The Eight Mohawk Territories

Haudenosaunee descendants of all six tribes still live on the Six Nations Reserve at Oshweken, Ontario, where Joseph Brant made his new home. Other Mohawk fled to Montreal at the end of the American Revolution and were granted reserve lands at Tyendinaga on the north shore of Lake Ontario.

Not all Mohawk followed this same order of migration or this exact pattern of alliance. Some had moved to Canada much earlier, as allies of the French. Starting in 1667, a group of Mohawk migrated from the Fonda, New York, region to La Prairie, a Jesuit mission, on the St. Lawrence River in Quebec. After having lived in several different locations in the area, in 1676 they finally settled just south of Montreal at a site they called Caugh-nawaga, after their original village in New York State. The spelling Kahnawake now is used.

The Kahnawake Mohawk practiced Catholicism, like the French. They also sometimes worked for the French as scouts and fur traders and fought with them as allies against the English. But they remained part of the Iroquois League and, at various times during the French and Indian wars, supported the English, along with other Haudenosaunee, against the French. They were a proud and independent people whom neither the French nor English could take for granted.

One celebrated Kahnawake Mohawk was Kateri Tekakwitha, called “Lily of the Mohawks.” She was born and baptized a Christian in the Mohawk valley but later moved to Kahnawake in Canada to escape persecution by non-Christian Indians. Her parents and brother died in a smallpox epidemic. She caught the disease too and her skin was severely scarred. But, it is said, because of her great faith in Catholicism and her dedication to helping others, when she died at the age of 24 in 1680 a miracle occurred—her pockmarks disappeared. In 1943, the Roman Catholic Church declared Kateri “venerable.” Then in 1980, the church declared her “blessed,” the second step toward canonization.

In 1755, at the urging of Jesuits who wanted to establish a French presence farther westward, a group of Mohawk from Kahnawake moved to a site on the St. Lawrence, south of present-day Cornwall, Ontario, and east of Massena, New York. What was known as the St. Regis Mission, the oldest permanent settlement in northern New York, became the St. Regis Reservation on the U. S. side of the St. Lawrence and the Akwesasne Reserve on the Canadian side, the preferred name among the Mohawk. Akwesasne Mohawk, who negotiate with four different governmental bodies—the U. S. and Canadian federal governments as well as New York and Ontario state and provincial governments—have had to struggle for sovereign rights. In 1968, they staged a protest by blocking the St. Lawrence Seaway International Bridge. They claimed that the Canadian government was not honoring the Jay Treaty of 1794, guaranteeing them the right to travel unrestricted back and forth between Canada and the United States. Border officials changed the policy, making crossings easier for tribal members. Moreover, until recent changes in the Indian Act of Canada, a Canadian Mohawk woman who married an American Mohawk man lost her Indian status and benefits. Akwesasne Mohawk also have had to struggle against big business threatening to pollute their homeland. In 1984, it was discovered that toxic wastes, especially deadly PCBs, from a neighboring off-reservation General Motors factory were endangering inhabitants.

Kahnawake and Awkwesasne Mohawk have become especially renowned as high-steel workers. Tribal members have traveled all over North America, and to other continents as well, to work on tall buildings and bridges, a tradition that began in 1886 when the Mohawk proved sure-footed and fearless in the construction of a bridge across the St. Lawrence River. The degree of risk in the profession was indicated in 1907, with the collapse of a portion of another bridge across the St. Lawrence, due to a faulty design, killing 33 ironworkers. A community of Mohawk ironworkers and relatives developed in Brooklyn, New York.

In the 19th century, Mohawk also settled the Lake of Two Mountains Reserve (now called Kanesatake) near Oka, Quebec, and the Gibson Reserve (Wahta) on Georgian Bay in Ontario.

In 1974, some 200 Akwesasne Mohawk and others occupied New York State-held land at Eagle Bay on Moss Lake in the Adirondacks, claiming original title to it. They called this 612-acre parcel of land Ganienkeh (or Kanienkah). In 1977, after negotiations with the state, the Mohawk activists were granted reservation lands at Schuyler and Altona Lakes in Clinton County.

In 1990, after a dispute between Canadian Mohawk and Quebec police over the construction of a golf course

Mohawk ash-splint and sweetgrass basket (modern)

A Mohawk girl and her bike

On land considered sacred to the Mohawk at Kanese-take—which led to barricades being erected and a standoff with police at Kahnawake as well—a group of Mohawk left Canada, purchasing 200 acres near Akwe-sasne on the United States side of the border in New York State.

In 1993, following a conflict between traditionalists who opposed casino gaming at Akwesasne and a progambling faction, a group of traditionalists purchased a piece of property in their ancestral homeland—on the north shore of the Mohawk River west of Fonda, New York—and established a community known as Kanatsio-hareke. The residents speak the Mohawk language, hold traditional ceremonies, and practice traditional farming. For additional income, Kanatsiohareke Mohawk maintain a bed-and-breakfast and a crafts store.

The Mohawk Nation Council of Chiefs is responsible for political, social, and cultural affairs of the eight current Mohawk territories—Akwesasne, Ganienkeh, Kahnawake, Kanesatake, Kanatsiohareke, Six Nations, Tyendinega, and Wahta—and tribal members who choose to live elsewhere.

What has been known as the Native North American Travelling College, now the Ronathahonni Cultural Center, through its resource center and Travel Troupe, is dedicated to teaching the history and culture of the Hau-denosaunee. Its Travel Troupe has performed traditional songs, dance, and storytelling throughout North America and in Europe, Asia, and Australia. Ronathahonni means “made the path.”