Molly Brant, George's famous mother

"The Three Faces of Molly Brant" (Iroquois, European, Loyalist).
 1986 design, Canada Post commemorative postage stamp.

Mary Brant, better known as Molly, was born around 1736, possibly in the Mohawk village of Canajoharie or further west in the Iroquois hunting grounds in Ohio Country. Her parents were Christian Mohawks. Most historians believe that her father was named Peter. Her brother Joseph Brant was born in 1743. In September 1753, Molly's mother married Brant Kanagaradunkwa, a prominent Mohawk sachem of the Turtle clan, and Molly and Joseph took their stepfather's name as a surname.

One of Molly's Mohawk names was Konwatsi'tsiaienni, which means "Someone Lends Her a Flower.” Her other Mohawk name, given to her at adulthood, was Degonwadonti, meaning "Two Against One.”

In Canajoharie, the Brants lived in a colonial-style frame house and used many European household goods. The family attended the Church of England. Molly was fluent in Mohawk and English. It is unclear whether she could read and write. Several letters signed "Mary Brant" may have been dictated by her and written by someone else.

Around 1758 she became was the consort of Sir William Johnson, the influential British superintendent of Indian Affairs, and together they had eight children. After Johnson's death in 1774, Molly and her children returned to her native village of Canajoharie across the Mohawk River. As the American Revolutionary War intensified, she fled to Canada, where she worked as an intermediary between British officials and the Iroquois warriors.

After the war, Molly settled with several of her children and their families in what is now Kingston, Ontario. For her service to the Crown, the British government granted her a pension and compensated her with land and money for her wartime losses.

Some Things about the Brants

Molly (Mary) Brant and her younger brother, Joseph, were in their teens when they first came to know William Johnson. The brilliant young Irishman saw qualities in them both that intrigued them. The family lived in the best house in the village of Canajoharie on the Mohawk River, and both children had some education.

Molly was both beautiful and clever. Early on, she took a role in Six Nations negotiations with the European colonists. In 1754, when Molly was 19, she accompanied her stepfather and a delegation of Mohawk elders to Philadelphia, where the men were to discuss fraudulent land sales with colonial leaders. Along the way in Albany, an English officer named Captain Morris, the nephew of the governor of Pennsylvania, declared himself to be in love with Molly. However, nothing came of this romantic meeting. Five years later Molly became the partner of William Johnson, now Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the northern colonies. They remained together until William's death in 1771.

Molly's brother Joseph, younger by eight years, was sent by William to Connecticut to be educated at Eleazar Wheelock's school, the  forerunner of Dartmouth College. Joseph was to have continued his studies at King's College in New York City, but the Pontiac Rebellion upset those plans and Joseph returned home to the Valley.

Joseph became an important military leader. When he was little more than a boy, he fought alongside William Johnson at the Battle of Lake George. Later he took part, again with William, in significant military ventures at Fort Niagara and Montreal. For his bravery, the British awarded him a silver medal. He held the rank of Captain of the British superintendent's Mohawk warriors throughout the Revolutionary War. At the war's end, he led a large group of Iroquois exiles and loyalists to settle on the banks of the Grand River to the north of Lake Ontario in Canada. 

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