The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-10-17
Many of Them Bear Titles of Indian
Derivation.
MEANING OF THE WORDS.
HARDLY ONE HAS RETAINED
ORIGINAL FORM.
Peculiar Significance of Some Of the
Names Borne By Fighting Ma
chimes In Uncle Sans Navy-Ge-
ographica1 Names In More FIRE.
quent Use Than Any Others.

Philadelphia Times: There is an in
teresting story told by the names c
the ships of the American navy, par
ticularly where the names claim In
dian derivation. This is especially tru
of the old monitors, which did servic
in the civil war, and which have bee
refitted for the purpose of harbor de
Tense
Among these relics of the past ther
is one called Canonicus, which perpetu
ates the memory of the great sachem o
the Narragansetts, whose name other
wise, and more correctly, spelled Quno
nacus, means, He is of tall aspect.
This famous sachem's nephew, Meku
meh, Put me in mind" who in youtl
was his marshal, afterward his asso
ciate, and finally the principal sachen
of the Narragansatt country, was al
ways the warm friend and protector o
the settlers of Rhode Island. He !:
described by his contemporaries a:
having been a man of great stature e
family characteristic, as would appeal
from his uncle's name), naughty, sterI
and commanding, and one who caused
all his subjects to tremble at his speecT
and promptly to respond to his sum
mons. 1t was doubtless for this rea-
son that in mature years he received
the name by which he is best known IN
histOry-that of Maiantonomeu Only
anton ON ai-oo), meaning He gath
ers together by word of mouth" His
name has been variously spelled in his
torical works. and. in the form of Mi
antonomoh, is now borne by one of our
modern monitors.
The name of the Mohegan sachem
who DEBATED Maiantonomeu in battle
delivered him to the English, and after
ward superintended his execution, is
borne by the dispatch boat Uncas.
UncaS is a corruption of WankuS, an
Algonkin name for the fox; the word
means the circler." and refers to the
animals habit of doubling or circling
when pursued.
The monitor Montauk bears the name
of a point familiar to everyone as the
locality off which the waters of the
ocean meet those of Long Island sound.
Montauk is a nasalized form dating
from about the middle of the 18th cen
tury) of a word that was originally
spelled Matowack or Metowack-prOp-
erly. Metawak-the participal form of
MataWan, meaning where one body
of water enters another" i. e., place of
confluence. In the name of the mont
tor Passaic, so called either from a city
or a river of New Jersey, we have the
Lenape word for valley" The Maho-
pac was named after a well-known
watering place in Putnam county, n.
Y. The older spelling of the word
Macookpack-stands for the Lenape
Mechekpog, meaning large lake" The
Nahant was so called after a watering
place situated an a small rocky PENN
sula in Massachusetts bay and the In
dian name of which means "at the
In Nantucket (the name
Of another of the monitors) we have
word from the same root as the last
meaning ''at the promon-
tory in a tidal river"
The name of the monitor Lehigh is
a corruption of Lechau, a word abbre-
waited by the Moraviar missionaries
in Pennsylvania from the Lenape Lee
meaning the fork of a
stream The familiar river named
Lackawanna represents the unabbre-
Waited word. The Wyandotte bears the
name of an Iroquoian people whom the
French nicknamed the Hurons. Their
name apparently meant, in its original
form, the Islanders" Finally, in the
name Comanche, meaning separated"
Of an aboriginal people of Numa stock,
who formerly wandered through north
ern Texas and on both sides of the
Rio Grande.
OF the new monitors. the only one
besides the Miantonomoh that bears an
indian title is the Monadnock, which
was so called after an isolated noun
ain in Cheshire county, n. II. The
aboriginal name of this eminece was
the bad mountain" which,
with the locative suffiX, becomes Ma
ladnak, "at the bad mountain" The
lame was probably given from the
act that a storm is preceded for sew
eral hours by a roaring of the noun
ain (of evil pOrtent to the natives),
which, according to Jeremy Belknap,
nay be heard to a distance of ten or
2 miles.
1t is probably to tradition that the
indians regarded this eminence as
'manito," that is, as possessing some
hing of the supernatural or mysteri-
JUS, that is due the unwarranted inter
1.-The spirits place." found in
ome books. AS the letter m is con-
-ertible in Algonkin with '1' and r.
he derogatory prefix in this word be-
ONES in certain dialects NAL or mar;
Whence the name Maramak, q bad
ishing place." applied to some locality
lpon a New England river, to which
he appellation, in the corrupt form of
derimack or Merrimack, was early
transferred by the European settlers.
Two other of our war vessels bear the
anne of mountains. One of these. the
rmored ram katahdin, was so called
fter the highest elevation in Maine.
he Indian name of which, Ketadene,
means the principal mountain" The
ther is the battleship Kearsarge (now
onstructing), which is to perpetuate
he memory of the famous corvette
hat sank the confederate cruiser Ala
anna in 1864, and ended her career on |
toncador Reef in 1894. This vessel was
o called after a conspicuous eminence
4 Carroll county, New Hampshire, the
1odern name of which is a very bad |
eruption of Kowasadchu, meaning
pine mountain"
The law that provides that cruisers |
hall be called after cities has given an |
indian name thus far to but one vessel |
this class-the Chicago; the name |
orne by the cruiser Topeka being |
lerely an Indian corruption of the |
,nglish word potato.
The meaning of the word Chicago |
spelled by early French writer's Chi |
agou) is obscure. Nevertheless, this |
as not prevented idle guesses being |
lade as to its Specification. There are |
vo things which can be stated with |
ositiveness in regard to the word Chi |
ago: First, that it was the name of |
village of the Miamis; and, second, |
lat in the dialect of these Indians it
ad none of the meanings that have
lus far been ascribed to it,
The name of the auxiliary cruiser
osemite is a beautiful and sonorous
of uzumaiti (oo-zoo- my-teel.
lie Miwok Indian name for the grizzly
ear. The word as a name for the
aautiful valley so called came into use
bout 1851, and the credit of it's appli-
alton is accorded to a DIR. L. H Bun