming her Indian blanket after the service 
 had closed. 35 Yet she never became a savage in her disposition. Her 
 influence at Caughnawaga was always exercised upon the side of 
 clemency towards captured foes and against barbarous warfare. The 
 humane inclinations with which she inspired her martial grandson 
 Thomas Williams amazed .his white allies. ^^ A letter written or dic- 
 tated by her to her brother Stephen in December, 1781, when she was 
 more than eighty-five years of age, shows, if faithfully rendered into 
 English, a resumption, perhaps a continuance, of the methods of 
 expression and drift of thought which must have been familiar to her 
 earliest childhood i^^ 
 
 My beloved brotber, once in captivity with me, and I am still so as you may 
 consider it, but I am' free in the Lord. We are now both very old and are still per- 
 mitted iiy the goodness of God to live in the land of the living. This may be the last 
 time .vou may hear from me. Oh pray for me that I may be prepared for death and 
 I trust we may meet in Heaven with all our godly relatives. 
 
 The writing of this letter is the latest event yet discovered in the 
 life of Eunice. Five years after, in 1786, she died at Caughnawaga.^* 
 
 Of her marriage with the Indian Amrusus were born one son and 
 two daughters, whose dates of birth are unknown. The son John 
 died childless at Lake George in 1758; the daughter Catherine al- 
 though married was likewise without offspring ; the remaining daugh- 
 ter, called sometimes Alary but more often and perhaps more correctly 
 Sarah is therefore the only child of Eunice by whom her blood has 
 been perpetuated. ^o That this statement as to the posterity of Eunice 
 is true is known from her own lips. The Rev. James Dean, who was 
 
 34. A letter (now owned by Edward E. Ayres of Clilcago) was written to the 
 Rev. Stephen Williams of Longmeadow. brother of Eunice, on October 24, 1743, by 
 the Rev. John Sergeant of Stoekbridge. congratulating Mr. Williams "on this third 
 visit from' your poor captive sister," and expressing the hope that "she will now be 
 persuaded to stay with you." The writer, born in Newark, Xew Jersey, 1710, Yale 
 1729, became a missionary to the Stockbridge Indians, 1734. Register X, 185, 232. 
 Mr. Sergeant married Abigail, sister of Colonel Ephraim W'illiams, founder of Will- 
 lamg College. Scribner's Monthly, February,; 1895, 247. 
 
 .35. Williams' Williams family, 92-94. 
 
 30. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 21. 
 
 37. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 41. 
 
 38. letter, April 6, 1896, from Edward H. Williams, jr. 
 
 .39. Williams' Williams family, 94; Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gcn, 17, IS.
 
 140 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 on a mission to the Indians of Caughnawaga and St. Francis in 1773 
 and 1774 and became well acquamted with Eunice and her surround- 
 ings, thus wrote to her brother Stephen under date of November 
 12, i774:-i'> 
 
 She has two daughters and one grands )u wh!c';i are all the di'sieudants s e has. 
 Both her daughters are married but one of thcni lias no children. Your sister lives 
 comfortably and well and considering lier advanced age enjoy'd a gojd state o' laeaith 
 when I left the country. She retains still an affectionate remembianc of her fr ends in 
 N. England but tells me that she never expects tu Sje thL'm again, the fatigues of so 
 long u journey would be too mncli for her to undergo. 
 
 This letter makes no reference to Anirusus — 1 assunu' tliat he 
 was dead. 
 
 Much obscurity gathers about Sarah, the daughter of Eunice. 
 That she was living in 1774 the above extract renders certain. The 
 name of her husband, the father of her children, has eluded much 
 vigilance, and in the search for him the shadow of the Rev. Eleazer 
 Williams of Green Bay glances for the first time across this paper's 
 path. In 1846 that gentleman had personal interviews with Stephen 
 W. Williams, M. D., then compiling the genealogy of the Williams 
 family, and threw this light, if light it be, upon the identity of Sarah's 
 husband :■*! 
 
 In the French war of 1755-60, an English fleet sent out against 
 the French was separated in a tremendous storm near the coast of 
 Nova Scotia. Doctor Williams, an English physician, was on one of 
 the vessels which was afterwards taken by a French man-of-war. As 
 Doctor Williams was a man of science and a distinguished pliysician, 
 he was treated with a great deal of attention by the French physicians 
 in Canada. He was a botanist and was suffered to ramble in various 
 parts of Canada and was carried by the Indians in their canoes to 
 several of their towns. At Caughnawaga he became acquainted with 
 Sarah, the daughter of Eunice, and in 1758 married her on condition 
 that he would not move from Canada. The physician proved to be the 
 son of the bishop of Chester. 
 
 The genealogist who preserves this story was in his lifetime 
 worthy of credit. His genealogy is not a model of execution, is un- 
 indexed and in many ways faulty, but the author was of high character 
 
 40. This letter is owned by Edward E. Ayres of Chicago, and was transcribed 
 for me (as well as the Sergeant letter) by the courtesy of Charles A. Smith of Chi- 
 cago. Mr. Dean graduated from Dartmoutli in 1773. lie i^assed his early life among 
 the Indians and became familiar with their language. After the Eevo-utionary war, 
 he was stationed at Fort Stanwix, now Rome, New Yorli, as interpreter. He died 
 at AVestmoreland, New York, in 1823, aged 75 years. Dartmouth Centennial, 21; 
 Hammond's Madison County, 110. 
 
 41. Williams' Williams family, 94.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 141 
 
 and of unimpeached integrity and has been praised for his patient, 
 painstaking and disinterested service to his family.'*- 
 
 It is supposed therefore that he printed the EngUsh physician story 
 precisely as he received it from Eleazer. But I may be asked, Why 
 tarry upon so unimportant a detail as- the name of the half-breed 
 Sarah's husband? The answer is at hand: The consideration of this 
 trifle may throw light upon the character of Eleazer Williams, and the 
 character of Eleazer Williams is a great part of my subject.** jf jn this 
 particular Eleazer may be disclosed a fabricator — not to use a Saxon 
 dissyllable of similar import — then the maxim may pertinently be in- 
 voked, Falsiis ill tino, falsus in omnibus. If Eleazer Williams has de- 
 ceived, deliberately deceived, the world as to the name and identity 
 of his grandfather he may well be assumed to have wrought like deceit 
 as to the name and identity of his father. 
 
 Diagnosis of the English physician tale leads to the following, 
 among other, observations: 
 
 I. The story itself is highly improbable: a cultivated English 
 gentleman, a physician, a bishop's son, would hardly ally himself for 
 life to a half-breed Caughnawaga girl and stipulate as the price of the 
 alliance, that he would not leave Canada. 
 
 II. History discloses no scattering and wrecking of an English 
 fleet just prerious to 1758, and the subse:;uent capture of a single vessel 
 by a French man-of-war. The authentic event most similar to the one 
 described by Eleazer — the destruction caused by the storm ofif Louis- 
 bourg in 1757^'* — is wanting in the particulars which his story con- 
 tains. 
 
 III. In the fall of 1852 this same Eleazer Williams wrote an eulo- 
 gistic biography of Thomas Williams. The pen being now in his .own 
 hand he must needs make wary statements. In announcing the parent- 
 age of Thomas (who was the son of Sarah) an account is given of 
 Thomas' mother,*^ but not a single syllable is devoted to his father — 
 he is not even hinted at. Does not the argumentum ab stlentio 
 apply with strong force in such a case? Would Eleazer Williams, 
 himself then an Episcopalian, neglect so grand an opportunity to 
 glorify his family by attaching it to that of an English prelate, if truth 
 permitted, if fear of discovery did not prevent? Why did he not in 
 1852 endorse by repetition the oral statements of 1846? 
 
 IV. In the biography of Thomas Williams just described, it is 
 
 42. Register XLIX, ISl; IX, 37C; II IIC. Dr. S. W. Williams died aged sixty- 
 flve years, July 6, 1855. 
 
 43. The Rev. Francis L. Hawks, D. D., in his Introductory note to Hanson's 
 Have We n Boiirhon AniaiiK Cs, in Putnam's .Mdutlily .Magazine I, 1!14, iemar!;s 
 that Eleazer's "character for veracity becomes an all important question." 
 
 44. Parkman's Montcalm and Wolfe I, 472. 
 
 45. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-s'en, 17, IS.
 
 142 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 written that at the age of twenty-three years or thereabouts Thomas 
 used an interpreter in conversation with his New England kin.**' Cer- 
 tainly no need for such service could have existed if he had been the 
 son of an EngHsh father, not to suppose if he had been the son of a 
 distinguished physician, a botanist, a man of science, of England. 
 
 V. Eleazer Williams, during his lifetime, made so many variations 
 upon the identity of this husband of Sarah and father of Thomas as to 
 demonstrate his versatility at the expense of his veracity. To the Rev. 
 Mr. Hanson, author of The Lost Prince, it was stated, or more accu- 
 rately, by him it was recorded, ■'''^ simply that the young Indian girl 
 married an English physician named Williams. When the 1853 edition 
 of The Redeemed Captive appeared, the diocese of the bishop, whose son 
 had exiled himself for a Caughnawaga bride, was changed and had 
 become Chichester.-is When, about 1845, Eleazer filed his pedigree 
 with the New England Historic-Genealogical Society he recorded the 
 husband of Sarah as Ezekiel Williams an English physician. ■i^ To 
 the prince de Joinville in 1841 Eleazer related that on his father's side 
 he, Eleazer, was of French origin;so while the present genealogist of 
 the Williams family has several lines of Eleazer's descent all purport- 
 ing to emanate from him and all different.^^ 
 
 VI. There never was a bishop of Chester of the name of Wil- 
 liams. The nearest designation to Williams in the Chesterian hier- 
 archy was that of John Wilkins, brother-in-law of Oliver Cromwell, 
 who was consecrated in 1668, ninety years before the alleged marriage 
 of Sarah, and who died November 19, 1672.^- There was a bishop 
 of Chichester named John Williams, but he was born in 1634,^2 a,nd 
 it has not yet been discovered even in the Registry of the diocese that 
 he ever married.'^* 
 
 VII. There has not j'^et been traced in Canada in the last century 
 any English physician named Ezekiel Williams or any such physi- 
 cian of that sirname who even remotely would answer Eleazer's de- 
 
 46. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 39. Wlion Thomas W'illiams was at Ijong- 
 meadow church, in 1800 he "could not understand a word of the sprvices." Colton's 
 Tour I. 160. 
 
 47. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 1S2. 
 
 48. Williams' Redeemed Captive, 176. 
 
 49. Huntoon's Eleazer Williams, 259. Eleazer became a corresponding member 
 of the New England Historic-Genealogical Society August 6, 1845. See Rolls of Mem- 
 bers, 1844-1890, page 90. 
 
 50. Hanson's The Lost Prince. 404. 
 
 51. Letter, April 6, 1896, from Edward II. Williams, jr. 
 
 52. Neal's Puritans II, 275: Noble's Protectoral House of Cromwell II, .012. 
 
 53. Allibone's Dictionary III, 2741. 
 
 54. Letter, March 21, 1896, from F. S. M. Bennett, private' secretary to the 
 present bishop of Chester; letter May 18, 1896, from Sir Robert Raper, private sec- 
 retary and registrar to the bishopi of Chichester. I am indebted to these right rev- 
 erend gentleji#en and to iheir courteous assistants for prompt and full replies to my 
 questions.
 
 HJS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 143 
 
 scription of Sarah's husband. Before venturing this assertion care- 
 ful search has been made of Dr. Munk's Roll of the Royal College of 
 Fliysicians from i^iS to iSoo,^^ Dr. Canniff's The Medical Profession 
 in Upper Canada, 1783 to 1850^^ and Tanguay's Dictionnaire genealog- 
 ique.''' 
 
 I conclude therefore that Eleazer Williams unconscionably mis- 
 stated the facts as to the identity of his paternal grandfather; that !".e 
 did not know, or did not care to disclose, the true name and national- 
 ity of that ancestor and that his persistent reference to a personage 
 called Williams as that ancestor was due to his desire to trace his own 
 possession of that sirname to the usual method of acquiring such des- 
 ignations and not to that of adoption. The fact is that the husband of 
 Sarah was an Indian of unkjiown, mayhap of unpossessed, name, and 
 that, just as Amrusus called himself Williams from reverence for his 
 vvife's New England ancestry, so the aboriginal husband of Sarah 
 assumed the same sirname for a similar reason. ^s 
 
 Of her marriage was a son Thomas, or Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen who 
 was apparently her only child. ^^ Eleazer in his life of Thomas, in- 
 forms us that Sarah died when her son Thomas was fifteen months old, 
 that is to say, about 1760.*^^ But if the Rev. James Dean, in 1774, can 
 be believed to have accurately employed the present tense in his be- 
 fore quoted letter to the Rev. Stephen Williams, Sarah was living 
 not fewer than fourteen years after her grandson writes she was dead. 
 From the usual longevity of the Williams family and from Eleazer's 
 notorious innocence of accuracy I fear that Mr. Dean was a truer 
 grammarian than Eleazer was a reliable historian. 
 
 Thomas — for his hyphenated Iroquois name is too cumbersome — 
 was born about 1758 or 1759.^^ He was a sprightly active lad, and was 
 skilled in the chase. He was of the age of eighteen years when the war 
 of the Revolution began. With the remainder of his band he espoused 
 the cause of England and was made a war chief in 1777. He was pres- 
 ent more or less actively at Bennington and at Saratoga but he ap- 
 
 55. In two octavos, Longman's 1861. 
 
 56. Containing short biographical memoirs of several huudrtd persons. Altlouirli 
 1783 was later than the time of Sarah's marriage, her claimed English medical hus- 
 band should have been in this volume had ho spent h's life in Canada and livel to 
 a reasonable age. 
 
 57. Seven large volumes. 
 
 58. Letter, April C, 189G, from Edwaid H. Williams, jr.. of Betii:ehom, 1 cnn- 
 sylvania, who for twenty-eight years has sought from original sources, the Iiistory of 
 the descendants of Robert "Williams. That the Indian posterity of Eunice Williams 
 assumed her sirname appears from the preface to Fossenden's Sermon. That it is 
 not uncommon for mixed-blood Indians to tal^e the rame of tlioir white antstois 
 appears from Colton's Tour I, 158; Davidson's In Unnamed Wisconsin. 65. 
 
 59. Williams' Williams family. 94; Dean's Letter, .swjpr.-i. 
 
 60. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 17. 
 
 61. Boston Daily Journal. October 17, 1S4S.
 
 144 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 pears not to have been entirely harmonious with the British officers, 
 perhaps because he lacked the visual Indian ferocity. His biography 
 ascribes his undoubted clemency, his magnanimity in battle and to 
 captured foes, to the influence of his grandmother Eunice. While none 
 disputed his bravery, his generosity excited the surprise of his fellow 
 warriors. Sir John Johnson heartily disliked him — a hostile feeling 
 which Thomas warmly reciprocated and which had its influence in 
 changing his allegiance when the war of 1812 was brewing.'^^ 
 
 After the peace of 1783 Thomas resumed the chase, carrying his 
 vocation as far as Lake George — his frequent and favorite hunting- 
 ground''-'' — and often visiting Albany to barter his furs. At the Dutch 
 capital he became the friend of General Philip Schuyler who had been 
 a pupil in the household of the Rev. Stephen Williams of Longmead- 
 (iw^^ and who was the grandson of Colonel John Schuyler, the strenu- 
 ous advocate for the release of Eunice Williams. With letters from 
 General Schuyler he made his first visit, in 1783, to his New England 
 kin and formed those friendships which led to important consequences 
 in the lives of two of his sons. At Stockbridge the interpreter between 
 Thomas and his English-speaking cousins was the Rev. Samuel 
 Kirkland, missionary to the Oneida Indians,"^ the tribe to which 
 afterwards the son of Thomas was to minister in the same capacity. At 
 Longmeadow he found to his sorrow that his great-uncle Stephen, to 
 whom Eunice had recently written so pathetically, was dead.*'*' Thomas 
 never forgot his New England connections. His friendship with the 
 Rev. Samuel Williams, LL. D., of Rutland, Vermont, was very intimate 
 and was full of satisfaction and helpfulness to both.*'" 
 
 When the great misunderstanding arose between England and the 
 United States in 1808 President Jefl'erson addressed a letter to the bor- 
 der Indians. In this he stated that the impending war was no quarrel 
 of theirs and urged them to remain quiet and neutral. Moreover he 
 promised them that should the British claim their services and they 
 chose instead to break up their settlements and cross into the United 
 States, he would find other settlements for them and make them chil- 
 dren of the young Republic. •'^ In addition, when the war actually 
 broke out, the President sent a personal invitation to Thomas Will- 
 
 62. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 21, 36. 
 
 63. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 1S3, 184; Williams' Te-ho-ia-gwa-ne-geu, 20. 
 
 64. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 37. 
 
 65. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 39. Foi" the ancestry of Mr. Kirlda'id see 
 Register XIV, 241; XLVIII, 66. 
 
 6G. The Rev. Stephen Williams died June 10, 17S2, after a pas^toiatr ovar 
 Txingmeadow church of sixty-six years. Register XXXVII, 40; Holland's Western 
 Massachusetts II, 78; Williams' Williams family, 71, S5. 
 
 67. Williams' Williams family, 42. 
 
 68. The original Jefferson letter belonged to the widow of Tlioni.is Williams. 
 It is copied in full in Exhibit A, Report of Hou=e Committee on Milit.iry Affais 
 No. 83, 34th Congess, Third Session, January 16, 1857.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 145 
 
 iams, as one of the infinenlial Iroquois chiefs, to join the American 
 standard, asking him to repress any belligerent movements which 
 might be contemplated by his own or other tribes against the United 
 States and promising him full indemnity for any losses which his loy- 
 alty to the Republic might occasion, besides support for his family and 
 himself during the war/'-' Confiding in these assurances Thomas 
 Williams removed to the United States in 1813, and was soon followed 
 by his son John and by other CaughnawagansJ*' This was not a 
 great hegira in point of distance, but by it he abandoned his Canadian 
 home, sacrificed an estate of not less than seven thousand dollars and 
 lost an annuity of two hundred and fifty dollars which he had enjoyed 
 from the British government. This removal, the active aid of 
 Thomas and his band against England and the inertness or neutralitj^ 
 of the other Indians whom Thomas influenced, so aroused against 
 him the resentment of his former allies that he was prohibited from re- 
 turning to Caughnawaga to live — he went there in the evening of his 
 days to die. 
 
 It is not to the credit of the United States government that 
 despite much personal eft'ort by Thomas and much solicitation upon 
 the part of his friends, his distinguished services in this war were 
 not requited, and his large pecimiary sacrifices were not made good, 
 during his lifetime. That his efforts were ef^cient and valuable and 
 were continued without intermission until the close of the struggle 
 was admitted by the Senate of the United States more than forty years 
 afterward, yet both Thomas and his widow emphasized by their impov- 
 erished and unrecompensed old age the ingratitude of republics. In 
 1858 too tardy justice was done the estate and memory of Thomas 
 Williams."! 
 
 Respected and beloved by his people, in his native village of 
 Caughnawaga, he died — but when? Eleazer Williams in his biography 
 ■ jf his father states'- that the latter died August 16, 1849. But here 
 appears the Boston Daily Journal of October 17, 1848, which in- 
 forms the world that Thomas, in his ninetieth year, died in Caugh- 
 nawaga September 16, 1848. To prove that this item was not prem- 
 ature, I find it repeated in the New England Historical and Genea- 
 logical Register for January 1849"-' — abundant opportunity for correct- 
 ing the earlier publication if incorrect. I deem it established therefore 
 
 69. Memori.il of his widow, ilaiy Ann William-;, dati d S'eplemb t. 184'; affida- 
 vit of Eleazpr Williams, .Tanr.ary 38, 1850, lioth attached to said Report Xo. 83. 
 
 70. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-no-gen, 72, 73, 76. 
 
 71. Report, April 17, 18.j8, of Houso Committee on Military Affairs, No. 303, 
 35th Congress, First Sessi.m, is authority for the facts as to Thoni-is' cliangc of 
 service and as to the tardy .justice of the government he was invited to serve. 
 
 72. Williams' Te-ho-!'a-gwa-ne-gcn, 90. 
 
 73. Register TIT, 10;^.
 
 146 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 that Eleazer Williams blundered eleven months in penning the time 
 of his father's death, and this when writing within three years after 
 the event and when the proper date was well known and had been 
 widely distributed in the public prints. Can Eleazer's sole authority 
 be accepted upon any point as to which general noninformation and 
 difference of opinion exist? Are we not justified in adopting the 
 animadversion of Lord Macaulay upon Mr. Croker:'''-^ "It is not likely 
 that a person who is ignorant of what almost everybody knows can 
 know that of which almost everybody is ignorant"? 
 
 The wife of Thomas Williams, named Mary Ann Rice, or Konante- 
 v.anteta, was like himself of mixed blood. "^ She was lineally descended 
 from a youth named Rice stolen by the Indians from Marlboro' in 
 the province of Massachusetts Bay early in the eighteenth century.'^'' 
 Her father was named Haronhumanen. She married Thomas Williams 
 January 7, 1779.'''' She was a devout Catholic. In 1852 when she 
 must have been more than ninety years of age she was residing on 
 the St. Regis reservation about eight miles from the village of St. 
 Regis. But little bowed with age she walked regularly to church with 
 no other aid than a staff, and was a1)le to attend to domestic duties. She 
 was apparently a full-blooded Indian and spoke no other language 
 than Mohawk. '^8 She died May i, 1856. '^^ As this event happened 
 more than seventy-seven years after her marriage she could not have 
 been far from a centenarian. 
 
 Thomas and Mar}^ Ann Williams had not fewer than eleven 
 children. There is printed in Hanson's The Lost Prince^^ a tran- 
 scription from the Register of the Mission at Caughnawaga authen- 
 ticated by Father Francis Marcoux, priest at the Mission in 1853 
 when the transcription was made, showing the names and dates of 
 birth of the eleven children of Thomas and Mary Ann there regis- 
 tered. This list is as follows: 
 
 74. See Macaulay's Critical and Miscellaneous Essays II, 20 (New York 1878). 
 
 75. Slie was "tliree-fourtlis Indian"': Smith's Eloazcr Williiims, Wis. Hist. 
 Coll. VI, 309. 
 
 76. Letter April 6, 180C, from Edward H. Williams, Jr. Tiiere were two Rice 
 boys, Silas and Timothy, captured at Marlboro', Massacliusetts, August 8, 1704, and 
 several Tarbell children seized at Groton, same colony. June 20, 1707. Ward's Rice 
 family, 37; Green's Groton, 109. To-day Kices are sub-chiefs at Caughnawaga and 
 Tarbells at St. Regis. Almost half of the village of St. Francis near O.uiglmawnga 
 was in 1774 composed of Gills descended from another New England captive. See 
 Dean letter described at note 40. 
 
 77. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 468. 
 
 78. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 89, Hough's note. 
 
