Chief Cornplanter
By Kyle Varner
Chief Cornplanter
John Abeel (ca. 1752–February 18, 1836) in the Seneca language and thus generally known as Cornplanter , was a Seneca war chief and diplomat. As a chief warrior, Cornplanter fought in the French And Indian war and the American and Revolutionary War. In both wars, the Seneca and three other Iroquois nations were allied with the British. After the war Cornplanter led negotiations with the United States. He helped gain Iroquois neutrality during the Northwest Indian War.
His greatest challanges
Cornplanter was born from a Seneca mother but his father was a Dutch trader from New York. He tried to keep his people from joining the war. He noticed that his tribe was moving more towards "white ways" and needed more European goods and wanted the tribe to stay more pure in its roots. His land was the last Indian grant until the United States took the land to make the Kinuza dam and resevoir in 1964
Ki-on-twog-ky by F. Bartoli (Seneca Chief Cornplanter) (408) | New-York Historical Society