The Cortland Democrat, Friday, August
5, 1887.
The Frenchman After Whom Oneida Lake Island Was
Named—Mr. Seymour’s Historical Discoveries. (Elmira Advertiser, July 29,
1887.)
Among the many pleasant trips that can now be taken from Elmira, the ride on the E.
C. & N. and Canastota Northern to Sylvan Beach on Oneida lake should not be forgotten.
Through the foresight and energy of General Manager A. A. McLeod, there
is
now direct communication between Elmira and Oneida lake and excellent connection with
the Rome, Watertown & Ogdensburg road at Camden for Henderson bay,
Sackett's harbor, Cape Vincent and all places in the Thousand Islands. When the Hon.
G. A. Forbes of Canastota was in Elmira the other day, he spoke in high terms of
the E. C. & N. and the extension to Camden and paid Manager McLeod deserved compliment
for opening up that branch of the line. It is very popular with the people
and gives promise of fine business.
Oneida
Lake is nearly twenty-five miles long and is seven wide at the widest point. It
is noted for its pure air and fine fishing. At Sylvan Beach the bathing and
swimming are
the finest to be found in fresh water. The lake is abundantly supplied with
steamboats and
yachts as well as row boats.
In
the widest part of Oneida Lake is a beautiful spot of land called Frenchman's island
around which cluster history and romance in fascinating proportions. An exchange has
this interesting sketch of the island and its settlers:
John
F. Seymour, a brother of the late Horatio Seymour, visited Frenchman's Island a
few weeks ago and cleared up some of the history of this pretty and romantic piece
of ground. That the island took its name from a mysterious Frenchman who made
it his home a hundred years ago or so is about the only established fact that
has been
known to the public for these many years. Even the owners of the island have been
in ignorance of everything but a legend that the Frenchman was a young man of
the customary poverty and honesty, who fell in love with a girl of surpassing
beauty, wealth
and aristocracy, and that the girl's parents
objecting to the match, the couple eloped from France and eventually brought up
at this chunk of fairy land in Oneida lake. A depression in the land with a few stones
lying about is pointed out as the site of their cottage.
The Frenchman's name, it appears from Mr. Seymour’s investigations, was Francois de Mattines. In the year
1792 Judge Adrian
Van der Kemp, a learned and [astute] man, made a tour through central and
western New
York by horseback and canoe and wrote graphic descriptions of the country through
which he passed to one Colonel Adam G. Mappa. The originals of these letters
are in the possession of the Buffalo historical society. Judge Van der Kemp, with
a companion, paddled the whole length of Oneida lake and down through the Oneida and
Oswego rivers to Lake Ontario. He stopped at Frenchman's Island and was surprised to
find living there a Frenchman of exceptional polish and education, and his wife
a lady of rare beauty and evident refinement. They had three beautiful young children,
the youngest a baby named Camille, who had been born on the island but a
few months before. Van der Kemp writes to his friend a very long account of his
discovery, and
thus describes how he alighted from his canoe and was entertained by M. de
Mattines:
"I never witnessed a more charming sight;
it was indeed exquisitely beautiful, the
sun in its full splendor at the western horizon, gilding the enlightened clouds,
an extensive
sheet of water in undulating motion, two islands toward the south in front which
we were now approaching, a small opening between these, through which we had
a view of the southern coast. Behind the tree adorned islands appeared the country of the
Oneidas with the Canaserago hills. We landed half after seven at the largest and
most westerly island, towed the canoe on shore and walked by an Indian path in the
woods.
"The
island might in ancient days have been the happy seat of a goddess, in
the middle ages that of a magician, or a fairy residence in the times of chivalry. Our
path,
gradually increasing in breadth, did lead us to the circumference of cleared
circle, surrounded with lime trees; at both sides of the path was planted Indian corn.
A small cottage of a few feet square did stand nearly in the center of this spot. It had a dark covering, and to the left
of it a similar one, three-fourths uncovered and appropriated for a kitchen. Here was
the residence of M. and Madame de Mattines,
with their three children. They lived there without servants, without neighbors, without
a cow; they lived, as it were, separated from the world. De Mattines sailed
forth and gave us a cordial welcome in his demesnes The well-educated man was
easily recognized through his slovenly dress. Ragged as he appeared without a coat
or hat, his manners were those of a gentleman; his address of one who had seen
the highest circles of civilized life.
"His beautiful wife was sitting at the entrance
of this cottage. She was dressed in white,
in a short gown and petticoat, garnished with the same stuff, her chestnut brown
hair hung back in ringlets over her shoulders, her eyes fixed on her darling Camille, a native
of this isle, at her breast. She received us with that easy politeness which
well educated people seldom lose. The couple were now in the second year on the
island, and all the improvements we had seen were the work of De Mattines' hand
exclusively.
"Few
trunks, few chairs,
an oval table, two seat beds, was the principal furniture; a double-barreled gun,
a pretty collection of books, chiefly modern literature in the French language, were
the chief ornaments of the cottage. De Mattines had laid out behind the cottage a
pretty garden, divided by a wall in the middle. The tablecloth was of neat damask,
a few silver spoons and forks, the plates and dishes cream colored, remnants yet
of their former alliance."
The writer covers several more pages with
rhapsodies of the charming island and its
live inhabitants. De Mattines cultivated enough ground to furnish an abundance of
vegetables for his family, and enjoyed an inexhaustible supply of fish, the lake then
being full of them. Van der Kemp grows quite melancholy contemplating the isolation
and loneliness of his new friends, and intimates that their exile from their native land
was forced. De Mattines evidently confided his troubles to his guest, who thought
himself under obligations not to disclose them to his correspondent. From the
fact that they had lived on the island newly two years when the judge visited them, they must have left their country in 1789 when France was beginning to feel the throes
of her great revolution. It appears therefore, that they were of the nobility who
had been driven from their homes by the rising populace and forced to flee into foreign lands for their lives.
De Mattines possibly
was an assumed name. The family lived on the inland for several years afterward, De
Mattines going to Fish Creek
to do his trading. There is no record of what eventually became of them.
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