 79. Report i>o. 303, House Committee on Military Affairs, 35ih Co'ig ns . I'ijst 
 Session, April 17, 1858. 
 
 80. Page 468. 
 
 81. This name occurs lower in tlio List ia the feminine form. These t\\<< weie 
 doubtless so named in compliment to .John Baptist Toietaliherontie, a frieu 1 ;ind 
 fellow-hunter of their father. Willi.Tm-;' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 38.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 
 
 U'l 
 
 Jean Baptiste,'^^^ 
 
 ne le 
 
 7 Sept. 1780. 
 
 Catherine, 
 
 nee le 
 
 4 Sept. 17S1. 
 
 Thomas, 
 
 ne le 
 
 28 Avr. 1786. 
 
 Louise, 
 
 nee le 
 
 18 Mai 1 791. 
 
 Jeanne Baptistc, 
 
 •• 
 
 21 Avr. 1793. 
 
 Pierre, 
 
 lie le 
 
 25 Aout 1793. 
 
 Pierre, 
 
 
 4 Sept. 1796. 
 
 Anne, 
 
 nee le 
 
 30 Janv. 1799. 
 
 Dorothee, 
 
 " 
 
 2 Aout 1801. 
 
 Charles, 
 
 ne 
 
 8 Sept. 1804. 
 
 Jervais, 
 
 '• 
 
 22 Juil. 1807. 
 
 Three facts appear on the face of this List: 
 
 A. The Christian name Eleazer is not to be found: 
 
 B. There is a gap of more than four years and seven months 
 between the birth of Catherine and that of Thomas; 
 
 C. There is a gap of more than five years between the lairdi of 
 Thomas and that of Louise. 
 
 Assuming for a moment the truth of the oft-repeated statement 
 of Mary Ann Williams, that Eleazer Williams, the subject of this 
 paper, was her child, three questions present themselves. L Where 
 was he born? II. Why was not his birth recorded in the Mission 
 Register? III. When was he born? 
 
 On the threshold of a reply an incident new to the aggressive 
 discussion of the Eleazer Williams problem must be related. Edward 
 llig-ginson Williams, a descendant of the emigrant Robert Williams, 
 was born in Woodstock, Vermont, June i, 1824, and graduated from 
 Vermont Medical College in 1846. For more than forty years he has 
 been engaged in railroading and in businesses connected therewith. In 
 1858 he was assistant superintendent of the Milwaukee and Mississippi 
 railroad with residence in Janesville; in 1864 he became superintendent 
 of the Galena Division of the Chicago and Northwestern Railway: from 
 1865 until 1870 he was general manager of the Pennsylvania Railroad, 
 and from 1870 until the present time he has been and is one of the 
 tirm of Burnham. Williams and Company of the Baldwin Locomotive 
 Works, Philadelphia. In 1851 he was adopted by the Caughnawaga 
 Indians into their tribe under the name of Raristeseres. He is a 
 member of the Swedish Royal Society and a kniglit of the Order oi 
 tlie North Star of Sweden. 
 
 In August and later months of 1851 this Doctor Williams was 
 employed in the construction of a line of railway at Caughnawaga 
 through the reservation. As an adopted member of the tribe he was 
 living with the leading man and princiiial cliief. O-ron-hi-a-tek-ha. 
 or George de Loriniier, an Indian oi iiuicli astuteness and capacity.
 
 148 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 One Sunday during the fall of 1851 several gentlemen, among them 
 a Mr. Parkman*- who was then examining the records of the Cath- 
 olic parish churches in Canada, visited Caughnawaga for the purpose 
 of investigating a story just then becoming widely current*'- that 
 Eleazer Williams formerly of that village was not the son of Mary Ann 
 Williams or Konantewanteta. The story was new to Caughnawaga 
 and de Lorimier learning his visitors' errand decided upon a careful 
 examination. Inviting Dr. Williams to be present with the other 
 gentlemen he sent for Konantewanteta and for two other of her 
 aged Indian friends — a man and a woman. Not knowing why they 
 were summoned, they were kept apart from each other and separately 
 questioned as to the birth of Eleazer Williams. There was no chance 
 for collusion. Konantewanteta stated without reservation that Eleazer 
 was her child and that he was born on the shores of Lake George 
 when her husband's band was hunting and fishing there. That Lake 
 George was a favorite camping ground of Thomas W^illiams has al- 
 ready been shown. The ancient friends when called upon confirmed in 
 detail what Konantewanteta had said, stating that they were with the 
 band at the time the child was born and the squaw adding that she 
 herself was present at the event. The interpreter of the testimony 
 was Alexander INIcNab. a ScotchmanS+ who was a much trusted magis- 
 trate in the tribe and had an Indian wife. The examination being 
 completed Eleazer Williams' story of his royal origin was then trans- 
 lated to the assembled Indians. One and all vehemently denounced 
 the tale as a lie. while the little old mother bursting into tears ex- 
 claimed that she knew Eleazer had been a bad man but she did not 
 know before that he was bad enough to deny his own mother. Ty-ia- 
 ya-ki. or Grand Baptiste. the pilot of the Lachine Rapids, declared 
 to the company that for a long period before Eleazer was ten years of 
 age he was the playmate and companion of the witness at Caughna- 
 waga. Dr. Williams writes, "The mother o^ Eleazer was very old — 
 possibly one hundred. She was what might be called feeble-minded 
 as old people are, but not in any way lacking in imderstanding. Her 
 testimony came out in pieces as in the case of old peo.ple and from 
 the appearance of the Indians and of herself during and after the read- 
 
 82. Dr. Williams lias always supposed that this was Francis Parkmnn. the h's- 
 torian. If so, his opinion of ElcaKor Williams, in Ilnlf-Cpntnry of Cnnflict. I, .S8, is 
 flonbtless based on the testimony given at this investigation. 
 
 83. Although the story of Eleazer Williams, as the diuphin had boon some- 
 what known before and indeed had bren published in the United States Magazine and 
 Democratic Rieview of Jul.v, 1S40, no especial attention had been given to tlie sub- 
 ject until tho Xew York Conrirr and Enquirer i)nlilished aiticlos about it in tho fall 
 of 1851. 
 
 84. The present priest at raughnuw,-ig:i. tlie R'v. .1. (J. L. Foibes is also a 
 Scotcliman.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. Ii9 
 
 ing of the statement it >vas evident that tlicy then heard it tor the first 
 time."*^ 
 
 To this narrative of a rehable and veracious auditor and eye-witness 
 like Dr. Williams I attach great importance. The statement of the 
 mother corroborated by her aged companions bears the marks of 
 exact trutli. Made with much formality, made in the presence of the 
 tribal chief, made in the first blush of the false tale, made before 
 cupidity had been aroused and base motives invoked, made before 
 the centenarian had been physically harassed and mentally tormented 
 by opponents and adherents of Eleazer's claims, made eighteen months 
 and two years before affidavits apparently inconsistent had been tor- 
 tured from her agitated and hence vacillating memory, this solemn 
 declaration of the aged squaw and her dusky friends should be accept- 
 ed as very truth, should forever relegate Eleazer Williams to the 
 too numerous company of unconscionable pretenders. '^"^ 
 
 Returning now to the three questions: 
 
 I. Where was Eleazer Williams born? Upon the testimony of 
 his mother — at Lake George. Eleazer himself relates that Thomas 
 Williams was much at Lake George after the close of the Revolu- 
 tionary War.s" 
 
 IL Why is not Eleazer's birth recorded in the ^Mission Register? 
 liecause it did not take place at the Mission. Absentee births were 
 not required to be listed at the home Mission. One object of regis- 
 tering births was to keep track of the parents, but as Indians desiring 
 to be away must first have obtained permission from the Indian agent, 
 of which a record was kept, absentees were traceable without regis- 
 tration of their offspring. So Father Marcoux stated to Dr. Williams 
 and so investigation of the parish books at Caughnawaga disclosed. ^s 
 Moreover, the affidavit of the old mother Konantewanteta, of July 8, 
 1853, the original of which Eleazer Williams prepared, ^^^ the transla- 
 tion of which Mr. Hanson corrected^*^ and the original and translation 
 of which the latter prints with inuch fiourish, proves that one at 
 least of the children whom Eleazer allows Konantewanteta to count 
 as her unchallenged very own, is not registered at the Mission. Nam- 
 
 85. Letter May 11, 180C, of Edward H. Williams, jr. 
 
 86. The aliovo account of the esaminatiou of tlie aged Indians is from Dr. 
 Williams' own lips, written hy his son Edward H. Williams, jr., and contaired in 
 letters to me dated April 6, 13, 15, 20 and! May 2, 1896. X reference to the same 
 examination will be found in The Nation, June 14, 1894, 446, from the pen f/f the 
 younger Mr. Williams. 
 
 87. Williams' Te-lio-ra-gwa-nc-gon, .37. 
 
 88. Letters, April 6, 15, 1896, from Edward H. Williams. .Tr. : Williams' Re- 
 deemed Captive, 179; Draper's Additional Notes, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 35G. 
 
 89. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 350; Robertson's The Last of 
 the Bourt'.oiv Story, Putnam's, II n. s., 92. 
 
 90. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 434.
 
 T^50 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 ing her progeny in somewhat of a chronological order, Konantewanteta 
 in that affidavit"^ is made to mention third in order a child Ignatius — 
 a name which by no philological strategy can be manoeuvred into 
 any other name on the Mission List, a name which Eleazer evidently 
 forgot to observe was not on the Mission List, a name which fits 
 exactly into the first gap in the Mission List, as Eleazer's fits exactly 
 into the second. 
 
 I am thus brought to the third question, 
 
 IIL When was Eleazer Williams born? The fact that Konante- 
 wanteta could give no date, the fact that she was a frequent visitor 
 at Lake George, render this question difftcult. I agree with Mr. 
 Hanson that when he wrote nothing certain was known concerning 
 the problem.^- It is sure, however, that no authority produced by 
 him has carried the birth date back to March, 1785 — the time of the 
 dauphin's birth. Much reliance has been placed upon Eleazer's own 
 statement'-*" in his application for masonic membership in Green Bay 
 in 1824 that he was then thirty-two years of age, that is, born about 
 1792. Apart, however, from the circumstance that Eleazer as an adult 
 was notoriously unreliable in the matter of vital statistics, an inspec- 
 tion of the Mission List will show that for physical reasons 1792 was 
 an impracticable if not an impossible year. Nevertheless in the ab- 
 sence of additional authentic information which Eleazer appears 
 never to have possessed, the above statement estops him from his 
 later claim that he was born in 1785, especially when in 185 1 he assert- 
 ed^-^ that in 1812 he was twenty-three or twenty-four years old. 
 
 No opinion worthy of a second's thought or of a feather's weight 
 has thrown the date of Eleazer's birth back of the second, or later, 
 gap in the Mission List. Dr. S. W. Williams, the author of The 
 Williams Family writes'-*-' that Eleazer frequently gave 1790 as about 
 his birth year; Calvin Colton, his school-mate, states^^ in 1830 that 
 
 91. Smith's Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VI, 321; Ilauson'.s The L,j,st 
 Prince, 435. 
 
 92. Hanson's The Lost Pi-iuce, 1S9. It is jjleasant occasionall.y to agree with 
 Mr. Hanson whose statements of fact are not seldom ludicrous. Thus on page 184 
 Colonel Ephraim Williams is described as "an honored ancestor of ths Williams 
 family." But infants In the genealogy of New England families know that Colonel 
 Williams, honored though he was and is, was a bachplor. Sheldon's Deeifield II, 378; 
 Everett's Address, (in Everett's Orations and Speeches II, 232). As to the relia- 
 bility of Mr. Hanson's statements in Harp \Vf ;i Honrhon Aiiioiim' I's? read the 
 Chaumont letter in Putnam's, II, 117. 
 
 93. The original application is iu the library of the Wisconsin Historiral So- 
 ciety. See it printed in Smith's Eleazer Williams, Wis'. Hist. Coll. VI. .S16. 
 
 94. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 69. 
 
 95. Williams' Redeemed Captive, 176. In 1851, Eleazer, visiting with Dr. S. 
 W. Williams, spoke in the latter's hearing of being the d.Tuphin. S ma one of hisi 
 host's family having enquired his age, he replied: "If I am a Williams I am so old, 
 but if I am' the dauphin I am older." 
 
 9G. Coltou's Tour, I, 158.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 151 
 
 Eleazer in 1800 was '"perhaps ten years old;" Air. Hal'e, with whose 
 father at Northampton Eleazer was a pupil, says^" that when he 
 first saw Eleazer in 1800 the latter was then hut ten years of age; 
 Governor Williams of Vermont who knew Eleazer from childhood 
 supposed'*^ he was born in 1790, and two Indians of Caughnawaga 
 who were children with him declared their opinion in 1853 that he 
 was about twelve or thirteen years of age when he first went to the 
 United States, which time is known to be 1800.^^ The documents of 
 Deacon Nathaniel Ely of Longmeadow, at whose home Eleazer be- 
 gan to live in 1800, vary in giving his birth year (omitting one palpable 
 error of 1781) between 1787 and 1788^0°— the latter date preponderating. 
 Indeed. 1788 is the year which Mr. Edward H. Williams, jr.. of 
 Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, has adopted as the true one from evidence se- 
 cured during his genealogical researches. ^^^ It will be observed that 
 all these opinions focus in the space which I have called the second 
 gap in the Mission List, that is to say, in the years 1787, 1788, 1789 
 and early 1790 — an approximation which agrees with his mother's 
 uncontradicted averment that Eleazer was her fourth child.^'^- For 
 myself I place implicit reliance upon the date ascertainable from a 
 letter concerning Eleazer written April 6, 181 1, to the Rev. John 
 Brodhead Romeyn, D. D., of New York by the Rev. Richard S. 
 Storrs. the successor of the Rev. Stephen Williams in Longmeadow 
 church. Mr. Storrs, writing on the authority of the lad's father says, 
 "Eleazer Williams came to this town in January of the year 1800: 
 the }k[ay following he was twel\-e years old."io3 That is. Eleazer Wil- 
 liams was born in May, 1788, and as the dauphin of France was 
 l)()rn Alarch 27, 1785, we have here a sort of natal alibi. Banishing 
 now all assumptions and suppositions I lay down as a fact of history — 
 for "History, like the elephant's trunk, concerns herself with very " 
 little thing.s" — that Eleazer Williams was the son of Thomas and 
 Mary .\nn Williams and that he was born on the shores of Lake 
 George in May, 1788. 
 
 The name bestowed on this son is not without niterest in connec- 
 tion with his ancestry. His great progenitor Eunice Williams died, 
 it will be remembered, in 1786. Her grandfather's name was Eleazer: 
 her eldest brother's name was Eleazer. Is it too much to suppose 
 that Eunice had instructed her family concerning her^Ncw England 
 kin? Would not Thomas be quick to honor her memory when his 
 
 97. '\\'iUiains' Redeemed Captive, 176. 
 
 08. Willi.inis' Hedeemed Captive, 183. 
 
 09. Smith's Kleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. r.,n. VI. .".1^. ;;!•".. 
 
 100. Hanson's Tlic Tyost Prince, 189. 
 
 101. I.pttor, May 2. ISOC, from Edward Jl. W illiaiiis, jr. 
 
 102. .'^iiiitirs RIoazor Williams. Wis. Ilisl. Ccill. VI, .".17: Ilaiisoii's 'llio I.o-Jt 
 Prince. 432. 
 
 10.1. I>iiii;'in'ail<iu' CiMilfniiial, 2.'!0.
 
 152 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 next son was born? Here the Storrs letter again speaks: "Eleazer 
 was baptized, as is supposed, in his infancy by a Catholic priest. His 
 father informed me that he named him after his granduncle Eleazer 
 Williams, first minister of Mansfield, Connecticut."^*** 
 
 Vivid pictures are preserved of Eleazer's boyhood at Cauglina- 
 waga, beginning with his third year. Clad only in a shirt, bare-footed 
 and bare-limbed he roamed about the Indian hamlet, suffering from 
 exposure to cold and storms, and scarring his legs from rough con- 
 tact with rocks, briars and thorns. These inclemencies, a fall over a 
 precipitous clifif at Lake George, the scrofulous tendencies in the Wil- 
 liams family, and the self-infliction, later in life, by means of lashes 
 and tartar-emetic, of blisters suggesting marks of shackles and other 
 injuries, go a long way to explain the brands and scars upon Eleazer's 
 adult person,io5 the sight of which made Mr. Hanson cry.ioo 
 
 Much has been attempted to be made of these scars as establish- 
 ing the identity of the princely youth, who died at ten years in 1795. 
 with the man who after 1848 and after he was sixty years of age 
 exhibited these marks for the first time for the purpose of establishing 
 such identity.io''^ Yet this kind of evidence is fragile, is deceptive. On 
 the bodies of several persons may be often seen scars so similar that 
 at a short distance of time it is impossible to remember how they are 
 distinguishable. Yet in the instance in hand, there is an interval of 
 more than half a century. Scars also wear out in the course of time. 
 They also may be simulated. ^^^ "Such imprints are not protected 
 from piracy by any law of copyright.''^''^ Eleazer apparently produced 
 scars to order. When the Dauphin articles first appeared in Putnim's, 
 Eleazer had ready the wounds upon his legs to correspond with 
 .young Louis' legs.^^'* But when Beauchesne's volumes arrived from 
 beyond seas and disclosed that the young prince had had scars upon 
 his arms, lo! Eleazer found these also upon his own upper limbs. ^^'^ 
 One of the most graphic scenes in connection with Eleazer's persona- 
 tion of royalty was when in the dim religious light of a church he 
 exhibited to Dr. Vinton, Dr. Hawks and Mr. Hanson an inoculation 
 
 104. Longmeadow Ceitennial, 230. 
 
 105. Smith's Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VI. .313. .114: Letter?, Ai.ril 
 6, 15, May 11, 1896, from Edward H. Williams, jr. 
 
 106. Vinton's Louis XVII and Eleazer Williams, Puliiam's, II, n. s., 340. 
 
 107. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 395; Evans' The Story of Louis XVII., 70: 
 Egeland's The Dauphin in Green Bay, in Door County Advocate, D?c3mb3r 22, 1891: 
 Ijost Dauphin of France, in Milwaukee "Sentinel. December 20. 1894: Waterm.nn's 
 "The Lost Prince," in Chicago Inter-Oeean of February 6, 1S95. 
 
 108. Wharton & Stillg's Medical .Jurisprudence, III, §040. 
 
 109. The Athenaeum, February 3, 1894, page 142. 
 
 110. Hanson's Have We a Bourbon Among Us?— Putnam's, I. 198. 
 
 111. Simms' Iroquois Bourbon, 163.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 153 
 
 mark upon his shoulder in the shape of a crescent, to correspond with 
 a Hke mark which the duchesse d' Angouleme had stated would be 
 found upon the royal shoulder of her genuine brother. "- 
 
 Returning now to Eleazer's childhood: While his father was visit- 
 ing Longmeadow in the winter of 1796-7, Deacon Nathaniel Ely, jr.,i^3 
 (whose wife was Thomas Williams' second cousin) proposed to Thom- 
 as that he send to Longmeadow one of his sons to attend school. 
 The proposition was favorably received but at first came to nothing. 
 In December, 1799, Deacon Ely sent, through a neighbor traveling 
 in Canada, a letter to Thomas containing an offer to receive two of 
 his sons to be educated. The motive was a religious one — that the 
 youths would become missionaries to their race.^^* Accordingly 
 on January 23. 1800^^' Thomas, with Eleazer and a younger son, 
 arrived in Longmeadow and the lads began to live in the family of 
 Mr. Ely. 
 
 A few sentences from Colton's Tour of the American Lakes will 
 give a photograph of these two Indian boys as they emerged from un- 
 civilized and sylvan scenes into the routine of a New England school. 
 Mr. Colton was a pupil at Longmeadow where Eleazer and his brother 
 began their studies and was an eyewitness of what he has printed. 
 His book was published in 1833: 
 
 Fi-oui the wililnoss of t&cir natui-o and habits it was necessary for (he master 
 to hiiraour their eccentricities until they might gradually accommodate themselves to 
 discipline; and but for the benevolent object in view, and tl e good anticipated, it was 
 no small sacrifice to endure the disorder which their manners at first created. Unused 
 to restraint and amazed at the orderly scenes around them, they would suddenly .i«mp 
 and cry Umph! or some otlier characteristic and guttural exc'araation, and then per- 
 haps spring across the room and make a true Indian assault upon a child on whom 
 they had fixed tlieir eyes, to his no small affright and consternation; or else dart out 
 of the house and take to their heels in such a direction as their whims might incline 
 them. Confinement they could ill endure at first; and so long as they did nothing hut 
 create disorder (and tliat they did very effectually) they were indulge! until by de- 
 grees they became used to discipline aijd began to learn. Their fir.^t attempts by imi- 
 tation to enunciate the letters of the Roman alphabet were quite amusing— so difficult 
 was it to form their tongues and other organs to the proper shapes. If the children 
 of the school laughed (as thrro was some apology for doing) Un^s^• boys would some- 
 
 112. Vinton's Imxus XVII. and Eleazer Williams. Putnam's, II n, s. 3r!9. 
 
 113. Martha Williams, born in May, 1733, the daughter of the Rev. Stephen 
 Williams of Longmeadow, married January 4, 1759, Dr. Samuel Reynolds and had 
 among other children, a daughter Elizabeth. Upon the death of Dr. Reynolds his 
 widow became, on November 15, 1787, the fourth wife of. Dencon Nathani' 1 Ely. 
 He died in his eighty-fourth year Decrmber 26, 1709, and his widow died agfd ninety- 
 two year.s February IS, 1825. Deacon Ely's sfU of liis first marriage, De..con Nathan- 
 iel Ely. junior, married February 16, 1786, said Eizaleth ReyroI:'s. Thi.*; s th.- 
 Deacon Ely of the lext. Register XXXV, 238; I-ongmeadow Centinnlal. Appendix, 
 page 00. Williams' Williams Family 89 is obscure and incoir ct here. Deacon Ely, 
 jr., died Juno 13, 1808, 
 
 114. Ivongmeadow Centennial, 230, 231. 
 
 115. Hanson's The I^ost Prince, 104.
 
 154 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 times cast a contemptuous roll of the eye over the liftle assembly and then leaviug 
 an "Umph!" behind them would dart out of the house in resentment. 116 
 
 I request unprejudiced readers to answer whether either of these 
 boys prior to entering Longmeadow school had ever dwelt in the 
 palace of Versailles, and had his infantile intellect enlightened or his 
 manners moulded by the best instructors in France. 
 
