The Seneca Chief Hiokatoo, “Most Cruel Human Being,” Died November 20, 1811

The second husband of Mary Jemison, the celebrated Indian captive known as “The White Woman of the Genesee” was Chief Hiokatoo, who she describes as the most cruel human being of whom we have any authentic record.

When Mary Jemison was an old woman she related the thrilling narrative of her long life among the Indians. Nothing told by the venerable captive was more thrilling than the life of Hiokatoo, also known as Gardow.

She says: “He was an old man when I first saw him, but he was by no means enervated. During the nearly fifty years that I lived with him, I received, according to Indian customs, all the kindness and attention that was my due as his wife. Although war was his trade from youth till old age and decrepitudedecrepitude stopped his career, he uniformly treated me with tenderness, and never offered an insult.

“I have frequently heard him repeat the history of his life from his childhood; and when he came to that part which related to his actions, his bravery and his valor in war; when he spoke of the ambush, the combat, the spoiling of his enemies and the sacrifice of the victims, his nerves seemed strung with youthful ardor. The warmth of the able warrior seemed to animate his frame and to produce the heated gestures he had practiced in middle age. He was a man of tender feelings to his friends, ready and willing to assist them in distress. Yet, as a warrior, his cruelties to his enemies perhaps were unparalleled, and will not admit of a word of palliation.

“Hiokatoo was born in one of the tribes of the Six Nations that inhabited the banks of the West Branch of the Susquehanna, in Pennsylvania. He belonged to a tribe of the Seneca nation. He was a cousin to Farmer’s Brother, a chief who has been justly celebrated for his worth. Their mothers were sisters, and it was through the influence of Farmer’s Brother that I became the wife of Hiokatoo.

“In early life Hiokatoo showed signs of thirst for blood by attending 814only to the art of war, in the use of the tomahawk and scalping knife and in practicing cruelties upon everything that chanced to fall into his hands which was susceptible of pain. In that way he learned to use his implements of war effectually and at the same time blunted all those fine feelings and tender sympathies that are naturally excited by seeing or hearing a fellow being in distress.

“He could inflict the most excruciating tortures upon his enemies and prided himself upon his fortitude in having performed the most barbarous ceremonies and tortures without the least degree of pity or remorse. Thus qualified, when very young he was initiated into scenes of carnage by being engaged in the wars that prevailed among the Indian tribes.”

In 1731 he was appointed a runner and assisted in collecting an army to go against the Catawba, Cherokee and other Southern Indians. In one great battle of this war the Northern Indians ambushed their enemies and in two days massacred 1200 of their Southern enemies.

During the French and Indian War Hiokatoo was in every battle that was fought along the Susquehanna and Ohio Rivers. At Braddock’s defeat he took two white prisoners and burned them alive in a fire of his own kindling.

Mary Jemison says he participated in the battle at Fort Freeland, on Warrior Run, Northumberland County, July 28, 1779. She says:

“Hiokatoo was in command of the 300 Seneca Indians, and that Captain John MacDonald commanded more than one hundred British regulars. Hiokatoo, with the help of a few Indians, tomahawked every wounded American while earnestly begging with uplifted hands for quarter.”

In an expedition against Cherry Valley, N. Y., Hiokatoo was second in command. This force of hundreds of Indians was determined upon the total destruction of the whites.

Besides these instances, he was in a number of parties during the Revolution, where he ever acted a conspicuous part.

When Tory Colonel John Butler and Chief Joe Brant were making their terrible incursions against the settlers in lower New York and Pennsylvania they frequently resided with Chief Hiokatoo and his wife, Mary Jemison, at their home in the German Flats.

During General Sullivan’s expedition against the Indians in the summer of 1779, Hiokatoo was most active in his attempt to frustrate his plans. During this march Lieutenant Thomas Boyd was captured by the Indians in ambush. While Chief Little Beard was in command at Boyd’s cruel execution, Hiokatoo was a close second.

Hiokatoo was one of the leading actors in the diabolical scene following the capture of Colonel William Crawford, July, 1782, when he was put to death after the most inhuman barbarities were inflicted upon him.

815The cruel Indian chief was assisted in these fiendish scenes by Simon Girty, the white savage renegade and outlaw Tory. Hiokatoo was the leading chief in the battle which destroyed Colonel Crawford’s command and personally directed the colonel’s execution. He painted Dr. Knight’s face black with his own hands and had him conducted to the place where he was to be executed. Dr. Knight escaped during the night and was able to reach his home and give the horrid details of Crawford’s execution.

Chief Hiokatoo served in seventeen campaigns during the period of the Revolution, until his death, which occurred on November 20, 1811, at the advanced age of 103 years.

Hiokatoo was about six feet four inches tall, large boned and rather inclined to leanness. He was very powerful and active for a man of his unusual size, and his wife said of him that he never found an Indian who could keep up with him in a race or throw him wrestling.

His eye was quick and penetrating and his voice was so harsh and powerful that amongst the Indians it always commanded attention. His health was uniformly good, and he was never confined by illness until attacked with tuberculosis when quite 100 years of age.

During his married life as the husband of the White Woman of the Genesee he was the father of four daughters and two sons. The elder of the two sons, John, killed his half-brother, Thomas, in a family feud which had existed between them since John was born, although Thomas was a fine character and John dissolute.

John a few years later, May, 1812, killed his own brother, Jesse, in a drunken frenzy, inflicting no less than eighteen wounds with a knife, each so deep that it would have been fatal. Jesse was twenty-seven years old and had been more like his mother than the other children. He shunned the Indian frolics, dressed and acted more like a white man and was sober and industrious.

Thus we see the cruelty of old Chief Hiokatoo inherited by his own son and inflicted upon his own blood in a most fiendish manner.

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