- -
- Sioux of DAKOTAs
*H º
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------- KANSAs
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WCHITAS
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Tre *As
A D. Do Al
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CADDOS
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fºº - $ºon
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t º THE M-N. Co., BUF
Longitude West 100° from Greenwich --
ſºlº, Ng * Nº ºr "A T *
-- - - --~~\º:
* C E
-->
º sºs.
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Linguistic Indian Stocks thus: ALGONQUIAN
Principal Tribes thus: chippewas
Early Settlements thus:
THE PRESENT UNITED STATES IN 1600. Explorers' Routes thus: -º
º -
Columbus, 1492
Plymºuth 1520
BLACK
HAwk, A SAUKIE
(See page 73.)
The Indian * *
The Northwest
THE RED MAN
THE WAR MAN
THE WHITE MAN
Chicago & North-Western Railway
|ºt
31
* ,
24
26 º
2;
29
ISSUED BY THE
TRAFFIC IDEPARTMENT
CHICAGO & North-WESTERN RAILWAY CO.
CHICAGO, ILL.
1901
CoPYRIGHTED
C O N T E N T S.
PROLOGUE, . . . . . . . . . . . . .
FIRST Epoch, THE RED MAN, . . . . . . . . . .
SECOND EPoCH, THE WAR MAN, . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
THIRD Epoch, THE WHITE MAN, . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
INDEX TO ILLUSTRATIONS.
TITLE. PAGE.
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP OF 1600, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . *
BLACK HAWK, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
PIONEER RESIDENCE OF 1791, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . '5
How SITTING BULL CAME, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
INDIAN HEAD FEATHERs, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
INDIANS PLAYING BALL, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IS
PROTECTING INDIAN GRAVES, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . '9
FRANÇUELIN's MAP, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
INDIAN GAMBLING Bowl, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .”
INDIAN SIGN SONG, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
A BUFFALO HUNT, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
IROQUois PIGEON PIPE, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
TAMBOURINE DRUM, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
GAME TRAP, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
CALUMET PIPE, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
MAP OF EXPLORATIONS OF THE NORTHWEST, . . . . . . . . . 32
SIOUX STONE PIPE, . . . . . . . . ' ' ' . . . . . . . 33
WAMPUM BELT, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
INDIAN ARRow POINT, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
INDIAN SPEAR HEAD, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
POTTAWATTOMI CANop, - - - - - - - 36
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP of 1804 AND 1806, . . . . . . . . . . 38.
MARQUETTE's SIGNATURE, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
GOURD RATTLE, . . . . - . . . . . . . . . . . . * * * 41
8 - COAV 7/AW Z'.S.
TITLE.
CHIPPEWA SNOWSHOE, . . . . . . . . . . . . .
INDIAN BED, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
GHOST DANCE – PRAYING, . . . . . . . . . . .
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP of 1833, .
SIOUX INDIAN GRAVE,
LA SALLE's PICTURE, . . . . . . .
JOLIET's SIGNATURE, .
INDIAN THUNDER BIRD,
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP OF 1852, .
INDIAN POTTERY Bowl,
STARVED ROCK,
GREEN VILLE MEDAL, .
CHEYENNE GIRLs,
INDIAN DICE,
CLAY STATUE, .
FoRT DEARBORN IN 1803, . . .
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP of 1861,
ForT DEARBORN MONUMENT, . . . . .
RED CLOUD, -
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP OF 1870, .
INDIAN FLAG, .
CHIEF Oshkosh, . . . . . . . . . .
SITTING BULL, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
WOLF's POINT, CHICAGO, 1832, . . . . . . . . . .
NEW ULM MONUMENT, . . . . . . . . . . . . .
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP OF 1880, . . . . . . . . . .
HANGING AT MANKATO, . . . . . . . . . . .
RAIN-IN-THE-FACE, . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
FIRST MONUMENT, CUSTER’s BATTLE GROUND, . . . .
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP OF 1890, .
KICKING BEAR, - -
CUSTER’s BATTLE GROUND,
WEST WARD THE COURSE OF EMPIRE TAKES ITS WAY,
ILLUSTRATIVE MAP OF 1900, . . .
PAGE.
42
43
44
46
48
5 I
52
56
57
6O
6I
63
65
66
68
7O
72
77
8O
SI
. . 87
89
• 94
96, 97
98
IOO
. IOI
IO2, IO3
IO4
IO6
II5
II6, II 7
AUTHORITIES CONSULTED.
ANDREAS’ HISTORY OF Chicago,
UNITED STATES Ethnological. Bureau,
- LARNED's READy REFERENCE History,
- SCHOOLCRAFT's AMERICAN INDIAN,
EARLY HISTORY OF ILLINOIS,
Wisconsin Historical SOCIETY,
MINNESOTA HISTORICAL SOCIETY,
SHALER's HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES,
FIFTY YEARS IN THE NORTHWEST,
LEWIS & CLARK EXPEDITION,
IOWA HISTORICAL REPORTs,
NARRATIVE AND CRITICAL HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES,
THE JESUIT RELATIONs. - -
SMITHSONIAN Report, -
LIFE OF SITTING BULL,
UNITED STATES REPORTs on Fort DEARBORN,
REPORTS OF COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS,
BANCROFT's History OF THE UNITED STATES,
ARMY HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES.
THE INDIAN. THE NORTHWEST.
I6oo – 1900.
PROLOGUE.
“Father have pity on me,
“Father have pity on me;
“I am crying for thirst,
“I am crying for thirst ;
“All is gone I have nothing to eat,
“All is gone I have nothing to eat.”
Prom an old Aražaho Song.
=AHE Indian was never negative in character. His
place in American history is as distinct as that of
the early Dutch, the Scotch-Irish, or the English.
His origin is still a matter of ethnological dis-
pute. He was writing rude poetry before England
received her Magna Charta. He understood
some musical notes, and made use of them before
the Psalms were chanted at Rome. He was wor-
shiping the sun, moon, and stars when Egyptians were still pon-
dering over the scarf of the Milky Way, thrown across the face.
of the heavens. He had a literature of legend and myth as old
as the Nibelungen Lay. His original language of love was as
pure, as sweet, as touched by the highest animations of the
heart, as English wooer ever gave to English maid. He lived as
an individual of wonderful physical endurance and a more than
primitive brain power. What survives of him to-day, in the
descendants that miserably crawl out their existence, is scarcely
an apology for what he was. As the Iroquois, the Illini, the
Sioux, the Pottawattomi, the Menomini, the Chippewa, the
Arapaho, he was imaginative, forceful, brave, yet neither a demi-
god nor a groveling human. Wholesale eulogies are no more
to be heaped upon him for what he was than wholesale condem-
nations for what he is. He belonged to the time when the youth
of earth was upon the continent of North America and the
Strong winds of a new civilization were sweeping down upon him
with warning as to his end. He filled his place in the work of
the evolution of man, as man shall be, when Time is no more.
In his place has come the rush and roar of the railroad, the throb
of great engines of manufacture, the crush of a new race push-
ing onward and onward to the same goal his eyes were set for
While he was master of the forest and plain.
II
12 THE /M/)/AM AM/) 7/// MCA 7//IVES 7.
THE FIRST EPOCH. THE RED MAN.
Taki maka a-icha'gha hena mita'wa-ye lo – Yo'yoyo
All that grows upon the earth is mine – Yo'yoyo
Trans/ation of a Siouar song.
Indian, ethnologists are slowly agreeing that his
existence on this continent certainly antedates I ooo
A. D., that he is of Asiatic origin, and that all of
the families found on the continent, from the
Atlantic to the Pacific, are interrelated, and origi-
nally came from one source. Historical evidences
- are multiplying as to the truth of these assertions.
In 1615, the French traveler, Champlain, visiting the Huron
tribe of Indians of the St. Lawrence valley, drew a map of the
country which they said laid to the west of their land. They
told him of a lake called Kitchi Gummi, and which he named
Grand Lac. This lake was visited by Allouez in 1666, and
called Lake Tracy. Hennepin saw it in 1680, and called it Lake
Conde. Schoolcraft was upon its waters' in 1819, and left it
with the title Lake Algona. This is the body of water now
known as Lake Superior ; and Champlain's rough map is one
of the first evidences given to white men, not only of its exist-
ence, but of the great stretch of land lying south and west of
its shores known now as North and South Dakota, Minnesota,
and Wisconsin.
The French explorers — Jesuit priests, voyageurs, and
trappers — touched the northern belt of what is popularly now
called the Northwest many decades before others of their kind
penetrated the land since divided into Illinois, Iowa, and
Nebraska. Marquette and Joliet did not ascend the Mississippi
from its junction with the Arkansas to the mouth of the Illinois,
once called the Divine River, until 1673. It was 1679 before
Fort Crevecoeur was built on the Illinois River. The famous
ancient white villages of Kaskaskia, Cahoki, and Prairie du
Rocher were not established on the banks of the Mississippi
until after 1683. But it is due to the honor of France, that dur-
ing the years of the seventeenth century, when England was
content to slowly upbuild her colonies on the Atlantic coast,
when Spain by moral law was being eliminated from the northern
half of the western continent, the fleur de lis should be im-
7///, /ö//) MAN. I 3
planted in what is now the center of western thought, western
activity, and agricultural development of the United States of
America.
Two separate movements of Gallic explorers in the seven-
teenth century — one along the shore lines of Lake Superior and
westward to the waters of the Mississippi; the other, via Lake
Michigan, to the Mississippi and the Illinois, and thence to what
has since become the Fox, Rock, and Wisconsin rivers—confronted
at the outset a remarkable group of Indian families. The
dominion of these families extended from the Platte and Mis-
Souri rivers, on the west, to Lake Superior and Lake Michigan,
on the east ; from the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi
rivers, on the south, to the Lake of the Woods and what is now
the Canadian border, on the north. Within this area, which
amounted to nearly 480,000 square miles, or one-ninth of the
total area of the United States, to the time of the late Spanish-
American war, were living, so far as men will ever know, about
5oo, ooo red men. The census taker was unknown, and the
figures can only be estimated from ancient memoranda and
numbers were then. But so swift are the mutations of Time,
that to-day, in this same area, there are living, sinew of a great
Commonwealth, 12, ooo, ooo white men and women, and their
children. Of the 500,ooo Indians, lords of the land 250 years
ago, but 48,8oo are now to be found within this area. One city
exists in the same territory that a 5oo-mile journey from, on the
line of a circle with Chicago as a center, will bring the traveler
in touch with more than one-half of the total population of the
United States. -
Three great Indian families occupied this Northwestern
prairie and timber land when the French first came upon them.
The most important of these families, so far as history is con-
Cerned, was the Siouan, or Sioux, composed of the following
tribes, occupying then approximately the regions indicated after
their names :
Assiniboin, Saskatchewan River.
Biloxi, , Mississippi River.
Crow, Yellowstone River.
Dakotas, Upper Mississippi River.
Iowas, . Iowa River.
Mandans, . Upper Missouri River.
Ogalala, Missouri River.
Omahas, Elkhorn River.
Otoes, . Platte River.
Poncas, Middle Missouri River.
Tetons, Missouri River.
Winnebagoes,
West of Lake Michigan.
I4 7///, /V/)/AV AV/) 7//E VOA 7//IVES 7.
Second in importance to the Sioux was the family of Algon-
quins, or Algonkians, composed of the tribes of :
Arapaho, . Upper Kansas River.
Black Feet, Upper Missouri River.
Cheyennes, Western Nebraska.
Chippewas, Lake Superior.
Illini, Illinois River.
Kaskaskia, Mississippi River.
Kickapoo, Illinois River.
Ottawas, South of Lake Michigan.
Piegans, Upper Missouri River.
Pottawattomi, South of Lake Michigan.
Sac and Fox, .
Ottawa River.
The third family, and the one first to be extinguished in the
wars waged between the trio, was the Iroquois, composed of the
Mohawks, )
Oneidas,
Onondaga, . &:
Cayuga, . - - - - - - - | Lakes
Seneca, . . . . . . . . . . -
Tuscarora, . . . . . . . . . )
Many more tribes belonged to these three great families than
are indicated here, but most of those omitted never settled in
the Northwest territory. Somehow, in the dim past, they were
separated from the parent tree, and connection was never made
again. For instance, the Abnaki of Nova Scotia were Algon-
quins ; so were the Passamaquoddi of Maine and the Powhatans
of Virginia. The Catawbas of North and South Carolina be-
longed to the Sioux family, as did, also, the Tutelo of the Roanoke
River of Virginia. The Cayugas, the Cherokees, the Eries, the
Mohawks, the Oneidas, were all tribes of the Iroquois family, but
yet had only a small part in the making of the history of the Iro-
quois south and west of Lake Michigan, who perished between
the Scylla of the Algonquins and the Charybdis of the whites.
The Dutch were settling Cape Colony in South Africa when
the French explorers came with messages and gifts to these
three Indian families. All history, as to the relation between
the white men and the Northwestern Indians during the seven-
teenth century, bears evidence that they acted with much fair-
ness toward each other. It was not until after the advent of
the English, who disputed the right to the territory with the
French, and then the incoming of the Americans, who drove out
French, English, and Indians, that the record of Savage war-
fare commences, which is crossed and recrossed with the slash
of the tomahawk and stained with powder and blood from the
knife of massacre. It is useless to say which was wrong. Since
7/// A F/O J/AA. I5
the formation of the United States Government, the American
people have paid to the Indians an average of $1,000,ooo per
year for the land taken. The Indian, in his turn, when treated
with the same honesty, the same decency, that characterizes
the ordinary relations of two white citizens, responded with a
loyalty equal to that of his white brother. Each race, as temp-
tation came, was treacherous, bloodthirsty, cruel. Each paid
the penalty for its wrongdoing. But that the earliest settlers
on the continent recognized the Indian as an equal is evidenced
by the first treaty ever made with a tribe (the Delawares), in
which they were conceded to be citizens entitled to representa-
tion in Congress. Unfortunately, this good intent never passed
in effect beyond the writing in the treaty. If the Indian has
been exterminated as the result of the advance of a new civil-
ization, the people of that civilization have paid a fearful price
for their victory.
The land was fair to look upon when Joliet, Marquette, and
Hennepin came with the sign of the cross to make converts of
the aboriginals. Curious, indeed, were the names then given
to streams, such as the Chicago, the Illinois, the Des Plaines, the
PIONEER RESIDENCE OF I79 I.
I 6 77///E / V/D/A M A V/D 7///E AWOA’ 7// Iſ 'A.S 7".
Kankakee, the Fox, the Rock, the Mississippi, the Missouri,
the Minnesota, the St. Louis, and Platte rivers. The Des
Plaines River, which now forms a portion of the famous drainage
channel of Chicago, and the meaning of whose name is “River
of the Plains,” bore the Indian name of Checaugau. Samson,
geographer to the French king in 1673, drew a map of what is
now the Mississippi River, and gave it the name Chicaugou.
Joliet called the Illinois River the Riviere La Divine, and he also
called the Illinois River the St. Louis River. What is now
called the Chicago River was known, until about 1800, as the
Portage River, receiving that name from Marquette. La Salle
gave to Lake Michigan the name of Islinois. The Kankakee was
called by the Jesuits Teakiki. Thevenot's map of 1673 for Lake
Michigan uses the
title Lac de Michi-
gami. The old
spelling of Lake
Superior, shown in
Joliet's map of New
France, 1674, was
Lac Suprieur. The
Illinois country was
indicated on this
map as La Fronte-
nack. The ancient
name of the Mil-
waukee River was
Melico. Green Bay
bore the name of
Bay of the Fetid.
Another name of Green Bay was Bay of the Puana. La Salle
gave the name of Colbert, Prime Minister of France under
Louis XIV., to the Mississippi. Duluth took its name from the
Sieur Du Lhut, at one time commander of the French fort at
Detroit. Racine, before 17oo, was known as Kipikawi, and the
name of Milwaukee was Melwarik. The whole Northwest
country bore the name of New France, or Canada, or Louisiana,
until after its acquisition by the United States.
In Minnesota, the Mississippi was given the name St. Louis
by Hennepin, Conception by Marquette, and north of the
Falls of St. Anthony, now Minneapolis, bore a dozen or more
titles until after the commencement of the nineteenth century.
The Minnesota, once a very important stream, was called the
Minisoute Ouadeha, and later St. Peter's River. The Missouri
takes its name from the Tciwere division of the Sioux stock
HOW SITTING BULL CAME.
7/// A //) J/4 A. I 7
of North American Indians. This tribe originally called itself
Niut'atci, which means “Those who reached the mouth " [of
the river|. The Kansas Indians called them the Nicudje, which
appellation is supposed to have been corrupted into Missouri.
The Platte bears, also, the title The Nebraska. The first name
is of Spanish origin, and the second of Indian. Iowa received
its name from the Indian tribe of the same title. Minnesota, Wis-
consin, and the two Dakotas are all names of Indian Origin,
taken from tribes either wholly or almost extinct
at the present time.
The narratives of the travelers
and explorers into the North-
West, between 16oo and 17oo —
there is no record of white men
appearing in this region prior to
I6oo — contained no reference to
the marvelous bread-giving
capacity of the land they found.
In no line that they wrote is there
to be found a hint that a granary
of the world had been uncovered.
Their records teem with descriptions
of half-explored waterways, of the
plentiful game, of stories of unfound
gold and silver and diamond mines.
They were eager to take possession for
the honor of France and for the finan-
cial gain that might come to them from
the discovery of the Fountain of Youth
or of mineral wealth such as the world
had not yet known. Little did they know
that greater wealth, greater blessing, was
given to all mankind than ever might be
found in silver and gold. The Indian
families they came in contact with tilled the
soil slightly. Investigation of the habits of the
Sioux, Algonquins, and Iroquois fails to reveal ex-
tensive cultivation of Indian corn, or maize, or any
great necessity for it. Food was to be had for the
mere raising of the hand, and the traditions of the
three predominant aboriginal families forbade stoop-
ing to tillage of the soil, except in case of dire
necessity. It is fairly well authenticated by Indian -
testimony that the buffalo roamed as far eastward INDIAN
as Lake Michigan until between 1770 and 1780. HEAD FEATHERs.
7/// RED WAAA. I9
In that decade a great snow-fall came and extremely cold
weather. After that storm, the buffalo, except in isolated groups,
were never seen east of the Mississippi again. Hundreds of
lakes that have since become extinct were to be found in every
direction. Bluff lands were numerous, and afforded winter shel-
ter from severe storms. West of the Upper Mississippi, wild
horses were to be found in great numbers. The region was
ideal. One feels this in reading Carver's description of Southern
Minnesota : -
“The river St. Pierre (Peter) flows through a most delightful
Country abounding with all the necessaries of life that grow
Spontaneously, and with a little cultivation it might be made to
produce even the luxuries of life. Wild rice grows here in great
abundance ; and every part is filled with trees bending under
their loads of fruit, such as plums, grapes, and apples : meadows
are covered with hops and many sorts of vegetables; whilst
the ground is stored with useful roots, with angelica, spikenard,
and nuts as large as a
hen's egg. At a little
distance from the sides
of the river are emi-
nences from which you
have views that cannot
be exceeded even by
the most beautiful of
those already described ;
ANCIENT FORM OF PROTECTING INDIAN GRAVES. amidst these are delight-
ful groves and such
amazing quantities of maples that they would produce sugar
sufficient for any number of inhabitants.”
He wrote when he viewed Lake Pepin and the Mississippi
River :
“Great numbers of fowl also frequent this lake and rivers
adjacent, such as storks, swans, geese, brants, and ducks; and
in the groves are found plenty of turkeys and partridges. On
the plains are the largest buffaloes of any in America.”
Innumerable are the legends related in the past by the Sioux,
Algonquins, and Iroquois as to how they came into this beauti-
ful watershed of the Mississippi, Missouri, and Illinois rivers.
But they can be to the historian of to-day nothing but legend.
A flash of lightning from the sky created the first Iroquois;
the Sioux was evolved from an egg, and so on and on the guess-
Work, but no fact. Schoolcraft fills six volumes with their
poetic tales. Leave these to the worthy perusal of students of
the first days and pass to the authentic history of the Sioux –
2O
I. Minong
Pointe Kiaonun *… º:2
~
Les Grande. "
- ab s
thii
-
|
Su per i e w *.d. Montreal')
<.
º,
% -
-
º
itºu."
º
ºna:
S 3 * I. Maxi-
oulin
A
u. Tºy, * Lac
§s
-
Huron
& Qiatinoachikºi
& Gannateki's Lºg
R.S., Danis
J. B. FRANÇUELIN'S MAP,
7//E RED WAAV. 2 I
they who were called the Chahrarat by the Pawnee and by
others :
Dakota, Nakota, or Lakota — their proper tribal names ac-
cording to dialect, meaning “Allies, Friends.” They sometimes
speak of themselves as Oceti Sakowin, meaning the seven coun-
cil fires, in allusion to their seven tribal divisions.
Itahatski — meaning “Long Arrows.”
Nadowesi, or Nadowesiu – a name given them by the Algon-
quins, and meaning “Little Snakes,” or “Little Enemies.” From
this comes the term Nadouessioux and Sioux. They bore, also,
Other names, which meant “Cutthroats,” or “Beheaders.”
