Beschreibung:

When one studies the early history of the United States and our struggle for freedom and independence during the American Revolution, there is no foreign-born participant more important to the outcome of that struggle than the Marquis de La Fayette. As a token of our honor and respect for his valor, sacrifice, and steadfast efforts towards upholding the freedom and equality of man, the name of Lafayette appears nearly 400 times in titling everything in this country from streets, towns and counties, to colleges and institutions, competing with the likes of Washington, Franklin and Jefferson. Woven into the fabric of some of Lafayette’s wartime exploits, and his subsequent triumphant tour of the 24 United States in 1824/25, is Chief Tunis. Although unknown to most, by some contemporary accounts he was a legendary figure in the history of the relationship between the Indian and the white settlers of the Beaverkill Valley area of New York. Due to the impact that he made on that area, the upper Beaverkill Valley, has on occasion, been historically referred to as “The Land of Tunis.” Present day maps of the area in which he lived still reference his namesake, Tunis Lake. We begin this short synopsis of these two individuals and their subsequent relationship as it applies to the rifle, with Tunis, who predates Lafayette in the area. By all accounts, he was a member of a group of Tuscarora Indians who had migrated from the Carolinas to eventually settle in the valley of the Beaverkill, in the State of New York. During the French and Indian War, a scout from Pepacton, N.Y. by the name of John Henry Osterhout, found the abandoned young Indian boy starving in the woods. He took pity on the child, brought him home, and raised him as a Christian. He was given Osterhout’s grandfather’s name of Teunis. Most other published references to his name utilize the spelling Tunis. The singularly significant heartache to befall Tunis, an Indian in a white man’s world, occurred when after falling in love with a local white girl named Ruth Yaple, his marriage proposal was racially spurned by her parents, and he left the white man’s world broken hearted, to live in the surrounding woods as a hermit. Published accounts involving his subsequent interaction with whites relate many examples of his continued selfless generosity and courageous actions toward a people, who, for the most part, did not consider him an equal. It is recorded that, at great risk, he saved the life of his adoptive father and his father’s partner, Silas Bowker. Both were scouts at the time for the Hudson Bay Trading Company, and were captured by the hostile Indians that they had been tracking. They were staked out for a torturous death, when Tunis crept into the Indian camp and cut their bonds under the cover of darkness. Tunis also reportedly found a fabulously productive lead mine while hunting, and over the years he supplied the much-needed lead required for the white man’s bullets. He was also known to share his talents with anyone that had an interest in learning Indian craft. It is interesting to note that historically, the Beaverkill Valley had been one of the last Indian strongholds in that mountainous area of New York. Again, published historical accounts document Tunis’ continued benevolence to the white man. Tunis, the Indian, who afterward lived in Bovina and on the Platt-Kill below Charles’ Factory, had always been particularly friendly with Mr. Yaple and his family. In 1778, Indians under the leadership of Mohawk Chief Joseph Brant, a British sympathizer, along with some loyalist whites, planned to raid and pillage the homes of the Whig settlers along the East Branch between Pepacton and Pakatakan. (Pepacton was located below the dam and Pakatakan was between the present towns of Margaretville and Arkville) Four Dutch families had settled at Pakatakan in 1763 and others followed, the Philip Yaple family arriving in 1771. Tunis warned the settlers in that area of the