 But aided by earnest teachers and assisted by salutary domestic 
 training, the young Indian foresters slowly began to tame. The de- 
 velopment of Eleazer's powers and capacities was not slow, although 
 as will be disclosed he never became a great scholar or even a studious 
 man. With the example of Deacon Ely before him he seems to have 
 become quite apt as a diarist, and from his journals, if the documents 
 printed as such by Mr. Hanson can be accepted as contemporar}- 
 with their dates, some opinion can be formed of his mental state. 
 These writings, which Mr. Hanson judges^i'^ began about 1802 or 
 1803, are what might be expected from a youth of fifteen or thereabouts, 
 backward in his education, and hampered by his early environment, 
 yet struggling for a more ambitious career than that of a hunter. 
 That he was influenced by the p'cty of his benefactor, yet unskilled 
 in the expression of befitting thoughts may be judged from an entry 
 of December 9, 1802, in his Journal :'^'^^ "God is once more pleased 
 to send our father. He came to-day about sundown and brought 
 us news that my sister is sick. God be praised." The diary of Dea- 
 con Ely shows that in these early years of Longmeadow life Eleazer 
 was much subdued by religious influences and while under their 
 sway he recorded his age to be thirteen years when he first reached 
 Longmeadow.ii^ A seemingly impaired state of health, his unfa- 
 miliarity with routine and discipline, drove him to travel as a portion 
 of his education. Thus, in 1805, he and Deacon Ely were in Boston; 
 later in the year he was in Canada. In 1806 he began to study witli 
 Dr. Welch of Mansfield, Connecticut, where descendants of the 
 Rev. John Williams resided. In May 1807 he was at Hartford wliere 
 he met President Dwight of Yale College who noticed what others 
 later noticed, tliat Itc little resembled his Indian ancestors. ^^o in 
 November, 1807, still seeking health he visited Dartmouth College.^ -^ 
 He must have tarried here some little time in study, for Parkman 
 writesi-2 that Eleazer was "educated at Dartmouth," and the Hon- 
 
 116. Cnltnn's Tour I. 102. The autlmr m\ist have frirRiitten this pns.sage wlien 
 he vsTote The Lost Prince, in Putnam III. 202, 2n0. 
 
 117. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 198. 
 
 118. Hanson's The Lost Prince. 199. 
 
 119. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 196. 
 
 120. Dwight's Travels. II. 69. 
 
 121. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 2] 6. 
 
 122. Parkman's Ilalf-Century of Confiiot, 87. Tl.e :mtli(ir nf llis!<ry of llie 
 Dauphin, in United States Magazine and Democratic Review for .Tu'y. 1840. p;ige IS, 
 says tliat Eleazer was srnt to the Academy oiinected wi li Par niiiu!li ;ind su-
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 155 
 
 orable Norman Williams of Vermont has preserved the circumstance 
 that he made young Eleazer's acquaintance while the latter, of about 
 twenty years of age or thereabouts, was a student in Hanover. Eleazer 
 was then, so Mr. Norman Williams said, a very pompous person, 
 wore a tinsel badge or star on his left breast and styled himself Count 
 de Lorraine. 123 This trifling affectation seems whimsical enough 
 while reading- in Eleazer's Journal'^--'' his comment on the Hanover 
 students: "The young gentlemen appear to be scholars, but I per- 
 ceive that there is something wanting in them to make them complete 
 gentlemen. Modesty is the ornament of a person." 
 
 In December, 1809. he became a pupil of the Rev. Enoch Hale or 
 West Hampton with whom he continued nominally until August, 1812. 
 During the early part of this period he did much traveling, making 
 among other tours a journey to the Caughnawagas, at the instance of 
 the American Board of ]\Iissions, to ascertain the prospect of intro- 
 ducing Protestantism among his own people. It was during this 
 period also that he first came into close contact with the Protestant 
 Episcopal Church in the person of Bishop Hobart of New York 
 "who even at that early day was attracted by him and showed him 
 much attention. "12-' Early in 181 1 he again visited Caughnawaga on 
 a similar mission to his former errand, but upon this trip new 
 influences were brought to bear upon him. The Jesuits approached 
 him with a proposition to accept authoritj' from their bishop as a 
 teacher to the Indians of his tribe. Although educated by Congrega- 
 
 tained a good reputation for scholarship and Christian character. That ha was not 
 in the college proper is shown by the absence of his name from the rerords, t;easiw.v 
 reports, eatalogues and lilce papers relating to that Instituti m. !?"(■ TiesidcTt Tu le- 
 er's letter, August 2.5, 1896. 
 
 12.'?. Xornian Williams, born October 0, 1791, was the eldest son of tl-e Hi n- 
 orable Jesse and Hannah (Palmer of Stoniugton, Conn.) Williim^. Je-se was a'soe'- 
 ate judge of the common pleas of Windsor County, Vermont, and was elected presid- 
 ing judge. Declining this trust he was for many years judge of the Hartford, Ver- 
 mont, district. His son Norman was also a lawyer, .Secretary of the Vermont sen- 
 ate. Secretary of State of Vermont, State Si^nator, and for nrarly thirty years 
 County Clerk of Windsor County. His wife Mary .Ann Wentworth Brown devised the 
 great seal of the state and the seals of several countic? and courts. Their son Dr. 
 Edward H. Williams, frequently mentioned in this pai'cr, and by whom his father's 
 facts have reached me, has built on the old linmestead in Wo^xlstock a free me- 
 morial lihrary to his father. These biographical morsels do not seem' foreign to this 
 narrative. Its truth depends much on the veiacily and intigrity of these gentlemen, 
 and their possession of these traits is al)un(lMiitly shown by the positions of trust 
 and responsibility uniformly held by them. 
 
 124. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 210. 
 
 12.J. Hanson's The Liost Prince, 218. The Rev. Benjamin Jtoore. D. D., Bishop 
 of New York, and the Rev. Dr. Montain uf Montreal were rsp"C:alIy urgent that 
 Kleazer sliould join the Episcopal communion, prnmising everything and anything 
 towards the completion of his education and the preparation for missionar.v labor. 
 .\t this time Deacon Kly was dead and (he Congregaticnalists found it difficult to 
 provide for Eleazer's support. Longmoadow Contcnnial 23f>. 2.31.
 
 156 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 tionalists and attracted towards the Episcopalians he was not averse 
 to this new offer. Indeed he is said actually to have been commis- 
 sioned by the Jesuits as a teacher and to have received from thejn a 
 good church library with prayer-books and missals^^e — incongruous 
 companions for his collection of the unprelatical sermons of his ances- 
 tor, the Rev. John Williams, which sermons in large number he had 
 brought away from New England upon his various trips, to be used 
 during his later ministerial peregrinations as his own effusions I^-' 
 
 One or two early criticisms upon him the Storrs letter of 1811 
 considers: "I have heard it objected to Eleazer that he appeared 
 fickle, but who would rationally expect that an Indian would at once 
 become steady? I have heard it said' that he was assuming: this no 
 one will think strange who considers how much he has been flattered 
 and caressed by many of the first characters in New England."i28 
 
 Now that Eleazer's life in New England has ended by his return 
 to Caughnawaga it may not be improper to enquire where the income 
 arose for all this private tutoring for the young student, this travel- 
 ing hither and yon about the United States and Canada. Where, 
 urge Mr. Hanson and Mrs. Evans, save from some mysterious French- 
 men who were supporting this exiled Bourbon. i^o Mr. Hanson has 
 even fui"nished the name of the agent who acted between Thomas 
 Williams and the French purse, and has given his authority for his 
 statement.i^o But after Eleazer Williams' death this somewhat per- 
 plexing matter straightened itself out. His papers including a Jour- 
 nal of a great part of his life and copies of apparently all his letters, 
 filling six or eight cases, came, in or about 1867, into the possession 
 of the Rev. Charles F. Robertson, later the Episcopal bishop of Mis- 
 souri. .A.mong the documents found and inspected by Mr. Robertson 
 were the original bills for the education of Eleazer and his brother, 
 together with evidence of their payment by the missionary societies 
 of ?ilassachusetts, which expected that these Indian youths instructed 
 at their expense would be their gospel heralds among the dwellers 
 oF tlic forest. Both the boys were wholly educated at the charge of 
 
 120. Klli.s' New York Indians. Wi.s. Hist. Coll. II, 41S: Ellis' Kecollectioas, 
 Wis. Hist. Coll. VII, 243. In the last article it is. stated that wbau one of th • Grig- 
 nons (>i Green Bay was dying in 1S23 Mr. Williams "offered the consolations of the 
 clnircli for the dying, reading in French and Latin from the Roman missal." A 
 note, page 243, adds, "But William.? never openly attempted to teach as a Catlnlic 
 priest." 
 
 127. So I infer from Ellis' Recollections, Wis, Hist. Coll. Vll. :2G: l':!lis' 
 Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 324, 
 
 ]2S. Longmeadow Centennial, 230, 231. 
 
 120. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 190, 470; Hanson's Have We a Bourl)on Among 
 Us? rntnam I, 202; Evans' The Story of Louis XVIT. 20; AVilder's The B-.urbon Who 
 Xevor Kcigned, Knickerbocker, LII, 447. 
 
 130. Hanson's 1'lie Ijost Trinee. 190.
 
 HIS FORERUNNEBS, HIMSELF. 157 
 
 these benevolent organizations.^""^ Moreover, it must be remembered 
 that Thomas Williams was not poor as Indians go. At any rate, just 
 prior to the war of 1812 he was enjoying an annuity and an estate 
 which even with his large family would have permitted him to con- 
 tri!)utc not a little towards the tuition and traveling expenses of the 
 lads, or, rather, of Eleazer, for the yotinger brother did not continu- 
 ously pursue his English studies. "^- 
 
 As to the mysterious inflow of French money it is sufficient to 
 say that there was none and no agent for any, for the entire incident 
 was a fabrication which Eleazer palmed ofif upon the public through 
 The ^llbany Knickerbocker. To this newspaper, under a fictitious 
 signature, Eleazer sent a communication which was the origin of all 
 the stories concerning foreign contributions for his maintenance and 
 tuition. Mr. Robertson found the draft or a copy of this communica- 
 tion in Eleazer's handwriting among his efifects.i^"' The assertion of 
 foreign support for him sprang entirely from his imagination. There 
 were not a few cases, some of which will disclose themselves later, 
 where incidents favoring Eleazer's claim to be the dauphin were insin- 
 uated upon the public through newspaper letters, claiming to be 
 written by persons struck by pertinent facts, but really emanating 
 from the fertile, ingenious and mischievous brain of Eleazer Wil- 
 liams. ^■""' This circumstance proves that Eleazer was not inert and 
 supine in the matter of his dauphinship as his clerical supporters so 
 often chorused, but was cunningly and artfully, yet persistently, push- 
 ing his fraud upon public attention. So alert was he that he solicited 
 his friends to find publishers for his various articles. In July. 1848, 
 he wrote ]Mr. E. Irving of New York thanking him lor his 
 trouble in going to half-a-dozen offices in order to get a notice of the 
 dauphin printed. i^'"* 
 
 It was doiditlcss in anticipation of permanent occupation as in- 
 structor of his fellow Indians that "Eleazer prepared, and published at 
 Burlington, Vermont, in January, 1813, .-/ frarf on man's j^riinitive 
 rectitude. Itis fall and /;/.? recovery through Jesus Chricf, and, in P a'ts- 
 
 1.31. Robertson's The Last of the Uoiu-bon Story, Putnam's. 11 n. s. 93. See 
 also Mathcs' Pi-ctenclor to a Throne, Xew York Times. February 10, tS9G. 
 
 132. The Storrs letter in Longmeadow Centennial, 231, says that in tlie winter 
 of 1803 Thomas and his wife visited Lnngmeadow and reported that unless they 
 carried one or both of the boys home the priest would excommunicate them. The 
 younger was therefore returned to Caughnawaga, but after a year resumed his studies 
 af Longnioadow. This time be remained four years and returned to Canada for good. 
 
 13S. Robertson's The Last of the Bourbon Story, Putnam's, II n. s. 93. 
 
 134. Draper's Additional Notes, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 3G0: Robertsnn's The 
 List of the Bourbon Story. Putnam's II. n. s. 97. 
 
 135. Robertson's The Last of the Bourbon Story, Putnam's II. n. .s. 97. De 
 Quincey, writing in 1S53. speaks of the spiritual absorption of Eleazer and his in- 
 (lifTeronce to his high rank. But the author had only Hanson's autliirity in liis first 
 riitnam article. Autobiographic Sketolies. 348.
 
 158 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 burg- in the same year, A spelling book in the liDigitagc of the scz'cii 
 Iroquois nations.'^^^ But if he commended himseh' to his people 
 as an author, he did not so commend liimself as an agent. Empow- 
 ered by the Caughnawagas in 1812 to draw from the state of 
 New York an annuity of two hundred and sixty-six dollars due them 
 upon some land transfers, he received this sum regularly every year 
 from 1812 until 1820; but not one cent of it ever reached the annui- 
 tants. In 1820 by reason of representations made by the Canadian 
 government to the state of New York payment to the unfaithful 
 steward was suspended. ^^t On account of this transaction he lost 
 favor and influence at Caughnawaga. Perhaps this incident helps 
 to explain the fact that when a half century later Eleazer was wrapt 
 in his shroud not a Mohawk Ijravc attended his funeral. ^"'^ 
 
 Eleazer Williams followed his father into the American army in 
 1813, to the disappointment and grief of his beneficent patrons in New 
 England. 13" By invitation he joined the troops of General Brown un- 
 der good pay in confidential service, collecting through the Canada 
 Indians important information of the movements of the British forces 
 and thereby in several instances rendering very valuable assistance 
 to the American interests. i**' For this service as well as for active 
 military operations he received the commendation of his officers for 
 zeal, bravery and fidelity. ^-^i Eleazer's own accounts of his achieve- 
 ments in the field are contained in his Jonrnal'^'^- and in his biog- 
 raphy of his father^^s — accounts which are so fulsome and ?o self- 
 laudatory as to suggest the thought that no historian of the war of 
 1812 has properly aw^arded the laurels of success. In the biography 
 the author calls himself "Lieutenant Colonel Eleazer Williams," and 
 "Colonel E. Williams (the Superintendent General)"i*^ — titles which 
 his panegyrists Mr. Hanson and ]\Irs. Evans do not bestow, titles 
 which are not accorded him by the representatives of the government 
 in passing upon his application for a pension. Doubtless like the 
 very nebulous appellation of Count dc Lorraine these military honors 
 were self-bestowed. 
 
 In the land battle at Plattsburg September 14. i8r4. he was 
 
 13C. Catalogue of tho 'Wiscon.sin Slate Historical Society, V, oGG. 
 
 137. Smitli's Eleazer William.?, Wis. Hist. Cnll. VI, .3.32. Tliis veferi nee ruen- 
 tioiis tbe exposure of Eleazer's claims in tlie New Ycirlv Woi'lil. !-'eiiTenilirr l'.». 1867. 
 
 138. Huntoon's Klcazer Williams. 27. i. 
 
 139. Colton's Tour, I, 1G4. 
 
 140. Ellis' Ne\\- Yorlc Indians, Wis. Hist. Cull. II, 418. 
 
 141. Report No. 303 oC House Committee ou Military Affairs, claim of Kleazer 
 Williams. 35th Congress, First Session, April 17. ISTiS. 
 
 142. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 230. 
 
 143. Williams' Te-ho-ra-g^a-ne-gtn. ilG. 
 
 144. Williams' Te-lio-ra-gwa-ne-gen. Cifl- 78. SI. 88.
 
 HIS FOEERUNXERS, HIMSELF. IW 
 
 wounded by a splinter in the left side,i-*' "slightly wounded", as he 
 states in one place ;i*" "a severe wound" as he swears in his applica- 
 tion for a pension; "not to that degree as to compel we to leave the 
 corps," as he states in his Journal.'^*' His father's nursing and 
 Indian remedies restored liini to health and strength after some weeks' 
 confinement. ^^'^ The scar which this injury left is useful to this nar- 
 rative in two ways: j\Iany years later he exhibited it to Dr. S. W. 
 Williams to obtain that physician's professional opinion as to whether 
 such a wound would entitle to a pension, and thus allowed Dr. Wil- 
 liams to discover that the unexposed skin of Eleazer was more the 
 color of an Indian than of a white man.i^'' The scar was carried, in a 
 memorial for a pension, to the senate of the United States, and the 
 report of the Committee on Pensions of that body apparently dis- 
 closes that either the wound or the military service or both could not 
 endure the rigid scrutiny of men charged with the duty of placing 
 only the truly deserving and the really disabled upon the roll of gov- 
 ernment dependents. The report on the Memorial was as follows i^'''^ 
 
 Tbe memorialist sets forth that he was engaged at sundry times on the Northern 
 frontier of New York during the last war with England in renderin? important serv- 
 ices to the commanding officers on that frontitT, by whom he was employed and the 
 evidence before the committee sliows that the menioriali-st was oflen at the htid- 
 quarters of said officers and communicating with them. He also states that he re- 
 ceived a severe wound at the battle of Plattsburg. The committee however are not 
 furnished with any proof as to the value or amount of service rendered, nor of its 
 nature, nor of the degree of disability occasionrd by the wound received l>y the me- 
 morialist, neither can they ascertain by any papers in their possession in what ca- 
 pacity he was engaged when he received said wound nor the amount paid him for 
 the service which he rendered. Under the circumstances the committee aslj to b^ 
 discharged from further consideration of said Memorial. 
 
 Upon the close of the war of 1812 Thomas with his soldier sons, 
 expatriated from Caughnawaga, joined his family at St. Regis. ^"^ 
 This Indian village, bisected by the present boundary between New 
 York and Canada, was founded as a Catholic mission about 1754 and 
 ever since then has been the home of a resident missionary of that 
 church. John and Zechariah Tarbell, captured when lads at Groton, 
 Massachusetts, became Caughnawaga chiefs, and it was one of these 
 who established the sanctuary at St. Regis. 1^2 
 
 145. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 418. 
 
 14G. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, 79. 
 
 147. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 266. 
 
 148. Hanson's The Ixist Prince, 269. 
 
 149. Williams' Redeemed Captive, 173. 
 
 150. Senate Report, No. 311, 31st Odugress, Second Session. Tlio r-^poit, dated 
 February 20. 1851, was made by Senator John P. Hale. 
 
 151. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 418. 
 
 1.52. See Note 76 supra.: Pocumtuck Valley Memorial -Association, Volume I. 
 471. For a description of the village read Da d sta's St<iry of St Regis's Bell. Gal- 
 axy, 1870, 124.
 
 160 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Eleazer, however, was too restive and too ambitious to remain 
 long in this seclusion. Besides, he believed himself out of caste at 
 St. Regis for the determination which he finally reached to "abandon 
 the church in favor there. i^a Quitting alike the Catholic faith in 
 which he was born, and the Congregational faith in which he 
 had been reared and whose societies had lavished money 
 upon his education, he went to New York where in St. John's Epis- 
 copal Church he was confirmed by Bishop Hobart, May 21, 1815.1"+ 
 
 In the preceding November Eleazer had visited at Oneida Castle, 
 renewing acquaintances he had previously made with some Iroquois 
 of the Oneida tribe. i-'^ Being satisfied that these bands were more 
 inclined to Christianity and civilization than any other division of 
 the Six Nations he enlisted the sympathy and services of Bishop 
 Hobart with a view to a mission at the Castle. i"'" Having prepared 
 a Booh of prayers for families and for particular persons, selected 
 from the book of common prayer, in the language of the Six Na- 
 tions, which was published at Albany in 1816,1^'^ and being armed 
 with a letter from Bishop Hobart, Eleazer on March 23, i8i6,i^s ^y^s 
 again at Oneida Castle, as a religious teacher, lay reader and cate- 
 chist. 
 
 He had good qualities for evangelizing work among the aborig- 
 ines. He had become tolerably versed in the Christian system and in 
 theology; moreover, he was a natural orator, a graceful and powerful 
 speaker — most invaluable aids to persuasion and success among the 
 Indians. 15^ Had he been content, in the humble avocations of a 
 school-master and an evangelist, faithfully to pursue in sequestered 
 vales the noiseless tenour of his way, he would belike have rounded 
 out for himself a tiseful and honourable career. Instead, however, 
 by neglecting these pursuits, i)y stretching out his hand toward vast 
 empire in the west and by indulging inane delusions concerning vaster 
 empire in the east, he wrecked his life, he left at his death a shadowed, 
 not to say a dishonored, name. 
 
 Another qualification for success among the Indians was his 
 thorough mastery of the Iroquois vocabular3^ Reference has already 
 been made to his authorship in that tongue. In 1820 in Utica he 
 printed another spelling book.^^o The Bnoh of prayers just alluded 
 
 153. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gpn, ol, and Hough',? rote. 
 
 154. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 274. 
 
 155. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 270. 
 
 156. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 418. 
 
 157. Catalogue of the Wisconsin St.nte Historical Society, V, 566. Eleazer re- 
 vised this Prayer-booli in lS-53. Vinton's Lonis XVII. and Eleazer Williams, Put- 
 n.nm's II, n. s. 339. 
 
 1.58. Hanson's The l/ost Piinc-o. 276: Chriyitiau .7 nrnal, Febrn.Tr.v. ISl". 
 
 159. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. C. 11. II, 419. 
 
 160. Catalogue of the Wisconsin State His'oriral Society, V, 566.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 161 
 
 to was simply a revision of the first part of the Episcopal prayer-book 
 which Joseph Brant, he of Wyoming massacre fame, had previously 
 translated^'^i and which was published in London in 1787.1*'- But Eleazer 
 Williams greatly improved upon Joseph Brant in scientific manipula- 
 tion of the letters, for while the latter employed twenty English char- 
 acters Eleazer confined himself to eleven. i^;^ This reduction simplified 
 the orthography and assisted the child in learning to read — an inven- 
 tion which while of lasting utility to the Indians arose in judgment 
 against the discoverer, as the sequel may show. 
 
 Possessing the qualifications just alluded to, it is not to be won- 
 dered at that his labors were at first successful. Beginning with that 
 small portion of the Oneidas who had already become favorable to 
 Christianity through the labors of Occam, Kirkland and Jenkins, and 
 who became known as the first Christian party, these he attached 
 to himself by his persuasive and attractive manners. The majority — 
 nearly three-fifths of the tribe — he attacked with sternness and author- 
 ity. The result was an abjuration of paganism and an acceptance of 
 Christianity.!^* Indeed, this Pagan party, to be known thereafter as 
 the second Christian party, addressed to the governor of New York 
 a formal renunciation of their heathen beliefs and practices. i^'^ Nay, 
 more, they waited upon him in person in the winter of 1817 and treated 
 with him for a cession of a portion of their reservation for the building 
 of a church and for providing for ministerial support. The ed'fice was 
 built and Eleazer although not then ordained entered it as minister. ^"^ 
 
 In November, iSig,!"'^ began the acquaintance between Eleazer 
 Williams and Albert G. Ellis, which materially influenced the career 
 of the latter and which enables us to know minutely the career of the 
 former. ^Mr. Ellis was born in Verona, three miles from Oneida, 
 August 24, 1800, and was therefore somewhat younger than Eleazer. 
 At his urgent solicitation young Ellis took up his abode at the Castle 
 in November, 1819, with the understanding that he was to teach the 
 
 161. Davidson's In Unnamed Wisconsin, 6S. 
 
 162. Catalogue of the Wisconsin State Historical Society, V, 78. 
 
 163. Ellis' Eleazei- Williams. Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 330. 
 
 164. Davidson's In Unnamed Wisconsin, 63: Ellis' Eleazer Williims, Wis Hist. 
 Coll. VIII, 325; Hammond's Madison County, 112. 
 
 165. The renunciation, whicli is dated January 25, 1817. is set nut at le:it; li in 
 Williams' Two Homilies, Appendi-v, p. 19. 
 