The Comanches called them “Beheaders,” thus indicating the
character of their warfare. The Ojibwa, or Chippewas, desig-
nated the Iroquois living east of them as the Nadowe ; while
the Sioux, living to the west, were distinguished as the Nadowesi.
In the height of their power they dominated a large part of
British North America, Montana, Wyoming, North and South
Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas, Mis-
Souri, Oklahoma, Indian Territory, Mississippi, Carolinas, Vir-
ginias, and Kentucky. Their present total population is about
26,ooo, of whom something over 6oo are yet in British North
America. Their hostilities have been conspicuous, not only
with the whites but with the Chippewas and Pawnees, and these
tribes of their own stock — the Crow, Mandan, and Omaha.
Captain John Smith met them in Virginia when he entered that
territory. Tall of stature, often handsome, striking in appear-
ance, they possessed a knowledge of religion, music, Oratory, and
statecraft. Their tribal sign was a sweeping pass of the right
hand in front of the neck, which may have given them their name
of “Cutthroats,” although the Kiowas claimed that this referred
to a kind of shell necklace peculiar to the Sioux. The seven
great divisions of the family were :
Medewacanton – Village of the Spirit Lake.
Wahpacoota — Leaf Shooters.
Wahpetons — Leaf Village.
Sissetons — Slimy Village, or Swamp Village.
Yanktons – End Village.
Yanktonnais – Center Village.
Tetons — Prairie Village.
The Sioux whom the French first came in contact with were
the Santee, comprising the first four of the above seven divisions.
Afterwards the English and Americans met the Yanktons and Yank-
tonnais and Tetons. The Tetons are subdivided into seven prin-
cipal divisions, of which the Brules and the Ogalala are the most
conspicuous. Powell says of the characteristics of the family :
22 7.///, /AV/O/AAV AAV/O 7///E AWO/C 7// IP/ES 7.
“By reason of their superior numbers the Sioux have always
assumed, if not exercised, the lordship over all the neighboring
tribes with the exception of the Ojibwa, who, having acquired
firearms before the Sioux, were enabled to drive the latter from
the headwaters of the Mississippi, and were steadily pressing
them westward when stopped by the intervention of the United
States Government. The Sioux, in turn, drove the Cheyenne,
Crow, Kiowa, and others before them and forced them into the
mountains or down to the southern prairies. The eastern bands
were sedentary and largely agricultural, but the Tetons were
prečminently wandering buffalo hunters. All dwelt in tipis —
the word is from the Sioux language – which were of bark in
the timber country and of buffalo skins on the plains. In war-
like character, they are probably second only to the Cheyenne,
and have an air of proud superiority rather unusual with Indians.
Clark says of them, “In mental, moral, and physical qualities
I consider the Sioux a little lower but still nearly equal to the
Cheyenne, and the Teton are the superior branch of the family."
The eastern Sioux are now far advanced toward civilization,
through the efforts of teachers and missionaries for over a genera-
tion, and the same is true in a less degree of the Yankton, while
a majority of the Teton are still nearly in their original condition.”
The Iroquois — second of the Indian families found in the
Northwest — were of much historical importance, although
numerically inferior to several other families. They were first
found in the valley of the St. Lawrence River, and their legends
have it that they came to the continent from the northeast.
They were valorous and among
the first of the aboriginals to
make use of firearms. When
the whites appeared on the con-
tinent, they were almost invari-
ably the allies of the English
against the French. From the
St. Lawrence River valley the
family movement through the
decades was southwest, along
INDIAN GAMBLING BOWL. the shores of the great lakes.
A portion of the family was
located between Quebec and Montreal in 1535. A century later
they were found in what is now Illinois, in the heart of the
Algonquin country, having driven before them all tribes that op-
posed their way. They were inclined to agriculture, paid less
attention to hunting than the Sioux, and were remarkable for their
skill in housebuilding and fortification. Their population now is
7//E RE/ M.A.A. 23
& & C a/ © f
- 252Nº.
\ @ º
- WS:2 iſ
~). z-z-z ~(A-4 ./ z-Zº->
A. 4. 4/5); m.
º
- Y\
2—z-z 2 27- *~~! z-z-z-z-z-z
S t
}* I 2 §2.
&z suzz & M & N 9, 8°
º
---—z-z-z-z
INDIAN SIGN SONG.
7"///E A2/2/9 MAAV. 25
about 43,000, of whom 9,000 are in Canada. Their name was
given them by the French, and may have been derived from an
exclamation used by their chiefs in conference. They had for
themselves another name meaning “Real men.” The Delawares
called them Mengwe, which was afterwards corrupted into
Mingo. The English knew them as the Confederates or Five
Nations, and, after the admission of the Tuscarora, as the Six
Nations. Their principal tribes in the seventeenth century
were the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca.
They had traditions of wars, as early as the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries, with the Algonquin family, who, they claimed,
drove them westward. They never passed west of the Illinois
River. The main reservation of the family at the present time
in Canada is on the Grand River, Ontario. Those in the United
States are on reservations in New York, except the Oneidas,
who are chiefly at Green Bay, Wisconsin.
Powell's linguistic map shows that, at the time of the contact
with the whites, Iroquoian was the language spoken by the
Indians on both sides of the Upper St. Lawrence as well as by
the tribes living around the shores of lakes Ontario and Erie.
Sometime, somewhere, they had come in contact with a mightier
civilization than prevailed when the French first knew them.
Their pipes found in mounds in Illinois and elsewhere have
human heads molded on them ; on others the figures of birds
and reptiles, well finished. They cultivated tobacco, for Cham-
plain, in 1603, found great fields of it on an island near Quebec.
The Iroquois gave it the name of “petum.” Cartier most quaintly
described the use of this tobacco as he observed it in 1635:
“There groweth also a certain kind of herbe, whereof in sum-
mer they make great provision for all the yeere, making great
account of it, and only men use of it; and first they cause it
to be dried in the sunne, then weare it about their neckes
Wrapped in a little beasts skinne made like a little bagge, with
a hollow peece of stone or wood like a pipe ; then, when they
please, they made pouder of it, and then put it in one of the
ends of said cornet or pipe, and, laying a cole of fire upon it, at
the other end sucke so long that they fill their bodies full of
Smoke till that it cometh out of their mouth and nostrils even
as Out of the tonnel of a chimney.”
Many of the Iroquois pipes were made of steel, brass or iron.
They could be used as a pipe or a tomahawk. The handle, or
blade, was often richly inlaid with silver. A curved pottery
pipe which they manufactured can no longer be duplicated, as
the art has been lost. It was of so fine a texture as to admit of
Polish, the black specimens found being so firm as to have the
26 77///E /AV/)/A A' AAV/) 7///E AWOA 7// J/Z.S 7.
appearance of stone. In connection with the tobacco habit,
which was then more marked in the Iroquois than in the Sioux
or Algonquins, Hale finds what he be-
lieves to be at least a possible origin of
the word Iroquois different from that
given above. For pipes or string of
tobacco the Iroquois used the word
“garokwa,” or “ireokwa,” meaning,
“They who smoke,” or, briefly, “Tobacco
people.” It does not appear from re-
corded history that the Iroquois made
any great impression upon the Illinois
country after their settle-
ment in the territory
of the
Algon-
quins. It \
will be
seen later
what part they IROQUOIS PIGEON PIPE.
had in the early
fierce wars that raged between the Illinois River and the Missis-
sippi; but they were rapidly decimated, and their important
family history is to be found in the archives of New York, Penn-
sylvania, and the Upper St. Lawrence River.
The Algonquins gave to the Northwest the Chippewas, the
Illini, the Kaskaskias, the Miami, the Ottawas, the Pottawattomi,
and the Sac and Fox tribes. Of these, the most important,
for the purpose of this history, were the Chippewas, the Meno-
mini, the Illini, the Miami, and the Sac and Fox divisions.
The Algonquin family takes its name from the French contrac-
tion of the word Algomequin and an Algonquin term, signi-
fying, “Those on the other side of the river " (the St. Lawrence
River). The family originally held the valley of the Ottawa
River and the northern tributaries of the St. Lawrence. They
were driven west by rival families, and at one time took on
the name of the Ottawa. Originally they occupied an area
larger than that held by any other aboriginal stock in America,
reaching from Labrador to the Rocky Mountains, and from
Hudson Bay to at least as far south as Palmico Sound in North
Carolina. The Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes early separated
from the main family and forced their way west, through hostile
tribes, across the Missouri River to the Black Hills, and after
that into Wyoming and Colorado. The Shawnee tribe also
separated from the main body about the same time, and advanced
7T///, /ö/ø/D A/A AV. 27
Southward and westward. The Algonquin stock now in exist-
ence numbers about 95,000, of whom 60,000 are in Canada and
the remainder in the United States.
The Menomini, an important tribe of the family, were found
by Nicollet in 1634. Their history, government writers say, is
intimately connected with that of the Winnebagoes, as they
lived with or beside that tribe from very early times, although
their language shows them to belong to the Algonquin stock
and more nearly related to the Chippewas, or Ojibwa, than to
any other tribe. The tribal name is from Oma'nomine'u, mean-
ing “Rice Man.” The French called both the grain and the
tribe Fol Avoin — Wild Oats. The tribe is now located on
a reservation at Keshena, Wisconsin, and Occupy almost the
MENOMINI TAMBOURINE DRUM.
Same territory in which they were found in 1634 by Nicollet.
The tribe has borne the names Addle-Head Malouminek,
Menomonier, Niniamis, Monomony, Moon-Calves, and Ouna-
boims. Nicollet came to the band dressed in a robe of
28 7///E /AW/)/A W AAVZ) 7///E AWOR 7//IV/ES 7.
China damask profusely decked with flowers and birds of various
colors, and firing pistols in the air. The reason for his gay
attire was that he believed he was at the approaches to the
kingdom of China, and that he would be welcomed by a mandarin.
A feast was proclaimed in honor of his visit, in which four or
five thousand Indians participated, and at one sitting 12'o
beavers were consumed. The entire population of the tribe
at this time is estimated to have not exceeded 7,ooo. The
present number is about 1,600. In appearance they were straight
and well made, about the middle size ; their complexions
generally fair for savages; their teeth good ; their eyes large
and rather languishing. They had a wild and independent
expression of countenance, that charmed at first sight. It was
noted that the thief was not as common a character with them
as in many other tribes. They were not as warlike as the Sac
and Fox. As a nation, they always proved friendly to the
whites. Their captives they held as slaves in some instances.
They had Pawnee slaves, whom they obtained by purchase of the
Ottawas, Sac and others who captured them. In Brunson's
early history of Wisconsin this reference is made to the tribe :
“The Menominees were the next tribe in point of importance,
though of prior date to some others among the first aboriginal
occupants of what is now the State of Wisconsin. They were
of the Algonquin race.”
Charlevoix wrote in 1721, after visiting Green Bay, and meet-
ing them : -
“They are even of a larger stature than the Poutewatamies.
I have been assured that they had the same origin and nearly
the same languages with the Noguets and the Indians at the
Falls. I have also been told several stories of them, as of a
serpent which visits their village every year and is received with
much ceremony, which makes me believe them a little addicted
to witchcraft.”
About three miles northwest of Keshena, near Wolf River,
there is a large Conical bowlder of pink granite, measuring about
six feet in height and about four feet in diameter at the base.
This rock has always been regarded by the Menomini as a
Ma'nido. In a myth, it is related that a party of Indians once
called on Ma'nabush to ask for favors, and that all of them were
accommodated save one, who had the temerity to ask for ever-
lasting life. Ma'nabush took this man by the shoulders and
thrust him upon the earth, saying :
“You shall have everlasting life.”
Whereupon he instantly became a rock. This rock, on
account of its flesh-like tint, is believed to be the remains of the
7///5 A*/E/D A/A AV. 29
unfortunate Indian, who has now become a Ma'nido. It has been
a custom for all passing Indians to deposit at the base of the
rock a small quantity of tobacco.
The Menomini believe their oldest chief was of Algonquin
origin. He was the one from whom all chiefs descended, and his
name was Owa’wse, or Bear. This Algonquin legend, given cur-
rency by the Menomini,
will serve to illustrate
one of the many myth
influences upon the trio
of Indian families pos-
sessing the Northwest
prior to and during the
seventeenth century.
When the Great Mystery,
the Masha Ma'nido, or
Great Unknown, made
the earth, he created,
also, numerous beings
termed Ma'nidos, or
CHIPPEWA TRAP FOR SMALL GAME. spirits, giving them the
- - forms of animals and
birds. Most of the animals were malevolent, while the birds
consisted of eagles and hawks. When Masha Ma'nido saw that
the Bear was still an animal, he determined to allow him to
change his form. The Bear was pleased, and he was made an
Indian, though with a light skin. This took place at Mi'nika’ni
se'pe (Menomini River), near the spot where its waters empty
into Green Bay; and at this place, also, the Bear first came out
of the ground. He was alone and decided to call to himself
the Eagle, and said :
“Eagle, come to me and be my brother.”
The Eagle joined him and became a human being. The two
then perceived a Beaver approaching and he was joined to the
two, but, being a woman, was called Nama'kakia (Beaver woman),
and was adopted as a younger brother of the Eagle. This
term, “ younger brother,” is employed in a generic sense and not
specifically. Later, the Bear adopted the Sturgeon as his
younger brother and servant, and the Eagle took in the Elk as
a younger brother and water carrier ; so, by the same processes,
the Crane and the Wolf and the Dog were brought in. Ina'-
maq-kiu – or Big Thunder (Eagle) – lived at Winnebago Lake,
near Fond du Lac. The Thunderers (Eagles and Hawks)
were made laborers and to be a benefit to the whole world.
When they return from the Southwest, in the spring, they bring
3O 7"///E /AV/9/A AV AAV/) 7///E AWOA 7// IP/ES 7.
the rains which make the earth green and cause plants and trees
to grow. They were, also, the makers of fire, having first
received it from Ma'Nabash, who stole it from an old man
dwelling on an island in the middle of a great lake. In the
geography of the union noted above, the Dog (Anam’) was
born at Nomawi'qkito — Sturgeon Bay. The Deer came from
Shawano or Southern Lake, and, together with the Dog, joined
the Wolf at Menomini River. -
The customs, religion, music, art, and legends of the tribes
holding these beliefs were fascinating to the French Jesuits.
“Wonderful, indeed, are the clouds of smoke that they blow
from their nostrils,” wrote Hennepin. Tobacco grew wild and
under cultivation in Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa.
McGuire said :
“The use of the tobacco plant for smoking purposes is un-
doubtedly of American origin, and has been common throughout
North America among the Indians from a period long prior to
the arrival of the whites on the continent.”
But tobacco smoking in pipes, as we know pipes, is an inven-
tion of the European. The snuffing of tobacco through the
nostrils is a peculiarity first noticed among the Indians of South
America, while chewing was but little practiced by the aborig-
inals until after the arrival of the white men. The Northwestern
Indians protected their pipes in cases or coverings of skin,
basketry work, bark, or woven rags. The Indians of Minnesota
raised a tobacco, the leaf of which, as obtained from them, was
considered of great value, and for which their fellow Indians
paid large prices. Peace parties of the Chippewas often pro-
ceeded hundreds of miles chiefly for procuring this coveted
tobacco leaf. The Seneca called it “Cannakanick.” The Sioux
used the term “Kil’li’kinick.” The Menomini used tobacco as
a sacred offering. It was written of the Omahas :
“They frequently eject the smoke through the nostrils and
often inhale it into the lungs, from which it is gradually ejected
again as they converse, or in expiration.” -
The Sioux made a tobacco out of the inner bark of the Sweet
willow, which they used with Sumac. All through the North-
western country, wherever Indian mounds have been opened,
pipe bowls in the form of birds, Swans, human heads, animal
heads, vase-shaped and urn-shaped, have been dug up. The
stems are of bone, wood, and sometimes stone. The Sioux of the
Upper Missouri made a pipe of metal catlinite. Tomahawk
pipes have been found in the Dakotas. The calumet pipe was
used by the Omahas and other tribes. It was ornamented with
feathers and was quite long. In all peace functions it occupied
7/// AA/, /AM. 3 I
an important position. Allouez, referring to the important part
that the pipe played in the relations between the Indians and the
whites, wrote in 1676 – the time when he met the Illini: -
“The chief advanced about thirty
steps to meet me, holding in one hand
a firebrand and in the other a feath-
ered calumet. As he drew near he
raised it to my mouth and himself lit
the tobacco, which obliged me to
pretend to smoke.”
Lafitau, in 1724, refers to the Sioux
having endeavored to fool a French
officer, by making him a present of a
dozen calumets. One of his Indians,
to whom he showed them, called his
attention to the fact that one was not
twisted with a hair as the others were
and had engraved on its handle a
Snake, and assured him it was a sign
of treason. Dorsey records an act of
worship among the Sioux, which he
said was of daily occurrence when one
was about to smoke his pipe :
“He looks to the sky and says, “Wakanta,
here is tobacco.' Then he puffs a mouthful of
smoke up to the sky, after which he smokes as he
pleases.”
Certain persons had the care of the peace
and war pipes among the Omahas, and there were
Others who were designated to light the pipe.
Certain words had to be used at times in taking
out the pipes; if they were not, misfortune Over-
took the delinquent. To learn the laws of the
pipes occupied four days. De Smet said that the
Pottawattomi regarded the pipe as sacred, and
that it took part in all their religious ceremonies.
Catlinite, the material so much used by the
Sioux for their great pipes, came from quarries
near the town of Pipestone, in Southwestern
Minnesota. The ancient quarries extended for - ºr
a distance of three-fourths of a mile, and the old- s\| V
est pits vary from twenty to forty feet in width, -> sº
and are from four to ten feet in depth. Stone sº
sledges of quartz have been found in these quar- CALUMET OR
ries and hand-chipping hammers. The quarries PEACE PIPE.
º-x-x-x Nicolet, 1634
------ Hennepin, 1680
Pike, 1805-6
cass L.
C gº
- - º
Itaºka
Lake Lºch
fº point º
reached by wº º
tº sº-- --
Wºlls tº
-ºštíAnthony º
R2- --~~
º y
ºoza
tº
--------- Schoolcraft, 1832
º
º
Farthest point reached º
by Pike. 1806 º
Explorers' Routes:
y
ºw-
º
º
º
-------- Groseillier & Radison, 1659-60
+++++ Joliet & Marquette, 1678
-o-º- La Salle, 1679-82
º º
K
1. º
º º
º:--> - te. M
º º St. Esp .
ſ sº
* F P 5, W/AS i.
O/R 9 J ºf W. As
OF
I. Minona
(Isle Royal)
P. E. c
U Ae
E At Lake Trºy 1006 O
*** * * Sº
ſissiºn 1665
º St. Igna
º-s-s 16
-
Explorºxtrovs
NORTHWEST,
SHOWING
General Location of Indian Tribes
and Early
Note:- Routes shown on the Map
along Rivers were actually traveled
on the Rivers.
Figures under Indian names
indicate when the Tribes were at the
\locations shown.
ake º
* {879
nºr. C.
º Miss
THE
Settlements.
|
Ft. Sauvage
IPPEw
ºn, º A
º
º Saſ #. º
–?"
Missow."
º
º *º § o- vo º
S.
jºſſini, Tribes
Z ite
• Fiſchartres, 1720 ºn,
1702
poſt raw ATOM, sº
- º,
|icago) /
imaculate Cone pti
issio I
º
º SS Ft. St.Louis,
K I C Kº A P o 0\S 1682
§ºſ F. c.
- t. Crevecoeur
$2%: ičiū
º PEORIA
.
oiâtre
§. -
t
Ft.StſCharlès, 1695
QKaskºskia)
Indian FLINT
ºf quaBRIES
e Wea Prairie
(Lafayette)
OTºtAWAS
(1700)
The M.-N. Co. BUFFALO, N.Y.
77///, /ö/2/D Al/AAV. 33
are still visited by the Sioux, who annually travel 200 miles or
more to obtain the material. As to the antiquity of these quarries,
they certainly antedate 16oo. The color of catlinite, the pipe-
stone, varies from dark red to light pink, and the Sioux holds
that it was presented to him by the Great Manitou, and that it
has sacred and mysterious properties. Catlinite has been found
in Dakota and Wisconsin as well as in Minnesota. A pipe of
this material was found in a mound on the Illinois River, fifteen
miles from its mouth, where, at a depth of sixteen feet from the
surface, was uncovered a basin of clay filled with clean white
sand, and by it a beautiful bowl of mottled catlinite.
The Sioux pipe appears to be distributed over a wider territory
than almost any other pipe. This is probably due to Indians
of other families having adopted the Smoking
- habit from the Sioux, who traded in catlinite for
- centuries. One ancient Sioux pipe has been
found, the art of which evidences a mental capacity
on the part of the aboriginal maker for which he
is not usually given credit. The bowl is in the
form of an acorn. This is held in the distended
jaws of a panther, the eyes,
teeth, and ears of which
are well carved. A projec-
tion extending from the back
is intended to afford some-
- thing to hold the pipe by
SIOUX STONE PIPE. when smoking. As to the
pipe and the smoking habit
among the Indians, McGuire concludes:
“Smoke, in some form, is shown to have been employed in
Europe and Asia from an antiquity long preceding the Christian
era. In North America the smoking customs of the natives
antedate the arrival of the whites on the continent, and there
is every indication that they must have prevailed for centuries.”
