Aka Se We':Ka Tsi (Oswegatchie)

Aka Se We':Ka Tsi (Oswegatchie). Cultural and Economic Crossroads. , Iroquois Village , In 1751, approximately 3,000 Iroquois lived in villages on both sides of the Oswegatchie River and the small islands in between, with the most influential families living in the three villages neighboring the fort. Together their homes numbered nearly 50 longhouses, each between 60 and 80 feet long and housing three or four families., 1752 Map of The Mouth of the Oswegatchie River , Map derived from a French drawing, distortions resulted from the incomplete data available at the time., After Fort de la Présentation was built a village began to develop outside the fort walls., As a result of the French defeat, Abbé Picquet was forced to flee Fort de la Présentation in 1759 with the help of his Iroquois friends and converts., Strategic Partnership , During the French and Indian War, the French fort and the Oswegatchie Iroquois villages were of strategic concern to the British. By 1754 more than half of the Onondagas had moved to the Iroquois villages near Fort de la Présentation. The Oswegatchie Iroquois also maintained strategic trading relationships with the Palatine German settlers living to the south in German Flatts (Herkimer), NY and the British feared they might use the Germans as a supply source in their war against them., The Oswegatchie Iroquois distinguished themselves in battle and diplomacy. Beginning in 1756, they appeared before the leaders of the Senecas, Cayugas, Onondagas, Tuscaroras and Oneidas to argue the usefulness of siding with the French., This 1760 drawing shows Fort de la Présentation and some of the buildings of the Iroquois village during a skirmish between the British and French on the river shortly after the fort was abandoned.