Teyoninhokarawen (Major John Norton)
Artist: Mather Brown (American, 1761–1831)
Date: c. 1805
Medium: Oil on canvas
Collection: Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, United States
Description
John Norton or Teyoninhokarawen (born c. 1770, Scotland (?) – died c. 1827, Upper Canada (?)) was a Mohawk chief, Indian Department interpreter and a school master. He was adopted by the Mohawk at about age 30 at their major reserve in Canada. After deserting the British military in the late 18th century, he became a military leader of Iroquois warriors in the War of 1812 on behalf of Great Britain against the United States. Commissioned as a major, he led warriors from the Six Nations of the Grand River into battle against American invaders at Queenston Heights, Stoney Creek, and Chippawa.
Likely born and educated in Scotland, he had a Scottish mother and a Cherokee father. His father was born in Keowee circa 1740, and was saved by British soldiers when they burned the town during the Anglo-Cherokee War. They took him to England and placed him with an English family. As an adult with the baptized surname Norton, he married a Scottish woman, whom he had a son with.
The junior John Norton joined the British Army, serving in Ireland before being assigned to Lower Canada after the American Revolutionary War. While there he became interested in the Six Nations of Grand River, ultimately learning the Mohawk language and culture, and being adopted into a family of the tribe. In 1804 on a diplomatic trip representing the Iroquois to England, he translated the Gospel of John into Mohawk for the British and Foreign Bible Society. This work was distributed in Upper Canada beginning in 1806.
Norton traveled in the American Southeast in 1809–1810, visiting many Cherokee towns and meeting some of his father’s relatives. He documented much about Cherokee culture and included this material in his journal, which primarily recounted events of the War of 1812. It is unique for his perspective on the war as an acculturated Mohawk raised in the British Isles. The memoir, The Journal of Major John Norton, 1816, was not published until 1970 in an annotated edition by The Champlain Society; other annotated versions have also been published, including the Society’s 2011 version.
