Tuscarora reservation

Six nations wikipedia
Cayuga
Deskaheh (aka Levi General), the son of the Cayuga man known as William General & the Oneida woman known as Lydia Burnham-General - Iroquois.

•

SIX NATIONS – The Remarkable Life of Levi General began in 1872. He was stood up as a royaner (hereditary chief) of the Cayuga nation under the name and title of “Deskaheh” in 1917, a pivotal time in Canadian and Haudenosaunee history.

He died June 27, 1925, of pleurisy, in Rochester, New York after being denied entry back into Canada following his extended visits to England and Holland. Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King had been embarrassed on the world stage by the revelations brought to members of the League of Nations by Deskaheh.

Prime Minister King would not honour the Jay Treaty when Deskaheh returned, which allows Haudenosaunee and all American Indians free and unhindered crossing of the border between Canada and the U.S. His family and friends were also prohibited access to the sick and weakening Deskaheh as he lay at the home of Tuscarora Chief Clinton Rickard.

After the death of Deskaheh, the Jay Treaty was honoured once again. Levi General’s remains were then brought back to his beloved Six Nations Grand River Territory and buried at the Cayuga Longho

•

DESKAHEH (Levi General), farmer, Cayuga chief, and activist; b. 15 March 1873 in Tuscarora Township, Ont., son of William General and Lydia Burnham; m. before 1898 Mary Bergen, and they had four daughters and five sons; d. 27 June 1925 on the Tuscarora Reservation, N.Y.

A descendant of Iroquois with some Scottish-Irish ancestry, Levi General was born on the Six Nations Reserve on the Grand River. His Oneida mother and Cayuga father, who ran their own farm but worked out during harvest season, had a family of eight, Levi being one of the older children. At primary school he had Christian teachers, but he remained an adherent of the traditional Longhouse religion.

The Six Nations community contained two distinct religious worlds: that of the Mohawk, Oneida, Tuscarora, and Iroquois allies such as the Delaware, who accepted Protestant Christianity, and that of the Seneca and Onondaga, who adhered to the teachings of Skanyátaí.yo? (Handsome Lake), who had reformed the Iroquois religion in the early 19th century. The Cayuga included both Christian and L

•

On Monday, June 29, 1925 the headlines of national news reported the death of Haudenosaunee leader and Confederacy spokesperson Deskaheh Levi General. His obituary read as follows:

“Levi General, a member of the old council of chiefs of the Six Nations Indians, died early yesterday morning on the Tuscarora Reservation near Niagara Falls. He had been stricken on a train from Rochester and was taken to the home of Chief Clinton Rickard on the reservation, where he died. Levi General was 52 years old, and a leader in the movement among the Six Nations to induce the Canadian Government to agree to certain treaty rights claimed by the red men. He had been in Rochester conferring with lawyers relative to tribal affairs and had planned to spend several weeks among the New York branches of the Six Nations. His home was in Hagersville, Ont., where the body was taken today for burial by his brother, Alexander General.

The funeral will take place tomorrow afternoon from his home to the Upper Cayuga Longhouse. The superintendent of the Six Nations, Lieutenant-Col, C.E. Morgan, this m