Excerpts from
Aboriginal Occupation of the Lower Genesee Country by George Henry Harris - 1884
The discovery of several tall, 7 and 8 foot skeletons in multiple
burial mounds around Western New York
Near the top of a high ridge of sand hills, in the town of Pittsford, south
of the Irondequoit valley, and about one mile east of Allen's creek, stands a
great heap of limestone boulders, evidently of drift origin. They are the only
stone of that character in that vicinity, measure from two to three feet in
diameter, and are heaped one upon the other in a space about twelve feet
square. They occupied the same place and position sixty or seventy years
ago, and old residents say the heap existed in the same form when the ground
was cleared. Indians who passed that way in early days regarded the stones
with superstitious awe, stating, when questioned, that a people who lived there
before the Indians brought the stones to the hilltop.
"On the shore of Lake Ontario, on a high bluff near Irondequoit bay, in
1796," says Oliver Culver, "the bank caved off and untombed a great quantity
of human bones, of a large size. The arm and leg bones, upon comparison,
were much larger than those of our own race."' The bluff mentioned by Mr.
Culver was the seaward side of an elevated spot that might properly be
termed a natural mound. It was one of the outlying range of sand hills or
knolls, then existent along the shore of the lake in that locality, and long
years ago succumbed to the never-ceasing encroachment of the lake waters.
Its location was immediately west of the angle formed by the present west
line of Irondequoit bay and Lake Ontario; as late as 1830 human bones of an
unusually large size were occasionally seen projecting from the face of the
bluff, or lying on the beach where the undermined soil had fallen. The tribe
of Seneca Indians living in Irondequoit in 1796 could give no information
concerning these bones, stating their belief that they were the remains of a
people who dwelt about the bay before the Indians came there.
In 1880 a sand bank was opened in the side of the ridge, and that part
covered by the mounds has since been entirely removed. During the course
of excavation a laborer came upon human remains. Parts of eight skeletons
were exhumed, each surrounded by fine black soil. These were concealed and
all evidence of the find destroyed; but the discovery of a bone of unusual
size, together with a curious pipe, was brought to the attention of Mr. Brewer.
The laborer could remember few details of the position in which the remains
were found, and the opportunity for careful investigation was lost.
The Mound-builders were inveterate smokers, and great numbers of pipes
have been found in their mounds. The skill of the makers seems to have been
exhausted in their construction, and no specimens of Indian art can equal those
of the lost race. Many pipes of a shape similar to those discovered in the
mounds of the Ohio and Mississippi valleys have been found in various parts
of the country.
Figure 1 is a greatly reduced representation of an article of
stone, evidently intended for a pipe, but unfinished, found near Mount Morris,
in the Genesee valley, and sent to the New York state cabinet at Albany by
Mr. Squier, who says: "It is composed of steatite or 'soap-stone,' and in
shape corresponds generally with the pipes of stone found in the mounds of the
Mississippi valley. One or two pipes of stone of very nearly the same shape
have been found in the same vicinity, but in point of symmetry or finish they
are in no way comparable to those of the mounds."' The pipe taken from the
ridge mound in Rochester is of the distinctively characteristic, or primitive
form^ peculiar to the Mound-builders, and is represented in figure 2.
It is, or was originally, five and one-half inches long, one and three-fourths
wide, and one inch and seven-eighths from bottom of base to top of bowl.
The lines are slightly irregular, but very perfect for a hand-made article. The
material is steatite, very close grain and quite brittle.
In the color it is a deep, rich brown, with blending patches of lighter shade,
and every particle of the surface is so beautifully polished that it might easily be
mistaken for marble. It was the only article of any description found with the human
remains, though other relics may have been unnoticed. Close questioning elicited the
fact that nearly all the graves were near the south slope of the ridge, and from two to
two and a half feet below the original surface, while the large bone, a humerus,
was nearer the surface and perhaps more directly beneath the center of the west
mound; from which it may be inferred, though not definitely proven, that the
mound was built over that particular bod)' with which the pipe was buried, and
the other bodies interred in the side of the mound at a subsequent period.
The condition of the remains would seem to fivor this view, the humerus
being the only remaining part of the body to which it belonged, while several
portions of skeletons from the other graves were, though very much decayed.
quite firm in comparison; one skull (figure 3 being preserved entire.)
Mr. Brewer presented this skull and pipe to Professor S A. Lattimore of the Uni-
versity of Rochester, to whom we are indebted for their use.
In March, 1882, a human skeleton of large proportions was unearthed near
the former location of the east mound. The laborers, astonished at the great
size of the bones, engaged in a discussion as to whether it was or was not the
remains of a human being, and, with true Hibernian method, broke the skele-
ton into fragments to prove the ease.
Read the Rest, including the discovery of a skeleton over eight
feet in height at Samuel Truesdale's farm in Greece, in 1878
