In 1651 or 1652, hunting fowl near his Trois-Rivières home, a petty squabble separated Radisson from his hunting group. After discovering its several men killed by a Mohawk raiding party, he was captured by the Iroquois. Perhaps because of his youth, he received fairly mild treatment and, as he showed interest in Mohawk language and culture, was assimilated. In a Mohawk custom of adopting young captives, whether indigenous or European, to replace relatives lost to disease or warfare, Radisson joined a local Mohawk family near modernday Schenectady in New York state.