 166. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 120. In 1818 Bisiop H i- 
 bart confirmed a class of eight>-nine persons, instructed and pr 's nted by Ee;zer 
 Williams. Morehouse's Some American Churchmen, 44. 
 
 167. I have adopted Draper's year, l.S1i», dntrodnctiim- to Kllis' Fifty-f(inr 
 years' Recollections, Wis. Hist. Coll. VII. 207-208) instead of 1820 as given by .Mr 
 Ellis himself in Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, .322. The earlier date is mo e consist nt with 
 other facts and with other statements of Mr. Ellis. Said Introduction givos a 
 sketch of Mr. Ellis. He resided In Wisconsin more than half a c?ntnry, held many 
 offices of trust and responsibility and was a man of unimpeachable integrily.
 
 162 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Indian children and be a companion for Eleazer, and in return was to 
 receive from the latter instruction in Latin, Greek and French. Upon 
 removing to the Castle he found Eleazer residing in the homestead 
 of the sometime deceased head chief of the Oneidas, Skanandoah, to 
 which homestead Eleazer had made an addition for school purposes. 
 But young Ellis soon discovered that instead of imparting knowledge 
 to Oneida pappooses he was expected to have Eleazer Williams for 
 a scholar, and that the sole purpose of bringing him to the Castle 
 was that he might teach Eleazer Williams to read, pronounce and 
 write the English language. For owing either to facile forgetfulnes? 
 or to the superficiality of his New England training Eleazer, although 
 he could understand common conversation, could neither speak nor 
 write the simplest sentences with accuracy. Cases, moods and tenses 
 were to him an unknown land. To the last of Mr. Ellis' intimacy 
 with Eleazer (which extended until long after their removal to Green 
 Bay) the latter could not write five lines of English decently. The 
 framing of his letters, the recasting of the old sermons, the prepara 
 tion of his documents, the correcting of his journals fell to his 
 successive secretaries. As to other languages, the only tongue which 
 he spoke to perfection was the Iroquois — strong evidence that he 
 sprang from the Caughnawaga forests and not from the Chateau St. 
 Cloud. Greek was an utter stranger to him; with Latin he had a 
 distant bowing acqttaintance — such an acquaintance as his prayer- 
 books and missals might impart. As to French he could read nar- 
 rative and history quite well, but he could not speak a single word 
 respectably. His French wife, of whom anon, more than once said 
 to him, "Now, Mr. Williams, I do beg of you never to try to talk 
 French, you cannot speak a single word right." His French pronun- 
 ciation was such as ignorant Indians on the edge of Canada might 
 acquire, but nothing more and that poorly.^^s y\nd yet we are called 
 upon to believe that this Gallic stumbler was reared in the very center 
 of pure Parisian — that his infant lips were instructed by Marie An 
 toinette, that he was the brother of IMadame d' Angoiileme, the pupil 
 of the duchess of Polignac and the abbe Devaux! Semi-idiocy for 
 a half-score years could never have reduced the genuine dauphrn lo 
 such lingual imbecility. 
 
 The statements just made as to Eleazer's familiarity with the 
 English language must be remembered in perusing his journals 
 from which Mr. Hanson quotes so copiously. These journals 
 are not fresh from the desk of the autobiographer. Other pens than 
 his must have arranged the orderly consecution of sentences, must have 
 made numbers and persons, moods and tenses concordant, must have 
 
 168. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wi.s. flist. Coll. VIII, 323, 324, 331, 349.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 163 
 
 imparted a faultless orthograph}' — certainly these necessities were be- 
 yond Eleazer's powers, although the ideas were doubtless his. 
 
 But if young Ellis was not at the Castle for the purposes of 
 teaching the Oneida children (and during the four years of his stay 
 tlicre he was not once called upon to teach them letters) to what 
 uses was put the school-room addition to the Skanandoah mansion? 
 To base uses. Upon every Thursday afternoon, the Indians who 
 would attend — 3'oung men, young women and aged persons — were 
 assembled in this room and treated to a discourse by Eleazer--not to 
 a variation of one of his ancestor's sermons, but to self-glorification. 
 These talks were devoted almost entirely to himself, to his birth and 
 childhood at Caughnawaga, to his infantile precocity, to his always 
 victorious strifes with his playmates, to his white ancestors of the 
 Williams family, to his nomadic exploits with his father at Lake 
 George, to any marvelous feat of his forest life which would prove 
 to his untutored listeners how mighty a hunter, how great a man, 
 he was.i"" This man of reminiscences, however, is the same one who 
 in 1851 told Mr. Hanson, "I know nothing about my infancy. Every- 
 thing that occurred to me is blotted out, entirely erased, irrecoverably 
 gone. My mind is a blank until thirteen or foureen years of age.''^'^*' 
 
 This little incident has its large significance. If it be true, as Mr. 
 Hanson gravely narrates^'^^ — and Mrs. Evans, of course, too.i'^^ — 
 that Eleazer, the disguised dauphin, between the period of his adop- 
 tion by Thomas Williams at ten years of age and his removal to 
 Longmeadow. had a fall into the limpid flood of Lake George, by 
 which a deep gash was cut in his head and as a result of which distinct 
 recollection began after a period of imbecility and mental unsound- 
 ness, how happens it that in these discourses to the Oneida aborig- 
 ines whose brains he was filling with his own magnificent proportions. 
 his memory reverted, not to the gorgeous halls of the Tuileries, not 
 to the gay avenues of rollicking Paris, not to the sombre seclusion of 
 the dreadful Temple, not to the long line of his royal sires stretching 
 to Hugh Capet, but to the leafy retreats of Caughnawaga, to his In- 
 dian playmates in those woody shades, to hunting and trapping and 
 fishing at Lake George, to his austere strain of pale faced ai ccstors in 
 Deerfield and Roxbury? 
 
 While Eleazer was thus exalting his ancestors, one of theni paid 
 him a visit. Twice Thomas Williams traveled to the Castle to visit 
 his son and there young Ellis made his acquaintance. He noticed, 
 and many others noticed, how much the son favored the father. It 
 
 169. Ellis" Eleazer Williams.' Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII. 329. 
 
 170. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 339. 
 
 171. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 183. 
 17'_'. Evans' Story of Louis XVH, IK.
 
 164 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 the son was Bourbonic — and no one denies that his appearance, espe- 
 cially in youth, strongly suggested the French^^^ — then was his fa- 
 ther Bourbonic also, for the latter had the peculiar cast of countenance 
 stronger than the son.^^^ De Loriniier the head chief of the Caugh- 
 nawagas in 1851 had the same features in a high degree; so also had 
 Grand Baptiste, the Lachine pilot; so also had another half-breed. 
 Francis Mount, a Rice relative of Eleazer. Indeed these "Bourbon" 
 facial characteristics were common to all the Caughnawagas descended 
 from white ancestors. De Loriniier exhibited to Dr. Williams at the 
 investigation several members of the tribe who had the peculiar or 
 Bourbon feattires.^"^ This infantile resemblance, real or fancied, to 
 Louis XVII, to which the attention of his mother and himself was 
 called in his childhood by passing soldiers^^'" doubtless started the 
 busy and wily mind of the adult Eleazer upon that scheme of per- 
 sonation and deception which a half-century of explanation has not, 
 it appears, completely exposed. i^''' 
 
 Yet Eleazer did not lack traces of his swarthy birth. His skin 
 was dark and of peculiar Indian texture. His hair, eye-brows and 
 eye-lashes were of the most inky raven blackness. ^'''^ His complexion 
 and hair stamped him as of mixed savage and civilized blood; indeed, 
 one connoisseur writes that Eleazer had that peculiar tint which dis- 
 tinguished half-breeds among the Six Nations from half-breeds in ihc 
 west.i'^'' His dark complexion, so opposite from the blonde features of 
 Louis XVII. is*^ was noticed by Mrs. Kinzie in 1830, who had she not 
 heard his Connecticut relatives so often call him their Indian cousin 
 might have thought him a Mexican or a Spaniard. ^''^ 
 
 Nor did he lack decided evidence of his Williams ancestry. The 
 frontispiece portrait in The Lost Prince shows many Williams feat- 
 ures. A letter in my possession from Edward H. Williams, jr., too 
 technical for insertion and requiring illustrations for its elucidation, 
 shows these resemblances in a convincing manner. ^■'^- 
 
 173. Eobertson's The Last of the Bourbon Story, Putnam, II. n. s. 92; 
 Vinton's Louis XA'II. and Eleazer Williams, Putnam's, II. 11. s. 333; F axis' Old New 
 York, 165 n. ; Editor's Easy Chair, Harpers, June 1S82, 14s. 
 
 174. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hi,st. CoL. VIII. 318. 
 
 175. Letters, April 6, 15, 1S9G, from Edward II. Williams, jr. 
 
 176. Neville's Green Bay, 223; Iluntoim's Eleazer Williams, 2."i.". 
 
 177. Parkman's Half-Century of Conflict, I, 88. 
 
 178. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll VIII, 348. 
 
 179. Trowbridge's Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VII, 414. 
 
 180. Beauchesne's Louis XVIL, 20. 
 
 181. Kinzie's Wau-bun, 52. Eieazer had the Indian habit of toeing in, which 
 when grown he tried in vain to overcome. Letter, May 2, 1896, from Edward H. 
 Williams, jr. His ears also betrayed him. Butler's Story of Louis XVII., Th • 
 Nation, May 31, 1894, 417; Shea on Eleazer Williams, Am'. Hist. Kecord, Jnly 1872, 
 page 30O. 
 
 182. Letter, May 8, 1S9G, from Edawrd H. Williams, jr. The frontispiece -n 
 this paper is a half-tone from' a photogTaph of an oil iiainting of Eleazer Williau s
 
 HIS FORERUNNEES, HIMSELF. 165 
 
 Notwithstanding the success which attended Eleazer's early evan- 
 gelizing efforts at the Castle incidents were happening which fretted 
 him, alienated his friends and impaired his usefulness. Indeed, ilie 
 same dishonest traits which weakened his hold upon the Canadian 
 Indians began to display themselves. An instance must be given: 
 Mention has been made of the little church wliicli tlie Oneidas were 
 to build from the avails of the transfer of a portion of their reserva- 
 tion to the governor of New York. These avails, four thousand dol- 
 lars, were intrusted to two gentlemen in Utica who having implicit 
 confidence in Eleazer committed them to him. The building was com- 
 pleted at a cost not exceeding fourteen hundred dollars, but the bal- 
 ance was never repaid nor could the trustees ever bring Eleazer to 
 adjust his accounts. ^^'^ 
 
 More than this, he was constantly in trouble with the white resi- 
 dents at Oneida Castle who, rendering to him their bills for services 
 performed or merchandise delivered, invariably found their claims con- 
 tested and payment procrastinated. Thus his reputation began to 
 darken, his influence to wane, among his white neighbors and his 
 Indian fiock.^-^ 
 
 But in spite of these domestic troubles Eleazer during his stay at 
 the Castle began to be widely known as an authority on matters :)er- 
 taining to the Indians. From New York, Philadelphia, Hartford, 
 Boston, letters were addressed to him enciuiring about labors of mis- 
 sionaries among the Indians; the travels and discoveries of La Salle, 
 Hennepin, Alarquette; early conflicts of the red man with New Eng- 
 land settlements and topics of kindred nature. The Rev. Samuel F. 
 Jarvis, D. D., Colonel Elihu Hoyt, Franklin B. Hough and Mrs. 
 Lydia Huntley Sigourney, among others, sought his experience, 
 knowledge and study concerning Indian history, manners and tradi- 
 tions.'*^ Yet there is grave reason to fear, in the cases of two, at least, 
 of these enquirers, that Eleazer Williams wilfully deceived them con- 
 cerning the massacre at Deerfield. Epephras Hoyt published his 
 meritorious Antiquarian Researches in Greenfield, Massachusetts, 
 in 1824. While he was preparing his chapter relative to de Rouville s 
 raid, the author's brother. Colonel Elihu Hoyt, conversed with Eleazer 
 and learned some quite new matters concerning the morning of Feb- 
 ruary 29, 1704. He discovered, for instance, that Eleazer on a 
 recent vist to Canada, had found a silk overdress which Mrs. Eunice 
 Williams wore that fateful morning when the Indians hurried Ikt 
 
 executed about 1833 by George Catlin aiul now owiieil by the Wisconsiu 8tiUo His- 
 torical Society. 
 
 183. Ellis' Elcazoi- WiUiaius, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 325. 
 
 184. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 32.5; couipaio Williams' Tc 
 Iio-ra-gwa-ne-gen, Hough's Introduction, p.Tge 9. 
 
 18.'5. Uobertson's The I^ast of; the Bourbon Story, Putnam's, II. n. s. 94.
 
 166 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 oflf directly after the sacking of the village. But it is exceedingly im- 
 probable that Mrs. Williams stopped to don her party gown on that 
 massacre morning, while it is a fact that she was tomahawked one 
 day's march out of Deerfield and her body left, unplundered, as it 
 fell, by retreating savages. Likewise, Eleazer told Colonel Hoyt ihat 
 returning commanders of expeditions were required to deposit in one 
 of the principal convents in Canada copies of the journals of their ex- 
 peditions, and that he, Eleazer, had found in a convent in Canada a 
 copy of de Rouville's journal of his raid upon Deerfield. But, no 
 such deposit of these documents in convents was ever required, no such 
 documents were ever so deposited and no eye save Eleazer's seeni^ 
 ever to have seen de Rouville's journal. Still again, Eleazer related 
 to Colonel Hoyt and to others that when Deerfield was destroyed thr. 
 Indians removed the church bell, conveyed it as far as Lake Champlain 
 and buried it there; that later it was dug up, conveyed to Canada 
 and hvmg in the Indian church at St. Regis. But apart from the cir- 
 cumstance that St. Regis was not established until half a ceniury 
 after Deerfield was raided, the Deerfield church had no bell.!'^** The 
 practising of this imposition upon Mrs. Sigourney has given the 
 world The hell of St. Regis.^^' Mr. Hough, who, however, perched 
 the Deerfield bell in the Caughnawaga steeple, seems to have printed 
 the same story without sut^cient investigation,^ ^^ j^^d Mr. Longfellow 
 has accepted it without question. ^^^ Somewhat later, about 1850. 
 Eleazer attempted a fraud upon the state of New York. He offered 
 to sell to the secretary of state A-Tarquette's Journal and his oncrinal 
 map which Eleazer claimed to have found in the ruins of the Caughna- 
 waga church. 190 But the Caughnawaga church was never in ruins and 
 the original Marquette Journal and map were, at the time Eleazer 
 ofifered to sell them, one of the chief jewels of St. Mary's College. 
 Montreal, as they are to this day.^^^ 
 
 A circumstance which contributed to the wide reputation of 
 Eleazer Williams as an Indianologist was the scheme which he either 
 originated or actively advanced for an emigration of New York red 
 men to the regions west of Lake Michigan and the foundation of an 
 Indian empire there over which he should reign. With whom the 
 
 18G. Hoyt's Antiquarian Researclies, 193; Register XXVIII, 287; Procefdings of 
 Massacluisetts Historical Society, 1869-70, page 311. See in ttie Galaxy for January, 
 1870, page 124, Da Costa's Story— a readable a< count of the romance. 
 
 187. Mrs. Sigourney 's poeur is printed as Appendix IV. 
 
 188. Hough's St. Lawrence and Franklin counti< s, 115. 
 
 189. Poems of Places — America, 98. 
 
 190. Shea's letter in Amerii an Ilistoiical Recoid. Juy 1872. pag ■ ;0>. 
 
 191. The journal was in the Hotel Dieu, Queljec, from aboiit ISO.) until 18-12: 
 and in the College of St. JIary in Montreal from 1842 until the present time. Winsor's 
 Gartier to Frontenac, 247. The maj) was found by Mr. Shea in the College of St. 
 Mary where it was put in 1842. Winsor's Narrative and Critical History IV, 217.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 167 
 
 idea of peopling these Occident shores with orient aborigines first had 
 birth — whether with the Rev. Jedediah Morse, D. D.,i''- or with the 
 Rev. Eleazer Williams/"^ or whether it had still earlier origin with the 
 tribes themselves^'-''* — is immaterial here. Certain it is that in 1820 
 Dr. Morse^^^ visited Mackinaw and Green Bay at the instance of the 
 Stockbridge Indians, i»« for the purpose of selecting, and negotiating 
 for a cession of, eligible lands. The choice which he made, and his 
 report^'J' upon the condition of the tribes in the west, were so satis- 
 factory to the Stockbridges that they determined to enlist the co-op- 
 eration of their friends and neighbors, the Oneidas. For this purpose 
 Dr. Morse in October. 1820, visited the Castle^^s ^nd found not only 
 that Eleazer Williams was ripe for the removal, but that he had already 
 taken a step in that direction. That step was his first western trip. 
 
 In the preceding winter application had been made to the War 
 Department at Washington by persons purporting to be representa- 
 tives of some of the New York Iroquois tribes, and of the Stockbridge 
 and St. Regis tribes, for leave to visit^the Green Bay Indians. The 
 secretary of war granted the permission, furnished delegates to the 
 number of twelve with rations and ammunition and directed the 
 Commissioner of Indian AiYairs at Detroit to expedite the travelers 
 with a government vessel should one fit for service be there upon 
 their arrival. The delegation, in which was Eleazer Williams, 
 reached Detroit July 22, 1820, in the steamboat Walk-in-the 
 water.'^^^ But the party proceeded no further. Learning that the 
 Indian agent at Green Bay, Colonel John Bowyer, had received from 
 the Menominees a cession of forty miles square of their land at Fort 
 Howard, which was the very land the members of the delegation 
 coveted, and the purchase of which was their real errand, they returned 
 home defeated and chagrined.-"'' 
 
 192. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 420. 
 
 193. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 421; Ellis' Eloazer Willianis. 
 Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 331. 
 
 194. Marsh's Stockbridges, Wis. Hist. Coll. IV, 300; Ellis" New Yuik Indians. 
 II, 416. 
 
 195. For a brief sketch of Dr. Morse see Davidson's In Unnamed Wisconsin, 47. 
 Ho .irrived in Green Bay, July 7. 1820, as see Davidson, 32: Neville's G ee:i Biiy, 17ii; 
 Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II. 417, note. Dnrrio (Green Itay. page 
 8) in writing 1821, is one year too late. 
 
 19G. The Stockbridges, more properly called tlic Mo-bo-kuii-iiinks. wiTe i mi- 
 grants at an early day from Massachusetts! to Oneida County, New York, wliere the 
 Oneidas coded to them a slice from the Southern portion of tboir reservation. Ellis' 
 New Y'ork Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 410. 
 
 107. This report, the most complete and exliaustive then i v r made on the con- 
 dition, nuniVier, names, territory and general affairs of the Ind'ans was p.iblisl ed in 
 New Haven in 1822, 49G pages, octavo. Catalogue of United States Publicatinns, 149. 
 
 198. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 327. 
 
 199. Detroit Gazette. July 28, 1820. 
 
 200. Ellis" New York Indinns. Wis. Hist. C 11. II, 423.
 
 168 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Hence Eleazer was at the Castle to meet Dr. Morse in October, 
 1820. But although these two agreed in expediting an Indian hegira, 
 they differed radically in their motives. Indeed, there were three 
 motives operating from three different directions in favor of removal: 
 From Dr. Morse and the Stockbridges, that the latter and their com- 
 panions might have Christian homes, free from Caucasian contamina- 
 tion; from Eleazer Williams, that he might lead the Iroquois and their 
 allies to vast areas for a grand imperial confederacy; and from thj 
 New York Land Company, that its already acquired pre-emption 
 right might attach to the fertile lands of the New York Indians, 
 which would happen as soon as these should quit the state. -^^ All 
 agreeing in the result to be accomplished, Eleazer was easily the ally 
 of both. He made the visit of Dr. Morse as pleasant and as profitable 
 as the inertness of the Oneidas and their unwillingness to remove 
 would permit. Indeed, he put into their mouths an address '.o Dr. 
 Morse agreeing to depart — an address which they never made and 
 which they repudiated as soon as they understood its sentiments. 202 
 
 The treaty of cession which Colonel Bowyer made with the 
 Menominees was rejected by the Senate of the United States-"'* and 
 therefore it was believed that a second trip to the west by the New 
 York Indians might result in their acquiring the longed for lands 
 about Fort Howard. Consequently in the spring of 182 1, Eleazer 
 Williams, aided by his friend Ellis, whose youthful ardor had been 
 stirred by the grandeur of the plan of Indian empire unfolded to him. 
 began preparations for the journey.-"'* 
 
 A visit by them to New York, Philadelphia and Washington ac- 
 complished much. The New York Land Company supplied them with 
 money; the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the Prot 
 estant Episcopal Chtirch, and the Presbyterian Board of Missions 
 handed them cautious but efficacious endorsements and the Presidcn'. 
 of the United States accorded his assent for a large delegation to 
 visit Green Bay under government patronage and protection. The 
 
 party consisted of duly accredited representatives from the Stock- 
 bridges and from the first Christian party of the Oneidas which had 
 finally approved Eleazer's plan^ Individual Indians on their own re- 
 sponsibility joined the company from the Tuscaroras, Onondagas and 
 
 Senecas, for these tribes as bodies had never yielded their consent tn 
 Eleazer's earnest blandishments. Eleazer himself went as represent,! 
 
 201. Davidson's In rnnamed Wisconsin, 55: Sulhevland's Enrly Wisconsin. Wis. 
 Hist. Coll. X, 278. For somo account of the Xcn- York Lird romi aii.\ '.^ relations 
 witli tlie Six Xations, see Seneca Nation of Indiars r Otiristy, 4!1 IIu i o2t; 12ii N. Y. 
 122; 162 U. S. 283. 
 
 202. Elli.s' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, .•^27. 
 
 203. Ellis' Ne-n- York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. 11, 423. 
 
 204. Ellis' EloMzei' Williams. Wis-. Hsf. Col. Mil. .'31. .'i.'.-?.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 169 
 
 live of the St. Regis tribe but apparently without their author. ty.-"'' 
 The delegation left Oneida in June, 1821, 2o« and arrived July 12, 
 1821, on the Walk-in-the-Water at Detroit.207 Here Governor Cass 
 added Charles C. Trowbridge to the party to protect the gov.-'-n- 
 ment's interests.-"^** The Walk-in-thc-Water, with its load of trav- 
 elers, started for Mackinaw July 31, 1821.200 Leaving Mr. Ellis there, 
 for he was ill,-i"' the IValk-in-the-Water advanced towards Green 
 Bay — the first steamer to plough the waters of Lake Michigan. "-i^ 
 
 The party reached Green Bay August 5, 1821,-1- but there was no 
 one to meet them. Colonel Bowyer, the Indian agent, had died 
 the preceding winter and the interested bands had not been informed 
 of the projected visit. With difficulty the Menominees and Winne- 
 bagoes were brought into council. When so brought they at first 
 refused to negotiate. Finally, however, through the influence of the 
 French inhabitants and traders, a reconsideration was accomplished 
 and on August 18, 1821, a treaty was concluded by which was ceded 
 to the New York Indians a strip about four miles in width crossing 
 Fo.x River at right angles, with Little Chute as a center and running 
 each way equidistant with the grantors' claim to the country. The 
 price paid was five hundred dollars in cash and fifteen hundred dollars 
 in goods to be delivered the following year.-^^ 
 
 If the agents were satisfied with this treaty their principals and 
 others whom they hoped to bind were not. All the tribes, except the 
 St. Regis band, took action upon the return of the delegates. The 
 cession was voted paltry and the motives of Eleazer were termed mer- 
 cenary if not villainous. The Oneidas especially, including even some 
 of the first Christian party, were vehement in their action. They 
 forwarded to Bishop Hobart a document, dated November 21, 1821, 
 remonstrating against the scheme to rob them of their homes and make 
 them fugitives and vagabonds, cautioning him against recognizing 
 Eleazer as having any authority to represent them either civilly or 
 religiously, and requesting the Bishop to withdraw him as their 
 religious teacher.-^* 
 
 205. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, AVis. Hist. Coll. VIII, :«:!, 331: Whlttlesoy's Kec- 
 oilfctions. Wis. Hist. Coll. 1, 68 note. 
 