The use of wampum by the Northwestern Indians was almost
as extensive as by those on the Atlantic coast. Wampum is a
small shell bead pierced and strung, used as money, for orna-
ment, and in treaties by the Indians. In making the beads the
shell was cut away, leaving only a cylinder like a bugle. The
Word wanpum means white. The value of a human life was six
Wampum. The shell used in the manufacture of wampum is
that of the Cohog clam. One reason for the use of this shell
was that the material never decayed and was so hard that even
now a diamond drill breaks upon its polished surface. To
reduce these shells to beads that could be strung, the Indians
34
7///E AWOA 7// IP/ES 7.
7///, /M/0/AV AND
THE DENNY WAMPUM BELT.
-
had a process of grinding be-
tween the hand and flat stones.
This process was so laborious
that an entire day was required
for the grinding of a single
bead. Thus a wanpum belt
of 1,000 beads would represent
1,000 days of labor for a
single brave or squaw. It
seems probable that the first
use of wampum by the Indians
was for the purpose of mak-
ing body ornaments. Belts
were designed, necklaces were
strung, chains made for the
ears, the nose, the wrists, and
other parts of the body. These
ornaments, being worn close
to the body, became in time
the dearest possession of the
Chippewa, the Winnebago, or
the Sioux, and, hence, when he
gave it up in connection with
the making of a pledge, it was
material evidence of the strong
and full purpose of his word.
The Winnebagoes possess the
rarest collection of wampum
belts now in existence in the
United States. These belts are
eleven in number and are in
the possession of White Buffalo,
chief of the tribe, who resides
in Chicago. The names of
these eleven belts are :
Five Nation's War Belt.
Six Nation's Peace Belt.
Six Nation's Peace Belt, rep-
resenting two roads.
Old French Fort Belt, of New
York, 3oo years old.
Black Hawk Belt.
First William Penn Belt, 2 18
years old.
Governor Denny Belt of 1758.
7//E RED MAA. 35
Red Jacket Belt of 1825.
Captain Brant Belt of 1750.
French Peace Belt, 200 years old.
French Mission Belt.
Holmes wrote of wampum :
“The wanpum belts used by many of the tribes of Indians
are known to contain an enormous number of beads. One of
the historical belts still kept contains nearly Io, ooo beads. The
famous belt of William Penn has about 3,000.”
How much the wanpum meant to the Indian is
found in the recorded speech of Cannehoot, a Seneca
chief, who spoke at a treaty council between the
Wagun has and the Senecas. He said:
“We come to join the two bodies into one. We
come to learn wisdom. (Giving
a belt or wanpum.) We by this
belt wipe away the tears from
- the eyes of your friends whose
Aºi. relations have been killed in
the war. We likewise wipe
the paint from your soldiers' faces.
(Giving a second belt.) We throw aside /
the ax which Yonondio put into º
your hands by this third belt. We
will bring your prisoners home
When the strawberries shall be in
blossom.”
The illustration in this work of
Wampum is of the famous Governor
Denny belt made by the Indians
in 1758, and owned now by the
Winnebagoes. Depicted on the
belt in bead work are the figures of
an Indian and a white man, at
peace with each other. This belt
is valued at $5,000.
Stone arrowheads, spearheads,
axes, and hammers were in use
among all the tribes until the ad-
Vent of the white man taught them
how to make use of iron and steel.
They possessed a crude knowledge
of the use of copper, a metal -
which they found in some quantities along the Lake Superior
shores. One of their great workshops for the making of stone
-
INDIAN SPEAR HEAD.
*GIONOVO IINOJLLVAAVALLO&H
7/// AA/) M.A.A. 37
arrowheads was in Union County, Illinois, and covered several
acres of ground. They had a flint quarry near the town of Mill
Creek, and out of this they secured the implements they used
for digging tools or agricultural purposes. On the ancient
sandy beach upon which Kenosha, Wisconsin, is built, evidences
have been found of a former manufactory of arrowheads and
Other articles of flint. For canoe making, they used hornstone
axes, as evidenced by a rich find of sixteen of these implements
in a cache at Bluff City, Illinois. At Fredericksville, in the
same State, 3,500 flints were found in one cache. In the Kewanee
Country a group of polished stone hatchets were found buried.
At Rose Creek, Minnesota, forty-eight arrow points were dug
up. These discoveries indicate that the Indian used the material
of nature in crude fashion as his necessities forced him to, and
that he was fully as imitative as the Japanese in simple things,
when with the first appearance of the white man he immedi-
ately fashioned his pipes like his and used for his weapons and
tools the same materials that the invaders did.
The tribes made much use of shells of the larger varieties.
Kohl, in writing of early trade with the Chippewas of Lake
Superior, states that when the traders exhibited a fine large shell
and held it to the ears of the Indians they were astonished, say-
ing they heard the roar of the ocean in it. They paid for such
a shell furs to the value of thirty or forty dollars, and even
more. The Illini used the shell known as the Busycon Per-
versum. Before the tribes learned of the French and English
the use of a more convenient implement, they tilled their corn
with hoes made of shells. The shell most common as currency
among the Indians of the Northwest, and which was highly
valued, was the Dentalium. The Indians decorated their shells
and other ornaments, long before they knew the white men,
with the cross, the scalloped disk, the bird, the spider, the Ser-
pent, the human face, the human figure, and the frog, showing a
possible connection with the signs of the old world, although
this has never yet been proven.
The storm bird of the Dakota Sioux dwells in the upper air
beyond the range of human vision, carrying on its back a lake of
fresh water. When it winks its eyes, there is lightning ;
When it flaps its wings, thunder is heard ; and when it shakes out
its plumage, the rain descends. The Mississippi Valley tribes
hold with the Shoshones, of the Far West, that the spider was
the first weaver. Each tribe annually had a fall hunt for winter
Supplies, and upon the success of this excursion depended their
Surviving the bitter cold of the winter months. Whiskey was
Called “life water.” Their first ideas of white men are beautifully
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v- vicago)
Pawnee Lou?
will. 1,500
120° 115° 110 Longitude West 105° from Greenwich 100° 95° 90°
Indian Information taken from Lewis & Clarks' Map. LEWIS & CLARIKS" ROUTE, 1804-06 Present State Boundaries are shown
- Assinnieoins - - - -
Numbers belºw Indian Names(*";") indicate Note:- Routes shown on the Map along Rivers were actually traveled on the Rivers. for reference only:--
number of Persons.
-
7//Z RAE/) /AM. 39
related in the meeting of Marquette, at the mouth of the Des
Plaines, with the first Indians he had ever seen. He saw foot-
prints of men on the banks of the river. They led to an Indian
village. Some of the tribe came to meet him.
“Who are you ?” asked Marquette in Algonquin.
“We are Illini,” they answered, “Illini” simply meaning
“men,” by which term they wished to convey friendly feeling
and to distinguish themselves
Z ~CLC/ ſnarſ/vºctº from the warlike Iroquois, whom
they called “beasts.” The fol-
MARQUETTE'S SIGNATURE. lowing day they gathered to-
gether to hear Marquette preach.
After he had finished, the chief rose and said to him :
“I thank you, Black Robe” (the usual Indian name for the
Jesuits), “and you, Frenchman,” addressing Joliet, “for taking
so much trouble to come and visit us. Never has the earth
appeared SO beautiful, nor the sun so brilliant, as to-day.”
With his hand on the head of a little Indian boy, whom he
was about to give to the Jesuits, he said :
“Here is my son, whom I give to you to show you my heart.
I pray you have pity on me and my nation. It is you who
know the Great Spirit who made us all. It is you who speak to
Him and know His word. Ask Him to give us life and health,
and come live with us and show Him to us.”
At the feast which followed, dog was served. This was the
greatest compliment an Illini could offer, for there is no race in
the world among whom the dog is so highly prized as with the
Indians.
Radisson, in 1661, journeying up the Mississippi and coming
to the vicinity of Lake Pepin (Lake of Tears), gives a curious
description of the appearance of the aboriginals. He writes :
“These weare men of extraordinary height & biggnesse, that
made us believe they had no communication with them. They
live onely uppon Corne & Citrulles, wch are mighty bigg.
They have fish in plenty throughout ye yeare. They have
fruit as big as the heart of an Oriniak, weh grows on vast
trees weh in compasse are three armefull in compasse. When
they see little men they are affraid and Cry Out, woh makes
many come help them. Their arrows are not of stone as ours
are, but of fish boans & other boans that they worke greatly,
as all other things. Their dishes are made of wood. I
have seene them [the dishes], & could not but admire the curios:
ity of their worke. They have great calimetts of great stones,
red & greene. They make a store of tobacco. They have a
kind of drink that makes them mad for a whole day.”
4O 7T///E /AV/D/AAV AAV/O 7///E AVOA’ 7"// JJ’A.S. 7".
Mats were used, not only in the dwellings of the Indians, but
they were commonly carried from place to place to sleep on,
for use as seats or carpets in councils. Weaving was common.
The hair of the buffalo was sometimes manufactured into
blankets. The Iroquois made nets out of the thread of nettles
or of whitewood, the bark of which they made into thread by
means of lye, which rendered it strong and pliable. The Omaha
made their lodges of earth, sometimes of skin, and rarely
of bark or mats. The earth lodge was for summer use. The
low lodges of bark were not only used by them but by the Iowas,
Sacs, and Winnebagoes. Before the introduction of canvas
tents by the whites, no needle or thread was used by the Sioux.
The women used sinews of the buffalo or deer instead of thread,
and for needles they had awls made of elk horn. The thin
skin of the deer, just next to the hair, was taken and dried and
used for pillows and moccasin strings. To make a pillow, the
skin was filled with goose feathers or the hair of deer.
The cradles were usually a board about a yard long and a
foot wide. A soft skin, covered with plenty of thick hair, was
laid on the board and on it was placed the infant. For the
swings of the children, the ends of two withes of buffalo hide
were secured to four trees or posts. A blanket was thrown across
the withes and folded Over on them. The infant was laid on
top of the fold and swung without falling. Brooms were made
by tying either sticks together or goose or turkey feathers.
Spoons were manufactured out of horn, wood, or pottery. The
Omahas used the shoulder blades of a buffalo for a hoe. They
made their knives of stone. Fire was made by rubbing or
turning a stick round and round between the hands. Afterwards
flint and tinder were used for the same purpose. Saddles were
in use before the coming of the French. They were made of
wood, around which was wrapped hide while it was still green.
Bridles and halters were made out of strips of hide. Bits were
unknown. When a rider wished to turn to the right he pulled
the single neck rein and pressed his left heel against the horse's
side. The lasso was called mam'tanah-icize, which means,
“that by which a wild horse is taken.” The Omaha made this
lasso by taking the hair from the hide of a buffalo and plaiting
it into a strong rope as thick as one's thumb.
Boats were made Out Of hide or mandeha. The hides were
sewed together with sinew so tightly that water could not pene-
trate. As to musical instruments, those used by the Omaha will
give an indication of the practices of other tribes of the North-
west. Rattles were of five kinds — some were of gourds filled
with seed, fine shot, or gravel. One rattle was made of the
7///, /ö/ /) Al/A AV. 4 I
teeth of the elk. The flat drum was made of buffalo hide, cow
hide or the skin of a horse. Whistles came from elder. Flutes
were made out of the red cedar and some of long bones from the
eagle's wings. Lances, darts, or spears were known among
the Omaha as man'dehi. The bow was fashioned out
of hickory, ash, or iron wood The bow strings were of
the twisted sinews of the elk and buffalo. The hunting
arrow was first made of flint. The flight of the arrow was
equalized by half-webs of feathers fastened near its
base. Another hunting arrow was made of wood. The
war arrow had a barbed point slightly attached to the
shaft, so that after it entered the body of an enemy it could
not be withdrawn without leaving the point in the wound.
Arrows were polished with sandstone.
A set of arrows was called manwin'dan. It sometimes
consisted of ten arrows ; other times of two, four, or even
twenty. The Sioux and Omaha made better arrows than
the Pawnee. The buffalo hide was used to make
quivers, but the Indian boys had quivers of Otter
skins or of the skins of cougars. The hides of
buffalo bulls were used for shields. Arrows could
not penetrate them. Some of the tribes wore a
helmet made of elk skins, which covered the back
Of the head and extended over the forehead, coming
down as far as the eyes. An Indian could notice
an arrow coming toward him and dodge it.
As to the religion of these people, let Mooney
aptly speak : GOURD RATTLE.
“As with men, so it is with nations. The lost
Paradise is the world's dreamland of youth. The doctrines of
the Hindoo avatar, the Hebrew Messiah, the Christian millennium,
and the Hesunamin of the Indian ghost dance are essentially
the same, and have their origin in a hope and a longing common
to all humanity. Probably, every Indian tribe, north and south,
had its early hero god, the great doer or teacher of all first things,
from the Iuskeha and Manabozho of the rude Iroquoian and
Algonquian to the Quetzalcoatl, the Bochica, and the Viracocha
of the more cultivated Aztecs, Muyscas, and Quichuas of the
milder southland. Among the roving tribes of the north this
hero is hardly more than an expert magician, frequently degraded
to the level of a common trickster, who, after ridding the world
of giants and monsters, and teaching his people a few simple
arts, retires to the upper world to rest and smoke until some
urgent necessity again required his presence below.”
The belief in the coming of a Messiah, who should restore
42 77///E /AV/D/A A' A V/D 7///E AWOA' 7"// Iſ//2.S 7.
them to their original happy condition, was wellnigh universal
among the American tribes. This faith in the return of a white
deliverer from the east not only opened the gate to the Span-
iards at their first coming in Mexico and Peru, but made the
entrance to the northwestern tipi most easy on the part of the
French. And as Mooney fitly puts it :
“Their first overbearing demands awakened no resentment;
for may not the gods claim their own, and is not resistance to
the divine will a crime 2''
The answer to this is found in Prescott's statement as to the
Indian and his welcome of the white man :
“Their doom was sealed when the white man had set his foot
on their soil.’’
The Indians of the Northwest still look for the coming of a
deliverer, to be heralded by signs and wonders, just as the
white race constantly lifts its eyes to the heavens for a sign of
the coming of the new dominion of Christ. Yet at the same
time the doctrine prevails with the northern
tribes, as well as with the others, that the
world is old and worn out, and that the time
for its renewal is near at hand. The most
sadly prophetic form of this myth has been
found among the Winnebagoes, who forty
years ago held that the tenth generation of
their people was near its close and that at the
end of the thirteenth the red race would be
destroyed. The Chippewa, or Ojibwa, on
Lake Superior, collected in great numbers for
songs and dances and the meeting of the -
prophet who was to herald the coming of the
new time. They danced naked, with their
bodies painted and with the war club in their
hands. The word came to them from this
prophet that fire must always be kept in the
tipi; that life would end if this fire was extin-
guished ; that a man, a woman, a child, a
dog, must never be struck. The Ojibwa
must cease to drink, to steal, to lie, or to go
chippewa snowsHof, against their enemies, for :
“While we yield an entire obedience to
these commands of the Great Spirit, the Sioux, even if they come
to Our Country, will not be able to see us ; we shall be pro-
tected and made happy.”
For two or three years the effect of this teaching was felt
upon the tribe, but in time the impression was obliterated and
7/// AA/) V.A.A. 43
women and children were beaten as before. The prophets came
among the tribes with their faces painted black. They asserted
that the dead would be caused to arise from the grave. They
ordered the sacred medicine bags to be thrown away. The shores
of Lake Superior, in the vicinity of Bayfield, were strewn with
these bags which had been cast into the water. Bayfield was
the ancient capital of the Chippewas. A migration of the Chip-
pewas was made to Detroit,
where they believed the
Great Spirit would be found.
The aboriginals had sun
gods, corn gods, rain gods,
and a vast collection of other
mythical supreme beings,
who regulated their evil and
their good. They were
polytheists. They believed
in a great variety of beings.
They made little separa-
tion between their good
and their bad gods. They
thought the world was
peopled with gods, men,
and animals. They held -
that the animals had a - =
language of their own. - -
The Iroquois had what
they called Daimon
gods; that is, the
trees, mountains, riv- - -
ers, and lakes were -
gods leading a double
existence, sometimes
animate and sometimes
inanimate. With most
of the Indian families
the sun god, or the fire INDIAN BED.
god, was supreme Over
all, thus showing their quick recognition of the fact that what
humans first most need is light and heat. Every tribe possessed a
body of Shamans (medicine men). These Shamans Were CuS-
todians of the mythologic lore of the tribe. They told oyº and
over again the varying stories of the creation, the lives of the
gods, the legends of their deeds. They prophesied the return of
peace to all the world and of plenty to all the aboriginals. Four
7/// KAZ) V.A.V. 45
was the sacred number of the tribes, symbolic of the points of
the compass — east, west, north, and south. In their religious
rites dancing played a great part. There was the green-corn
dance, the hunting dance, the human dance, the fishing dance,
and last the ghost dance, which precipitated the latest great
Indian outbreak and ended in the death of Sitting Bull.
One of their legends of their origin is as peculiar as that of
the Menomini. The founder of a tribe was a snail passing a
quiet existence on the banks of a river. A high flood came and
swept him to another river where he was exposed on the shore.
The heat of a summer's sun beat upon him and he became a
man. His change of nature had made him forget the land in
which he had first lived as a snail. He tried to find it, however,
but was overcome by hunger and fatigue. Then the Great
Spirit appeared, gave him a bow and arrow, taught him how to
kill and cook game, and showed him how to cover himself with
skins. Thus equipped, the man proceeded toward his original
snail-home, but as he approached the spot he was met by a
beaver, who asked him who he was and why he came to disturb
him. The man answered that the place was his own for he had
Once lived there. The two disputed until the daughter of the
beaver came and reconciled her father to the man. Soon after,
she and the man were married, and from this union sprung the
tribe that worshiped the beaver and refused to pursue it as game.
Particular mounds on the prairies were often selected by
tribes as objects of special veneration. Spirit Mound, in South
Dakota, was one of these. The Indians called it the Mountain
of Little People, or Little Spirits. They believed that it was
the abode of little devils in human form, about eighteen inches
high and with remarkably large heads, armed with sharp arrows,
in the use of which they were skillful. They were supposed to
be always on the watch to kill those who should have the temerity
to approach the mound. Many reckless Indians, it was said,
fell victims to their malice.
Young braves of a tribe, active and brave, bound to each,
other by natural attachments, sometimes formed an association,
held by a vow, never to retreat before any danger or to give
way to their enemies. In battle time they would go forward
without sheltering themselves behind trees or aiding their natural
Valor by any artifice. Several young braves of the Yanktons
formed such an association and afterwards came to an ice
crossing of the Missouri. A hole lay in their course, which,
might have been avoided by going around. The first one of the
braves disdained to do this, but went straight ahead and was
lost. The others would have followed his example, but Were
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forcibly prevented. Young braves, bound together by such a
vow, sat, Camped, and danced together, distinct from the rest of
the tribe. Their ages were from thirty to thirty-five, and such
tribute was paid to their courage, that their seats in the council
were superior to those of the chief and their persons more
respected. -
In some of the tribes the men shaved the hair off their heads
except a small tuft on the top. This they let grow and wore
in plaits over the shoulders. They entertained about the same
notion in regard to this plait as do the Chinese in relation to
the cue. It was not sacrificed save on the death of near
relations. In full dress, the men of note wore a hawk's or
calumet feather, worked with porcupine quills, and fastened to
the top of the head. The face and body were painted with
a mixture of grease and coal ; often moistened colored earths
were used for the painting, and the juices from plants.
Over the shoulders a loose robe or mantle of buffalo skin, dressed
white, was thrown. The hair of the women grew long.
Their dress, when worn, was a long, loose shift of skin. This
was fastened over the shoulders by a sinew, and had no sleeve.
If a wife left the tipi of her husband permanently, he was
entitled to kill her. In many of the tribes adultery was
punished with the death of both the guilty parties. Elopements
between the young people were frequent. The higher the
intelligence of a tribe, the higher was the position of the women.
The lower the intelligence, the lower the plane upon which
the woman was kept. Some tribes maintained an officer whose
position was virtually that of chief of police. His duty was
to keep peace by day and guard the camp by night. His term
of Office was always short, but his authority was supreme. He
could not, in the execution of his duties, be punished for striking
even a chief of the second class. His distinguishing mark was
usually a collection of bird skins fixed to the girdle at his
back. He wore on his head a bird skin split in two parts and
tied so that they left the beak to project from the forehead.
