Samson Occom


The Reverend Samson Occom was a member of the Mohegan nation, from near New London, Connecticut, who became a Presbyterian cleric. Occom was the first Native American to publish his writings in English, and also helped found several settlements, including what ultimately became known as the Brothertown Indians. Together with the missionary John Eliot, Occom became one of the foremost missionaries who cross-fertilised Native American communities with Christianized European culture.

Early life and education

Born to Joshua Tomacham and his wife Sarah, Occom is believed to be a direct descendant of Uncas, the notable Mohegan chief. In 1743 at the age of 20, Occom heard the teachings of Christian evangelical preachers in the Great Awakening. He began to study theology at the "Lattin School" of Congregational minister Eleazar Wheelock in 1743 and stayed for four years until leaving to begin his own career. In addition to improving his English, Occom learned to read and speak Hebrew. As a young man, the only book he owned was the Bible. From 1747 until 1749, Occum worked under and studied with the Reverend Solomon Williams in New London, Connecticut.

Career

Occom became a teacher, preacher, and judge among the Montaukett Native Americans in Montauk, eastern Long Island, and married Mary Fowler, a Montaukett woman. Occom helped some of the Pequot peoples he worked with assimilate and adopt European-style houses, dress and culture.
He was officially ordained a minister on August 30, 1759, by the presbytery of Suffolk. Occom was never paid the same salary as white preachers, although promised he would be. The Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge also gave Occom a stipend for some time, but he lived in deep poverty for much of his life.
In 1761 and 1763, Occom traveled to the Six Nations of the Iroquois in upstate New York to preach. Winning few converts, he returned to teach at Mohegan, Connecticut, near New London.
Wheelock had meanwhile established an Indian charity school in Lebanon, Connecticut in 1754 with a legacy from Joshua Moor. Upon Occam’s return to Mohegan, Wheelock persuaded his former pupil to travel to England to raise money for the school. Occom preached his way across Britain from February 16, 1766, to July 22, 1767, delivering between 300-400 sermons, drawing large crowds wherever he went, and raising over £12,000 for Wheelock's project. King George III donated 200 pounds, and William Legge, Earl of Dartmouth, subscribed 50 guineas. However, Occom on his return learned that Wheelock had failed to care for Occom's wife and children while he was away. Furthermore, Wheelock moved to New Hampshire and used the funds raised to establish Dartmouth College for the education of English colonists, rather than Native Americans as had originally been promised to Occom. Even 200 years later, the college had graduated less than 20 Indian students.
In 1768, Occom wrote A Short Narrative of My Life, a ten-page manuscript now held in Dartmouth College's archive collection; however, it was not published until 1982. The document expands upon a single-page biography that Occom wrote before his preaching tour of England and Scotland. Occom also published Sermon at the Execution of Moses Paul and A Choice Collection of Hymns and Spiritual Songs in 1774. All of these documents provide a very different perspective on the relations between colonists and Native Americans from Mary Rowlandson's narrative of her captivity in similar areas a century earlier.

Ministry and later life

Upon his return from England, Occom lived with his Mohegan people. After Wheelock's betrayal, Occom worked to organize the Christian Indians of New England and Long Island into a new tribe located in western Connecticut. Under continuing pressure from settlers following the American Revolutionary War, in 1785 they migrated at the invitation of Christians of the Oneida tribe to their reservation in central New York state. Occom, his Mohegan son-in-law Joseph Johnson, and his Montauk brother-in-law David Fowler led the people who built a new settlement called Brothertown.
The Oneida also invited other Christian Indians to live with them, namely the Stockbridge Mohican from land claimed by western Massachusetts and two Lenape groups from the southern New Jersey area. The Mohicans founded what they called New Stockbridge in New York, near Oneida Lake. Occom not only assured that these villages received official civil charters in 1787, but also evicted white settlers from Brothertown on April 12, 1792.
Occom died on July 14, 1792, in New Stockbridge. He is buried just off Bogusville Hill Road outside of Deansboro, New York.

Legacy

After Occom's death, during the 1820s, many Brothertown Indians and some Oneida accepted payment from New York State for their land and were removed to what is now known as the town of Brothertown in Calumet County, Wisconsin. In the modern era, the Brothertown Indians petitioned the federal government for recognition as a tribe, but were denied and have appealed.
Several locations around Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, are named after Occom, including Occom Pond and Occom Ridge on the college campus's northern edge. The Native American Studies program has a Samson Occom professorship. The Occom Commons community space is part of Goldstein Hall in the recently opened McLaughlin Residential Cluster. Eastern Connecticut State University in Willimantic, Connecticut, also named a residence hall for upperclassmen after Occom.
The Norwich, Connecticut neighborhood of Occum is named for Samson Occom.

Veneration

Occom is honored with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church on July 14.

Works of Samson Occom