Kuskusky
Kuskusky, also known as the Kuskuskies Towns, Kuskuskie Towns, or Kuskuskies' Indian Town, with a wide variety of other spellings, were several Native American communities inhabited near New Castle, Mahoning, and Edinburg, Pennsylvania, and Youngstown, Ohio, during the mid-18th century. It was not one town, but three or four contiguous towns of the Mingoes, Lenape, and Seneca, located along the Beaver River, at and above the junction of its east and west branches, the Mahoning River and the Shenango River. It is usually referred to in the plural.
Etymology
Several different origins have been proposed for the name "Kuskusky." In the 1826 captivity narrative of Hugh Gibson,captured by Lenape in July, 1756, he states that he lived in the spring and fall of 1757 at "Kuskuskin, or Hog Town" on the Mahoning." The word may also have come from the Seneca koskohsh-ehtoh, meaning "at the falls, by the falls or rapids," referring to Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania.
Establishment
There was very likely a settlement of some kind in the vicinity as early as 1720, initially established by Lenape, Seneca and Shawnee Indians moving west after being displaced from the Susquehanna Valley by growing European settlements and the increasing scarcity of game due to overhunting. A smallpox epidemic in 1733 and a drought in 1741 may have led to the arrival of new groups, under pressure to resettle. Two Seneca villages with the same name were established before 1742, one at the mouth of the Shenango River and the other at the mouth of Neshannock Creek. English traders, looking for new sources of skins and furs, established trading posts that, in turn, attracted Natives seeking sources of European trade goods, particularly liquor, which was becoming a fixture in Native American culture by the early 18th century.On 11 November 1747 the Seneca leader Kanuksusy traveled from Kuskusky to Philadelphia with ten young Mingo warriors to deliver news of French activities in western Pennsylvania. These were the first reports to be heard from outside the colony. He later addressed the Pennsylvania Council, declaring that he and his group were representatives of the Six Nations and confirmed its neutrality during King George's War, which had earlier been decided at the Onondaga Council.
In April, 1748 Orontony and 119 Wyandot warriors, together with Miami Indian warriors led by Memeskia, attacked and burned the French Fort St. Philippe. Orontony then abandoned his community of Junundat and set off for the Ohio valley. About 70 of the warriors and their families settled at Conchake. The remainder went farther east to build a new town at Kuskusky.
Rivalry with Logstown, 1748
At this time, the rival colonies of Pennsylvania and Virginia were competing against Canada to attain control over the Ohio Country, a source of skins and furs and a geographic middle ground between the eastern colonies and the Mississippi and lands west of it. For Canada, control of the Ohio also facilitated commerce and communication with Louisiana. As the prospect of war between Britain and France grew increasingly imminent, Native American inhabitants of the Ohio River Valley were attempting to maintain their autonomy while extracting valuable trade goods from the Europeans. In November, 1747 Scarouady and other Iroquois leaders visited Philadelphia to sign the "Treaty Between the President and Council of the Province of Pennsylvania and the Ohio Indians," promising a military alliance against the French in exchange for supplies and trade goods. The Council obtained £200 worth of goods and sent Croghan to Logstown in April, 1748 to cement the terms of the treaty and secure the tribes' loyalty to the British. Conrad Weiser was to follow in August with more gifts.After destroying Fort St. Philippe, Orontony and other Wyandot leaders had no choice but to seek an alliance with the English, but Orontony was anxious to get assurances from Philadelphia that the English would offer military support as well as abundant trade goods, on which the Indians were growing increasingly dependent. As Tanacharisson's influence in negotiating terms with Pennsylvania grew, Orontony and other Iroquois leaders in Kuskusky wanted to get the attention of Philadelphia. Soon after Weiser arrived at Logstown, he received a message on 1 September 1748: "Andrew Montour came back from Coscosky with a message from the Indians there to desire of me that the ensuing Council might be held at their town." Tanacharisson insisted that "the Indians at Coscosky were no more Chiefs than themselves, and that last spring they had nothing to eat, & expecting that they shou'd have nothing to eat at our arrival." In any case, Weiser's instructions bound him to negotiate with the Indians at Logstown, and he replied to the request, saying that "the Shawonese and Twightwees would be offended if the Council was to be held at Coscosky." On 15 September Orontony and five other Wyandot chiefs arrived in Logstown and met with Weiser, presenting him with a gift of seven beaver skins. Weiser wrote that they "behav’d like People of good Sense & Sincerity; the most of them are grey-headed."
