rigines, but the Mohegans laid claim to the status of an independent nation 
existent even prior to the Pequot hostilities. 24 In 1640 Uncas, allegedly as a 
gesture of friendship, granted to the Governor and Magistrates all the tribal 
lands excepting those cultivated or improved. 20 The Mohegans later not only 
advanced that this deed was merely one granting pre-emptive rights but also 
challenged its authenticity. 26 In 1659 Sachem Uncas and his brother Wawequa 
granted to Major John Mason, a principal officer of the colony, all the Mohegan 
lands. The colony alleged that this grant was made to obviate objections 
arising from ascertainment of the reserved lands in the 1640 grant in 
making application for a royal charter, 27 while the tribe represented the grant 
to be in the form of a trust to prevent injurious alienations by individual Mohegans 
28 In 1660 Mason, presumably to facilitate the negotiations for a charter, 
surrendered to the General Court jurisdictional power over the lands 
vested in him in 1659, reserving sufficient planting grounds for the Mohegans 
and farm lands for himself. Whether this grant of jurisdiction constituted a 
grant of the lands themselves proved another controversial point. 29 In 1661 
Uncas and his sons confirmed the 1659 grant to Mason, the confirmation according 
to the colony inuring only to the benefit of the colony. 30 
All the native rights having been allegedly acquired by the colonists, in 1662, 
the lands in question were granted to the Governor and Company by a charter 
from Charles II. 31 In 1665 Uncas and two other sachems confirmed the 
former grant of their lands to Mason and covenanted not to dispose of any 
lands without consent of Mason and his heirs. The colony termed this deed 
an imposition by Mason on the ignorance of the Indians in leading them to 
believe they retained any rights in the land. 32 This confirmation was also 
explained by the colony as a conciliatory act made necessary by circumstances, 
not a recognition of the invalidity of former grants. 33 In 1671 Mason entailed 
a tract of land in the north parish of New London, later known as the "sequestered 
lands," in Uncas, purportedly to prevent alienation even with con- 
24 Case of the Respondents, the Governor and 
Company of the Colony of Connecticut (1770), 
1; Case of the Respondents, the Landholders 
(1770), 1; Case of the Appellants, the Mohegan 
Indians (1770), 1-2. All cases in the 
Columbia University Law Library. 
25 Case of Respondents (Governor and Company), 
2; Case of Respondents (Landholders), 
2. 
26 Case of Appellants, 24. 
27 Case of Respondents (Governor and Company), 
2; Case of Respondents (Landholders), 
2. 
28 Case of Appellants, 2; MS Conn. Archives, 
2 Indians, #277 c, d. 
29 Case of Respondents (Governor and Company), 
2-3; Case of Respondents (Landholders), 
2; Case of Appellants, 2; MS Conn. 
Archives, 2 Indians, #277 d, e. 
30 Case of Respondents (Governor and Company), 
3; Case of Respondents (Landholders), 
3; MS Conn. Archives, 2 Indians, #277 e, f. 
31 Case of Respondents (Governor and Company), 
3-4. As to the Mohegan allegations of 
the suggestions upon which the charter was 
obtained, see MS Conn. Archives, 2 Indians, 
#277 i-32 
Case of Respondents (Governor and Company), 
5; Case of Appellants, 3. 
33 MS Conn. Archives, 1 Indians, #277 g, h.