Batavia – 1722. Two colonial Pennsylvania fur traders fought his native American hunter and left him dead. Rival investigations by several Indigenous Aboriginal leaders, colonial officials from several colonies, and members of the British Trade Commission follow.
The investigation leads to a heated debate about the nature of justice. The positions taken in these discussions may surprise you.
Nicole Eustace, professor of history at New York University, will share this case in her opening lecture for the Spring Season of Historical Horizons on February 1 at Genesee Community College on 1 College Road in Batavia.
Eustace’s program is called Murder and Mercy on the Susquehanna: Captain Citizens of Conestoga Teaches Pennsylvania Settlers Principles of Native Justice.
While settlers claimed to immediately imprison accused murderers and uphold the death penalty if convicted, a Native spokesman advocated the opposite approach. A Susquehannock man named Atalensally (known to the settlers as “Captain Civility”) offered compensation and condolences to the friends and relatives of the victims, and sought pardon for the accused. rice field. Relatives of the murdered man within the Haudenosaunee Confederacy agreed with this approach, as did his Shawnee widow and her community leaders.
The position of Captain Civility prevailed at a time when indigenous peoples remained a powerful force in colonial affairs.
In a news release, the organizers of Historical Horizon say the conflicting ideas of indigenous peoples and settlers about how to manage the aftermath of a murder can teach us a lot today.
lesson? Whereas crime-fighting settlers emphasized legal retribution against individuals, indigenous peoples believed in economic recovery, emotional reconciliation, and social reintegration of entire communities.
Eustace, author of “Covered with Night: A Story of Murder and Indigenous Justice in Early America,” won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for History, the Francis Parkman Prize, and was a finalist for the National Book Award for Nonfiction. became too.
This lecture is one of four that will be featured in the spring session of the GCC’s History Club initiative “Historical Horizons.” This series features presentations, readings, and other live events.
“Historical Horizons” resumed presentations in the fall semester after a two-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
All events begin at 7pm and take place in room T102 of the Conable Technology Building on the GCC’s Batavia campus. All presentations are free and open to the public.
Other upcoming talks include:
n March 1: “March Home: Union Veterans and the Endless Civil War” with Dr. Brian Matthew Jordan.
A groundbreaking investigation into the fate of Union veterans who won the war but failed to endure peace. For more than a century, the history of the traditional Civil War ended in his 1865, bitterly winning peace and triumphant return of Union soldiers home. In a work that challenges the barren portraiture that has been accepted for generations, Civil War historian Brian Matthew Jordan creates an entirely new narrative. While these veterans were healing rotting wounds, battling alcoholism, and campaigning for meager pensions, tragically, they healed, forgot, and embraced the freewheeling graces of the Gilded Age. I found myself standing as an unwelcome reminder of the new America that aspires to be.
Brian Matthew Jordan, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of History and Director of Graduate Studies in History at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas, where he teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in Civil War, Reconstruction, and Philosophy of History. .
“Marching Home: Union Veterans and Their Endless Civil War” (Liveright/WW Norton, 2015), the story of a man who won the war but could not stand peace, won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize in History was a finalist in the division. , in the form of that paper, won the George Washington Eggleston Award at Yale University for best American history paper, and Yale University’s John Addison Porter Prize. “Marching Home” also won the Boston Union Club Governor’s John Andrew Award.
In 2020, Jordan co-edited “The War Went On: Reconsidering the Lives of Civil War Veterans” (Louisiana State University Press). The book, Final Resting Place: Reflections on the Meaning of Civil War Graves, co-edited with Lincoln scholar Jonathan White, will be published by the University of Georgia Press in 2023.
n April 19: “The Water Wedding and the Grand Celebration of the Opening of the Erie Canal: The History of Ceremonies and the Ceremonies of History” with Dr. Marla Segor and historian Dan Hamner
Nearly 200 years ago, the Erie Canal opened in a month-long water march and series of celebrations, culminating in a flotilla of barges, steamboats and other boats met with local parades, ceremonies and fireworks along the way. reached. In “Water Wedding”. The ceremony mixed mythological imagery, Masonic symbolism, and a new vision of a thriving American future.
This lecture explores the political purpose of rituals, the elements of their performance, and how they worked together to transform people and places.
The discussion was led by Marla Segor, professor of religious studies at the State University at Buffalo and scholar of religious studies, and Dan Hamner, historian and adjunct professor at Genesee Community College. and a unique field of religion. And what is the meaning of this ritual?
n May 3: “Man of Fire: William Tecumseh Sherman in the Civil War” with GCC Associate Professor Derek D. Maxfield
Sherman has been accused of “researched and manipulative atrocities.” He has been called savior and savage, hero and villain, genius and madman. But whatever you call William Tecumseh Sherman, you have to admit he’s utterly charming, says Maxfield.
“Man of Fire: William Tecumseh Sherman in the Civil War” is the story of a man who went to war and, as a result, made history. Condemned for barbarism or hailed as a hero, the life of this peculiar general is compelling and utterly American.
A brief book talk by Maxfield will be followed by a panel discussion with appendix authors of the book, including Jess Maxfield, and GCC Associate Professors Tracy Ford and Michael Gosselin.
Maxfield is Associate Professor of History at the GCC and author of Hellmira: The Union’s Most Infamous Civil War Prison Camp – Elmira, NY. Maxfield has been contributing to his Emerging Civil War since 2015. In 2019 he received the SUNY President’s Award for Excellence in Teaching and in 2013 he received the SUNY President’s Award for Excellence in Scholarship and Creative Activities.
For more information on the Historical Horizons lecture series, please contact Derek Maxfield (ddmaxfield@genesee.edu).
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