Douw Jellise Fonda (1700–1780) was a prominent settler and trader in the

Mohawk Valley The Mohawk Valley region of the U.S. state of New York is the area surrounding the Mohawk River, sandwiched between the Adirondack Mountains and Catskill Mountains, northwest of the Capital District. As of the 2010 United States Census, th ...

New York State New York, officially the State of New York, is a state in the Northeastern United States. It is often called New York State to distinguish it from its largest city, New York City. With a total area of , New York is the 27th-largest U.S. stat ...

. The village of

Fonda, New York Fonda is a village in and the county seat of Montgomery County, New York, United States. The population was 795 at the 2010 census. The village is named after Douw Fonda, a Dutch-American settler who was killed and scalped in 1780, during a Mohawk ...

is named for him. Douw Fonda was born in

Schenectady, New York Schenectady () is a city in Schenectady County, New York, United States, of which it is the county seat. As of the 2020 census, the city's population of 67,047 made it the state's ninth-largest city by population. The city is in eastern New Y ...

on August 22, 1700, the third child of Jillis (or Jelles) Adam and Rachel (Winnie) Fonda. He married Maritje Vrooman on October 29, 1725. Around 1751, he moved to Caughnawaga. The couple had seven children. Maritje died in 1756, and apparently Douw remarried, to the widow Deborah (Veeder) Wimple. Fonda "conducted a flourishing trading business" in Caughnawaga. In 1780,

Sir John Johnson Brigadier General Sir John Johnson, 2nd Baronet (5 November 1741 – 4 January 1830) was an American-born military officer, magistrate, landowner and colonial official in the British Indian Department who fought as a Loyalist during the American ...

led a party of about 528

Loyalists Loyalism, in the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and its former colonies, refers to the allegiance to the British crown or the United Kingdom. In North America, the most common usage of the term refers to loyalty to the British Cr ...

and

Mohawk Mohawk may refer to: Related to Native Americans *Mohawk people, an indigenous people of North America (Canada and New York) *Mohawk language, the language spoken by the Mohawk people *Mohawk hairstyle, from a hairstyle once thought to have been t ...

warriors on a raid into the Mohawk Valley. Many residents fled the area, but Fonda decided to stay and fight. On May 22, 1780, he was captured by a Mohawk called "One Armed Peter", with whom he was acquainted,

tomahawked A tomahawk is a type of single-handed axe used by the many Indigenous peoples and nations of North America. It traditionally resembles a hatchet with a straight shaft. In pre-colonial times the head was made of stone, bone, or antler, and Europ ...

, and

scalped Scalping is the act of cutting or tearing a part of the human scalp, with hair attached, from the head, and generally occurred in warfare with the scalp being a trophy. Scalp-taking is considered part of the broader cultural practice of the tak ...

. Fonda had been a longtime friend of Johnson's father

Sir William Johnson Sir William Johnson, 1st Baronet of New York ( – 11 July 1774), was a British Army officer and colonial administrator from Ireland. As a young man, Johnson moved to the Province of New York to manage an estate purchased by his uncle, Royal Na ...

, and Johnson was unhappy about the killing. In fact, he had made it a practice to spare many, who had been his neighbors before the

Revolution In political science, a revolution (Latin: ''revolutio'', "a turn around") is a fundamental and relatively sudden change in political power and political organization which occurs when the population revolts against the government, typically due ...

. Johnson rebuked Peter for the killing, but Peter replied that "as it was the intention of the enemy to kill him, he thought he might as well get the bounty for his scalp as any one else!" Two of Douw Fonda's sons, John and Adam, were taken prisoner in the raid and taken to Canada.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fonda, Douw 1700 births 1780 deaths People of New York (state) in the American Revolution People from Montgomery County, New York Axe murder