Battle of Fort George. Struggle for Oil Spring Reservation Governor Blacksnake "helped save the Oil Spring Reserve" for the Seneca. His victory in this New York State court case established a precedent for the land claim settled in June 2005 over Cuba Lake. After the war, American colonists Stanley Clark, Benjamin Chamberlain, and William Gallagher bought lands adjacent to the Seneca Oil Spring Reservation. Clark surveyed Reservation lands and claimed the area for the three men, granting one-quarter of the reservation to Horatio Seymour, later elected as governor of New York. In the 1850s, Clark conveyed another quarter to Philonius Pattison. In response to these actions, the Seneca filed a legal challenge that reached the New York Court of Appeals, Seneca Nation of Indians v. Philonus Pattison. They protested against the Seymour, Gallagher, Chamberlain, and Clark claims to the northeast quarter of Oil Spring. Governor Blacksnake, who had attended the negotiations of the Treaty of Big Tree that established the reservation, testified that he and Joseph Ellicott had surveyed the Oil Spring lands and that the omission of a full legal description of the lands from the treaty was a mistake. He produced a map copied by the Holland Land Company, in which the Oil Spring Reservation was marked similarly to other Seneca lands. In 1861, the Court found for the Seneca Nation. Pattison, Chamberlain, Clark, Gallagher, and Seymour were forced to leave the reservation. While later incursions by the New York State Board of Canal Commissioners and tourist activities have taken additional land from the Reservation, Governor Blacksnake's actions helped preserve some of Oil Spring as Seneca land. Later life In later life, Chainbreaker's political influence waned, as younger Seneca men assumed control. But he continued to participate in the condolence ceremony into his nineties. Chainbreaker died on the Allegany Reservation in Cattaraugus County, New York in late December 1859. He is remembered by the Seneca Nation as "a man of rare intellectual and moral power." Notes References External links Tenh-Wen-Nyos, Governor Blacksnake at Find-a-Grave Governor Blacksnake Manuscript Page Poem: Governor Blacksnake Speaks , contains information on Governor Blacksnake and the Senecas of the Cornplanter Grant Seneca people Native Americans in the American Revolution Native American leaders Native American people of the Indian Wars Native Americans in the War of 1812 Native American writers People from Cattaraugus County, New York 18th-century births 1859 deaths Year of birth uncertain Native