The Indian was always seeking an explanation for the where-
abouts of those whom he loved after they died. This legend
will explain. On one of the Northwestern prairies there are
two stones resembling human figures and a third that looks like
a dog. A young brave was in love with a young Squaw, whose
parents refused consent to their marriage. The youth Wan-
dered to the prairie to mourn. The lady of his heart followed
him, and the faithful dog of the brave kept after both. The
young couple had nothing but grapes to subsist on, hence they
Starved to death and were converted into stone. This conversion
48 7///, /v/)/AA AA/) 7:/// vow 7.// iſºsz,
into stone began at their feet and extended upwards, leaving
nothing unchanged but a bunch of grapes, which the female
held in her hand. Whenever the tribe to which the young
people and the dog belonged passed these sacred stones they
stopped to make some offering of dress to propitiate these deities.
SIOUX INDIAN GRAVE.
Another custom was that of expressing grief for the death of
relations by some corporeal suffering. The usual mode was to
cut off two joints of the little finger, or sometimes of the other
fingers. In religion, all the tribes believed in one Great Spirit,
who presided over their destinies. He was a good genius,
since he was always associated with the healing art. All the
tribes believed in a future state, and many of them in the coming
of a Messiah. One of their beliefs in the future state is con-
nected with this tradition of the origin of the Mandan. This
tribe resided in a large village underground, near a subterranean
lake. A grapevine extended down to their village and gave
them a view of the light on the earth above. Some of the ad-
venturous ones of the tribe climbed the vine and were delighted
with the sight of the earth, which they found covered with
buffalo and rich with fruits. Returning with the fruit to the
7///, /ø/2/) A/A AV. 49
village, they so pleased their fellows with their discoveries that
the entire tribe started to ascend by the vine. When about
half had ascended to the surface of the earth, a fat woman, who
was clambering up, broke the vine with her weight and shut
off from herself and the rest of the tribe the light of the sun.
Those who had gained the earth formed a new village and
became the Mandans. When they die they expect to return to
the underground village — the good reaching it by means of
a lake, which the burden of the sins of the wicked will not en-
able them to cross.
The buffalo dance was an institution devised for the benefit
of the old men and practiced at their suggestion. When buffalo
became scarce these old men harangued the tribe, saying that
the game was far off, and that a feast and dance would be
necessary to bring it back. A day and place was named for
the celebration. At the appointed time the old men came to
the spot and seated themselves crosslegged on skins round a
fire in the middle of a lodge, with a sort of doll, dressed like a
female, placed before them. The young men then came, bring-
ing with them a platter of provisions, a pipe of tobacco, and
their wives. The wives on this occasion wore only a robe
loosely thrown around the body. On their arrival each youth
Selected the old man whom he meant to distinguish by his
favor and placed before him the provisions, the tobacco and
his wife. Then the feast, dance and orgy followed. The tribes
frequently consulted their medicine stones as to their prospects
for the following year, and whatever they announced was
believed. The medicine stone was kept in a sacred spot, to
which those who wished to consult it came. The first ceremony
consisted in smoking with it. The braves sat about the stone
and whiffed their pipes, and then presented them to the stone
for its use. When this was finished, the seekers after the truth
retired to a distant spot and slept over night. In the morning
they returned to the stone and read the destinies of the nation
in the white marks upon it. Of course, those who placed the
marks there understood ; but, outside the circle of medicine men,
the divine powers of the stone were firmly believed in by the
tribes.
It was in such simplicity as this that the red man dwelt,
attended by his gods and spirits, loved by his women, honored
by his fellows if he were stern in courage, just in his dealings,
reverential to the dead and that far-away Past out of which
he had come to be the aboriginal of the Western Continent.
50 7///, /AV/)/A AV AAV/) 7///º AWO/C 7// J/Z/2.S 7.
THE SECOND EPOCH. THE WAR MAN.
Mila kin hiyu'michi'chiyana ;
Mila kin hiyu'michi'chiyana.
Give me my knife ;
Give me my knife.
A Song of the Sioux.
HE French on their arrival in the Northwest –
pioneers of all the civilization that was to come
afterwards — did not find peace and concord exist-
ing between the three families of the Sioux, the
Algonquin, and the Iroquois. Each family, as it
met the newcomers, related tales of savage con-
flicts that had raged between them from the St.
Lawrence to the Missouri. Of what had gone on
beyond the Missouri, or what was going on then,
they could say nothing. They only knew that
beyond the famous river were the Shining Mountains. The
Menomini and the Iroquois (although the latter were more in-
clined to warfare than the former) were, without question, more
amenable to white influence. The Winnebagoes, scattered at
that time Over what is now Eastern Minnesota and Western and
Central Wisconsin, were scarcely less so ; but the other tribes —
the Illini, the Sac, the Fox, nearly all of the divisions of the Sioux
and Chippewas – after a short period of friendly relations with
the white invaders made war, and their forays and massacres have
been a part of current history from 1699 to the death of Major
Wilkinson at Leech Lake, Minnesota, in 1898.
The French adventurers, who closely followed the Jesuits
into the Northwest, either by way of Detroit, Green Bay, and
Lake Superior, or by the route through St. Joseph, Chicago,
and Kaskaskia, were eager first for treasures of gold, and not
finding that, anxious to take possession of the land in the name
of their king and for the purpose of colonial settlement. They
bore little respect for the morality of the Indian, his rights as a
husband or a father, or his title to stream and land at the spot
where his tipi was pitched. From the time of the discovery of
America by Columbus, in 1492, which preceded by more than
a hundred years the discovery of the Northwest, Europe gave
forth band after band of more or less unscrupulous explorers.
The Old World was tired of itself. England was moved with a
new spirit of territorial aggrandizement. The aristocracy of
7///? Iſ 'A /ø A/A A'. 5 I
France, cloyed with drinking the cup of pleasure, was hot to
find new diversions. Religion sought new converts by brave
missionaries. To these the romance and legend slowly crossing
#
º º
#
º
º
º
#
º
§§
º § :
FROM AN EARLY PORTRAIT OF LA SALLE.
the seas appealed irresistibly as heralds of a new world to be -
Conquered and new pleasures to be found. Thus they came in
the early years of the seventeenth century to the borderland
of what is now the Northwest, found the land pleasing to look
52 77///, /AV/)/A AV AAV/) 7///º A/OA 7"// IP/ES 7".
upon and no obstacle to its occupancy but the Indian. It took
but a few years of despoliation of his land, violation of the honor
of his child, insults to his wife, and unwarranted robbery of
himself, to change him into some-
thing a little short of demonaic.
Let Professor Shaler, of Harvard
- º University, describe the Indian's
true state just before his war-
life with the whites commenced :
» - “The American Indians were
JOLIET'S SIGNATURE. - - -
not nomadic until they obtained
horses and firearms from or through Europeans ; and, not being
nomadic, they never passed into the patriarchal form of organi-
zation, which step, the next in orderly sequence, was arrested
by foreign violence. While their religions were much more
primitive than that of monotheism, which has been generally
and falsely attributed to them, they influenced the acts of their
daily life and the conduct of their governments to a degree
beyond that exercised by modern Christianity. Their creeds
were largely concerned with two points of vital importance to
the success of any attempts to establish compliance with the
system set forth in the common and statute laws prevalent in
North America. These points relate to the title to land and the
inheritance of property. What the law of the United States
declares to be right about the ownership of land, the Indian
religiously believes to be a crime, and to him the usual provis-
ions for the distribution of a decedent's personal effects are so
abhorrent, that he prefers that the articles should be destroyed
or buried with the corpse of their former owner.
“Without referring to cases of oppression or neglect, and only
considering the many experiments of sincere legislators and
philanthropists to improve the condition of Indian tribes and
individuals, it is clear that hitherto such attempts have had
meager success ; and it is also clear that they have been mis-
directed through the utter ignorance of the Indian character
and through false theories based on mistaken data. Only since
1879, when Congress established the Bureau of Ethnology, has
there been any systematic endeavor, free alike from sentiment,
greed, and preconceived theory, to study and publish the
ascertained facts concerning the North American Indians.”
Champlain, Jean Nicollet, and the other early explorers be-
lieved they were on the way to finding a shorter road to China
by crossing America than that usually followed in rounding the
Cape of Good Hope. Nicollet reached Canada in 1618. In
1634 he left the Georgian Bay in a birch canoe with seven
7///E I/AA’ A/A AW. 53
savages and came to the Sault Sainte Marie. Afterwards,
crossing to Mackinaw, he entered Lake Michigan and sailed
over it to Green Bay, where he met the Menomini and later the
“Men of the Sea,” better known afterwards under the name of
Winnebagoes. The object of his visit was to conclude a treaty
of peace with the Winnebagoes on the part of the French Gov-
ernment. This treaty was made. Nicollet crossed the portage
which separates the Fox from the Wisconsin River and then de-
scended the latter to the
Mississippi.
It was while in Wisconsin
that Nicollet learned of the #
feud between the Sioux and º
the Chippewas, which was * * .
in a few short years to in- ºr ºl
volve also the whites and * -
to lead to more than a cen- §
tury and a half of war and mas- º
sacre. The Chippewas said that *.
there was a stream which emptied *: ;
into Lake Superior and into which º
came many white fish. The Menomini
desired to place a dam across this
stream in order to keep the white fish
out of it. The Chippewas objected,
because this would deprive them of †
food, they having many tipis along the #
banks of the stream. The Sioux sided º
with the Menomini and the stream was
dammed. From that time on there was
blood-hatred between the Sioux and the INDIAN THUNDER BIRD.
Chippewas, in which the early whites, -
as they favored or opposed one or the other of the two tribes,
took part. The Miami, a powerful branch of the Illini tribe,
were south of the Chippewas in Wisconsin, and their influence
and power extended over the country in which is now Chicago
and the greater portion of the settlements on the southern shore
of Lake Michigan. They were partial to the French from their
first meeting with them, but hostile to the Iroquois, and were
engaged in numerous battles with them during the seventeenth
century. The French came in rapidly, both by way of Lake
Superior and Chicago; but their relations were quite amicable
with the tribes for seventy-five or a hundred years. -
Taking Chicago from this time on as the center from which
all the powerful influences that were to revolutionize the North-
-
…
54 ZT///E /AV/9/A AW 4 AV/) / ///E AWOA 7// J/Z/2.S 7.
west emanated, the history of treaties and wars with the Indi-
ans commences with the arrival of an English ambassador
in Wisconsin, in 1690, who sought to purchase the friendship of
the Miami with gifts. The overtures were rejected and friendship
for the French maintained for a long time afterwards. Before
the opening of the eighteenth century, the Illini and Miami had
been driven from the vicinity of Chicago by the attacks made
upon them by the “canoe" men. These are better known
as the Pottawattomi and Chippewas, who came from the north
by way of lakes Superior and Michigan in canoes. It was about
this time that many of the French traders, through policy,
joined with the Sac and Fox tribes, the Sioux, the Chippewas,
the Pottawattomi, the Cherokees, and the Choctaws, who came
from the south, in a general attack on the Illini. The war
lasted a number of years and resulted in the practical extermi-
nation of the great nation. The Illini never made voyages on
water and were afraid of the “canoe" people, especially of the
Pottawattomi, whom Nicollet had first met at their islands in
Green Bay. In 1641, Joques and Raymbault were at Sault Sainte
Marie, seeking to prevent war between the Chippewas and the
Iroquois. Joques was taken prisoner by the Iroquois and cruelly
scourged and mutilated. De Groselles was a holy father, who
came to the shore of Lake Superior in 1658 and preached
among the Sioux and the Illini. Rene Menard founded an Ot-
tawa mission on the southern shore of Lake Superior, at Kewee-
non Bay, in 1660, but was lost in the woods and died. Allouez
took up the work of Menard, 1665, at Ashland Bay, where he
said : “At the bottom of which are situated the great villages
of the savages who there plant their fields of corn and lead a
stationary life.”
Near by he erected a small chapel of brick, the first structure
erected by a civilized man in Wisconsin ; and at La Pointe, a
little north of the Indian villages, he established a mission of the
Holy Ghost, which, in 1669, came into the charge of Father,
Marquette, one of the first white men to reach Chicago from
the Old World. La Pointe at this time was the farthermost
western point to which the French had penetrated. Marquette
remained there a year and then sought work among the Illini;
but the Sioux, who had declared war upon them, drove him
and his flock back to the Mission of the Holy Ghost. In 1671
France took formal possession of the whole country of the upper
lakes. It was already known as New France, and it was in
this new land that the ambitious Frontenack and sagacious Talon
believed would be found the mythical kingdom of Quivira,
which, with its gold and precious stones, was thought to lead
7/// iſ AA. W.A.A. 55
on to the path to the California Sea. Joliet and Marquette were
both commissioned by the French rulers at home to Christian-
ize the savages and to seek for Quivira.
The first official action towards the discovery and the estab-
lishment of the French Government over the Northwest, of
which there is a record, was in 1670. M. Talon, in his report to
the king, dated at Quebec, September, 1670, says:
“I have dispatched persons of reputation, who promised to
penetrate farther than ever has been done ; they went to the
west and the northwest of Canada and thence to the Southwest
and South. These adventurers are to keep journals, take posses-
sion, display the king's arms, and try by process verbaux to
serve as title.”
The name of Chicago in this region was already well known,
no matter whether its origin was from a name given by the
Indians to a stream or from an Ottawa name meaning “Place
of the Skunk.” It was a place of easy approach, commanding
what was then considered to be great rivers, and fully as impor-
tant as a meeting place for the tribes as Kaskaskia in the
Southwest and Green Bay in the northwest. Between these three
points and to the west of them laid a vast territory practically
unexplored by the French, although claimed by them, until after
17oo. La Salle, in 1679, came into Green Bay with the first
large vessel ever there and constructed by white men. The
boat carried thirty-four sailors and laborers and had a capacity
of forty-five tons. With La Salle was Father Hennepin, and
the two visited the mouth of the Chicago River and were at what
is now South Bend, Indiana. Early in January, 1680, they
were encamped at a short distance below Peoria Lake, near eighty
tipis of Illini. It was near this camp that La Salle eventually
built the fort known as Broken Heart. It was here that he found
the famous chief Pontiac. At this fort La Salle left his faithful
Companion Tonty in command of fourteen or fifteen men,
while he himself hastened back to Montreal to procure needed
supplies for them. During his absence the soldiers of Fort
Broken Heart deserted Tonty and destroyed the fort. La Salle
returned to find them missing and the Indian villages of the
Kaskaskia ruined. The Iroquois had visited the spot and
wreaked vengeance on their ancient enemies, while Tonty had
been left to his fate by his treacherous companions. Tonty was
afterwards found at Green Bay safe from harm. By 1681 La
Salle had perfected a plan for uniting the Wisconsin tribes in a
league and of colonizing them around a French fort in the valley
of the Illinois, which should be a center of trade and a safe point
from which to extend explorations to the south and west. In
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Boundaries - - " - -
oundaries of unceded Indian lands thus: THE NORTHWEST IN 1852. Part of the Chicago & North-Western Railway
Indian Reservations thus: | -- - - -
Giving Year of Settlement of Important Places from 1800 to 1852. built up to 1852 shown thus: -
7///, /ſ/AA A/AAV. 57
1682, on the 6th day of February, at the mouth of the Missis-
sippi, La Salle took possession of the valley of the same in the
name of France, called the new possession Louisiana, in honor
of the king, and realized the great and all-absorbing desire of
his life. He was in Illinois once again, building Fort St. Louis,
at what is known now as Starved Rock, near Ottawa. He
established there an Indian village of 20,000 souls. A year later
Tonty fought the Iroquois at Fort St. Louis and defeated them.
While La Salle was making early history in Illinois, Captain
Duluth had held a council with the Indians of the Lake Superior
shore and concluded a peace with them. Meanwhile Father
Hennepin, who had become separated from La Salle, was, in
1680, while on his way up the Mississippi, captured by a Sioux
war party at Lake Pepin and taken to Mille Lacs, where he re-
mained for several months. On his return homeward, after
being released, he discovered the Falls of Saint Anthony, now
Minneapolis, which he named after his patron saint, Anthony of
Padua. Le Seur, three years later, made a complete voyage of
the Fox and Wisconsin rivers to the Mississippi; and five years
after that date, Perrot first planted the cross and arms of
France on the soil of Minnesota and constructed a fort on Lake
Pepin, near what is now Lake City. In 1695, La Seur con-
structed a fort on Isle Pelee in the Mississippi, just below the
present village of Prescott. Still five years later, L'Huillier em-
barked from France with many galleons, crossed the Ocean, sailed
up the Mississippi
to its junction
with the Minne-
Sota at Fort Snell-
ing ; thence up
that river more
than a hundred
miles to where the
Terre de Blue, or
Blue Earth Riv-
er, joins it, and
there constructed
a fort, from which - * T ºr . . .
the Sioux were first supplied with firearms. The object of L'Huil-
lier's journey was to take back the blue earth found on the banks
of the river of the same name to France, under the impression
that it was of great mineral wealth. On bringing it to France,
he found that it was only valuable for chapped hands. .
England and France clashed as to their possessions in the
New World. Upon both English and French explorers dawned
IOWA POTTERY BOWLS.
58 ZZ//, /AV/9/A A' AAV/) ////E AVOA’ Z'A/ W/2.S 7.
the knowledge that command of the valley of the St. Lawrence,
of the gateways to the Great Lakes, and of the Mississippi Val-
ley meant control of a new territory marvelous in richness of
soil and timber. But it was necessary before the bona fide
settler — the farmer, the merchant, and the manufacturer —
could come, that after the day of peace in the life of the Indian
should come the day of war. Each of the two great European
nations, as it gained or lost advantages in the Northwest, drew to
itself Indian allies, whose ferocious character of warfare accent-
uated the horrors of frontier conflict. Quebec surrendered to
the English in 1629, and English traders commenced an active
sale of their wares to the aborigines. Quebec was restored to
the French in 1633, and then came the great Iroquois war.
For years the Iroquois had longed to be avenged upon those
who, with the aid of the French arquebuses, had defeated
them in battle. They sold their beaver skins for powder
and firearms. They destroyed the Hurons and compelled the
abandonment of French trading posts on Lake Michigan.
Peace was not declared between the French and the Iroquois
until 1654. -
The chartering of the Hudson Bay Fur Company, in 1670,
brought into contact with the already disturbed spirits of the
Indians new and more daring adventurers than those who had
preceded. And the agents of the company, to add to the hostile
motive of the situation, carried as gift-offering — liquor and gun-
powder. Father Menard was murdered at the Black Hawk
River in 1660. Nicholas Perrot was at the Sault Ste. Marie in
1671, making peace with the Sacs, Menomini, Pottawattomi,
and Winnebagoes for France. To him they gave all the lands
about lakes Huron and Superior for Louis the XIV. The
Hurons did not take part in this treaty, for they were in trouble
with the Sioux, and were driven out with them from the Chegoi-
megon Country, never to return.
In 17oo, De Courte Manche was sent by the Governor Gen-
eral of Canada to visit the various Indian tribes in what is now
Michigan and Illinois, and to invite them to send deputies from
their tribes to Montreal, in order to arrange terms for a final
peace between them and the Iroquois. He found the Miami
preparing to make war against the Iroquois, as were, also, all
the Illinois tribes except the Kaskaskias. At Chicago he dis-
covered one tribe which was preparing to fight both the Sioux
and the Iroquois. He succeeded in preventing the conflict.
Two years later Fort St. Louis, better known as Starved Rock,
was abandoned as a French military post, and then came long
and bloody wars between the French and their Illini allies with
7///E WAA’ Al/AAW. 59
the various tribes of the Northwest, commencing with the Foxes
of Wisconsin. Charlevoix wrote of the latter : -
“The Foxes infested with their robberies and murders, not
only the neighborhood of Green Bay but almost all the routes
communicating with the remote colonial posts, as well as those
leading from Canada to Louisiana.”
After the Foxes had their day, came the Pottawattomi, who
finally almost exterminated the Illini allies of the French and
for a time made it unsafe for explorers and missionaries to enter
the Northwest by way of the Chicago route. The original tribes
of Illinois, by 1720, had been driven from the entire northern
portion of the State, but the French came to their assistance at
that time and built Fort Chartres near Kaskaskia. The Illini
Indians abandoned their country and settled on the lower
Mississippi. The French were left to fight it out alone with
the Foxes and Pottawattomi, who controlled all of upper Illinois.
The colonists were murdered almost under the guns of Fort
Chartres and the entire country north of it was a battle ground.
In 1728, the French made determined war on the Foxes and a
battle ensued at Butte des Morts, Wisconsin, in which the French
were successful and the Foxes nearly exterminated. But SO
unsafe had they made the Chicago route into the Northwest
that between 1725 and 1775 the name Chicago rarely appears
in the chronicles of travelers. That entrance into the North-
west was abandoned. The travelers of that period traveled
down the Wabash River to the Ohio and from this into the
Mississippi.
While Chicago was still an unsafe resort for white men, in
1763, came the effort of Pontiac, chief of the Ottawas, to com-
bine all the Northwestern tribes against the whites and drive
them from the land. He organized the Chippewas, Shawnees,
Wyandots, into a confederation and ruthlessly descended upon
the settlers and traders. He was a general of ability, a chief
of brain, and his onslaught was terrible. Mackinaw was cap-
tured by a stratagem, Detroit besieged, and war made until
1764. A treaty was concluded between the English and the
Western Confederacy in August, 1764, and of the 1,930 warriors
assembled at Niagara, as representatives of the various tribes,
450 were Pottawattomi. Pontiac, disappointed at the result of
his efforts to keep the hated English from the regions of Detroit,
Came, it is said, to Illinois and settled with a band of Ottawas
on the banks of the Kankakee. In 1769 he was assassinated,
and it was believed by the united tribes (Ottawas and Potta-
Wattomi) that the Illini Indians were accessory to the Crime.