 206. EUis' Recollections, Wis. Hist. Coll. VII, 210. 
 
 207. Detroit Gazette, July 13, 1821. 
 
 208. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIII, 335. 
 
 209. Baird's Early Wisconsin, Wis. Hist. Coll. II. 94, note. 
 
 210. Ellis' Recollections, Wis. Hist. Coll. VII, 213. 
 
 211. Baird's Early Wisconsin, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 94, and nuto. 
 
 212. Durrie's Green Bay, 8. 
 
 213. Martin's Addre.^s, January 21. lfS51. pau'c 3((, give-; tli ■ lioaly ii full. It 
 Mas' apiiroved by the president, February 19, 1822. 
 
 214. David.son's In Unnamed Wisconsin, 04; Ellis' Eleazer Williams. Wis. Hi-t. 
 Coli. VIII, 336. 
 
 -to 05 1,5
 
 170 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 But to this document although certain in its sound and pointed 
 in its statements the Bishop paid no heed. Moreover, the president 
 by a new order permitted a third visit to Green Bay, in 1822, for the 
 purpose of paying for the former purchase and also for attempting an 
 extension of the cession. Althuogh the Iroquois were still in opposi- 
 tion, the delegation was larger than before for the Stockbridges had 
 brought in the Brothertowns and the Munsees.-^^ The party, Eleazer 
 included, reached Green Bay September i, 1822. The granting Indians 
 assembled to receive their deferred pajaiient and were asked for an 
 enlargement of the grant. The Winnebagocs refused and retired. 
 The Menominees finally, after much parleying in which Eleazer urged 
 many plausible arguments and made many fulsome promises, entered 
 into a treaty admitting the New York Indians to an occupancy in 
 common with them of all their country without reserve — a treaty 
 which related to nearly one-half the present state of Wisconsin and 
 which became the source of endless trouble. -i'' With slight modifica- 
 tion President Monroe gave Ifis approval March 13, 1823. 
 
 So Eleazer Williams, in September, 1822, began to reside in 
 Wisconsin. He and the individual Oneidas in the delegation who 
 had continued loyal to him remained the approaching winter ni Green 
 Bay. 
 
 The next season about one hundred and fifty Oneidas of the 
 first Christian party and as many Stockbridges removed to the new 
 possessions. But the implacable hostility of the Six Nations as 
 a whole continued, and although Oneidas and Stockbridges year after 
 year dribbled into the new territory the fewness of their numbers was 
 a disappointment to Eleazer and a menace to his ambitions. -^^ 
 
 Eleazer's first residence in Green Bay was in the Indian Agency 
 building made vacant by Colonel Bowyer's death. -is In this was a 
 large square room suitable for school purposes and schools were 
 what the ^lenominees desired. Indeed education, although not men- 
 tioned in the treaty with them, was written between its lines. The 
 Green Bay Indians influenced by their alliances and business dealings 
 with the resident French had formed a high opinion of intelligence 
 and admired the learning of the New York red men, not a few of 
 whom could read and write. Eleazer, in furthering the negotiations 
 
 215. Tbe Brothertowns were associated remnants of various New England tribes. 
 TTie Stoclibridges sold them a strip from their Southern holder. Ellis' New York In- 
 dians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 416. The Munsces were a branch of the Delawares scat- 
 tered in consequence of having sided against the colonists in the American R 'volution. 
 In Wisconsin they are united with the Stoeiibridges. Davidson's In rnnau;el Wis- 
 consin, .^)4. 
 
 210. Ellis' Recollections, Wis. Hist. Cull. VII, 225; Ellis' New Ycjrlj Indians, 
 Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 428. The treaty in full is in Martin's Address, 3S. 
 
 217. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll. II, 430. 
 
 21S. Davidson's In Unnamed Wisconsin, 202.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 171 
 
 for the treaty had kept the subject of education foremost in his lobby- 
 ing and had promised profusely that if the New York Indians secured 
 the foothold they sought, the Institutions of civilization should imme- 
 diately be forthcoming. These promises made a deep impression — 
 their non-fulfillment a still deeper impression. Suftice it to say that 
 although a vacant room apt for school use was under Eleazer's roof, 
 though his friend Mr. Ellis pressed vigorously upon him his plighted 
 word, the ignorance and degradation of the untutored savages and the 
 expectations of the Eastern societies which had furthered the removal. 
 Eleazer completely banished the subject from his serious consideration 
 and raised another monument against himself in the breasts of those 
 whose religious teacher and exemplar he professed to be. 219 
 
 On March 3, 1823, Eleazer Williams married Mary or Magdalene 
 or Madelaine Jourdain.--** She was the daughter of Joseph Jourdain 
 who about 1798 removed from Canada to Green Bay, and worked first 
 for Jacob Franks the blacksmith, and later for himself.--^. Afterwards 
 he became the blacksmith of the Indian department at the Bay.-^^ 
 Joseph married the daughter of Michael Gravel whose wife was the 
 daughter of a Menominee chief.^^s AH the witnesses represent the 
 wife of Eleazer as an attractive girl, — girl, literally, for she was but 
 fourteen years of age at the time of her marriage.--* By '\lr. Trow- 
 bridge she is called a pretty but uneducated half-breed.---* Mr. Han- 
 son speaks of her as of great personal attractions, considerable accom- 
 plishments and prepossessing sweetness of disposition. -^s Mrs. Evans 
 states that "she was a beautiful and amiable girl whose father was 
 French (said to be a relation of 'Marshal Jourdain) and whose mother 
 was of French and Indian extraction. "22T Mr. Wheelock mforms me 
 that when he was accustomed to see her in and after 1841 she was 
 a handsome, fine appearing woman. --* In addition to her attractions 
 of person she owned between four and five thousand acres of land on 
 
 219. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. YIII, 3.3S. A school was estab- 
 lished through the efforts of Mr. Ellis. See his RecoUeetious, Wis. Hist. Coll. VII, 
 22(5. In ascribing educational initiative to Eleazer, Mr. Whitford (Early Histnry of 
 Education in Wisconsin, and History of School Supervision, Wis. Hist. Coll. V, 327, 
 354) does not give proper credit. For Eleazer's longings on the subject of the <'ilu- 
 cation of his race, see Colton's Tour 1, 175. 
 
 220. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 300. 
 
 221. Grignon's Recollections, Wis. Hist. Coll. HI, 253. 
 
 222. Trowbridge's Eleazor Williams Wis. Hist. Coll. VII. 414. 
 
 223. Grignon's Recollections, Wis. Hist. Coll. III., 253. Joseph .Jourdiin died 
 May 21, 1866; his wife died June 13, 1S(>5. See .Mrs. Wil lams' Diary. 
 
 224. Neville's Green Bay, 221. 
 
 225. Trowbridge Eleazer William.'J, Wis. Hist. Ciill.. VII.. 4U. 
 22S. Hanson's The Lost Prince, SCO. 
 
 227. Evans' Story of Louis XVH., 30. 
 
 228. Personal inlerview May 1S!JU, with the author.
 
 172 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Fox River near Green Bay.-^'* To the author of the Williams geneal- 
 ogy Eleazer, ni 1846, mentioned her as "Mary Hobart Jourdan. a dis- 
 tant relative of the king of France from whom he has been honored 
 with several splendid gifts and honors, among the rest a golden 
 cross and star."-^** In other conversation with the same person 
 Eleazer stated that the prince de Joinville was a relative of his wife 
 and that this relationship caused the visit, (to be hereinafter narrated) 
 which that prince made to Eleazer in 1841 and the gifts which 
 followed the visit. --"^ I make no comment upon this story except to 
 urge that, if the prince was a relative of Mrs. Williams, he was a 
 very ungallant young Frenchman to travel all the distance from Paris 
 to Green Bay and not once tender his respects to his beautiful kins- 
 woman. 
 
 Eleazers matrimonial incident does not enhance respect for the 
 masculine participator. At the time of the marriage he was almost 
 three times the age of the young girl; she was then betrothed to a 
 worthy young trader; she was not consulted as to her willingness to 
 marry Eleazer; she was not even allowed a woman's privilege of a 
 courtship, but was notified one morning that she need not go to 
 school that day as she was to be married that evening to "Priest 
 Williams." One authority finds in these unchivalrous proceedings an 
 evidence that the bridegroom was not a high-Dorn Frenchmen. ^^^ 
 
 Mrs. Williams had three children — two of them daughters. These 
 last died in infancj^, one about October 15, 1841.-33 The son John, 
 born about 1825, -s* was in 1867 the captain of a steamboat on Lake 
 Winnebago. -35 Pie died in 1884 from injuries received in his busi- 
 ness. -^*^ Eleazer Williams told the genealogist Dr. S. W. Williams 
 in 1846 that his son, the said John, was then upon a visit to the king 
 of France at the latter's reciuest.-^'^ One can imagine the glee of the 
 cunning Indian as he solemnly doled out his morsels of unmitigated 
 fiction to auditors who relying upon his clerical profession implicitly 
 believed all his lies. 
 
 Descendants of John Williams are now, it is said, residents of 
 
 229. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 300; Evans' Story of Ix>uls XVII., 30; McCall's 
 Journal, Wis. Hist. Coll., XII., 185. 
 
 230. Williams' Williams Family, 9C. 
 
 231. Williams' Redeemed Captive, 177. 
 
 232. Draper's Additional Notes, Wis. Hist. Coll., VIII., 367; Neville's Green 
 Bay, 221. A view of the house where the wedding took place is at page 219 of ihe 
 latter book. See also Baird's Indian Customs, Wis. Hist. Coll., IX., 321. Some 
 account of the wedding is in Ellis' Recollections, Wis. Hist. Coll., VII., 227. 
 
 233. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 372. 
 
 234. Register, XIII., 95. 
 
 235. Alllbone's Dictionary of Authors, III., 2738. 
 
 236. Green Bay Gazette, July, 1886. 
 
 237. Williams' Williams Family, 96.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 173 
 
 Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Mrs. Williams, the widow of Eleazer, was in 
 1874 living alone in a desolate looking cabin near Green Bay, its 
 only embellishments a few simple articles of bead or porcupine em- 
 broidery, and a well-executed liie-size portrait in oil of Eleazer Wil- 
 liams, on either side of which were suspended exquisitely finished en- 
 gravings of Louis XVI. of France and Marie Antoinette. ^^^ Mrs. 
 Williams adopted her husband's diary habit. From one of her 
 journals penned when well along in years it app'ears that she took 
 interest in her farm, produce and livestock and in the domestic affairs 
 of her relatives and neighbors. She died in her cabin home, which 
 was in the town of Lawrence in Brown County, July 21, 1886.239 
 
 Resuming the chronological narrative: In 1824, the next year 
 after Eleazer's marriage, he was licensed to perform the marriage 
 ceremony for others — at that time a civil service. -"'•' At about the 
 same period he began to preach in Green Bay, using the much mod- 
 ernized discourses of his Deerfield great ancestor.-*^ In the fall of 
 1825 he took his young wife to New York, where Bishop Hobart 
 baptized and confirmed her, giving her his sirname for her middle 
 name. Her christianization "excited almost as vivid a sensation in 
 the fashionable world as had that of Pocahontas in English society 
 two centuries before."-^- In the spring of 1826 at Oneida Eleazer was 
 ordained as a deacon by Bishop Hobart, but he never attained any 
 higher ecclesiastical rank.^^s Returning to Green Bay he preached 
 at the Post school-house-** and in his flowing robe did service in the 
 episcopalian form.-*^ 
 
 But he was not so occupied with religious afifairs as to forget 
 that grand earthly empire that he would fain establish. And yet the 
 establishing was very slow. The New York Indians came in but 
 scant numbers and the Indians already settled, disaffected by his 
 broken promises and his want of earnestness for their spiritual wel- 
 fare, withdrew their confidence. The Domestic and Foreign Mis- 
 sionary Society trusted him no longer. Finally in 1827 the Menom- 
 inees, the tribe which had opened its lands to the New York Indians, 
 showed its opposition to him by its attitude towards them. This was 
 at the treaty of Butte des Morts, concluded August 11, 1827,2** be- 
 
 238. Martin's Uncrowned Hapsburg, 87. 
 
 239. Green Uay Gazette, July, 1886; O'Brien's Account of EUazer Williams, in 
 Chicago Times, September 18, 1886. 
 
 240. Durrie's Green Bay, 9. 
 
 241. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll., VIII, 324. 
 
 242. Martin's Uncrowned Ilapsbuig, 92; Neville's Green Bay, 222. 
 
 243. Davidson's In Unnamed Wisconsin, 65; Letter of Mrs. Ev;ms in Green Bay 
 Gazette, July, 1895; Miss Martin's Reply, Green Bay Gazette, July 28, 1895. 
 
 244. Ellis' Recollections, Wis. Hist. Coll., VII., 237. 
 
 245. McCall's Journal, Wis. Hist. Coll., XII., 190. 
 
 246. McCall's Journal, Wis. Hist. Coll., XII., 172.
 
 174 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 tween the Menoniinees and the government. By this instrument but 
 little regard was paid to any rights formerly given to the eastern 
 Indians. If ill faith be imputed to the contracting parties there is 
 much justification alleged. The arrivals from New^ York had been so 
 few that it was not fair to the rapidly growing west to concede to 
 those few an impe^^ial territory. Moreover, it was notorious that few 
 if any more were expected to migrate. It was poor policy to yield 
 up in perpetuity to a few Oneidas, Stockbridges, Brothertowns, Mun- 
 sees, a parcel of country equal to about one-half of the present state 
 of Wisconsin.^-iT 
 
 In 1829 Colonel Samuel C. Stambaugh of Pennsylvania became 
 Indian agent at Green Bay. His advice to the Menoniinees was 
 along the line of the Butte des Morts treaty — to ignore the New York 
 Indians and sell land to the government-*** — advice which established 
 him in the high regard of the Menominees and in the low esteem of 
 Eleazer who saw in the acceptance of this advice the death of his am- 
 bitious hopes. 
 
 In 1830 commissioners appointed by the president under authority 
 actually granted by, or plainly inferable from, the treaty of Butte des 
 Morts appeared at the Bay, to localize, to establish boundaries for, 
 the New York tribes which, under the treaty of 1822, were in the 
 reservations of the Menominees. At the conference held with these 
 commissioners Eleazer Williams appeared as the representative of 
 the St. Regis Indians,-*'* not one of whom, so far as I can learn, 
 had yet arrived at Green Bay as a settler. The commissioners accom- 
 plished nothing — the Menominees, Oshkosh at their head, refused any 
 agreement by which the New York Indians were to have separate 
 localization. Indeed, Oshkosh denied that they had any claims at 
 all, yet as these Indians were on the ground they could be considered 
 as tenants at will during good behavior but not as owners or con- 
 trollers of the soil.-^** 
 
 This was Colonel Stambaugh's opportunity. Accompanied by a 
 dozen or more Menominees he started November 8, 1830, for Wash- 
 ington. Upon reaching Detroit Mr. and Mrs. Williams, who had 
 followed the party from Green Bay, were ofificially attached to it by 
 Governor Cass, although Eleazer and the other New York Indians 
 were opposed to the object of the errand. -^^ The Menominees suc- 
 ceeded in effecting a cession to the government of more than one-half 
 
 247. Ellis' Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll., VIII.. 341. Eleazer Williams' 
 views of the wrongs done to the New York Indians will be fciuod in Oolton's Tour, I., 
 175 et seq. 
 
 248. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll., II., 432. 
 
 249. McCall's Journal, Wis. Hist. Coll., XII., 192. 
 
 250. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll.. II., 432. 
 
 251. Carpenter's Sketch of Daniel Bread, Wis. Hist. Coll., III., 56.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 175 
 
 of their possessions west of Lake Michigan, ignoring almost wholly 
 the rights which about eight years before they had solemnly conferred 
 upon their eastern brethren. This, the Stambaugh treaty,-''- dated 
 February 8, 1831, was not confirmed by the senate exactly as made, 
 for the New York senators proposed to be just to the emigrants from 
 that state to the western territory. The details of much negotiation 
 and much heart-burning are not pertinent here. Suffice it to say 
 that when the vexed land question was finally settled the Stockbridges, 
 ^lunsees and Brothertowns were restricted to a parcel, eight miles 
 by twelve, on the eastern shores of Lake Wmnebago, while the Onei- 
 das and other scattered Six Nations were settled at Duck Creek west 
 of Fox River on a tract about twelve miles square. The senate ratified 
 this arrangement 2\Iay 17, 1838.-''" 
 
 This was the end of the scheme of ambition and temporal sov- 
 ereignty which for almost a score of years Eleazer Williams had 
 nourished and fostered. The dusky empire had disintegrated, the 
 different bands discordant and hostile had been confined in narrow 
 paddocks, the tide of white civilization was rushing in. No longer 
 a public character Eleazer had withdrawn from Green Bay and was 
 residing upon his wife's estate at Little Kaukaulin, there to remain 
 in humble obscurity until a wilder dream for wider empire should 
 arouse his dormant hopes. 
 
 Eleazer had become not only dethroned but discredited. For 
 quite a period he had been chaplain of the Oneidas settled at Duck 
 Creek, upon an annual salary of two hundred and fifty dollars. -=•* 
 Yet he constantly neglected his flock. ]\Iore than this, he forbade the 
 Oneidas to receive the evangelizations of pastors of other denomina- 
 tions. ^^^ Weary of neglect, still wearier of him, the Oneidas held a 
 council in February. 1832, to which the Indian agent. Colonel George 
 Boyd,-^*' was summoned and to which he invited some citizens of 
 Green Bay. These Oneidas were chietiy of the First Christian party, 
 whom Eleazer had bound to himself a dozen years before, in the first 
 days of his ministrations, before the cares of this world and the deceit- 
 fulness of riches had made him unfit to be their pastor. The assembled 
 Indians after rehearsing their grievances against Eleazer concluded 
 with an address to the agent, stating that they had invited him to 
 assist them in making a final separation from Eleazer and dismissing 
 
 252. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll., II., 435 gives extracts from tlie 
 Stambaugh treaty. 
 
 253. Ellis' New York Indians, Wis. Hist. Coll., II., 445, 448; Ellis' Eleazer 
 Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll., VIII., 343. 
 
 254. McCall's .Tourual, Wis. Hist. Coll., XII., 185. 
 
 255. Davidson's lu Unnamed Wisconsin, 122. 
 
 256. Colonel Stambaugh's appointment as an Indian Agent was refused confirma- 
 tion and Colonel Boyd was appointed in his room.
 
 176 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 him entirely. They expressed their desire to repudiate him sum- 
 marily, to warn the government of the United States, the state of New 
 York and all church and missionary societies against recognizing his 
 authority to act for them, to speak in their name, or in any possible 
 way to meddle in their affairs. They requested Colonel Boyd to draft 
 in triplicate an instrument to be signed by them and witnessed by him 
 and by his invited guests, setting forth distinctly and plainly their 
 protestations — one for the secretary of war, another for the governor 
 of New York, the third for the proper authorities of the Episcopal 
 church. These documents were drafted and signed and committed 
 to the agent for delivery — an action which while perhaps neither 
 technical, official nor ecclesiastical, fully justified, the authors of His- 
 toric Green Bay in writing of Eleazer Williams as a "disowned clergy- 
 man of the Episcopal church, "^^t notwithstanding the assertion con- 
 cerning him of Dr. Hawks on January i, 1853, "He is in good standing 
 as a clergyman and is deemed a man of truth among his acquaintance 
 and those with whom he has longest lived. "^^s 
 
 Exactly what his standing was in and about Green Bay, let Mr. 
 John Y. Smith witness, who knew him intimately from 182S until 
 1837:-^^ 
 
 He was a fat, lazy, good-for-nothing Indian; but cunnlng,260 crafty, fruitful in 
 expedients to raise the wind and unscrupulous about the means of accomplishing it. 
 During the last four or five years of my acquaintance with him, I doubt whetlier 
 there was a man at Green Bay whose word commanded less confidence than that of 
 Eleazer Williams. His cliaracter for dishonesty, trickery and falsehood .became so 
 notorious and scandalous that respectable Kplscopalians preferred charges against him 
 to Bishop Onderdonk.261 But as Mr. Williams was located in the dincese of Wis- 
 consin under Bishop Kemper, the bishop of New York disclaimed jurisdii tiou of the 
 case; and, as Williams was there under a commission from a suciety in New York, 
 Bishop Kemper disclaimed jurisdiction of the case, and In consequence of tlie-e 
 counter-disclaimers the charges were never investigated. 262 
 
 257. Neville's Green Bay, 222. Ellis' E!eazL-r Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VIH 
 344. 
 
 258. Dr. Hawks' Introduction to Have We a Bourbon Among Us?— Putnam's 
 I., 194. 
 
 259. Smith's Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll., VI., 330. 
 
 260. Cunning is ascribed to Eleazer in one of the earliest ciiaracterizations <if 
 him as an adult which I have seen — in August, 1830. See McCall's Journal, Wis. Hist. 
 Coll., XII., 185. 
 
 261. Bishop Hobart had died September 12, 1830; Benjamin T. Onderdonk suc- 
 ceeded him as bishop of New York, November 26, 1830. The Rev. Jackson Kemper 
 became in 1835 missionary bishop of Missouri and Indiana with jurisdiction through- 
 out the Northwest. In 1859 this jurisdiction was limited by his accepting the bishop- 
 ric of Wisconsin. Morehouse's Some American Churchmen, 110, 117. As to the unwil- 
 lingness of either Bishop Onderdonk or Bishop Kemper to be responsible for Eleazer 
 Williams, see Hanson's Have We a Bourbon Among Us? — Putnam's, I., 200. 
 
 262. Smith's Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Coll., VI., 332. John Y. Smith was 
 born in New York State February 10, 1807. He was a man of great strengtli of
 
 HJS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 177 
 
 It is not pleasant to perpetuate these charcterizations, to recall 
 these misconducts of one long dead and as to whom I would fain 
 apply the direction, A'i7 nisi honiini dc mortttis. But the truth of 
 history is involved and the claims for Eleazer Williams depend largely 
 upon his personal statements. Candor, therefore, compels me to say — 
 and these pages ill perform their mission if they fail to prove — that 
 obstinate persisting to act a false part was exactly suitable to Eleazer 
 Williams' character,-**^ that he abounded in sly cunning, was prone 
 to tricks, apt to exaggerate, quick to invent, utterly untruthful. 
 
