A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary JemisonSeaver, James E. (James Everett)
History
A Narrative of the Life of Mrs. Mary Jemison
Seaver, James E. (James Everett)
Jemison, Mary, 1743-1833; Seneca Indians
"How, my daughter, (said she, addressing my sister,) how can you even
think of attending the feast and seeing the unspeakable torments that
those poor unfortunate prisoners must inevitably suffer from the
hands of our warriors? How can you stand and see them writhing in the
warriors' fire, in all the agonies of a slow, a lingering death?
"How can you think of enduring the sound of their groanings and prayers
to the Great Spirit for sudden deliverance from their enemies, or from
life? And how can you think of conducting to that melancholy spot your
poor sister Dickewamis, (meaning myself), who has so lately been a
prisoner, who has lost her parents and brothers by the hands of the
bloody warriors, and who has felt all the horrors of the loss of her
freedom, in lonesome captivity? Oh! how can you think of making her
bleed at the wounds which now are but partially healed? The recollection
of her former troubles would deprive us of Dickewamis, and she would
depart to the fields of the blessed, where fighting has ceased, and the
corn needs no tending--where hunting is easy, the forests delightful,
the summers are pleasant, and the winters are mild!--O! think once, my
daughter, how soon you may have a brave brother made prisoner in battle,
and sacrificed to feast the ambition of the enemies of his kindred, and
leave us to mourn for the loss of a friend, a son and a brother, whose
bow brought us venison, and supplied us with blankets!--Our task is
quite easy at home, and our business needs our attention. With war we
have nothing to do: our husbands and brothers are proud to defend us,
and their hearts beat with ardor to meet our proud foes. Oh! stay then,
my daughter; let our warriors alone perform on their victims their
customs of war!"
This speech of our mother had the desired effect; we stayed at home and
attended to our domestic concerns. The prisoners, however, were
executed by having their heads taken off, their bodies cut in pieces
and shockingly mangled, and then burnt to ashes!--They were burnt on the
north side of Fall-brook, directly opposite the town which was on the
south side, some time in the month of November, 1759.
I spent the winter comfortably, and as agreeably as I could have
expected to, in the absence of my kind husband. Spring at length
appeared, but Sheninjee was yet away; summer came on, but my husband
had not found me. Fearful forebodings haunted my imagination; yet I felt
confident that his affection for me was so great that if he was alive he
would follow me and I should again see him. In the course of the
summer, however, I received intelligence that soon after he left me at
Yiskahwana he was taken sick and died at Wiishto. This was a heavy and
an unexpected blow. I was now in my youthful days left a widow, with one
son, and entirely dependent on myself for his and my support. My mother
and her family gave me all the consolation in their power, and in a few
months nay grief wore off and I became contented.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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