In revenge for the death of their idolized leader, war was waged
6o 7 'A' / /AV/O/AAV AAV/) ////- ATO/07// / / /.S. /.
by the Pottawattomi and other Northwestern tribes against the
Illini until the latter were exterminated, and the victors had
possession of all Northern Illinois. Starved Rock, in La Salle
County (the “Rock of St. Louis,” of La Salle and Tonty), was
the scene of the final disaster which completely annihilated the
once powerful nation which gave the State of Illinois its name.
Driven from one place of refuge to another, the last surviving
remnant of the Illini Indians gathered on the summit of
Starved Rock, where they were besieged by their enemies on
every side ; and when at last, compelled by pangs of hunger and
STARVED ROCK.
thirst, in desperation they attempted to force a path through
the ranks of the enemy, nearly every one was slain. Scarcely
enough escaped to tell the tale.
The Pottawattomi were now the dominant tribe in upper
Illinois, although in many cases their villages were composed
of united Pottawattomi, Ottawas, and Chippewas. Through the
Revolution they were hostile to the Americans, but after the
victory gained by General Wayne over the Western Confederates
in the summer of 1794, at Presque Isle, on the Maumee River,
the Pottawattomi joined the other tribes in suing for peace.
The nations who, with the Pottawattomi, formed the con-
federated Indian force led by Little Turtle and Blue Jacket,
7///E WAA A/AM. 6 I
Ottawa and Shawnee chiefs, against General Wayne at this de-
cisive battle, which eventuated in the treaty of Greenville, were
the Miami, Shawnees, Delawares, Chippewas, and Ottawas.
In 1773, William Murray, a subject of Great Britain, residing
at Kaskaskia, purchased from the Illini Indians, for five shillings
and a small amount of goods and merchandise, all the land on
which Chicago now stands and all the land west of it to the
Mississippi River and south to where the Mississippi and the
Illinois join, and north to about the present site of Waukegan.
What the value of this land now is, then sold for five shillings, it
is almost impossible to say , but the real and personal property
valuation of Chicago alone, at the present time, is $5,000,ooo, ooo.
Murray organized the Illinois Land Company, which took form
in Philadelphia in 1780, but the United States Government de-
nied the validity of his purchase ; he was never able to secure
the land. His claim was eventually disposed of on August 3,
1795, when, by the terms of the treaty of Greenville, a piece of
land six miles square at the mouth of the Chicago River, empty-
ing into the southwest end of Lake Michigan, and where a
French fort had once stood, was ceded by the Indians to the
Earge washiºdºr
PRESIDENT 1793
GREEN VILLE MEDAL.
United States in anticipation of its being made a military post.
With the acquirement of this land by the United States Govern-
ment, and on which Fort Dearborn was eventually to stand,
62 77///E /AV/O/A A' A V/O 7///E AWOA' 7"// IPA.S. 7".
came the first definite movement of civilized people to take
honorable possession and develop the Northwest.
Prior to the Greenville treaty, Illinois and the territory of
the Northwest were retarded in development by the Indian
outbreaks. Nebraska was given up to the Otoes, Pawnees,
Omahas, and Sioux. Iowa was possessed by the Iowas and
Sioux ; Minnesota, Wisconsin, and, in fact, the entire land to
the Upper Missouri were Indian dominated. Virginia, which,
in a fashion, pretended to govern Illinois prior to 1784, ceded
the territory that year to the United States. But after the
close of the Revolutionary War the civil affairs of the frontier
land were entirely neglected by both Virginia and Congress,
and the settlers left to rule themselves as they saw fit. Courts
were not held, and public officers failed or refused to discharge
their duties. To make the condition of the people still
worse, after the cession of the country to the United States,
an irresponsible body of soldiers, pretending to have authority
from Virginia, organized, assumed control of the people and
plundered them. In 1787, Congress formed a plan for the gov-
ernment of the territory, and General Arthur St. Clair was sent
out as governor. In 1790, he made his first visit to Illinois.
He found the few settlers in great distress. They had lost
their Indian trade, they were without money, and they had suf-
fered from three extraordinary inundations of the Mississippi.
As a result of this visit, the first county was organized within
what is now Illinois, and became known as St. Clair County.
Land titles were practically valueless. Grants were held from
Indians, the French, and the English, for which no proof of
validity could be given. But the valuable Greenville treaty,
aside from dedicating the land on which Chicago now stands to
the United States Government, guaranteed by the Indians a
free passage through their country in Illinois from the mouth
of the Chicago River and over the portage to the Illinois River,
and down that to the Mississippi; also down the Wabash.
Under this treaty of the Illinois tribes, the Pottawattomi were
to receive an annual stipend of $1,000 in goods, and the Kicka-
poos and two other tribes $500 each. The good news of this
important treaty spread East, and a genuine wave of emigration
began to flow, with augmenting force, into the Northwest. Ap-
prehension of danger from the Indians was temporarily ban-
ished, and friendly intercourse with them succeeded former
enmity.
The hardy pioneer pushed forward and extended the frontier
northwestward to the Mississippi, westward to the Missouri,
and southward to beyond St. Louis. Forts, stations and stock-
7///E JPA A' A/A AV. 63
--
ades were abandoned to decay. Men of capital and enterprise
secured title to extensive bodies of fertile lands, and organ-
ized colonies for their occupation. To the spot where the
moccasined feet of the aboriginal had trod, where the calumet
and tomahawk were buried, came the share of the plow,
the edge of the ax, the smoke of the chimneys of peaceful
ſº º T-
CHEYENNE GIRLs.
homes, and the prosperity due the men and women who were
making the wilderness blossom like the rose. An act of Congress,
in 1791, aided much in this first real settlement of the North-
west. By this act a tract of 400 acres of land was granted to
all heads of families who made improvements in Illinois
prior to 1788, except village improvements. The population
of the territory at this time, excluding negroes, was about 1,220.
64 7///E /AV/D/A AV AAV/O 7///E AWOA’ 7"// Iſ’A.S 7.
By act of Congress of May 7, 1800, the large and unwieldy
territory of the Northwest was divided. All that part of it
lying westward of a line beginning on the Ohio River opposite
the mouth of the Kentucky, running thence north to the British
possessions, was constituted a separate territory and called
Indiana. It enclosed the present States of Illinois, Wisconsin,
Michigan and Indiana, except a small strip on the eastern side,
between the mouth of the Kentucky and the Great Miami.
The white population of the country was estimated at 4,875 ;
negro slaves, 135, while the aggregate number of Indians within
the extreme limits of the territory was fairly reckoned at Ioo,0oo.
J. M. Peck states, in his “Gazette of Illinois,” published in
1837, that there were at the beginning of the century 3,000
people within the limits of Illinois. In 1809 this portion was
divided into the territories of Indiana and Illinois, and in the
subsequent year Illinois contained a population of 12,282. The
chief reason for making the division of 1800 was the large
extent of the Northwestern territory, which rendered the ordi-
nary operations of government uncertain, and the prompt and
efficient administration of justice almost impossible. In the
three western counties, Knox, St. Clair and Randolph, the latter
two in Illinois, there had been but one term of court having
cognizance of crime in five years. General William Henry Har-
rison, August 13, 1803, in consequence of the extensive set-
tlement toward the Mississippi, found it necessary to secure
land in that direction, and concluded at Vincennes a treaty
with the Kaskaskias — representing the Kaskaskias, Cahokias,
Michigamies, and Tamatoas of the ancient confederation of
the Illini Indians – for over 8, ooo, ooo acres of land in the
southern portion of what is now Illinois. Following this treaty,
others were made with the Shawnees and Piankashaws the
same year, with the Piankashaws and Sacs and Foxes in 1804,
the Kickapoos and Pottawattomi in 1809, the Peorias, Illini and
Kickapoos in 1818, by which Indian claims to lands in the
greater portion of Illinois were extinguished. Kaskaskia, to
which General Lafayette came in 1824, was the seat of govern-
ment, and Chicago but a sandy waste.
At the opening of the nineteenth century, Wisconsin was a
vast wilderness, given over to hordes of Savages and a few fur
traders. It was rich only in romance and the promise of a
glorious future, the rainbow of which had not pierced with its
rosy light the gray of the dawn. It enters the twentieth century
a lusty giant, proud of its strength and vigorous manhood.
In certain respects Wisconsin is peculiar among the States of
the Union. First, no other has such a cosmopolitan population.
77///, /ſ/.4/º A/4 AV. 65
Every country of Europe, with Turkey excepted, and including
Iceland, is represented, not by solitary groups, but by whole
communities. The German and Scandinavian races predominate
in this great body of foreign descent. Second, its natural
wealth is more diversified than that of any other State in the
Union.
Wisconsin was a theoretical part of the political organism
known as the Great Northwest Territory, which came to the
United States through the peace of 1783. Practically it was still
a part of the English Empire, governed through the fur traders,
who were British to the core and wielded preponderating
influence over the Indians who roamed through the territory.
Nor was this influence broken until nearly a quarter of a
century later.
The only settlements within the confines of the present
commonwealth were at Green Bay, or at La Baye, as it was then
known, and Prairie du Chien, -
if a fur trader's post, surrounded
by the cabins of his employees,
can be called a settlement. At
Green Bay there were perhaps
a dozen families, and at Prairie
du Chien even fewer, though
both places were at times the
centers of temporary habitation
for several hundred traders and
their men, just starting out on
their trips or returning after a
Successful winter in the woods
with their Indian clients. Here
and there in other parts of the
territory were isolated traders,
as at Milwaukee, Sheboygan,
Black River Falls, and other
points where they had posts to
Supply the Indians with ammu-
nition, blankets, calico, and
trinkets in exchange for furs.
The year 1800 was remark- -
able for two important events— INDIAN DICE.
the death of Charles de Lang-
lade, who is known as the father of Wisconsin, and the establish-
ment of Indiana territory, of which Wisconsin was a part, being
included in St. Clair County. Charles de Langlade was one of
the most able of the partisans employed by the British to com-
66 77///E /AV/)/A A' AAV/) 7///E AWOA 7// IP/ES 7.
mand their Indian allies. His history reads like a romance. He
and his father, Augustin de Langlade, were the first settlers at
Green Bay, going there about the middle of the eighteenth
century. Both lived there until their death. As already set
forth, while the future Wisconsin was nominally under the control
of the United States and the inhabitants amenable to the
orders of General William Henry Harrison, -
the governor of the territory of Indiana, -
they gave themselves little trouble about
that. The few French creoles and half-
breeds in the territory went on in their usual
happy, pleasure-loving life, paying little
attention to the power over them. If they
thought of it at all, they looked to the
Canadian Government as the supreme
authority, expecting that the whole country
would soon return to English allegiance,
a belief that was carefully fostered by the
English authorities and their Indian agents,
On the other hand, the general govern-
ment gave the people of La Baye and
beyond little attention. It is true that in
1804 General Harrison, by treaty with the
Sacs and Foxes, extinguished their title to lands in Wisconsin ;
but this was at St. Louis, and too far away to interest the
traders. The only thing that showed a supervising power on
the part of the territorial government was the appointment of
Charles Reaume justice of the peace for that section ; but, then,
Judge Reaume had held a similar position from King George,
and the distinction was too fine for the illiterate minds of the
engages and voyageurs. Of this same justice many readable
stories are told. Off on the border, beyond the pale of civiliza.
tion, he administered the law according to his own ideas of
justice and the forms of Paris which had been in vogue since the
time of the French possession. Whether the judge had ever
looked inside a law book is doubtful. If so, he never intimated
anything of the kind, nor did his decisions show an acquaintance
with the precepts of Blackstone or Kent. Several of his de-
cisions have been recorded in the traditions of the Bay. In one
case which was brought before him, after listening to the testi-
mony on both sides, Judge Reaume delivered his decision as
follows:
“You are both wrong. You,” pointing to the plaintiff,
“bring me a load of wood ; you,” pointing to the defendant,
“bring me a load of hay ; the case is dismissed.”
CLAY STATUE.
7///E J174 AE A/A A/. 67
On another occasion one of the traders was sued by a half-
breed girl. After hearing both sides, the judge decided that
the defendant should give the plaintiff a calico dress and buy
two dresses for the child. The costs were to be paid by the
constable splitting 1,000 rails for the court. When the constable
entered an earnest protest, the court cut him short ; but finally
agreed to board the unfortunate official during the period of
rail-splitting. The court seal was the judge's jack knife, which
the constable took with him as a warrant of arrest whenever
he went after a prisoner. Curious as they were, Judge Reaume's
decisions stood among the simple people over whom he ruled
and even later, when the first advance guard of settlers began
to come in. It was many weeks' travel by trail or river to the
capital of the territory, and the costs of an appeal were too
great to be thought of, especially as the amounts involved were
usually small.
There was nothing to disturb the placid pool of existence in
the territory until the century was eleven years old, when
Tecumseh's war disturbed the tribes. That wily chief endeav-
ored to have the Wisconsin Indians make common cause with
him against the whites; but, through the influence of Tomah, the
Menomini were held fast, and few of the other Wisconsin
Indians took part in the war that ended so disastrously for the
leader. Two events worthy of notice had preceded this by a
year or two. Illinois territory was created and Wisconsin made
a part of it. In 1809 the party of explorers sent out by John
Jacob Astor, under the leadership of William P. Hunt and
Ramsey Crooks, passed through the territory on their way to the
Pacific coast. They used the old water-way up the lakes and
Fox River and down the Wisconsin, which had been the princi-
pal highway of travel since the days of the first French explorers.
In 1763, by the treaty of Versailles, France ceded Minne-
Sota east of the Mississippi to England and west of it to Spain.
Captain Jonathan Carver visited Saint Anthony Falls three
years later and explored the Minnesota. He also located the
present site of the City of St. Paul and found a settlement of 3oo
whites at Prairie du Chien. The ordinance of 1787 brought
all of Minnesota under the control of the United States, and
by 1798 the Northwestern Fur Company had established itself in
the State. The territory that now comprises the State remained
for a long while a part of the State of Michigan and afterwards
was a part of the State of Wisconsin.
It was not until after the Fort Dearborn massacre of 1812,
though, that the particular attention of would-be settlers in the
Northwest was called to that portion of it now known as Iowa,
7///E I/AA’ MAAV. 69
Nebraska, Minnesota, and the two Dakotas. Illinois and
Wisconsin furnished the conspicuous Indian history of the sev-
enteenth and eighteenth centuries. But the Indian history of the
nineteenth century has been made largely within the confines
of the Dakotas, Minnesota and Nebraska. Iowa, although hav-
ing at one time a considerable number of Indians within its
area, was in a manner always neutral ground and escaped many
of the worst results of the contact of the whites with the
aboriginals. The Fort Dearborn massacre took place at Chi-
cago on the 15th of August, 1812. The Indians gave General
Anthony Wayne the name of “The Tempest.” He it was
whose efforts secured the land on the present site of Chicago,
where Fort Dearborn was finally built, and where Fort Miami
had stood under French control in 1718. Fort Dearborn, itself,
was established in 1803 and a company of United States soldiers
stationed there. The fort was named after General Henry
Dearborn, at that time Secretary of War. The fort stood on the
south side of the Chicago River, at the bend where the river
turned to enter the lake. It was equipped with three pieces of
light artillery. Captain Nathan Heald was the commandant of
it in 1812. The Pottawattomi were the Indians then in con-
trol of the country. The war which the United States was wag-
ing with England and a religious revival in progress among the
Indians served just then to bring on signs of discontent.
The great chiefs saw with alarm the continual encroachments
of the whites and their demands for more lands. As early as
1806, Tecumseh and his brother, the Prophet, had sought, with
considerable success, to unite all the Indians in one great Con-
federacy to withstand the whites. War followed, although the
Pottawattomi did not join with the other tribes at first. John
Kinsey and the officers at Fort Dearborn did much to keep
Black Partridge, Winnemeg, Topenebe, and other leading Wis-
consin and Illinois chiefs friendly. Two years prior to the
famous massacre the Pottawattomi, Chippewas, and Ottawas
held a council, at which the last two named tribes decided to
join the confederacy against the whites. The younger warriors
of the Pottawattomi desired to do so themselves, but the older
chiefs held them back. All the Indians were largely under
British influence, and visited Malden, Canada, every year to re-
ceive British presents. The battle of Tippecanoe was fought
in 1811, and the Indian confederacy would have dissolved
at that time but for British influence. This influence brought
matters to that point that the Indians surrounded Fort Dearborn
to massacre the settlers. The Winnebagoes came into the
neighborhood of the fort and committed a number of depreda-
Lake ºf th
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Boundaries of Unceded Indian Lands thus:
Indian Reservations thus:
THE NORTHWEST IN 1861.
Part of the Chicago & North-Western Railway
built up to 1861 shown thus:-
7///E IVA A' A/A AV. 7 I
tions. On the 9th of August, 1812, Fort Dearborn learned of
the British success at Mackinac, and orders came to Captain
Heald to evacuate the fort and retreat to Detroit. There were
but fifty-four privates in the fort of the regular army; twelve
militia men and two minor officers. With them were a dozen
women and twenty children. On the 14th, Chief Winnemeg
called on Captain Heald and said :
“Father, I come to deliver up the medal I wear. It was
given me by the Americans, and I have long worn it in token
of our mutual friendship. But our young men are resolved
to imbrue their hands in the blood of the whites. I cannot re-
strain them, and I will not wear a token of peace while I am
compelled to act as an enemy.”
On the morning of the 15th of August the retreat from the
fort commenced. The soldiers marched out to the strains of
music, and by some strange and weird choice of the band-
master, who was among the killed, the “Dead March " was
played as the soldiers advanced to the open sands of what is
now State Street, Chicago. A quarter of a mile from the fort
was a sand bank, or range of sand hills, separating Lake Michi-
gan from the prairie. Back of this were in hiding some 500
Pottawattomi. The little band was permitted to march in
front of these banks about a mile and a half, or to where the
residence of the late George M. Pullman stands, on Prairie
Avenue, and there the Indians opened fire. The Officers, men
and even the women fought for their lives; but it was soon
over. A few wounded men were left to make a last stand when
Chief Black Bird advanced and promised to spare their lives if
they would surrender. They did so. There survived this
massacre twenty-five non-commissioned officers and privates
and eleven women and children. The Indian loss was fifteen.
A Mrs. Helm was saved by Black Partridge, who conducted
her to a place of safety. The day following the massacre
the Indians burned the fort and agency building. The same
day that Fort Dearborn was burned General Hull Surrendered
Detroit to the British.
The probabilities are that nothing whatever could have saved
the ill-fated Fort Dearborn garrison. War was declared, the
Indians were aroused and allied with the British. Certain ones
had friends with the Americans, and did what could be done to
save individuals, but they had no friendship for the United
States. Fort Dearborn was rebuilt in 1816 and under the Ameri-
can flag. This same year of 1816 the Ottawas and Chippewas
ceded to the United States the land surrounding the head of
Lake Michigan, ten miles north and ten miles south, to the mouth
72 7///, /v/)/AA AMD 7///; vok 7//IVES 7.
of the Chicago River and back to the Kankakee, Illinois and
Fox rivers. The frontier line at this time moved southwest to the
Mississippi, and a garrison was only maintained at the fort until
1823. At the time of the Black Hawk War, in 1832, it was again
regarrisoned, and General Scott landed there with troops on the
8th of July of that year. The troops were permanently with-
drawn from the fort, and it ceased to be on December 29th, 1836,
one year before Chicago's incorporation.
But two years after the first location of Fort Dearborn an-
other fort — Fort Snelling at St. Paul — was located in the
Northwest, destined to be equally famous in determining the
final destiny of the Indian tribes.
General Zebulon M. Pike came
to the junction of the Minne-
sota and Mississippi rivers, at
what is now Mendota, in 1805,
and there concluded a treaty of
peace with the Indians, by which
they ceded to him much land.
He met the Sioux in council, and
he was authorized by the gen-
eral government to purchase
lands for government forts.
Curious, indeed, is the speech
which he made to the Sioux at
the old site of Mendota. He
said :
“Brothers : – You Old men
probably know that about thirty
years ago we were subject to
FORT DEARBORN MONUMENT. the King of England, and gov-
erned by his laws. But he, not
treating us as children, we refused to acknowledge him as father.
After ten years of war, in which he lost roo, ooo men, he acknowl-
edged us as a free and independent nation. They knew that
not many years since we received Detroit, Michilmackinac, and
all the ports on the lakes from the English, and now, but the
Other day, Louisiana from the Spanish ; so that we put one foot
on the Sea at the east and the other on the sea at the west, and
of Once children are now men ; yet I think that the traders who
come from Canada are bad birds amongst the Chippewas and
instigate them to make war on their red brothers, the Sioux, in
Order to prevent our traders from going high up the Mississippi.
This I shall inquire into, and so warn those persons of their ill
conduct.