 And yet, I am glad to parallel these criticisms, with the justifica- 
 tions which Judge ^Morgan L. ^Martin with charcteristic clemency has 
 uttered in favor of Eleazer Williams : 
 
 A iiiau roared auiid savage surroundings, as he was, si ouM be judged by a 
 different standard tlian we set up for one who has spent his life entirely amoni; 
 white people. No one can from childhood fraternize with Indians without absorbing 
 their characteristics to some extent, — and becoming vain, deceitful and bia^tful. He 
 was a remarkable man in many respects, but was deeply imbued with false notions 
 of life, and his career was a failure. He was neither better nor worse than hi.s 
 life-long companions and was what might have been expected from one wlio had 
 been sent into the world with certain racial vices and whose training and associations 
 were not calculated to better liim.264 
 
 Notwithstanding Eleazer's permanent residence in Wisconsn he 
 did not sever his connection with his eastern kin. In 1835 he was at 
 St. Regis endeavoring to obtain long delayed jttstice from the govern- 
 ment for his father's services in the war of 1812.20"' Three years later 
 he was again in New York and visited in Buffalo ;-66 in 1841 while 
 once more in the same state incidents occtirred which demand atten- 
 tion. 
 
 In August of that year ho celebrated with the Oneida Indians at 
 the Castle the eighth triennial anniversary of the conversion of six 
 hundred pagans of that tribe to the Christian faith. His part in the 
 commemoration of an event with which in 1817 he was personally con- 
 nected consisted in the delivery of two homilies entitled The salva- 
 tion of sinners iltroiigli riches of diiine grace.-''' After pariicipating 
 in the celel)ration Eleazer Williams proceeded to St. Regis. There 
 he was abiding in October, 1841, when the prince de Joinvi'.le then in 
 America was about starting upon his tour to the Mississippi. 
 
 The prince de Joinville was the third son of Louis' Philippe, then 
 
 character. ili..rcMi-h pmlity .ind liifiary culture. His statemeiit.s may be accepted 
 without rpiestion. He died May .-.. I,s74. Wiglifs T!;e Old White Church, H; Durrie's 
 John Y. Smith, Wis. Hist. CipU., Vll., 452. 
 
 263. Ram on Facts, 435, u.ses this clausi> wiili reference to Arnold du Tilh. 
 
 264. Martin's Narative, Wis. Hist. Coll., XI., 390. 
 
 265. Report, January 16, 1857, on claim of Mary Ann Willian s, II. use Com- 
 mittee on Military Affairs, 34th Congres-J, Tliiid Session, .\o. S3. 
 
 266. Rohert.son'a Last of the Bourbon story. 91!. 
 
 267. These homilies were published at Green Bay in 1812.
 
 178 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 king of the Frencli, and was born August 14, iSiS.-*** In 1840 he com- 
 manded the vessel which brought from St. Helena the bones of the 
 great emperor — that mistake of policy fatal to the house of Orleans — , 
 and in 1841 was traveling in Canada and in the United States. He 
 desired to familiarize himself with the history of those two countries 
 especially in relation to the French occupation of the former country. 
 Besides as he states in his Memoirs, "I was anxious to go, via the 
 Great lakes to Green Bay on Lake Michigan, and then starting from 
 Mackinaw, the old Indian Michillimackinac, to follow up the track of 
 our officers and soldiers and missionaries who pushed on till they 
 discovered the Mississippi. "-^^ The prince leaving his large party at 
 Albany, New York, selected a few friends to make this trip with hnn, 
 they thus traversing the route which the prince's father, Louis Philippe, 
 had taken when an exile in America. ^^o It may well be believed that 
 upon the beginning of his trip the prince sought the name and address 
 of some person resident among the western Indians, ripe in years 
 and ready with reminiscences, with whom he could converse. -"^ Cer- 
 tain it is that upon boarding the Columbus for his tour around the 
 lakes he avowed to Captain Shook his errand and coupled with the 
 information an earnest request that the captain would direct him to 
 some aged person residing along his route who might possibly have 
 personal recollection of his father's trip, or, such failing, some person 
 of a younger generation who might know of it by hearsay. The cap- 
 tain whose vessel plied regularly between the ports along the lakes 
 knew Eleazer and mentioned his name to the prince. -'- 
 
 Meanwhile Eleazer Williams had learned at St. Regis of the 
 prince's contemplated journey. Of his desire for an expert in Indian 
 habits, one familiar with Indian history, one who mayhap knew his 
 father, Eleazer also learned, perhaps by letter from friends in New 
 York, for his reputation as a scholar in Indian afYairs was a score of 
 years old, perhaps not until he reached Mackinaw. However this 
 may be, alert for exciting episodes, he hvtrriedly quit St. Regis and 
 journeying in haste, anticipated the prince and his reiinue and was 
 standing on the wharf at Mackinaw when the Columbus reached that 
 port October 18, 1841.-"" 
 
 I summarize from The Lost Prince the account of what then 
 
 268. Prince de .Toinville's Memoire, 1. 
 
 269. Prince tie Joinvllle'.s Memoirs, 207. 
 
 270. Martin's tJncrowned Hapsbiirg, 87. 
 
 271. Robertson's Last of the Bourbon Story, Putnam's. II. u. s.. 95. 
 
 272. Martin's Uncrowned Hapsburg, 87. 
 
 273. Ilanson'si Tlie Lost Prince. 370. I am inclined to flistiust tliis date as a 
 few days too early, but cannot yet piove it wrong. Kut ir is certi.i Iv nor- (orror 
 than the year 1854, given in Harper's Book of Facts. ii3:!, a< thi' tim" of the P. in>e's 
 ■visit to Green Bay.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 179 
 
 transpired, as Mr. Hanson secured the information in conversation 
 with Eleazer Williams on December 7, 1852, and as contained in 
 journals which somewhat later he produced for the inspection of Mr. 
 Hanson.-"* 
 
 While Eleazer was standing on the wharf and the prince and 
 companions having gone ashore were viewing the sights, John Shook, 
 the captain of the vessel, approaching Eleazer asked him if 
 he were not going on to Green Bay, for the prince de 
 Joinvillc had been making inciuiries for a Mr. Williams, and he. 
 Captain Shook, had told the prince that such a man lived 
 at Green Bay. Consequently, when the prince re-boarded the ship, 
 Eleazer took passage. As the vessel proceeded. Captain Shook told 
 the prince that Eleazer was on beard and he brought the two to 
 an acquaintance. Quoting Eleazer's Journal: "1 was siltng at the 
 time on a barrel. The prince not only started with evident and invol- 
 untary surprise when he saw me but there was a great agitation in his 
 face and manner — a slight paleness and a quivering of the lip — which I 
 could not help remarking at the time, but which struck me more 
 forcibly afterwards, in connection with the whole train of circum- 
 stances, and by contrast with his usual self-possessed manner. Kc 
 then shook me earnestly and respectfully by the hand and drew me 
 immediately into conversation." After the dinner which Eleazer po- 
 litely declined to eat at the same private table with the prince and his 
 suite, conversation passed between them on early French settlements 
 in America and on the much lamented loss of Canada to France. 
 Until late in the night, all the next morning and until three in the 
 afternoon, when the vessel reached Green Bay, they talked together. 
 Upon landing the prince went to the Astor House and stating 
 that he must leave the next day or the day following, begged Eleazer 
 to take up his quarters at the hotel. But Eleazer preferred to go to 
 the home of his father-in-law and returned in the evening to the 
 prince. The latter made himself alone by dismissing an attendant 
 although the carousing of his suite could be heard in an adjoining- 
 room. The prince then stated that "he had a communication to 
 make to me of a very serious nature as concerned himself and of the 
 last importance to me — that it was one in which no others were in- 
 terested, and therefore before proceeding further, he wished to obtain 
 some pledge of secrecy, some promise that I would not reveal to any 
 one what he was going to say." Naturally Eleazer demurred, but 
 finally pledged his honor not to reveal what the prince was going 
 to say, provided there was nothing in it prejudicial to anyone, and he 
 signed a promise to that effect. "It was vague and general, for I 
 would not tie myself down to absolute secrecy but left the matter 
 
 274. Hanson's Tlic L<5st Prince, 356, 364.
 
 180 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 conditional." The prince then told Eleazer that he, the latter, was 
 of foreign descent, was born in Europe and was the son of a king. 
 He added, "You have sufifered a great deal, and have been brought 
 very low, but you have not sufifered more, or been more degraded 
 than my father, who was long in exile and poverty in this country; 
 but there is this difiference between him and you, that he was all along 
 aware of his high birth, whereas you have been spared the knowledge 
 of your origin." The narrative proceeds: "When the prince had 
 said this I was much overcome and thrown into a state of mind which 
 you can easily imagine. In fact I hardly knew what to do or say, and 
 my feelings were so much excited that I was like one in a dream 
 and much was said between us of which I can give but an indistinct 
 account. However, I remember I told him his communication was 
 so startling and unexpected, that he must forgive me for being in- 
 credulous, and that really I was 'between two.' 'What do you mean,' 
 he said, 'by being "between two"?' I replied that on the one hand it 
 scarcely seemed to me he could believe what he said, and on the 
 other I feared he might be under some mistake as to the person."' 
 The prince disclaimed any intention to trifle with Eleazer's feelings 
 and stated that he had ample proof of his identity. Before granting 
 Eleazer's request that he would proceed with his disclosure the prince 
 produced from his trunk a parchment and a "governmental seal of 
 France, the one if I mistake not, used under the old monarchy." 
 Eleazer relates that as soon as he knew the whole story, "the sight 
 of. the seal put before me by a member of the family of Orleans stirred 
 my indignation." The parchment was very handsomely written in 
 double parallel columns of French and English. "I continued intently 
 reading and considering it for a space of four or five hours ... it 
 was a solemn abdication of the crown of France in favor of Louis 
 Philippe by Charles Louis who was styled Louis XVH.. king of 
 France and Navarre with all accompanying names and titles of 
 honor, according to the custom of the old French monarchy." As a 
 return for this .sacrifice, Eleazer was to receive a princely establishment 
 either in France or in America and the restoration of all the private 
 property of the royal family, or its equivalent, confiscated by the French 
 Revolution or in any other way. After much reflection Eleazer in- 
 formed the Prince that he could not barter away the rights pertaining 
 to him by his birth and sacrifice the interests of his family and that 
 he could give the prince only the answer which de Provence gave to 
 the ambassador of Napoleon at Warsaw, "Though I am in poverty 
 and exile I will not sacrifice my honor." "The prince upon this 
 assumed a loud tone and accused me of ingratitude in trampling on 
 the overtures of the king, his father, who, he said, was actuated in 
 making the propositicn. more by feelings of kindness and pity towards 
 me than by any other consideration, since liis claim to the French
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 181 
 
 throne rested on an entirely different basis to mine, viz., not that of 
 hereditary descent, but of popular election. When he spoke in this 
 strain I spoke loud also, and said, that as he, by his disclosure, had 
 put me in the position of a superior, I must assume that position, and 
 frankly say that my indignation was stirred by the memory that one of 
 the family of Orleans had imbrued his hands in my father's blood-"'^ 
 and that another now wished to obtain from me an abdication of the 
 throne. When I spOke of superiority, the Prince immediately assumed 
 a respectful attitude and remained silent for several minutes. It had 
 now grown very late and we parted with a request from him that I 
 would reconsider the proposal of his father, and not be too hasty in 
 mjf decision. I returned to my father-in-law's, and the next day saw 
 the prince again and on his renewal of the subject gave him a similar 
 answer." Before he went awaj' the Frenchman said "Though we part 
 I hope we part friends." Upon whatever terms they parted they never 
 met again. . 
 
 Now around this narrative as a center divers observations cluster: 
 
 I. It seems remarkable that if the object of the prince in coming 
 ' to America was to obtain this renunciation, he should go more than a 
 
 thousand miles from his vessel to secure it. Eleazer Williams was in 
 the East and the place of his sojourn was accessible, and it seems 
 ludicrous that .for a purpose so weighty the prince and the priest 
 should race across one-third of the span of the continent to meet in a 
 tavern in Green Bay. 
 
 II. This astounding fact of Eleazer's history, making as it did 
 if true his wife the blood queen of France and his son the dauphin, 
 he never revealed to his wife and son. Twelve years after the prince 
 visited Green Bay, when the story of this claimed disclosure had for 
 a long while been public property, a friend of Mrs. Williams who had 
 read in Putnam's, Have We a Bourbon Among Us? and The Bour- 
 bon Question, related the story to her.-""^ At this time, in 1853. 
 Eleazer had finally abandoned Green Bay and never saw his family 
 again to explain his prolonged silence upon a fact so momentous. 
 But one can imagine ]\[rs. Williams reflecting upon her husband's 
 half-formed Frepch speech and the many other evidences she must 
 have possessed of his Indian origin, and deciding that his silence to 
 her was another evidence of his astuteness. Notwithstanding the ig- 
 norance of his wife and son until 1853, Eleazer stated to Mr. Hanson 
 in 1851, "I am convinced of my royal descent; so are my family. The 
 idea of royalty is in our minds and we will never relinquish it."-^^. 
 
 «• 
 
 275. Referring to the Duke of Orleacs, father of Louis Philippe, who voted for 
 the death of Louis XVI. Lainartlne'3 Girondists, II., 350. 
 
 276. Draper's Additional Notes, Wis. Hist. Coll., VIII., 367; O'Brien's The 
 Mystery of His Life, in Yenowine's News, September 19, 1S86. 
 
 277. Hanson's The T/ist Prince. 346.
 
 182 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 III. The most natural action for one whose affiliation has been 
 attacked, whose beliefs as to his paternity and maternity have been 
 rudely jostled, is to consult forthwith the persons he had supposed 
 to be his parents. But no such thing did Eleazer Williams. In 1851. 
 when his mother was summoned before de Lorimier to testify as to 
 his parentage she learned for the first time, and not from her son, that 
 he was claiming another ancestry. Strange and inexplicable mystery 
 of reticence! A person is announced to be Louis XVII., the uncrowned 
 king of France and Navarre, and his wife, and son, those whom all 
 men believe to be his parents, learn of the announcement a decade' 
 afterward from the lips of strangers! Eleazer was very careful that 
 this story should not become wide-spread until his father had died 
 or become too decrepid to wreak vengeance upon the slanderers of 
 his family. I have no doubt that the true explanation of Eleazer's 
 protracted silence concerning this alleged disclosure lies in the survival 
 of his father. And in this connection I cannot but condemn those 
 who state that Thomas Williams never claimed Eleazer to be any more 
 than his adopted son. -'^^ This statement is grossly unjust to that ex- 
 cellent soldier and good man. E>oubtless Thomas never did "claim" 
 Eleazer to be his son; most fathers do not "claim" their sons — the 
 paternity goes without claiming; but that Thomas ever denied the 
 fatherhood of Eleazer — much as he might blush to admit it — has not a 
 mote of evidence to sustain it. 
 
 IV. The whole story of the disclosure and requested abdication 
 is inherently improbable. It is improbable that Louis Philippe would 
 entrust such a mission to a yottth of twenty-two; it is itnprobable that 
 if Eleazer was the dauphin, and was shut off from all the world in 
 the Wisconsin woods, and was ignorant of his magnificent ancestrj' 
 and was likely never to learn it — it is improbable, I say, that even 
 Orleans princes would deliberately seek him out and reveal to him 
 that very thing which would make their thrones unstable, their 
 crowned heads uneasy. Were there not pretenders enough sprinkled 
 about Europe to be thorns in his side, that Louis Philippe should 
 deliberately go about to discover the real heir in America, to be a still 
 deeper sting? • 
 
 V. A noticeable circumstance about the interview between the 
 prince and Eleazer was the extreme astonishment attributed to the lat- 
 ter at the disclosure — an astonishment so absorbing that Eleazer neg- 
 lected to demand from his informant the customary and necessary 
 proofs of his remarkable assertions. Any person supposing himself to be 
 simply a Caughnawaga Indian would develop astonishment on learning 
 that he is the representative of the longest royal line in Europe. Eleazer 
 himself speaks of his timidity and bashfulness as traits of one "who 
 
 278. Historical Magazine, October, 1859, 323.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 183 
 
 had always considered himself of such obscure rank."2T9 And yet, not- 
 withstanding this astonishment, timidity and bashfulncss, it is a fact 
 that, three years before this interview. Eleazer had claimed to be that 
 very person concerning his idenity with whom he is now filled with 
 so much surprise. In or about 1838 Eleazer entered the office of 
 George H. Haskins, editor of The Buffalo Express and confided to him 
 under the seal of the most profound scerecy that he, Eleazer, was not 
 what he appeared to be but was in reality the dauphin of France, men- 
 tioning his early idiocy, his sanative fall into Lake George and the 
 miraculous restoration of his memory.^so When therefore the prince 
 revealed to him the same ancestry Eleazer ought not to have mani- 
 fested or even experienced any astonishment, but should have received 
 the news with the dignity and reserve of one who had long become 
 accustomed to the information. Just here it is worth wdiile to notice 
 that after this whisper to Mr. Haskins, and while the prince and 
 Eleazer were chatting on Captain Shook's vessel, Eleazer told the 
 prince that when Montcalm fell at Quebec that gallant Frenchman left 
 his sword to an Iroquois and then expired In that Iroquois' arms: 
 that he, Eleazer, was a relative of that Iroquois, and that his, Eleazer's. 
 mother was an Indian woman. ^si Thus did this remarkable personage 
 change his ancestors as his whim suggested; thus did he establish 
 himself an utterly irresponsible informant. 
 
 VI. Among many slips of detail I notice one: Eleazer tells us 
 that after talking far into the night with the prince both separated 
 to meet the next day. But the difficulty with this is that the prince did 
 not tarry over night in Green Bay. The prince writing twelve years 
 afterward states that he remained there but half a day-*-, and Dr. 
 Butler of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin prints in The Na- 
 tion that de Joinville did not pass the night in Green Bay.-^" To the 
 same efifect is the testimony of Mrs. Elizabeth S. Martin who met 
 the prince upon this occasion at Green Bay and who in a hearty and 
 genial old age still survives. She has recorded that the prince did not 
 remain over six hours in Green Bay and that a large portion of this 
 time was spent at the toilette in preparation for a i-eception and dinner 
 at which Eleazfer Williams and Mrs. Martin among others were 
 present. Immediately after the dinner the prince started on his eques- 
 trian tour, tarrying for the night at the house of John McCarty, four 
 or five miles beyond DePere-^* — instead of spending the hours at the 
 
 279. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 362. 
 
 2S0. Robertson's The Last of the Bourbon Story, Putnam's IT. n. s.. 9C; Drap- 
 er's Additional Notes, Wis. Hist. Coll., VIII., 3G2. 
 
 281. Hanson's The Lost Prince. 405. 404. 
 
 282. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 403. 
 
 283. Butler's The Story of Louis XVII., in Nation, May 01, 1894, 417. 
 2S4. Martin's Uncrowned Hapsburfr. S7. and Draper's Note in Ms.
 
 184 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Astor House in Green Bay begging Eleazer Williams to resign the 
 kingdom of France. 
 
 VII. But what said the other party to this interview? Upon the 
 receipt by the prince de Joinville of the February, 1853, number of 
 Putnam's Magazine containing the account of the meeting, the dis- 
 closure.and the request for abdication, the prince through his secretary 
 addressed, from his exile home in Claremont, Surrey, England, a 
 letter dated February 9, 1853, to the London agent of Mr. Putnam. In 
 this communication he admitted the meeting, and the conversation 
 with Eleazer and subsequent correspondence between the two on 
 matters relating to the Indians, but as to the main story the prince 
 stamped it in every particular as a work of the imagination, a fable 
 woven wholesale, a speculation upon public credulity.-^^ Mr. Hanson, 
 who could not well exclude this letter from The Lost Prince, made 
 an effort to blunt its point and counteract its force, but his attempt 
 was feeble and unsatisfactory and this denial of the prince so compre- 
 hensive and so emphatic must be accepted as converting Eleazer's 
 story into the wildest fiction. 
 
 VIII. But it is perhaps not astonishing to know that Eleazer 
 Williams did not believe this story himself and so stated in at least 
 two instances. After the appearance of The Lost Prince, Eleazer hap- 
 pened to meet in Baltimore Charles D. Robinson of Green Bay, a 
 friend, and the editor of The Green Bay Advocate. Mr. Robinson who 
 knew Eleazer and his character well, said to Eleazer, referring to 
 this book, "I don't believe there is a word of truth in it." Eleazer 
 broke into a hearty laugh, seeming to appreciate the point, and replied, 
 "Nor do I, either." So, meeting his longtime friend Alexander Grig- 
 non, Eleazer asked him if he had heard anything about the dauphin 
 matter. "Yes, I have," was the reply, with a laugh and manner evinc- 
 ing his total disbelief of the story. "It is not me," continued Eleazer 
 with a disregard of grammar that would have made the young dauphin 
 blush, "they wanted it so, and I don't care.''-^" Perhaps the true in- 
 wardness of this wholesale deception would be disclosed if Eleazer 
 had stated definitely whom he meant by they. But, if Eleazer himself 
 did not believe this tale, the rest of mankind — which excludes the 
 writer of The Story of Louis XVIL— may be pardoned for sharing 
 his incredulity. 
 
 IX. Moreover, belief by Eleazer in his identity with the dauphin 
 would have been totally inconsistent with his conduct and admissions 
 subsequent to 1841. Four years after the prince's visit, that is to say 
 in 1845, Eleazer assisted in preparing a memoir of his great-grand- 
 mother, Eunice Williams; in 1848 he preached historical sermons in 
 
 285. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 404. 
 
