First Manhattans: A History of the Indians of Greater New York

by Robert S. Grumet

A concise history of the Indians said to have sold Manhattan for $24 The Indian sale of Manhattan is one of the world's most cherished legends. Few people know that the Indians who made the fabled sale were Munsees whose ancestral homeland lay between the lower Hudson and upper Delaware river valleys. The story of the Munsee people has long lain unnoticed in broader histories of the Delaware Nation. First Manhattans , a concise and lively distillation of the author's comprehensive The Munsee Indians, resurrects the lost history of this forgotten people, from their earliest contacts with Europeans to their final expulsion just before the American Revolution. Anthropologist Robert S. Grumet rescues from obscurity Mattano, Tackapousha, Mamanuchqua, and other Munsee sachems whose influence on Dutch and British settlers helped shape the course of early American history in the mid-Atlantic heartland. He looks past the legendary sale of Manhattan to show for the first time how Munsee leaders forestalled land-hungry colonists by selling small tracts whose vaguely worded and bounded titles kept courts busy―and settlers out―for more than 150 years. Ravaged by disease, war, and alcohol, the Munsees finally emigrated to reservations in Wisconsin, Oklahoma, and Ontario, where most of their descendants still live today. With the four hundredth anniversary of Hudson's voyage to the river that bears his name, this book shows how Indians and settlers struggled, through land deals and other transactions, to reconcile cultural ideals with political realities. It offers a wide audience access to the most authoritative treatment of the Munsee experience―one that restores this people to their place in history.

Genres: History, Native Americans, Nonfiction

256 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2011

Reviews

[Gemini · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well it makes so much sense now. Growing up in NY & living in PA, NJ & MA all these bizarre funny sounding names were all because of the Native Americans/Indigenous people. It was really interesting to see how these various tribe/nations all came about & ended up crossing 'state' lines although those lines didn't really exist. The Indians were of a regional area & some moved around due to settlers forcing them to move, which of course was not what they should be doing. It's pretty neat to see how these different names of towns, rivers & mountains were all named such, since these words all have meaning in the various languages of Indigenous people. I found it pretty fascinating & the time table is actually from like the 18th to the 19th century. It's awful though that they had to be displaced & went through some horrible things due to the settlers who took over their land & pushed them out. This is how you really learn the history of what transpired back then.

[Roy Lotz · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this book in the gift shop of the National Museum of the American Indian in New York City. This somewhat overlooked museum is housed in the Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House, a rather resplendent Beaux-Arts building near the southern tip of Manhattan. After enjoying the museum’s (entirely free) exhibits, I decided that it was finally time to learn something more about the original inhabitants of this famous island, and bought this.

Grumet’s book is the product of years of careful research. He spent decades on the project, piecing together the story of the Munsees from the fragmentary evidence scattered over dozens of different institutions. And he had the goodness to present his research in simple, solid prose rather than directing it solely to academics. For all of this, he is highly praiseworthy. Nevertheless, I admit that I found the story told in these pages all too familiar, to the point that I did not feel as if I had achieved any great insight.

But I am still glad I read it. Manhattan today is so urbanized that imagining what it could have been like before European contact is nearly impossible. Yet in the span of history, it really wasn’t all too long ago that the island had no rats, no pigeons (at least not the ones we know today), and no black bags of steaming garbage. But it was still a home to many.

[Sistermagpie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good, straightforward history of the Munsee people of what is now NY State, from the first arrivals of the Europeans to the present. Reading it I was all too aware of how little I studied Native American history growing up because when there was reference to "the French" or "the Dutch" I'd immediately have something to picture in my mind, while the different Indian nations are familiar names without that kind of association. The Munsee, more than many other nations, aren't so remembered today, probably because of this very complicated history.

[Debby Ebert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having lived in Orange County for a number of years, it was interesting to see where some of the more unusual place names originated. I had never heard of the Muncee tribe and it turns out they played a key role in the early settlement of the area. It was fascinating to see how the Native tribes interacted with the early settlers until the newcomers vast superiority in numbers drove the original people further north and west.

[Peahen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book gave me a new insight into the complexity of the people's of the Manhattan area during early contact with European settlers.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating study on the forgotten Munsee people, the Native Americans of New York. The book examines how they coped with the arrival of European settlers and spent the next two hundred years trying to find a way of coexisting while preserving as much of their native homelands as possible. Unfortunately the ravages of disease, warfare and a growing colonist desire for land eventually saw them dispersed and absorbed into other tribal groups.