by Henry Rowe Schoolcraft, 1793-1864.

See previous entry: Logan, Part 1 -- Table of Contents and Introduction: The Effects of a Great Speech.

Logan was an Iroquois: a member of that once proud and powerful confederacy that had formed the first representative republic in North America. [The term Iroquois was applied by the French to the Six Nations, who constituted the celebrated confederation of the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, Senecas, and Tuscaroras. (Mingo was the equivalent term used by English writers of the times.) In some of the Virginia newspapers of 1774, Logan was said to be a "Shawnee chief," an impression very naturally gained by the soldiers who returned from the scenes of the treaty framed in the West, amid the Shawnee nation, where Logan's celebrated speech was first recited. Logan had married a Shawnee wife and had long been a resident with the Shawnees and Delawares, with whom he fought in the war against the British and Americans. Years later, in remarks before the Senate of the United States during the second session of the 33rd Congress, Lewis Cass also stated that Logan was a Shawnee. However, Logan had passed from the scenes long before Cass went to the West, and it was natural that local tradition in Ohio should associate the name of this chief with the lineage of the tribe with whom he lived and died. The authorities are, however, very clear on this point -- that Logan was an Iroquois. See the footnotes of Brantz Mayer's discourse before the Maryland Historical Society, 9 May 1851. Also, "Weiser's Journal" in Collections of the Pennsylvania Historical Society. And Heckewelder's Letters.]

Logan's father, Shikellamy, was a Cayuga, who had left his childhood home on the picturesque borders of the lake of that name [Lake Cayuga] in western New York, and fixed his home on the banks of the Susquehannah, at Shamokin [now Sunbury, Pennsylvania].

In early times the Susquehannah Valley had been assigned as the hunting ground for the remnants of various tribes who had fallen under the power of the Iroquois. Such were the once prominent tribes of the Shawnees and Delawares, the Nanticokes, and the Conoys, a tribe of the Susquehannocks of Maryland, and also the Munceys and Mahicans, two affiliated tribes of the Lenno Lenapean stock, who were in absolute subjugation to the Iroquois.

Shamokin was a point from which the war then waged by the Iroquois against the Catawbas and Cherokees of South Carolina could be conveniently carried on, and it became a point of rest and support for the war parties of the Six Nations, on their return from the South. The Iroquois Council-fire committed the chieftainship of this frontier to Shikellamy, and the trust appears to have been conveyed to competent and honest hands.

When the government of Pennsylvania wanted to open contact with the Iroquois in 1737, Shikellamy was selected to guide Conrad Weiser, the celebrated Indian linguist and official, to Onondaga -- the capital of the Iroquois power. This journey, which is recorded in Weiser's diary, is an interesting passage in Indian history, and presents Shikellamy in favorable light.

Five years later (in 1742), when the Count Zinzendorf reached the beautiful area of Shamokin, Shikellamy was the first person to step forth and welcome the celebrated Moravian; and Shikellamy promised Count Zinzendorf his friendly aid in the introduction of the gospel to the sons of the forest.

The Pennsylvania government found Shikellamy's wigwam to be its most reliable point of communication with the then leading Iroquois power. Here the governor's secretary, Mr. Jonathon Logan (d. 1751), was often entertained. It is from these friendly and positive contacts with Mr. Logan that Logan's name was bestowed upon the chief's [Shikellamy's] active and promising son, who had been born at Shamokin. Shikellamy's son, whose Indian name was Tah-ga-yu-ta, was also a listener to the Moravian teachings, and, it is said that he was well-acquainted with the leading Christian doctrines.

Shikellamy died at Shamokin in 1748.

See next entry: Logan, Part 3 -- His Changing World.

See the first entry in this series: Logan, Part 1 -- Table of Contents and Introduction: The Effects of a Great Speech.

This entry is adapted from Henry R. Schoolcraft's massive six-volume work, INDIAN TRIBES OF THE UNITED STATES...., which was published during the 1850s and 1860s. This entry has been reedited extensively for inclusion in the Pierian Press Fulltext eBooks database, and is included on the Stratton House Inn Web site by special permission. This entry is licensed for use ONLY on this Web site. It may not be copied or downloaded, but may be used for educational purposes and personal pleasure under fair-use provisions via this Web site. Please note that this Stratton House Inn iteration of this entry does NOT include the subject headings assigned each chapter for use in the Fulltext eBooks database.

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ENTRY NUMBER: EBK30000841

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