Brant, Joseph (Thayendanegea) (1743?-1807)

Joseph Brant (Thayendanegea) (1743?-1807)

Mohawk tribal leader

Sources

Family Connections. Named Thayendanegea (“He Places Together Two Bets”) by his people, Joseph Brant was born into a prominent Mohawk family on the New York frontier. His father was Tehonwaghkwangeraghkwa, or Nickus Brant, while his grandfather was Sagayeeanquarashtow, one of the four native “kings” who visited London in the early eighteenth century. Molly, his older sister, was the influential consort of the wealthy landowner and merchant Sir William Johnson, superintendent of the Northern District for Indian Affairs. Brant married Margaret, the daughter of the Oneida leader Skenandon. When she died he wed her sister, Susana; when he was widowed a second time he married Catherine Croghan, the half-Mohawk daughter of Col. George Croghan, an interpreter in the Indian Department.

Accomplishments. Joseph Brant is remembered as a military leader, a diplomat, and a linguist. Missionaries taught him how to write Mohawk, and in 1761 he was recruited by the Mohegan teacher Samson Occom to attend Eleazar Wheelock’s charity school in Lebanon, Connecticut. Brant attended the school for several terms and instructed white youths in the Mohawk language, emerging as a skilled interpreter. His formal education ended in 1763 when his sister Molly persuaded him to return home. Until 1775 he served Johnson as an aide and translator and informed him of American overtures for Iroquoian neutrality in the war between England and her colonies.

Ties with England. Brant visited London during the winter of 1775–1776. He apparently concluded from his visit that the British were the best protection for native peoples, who feared the rebellious Americans. During the Revolutionary War he helped keep the majority of Iroquois warriors in the royal camp, and he led several raids against the frontier settlements. Afterward Brant led some of the Mohawks into Canada along the Grand River, north of Lake Erie. While there he fused the roles of traditional Iroquois sachem and colonial lord of the manor. He and his family lived in a grand style, speaking English, wearing European clothes, and hosting elegant dinners served by well-dressed slaves. He encouraged missionary efforts and wrote Mohawk translations of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer and the Gospel of Mark. During conflicts with the new American government in the 1790s he lost his influence among the western tribes and died on 24 November 1807.

Sources

Isabel Thompson Kelsay, Joseph Brant, 1743–1807: Man of Two Worlds (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1984);

James O’Donnell, “Joseph Brant,” in American Indian Leaders: Studies in Diversity, edited by R. David Edmunds (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1980), pp. 21–40.