7///E WAAC MAAV. 73
“Brothers, I expect that you will give orders to all your
young warriors to respect my flag and protection, which I may
send to the Chippewa chief, who may come down with me in
the spring ; for was a dog to run to my lodge for safety, his
enemy must walk over me to hurt him. -
“Brothers, I am told that the traders have a habit of selling
rum to you. All of you in your right senses must know that
this is injurious and occasions quarrels, murders, etc., amongst
yourselves. For this reason your father has thought proper
to prohibit the traders from selling you rum.
“Brothers, I now present you with some of your father's
tobacco, and some other trifling things, as a memorandum of my
good will, and before my departure I will give you some liquor
to clear your throats.”
At this conference the Sioux granted to the United States a
tract nine miles square at the mouth of the St. Croix River and
a similar tract at the mouth of the Minnesota, lying on both
sides of the Mississippi and including the Falls of St. Anthony.
They gave the land required, about 1oo,ooo acres, for $200 and
sixty gallons of liquor. It is curious to know that at this time
the surveying of public lands was going on under a device first
proposed by General Rufus Putnam to President Washington,
and which still is in vogue. General Putnam in the last year
of the eighteenth century proposed divisions of the public lands
into townships six miles square, to be marked by township and
range lines. Under the same law by which the lands were
subdivided and opened to the public, one section, number six-
teen, in every township was reserved from sale for the support of
common schools.
Following the Fort Dearborn massacre, in the history of
Indian warfare, came the Black Hawk War of 1832. Black
Hawk did not begin the war. He was a chief in 1831, with his
home near Rock Island, where he owned farms and cabins.
From there he was accustomed to go away on hunting expedi-
tions. After one of these hunts, in the summer of that year, he
found his cabins had been taken possession of by the whites
and his crops destroyed. He determined to take back his prop-
erty to himself and tribe. He endeavored to do so, but Goy-
ernor Reynolds, of Illinois, became alarmed, thought an Indian
outbreak was at hand and called for volunteers. He SOOn was
able to send 2,000 militia men to Black Hawk's territory. The
chief retreated to the west bank of the Mississippi River, where
a council was held with him at which he relinquished all claims
to lands or rights on the Illinois side of the Mississippi. The
winter which came afterwards was severe, and in the Spring
74 7T///E /AV/)/AAV AAV/D 7"Aſ/E AWOA 7"Aſ IV/2.S 7.
Black Hawk and his people sought game in the northwest section
of Illinois. It was forbidden territory, but there is ample evi-
dence that he did not know this. It can never be made to
appear that he came with hostile intent toward the settlers. But
an alarm was given that Black Hawk was moving and this
spread through Southern Wisconsin, Northern Illinois, and from
Chicago into Indiana and Michigan. Rumor had it that Black
Hawk was tampering with the Chippewas, and the Pottawat-
tomi, and that there was danger of a general Indian uprising to
make more or less war on the whites. All this time Black
Hawk was on a hunt for small game and fur animals in the woods
of Winnebago County, near the site of the present village of
Durand. There happened to be State troops in that county in
command of Major Stillman, who was more reckless than pru-
dent. In moving his troops about the country near Rock River
he came upon a portion of Black Hawk's band, who displayed
the white flag. Nevertheless he attacked them and was defeated.
There was a small creek at the spot and there a considerable
portion of the command was killed. Major Stillman fled with
a part of his troops. Captain Adams, in charge of one of the
companies, stood his ground, crying :
“Men, for your wives and children's sake, for your country's
sake, and for God's sake, stop and fight.”
All was in vain. The panic-stricken soldiers, save those that
were killed, never stopped until they reached Dixon. Cap-
tain Adams took his stand by a sycamore tree and, deserted and
alone, killed seven of Black Hawk's warriors before he was
shot down. Black Hawk always claimed that he had but forty
or fifty braves in the fight. The battle took place on what
was then called Sycamore or Old Man's Creek, lying in Stillman's
Valley. The result of this engagement made necessary the
rout of Black Hawk and his band. Galena believed that it
was threatened by Black Hawk, Chicago felt in danger, so did
Dixon. Government troops were ordered from Sackett's Harbor
and also from Fort Gratiot. General Winfield Scott was placed
in command. Volunteer troops came from Southern Michigan.
The volunteers were first located at Fort Dearborn. General
Scott had cholera in his command and was located on a camp-
ing ground on the present site of Riverside, a suburb of Chicago.
Dixon's Ferry, now Dixon, and originally known as O'Gee,
was another important rendezvous of the troops.
A military company was recruited in Chicago, which pro-
ceeded to Naperville, thence to Plainfield, and thence to a point
on Indian Creek near Ottawa, where it found fifteen white set-
tlers murdered and all their property destroyed by the Indians.
7///E I/AA’ Al/.4 AV. 75
Meanwhile volunteers, commanded by General Dodge and
assisted by Colonel Zachary Taylor, also regular soldiers under
General Scott, met Black Hawk's band at Wisconsin Heights,
July 22, 1832, and defeated him. The decisive battle of the war
was fought at Bad Ax, near the mouth of the Bad Ax River
in Wisconsin, August 2, 1832, in which the Indians were de-
feated and Black Hawk surrendered. Among those who met at
Dixon's Ferry during the Black Hawk war were General Win-
field Scott, Colonel Zachary Taylor, Lieutenant Robert Ander-
son, hero of Fort Sumter, Lieutenant Jefferson Davis, and
private Abraham Lincoln. It was not much of an Indian out-
break at the best, but it served to check settlements and to
retard the natural growth of the Northwest for at least a decade.
During that period, Chicago and Milwaukee took definite form
and became ports of entry of considerable importance ; but
at that time, and for a considerable period afterwards, St. Louis
was the only city west of the Ohio that was entitled to metro-
politan airs. The others were but rude villages and trading
places, where silently but surely the foundations of a greater
and better era were being laid.
76 77///E /AV/9/AAV AAV/D 7///E AWOA 7// IP/ES 7.
THE THIRD EPOCH. THE WHITE MAN.
For the fires grow cold and the dances fail,
And the songs of their echoes die ;
And what have we left but the graves beneath,
And above the waiting sky?
The song of the Ancient Peop/e.
HE real motive for the building of the Northwest,
the cause proper that led to its final making, is to
be found in the national movement or spirit that
swept over the New England and Atlantic States
between 1820 and 1860. The revolution of 1776
“Twº- ºr "Tº did not leave the people of the thirteen colonies, if
we are to believe history, with a strong national spirit. They
were poor, divided as to the form of government best needed,
harassed by traitors at home and enemies abroad. The war of
1812 did more to fuse in them the national idea than the conflict
of 1776 ; and when, at the opening of 1820, an era of national
prosperity dawned, the thought grew and swelled that the thir-
teen colonies were but stepping stones to the possession of a
territory so immense in its bounds that monarchies of Europe
would seem as playgrounds beside it.
Fur traders, generals sent to the western borders with troops,
brought back to the struggling settlements in New York and
the New England States tales of a land where the forests were
miles in width ; where streams abounded on every hand ; where
the soil was rich with one turning of the furrow ; where there
might be found that liberty of action and mind already missed
in the first settlements of the republic. Men were shaking off
traditions of the past ; the spirit of adventure was strong ; the
sense of possession great. Thinkers from every state of Europe,
sick of old conditions, were visiting the new world and urging
men to build. In the West, the boundless prairies, the crowding
forests, the many streams, were inviting the presence of the
white man, were bidding adieu to the savage.
A railroad was to give the coup de grace to all Indian pre-
tensions in the Northwest ; to end the days of aboriginal rule
and disturbance ; to make the white man supreme, when Tecum-
seh, Pontiac, and Little Crow had hoped to humble him forever.
True, the red man protested in the massacre at New Ulm, at
the fall of Custer, at Wounded Knee ; but these were no more
RED CLOUD.
78 77///E /AV/D/A AV AAV/) /º///º AWOA' 7"// J///E.S 7.
than episodes — last resistance of the conquered. The steam-
boat made some show on the Upper Mississippi prior to the
Black Hawk War. Canal digging was favored in Illinois for a
few years, as a means of developing commerce; and the Illinois
and Michigan Canal, now a mere ditch, was actually dug at a
cost of millions. But the railroad overwhelmed both steamboat
and canal, pierced the wilderness of the Northwest at seemingly
a bound, and gave to the world an unsurpassed granary.
The territory occupied by the Indians, January 16, 1836,
when the Galena & Chicago Union Railroad (now the Chicago
& North-Western) was incorporated, comprised nearly all of
Nebraska, nearly all of Iowa, none of Illinois, most of Minne-
sota, a part of Wisconsin. Treaties just before that date, and
others following close afterwards, surrendered immense acreage
to settlers. In Wisconsin, prior to the Black Hawk War,
Prairie du Chien was a prominent headquarters for the Indians.
The Winnebagoes at that time were the prevailing tribe in the
territory, and on the lands held by them were the Illinois
and Wisconsin lead mines. The Ottawas occupied the country
along the Rock River and southward to Rock Island and west
to Prairie du Chien. The Winnebagoes were on the Mississippi,
the Upper Iowa, the Black River, the Wisconsin, the Rock
River, and claimed the whole of Winnebago Lake. The lead
miners trespassed upon the property of the Winnebagoes and
this led to reprisals. The Sioux chief Wazwekootee, or “He
That Shoots in the Pine Tops,” encouraged the Winnebagoes
to make frequent attacks upon the settlers in the Wisconsin
territory, and these continued for some time after the Black
Hawk War. Red Bird was the great chief of the Winnebagoes,
whose outbreak against the incursions of unscrupulous miners
led to much trouble. He eventually voluntarily surrendered
himself to the soldiers. Dressed in his Yankton uniform of
white unsoiled skins, with a fine white dressed skin robe cast
loosely about his shoulders, and mounted on a mettlesome horse,
with a white flag in his hand, he came into the camp of the
troops sent against him and gave himself up. The Menomini
were at Kaukauna Rapids then, and another large village of the
same tribe commanded by Oshkosh was at Butte des Morts.
Major David E. Twiggs, afterwards famous in the Civil War,
established a garrison at Fort Winnebago, in which he placed
three companies of soldiers. Jefferson Davis, just graduated
from West Point, was one of his lieutenants. Major Twiggs even
at that time bore a hard reputation. One of his privates, ex-
asperated by brutal treatment, had attempted to take his life on
account of abuse received and was put in irons for the offense.
7//Z W///7Z A/AA. 79
The close of the Black Hawk War had resulted in the final
extinguishment of the title of the Sac and Fox Indians to all
their lands east of the Mississippi. September 15, 1832, a treaty
was concluded at Fort Armstrong, whereby the Winnebago na-
tion ceded all their lands to the United States lying south and
east of the Wisconsin River and the Fox River of Green Bay.
The Chippewas, Ottawas, and Pottawattomi still held their title
to the land of Northeastern Illinois and Southern Wisconsin,
besides large tracts not very definitely defined in Indiana and
Michigan. It was necessary, in order to open up to civilization
the lands ceded by the other tribes lying west and northwest,
that the Indian title to this vast tract of land lying along the
western shore of Lake Michigan should be extinguished. For
Chicago, it was a vital necessity, as the town was girt on all sides
and for many miles north and west by the lands of the United
Nation of Chippewa, Ottawa, and Pottawattomi Indians.
In September, 1833, a grand council of the chiefs and head
men was called to meet at Chicago to negotiate a treaty whereby
the lands might be peaceably ceded, and the Indians removed
therefrom, to make way for the tide of white emigration which
had begun to set irresistibly and with ever-increasing volume
to the coveted region. It was a most important matter for both
the Indians and the Government; but to the former most
momentous, since it involved the extinction of not only their
title to the land which had been their home during a period
which only their traditions could dimly measure, but the Ob-
literation of all associations dear to them in their tribal or
family relations. Black Hawk's ill-starred campaign, followed
by the subsequent treaty made by his tribe, showed them the
inevitable result which must follow resistance. They knew quite
well that they had no alternative. They must sell their lands
for such sum and on such terms as the Government agents might
deem it politic or just or generous to grant. The result of the
treaty was what might have been expected. The Indians gave
up their lands and agreed for certain considerations, the most of
which did not redound to their profit, to cede all their lands to
the Government, and to leave forever their homes and the graves
of their fathers for a land far toward the setting Sun, which they
had never seen and of which they knew nothing.
The treaty consummated at this time was signed on Septem-
ber 26, 1833, and ratified by the Senate, after some unimportant
changes, May 22, 1834. Its provisions and terms were as follows:
Article I ceded to the United States all the lands of the
United Nation of Chippewa, Ottawa, and Pottawattomi Indians
“ along the western shore of Lake Michigan, and between this
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HE M-N. Co-Buffalo, N.Y.
Boundaries of Unceded Indian Lands thus : – THE NORTHWEST IN 1870. Part of the Chicago & North-Western Railway
Indian Reservations thus : [T] built up to 1870 shown thus:
Indian Battles thus;x
7/// iſº///7/, /AM. 8 I
lake and the land ceded to the United States by the Winnebago
Nation, at the treaty of Fort Armstrong, made on the 15th day
of September, 1832 ; bounded on the north by the country lately
ceded by the Menomini, and on the south by the country ceded
at the treaty of Prairie du Chien, made on the 29th of July,
1829, supposed to contain five millions of acres.” This cession
completely extinguished all the title to lands owned or claimed
by the United Nation east of the Mississippi, and left the whole
Northwest, with the exception of some reservations, open to
the settlement of whites, who, henceforth, could look to the
United States to protect them under its laws in any legal title
they might acquire by pre-
émption or purchase.
The treaty was consum-
mated – the Indian title
to lands in Illinois was ex-
tinguished. After two
more annual payments to
the Pottawattomi, who
lingered in Wisconsin, the
tribes disappeared from
the region, and with them
went many of the earlier
settlers who had intermar-
ried and thus become
identified with them. The
Bourassas, Laframboise,
Madore B. Beaubien, the
Bourbonnais, the Miran-
deaus (all but Victoire —
Mrs. Porthier), some of
the Clark Indian children,
a part of the Juneau
family – in fact, nearly all
the half-breed families moved west with the Indians with whom
they had become allied ; and their descendants are to-day
leaders in the tribe in the Indian Territory and Kansas, Or,
having severed their tribal relations, have become leading
citizens of Kansas. -
The Pottawattomi signing the land transfer were granted a
reservation which was then a part of the Indian Territory,
but which, by the “Platte Purchase” of 1836, became the north-
western portion of Missouri. In the summer of 1835 the Pot-
tawattomi came for the last time to Chicago to receive their
annuities, and to start thence for their western reservation.
INDIAN FLAG,
82 Z"///E /AV/9/4AW AAV/) / ///E AWOA' 7"// IPA.S 7.
The total number that assembled was about 5,000. While in
the town of Chicago, at that time, the Indians performed their
war-dance as a sort of farewell to their old home and their re-
maining friends among the whites. They were removed by the
Government, under charge of the late Captain J. B. F. Russell,
to the reservation assigned them, now in Northwestern Missouri,
and about two years later again removed to the present site
of Council Bluffs, Iowa. In 1837, the Pottawattomi of Indiana
were removed to a tract on the Osage River, now in Miami
County, Kansas. In 1848, the several bands disposed of their
lands in Iowa and on the Osage for the sum of $850,000 and
removed to another reservation on the Kansas River, where they
were joined, in 1850, by the remnant still remaining in Mich-
igan. In their western home, as here, they were divided into
the Pottawattomi of the Woods, the Mission band (who were
generally Catholics, docile and easily civilized), and the wild
Prairie band.
The first railroad chartered out of Chicago and into the
Northwest, upon which work was immediately commenced, and
which afterward became an important section of the great North-
Western system, was the Galena & Chicago Union Railroad,
which was chartered January 16, 1836. The document was pre-
pared by Ebenezer Peck and T. W. Smith, with the object of
increasing the value of real estate at both points; but Galena,
being then the leading village of the West, obtained precedence
in the naming of the road. The capital stock was placed at
$1oo, ooo, but could be increased to $1,000,ooo, and the incor-
porators were given the choice of operating the road by animal
or steam power. They were allowed three years from January
16, 1836, in which to begin work. E. D. Taylor, Jesse B.
Thomas, Jr., J. C. Goodhue, Peter Temple, William Bennett,
Thomas Drummond, and J. W. Turner were named as commis-
sioners to receive subscriptions. The survey of the land was
begun in February, 1837, by Engineer James Seymour with his
assistants, from the foot of North Dearborn Street, Chicago, and
ran due west to the Des Plaines River. In June, 1837, survey-
ors and laborers were discharged. In 1838, work was resumed,
piles being driven along the line of Madison Street and string-
ers placed upon them. These operations were continued
under the direction of E. K. Hubbard until the collapse of the
enterprise during the same year. The ambition of Chicago was
evidently a little ahead of her means, and the Galena & Chi-
cago Union had to wait ten years before it was fairly placed
upon a successful basis.
Up to the latter part of 1837 the only railroad in the North-
77///º JPA//7”/2 MAAV. 83
west which had been made a success was the “Coal Mine Bluff
Railroad,” built by Ex-Governor Reynolds, of Illinois, and
friends, and extending from his coal fields, six miles from the
Mississippi River, to East St. Louis. Among other difficulties
overcome by the energetic young men was the bridging of a
lake over 2,000 feet across. The road was working without iron
and with horse-power ; was regularly chartered in 1841, and
long afterward became known as the “Illinois & St. Louis
Railroad.” Governor Reynolds' railroad is claimed to be the
first one actually constructed in the Mississippi Valley, and,
under the circumstances, he appropriately asserts “that it was
the greatest work or enterprise ever performed in Illinois. But,”
he adds, “it wellnigh broke us all.” And the experience of
these pioneers with that little six-mile section of road was the
experience of hundreds of other would-be railroad builders, who
made more ambitious attempts within the next dozen of years.
Upon the suspension of operations on the Galena & Chicago
Union Railroad, the people of the Rock River country made
several attempts to avail themselves of Chicago's increasing
commercial importance. First a plank road was urged to be
built from Chicago to the Rock River at a cost of over $300,ooo.
Next, in 1843, a survey was made between Joliet and Aurora
for a canal to connect the Fox River with the Illinois and Michi-
gan Canal; and the suggestion was favorably received, that
it would be a plausible undertaking to extend the improvements
to Rockford. But these schemes were abandoned, and in
1846 the Galena & Chicago Union was revived by the convention
held at Rockford in January of that year. Delegates, to the
number of 319, attended from all the counties on the proposed
line between Galena and Chicago. The officers selected were :
Zºreside/- Thomas Drummond, of Jo Daviess.
l/ice Presidents.-William H. Brown, of Cook ; Joel Walker,
of Boone; Spooner Ruggles, of Ogle ; Elijah Wilcox, of Kane.
Secretaries.— T. D. Robertson, of Winnebago ; J. B. F. Rus-
sell, of Cook ; S. P. Hyde, of McHenry.
A resolution was adopted, that the members of the conven-
tion obtain subscriptions to the stock of the company, if satis-
factory arrangements could be made with its holders; and
resolutions were also passed, presented by J. Young Scammon,
showing the necessity of a general subscription to the stock
by farmers along the proposed route. Galena and Chicago vied
with each other in the renewed enthusiasm with which the
enterprise was taken up. But about this time Messrs. Town-
send and Mather offered the improvements, land and charter of
the road to Chicago citizens for $20,000. The offer was ac-
CHIEF OSHKOSH.
7A/AE WA//7′E MAAV. 85
cepted under the following conditions: The payment of the
entire sum in full-paid stock of the company, $10,000, imme-
diately after the organization of the board of directors, and
$10,000 on the completion of the road to Rock River, or as soon
as a dividend of six per cent, would be earned. On December
15, 1846, the persons named above subscribed toward the
expenses of a survey, and had one made during the succeed-
ing year by Richard P. Morgan.
Subscription books were opened at settlements along the pro-
posed line of the Galena & Chicago Union. August 10, 1847,
William B. Ogden and J. Young Scammon solicited subscrip-
tions in the city, but could only obtain promises for $20,000
from all the real estate men or others particularly interested.
Some merchants opposed the scheme, fearing it would take
the sale of goods from Chicago to points on the line of the road.
Up to April 1, 1848, 1,206 subscribers guaranteed $351,8oo, on
which sum payments amounting to $20,817.68 were made up
to that date. Outside the city there was scarcely any money,
and the payment for subscriptions beyond the first installment of
two and one-half per cent. had to depend upon future crops.
The people subscribed as liberally as their limited means would
permit, and succeeded in raising a fair amount. Railroad
meetings were not frequent in those days, the settlers residing
So far apart that they could not assemble on short notice, and
those interested in placing the stock were obliged to travel
the country to secure its taking. In many settlements the resi-
dents were found willing to coöperate, the ladies vieing with
the men in their readiness to render assistance. They appreci-
ated how necessary it was to have the road built, and were pre-
pared to make any personal sacrifice to further the undertaking.
Many of them helped to pay for the stock subscribed for at
their solicitation from the profits derived from the sale of butter,
cheese and other household productions, even depriving them-
selves of the means required to educate their children, that a
railroad might be built for the good of that and future genera-
t1OnS.
