Madame Montour Resents Murder of Her Brother, September 15, 1711

In the provincial history of Pennsylvania the name of the Montours stands out among the many Indians of note, and the intimate story of this large family presents many interesting and contradictory characteristics.

The first one of this family, which has given us its name for a county, town, river, creek and mountain range, was the celebrated Madame Montour.

There has always been a question of doubt as to her birth. She claimed to be a half-breed French-Indian, her father being a Governor of Canada. Whether this is true or not, about 1665 a French nobleman named Montour settled in Canada, where by an Indian woman, probably a Huron, he became the father of a son and two daughters. This son of Montour grew up among those Indians, who were at that time in alliance with the French.

In 1685, while in the French service, he was wounded in a fight with two Mohawk warriors on Lake Champlain. Subsequently he deserted the French cause and again lived among the Indians. In 1709 he was killed while inducing twelve of the Western tribes to support the English.

One of his sisters became a noted interpreter and friend of the English, and was known as Madame Montour; the other sister married a Miami Indian and her history is lost.

Madame Montour was born previous to the year 1684. When about ten years old she was captured by some Iroquois warriors and adopted, probably by the Seneca tribe, for at maturity she married a Seneca named Roland Montour, by whom she had five children: Andrew, Henry, Robert, Lewis and Margaret.

After the death of Roland, Madame Montour married the noted Oneida chief, Carondowanen, or “Big Tree,” who later took the name 639Robert Hunter in honor of the royal governor of the province of New York.

About 1729 Robert Hunter was killed in battle with the Catawba, against whom he was waging war.

Madame Montour first appeared as an official interpreter at the conference at Albany, September 15, 1711. At this conference the wanton murder of her brother, Andrew, by Vaudreuil, was bitterly resented by Madame Montour, and she employed her great influence with telling effect against the French, who tried to induce her to remove to Canada, but she remained loyal to the English and was put in a position of great power with lucrative return.

Madame Montour was the interpreter in Philadelphia in 1727 at a conference between Deputy Governor Patrick Gordon and the Provincial Council on the one hand and the Six Nations, Conestoga, Ganawese and Susquehanna Indians on the other.

It is claimed that Madame Montour was a lady in manner and education, was very attractive in mind and body, and that she was entertained by ladies of the best society on her trips to Philadelphia; but as her sister married an Indian and she was twice wedded to an Indian warrior, it is probable her education and refinement were not so marked as is claimed.

Nevertheless, from the testimony of those who saw and knew her, but contrary to the statement of Lord Cornbury, who knew her brother, it seems almost certain that she was a French-Canadian without any admixture of Indian blood, and that for some unaccountable reason she preferred the life and dress of her adopted people.

Madame Montour was always uniformly friendly toward the proprietary Government, and such was the loyalty of her family that at least two of her sons, Henry and Andrew, received large grants of “donation land” from the Government. That of Henry lay upon the Chillisquaque Creek, in Northumberland County, and that of Andrew, on the Loyalsock, where Montoursville, in Lycoming County, is now situated.

Madame Montour resided at the village of Ostonwackin^[7] in 1734. This was some times known as Frenchtown. When Conrad Weiser visited there in 1737, on his way to Onondaga, he wrote of Madame Montour, as “a French woman by birth, of a good family, but now in mode of life a complete Indian.”

When she attended the great treaty at Lancaster in 1744 she was accompanied by two of her daughters, and at that time related to Witham Marshe the story of her life. He represented her as genteel and of polite address and as having been attractive in her prime.

When Count Zinzendorf, the Moravian missionary, visited Shamokin 640(now Sunbury) in 1742, he was welcomed by Madame Montour and her son Andrew. She had moved to that place from Ostonwackin.

Upon learning that the Count came to preach the gospel, the truths of which she had almost forgotten, she burst into tears. It was learned that she believed that Bethlehem, the birthplace of Christ, was situated in France, and that it was the English who crucified him—a silly perversion of the truth that originated with French religious teachers.

It is thought she died at the home of her son, Andrew, in 1752.

Of the children of Madame Montour, Andrew became the most prominent and indeed he was one of the strong men during a long period of stirring times in the province. His Indian name was Sattelihu, he was a son by her first husband.

Andrew became an interpreter at an early age and served the Proprietary Government faithfully and well; he also was loved by his Indian brethren, for he zealously guarded their interests.

In 1745 he accompanied Conrad Weiser and Shikellamy, the vicegerent of the Six Nations on the Susquehanna, on a mission to Onondaga, the Federal capital of the confederation.

He was sent on important missions to Maryland and other places and in 1753 the French authorities set a price of $500 on his head. In 1755 he was living ten miles northwest from Carlisle, on land which had been granted to him for his services.

During the French and Indian War he was captain of a company of Indians in the English service, and later rose to the rank of major.

In 1762 he was King’s interpreter to the United Nations, and he served as interpreter for the Delaware Indians at Fort Augusta, at the time Conrad Weiser held a conference for the purpose of bringing about peace between the Southern Confederation and the Six Nations.

October 29, 1768, the Proprietary Government surveyed and granted to Andrew Montour 880 acres of land at the mouth of the Loyalsock, where the borough of Montoursville now is. With this and other grants he was considered a man of great wealth.

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