Samuel Kirkland was born on November 20, 1741 in Norwich, Connecticut, United States, the son of Reverend Daniel and Mary (Perkins) Kirtland. He later changed the spelling of the name to Kirkland. He was a descendant of Nathaniel Kyrtland, or Kertland, of Sherrington, Bucks, England, who was in Lynn, Massachusetts, in 1635. Samuel's father, a graduate of Yale College in the class of 1720, was for many years the pastor of the Parish of Newent, now Lisbon, in the town of Norwich.
Young Kirkland, having determined to devote himself to missionary work among the Indians, prepared for college at Eleazar Wheelock's school at Lebanon, Connecticut, where he began his lifelong friendship with Joseph Brant and other Indian pupils, and acquired some knowledge of the Mohawk language. He entered the College of New Jersey as a sophomore in 1762, and received his degree in absentia in 1765.
Kirkland began his missionary work with recommendations from Wheelock and Sir William Johnson in Canadasaga, the principal village of the Senecas. Here he was adopted into the family of the chief sachem and remained until May 1766, learning the language, instructing his neighbors, and making acquaintances throughout the tribe. In spite of the loyalty of his friends, many of the Senecas, still excited on account of the late war, were suspicious and hostile. His life was often in danger, but his courage and tact gradually won for him general confidence.
He returned to Lebanon in the spring of 1766 to be ordained on June 19, and, yielding to the advice of his friends, determined to establish his permanent mission among the Oneidas. He settled at Canowaroghare (Oneida Castle), their chief village, in August 1766, and carried on his mission in this vicinity for forty years. Receiving no regular financial support, he endured extreme poverty, living as an Indian. He soon gained the affection and confidence of the Oneidas to such a degree that they looked to him for counsel in all their affairs. He established a vigorous church, taught the people habits of industry, and persuaded them to prohibit the sale of liquor in their territory. During this period Wheelock gave full accounts of Kirkland's activities in the successive Narratives which he printed for his English contributors, and early in 1769 there came a gift of £30 from an admirer in Scotland, almost the first money Kirkland had received since he came among the Oneidas. Much of this went for relief of the Indians in a famine.
He passed the summer of 1769 in New England to regain his health, which had broken down from exposure and hardships. In 1770 a disagreement with Wheelock, who was now engaged in the establishment of Dartmouth College, induced Kirkland, with Wheelock's consent, to place himself under the charge of the Boston commissioners of the Honorable Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge. He now received a salary of £100 from the Society and from Harvard College. He found means to erect a church, set up mills, and obtain oxen and tools for the Indians.
From Kirkland's papers, it appears that he was instrumental in preventing Lord Dunmore's War from becoming a general Indian uprising in 1774-1775. The Shawnees of Virginia, infuriated by encroachments upon their lands and the murder of several of their tribesmen and a number of Senecas, sent messengers to the Six Nations to inform them of the facts and to incite them to take the lead in a general war against the colonists, assuring them that the Indians of the Ohio region were pledged to join in a great alliance on condition that the Six Nations would give their support. A council was called at Onondaga, and continued for more than a month before a decision was reached. Largely on account of the vigorous opposition of the Oneidas and Tuscaroras, the Six Nations refused to enter the war and advised the Shawnees to make peace with the Virginians. A general Indian war at that time might well have forced the colonists to look to Britain for aid and have suppressed the revolutionary movement.
Kirkland's second great service to the colonists followed in 1775. He persuaded the Oneidas to issue a formal declaration of neutrality (May 1775) and soon afterward obtained a general declaration of neutrality from the Six Nations. The authorities in Albany were unable, however, to complete the work which Kirkland had begun; the western tribes of the Confederacy, like the Mohawks, were unwilling to remain mere spectators when a war was in progress; and the Loyalists, with the aid of Brant, were unable to break the League of the Iroquois at a council held near Niagara. Only the Oneidas and Tuscaroras remained loyal to the colonies.
During the war the Oneidas were scattered and Kirkland's mission was suspended. He directed Oneida scouts, securing valuable information of the movements of the enemy; served as chaplain at Fort Schuyler (Stanwix) and with Sullivan's expedition; and performed other services. His aid was formally recognized by Congress and by the legislatures of Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New York. At the close of the war he returned to Canowaroghare. He assisted at the treaty of Fort Stanwix (1784) and helped in persuading the Senecas to accept the terms laid down by the government. He rebuilt the church and found encouragement in the rapid progress of his people. In the summer of 1788 he made a tour through the Seneca country, discussed with Brant plans for the welfare of the Indians, and counseled the Six Nations in the business of the Phelps and Gorham purchase. In recognition of his services the Indians and the state of New York made him a grant of some 4, 000 acres of wild land along the boundary of the Oneida territory a few miles east of Utica.
During the following summer he journeyed through the entire country of the Six Nations, making an elaborate census of the Indians by families. Hostile demonstrations of the Ohio Indians were causing anxiety in 1790. Kirkland proposed to the government in Philadelphia that a delegation be sent from the Six Nations to the Miamis to persuade them against war. But on account of delays, and the unwillingness of the government to treat with all the Indians in one great council, the embassy failed. Shortly afterward the victory of the Miamis over St. Clair so excited the Senecas that there was prospect of a further uprising under their leadership.
At the request of General Henry Knox, secretary of war, Kirkland went through the western part of the state in the winter of 1792 to convince the Indians, if possible, that such a policy would destroy them. He succeeded in bringing together a council of the Six Nations in spite of the threats of the western Indians and the intrigues of hostile whites, and persuaded the council to send a large delegation of chiefs to Philadelphia to negotiate with the federal government. As a result, the Six Nations continued friendly with the United States. Kirkland now set about the accomplishment of a plan which he had long cherished: the equipment of an academy on the boundary between the Indian lands and the white settlements for the coeducation of Indian and white boys. With the approval of President Washington and the promise of support from Alexander Hamilton, he obtained a charter for the Hamilton Oneida Academy in January 1793. He was the most liberal contributor to the school both in lands and in funds, and supported several Indian pupils; but the public had lost faith in the possibility of civilizing the Indians, and the school proved of more value to the white settlements. In 1812 it received a new charter as Hamilton College.
The last years of Kirkland's life were uneventful. Despite painful illnesses and personal misfortunes he continued his missionary labors among the Oneidas until shortly before his death. Kindly, wise, and brave, he was respected and loved by the Oneidas and throughout the Iroquois Confederacy as a father and faithful counselor.
Kirkland was well known for his missionary work among the Oneida and Tuscarora people. He was instrumental in negotiating the treaties between Oneida Alliance and the colonists during the American Revolution. He played an important part in organizing purchases of land from Indians on behalf of New York state. He also founded the Hamilton Oneida Academy for young Indian and white men in the new town of Kirkland.
Kirkland was married to Jerusha Bingham on September 19, 1969. John Thornton Kirkland was his son.
