PIPE A SYMBOL OF PRIDE
Tomahawk returns to its original Seneca Nation owners after decades
A pipe tomahawk gifted to chief Cornplanter has returned home to the Seneca Nation after years in the hands of private collectors and the state of New York.
In a ceremony on Jan. 9 in Salamanca, N.Y., in Allegany Territory, the New York State Museum officially restored the pipe to its original owners. The pipe’s return is symbolic of Seneca pride and an important recognition of today’s 8,000-member Seneca nation.
“At one point people really didn’t think Indian people would make it into the 21st century,” said Joe Stahlman, director of the SenecaIroquois National Museum, “but here we are … really thriving.”
George Washington gave Seneca diplomat Cornplanter, or Gy-ant-wa-ka, the tomahawk pipe in 1792 during negotiations for the Treaty of Canandaigua. Rickey Armstrong Sr., president of the Seneca Nation, said Cornplanter, who was a chief during the Revolutionary War, forged a bond with the new United States government following the war, during which the Senecas were allies of the British, while also protecting the rights and sovereignty of his people.
After the New York State Museum lost the pipe in the 1950s, it resurfaced in 2018 when it was donated back to the museum and finally returned to the Seneca Nation.
Now, it will be permanently housed at the SenecaIroquois National Museum at the Onöhsagwe:de‘ Cultural Center on the Seneca Nation’s Allegany Territory.
The event garnered an outpouring of Seneca support. When the flyer for the event went up online, the post had over 14,000 hits in the first 36 hours, Mr. Stahlman said.
Amy Covell-Murthy, archaeology collection manager at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, said the return of the tomahawk pipe is part of a reparation trend, and that institutions are “taking accountability” and returning items that once belonged to native peoples.
Institutions are required by federal law to post a list of Native American objects on a federal register, to which individuals can place claim. Ms. Covell-Murthy added that “actively accounting” objects’ history, interpretation and care is also essential moving forward.
The Treaty of Canandaigua, signed in 1794, recognized the Seneca people as a sovereign nation. It also recognized the United States as a sovereign nation, Mr. Stahlman said, an important component during a time of postwar land disputes.
At the close of the Revolutionary War, Britain recognized United States sovereignty over all land east of the Mississippi and south of the Great Lakes, but the “old northwest,” which includes today’s Ohio and Wisconsin, remained contested. Many tribes in this area recognized British sovereignty rather than American. Additionally, federal and state governments climbed out of postwar debt by trading items like guns for Native American land, which they then sold, Mr. Stahlman said.
With the Canandaigua Treaty, the Seneca Nation recognized America’s right to exist and the United States recognized the Seneca Nation. Regardless of this shared history, however, respect for the Seneca nation and its sovereignty didn’t last.
In the 1960s, the federal government seized a piece of Seneca land in Warren, Pa., to construct the Kinzua Dam, an incident known as the “Kinzua Removal.” Cornplanter’s grave had to be moved, and much of the area was flooded. Mr. Armstrong called the event an “egregious betrayal” of the 1794 treaty.
Today, Ms. Covell-Murthy said the land under the dam is the only federally recognized native land in Pennsylvania.
A decade before the “Kinzua Removal,” the tomahawk pipe went missing from the New York State Museum. Museum officials say they don’t know how or why it was stolen.
Cornplanter gifted the pipe to his successor, Canada. Cornplanter’s nephew, Ely Parker, then purchased it from Canada’s widow. Parker sold the pipe to a friend, Louis H. Morgan, who then donated it to the New York State Museum around 1851, according to a letter from Parker to the regents of the University of the State of New York.
When it disappeared from the state museum, it didn’t resurface until 2010 when a private collector bought the pipe on the black market. When his widow’s attorney contacted the museum in June 2018, the museum published a press release that caught the attention of Seneca officials, Mr. Stahlman said.
The museum originally gave the Seneca-Iroquois National Museum the pipe on a six-month loan, but Seneca officials knew that its rightful place was in the hands of the Native American nation to which it had once belonged. Both parties eventually agreed the pipe should be returned to Seneca land permanently.
The event meant more than the return of an artifact. Mr. Stahlman said it brought the nation back together.
“There’s been an insurgence of pride,” he said.