The early canvassing along the proposed line of the Galena &
Chicago Union Railroad for subscriptions for building the
road was made by Messrs. Ogden and Scammon, who traveled
the whole distance from Chicago to Galena for this purpose,
holding meetings and obtaining subscriptions at all considerable
places on the route. Subsequently, Charles Walker, Isaac N.
Arnold, John Locke Scripps, John B. Turner, and others
canvassed at points on the line of the road. B. W. Raymond
and John B. Turner visited the East in 1848 with the object
86 7"AAA /AV/D/AAV AAV/D 77/7/2 AVOA’ 7"// W/2.S. 7". .
of securing subscriptions to the stock. Their efforts resulted in
the sale of $15,000 of stock and a loan of $7,000. This money
completed the road across the marsh to the foot of Cottage
Hill (Elmhurst). They then purchased two locomotives from
the Baldwin Works. In the meantime Mr. Ogden, then a mem-
ber of the Chicago Common Council, had introduced an ordi-
nance into that body, which was voted down, proposing to
grant the right of way to the road from the west into the city
on a line with Kinzie Street, with the necessary privileges for
constructing tracks, drawbridges and depots. Notwithstanding
which, the contract for the first thirty-two miles of road from
Chicago was let March 1, 1848, the first sixteen miles to be
finished by August 1st, and the balance by October 1, 1848. John
Van Nortwick had been appointed engineer. George W.
Waite, assistant engineer, drove the first grade-peg near the
corner of Kinzie and Halsted streets in June, 1848, then a
point outside the city limits. The Council had refused the
entrance of the road into the city; but granted leave to build a
temporary track east to the river, so that one of the two engines
could be brought to the head of the road.
In September, the management purchased a locomotive of the
Tonawanda (N. Y.) Company, and also one of the Auburn &
Syracuse Company. These were fitted up with new gearing
and boilers, and the first one was placed on the section between
Chicago and the Des Plaines River in November. The
“Pioneer” arrived on the brig “ Buffalo,” October 10, 1848.
The engine was taken off the boat on Sunday by Redmond
Prindiville, Wells Lake, George W. Waite, George C. Morgan,
and John Ebert, the engineer. This engine was sold by the
Baldwin Company on commission for the Rochester & Tona-
wanda Railroad Company. It served its purpose well, and
is in existence to-day, being among the interesting exhibits of
Chicago's great Field Columbian Museum.
When the Des Plaines River division was in working order,
the rolling stock consisted of six old freight cars and the
“Pioneer.” By November 21st the engine was running daily
on the ten miles of completed road west of Chicago, conveying
materials and laborers to carry on the work. The day previous,
Chicago received the first wheat ever transported by rail.
Upon the invitation of the board of directors, a number of
stockholders and editors of the city took a “flying trip" over
Chicago's system of railways, then extending ten miles west
of the Chicago River. A couple of baggage wagons had
been provided with seats, and at about four o'clock P. M. the
train, bearing away about Ioo persons, moved from the foot
Egºis
SITTING BULL.
88 7:///, /Ai/)/AA AA/) 7:///, wok 7://///es/
of North Dearborn Street, where a crowd had collected to wit-
ness the novel spectacle. On the return trip a load of wheat
was transferred from a farmer's wagon to one of the cars, and
this was the first grain transported by rail to Chicago. This
fact soon became known to the farmers living west of the city,
and the company made arrangements to accommodate the
expected increase of their business. They at once placed
covered cars upon the track, and about a week after the line
was open to travel the business men of Chicago were elec-
trified by the announcement that over thirty loads of wheat
were at the Des Plaines River waiting to be transported to the
city. The expected receipts of the road would amount to
$15 per day for the winter, and wheat buyers were informed
(partly with a view of increasing the passenger traffic) that they
must now take their stations at the Des Plaines River instead
of at Randolph Street bridge. Facts and statistics were pouring
in from Galena, also, showing the benefits that would accrue
when the line should reach that flourishing city. For instance,
in January, 1849, the public were informed that the arrivals
in Galena from March 17 to December 6, 1848, were : Keel-
boats, 158; flat-boats, Io'7; that the revenue was $1,950, and
the value of the exports for 1848 was $1,602,050.40. Further-
more, that “a large portion of these will seek an Eastern market
by railroad.” The citizens of Galena were shoulder to shoulder
with Chicago in the building of this road, but rumors were soon
afloat that there was a disposition in certain quarters to cut off
that thriving town from the benefits of the road which she
was doing so much to build. To allay these suspicions, at the
annual meeting held April 5, 1849, the stockholders resolved
that Galena was the true terminus of the road, and that “any
diversion would be a violation of good faith, a fraud on the
stockholders, and an illegal perversion of the charter.” Of the
$150,000 loan, authorized in May, 1848, to be negotiated,
$71,700 had then been expended.
Henry W. Clarke, DeWitt Lane, later of Lane's Island, and
Major James Mulford, were the commissioners appointed to
procure the right of way for the Galena & Chicago Union Rail-
road, and to assess damages within Cook County. This work
was undertaken in March, 1849. The commissioners were
accompanied by William B. Ogden, John B. Turner, John Van
Nortwick, engineer, James H. Rees, “Ogden's own surveyor,”
and a few others. When the party reached Oak Park, then called
Oak Ridge, the commissioners agreed that the assessment of
damages for right of way should be merely nominal, and from
this agreement resulted the offer of six cents to each land owner
WOLF's POINT, CHICAGO, 1832. NEAR THE PRESENT SITE OF THE NORTH-WESTERN LINE
- CHICAGO PASSENGER STATION.
90 77///E /AV/D/A AV AAV/) 7"///E AWO/C 7// IPA.S. 7".
along the route. This offer was accepted without dissent, quit-
claim deeds were made to the company and the roadway was
secured.
The total earnings of the road from the commencement of
business in January, 1849, to December 1, 1849, were $23,763.74;
from December 1, 1849, to December 1, 1850, $104,359.62. By
January, 1850, the main line had been extended to Elgin, forty-
two miles west of Chicago, and Galena was still cut off from rail-
road communication ; her ambition finally was not to be realized
through the instrumentality of the road which she was helping
to build. Another rival for popular favor was reaching out its
giant arms to embrace, at least, the territory of a great State.
The superstructure of the road was completed to Elgin,
January 22, 1850, the length of the main track from the north
branch of the Chicago River to the western terminus being
42.44 miles, which, with side track of 1.88 miles, gave a road-
way of 44.32 miles. The amount expended on this superstructure
was $164,131.87. The stock of locomotives and cars, May 1,
1850, was as follows: One ten-ton locomotive (second hand),
six-wheeled, two drivers; three fifteen-ton locomotives (new,
Norris's), eight-wheeled, four drivers; thirteen double covered
freight cars ; sixteen double platform freight cars; three single
covered freight cars; six single platform freight cars; eleven
gravel repairing cars ; four hand cars ; two passenger cars
(new), one of fifty-six and one of sixty seats ; two passenger cars
(old) forty seats each ; two baggage and accommodation cars
of eight wheels each. -
The progress of the road from June, 1849, to April 30, 1850,
is shown in the following table :
1849. Miles. Total Receipts.
June, . . . . . . . IO . . . . . . $ 913.35
July, . . . . . . . I5 . . . . . . I,602.52
August, . . . . . I 8 . . . . . . 2,743. I3
September, . . . . . 20 . . . . . . 4,267.43
October, . . . . . . 22 . . . . . . 7, IO4.93
November, . . . . . 28 . . . . . . 5,899.48
December, . . . . . 33 . . . . . . 4,887.79
1850.
January, . . . . . . 37 . . . . . . 5, 195.48
February, . . . . . 42% . . . . . 5,029.47
March, . . . . . . 42% . . . . . 4,893.75
April, . . . . . . . 42% . . . . . 5,794.63
Total, . . . . . . . . . . . . 48,331.96
Expenses of operating, . . . . . . . I 8,519.82
Net earnings, . . . . . . . . . $29,812, 14
7///E IV///7/2 J/4 AV. 9I
The number of passengers carried over the road from June 1,
1849, to April 30, 1850, was 37,524.
The Sioux, in 1837, as if to open the pioneer land to this
pioneer railroad, ceded to the Government all their lands east
of the Mississippi River and all their islands in the said river.
The language of this treaty runs:
“All they owned east of the Mississippi and west of the fol-
lowing lines: Commencing at the Chippewa River, half a day's
march below the falls; from thence to Red Cedar River, im-
mediately below the falls ; thence to the St. Croix River, at a
point called the Standing Cedar, about a day's paddle in a canoe
above the lake at the mouth of that river ; thence passing be-
tween two lakes, called by the Chippewas Green Lakes,' and by
the Sioux, ‘The Lakes They Bury the Eagles in '; thence to the
Standing Cedar that the Sioux split ; thence to Rum River
Crossing, at the mouth of a small creek called Choking Creek,
a long day's march from the Mississippi; thence to a point of
woods that project into the prairie, half a day's march from
the Mississippi; thence in a straight line to the mouth of the
first river which enters the Mississippi at the east side above the
mouth of the Sac River (Watab River).”
This boundary line had been established in 1825 between
the Sioux and Chippewa Indians in council at Prairie du Chien.
What are now St. Paul, East Minneapolis, and Stillwater are
embraced within the above limits. In 1847, at Fond du Lac, the
Chippewas of the Mississippi and Lake Superior ceded to the
Government the country beginning at the junction of the Crow
Wing and Mississippi rivers; thence up the Crow River to its
junction with the Long Prairie River ; thence up the Long
Prairie River to the boundary line between the Sioux and Chip-
pe was ; thence south to a lake at the head of Long Prairie
River; thence to the sources of the Wautab River ; thence down
the river to its junction with the Mississippi; thence up the
Mississippi to the place of beginning. Another treaty made the
same year with a Pillager band of Indians gave the Govern.
ment important lakes on the Otter Tail Lake and the Crow Wing
and Leaf rivers. In 1851, still further marking the retreat of
the Sioux before the whites, a treaty was made at Traverse
des Sioux, now St. Peter, between the See-see-toan and the
Wah-pay-toan bands of Sioux. They ceded all their lands in
the State of Iowa to the Government. Also all their lands on
the Buffalo and Red rivers, the Sioux Wood River and the Sioux
River. The same year the Med-ay-wa-kan-toan and Wah-pay-
koo-jay bands of Sioux gave to the Government all of
their lands in the territory of Minnesota and State of Iowa.
92 Z"///E /AV/)/A W 4 AV/) /º///E AWO/C 7// IP/ES 7.
These last two treaties brought over to the Government, as well,
a large strip of Dakota territory and contained nearly one-half
of the present State of Minnesota. The Chippewas, in 1854,
ceded all of the country bordering upon Lake Superior in the
State of Minnesota, including iron and other mines. The City
of Duluth was included in this session.
The last treaty made with the Chippewas, for all lands
owned or claimed by them in Minnesota, bears date September
22, 1855. Reservations were set aside at the time of this sale for
the future homes of the different bands of the Chippewa and
Pillager Indians. A treaty of 1863 secured a second affirmation
from the Chippewas of the transfer of all their lands east of
the Red River of the north and within the State of Minnesota
to the Government. These treaties included all the lands within
the State of Minnesota originally owned by Indian tribes,
except the Red Lake reservation, which was disposed of in 1886.
The Galena Road, soon to become the Chicago & North-
Western, was now an established fact. The line west of the
Mississippi River was built from Clinton, Iowa, to Cedar Rapids,
in 1858. From Cedar Rapids westward twenty-seven miles
were completed in 1860, and extended from time to time, and
finally reached the Missouri River March 15, 1867. The Union
Pacific Railway was commenced (at Omaha) in 1864.
The development of 7%e AVorſ/- IVestern Zine may be followed
through a series of consolidations and numerous constructions,
under various corporate names and during a series of years,
until at this time it comprises 8,528 miles of high-standard railway
operating in the States of Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa,
Minnesota, South Dakota, North Dakota, Nebraska and Wyoming.
Its motto : The Best of Everything. Other railroads, sup-
ported by other financial interests, quickly followed in its wake
and extended their steel ways southward to St. Louis, westward
to Burlington, Dubuque, and Davenport, and northward to
Milwaukee. Iowa was tapped, the border land of Minnesota
was approached, and a great era of development inaugurated in
the years between 1850 and 1860. In this development the
Indians took little, if any, part. The first telegram ever received
in the Northwest was on January 15, 1848, from Milwaukee to
Chicago. The first through telegram from the East was received
at Chicago April 6, 1848. The first express service between
the Northwest and the East had been inaugurated in 1843. The
American Express Company did not enter the new territory until
1851. The United States Express Company was doing business
in 1857. The Mexican War of 1847, of course, somewhat
diverted attention from the Northwest, but not sufficiently to do
77///, ////// 7/5 A/4 AV. 93
it any particular harm. Illinois sent six regiments to this war.
In these regiments, fairly representative of the flower of young
manhood in the Northwest at that time, were Ulysses S. Grant,
Major-General John Pope, Richard J. Oglesby, and John A.
Logan. It is not out of place at this point to call attention to
the fact that Joseph Jefferson first came to the Northwest as an
actor in October, 1838; that Dan Marble was a popular favorite
at that time with James E. Murdoch, James H. McVicker,
Julia Dean, Edwin Forest, Junius Brutus Booth, Tom Thumb,
and Charles Thorne. Where Little Turtle had once commanded
thousands of braves, a playhouse arose and with it the tragedy
in acting and not in reality. In this same decade almost the
entire issue of currency in the Northwest used by the people
in all their transactions was carried by the late George Smith,
then a banker of Chicago, and the late Alexander Mitchell, of
Milwaukee. So great was the need of some circulating medium
that every man became himself a bank and issued tickets
inscribed, “Good for a Drink,” or “a Shave,” or “a Pound of
Tea.” After the issues of currency by Messrs. Smith and Mitchell
had ceased to be lawful, and before the passage of fair banking
laws by Congress, “wild cat" and “stump tail” flooded the
Northwest. Railroad building in Wisconsin dates from 1849;
but its lines were bankrupt and fragmentary ten years afterwards,
and suffered much until further opening for settlement of the
beautiful State gave them the support they needed. Iowa's
development dated from the crossing of the Mississippi by the
Illinois railroads. Minnesota's rapid growth did not commence
until after the suppression of the Sioux outbreak in 1862.
Nebraska awaited the opening of the Union Pacific Railroad, in
1866, for its first great awakening; and Dakota territory first
gained prominence on the arrival of the Winona & St. Peter
division of the Chicago & North-Western Railroad and the com-
pletion of the Northern Pacific.
In the summer of 1860, roving bands of Sioux appeared in
Southern Minnesota and Northern Iowa, committing depredations
upon settlers. Quite important settlements had sprung up
south of St. Paul along the Minnesota River, and these were
unguarded. The coming of the Civil War distracted the atten-
tion of the settlers from the discontent of the Indians, who
made too-well-founded claims that they had been mistreated by
Indian agents. The leader of the Sioux was Little Crow, and
one of his important chiefs Chaska. Their raids upon isolated
farmers continued through 1861 and down to the summer of 1862,
when they suddenly attacked in body the town of New Ulm,
massacred a large number of people and started to raid the Min-
94 7///E /AV/O/AAV AAV/O / ///E AWOA' 7"// ||V/E.S 7.
nesota Valley. A general alarm was not given until they had
killed between 200 and 3oo people, and then militia companies
were hastily organized and troops placed in the field.
Little
Crow led the Sioux in all principal attacks and massacres which
THE NEW ULM MONUMENT AND ITS INSCRIPTION.
The Sioux Indians, located at the Red Wood and
Yellow Medicine Agencies on the upper waters
of the Minnesota River, broke into open rebel-
lion on the 18th day of August, 1862. They mas-
sacred nearly all the whites in and about the
agencies. Under the leadership of the chief
Little Crow, they proceeded down the river
toward New Ulm, and on the 19th of August
entered the settlement of Milford, about seven
miles west of New Ulm, and killed many of
the inhabitants. On the afternoon of the 19th
of August a force of about one hundred war-
riors attacked the town of New Ulm, killing
several of the citizens and burning a number
of buildings, but did not carry the barricades
which had been hastily thrown up.
1st Lieut. Wm. B.
MONUMENT COMMISSION.
HENRY H. SIBLEY, of St. Paul, Chairman;
John F. MEAGHER, of Mankato;
A. W. DANIELS, of St. Peter;
WM. PFAENDER, of New Ulm, Secretary.
While the battle was in progress, the advance of Captain
Charles E. Flandrau's company from Nicollet County, about
fifteen strong, under the command of L. M. Boardman,
entered the town and the savages withdrew. The defense
up to this time was in charge of Captain Jacob Nix. At 9
P. M. of the 19th of August, a large force, consisting of
Captain Flandrau's company, from Nicollet County, to-
gether with a company from Le Sueur County, arrived and
took possession of the town; reinforcements to the number
of several hundred subsequently arrived. On the 20th, Cap-
tain Flandrau was chosen commander in chief and the de-
fenses were strengthened.
CITIZENS KILLED AUGUST 19, 1862, RETURNING
FROM A RECONNAISSANCE.
Almond D. Loomis, De Witt Lemon,
Uri Loomis, Ole Olson,
William Tuttle, Nels. Olson,
William Carroll, Tory Olson,
George Lamb, Jan. Tomson.
FLANDRAU.
This monument is erected by the State of Minnesota to com-
memorate the battles and incidents of the Sioux Indian war
of 1862, which particularly relate to the town of New Ulm,
1890.
Honored be the memory of the citizens of Blue Earth, Nicollet,
Le Sueur and adjacent counties, who so gallantly came to the
rescue of their neighbors of Brown County and by their
prompt action and bravery aided the inhabitants in defeating
the enemy in the two battles of New Ulm, whereby the depre-
dations of the savages were confined to the border, which
would otherwise have extended into the heart of the State.
ROSTER OF THOSE KILLED IN THE BATTLE OF
NEW ULM.
Capt. John Belm's Co., New Ulm, 11th Reg't, State Militia,
C. W. Otto Barth, William England, Matthias Meyer, Leopold
Senzke, Jacob Castor, Julius Kirschstein, August Roepke.
Le Seuer Tigers No. 1, Capt. William Dellaughter,
1st Lieut. A. M. Edwards, William Lusky.
Le Sueur Tigers No. 2, Capt. E. C. Saunders,
5th Serg't William Maloney, Mathew Aherin, Washington Kulp.
Capt. William Bierbauer's Mankato Co.,
Newel E. Houghton, William Nicholson.
Capt. Charles E. Flandrau's Co., St. Peter Frontier Guards,
Dodd, Max Haack, Jerry Quane, John
Summers, Rufus Huggins, Luke Smith.
Capt. Louis Buggert's Co., Capt. Louis Buggert.
New Ulm Co., Ferdinand Krause, August Riemann.
Milford Co., Jacob Haeberle.
On the 23d the Indians, six hundred and fifty
strong, again attacked New Ulm at half past
nine in the morning, and besieged it until noon
of the 24th. The assault was vigorously exe-
cuted and desperately resisted. One hundred
and eighty buildings were destroyed in the
contest, leaving of the town such part only
as lay within the barricades. Of the defend-
ers thirty-four were killed and about sixty
wounded. Reinforcements arrived at noon of
the 24th under Captain Cox of St. Peter. On
the 25th the town was evacuated and the in-
habitants all safely conveyed to Mankato.
7/// W///7Z 1/AW. 95
took place. Alexander Ramsey, then Governor of the State
of Minnesota, appointed Henry Hastings Sibley commander of
the State forces sent to quell the Sioux. Sibley marched with
his command in pursuit of the Indians, defeated them in several
skirmishes and battles, released 250 captives held by them and
captured 2,000 prisoners. Over 4oo of these latter were tried
by court-martial and sentenced to be hanged. Of this number
thirty-eight were executed at Mankato, December 26, 1862,
President Lincoln having pardoned the remainder. A year later,
General Sibley led another expedition against the Sioux and
drove them across the Missouri River. During 1864 and 1865
so many forts and garrisons were located throughout Western
Minnesota and Eastern Dakota that the Sioux never returned to
that country as marauders. In fact, it was fourteen years before
they caused another outbreak, which led to the death of that
gallant soldier, General George A. Custer.
The Indian story of the Custer massacre has never been told,
save in fragments — poor fragments at that. But for years
after that afternoon of June 25, 1876, there were little chiefs
and big chiefs and braves with long tongues that told something
or other of what happened — rough pictures of an immortal
scene. These tales came to Billings, to Glendive, to Miles City,
Standing Rock, and the Black Hills country, into which, after
peace was made, the Sioux came as they willed and waited to
make Wounded Knee and the Grand River part of the history of
frontier warfare. -
Custer and the Seventh Cavalry, after forty victorious battles
with the Indians in the Southwest during 1867 and 1868, were
transferred to the North, and after service at Yankton were
stationed at Fort Abraham Lincoln in the early part of 1876,
when Sitting Bull's uprising became most serious. General
Crook had been unable to make headway against the tribes of
Western Dakota and Southeastern Montana, then in revolt, and
General Terry determined to take the field himself. He left
Fort Abraham Lincoln on May 17, 1876, with Custer, the Seventh
Cavalry, 6oo strong, and 4oo infantry, and reached the junction
of the Powder and Yellowstone rivers on June 9th.
