Johann

October 14, 1744

Not known

June 21, 1814

Ontario, Canada

Burial:

Johann Jacob Powley married Annetje (or Nancy) Van Voorst.

     Jacob and Nancy had settled on a farm near Schenectady, New York.  One day Jacob was busy ploughing (about 1773 or 1774), when a roving band of Indians came, seized him, killed his horses, and roasted the horse meat.  Jacob was fortunate to get a piece of the horse's shank.  After the Indians feasted, they took what meat they could carry and headed west across country, taking Jacob with them.  They made long, swift passages.  By and by the shank became unfit to eat and had to be thrown away.  Jacob became very weak.  He was a small man, about 110 pounds, jet black hair, piercing black eyes, very white skin.  On coming to a river, which now flows through Watertown, New York.  Jacob played out and and Indian raised his tomahawk to kill him.  One of the Indian squaws (who had evidently taken to Jacob), knocked the tomahawk out of the way, picked him up and carried him on her shoulders across the river.  They went a short distance further where they had hidden their canoes, paddled down the river, crossing the foot of Lake Ontario around the north side of Wolfe Island to Kingston, Ontario.  The Indians went to the British garrison there where they sold Jacob for three strings of beads and two hatchets.
     Jacob then served three years in the British army, getting a shilling a day and a pint of beer.  Jacob sold his beer, saved the money, and after the War of Independence, was discharged and started home with gold hidden in the back of one of his boots.  On the road home he was met and robbed by another group of Indians, but they did not find the gold in his boot.  The rest of the trip home was uneventful -- and he walked in on his wife Nancy after nearly five years.  Nancy, who had remained loyal to England all through the war, was hated by her neighbors.  So they bought a team of oxen and a wagon and headed north to Canada, where, in due time, they arrived near Kingston.  The British government gave them about 600 acres near what is now known as the village of Westbrook.