Another chief from Kuskusky, Canajachrera or Oniadagarehra, met Weiser on 19 September. In 1750, after Orontony's sudden death from smallpox, Canajachrera became the acting leader at Kuskusky. In late 1748 the Pennsylvania Council sent the Indians at Kuskusky 12 barrels of gunpowder as a gift and a peace-offering after having rejected their request to hold the council at their town.
Commerce with English traders
By 1748, English traders set up trading posts at each of the Kuskuskies towns, drawing some of the fur trade away from French traders to the north. The demand for rum as a trade item was particularly high, leading to some violence. On October 20, 1748, William Trent wrote to Secretary Richard Peters, describing a murder which took place at Kuskusky:Last night came here from Allegheny one John Hays, who informs us that the night before he left it, the Indians killed one of Mr. Parker's hands...Mr. Parker had a large quantity of liquor up with him, which he was tying up in his goods, in order to send to the Lower Shawna Town; and the Indians kept pressing into his house...Some he turned out, and others, as they came in, he pushed the door in their faces; upon which they were determined to take his liquor...They brought him wampum, and offered to leave it in pledge; but he refused to let them have it; upon which they took a quantity from him. A great many of them got drunk, who then insisted upon revenge for the ill-treatment he gave them; and accordingly took Parker prisoner and tyed him, and determined to scalp him. But the rest of the whites who were in the town rescued him. He immediately went off...to the Logs Town. The Indians imagined that he was gone into his house. One of them laid wait for him at the door, with his gun. At last, one Brown, one of Mr. Parker's hands, came out...which the Indian took for Parker...and shot him down. This happened at Coscoske.
In spite of this event, Parker maintained his trading post at Kuskusky and in 1749 employed Barnaby Curran to manage it after Brown was killed.
Encounter with Céloron de Blainville, 1749
In the summer of 1749 Pierre Joseph Céloron de Blainville, leading a force of eight officers, six cadets, an armorer, 20 soldiers, 180 Canadians, 30 Iroquois and 25 Abenakis, moved down the Ohio River on a flotilla of 23 large boats and birch-bark canoes, on his "lead plate expedition," burying lead plates at six locations where major tributaries entered the Ohio and nailing copper plates bearing royal arms to trees to claim the territory for New France. After stopping at the abandoned village of Kittanning, Céloron arrived at Logstown on August 8, 1749. That night, the French were warned that "80 warriors starting from Kaskaské were on the point of arriving; that they came intending to aid their brothers, and to deal us a blow." Céloron ordered his men to prepare for battle, but there was no attack, and instead the warriors appeared at the French camp "and made the accustomed salute. They may have numbered about fifty men." The Jesuit priest Joseph Pierre de Bonnecamps, who accompanied Céloron, wrote that "the savages, seeing our bold front and our superior number, quietly withdrew and saluted us very politely in passing before our camp."Although the French expedition was never attacked, the potential for violence remained throughout the journey, and Céloron was conscious that his mostly inexperienced troops would probably not have performed well. On the other hand, the Indians chose not to attack, as they did not want to risk bringing a stronger French military force into the Ohio country, which likely would have been the response. They therefore confined themselves to shooting holes in the French flag when Céloron visited Lower Shawneetown a week later. However, on his return to Canada, Céloron reported that "the nations of these localities are very badly disposed towards the French, and are entirely devoted to the English." This led to the destruction of Pickawillany in June, 1752 and the killing of Memeskia, one of Orontony's allies, and to the decision by the Governor-General of New France to send a sizeable French military force under the command of Paul Marin de la Malgue to build a road and construct Fort Presque Isle, Fort Le Boeuf, and Fort Machault in 1753 and 1754.