Ulster County Historian Reflects on Visit to Rebuild Relationships with Lenape Descendants

Ulster County is working to rebuild its relationship with federally recognized tribes that comprise Lenape Indigenous descendants.

Ulster County Historian Edward Moran and visiting scholars recently visited two federally recognized tribes in Ontario, Canada in April: the Munsee-Delaware Nation and the Delaware Nation at Moravariantown.

“These two communities really keep this, not just Lenape way of life but the Munsee language and their culture alive,” said Moran.

For thousands of years, Lenape-speaking Indigenous communities inhabited large swaths of upstate New York, from west into the upper Delaware and Susquehanna River Valleys all the way south through New York City into the western half of Long Island.

When Dutch settlers arrived and colonized the region in the early 17th century, Moran says Indigenous communities and Dutch colonists tried to coexist. But tensions arose, leading to the Esopus Wars from 1659 to 1663. The two sides signed and renewed the Nicolls Esopus Peace Treaty in 1665 that ended the fighting for nearly a century until the American Revolution.

“The American Revolution unfortunately really fractures that alliance,” said Moran. The Revolution’s events directly led to Esopus people being forcibly displaced by war and colonization out of New York state to what is now known as Ontario, Canada.

Tribal logo in the Anishinabek Educational Institute, Munsee-Delaware Nation Reserve. (Photo Credit: Edward Moran, Ulster County)

Visiting scholars, educators, and members of the Lenape communities in Ontario and Oklahoma listening to presentations at the Eelünaapéewi Lahkéewiit Community Centre, Delaware Nation at Moraviantown Reserve. (Photo Credit, Edward Moran, Ulster County)

About an hour’s drive from the two Lenape First Nation settlements in Ontario are the Six Nations of the Grand River – where descendants of the Esoupus people live. Moran says Ulster County hopes to build a more direct relationship with Esopus communities.

Moran first began building these relationships during his time at Historic Huguenot Street, a 10-acre national historic site that explores the French Huguenot settlement and its history of Indigenous and enslaved Africans and Dutch settlers. Now, he’s looking forward to restoring the county’s relationships with Lenape descendants and possibly renewing the 1665 Nicolls Treaty one day.

“We hope to one day not just cultivate opportunities for them to return to their homelands, both for reasons of education [and] of viewing historic sites but really incorporating their feedback and perspective in public history… so they can return and engage with their homelands however they want,” said Moran.

Featured Image: Members of the Delaware Nation at Moraviantown speaking to visiting scholars and educators at the Eelünaapéewi Lahkéewiit Community Centre, Delaware Nation at Moraviantown Reserve. (Photo Credit: Edward Moran, Ulster County)