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This website exists to promote the idea that the origin of the name of both the City of Buffalo and Buffalo Creek comes from the term “Bois Blanc” the name given to the creek by the French in the 1750’s.
Native Americans knew Buffalo Creek as Toseoway or Tehoseroron which meant "place of basswoods" or "between the basswoods".
Basswood was an important tree providing Native Americans with bark for their shelters and the inside wood could be used for fasteners and basketry.
The French named the creek the Riviere du Bois Blanc which means "White Wood River".
White wood was a synonym for birch and basswood which were important trees for use on French vessels as they explored the Great Lakes region.
At the end of the French and Indian War, the British having won the Great Lakes, kept the name Bois Blanc which were pronounced "Boblo" on two islands, one north and one south of Detroit.
In Western New York the pronunciation of Bois Blanc evolved into Buffloe, Bufflo, Buffeloe, Buffaloe and finally Buffalo.
The maps of two French soldiers are crucial in showing Bois Blanc as Buffalo Creek. Those maps are found below.
(Pouchot map from Franklin Hough's book, author's copy)
The French had occupied the Niagara region from the early 1700’s up to July of 1759 when Captain Pierre Pouchot the Commandant of Fort Niagara surrendered the fort under military pressure by the British in the midst of the Seven Years War.
Pouchot had made a map of the Niagara region which he sent to his superiors prior to surrender that indicated a waterway with the name “Riviere aux Bois Blanc”. While that map has been lost, he recreated it and that map was published along with his memoirs in 1781.
In his memoir Pouchot also described the "Petit Rapide" and the "Riviere aux Chevaux" in the WNY region, but his map does not include either of them.
Michel Crevecoeur was a French citizen who also served in the Seven Years War. He acted as a geographer and cartographer for Aide to Camp Louis-Antoine de Bougainville who served the Commander of the French Army, General Louis-Joseph de Montcalm.
In this capacity Crevecoeur made maps of the war regions including the Great Lakes. It is without doubt that Crevecoeur would have been familiar with the map that Pouchot sent up the chain of command to Montcalm.
After the war, Crevecoeur was known as Hector St. John in the colonies and eventually settled in New York. He was a surveyor by trade and then bought a farm. Later, in 1782, he wrote a bestselling book, Letters from an American Farmer which was also popular in Europe.
In 1787, in a separate later French edition of this book, Crevecoeur included a reworking of a 1755 map by Lewis Evans of the newly formed United States originally done when they were colonies.
On this map Crevecoeur names Buffalo Creek as the “Riviere du Bois Blanc”. He does this specifically by placing the waterway above a label “Swift” that Evans had included on the original map to show that the water leaving Lake Erie going into the Niagara was moving fast. This use of “Swift” by Evans was describing what Pouchot had called the “Petite Rapide” in his memoir. Crevecoeur on his map also included the “Riviere aux Chevaux” which was situated as being below the “Swift” waters.
Pouchot and Crevecoeur’s are the only 18th century maps to indicate the Riviere aux/du Bois Blanc and Crevecoeur’s map is the only to depict the Riviere aux Chevaux at that time.
Other Facts:
The Greek “boubalos” and the Latin “bubalus” both mean “Buffalo” in their respective languages.
In July of 2021 the Buffalo Historical Museum mentioned that William Beauchamp originally suggested Bois Blancs may be the origin the name of Buffalo Creek in a 1907 NY Museum Bulletin,
Beauchamp wrote,
Do'-syo-wa, place of basswoods, which abounded at Buffalo. On Pouchot's map the creek appears as R. au boiblanc, equivalent to river of basswoods, and Buffalo may be a corruption of this. the Rev. Asher Wright said this Indian name was shortened from Ti-yoos-yo-wa, Oo-sah being the Seneca word for the basswood, often called Whitewood by the French.
1787 Evans/Crevecoeur Tardieu Map-Detail (Author's copy)
This map depicts the Niagara region when the French controlled it in the 1750’s.
It shows the Riviere du Bois Blanc (White Wood/Basswood River) above the rapids (swift) and is now called the Buffalo River.
The map also shows the Riviere aux Chevaux (River of Horses) below the rapids and is now called Scajaquada Creek.
The next map is the first map to show the name Buffalo although spelled Buffeloe, and having been made some 10 months after the French had been removed from the area.
1760 Demler Map-Detail (leventhalmap.org)
Here is the key to the map above, showing Buffeloe as "L." on the map with the date of "May 1760" in the bottom right and the mapmakers name "Demler".
The first time “Buffalo” is mentioned in print in relation to the river of which the City of Buffalo is named, is by Lt. George Demler a British military engineer who labelled the waterway on a map dated May of 1760, “A Creek known by the Name of Buffeloe Creek”.
Theory:
Sometime between July 1759 and May of 1760 British engineer and mapmaker Lt. George Demler heard a local mention the name "Bois Blanc" pronounced “Boblo” for a waterway and thinking the local said "Buffeloe" or the Greek “boubalos” or the Latin “bubalus”, he copied it on to his map as “Buffeloe Creek.”
Below please find part of Millard Fillmore's Inaugural Address to the Buffalo Historical Society.
Buffalo! Is it not a strange name for a city? To our ears it is familiar, indicating only the name of a pleasant and beautiful city. But a foreigner, when you say you are from Buffalo, looks at you as though he thought the inhabitants of the place where you reside were buffalos, and you unavoidably feel that you would be glad to give some reason why this singular name has been attached to your place of residence. But who among us can tell? I am sure I cannot. I do not mean to say that it is difficult to ascertain how the city came by this name, for it is manifest that it took its name from the creek. But the question is, why was this stream that runs through our city called " Buffalo creek," and when and by whom was it thus christened? To this question I confess that I have never seen any satisfactory answer. I have never seen any reliable statement that the buffalo in his wild state was ever found in Western New York.
My research shows that this 200-year-old mystery has now been solved.
My name is Joe Van Remmen. Correspondence in regard to this website can be made by contacting me at joevan@live.com.
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