 286. Draper's Additional Notes. Wis. Hist. Coll., VIII., 367.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 185 
 
 Deerfield on the anniversary of the death of his ancestor, the Rev. 
 John Williams-8"; in 1845 he gave his pedigree to the genealogist, S. 
 W. WiUiams, M. D., stating therein that Thomas Williams was his 
 father, also writing, "I am highly pleased to learn that you are tracing- 
 out the genealogy of the Williams family and particularly of my grand- 
 father, Rev. John Williams'"; in October, 1846, he offered to lend his 
 portrait of his "grandsire", the Rev. John Williams, to the uses of 
 the contemplated genealogj'; in September, 1847, he sent to the gene- 
 alogist Williams a portrait of his "grandfather Williams" ;"-88 q^ Janu- 
 ary 18, 1850, in furthering the claim of Mary Ann Williams for the 
 services of her husband in the war of 1812 Eleazer Williams swore 
 upon oath as follows: "That I was in the secret of the United States 
 in the war which commenced in 1812 and that I had the charge and 
 commanded the secret corps of observation on the northern frontier 
 during the said war; and that it was through me that my father, 
 Thomas Williams, an Iroquois chief, was especially invited, in behalf 
 of the general government .... to join the American stand- 
 ard,"2S9 — all these admissions of conduct, speect and oath after the 
 prince de Joinville had solemnlj^ informed Eleazer that he was not a 
 Williams at all but was Louis of France, the seventeenth of that name! 
 X. The attitude towards each other of both prince and priest sub- 
 sequent to the interview indicates that no momentous subject was dis- 
 cussed at Green Baj-. Soon after the prince's departure Eleazer sent 
 him a paper relating to Charlevoix and La Salle. The prince's courteous 
 acknowledgment shows no evidence of any secret matter between them. 
 Two years later, in the name of Eis Indian brethren, Eleazer sent 
 through the prince to Louis Philippe for some books. The books 
 were sent with a letter from the prince's secretary announcing the 
 king's compliance. A delay in transit brought from the French consul 
 general in New York a note of regret that he "was unable before to 
 present to Mr. Williams the enclosed letter and the box of books sent 
 by the king of the French"- — the letter being the one from the prince's 
 secretary. The matter just quoted is the foundation for the story of 
 Eleazer receiving an autograph letter from Louis Philippe — a stor}- of 
 which Eleazer boasted. When asked to exhibit this autograph letter 
 it was lost. The reply of Eleazer to the letter from the prince by the 
 hitter's secretary is certainly not penned by one who considered himself 
 placed by the disclosures made at Green Bay "in the position of a 
 stiperior" to the prince, as this extract will show: 
 
 So well pleased am I with the books, and so lilfrh an opinion do I entertain of 
 your Royal llishness' benevolence and friendship as to taalmldeii m'_' t) appear before 
 
 287. Robertson's The Last of llio lionrtion Story, I'utn.im's, II. n. s.. 04. 
 
 288. Williams' The Redeemed Captive. 177. 
 
 289. Report, .January 16, 18.">7, House Cummittee on Military .\ffairs, on claim 
 if Mary Ann Willhinis. p:i,irf ."«, .'!4tli (?ongiess, Tliird S 'SS'on. No. S;{.
 
 186 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 him as a supplianti for a similar favor. For years I have been desirous to acquaint 
 myself with the writings of the French, either in civil or ecclesiastical histories, as 
 well as in theology. If it is not asking and intruding too much upon your Ruyal 
 Highness' goodness may I hope that he will give a favorable hearing to my humble 
 request.290 
 
 It should be stated parenthetically that whenever Eleazer was 
 called upon to produce original documents — letters, medals or what 
 not — these were always missing, burned, stolen, mislaid, among his 
 papers at some other place. He boasted, for example, of several mis- 
 sives from French bishops and cardinals and one from the secretary 
 of Napoleon III., all enquiring about his history. Like the autograph 
 letter from Louis Philippe they had all disappeared.-''^ 
 
 Eleazer's journals were as useful to his purpose as his mysteriously 
 disappearing documents. These journals consisted of sheets loosely 
 stitched together so that the insertion of leaves containing new matter 
 or the re-writing of old matter was an easy task. Indeed, for some 
 periods of his life there are preserved two journals differing in details 
 of events292 — one or the other or both evidently prepared after the 
 incidents recorded and to serve some purpose. Eleazer could produce- 
 journals as he did scars. 
 
 XI. A curious phenomenon is to be observed about the expres- 
 sions and reflections attributed to the prince during his interview 
 with Eleazer — that they are identical in sentiment, that they are often 
 clothed in exactly the same language, with ideas and opinions contained 
 in the journals of Eleazer, of dates long anterior to 1841. Especially 
 is this true as to the remarks concerning the aid rendered by France 
 to America during our revolution and concerning the connection be- 
 tween the French revolution and the misfortunes of Louis XVI.-''-' 
 This is easily explicable. When Eleazer in 1848, either alone or with 
 the aid of a friend was stealthily launching his imposture, he found 
 in his own early meditations satisfactory material for the made-up con- 
 versations of the prince with himself. About these were grouped 
 the other incidents — the prince's expression of astonishment at see- 
 ing the Bourbon lineaments on Eleazer's face, the humility which 
 would not permit the priest to dine at the same table with the 
 prince, the night meeting at the Astor House, the revelation, the 
 bribe, the indignant rejection, the over-night reconsideration, the re- 
 newal of the refusal, the final parting — all clustered into a sensa- 
 tional, if not into a coherent, narrative. 
 
 XII. It need not elicit surprise that Eleazer Williams as long 
 
 200. Robertson's The Last of the Bourbon Story, Putnam's, II, n. s.. OG. 
 
 291. Robertson's The Last of the Bourbon Story, Fntnam's, 11, n. s.. !)0; Han- 
 son's The Lost Prince, 355. 
 
 292. Robertson's The Last of the I'.ourhon Story. Putnam's, II, n. s., 9G. 
 
 293. Robertson's The Last of the nourbon ^^tory, I'utnam's. II, n. s., 95.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 187 
 
 ago as TS38, had declared himself the dauphin. He enjoyed the privi- 
 lege not accorded to those who live a century after the episode in the 
 Temple, of existing in the age that produced dauphins. Men far less 
 acute and cunning than Eleazer had palmed themselves off upon the 
 l)uhlic as the heir of St. Louis, had been the objects of anxiety and 
 solicitude, had even engaged tlie attention of the daughter of Louis 
 XVL While dauphin-meteors had been shooting athwart the Euro- 
 pean firmament, while one at least was still shining with tinsel lustre, 
 should not one pretender glitter with bright effulgence in the western 
 horizon? Should not Eleazer Williams be that pretender? 
 
 After the visit of the prince to Green Bay, but little in the life 
 of Eleazer requires notice for several years. He was almost entirely 
 disassociated from the Indians but was much occupied in pressing 
 against the government claims growing out of their removal to the 
 western country. In 1846 the Society for the Propagation of the Gos- 
 pel among the Indians and others in North America appropriated 
 money for his support as a missionary, but after two years this stipend 
 was withdrawn, the result not justifying its continuance.-*'^ In 1850 
 he went east to proffer his services for the removal of the Seneca In- 
 dians from Indian Territory to the upper waters of the Mississippi. 
 His offer was declined. Not returning to his family--''"' he took up his 
 residence at St. Regis, where he commenced a school and where he 
 had some kind of missionary appointment from the Diocesan Society 
 of New York and from the Boston Unitarian Society.^^s Upon the 
 recommendation of his neighbors the Societj' for the Propagation of 
 the Gospel renewed its appropriation, but in 1853 this was withdrawn, 
 owing to his protracted absences from duty.-^'' 
 
 His home was on the St. Regis reservation for the remainder of 
 liis life, although he frequently traveled. It was in the autumn of 1851. 
 while on a journey, that Mr. Hanson, who had read of the claim for 
 Eleazer in The New York Courier and Enquirer, made his acquaint- 
 ance.-'^* Through Mr. Hanson's energetic espousal Eleazer was con- 
 verttd from a secret, surreptitious pretender into an open declarator 
 of his roj-al position. Under Mr. Hanson's tuition he became a genu- 
 ine monarch, issued manifestos, signed L. C. to his documents, re- 
 
 294. Huntoou's Eleazer Williams, 259. 
 
 29.5. Before leaving Wi.sconsin Eleazer Icit wiili Mrs. Daniel Brown of Sheboygan 
 a paintinfr to be kept by ber until he should ordfr it sent to lii:ii. He e'aimeJ it was 
 a picture of Louis XVI. and Mrs. Brown says there is a strong likeness between thi' 
 face in the painting and that of Eleazer Williams. The picture is now owned by Mrs. 
 Brown's daughter, Mrs. I. H. Jones of Shebo.vgan. Mrs. Brown, who was born August 
 22, 1809, is still living. Letter from Mrs. Brown. May 12, 1896; Wight's The Old 
 White Church, 9. 
 
 29G. Kobcrtson's The L;ist of the Bourlnm Slory. 98. 
 
 297. Ihintnon's Kleazcr Williams, 260. 
 
 20S. Hanson's Tlie Lost I'liufe, MO.
 
 188 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 ceived notes phrased Your Most Gracious Majesty-^'' and promised 
 his friends passage to France in a national ship when he should ob- 
 tain his own."*'*^ 
 
 T have said that at first Eleazer was a secret pretender. I mean that 
 the first obtrusion of himself as a dauphin was in private ways, by per- 
 sonal interview, by anonymous letter, by fictitious signature. In- 
 stances (ji his NK'thod h.'ae i ctn given. Instances fvrther follow: D- 
 Vinton writes that in August, 1844, while he and Eleazer were in the 
 parlor of the residence of Mrs. O. H. Perry at Newport, the writer's 
 attention was attraced by the gesticulations and other antics of Eleazer 
 who was examining a volume of engravings and accidentally came 
 upon a print of Simon, the dauphin's cruel jailer in the Temple. Dr. 
 Vinton says, "I saw Williams sitting upright and stiff in his chair, his 
 eyes fixed and wide open, his hands clenched on the table, his whole 
 frame shaking and trembling as if paralysis had seized him. . . Point- 
 ing to the wood-cut he said, 'That image has haunted me day and night, 
 as long as I can remember. 'Tis the horrid vision of my dreams; what 
 is it? Who is it?' " The leaf was turned and Simon's name was on the 
 reverse. ^•'^ From this incident those who did homage to Eleazer drew 
 sure conclusions; but I have no doubt the scene was a very clever bit 
 of play and if Dr. Vinton is not mistaken in the year, Eleazer was en- 
 gaged longer than has been believed in working up his imposture. It 
 should be added that Eleazer is credited with the same theatrical piece 
 of acting about six years later at the residence of Professor Day of 
 Northampton — there was another picture of Simon, Eleazer greatly 
 excited, and the ejaculation "Good God, I know that face, it has 
 haunted me through life-''^**- I have no doubt that if the matter could 
 be thoroughly ferreted, it would be found that the half-breeds Skenon- 
 dogh and Eleazer arranged the story and provided for the affidavit 
 which was taken so formally on June 14, 1853, in which Skenondogh 
 is made to swear that he was present at Ticonderoga in 1795 when 
 two Frenchmen delivered an imbecile and sickly boy to Thomas Wil- 
 liams and that Eleazer was that boy.°*>' The story of the taking of the 
 affidavit and of the actions of Eleazer — for by a curious coincidence he 
 happened to be in New York at the time — before the notary, all display 
 the artful and cunning methods of an artful and cunning man."*** 
 
 Another way in which he brought himself into notice by the under- 
 
 21)!). Kobertsoh"s The Last of tlie Bourbon Story, l'\itn;mi"s. II, n. s., !)S». 
 
 .•iiH>. L«ttei-, April 6, 1896, from George Sheldon of DeerfielJ. Mass. 
 
 .■JOl. Vinton's Louis XVII. find Eleazer Williams, Putnam's II, n. s. Z'AX. 
 
 3C"J. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 354; Hanson's Have We a Bourbon Among- Us? 
 
 I'utnam's, I, 209; Huntoon's Eleazer Williams, 203. 
 
 303. Hanson's The I.«st Prince. 177, 405. 
 
 304. Vinton's Louis XVII. and EIeaz"r Williams, I'utiiam's, II. n. s. 336.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 189 
 
 ground plan is exhibited by the following letter written under a false 
 name to a Mr. Reed of Buffalo in August, 1850: 
 
 It so bappened that I was at the Eagle Hotel in I'liiladelphia when yiu and 
 Mr. Williams (the dauphin of France) were there. Curiusity, as well as havin;; taken 
 an interest in the history of the unfortunate Prince, has led me tj addrcs; yoa an I 
 ask you to have the goodness to inform me if you are in possession of any historical 
 facts in relation to this wonderful man. 
 
 Aonther instance of the same kind a little earlier in time: There 
 appeared in the United States Magazine and Democratic Review for 
 Jul3% 1849, what seemed to be an anonymous review of a book entitled 
 History of the Dauphin, Son of Louis the Sixteenth of France, by 
 H. B. Eh^, or as given in the Table of Contents, N. B. Ely. The 
 review includes quite an account of Eleazer Williams and the different 
 proofs of his royal extraction and is so much in the style of Eleazer 
 that Mr. Robertson was fully justified in suspecting his authorship. 
 When it is added that no such book ever existed as Mr. Ely purported 
 to review and that no such man as H. B. Ely or N. B. Ely ever again 
 arose during the Williams controversy, although sought for and asked 
 to present himself, enough has been said to expose the guileful Indian 
 hand of the hero of this paper.^^os 
 
 The Bellanger incident was a fiction of Colonel Henry E. East- 
 man of Green Bay. In or after 1847, Colonel Eastman, a lawyer and a 
 prominent citizen, was an intimate and confidential friend of Eleazer 
 Williams. Interested in French history and in the decay of Bourbon 
 power Colonel Eastman wrote a romance based on the misfortunes 
 of young Louis and made Eleazer Williams the chief character. The 
 manuscripts from time to time were loaned to him to read at his 
 leisure. Unknown to the author the parts were copied and returned. 
 An account of the death in New Orleans of the faithful adherent. Bel- 
 langer, who had brought the dauphin to America and placed him in 
 the charge of Thomas Williams, was one of the features of this ro- 
 mance, as it is one of the features of Mr. Hanson's romance. ^^"^ 
 To the amazement of Colonel Eastman, his story with the 
 addition of some affidavits and other special proofs, not necessary to 
 his imaginary tale, appeared in Putnam's Magamne. Of course Elea- 
 zer's Journal contained the matter, of course it was exhibited to Mr. 
 Hanson and is quoted from at length.'"'^ The information of the 
 
 305. Robertson's The Last of the Bourbon Stoiy, Putnam's, 11. n. s. OS. 
 
 306. Smith's Eleazer Williams, Wis. Hist. Ck)ll. VI. 337. Colonel Eastman his 
 bc-fu mayor of Green Bay and was lieutenant-colonel of thL- Second Wiseondn cavalry 
 from November, 1861, until July, 1SG4. His statements as t. this lomanet' are in part 
 confirmed by the recollection of Senator Timothy i >. Howe .if Wise iiisin and in great 
 laeasure by the recollection of Colonel James II. Hkwc ol" Chiiago. 
 
 307. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 378. The journal is dated Marcli 10, 1S4S. Mr. 
 Uobertson found two editions of the journal of this date, exhibiting Impotant differ- 
 ences. Robertson's The I-ist of the Bourbnn Story, Putnam's, II. n. s. 96.
 
 190 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 death of Bellanger was conveyed to Eleazer, the Journal states, by 
 letter from Thomas Kimball of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The name 
 of Mr. Kimball does not appear again in Eleazer's Journal, the orig- 
 inal Kimball letter was never produced for inspection and Mr. Han- 
 son, although he went to New Orleans and secured some very incon- 
 sequential affidavits, was obliged to confess that he could find no trace 
 of Bellanger.sos 
 
 In 1853 in Februar}^ Mr. Hanson published in the second number 
 of I'litnam's Magazine the sensational paper, Have Wc a Bourbon 
 Among Us? which is said to have added twenty thousand names to 
 the subscription list of that magazine. ^o'* Immediately upon the arrival 
 of the article in England, appeared the prince de Joinville's emphatic 
 denial of its most salient feature, and Le Ray de Chaumont's correc- 
 tion of Hanson so far as the latter had mentioned his father. As 
 soon as the first article appeared attention was directed where nat- 
 urally Eleazer's attention ought to have been first directed — to his 
 mother, Mary Ann Williams. Of course much excitement was aroused 
 and of course much agitation would find its way to, and afifect, the 
 aged mother. On March 28, 1853, an affidavit in English, prepared 
 by Father Marcoux, was presented to and executed by her. In plain 
 language she established for herself the doubtful honor of being Elea- 
 zer Williams' mother— thus confirming the statement which she had 
 made to de Lorimier in 1851 and confirming the oath of Eleazer Wil- 
 liams himself in January, 1850. As this affidavit was widely published 
 and was a death blow to Eleazer's claims there was need to counteract 
 it. This was attempted by means of an affidavit in Iroquois sworn to 
 by Mary Ann Williams on July 8, 1853. As I do not rest my judgment 
 concerning Eleazer's claims upon either of these affidavits I do not 
 deem it necessary to publish them.^io As to the latter, however, I 
 wish to make two or three observations. 
 
 I. So far as the afifiant had aught to do with it, it is the work of 
 a person considerably over ninety years of age who was so distracted 
 by the opponents and adherents of her son that she lost what little 
 strength of intellect a monagenarian might have otherwise had. This 
 remark applies though in less degree to the affidavit of March 28, 1853. 
 
 II. The affidavit of July 8, 1853, was written by the person most 
 interested in its contents — Eleazer Williams. This is proved by the 
 fact that the original draft of the document in his handwriting with 
 erasures and interlineations and showing how gradually it was built 
 up, was found among his papers after his deatli. and by the furtlier 
 
 308. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 430. 
 
 309. Huntoon's Kleazer Wiliiairi', 25:2. Si'c Kd tur's Easy (liar. lapr-. 
 .Tunu. 1882, 148. 
 
 310. They are printed in Hanson's The Lnst Prime. 432, 4.^5, and in SniUis 
 Eleazer Williams. Wis. Hist. Coll. VI. .'JlT. 321.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. I'Ji 
 
 fact that the document contains those improvements in the Iroquois 
 language which Eleazer had many years before invented. ^^^ Eleazer 
 must therefore stand convicted of preparing for the signature and oath 
 of his feeble and distracted mother a document which involved what he 
 knew was a falsehood, a document "indicating an apparent purpose 
 to steal the desired avowal of his adoption from his mother without 
 making too broad an issue." Notwithstanding the duress of her son's 
 presence when she executed the instrument she evinced surprise that 
 he should claim to be any other than her own son and, in tlie opinion 
 of the justice who took her oath, did not know the meaning of the 
 word adopted which Eleazer had inserted after his name, and did not 
 intend to say what she was made to say."^- 
 
 III. This affidavit, written in Iroquois, was translated into Eng- 
 lish and Mr. Hanson corrected the translation. ^^^ What shall be said 
 of this affidavit as speaking the sentiment of Mary Ann Williams, 
 when we reflect that it was signed by the mark of a woman close on 
 to one hundred years of age, that it was prepared in Iroquois by an 
 unscrupulous and scheming man interested in upholding a petty noto- 
 riety and that its translation was corrected by that unscrupulous 
 schemer's most ardent and indefatigable lieutenant? And yet not- 
 withstanding this Eleazer did not dare formulate such language as 
 would make his mother deliberately deny her child, but by indirec- 
 tion, by insertion of the word "adopted" in two places and by denial 
 of unimportant details he concocted a document which has not helped 
 his case in any particular but exposes him, and I fear, Mr. Hanson, 
 to great odium. 
 
 One more incident in Eleazer's life before his leaving it: Frequent 
 mention has been made of the attempts to secure from the government 
 indemnity for the losses sustained by Thomas Williams in the war of 
 1812. Not until the death of Thomas and his widow was the proper 
 reparation made. And in doing this justice the government has also 
 done justice to the truth of history. On April 17, 1858, the House 
 Committee on Military Afifairs reported on the claim of "Eleazer Wil- 
 liams, heir of Thomas Williams," finding the latter's distinguished 
 and unrecompensed military services and his great pecuniary sacrifices. 
 They found also his death and tlie death of his widow and then 
 found that she left "as her sole heir and devisee her son, the Rev. 
 Eleazer Williams, who is likewise the sole surviving son and heir of the 
 said Thomas Williams." Representative Pendleton of Ohio, an acute 
 and sagacious lawyer, reported these findings and that they were 
 "abundantly pro\'en by the evidence."-'^' And stj, within ti\-e iinHiths 
 
 ail. Ellis' Kloii7.IT Willuinis. Wis. Hist. Cull. VIII. S.'jI). 
 
 .'{12. Roberlsdii's 'J'lie Last of the r.oiiibon Slory, Piitniun's, 11, 11 s. '.<-. 
 
 S1.3. Hanson's The Lost Prince, 4:^4. 
 
 .•'.14. Kcport No. ?.<)?,. 3.'tli Congress. First s. >>i,.ii.
 
 192 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 of his death, Eleazer Williams was "abundantly proven," by evidence 
 preserved in the archives at Washington, the son — not of Louis XVI., 
 the heir — not of France, but the son and heir of the Caughnawaga 
 Indians, Thomas and Mary Ann Williams, whose paternity for twenty 
 years he had disowned but whose heritage he did not hesitate to ac- 
 cept. 
 
 He died August 28, iSsS,^!-* in great poverty, suffering from want 
 of attention and from the necessaries of life."!*^ He had dwelt mostly 
 alone in a neat cottage erected by friends subsequent to the publications 
 which excited so general an interest in 1853. "His habits of domstic 
 economy were such as might under the circvunstances be alike ex- 
 pected in one reared as a prince or a savage; and his household pre- 
 sented an aspect of cheerless desolation without a mitigating ray of 
 comfort or a genial spark of home light. His neatly finished rooms 
 had neither carpets, curtains nor furniture save a scanty supply of 
 broken chairs and invalid tables; boxes filled with books, the gifts 
 of friends, lay stored away in corners; his dining-table, unmoved from 
 week to week and covered with the broken remains of former repasts 
 and his pantry and sleeping-room disordered and filthy, left upon the 
 visitor an oppressive feeling of homeless solitude that it was impos- 
 sible to efiface from the memory.''^!''' 
 
 The occupant of this ill-kept abode, his sk;in turned to a dark red 
 surely betokening his Indian descent,^!^ his family a thousand miles 
 away and wilfully deserted by himself, his hopes and ambitions turned 
 to decay and ashes, crept scant honored into a lonel)^ grave. His son 
 erected a monument to his memory. 
 
 It must have been observed that this paper has considered the 
 dauphin question in connection with Eleazer Williams entirely from the 
 American standpoint. Granted that certain actions of the French revo- 
 lutionary government in 1795, granted that certain actions of the 
 restored Bourbon kings, indicated a doubt of the death of young Louis 
 in the Temple; granted that the frail child did not, as a matter of 
 history, die in 1795, that his escape was accomplished, that he received 
 safe asylum in Italy, in England, in America even, yet still Eleazer 
 Williams was not he. Hervagault. Persat, Fontolive, Mathurin-Bru- 
 
 315. Register XIII, 95; Evans' Story of Lmis XVII, 90; Smith's Eloazer Will- 
 iams, Wis. Hist. Coll. VI, 337; Egeland's Dauphin in Green Bay, Door County Advo- 
 cate, December 22, 1894; Huntoon's Eleazer Williams, 26S. Mrs. Williams' Diary 
 however malies the date four days earlier: "August 24, 1858, Mr. Williams died." 
 As she was not with him at his death and the entry was evidently made somewhat 
 later than the event I am inclined to accept the date in the text. 
 
 316. An account of his funeral is in Huntoon's Eleazer Williams, 268. 
 
 317. Williams' Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, Introduction, page 13. 
 
 318. Letter, May 2, 1896, of Edward H.' Williams, Jr.; Butler's Tlie Story of 
 Louis XVII., The Nation, May 31, 1894, 417.
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 193 
 
 neau, Ojardais, Meves, Richemont, Naundorff, any one of the brood 
 of Bourbonic upstarts, had better reason to be identified as that 
 escaped scion of unhappy majesty than the half-breed Iroquois whose 
 lines have fallen unto us in this paper, who was born more than 
 three years later than Louis, at a place removed three thousand miles 
 from the rock of Louis' cradle, of a parentage not Capetian and Aus- 
 trian, but Mohawk and Massachusetts, who never heard the eastern 
 wash of the Atlantic waves and who never elbowed royalty save on Lake 
 Michigan and at Green Bay. 
 
