The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1928-02-24

Mohawk Indian chief, Thomas VIII.
liams, who was descended from
Eunice Williams, the famous Deerfield
captive, and was one of the family
of thirteen halfbreeds by Thomas Will
liams' Indian wife, Mary Ann Will
liams. He grew up among the Mo-
hawks at Caughnawaga, Quebec, but
was educated in New England and
served brilliantly as the head of a
corps of scouts and spies for the
Americans in the War of 1912. Later
he became missionary among his
fathers people, first as a Congrega-
tionalist and later as an Episcopalian.
When they and other Iroquois tribes
men in New York We're being hard
pressed by the advancing white set
tiers, he was instrumental in OBJ
tanning lands for them in Wisconsin.
At some time during his early career
he heard the story of the lost Dau-
phin and having been told that he
resembled the Bourbon Prince, he
decided to advance his claims to the
honor of being that person. Owing to
a scrofulous faint in his family, the
bruises and injuries, received while
he was a child playing with his In
dian playmates, left permanent scars
which were later in life increased
in size by artificial means. These
he claimed to have been the result Of
the shackles and chains with which
he was confined in the Temple.
In 1S41 the Prince de Joinville,
son of the then reigning King Louis
Philippe of France, followed his ia
theirs example and paid visit to
America. During trip on the Great
Lakes the Prince found awaiting
him at Mackinac clerical-lOoking
gentleman who asked permission to
accompany the Princes party to
Green Bay, wis. This cleric was
Eleazer Williams and soon after the
departure of the Prince from Green
Bay, Williams gave out the astonish-
ing statement that De Joinville
had acknowledged that he (Wil-
liams) was Louis XVII, and that the
Prince had sought him out in the west
ern wilderness to ask him to re-
nounce his claim to the throne Of
France. A few years later Williams
told his story to Rev. J. III. Han
son who wrote an article "Have We
a Bourbon Among U.s." which ap-
peared in the February, 1858, number
of Putnam's Monthly. When a copy
Of this magazine was received in
England, where the Prince de join
vile was then living as an exile from
France, he Immediately repudiated
the alleged interview and denounced
Williams as an impostOr. However,
a book by Hanson, 'The Lost Prince"
which gave a detailed account of Will
liams' life, and which proved to the
satisfaction of the author, at least,
that the Mohawk> halfbreed mission
airy was indeed the lost Dauphin,
gained for him many adherents.
Although Williams steadfastly main
tanned that he was the lost Dau-
phin, nothing ever came of his pre-
tensions and he died August %, 1853.
on the St. Regis reservation near
Hogansburg, N. Y. Evidently his adj
herents were not as steadfast i'm their
belief as were those of Naurendorf,
for he was buried with Masonic rites
simply as Brother Eleazer Williams"
and the plain monument over his
grave at Hogansburg bears not the
royal crest of the house of Bour-
bon, but the Masonic emblem, his
name, dates of his birth and death.
Perhaps he has had as much right to
the title Of the lost Dauphin as any
other claimant but history has not
vet been convinced that any of the
claims are convincing.