 It must also have been observed that this paper, although brought 
 into late being as a consequence of The Story of Louis Xl'H. of 
 France has made but scant mention of that effort. Purposely so. 
 Notwithstanding the author's advertisement that her volume is a 
 "new solution of a historical mystery", notwithstanding the compli- 
 ment of Professor Andrew D. White, ex-minister of the United States 
 to Russia, that the book is "beautiful and interesting" and "must take 
 the leading place in the literature of the subject" and that "it makes out 
 a strong case"^'^ one cannot avoid wondering whether the author de- 
 sires to be taken seriously, whether she does not intend a huge gro- 
 tesque. But admitting the grave purpose,320 this must be said: In the 
 pages devoted to Eleazer Williams there is little that has not been 
 condensed, errors and all, from The Lost Prince; the book abun- 
 dantly deserves the characterization of The Athenaeum, "exceptionally 
 tedious and ill-written compilation" ;32i that portion relating to Eleazer 
 Williams overflows with statements for which no proof is ten- 
 dered, overflows with statements for which no proof can be ten- 
 dered. Two or three specimens of the inaccuracies must be pre- 
 sented: Mrs. Evans states that Thomas Williams' mother was stolen 
 by the Indians from Deerfield in 1704^22 — Thomas Williams' mother 
 was not born until after 1714.323. Again, it is related that certain 
 French travelers visited in 1794 in Stockbridge "Mr. Williams, a man 
 of social and political importance, founder of Williams College. ''"2+ 
 The founder of Williams College, Colonel Ephraim Williams, died Sep- 
 tember 8, 1755,-^-^ nearly forty years before the Frenchmen visited 
 Stockbridge. Mrs. Evans may be excused for this error, for she bor- 
 rowed it from Mr. Hanson. ^20 Onfce more: the world is gravely in- 
 formed that the prince de Joinville was "the eldest son of King Louis 
 
 319. Advertisement in The Athenaeum, Feb. 3, 1S94. 
 
 320. Tlie Atlantic Monthly (June 1S94, S52) seem.s to think her serious. 
 
 321. The Athenaeum No. 3458, February 3, 1894. p. 142. 
 
 322. Page 15. 
 
 323. Thomas Williams' mother's mother was b>it eivrlit years oM in 1704. Will- 
 iams' Robert W'illiams, 15. 
 
 .*?24. Evans' Story of Louis XVII, 41, 42. 
 
 325. Everett's Address, Orations and Speeches. II. 231. 
 
 320. Hanson's Have Wo a Bourbon Among Us? Putnam's, I, 211.
 
 194 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 Philippe," and that when he arrived in America in 1841 "one of his 
 first enquiries was whether a man named Eleazer Williams was living 
 among the Indians of Northern New York.''^^^ These two clauses rest 
 on equal authority, the latter on Eleazer Williamsons ^nd the former 
 on nothing. Surely Mrs. Evans should have known that while she was 
 writing her book in England a son of Louis Philippe, elder than de 
 Joinville, was then living in Europe. The due de Nemours, the sec- 
 ond son of Louis Philippe died aged eighty-one years June 25, 1896.2-" 
 Let us read together IMacaulay's criticism of Mr. Croker: "We 
 do not suspect him of intentionally falsifying history. But of this high 
 literary misdemeanor we do without hesitation accuse him — that he 
 has no adequate sense of the obligation which a writer, who professes 
 to relate facts, owes to the public. We accuse him of a negligence and 
 an ignorance analogous to that crassa negligciitia and that crassa 
 ignorantia on which the law animadverts in magistrates and surgeons 
 even when malice and corruption are not imputed. We accuse him of 
 having undertaken a work which, if not performed with strict accuracy, 
 must be very much worse than useless, and of having performed it as 
 if the difference between an accurate and an inaccurate statement was 
 
 not worth the trouble of looking into the most common book of refer- 
 ence."33o 
 
 It is difficult accurately to characterize the Rev. Mr. Hanson in his 
 capacity as the defender and promoter of Eleazer Williams and his 
 claims. As the grand nephew of Oliver Goldsmith33i \^q j^jjy jjg ex- 
 cused if he was credulous and simple-minded. But so much imposi- 
 tion was practiced by Eleazer Williams, so many marvelous tales he 
 related, so many documents he boasted of but never exhibited, so many 
 discrepancies are palpable in his journals, so many statements unsub- 
 stantiated, that I wonder the uttermost extreme of gullibility did not 
 become suspicious. That Mr. Hanson was an enthusiastic and loj^al 
 advocate; that he wrote vigorous, elegant and exciting English; that 
 his enthusiasm became contagious, producing adherents who are still 
 believers; that he infected other reputable ministers whose arguments 
 and evidence were superficially powerful — all these things are admitted. 
 Whether Mr. Hanson's investigations and probings left him still in 
 
 his heart a believer in the statements set out in TJie Lost Prince, 
 whether at his death^ss three years after the book was printed he 
 
 327. Evans' Story of Louis XVII, 32. 
 
 328. Hanson's Have We a Bourbon Among Us? Putnam's I, 196; Hansons 
 The Lost Prince, 339. 
 
 329. Review of Reviews, August, 1890. 152. 
 
 330. See Macaulay's Critical and Miscellaneous Essays, II, 18, (New Tort, 1878) 
 
 331. Putnam's, II. n. s., 127, for July, 1868. 
 
 332. Mr. Hanson died 1857; Mr. Colton died March 13, 1857; Dr. Hawks died 
 September 26, 1866 and Dr. Vinton died September 29, 1872; Rev. Charles F. Rob- 
 ertson, who was consecrated bishop of Missouri October 25, 1838. died May 1, 1886
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 195 
 
 looked back with satisfaction and self-approval upon his volume, I 
 have no means of knowing. Certain it is, however, that in his writings 
 on the subject now in hand Mr. Hanson was often intemperate and not 
 always fair. Notice in his attack upon Dr. S. W. Williams, the fol- 
 lowing^, italics and quotation marks included i^^" 
 
 But Dr. Williams contradicts himself iu a manner which shows how little 
 reliance can be placed on any of his recollections. On p. 1743.34 we are told by him 
 Mr. Williams never made the ' most ilistnut nllusion" to "his ever having liaU an 
 interview with the Prince de Joinville;" and lo! on p. 177 we read, " He trpquenti.- 
 told me and my family that thin visit fro n the Prince was in consequence of liis 
 relationsbii) to bis irjfr. and that he received his presenis from the sams cans ■. 
 His stories here were much at variance with those in the magazine." I w< nder with 
 what Dr. Williams' stories are at variance. 
 
 It is not to the credit of Mr. Hanson, btit it is strict justice to the 
 memory of Dr. S. W. Williams — a most exemplary and truthful man^^'' 
 — to write that the former has deliberately misquoted the latter. On 
 page 174 Dr. Williams is recording a single interview with Eleazer 
 Williams — the interview in 1846 in which the latter gave Dr. Williams 
 the genealogical particulars quoted in this paper — and Dr. Williams 
 states that at that interview Eleazer gave him the "notice of his family, 
 without ever making the most distant allusion to his royal descent or 
 to his ever having had an interview with de Joinville." This is not 
 
 contradictory of page 177 — Dr. Williams was to careful to make such 
 an error. Mr. Hanson was not fair to accuse him of it.^'-'"' 
 
 This is btit one instance — ex itno discc omnes. I am constrained 
 to believe that in his loyalty to the royal pretensions of Eleazer Wil- 
 liams, in his pettish, even angry, hostility to opposing views, in his 
 surendering the calm historical judicial sense to the acrimoniotisness 
 of the advocate, 33" Mr. Hanson became uncandid and disingenuous. 
 From that criticism his method cannot escape; while, with a full 
 knowledge of Eleazer Williams, his character, his disposition, his 
 racial propensities, The Lost Prince with its formidable array of 
 emptv statements can be pricked and proven a vain bubble. 
 
 WILLIAM WARD WIGHT. 
 
 333. Hanson's The Ixist Prince, 442. 
 
 334. Of Dr. Williams' edition of The Redeemed Captive. 
 
 335. See his life and character in Huntington's S. W. Williams, II, 389. 
 
 336. Mrs. Evans is guilty of lilio unfairness, Story of Louis XVII., S5. 
 
 337. For a like charge against Mr. Hanson see Simms' Iroquois Bourbon, South- 
 ern Quarterly Review, July, 1853, page 133.
 
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 Boston 1891. 
 
 82. New York. Documentary History of. Edited by E. B. O'Callagban, M. D., 
 
 4 V. Albany 1849-1851. 
 
 83. New York. Documents relating to the colonial history of the state of. Elited 
 
 by E. B. O'Callagban, M. D. 10 v. Albany 185B-lSr>8. 
 
 84. Noble, Mark. Memoirs of the Protectoral Hcmse of Cromwell. 2\'. Birming- 
 
 ham, 1787. 
 
 85. O'Brien, Anna I. Account of Eleazer Williams. In Chicago Times. September 
 
 18, 1886, and under title "The Mystery of Life," in Yenowine's News,. 
 September 19, 1886. 
 
 86. Parkman, Francis. A Half-Century of Conflict, 2 v. Boston 1894. 
 
 87. Parkman, Francis. Montcalm and Wolfe, 2 v. Bnston 1894. 
 
 88. Parkman, Francis. The Old Regime in Canada. Boston 1.S94. 
 
 89. Penhallow, Samuel. History of the Wars of New England With the Eastern 
 
 Indians. Philadelphia, 1859,
 
 HIS FORERUNNERS, HIMSELF. 199 
 
 i)0. I'ocimituck Valley Memorial Associutiun. History aud Proceedings. Vol. 1. 
 1800. 
 
 91. Putnam's Magazine. Editorial. July, 18(18. Vol. II. n. s. VM. 
 
 92. Ram, James. A Treatise on Facts. 4tli Am. Edition. New York, 1890. 
 
 93. Raper, Sir Robert, Secretaiy of the lllsliup of Cbicl. ester, Kn-laml. Liller. 
 
 May 18, 1S9G. 
 
 94. Relations des JCsuites. L'un IGSti. Vul. I. Qiiebfc, li^-SS. 
 
 95. Review of Reviews, New York, Aiiyiisi, 189G. i)agL- 152. 
 
 90. Robertson, Charles F. The Last of the Ilouibon Story. In I'm nam's Ma;;- 
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 97. .Scribner's Monthly Magazine. February, 1895, p. 247. ".Soiuo OUl Letleis." 
 
 98. Senate Reiwrt, No. 311, 31st Congress, Second Session. Made I-'ebruary 
 
 20, 1851, by John P. Hale. 
 
 99. Sergeant, Johu, Stoekbridge. Letter. O t< ber 24, 1743. 
 
 100. Shea, John G. Letter on Elea/.er Williams. In American H storical Rec- 
 
 ord, July, 1872, 300. 
 
 101. Sheldon, George. History of Deerfield, 103ti-188G. 2v. 1895-6. 
 
 102. Sheldon, George, Deerlield. Letter, April 6, 1896. 
 
 103. Sibley, John Langdon. Biographical Sketches of (iraduitos of Harvard 
 
 University. 3 v. Cambridge, 1S8.">. 
 
 104. Sigourney, Lydia Huntley. The Bell of St. Rej;is. 
 
 105. Simms, William G. The Iroquois Bourb: u. In Southein Quarterly Review. 
 
 July, 1853, 141. 
 
 106. Smith, John Y. Eleazer Williams and Ihe Lost Prince. I" Wisconsin His- 
 
 torical Collections, VI. 308. 
 
 107. Stoddard, Johu. Journal. In Register. V. 26. 
 
 lOS. Storrs, Richard S., Ix)ugmeadow. Letter, April 6, 1811. 
 
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 110. Sutherland, James. Early Wisconsin E.\ploration and Sett:en;ent. In Wis- 
 
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 111. Tanguay, Cyprien. Dictioiinaire GeniaUi^iiii e i!es Fam lie . Ca a.inats 
 
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 1886-1890. 
 
 112. Trowbridge, Charles C. Note on Eleazer Williams. In Wisconsin Historical 
 
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 113. Van Rensselaer, Cortlandt. Historical Discourse of tlio Battle of Lake 
 
 George, 1755. Philadelphia, 1856. 
 
 114. Vinton, Francis. Louis XVII. aud Eleazi r Willi. ims, Were They Really 
 
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 115. Ward, Andrew H. Genealogical History of the Rice Family. Bjsto'i, 185S. 
 
 116. Waterman, T. A. The Lust Prince. In Cliicago Inter-( icean. Febiuav,\ 6, 1.S95. 
 
 117. Wliarlon, Francis and Slille. Alfied. Medical Jurspiud nee. 3 v. P.iil 
 
 adelphia, 1884. 
 
 118. Wheelock, Charles L. Milwaukee. Interview. May. 1.S90. 
 
 119. Wliitford, William ('. Early Educatinn in 'niscorisin. In Wisconsin His 
 
 torical Collections, V. 321. 
 
 120. Whitford, William C. History of Scliool Superc isi. n in Wiscmsln. In 
 
 Wisconsin Historical Collections, V. 352. 
 
 121. Whittlesey, Charles. Recollections of a Tour Thmugli Wiseonsln in 1812. 
 
 In Wisconsin Historical Collections. I. 04. 
 
 122. Wight, William W. The Old White Clmrcli. Milwaukee, 1894. 
 
 123. Wilder, Alexander. Tlie Bourbon Who Never Reigned. In The Knlckcrliocker, 
 
 November, 1858, LIL, 441. 
 
 124. Williams, Edward H. jr. Eleazer Williams. In The Natl.n, Vol. ."S, No. 
 
 1511. June 14. 1894. 446.
 
 200 
 
 ELEAZER WILLIAMS. 
 
 125. Williams, Edward H. jr. Hobert Williams (f Boxbiiry, Mass.. ;in I lii-; 
 
 Descendants. With addenda. Newport, R. I., 1891. 
 
 126. Williams, Edward H. jr., Betlilehem, Pennsylvania. I<etters April C. 1.'., 
 
 15, 20, May 2, 8, 11, 15, 1896. 
 
 127. Williams, Eleazer. Life of Te-ho-ra-gwa-ne-gen, Alias Tliomas Williams. 
 
 With Introduction and Notes by Franklin B. Hougli. Alban.v, 1859. 
 
 128. Williams, Eleazer. Two Homilies: The Salvation of Sinners Through 
 
 Riches of Divine Grace. Delivered August 8, 1841, in the Audience of 
 the Oneida Indians at Their Eighth Triennial Aniiiver-ary Snre tl;e 
 Conversion of 600 Pagans of That Tribe to the Cliristian Faith. With 
 Appendix. Green Bay, 1842. 
 
 129. Williams, John. The Redeemed Captive Returning to Zion. Added by S. 
 
 W. Williams: Biography of tlie Authnr. -Appendix and No es. North- 
 ampton, 1853. 
 
 130. Williams, Madelaiue H. Manuscript Diary. 
 
 131. Williams, Stephen W. The Genealogy and History of the Family of Wil- 
 liauis in America. Greenfield, 1847. 
 
 132. Winsor, Justin. Cartier to Frontenac. Boston and New Ynrk, 1894. 
 
 133. Winsor, Justin, Editor. Narrative and Critical History of North Americi. 
 
 Vols. IV., v., Boston and New York, n. d. 
 
 134. World, The. New York. September 19, 1867. 
 
 135. Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Jvne 1882, page 14S. 
 
 136. Seneca Nation of Indians v. Ohrisly, 49 Hiin 524; 121 N, Y. 122, 162 U. S. 
 
 283. 
 
 137. Tucker, The Rev. W. J., D. D., Ham.ver, N. H. Letter, August 2.j, 18;)6. 
 
 APPENDIX II. 
 
 Children of the Rev. John and Eunice (Mather) Williams. 
 
 Name. 
 
 Date of Birth 
 
 Eleazer 
 
 Samuel 
 
 Esther 
 
 Stephen 
 
 El.iakim 
 
 Eunice 
 
 John 
 
 Warham 
 
 Jemima 
 
 Jerusha 
 
 Jerusha 
 
 July 16, 1688 
 I January 24, 1690 
 I April 10, 1691 
 [May 14, 1693 
 
 May 1, 1695 
 
 September 17, 1696 
 
 January 19, 1698 
 [September 16, 1699 
 
 September 3, 1701 
 : September 3, 1701 
 I January 15, 1704 
 
 Date of Death 
 
 Remarks 
 
 September 21, 1742 
 June 30, 1713 
 March 12, 1751 
 June 10, 1782 
 April 15. 1696 
 
 1786 
 February 29, 1704 
 June 22, 1751 
 September 11, 1701 
 September 16, 1701 
 February 29, 1704 
 
 Minister at Mansfield, Conn. 
 Town clerk of Deerfield 
 Wife of Rev. Joseph Meacham 
 Minister at Longmeadow 66 years 
 
 Captive at Caughnawaga 
 Killed at the massacre 
 Minister at Waltham 
 
 Killed at the massacre
 
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 APPENDIX IV. 
 
 THE BELL. OK ST. REGIS, 
 by 
 
 Lydia Huntlry Slgoiirney. 
 
 The red men came in their pride and wrath, 
 
 Deep vengeance fired their eye, 
 And the blood of the white was in their path, 
 
 And the iJame fiora his roof rose high. 
 
 Then down from the burning chiirch they tore 
 
 The bell of tuneful sound. 
 And on with their captive train they bore 
 That wonderful thing to thoir nativ" shor.-, 
 
 The rude Canadian bound. 
 
 But now and then, with a fearful tone, 
 
 It struck on their startled ear,— 
 And sad it was, mid the mountains lone. 
 Or the ruined tempest's muttered moiin. 
 
 That terrible voice to hear. 
 
 It seemed like the question that stirs the soul 
 
 Of its secret good or ill, 
 And they quaked as its stein and solemn toll 
 
 Re-echoed from rock to hill. 
 
 And they started up in their broken dream, 
 
 Mid the lonely forest sliade, 
 And thought that they lieard tlie dying scream, 
 And saw the blood of slaughter stream 
 
 Afresh through the village gl.-tde. 
 
 Then they sat in council, tliose chieftains old, 
 
 And a mighty pit was made, 
 Where the lake with its silver waters rolled 
 They buried that bell 'ueath the verdant m mid, 
 
 And crossed themselves and prayed. 
 
 And there till a stately pow-wow came 
 
 It slept in its tomb forgot; 
 With a mantle of fur, and a brow of flame, 
 
 He stood on that burial siiot:
 
 KLEAZER WILLIAMS. 'lOW 
 
 Tbey wheeled the dame with its myiitic round 
 
 At the stormy midnight liour, 
 .Vnd a dead nuin's hand on his breast he bound, 
 And invoked, ere he hrolvo that awful s;runnd, 
 
 The demiins oC pride and iiowcr. 
 
 Thou he raised the bell, with a nameless rite. 
 
 Which none but himself might tell, 
 In blanket and buar-skin he bound it tij-'ht, 
 And it journeyed in silence both day and iiijjht, 
 
 So strong was tliat magic spell. 
 
 It spake no more, till St. Regis' tower 
 
 In northern skies appeared. 
 And their Icgend.s extol that pow-wow's power 
 Which lulled that knell like the poipy fl iwer. 
 As conscience now slumbereth a little hour 
 
 In the cell of a heart that's seared.
 
 PARKMAN CLUB PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 No. 1. 
 
 No. 2. 
 
 No. 3. 
 
 No. 4. 
 
 No. 5. 
 
 No. 6. 
 
 Nicholas Perrot; a Study in Wisconsin History. By Gardner P. 
 
 Stickney, Milwaukee, 1895. 16 pp.. paper; 8to. 
 Exploration of Lake Superior; the Voyages of Radisson and Groseil- 
 
 liers. By Henry C. Campbell, Milwaukee, 1896. 22 pp., parser ; 8vo. 
 
 Chevalier Henry de Tonty ; His Exploits in the Valley of the Missis- 
 sippi. By Henry E. Legler, Milwaukee, 1896. 22 pp.. paper; 8vo. 
 
 The Aborigines of the Northwest; a Glance into the Eemote Past. 
 By Frank T. Terry. Milwaukee, 1896. 14 pp., paper; Svo. 
 
 Jonathan Carver ; His Travels in the Northwest in 1766-8. By .John 
 G.Gregory. Milwaukee, 1896. 28 pp., 1 plate, 1 map, paper; Svo. 
 
 Negro Slavery in Wisconsin. By John N. Davidson. Milwaukee, 
 1896, 28 pp., paper; Svo. 
 
 IN PRESS. 
 
 Wisconsin's First Settler. 
 
 By Montgomery E. 
 
 No. 8. Charles Langlade, 
 
 Mcintosh. 
 No. 9. The German Voter in Wisconsin Politics. By Ernest Bruncken. This 
 
 paper wilV cover the period preceding the organization of the 
 
 Republican party. 
 
 ITi F'RECF'ARATION. 
 
 Bostwick, M. M. — Ancient Copper Miners of Lake Superior. 
 
 BruEcken, Ernest— The German Voter iu Wisconsin Politics. This paper 
 will include the period of the civil war. 
 
 Campbell, Henry Colin— Mennrd, the Jesuit. Migrations of the Hurous. 
 
 Davidson, Eev, John Nels n — Beginnitgs of Highar Education in 
 Wisconsin. 
 
 Gregory, John G.— Suffrage in Wisconsin. 
 
 Kelly, Frederick W. — Local Government in Wisconsin. 
 
 La Boule, Eev. Joseph S.— Allouez, the Father of Wisconsin Missions. 
 
 Legler, Henry E.— Mormons in Wisconsin. 
 
 Mcintosh, Montgomery E. — Co-operative Communities in Wiscouvsin. 
 
 Miller, Frank H. — Polanders in Wisconsin. 
 
 Starkey, Dan B. — Wisconsin and tho Revolutionary Epoch. 
 
 Stickney, Gardner P.— Certain Vegetable Food Products of V»'isconsin 
 and Their Bearing upon Indian Life. 
 
 Terry, Frank T. — Wisconsin Aborigines. 
 
 Wight, William Ward— Joshua Glover, the Fugitive Slave. 
 
 Publication Committee.- Taenry Colin Campbell, Henry E. Legler and 
 John G. Gregory. . 
 
 The Parkman Club was f)iganized Dec. 10th, 1895, for study of the history 
 of the Northwest. Its publications are printed for private distribution by 
 the members of the club. A limited number of copies of each paper is set 
 aside for sale and exchange. Single copies are sold at the uniform price of 
 25 cents, and the annual subscription (10 numbers) is placed at $1,50. 
 Correspondence may be addressed, 
 
 Gabdnee p. StickneT: Secretary, 
 
 427 Bradford Street, Milwaukee, Wis. 
 
 I ' 
 
 UNI^- 
 
 ; CALIFORNM' 
 
 LOS ANGELES 
 LIBRARY
 
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