Sitting Bull and his warriors were then in a valley between
the Big Horn River and the Rosebud Mountains, hemmed
in by mountain walls accessible only through rough passes and
dangerous water ways. But the precise spot of the hostile camp
was not known to Terry, and was never known to the army
until Custer burst in upon it June 25th. On June 22d, Custer
and Terry were at the junction of the Rosebud and the Yellow-
stone, McCook was encamped on Goose Creek near the Wolf
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Indian Reservations, thus:
Number of Indians on Reservations, thus: 2,958
- THE NORTHWEST
part of the Chicago & North-Western Railway
built up to 1880 shown thus: -
IN 1880.
7/// IV///7Z MA W. 99
Mountains, and Colonel Gibbons was at the junction of the Big
Horn and the Yellowstone. The effort of Gibbons was to
prevent the escaping of the Indians to the north and the Canada
line. Crook was watching them on the southeast. General
Terry decided that Custer and his force should go down the
Rosebud and locate the hostiles, while he (Terry) formed a con-
nection with Gibbons and advanced from the north, and then,
when the Sioux were located, have them hemmed in between
him and Custer, and either force their surrender or annihilate
them.
Riding up the valley with Custer was Captain Tom Custer of
Troop C; Boston Custer, another brother ; his nephew, Adjutant
Cooke; Captain Myles W. Keogh, Yates, Porter, Harrington,
and the rest of that brilliant set of fighting men. Detached
bands of the young braves, which had been engaged in worrying
Reno and Benteen into an awful fright, while De Rudio was
lost in the brush and did not reappear for twenty-four hours,
were filing through the many passes and defiles leading to a
center, at which was Custer. Rain-in-the-Face was at the head
of these braves, and Rain-in-the-Face was out for revenge. The
most bloody and brutal of the chiefs, he had been captured the
winter previous by Tom Custer and confined in a guard house
for a murder he had committed. He made his escape ; but the
message came back from him, that some day and some time
he would be revenged, and he kept his word.
It was almost three o'clock in the afternoon. Custer was
already five miles distant from the commands of Reno and
Benteen and very close to the right bank of the Little Big Horn.
Between him and the main body of the Indian village, and on
the river's side, rose a crested butte, fringed at the bottom with
brush, shaly and rocky at the top. Sitting Bull was in the valley
beyond giving orders. Gall was already moving to Custer's
front from the west. Rain-in-the-Face was in his rear. To the
right of his command was Red Horse and to the left Little Dog.
Kicking Horse, with a detail of braves who had been recon-
noitering the necessarily slow advance of the troops, saw that
they had finally reached the pocket, river and butte bounded,
from which there could be no escape.
There were twenty warriors for every trooper, and each
warrior carried a magazine gun of latest make. The troops
had inferior arms, and were embarrassed with led horses. Custer's
scouts, unmolested by the foe so close to them, brought in word
that the center of the Indian village had almost been reached,
and then Cooke's message went flying back to Benteen to close
in. The trumpeter could hardly have left when out of a defile,
ºº
RAIN-IN-THE-FACE.
7///E J//// 7/2 A/A A/. IOI
down upon the soldiers, who had just reached the one butte
between them and the village, dashed Rain-in-the-Face and a
thousand warriors. From another defile came Little Dog, and
then Red Wolf and White Bear, until around Custer and his
men there was a perfect cordon of Indians.
Two ways existed by which Custer on a bare chance might
escape. He might gain the top of the butte and stand a siege
until aid came. Or he might dash down the precipitous slopes
to the river and force his way across. Rain-in-the-Face settled
what he must do. He directed the fire of the braves to killing
the horses of the troopers.
“In five minutes, no time,” said White Bear, “no horses re-
mained, and the soldiers were down behind them fighting.”
Closer and closer drew the Indian circle. An hour had passed
and the sun was creeping down to the western hills. A Crow
Scout, one of Custer's men, having disguised himself as a Sioux,
gained his side and offered him opportunity of escape. He
refused it. Many of the fighting warriors that knew him well
called on him to surrender. His answer was to fight the more
bitterly.
A handful of his men were left, his brothers were dead, the
men could no longer fire, cartridge shells were empty, the last
FIRST MONUMENT, CUSTER’s BATTLE GROUND.
act of the tragedy was at hand. No inrush of the Indians was
necessary to destroy the few left. Rain-in-the-Face could keep
at a distance and have them picked off.
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THE MATTHEws-noRTHRuP co,
Indian Reservations thus:
Part of The North-Western System built
up to 1890 shown thus:-
Stevens º - cenſº.
Spoint on Fºº ** S.
Evanston
KICKING BEAR.
7///º JPA// 7/2 MAAV. Io5
White Bear always claimed that Custer was the last to die,
and if this be true, what a sight for gods must have been that
death. About him, the dead of five companies of the Seventh
Cavalry ; at his feet, the men of his own blood ; on all sides of
him, the foe that was still willing to accept his surrender and
make him captive ; far in the East, the wife, unwitting of where
and how he stood ; but a few miles away Reno, Benteen, Terry,
Gibbons.
Surrender Custer never knew the meaning of the word.
Live, when his men were dead He did not know what such a
thing meant. Out from a defile came a puff of smoke, the ring
of a rifle shot, a flash of flame, and the Colonel of the Seventh
had gone to his eternal rest.
After Custer, came the ghost dance and the Sioux outbreak
of 1890. The Sioux are the largest and strongest tribe in the
United States. In spite of wars, removals, and diminished
food supply since the advent of the white man they still number
nearly 26, ooo. They were driven into the prairie 200 years ago
by their enemies, the Chippewa, after the latter had obtained
firearms from the French. On coming out on the buffalo plains
they became possessed of the horse, which enabled them to
assume the offensive, and in a short time they were the undis-
puted masters of an immense territory, extending from the Red
River of the north to the Rocky Mountains, and from the Yel-
lowstone to the Platte. A few small tribes were able to maintain
their position within these limits, but only by keeping close to
their strongly-built permanent villages on the Missouri. Millions
of buffalo to furnish unlimited food supply, thousands of horses,
and hundreds of miles of free range made the Sioux, up to the
year 1868, the richest and most prosperous, the proudest, and
withal, perhaps, the wildest of all the tribes on the plains.
In that year, in pursuance of a policy inaugurated for bring-
ing all the plains tribes under the direct control of the Govern-
ment, a treaty was negotiated with the Sioux living west of
the Missouri, by which they renounced their claims to a great
part of their territory and had “set apart for their absolute
and undisturbed use and occupation "-so the treaty reads — a
reservation which embraced all of the present State of South
Dakota west of the Missouri River. At the same time agents
were appointed and agencies established for them ; annuities
and rations, cows, physicians, farmers, teachers, and other good
things were promised them, and they agreed to allow railroad
routes to be surveyed and built and military posts to be estab-
lished in their territory and neighborhood. At one stroke they
were reduced from a free nation to dependent wards of the
I of 7///, /AV/)/AAW AAV/) ////E AWOA' 7// / / / S7.
Government. It was stipulated, also, that they should be
allowed to hunt within their old range, outside the limits of the
CUSTER’s BATTLE GROUND.
reservation, so long as the buffalo abounded — a proviso which,
to the Indians, must have meant forever.
The reservation thus established was an immense one, and
would have been ample for all the Sioux while being gradually
educated toward civilization, could the buffalo have remained
and the white man kept away. But the times were changing.
The building of the railroads brought into the plains swarms of
hunters and emigrants, who began to exterminate the buffalo at
such a rate that in a few years the Sioux, with all the other
hunting tribes of the plains, realized that their food supply was
rapidly going. Then gold was discovered in the Black Hills,
within the reservation, and at once thousands of miners and
hundreds of lawless desperadoes rushed into the country, in defi-
ance of the protests of the Indians and the pledges of the
7 'AAA IV/// 7/5 A/A AV. IO7
Government, and the Sioux saw their last remaining hunting
ground taken from them. The result was the Custer war and
massacre, and a new agreement, in 1876, by which the Sioux
were shorn of one-third of their guaranteed reservation, includ-
ing the Black Hills, and this led to deep and wide-spread dis-
satisfaction throughout the tribe. The conservatives brooded
over the past and planned opposition to further changes which
they felt themselves unable to meet. The progressives felt that
the white man's promise meant nothing.
The white population in the Black Hills had rapidly increased,
and it had become desirable to open communication between
Eastern and Western Dakota. To accomplish this, it was pro-
posed to cut out the heart of the Sioux reservation, and in 1882,
only six years after the Black Hills had been seized, the Sioux
were called on to surrender more territory. A commission
was sent out to treat with them, but the price offered — only
about eight cents per acre – was so absurdly small, and the
methods used so palpably unjust, that friends of the Indians
interposed and succeeded in defeating the measure in Congress.
Another agreement was prepared ; but experience had made
the Indians suspicious, and it was not until a third commission
went out under the chairmanship of General Crook, known to
the Indians as a brave soldier and an honorable man, that the
Sioux consented to treat. The result, after much effort on the
part of the commission and determined opposition by the Con-
servatives, was another agreement, in 1889, by which the Sioux
surrendered one-half (about 11,000,ooo acres) of their remaining
territory, and the great reservation was cut up into five Smaller
ones, the northern and southern reservations being separated by
a strip sixty miles wide.
In 1888, their cattle had been diminished by disease. In
1889, their crops were a failure, owing largely to the fact
that the Indians had been called into the agency in the
middle of the farming season and kept there to treat with
the commission, going back afterward to find their fields.
trampled and torn up by stock in their absence. Then fol-
lowed epidemics of measles, grippe and whooping cough in
rapid succession, and with terribly fatal results. Anyone who
understands the Indian character needs not the testimony
of witnesses to know the mental effect thus produced. Sul-
lenness and gloom, amounting almost to despair, settled down
on the Sioux, especially among the wilder portion. Then
came another entire failure of crops in 1890, and an unex-
pected reduction of rations, and the Indians were brought
face to face with starvation. They had been expressly
-
IoS 7///E /AV/D/AAV AAV/) 7///E AVOA’ 7"// WA.S 7.
and repeatedly told by the commission that their rations
would not be affected by their signing the treaty, but imme-
diately on the consummation of the agreement Congress
cut down their beef rations by 2,000,ooo pounds at Rosebud,
1,000,ooo pounds at Pine Ridge, and in less proportion at
other agencies. Earnest protest against this reduction was
made by the commission which had negotiated the treaty, by
Commissioner Morgan, and by General Miles, but still Congress
failed to remedy the matter until the Sioux had actually
been driven to rebellion. As Commissioner Morgan states :
“It was not until January, 1891, after the troubles, that an
appropriation of $1 oo, ooo was made by Congress for additional
beef for the Sioux.”
The Indians became so excited over the promised coming
of the Messiah and over the troubles which had beset them
for a number of years past, that the Government ordered
3,000 troops into the field in November, 1891, with General
Nelson A. Miles in command. Upon the first appearance
of the troops a large number of Sioux of Rosebud and Pine
Ridge agencies, led by Short Bull, Kicking Bear, and others,
left their homes and fled to the Bad Lands. In a short time
they had gathered there 3,000 Indians. These were led by
Short Bull and Kicking Bear and Sitting Bull and Big
Foot. Sitting Bull himself was plotting mischief. His arrest
was ordered. His camp on the Grand River was attacked
by Indian police and the troops, and he killed. Thus died
Tata'nka, I'yota'nke, Sitting Bull, the great medicine man of the
Sioux, on the morning of December 15, 1890, aged about
fifty-six years. He belonged to the Uncpapa division of the
Teton Sioux. Although a priest rather than a chief, he had
gained a reputation in his early years by organizing and lead-
ing war parties, and became first prominent by his leader-
ship in the Custer massacre of 1876. He it was who, after
the great Sioux reservation was broken up in 1889, was
asked by a white man what the Indians thought of the
treaty which led to this act. With a burst of indignation he
replied : -
“Indians ! There are no Indians left now but me.”
General Miles said of him :
“His tragic fate was but the ending of a tragic life. Since
the days of Pontiac, Tecumseh, and Red Jacket no Indian has
had the power of drawing to him so large a following of
his race and molding and wielding it against the authority
of the United States, or of inspiring it with greater animosity
against the white race and civilization.”
|
--
*
7///E WA// 7/2 MAAV. Io9
This is the Indian story of the Northwest to the present
time. What more shall be said 2
Attendant upon the formation and growth of the Chicago &
North-Western Railway Co., which now penetrates every part
of the Northwest, was the quick opening of farming lands to
settlement, the building of new cities and towns, the rapid
advent of population, and the creation out of the old Indian
hunting grounds of a vast granary for the world.
The Northwest has given Grant, Lincoln, Logan, Bragg,
Henderson, Sibley, Rice and Oglesby to the cause of good
government. The Northwest has created the modern reaper,
threshing machine, plow, earth excavator, dredge, and cantilever
carrier to the world at large. The Northwest has replaced
the tipi with the home of industry and prosperity. The North-
west sends out from its gateways on Lake Superior and Lake
Michigan more than 350,000,ooo bushels of grain annually.
Her cattle, sheep and hogs converted each year into provisions
for man's table aggregate more than 8oo,000,ooo pounds. In
India, where the natives are nothing if not poetical, the
name has been given to this land of “Mother of Food.” When
the pioneer railroad—the Chicago & North-Western—was first
placing its rails upon her bosom, the center of political power
in this Government was in Massachusetts and New York.
The Northwest has grown until that center of power has passed
from the Atlantic Coast to the four States of Illinois, Wiscon-
sin, Minnesota and Iowa. Her population is the most cosmo-
politan in the world for the area it occupies. The Greek,
the Turk, the Lithuanian, the Slav, the Arab, the Egyptian, the
Chinese, the Japanese, work and live within her confines in
harmony with the Scandinavian, the German and the English-
man. She depopulated herself for the cause of the Republic
in the Civil War, and it was her armies, lead by her generals,
that first demonstrated on the field of battle that secession
might threaten and conquer Washington, but never could come
northward through the valleys of the Mississippi and the Illinois.
West of the fertile lands now traversed by the North-Western
Line is more than one-third of the total area of the United
States. Millions of acres of land are yet undisturbed by the
foot of the white man or the share of his plow. Of this
76,500,000 acres can be irrigated, and when the water has come
to this parched soil it will blossom and sustain the life of
40,000,ooo of new population, more than one-half of the present
population of the United States. -
This 76,500,000 acres the General Government is now study-
ing with a view to finally turning the waters of the pent-up
-
II O 7///E /AV/O/AAW AAV/) 7///E AVOA’ 7// IPA.S 7.
mountain streams or the artesian upon it. The science of man
is to redeem it from the solitude in which it now dwells. Tracts
that were barren a decade ago now yield the best of earth's
fruits, rewards for the patient toil of the soil cleaver – the Man
who made the Northwest, whose sons are opening the Far
West, even through the Red Desert, by the plain-home of the
Bannack, near to the gorges of the Snake, up to the feet of the
everlasting hills of the mountain domain.
The seat of empire of the indissoluble republic is moving
rapidly into this region where Iroquois, Algonquin and Sioux
Once snared the beast of prey or threw the dice of chance in
idle play upon a river's bank. The giants of the Northwest,
the imperial States of the Upper Mississippi Valley, are almost
in the van now. Scan their advance in rank as to population,
compared with the other States for a hundred years gone by :
State. 1800. 1820, 1840. 1860. 1880. 1890. IQ00.
Illinois, O 24 I4 4 4 3 3
Iowa, . O O 29 2O IO IO IO
Wisconsin, O O 30 I5 I6 I4 I3
Minnesota, O O O 3O 26 2O IQ
Nebraska, ... O O O 39 3O 26 27
North Dakota, o O O 42 4O 4 I 39
South Dokota, o O O 42 40 37 37
And as these stars of progress have moved on, slowly but
surely the center of national population has drawn nearer to
them, seeking its final approximate resting place by their con-
fines. The changes in this center have been in I Io years :
1790 – 23 miles east of Baltimore, Md.
1800 – 18 miles west of Baltimore, moved 41 miles west.
1810 – 40 miles northwest by west of Washington, D. C., moved
36 miles west.
1820 – 16 miles north of Woodstock, Va., moved 50 miles west.
1830 – 19 miles west-southwest of Moorefield, West Va., moved
39 miles west.
1840 – 16 miles south of Clarksburg, West Va., moved 55 miles
West.
1850 – 23 miles southeast of Parkersburg, West Va., moved 55
miles west.
1860 — 20 miles south of Chillicothe, O., moved 81 miles west.
1870 – 48 miles east by north of Cincinnati, O., moved 42 miles
West.
1880 – 8 miles west by south of Cincinnati, O., moved 58 miles
West.
1890 – 20 miles east of Columbus, Ind., moved 48 miles west.
1900 – 4% miles southeast of Columbus, Ind., moved 15 miles
West.
7A/A2 WA// 7/2 A/A AV. I-II
This is not the hand of Destiny as men commonly use that
much-abused word. Destiny is but the worked-out will of man,
for weal or woe. His will has shaped the deeds of more than a
century for the building of the Northwest, the new birth of
the Far West. His will has given to where the cry of the
Savage rang, the babble of children ; to where the wolf howled,
the hum of the mill; to where the smoke from the tipi crawled
skyward, the exhaust of the locomotive leaping to the sun. For
what he—Man—is, let another speak.
There was one who stood at Mission Ridge on the 25th of
November, 1863, and saw the Northwest charge the mountain
side for the cause of the flag ; and when it was over, and
the flame of battle had passed, he wrote this of those who scaled
the heights that day :
“To living and dead in the commands of Sherman and How-
ard, who struck a blow that day–out of my heart I utter it—
hail and farewell And, as I think it all over—glancing again
along that grand heroic line of the Federal Epic—I commit
the story with a child-like faith to history ; sure that when she
gives her clear, calm record of that day's famous work, standing
like Ruth among the reapers in the field that feeds the world,
she will declare the grandest staple of the Northwest is Man "
THE NORTHWEST.
I900, 76,295,220
Population of the United States and Territories, . . I890, 63,069,756
I800, 5,308,483
States. Area, Sq. Miles. Population.
Illinois, - - - - - - - - - - - - - 56,650 4,821,550
Iowa, . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56,035 2,251,829
Wisconsin, . . . . . . . . . . . . 56,040 2,068,963
Minnesota, . . . . . . . . . . . . 83,365 I, 75 I, 395
Nebraska, . . . . . . . . . . . . 77,510 I,068,901
South Dakota, . . . . . . . . . . . 77,650 4OI,559
North Dakota, . . . . . . . . . . . 70,795 3I9, O40
Other States in which the North-Western Line operates :
States. Area, Sq. Miles. Population.
Michigan, . . . . . . . . . . . . 58,915 2,419,782
Wyoming, . . . . . . . . . . . . 97,890 92,53 I
HISTORY OF THE NORTHWEST.
ILLINOIs – originally a part of the Northwest territory, and subsequently
a part of Indiana territory — was organized as a territory on March
1, 1809. On December 3, 1818, it was admitted as a State.
Iowa – was organized as a territory on July 3, 1838, being, formed from
a portion of Wisconsin territory; was admitted to the Union on
March 3, 1845.
II 2 77//E /AV/D/AAV AAV/D 7///E AWOA' 7"// IWA.S 7.
WISCONSIN — was formed originally from that part of Michigan territory
lying west of the present limits of the State of that name ; was
organized as a territory July 3, 1836, and was made a State on May
29, 1848.
MINNESOTA – was organized as a territory on March 3, 1849, and origi-
nally comprised the portion of the former territory of Iowa outside
of the limits of the present State of Iowa extending east to the west
boundary line of Wisconsin ; was admitted as a State on May 11, 1858.
NEBRASKA — was organized as a territory on May 30, 1854, from the
northwestern part of Missouri territory. This area was reduced in
1861 by the formation of the territories of Colorado and Dakota ;
was admitted as a State on March 1, 1867.
DAKOTA – was organized on March 2, 1861, from parts of Minnesota and
Nebraska territory. In 1863 the territory of Idaho was formed and
part of its area taken from Dakota. In 1882 a small area of Dakota
was transferred to Nebraska. The States of North and South
Dakota were admitted on February 22, 1889.
PRESENT POPULATION OF INDIANS IN THE NORTHWEST.,
Cheyenne River agency, South Dakota, Sioux, . . . . 2,557
Area of agency, 2,867,840 acres.
Crow Creek agency, South Dakota, Sioux, . . . . . I,061
Area of agency, 285,521 acres.
Devil's Lake agency, North Dakota, Sioux–Chippewas, , 3,4Io
Area of agency, 276,730 acres.
Fort Berthold agency, North Dakota, Sioux . . . . . I, 148
Area of agency, 965, I2O acres.
Green Bay agency, Wisconsin, Oneida-Menomini and others, 3,829
Area of agency, 243,583 acres.
La Pointe agency, Wisconsin, Chippewas, . . . . . . 4,682
Area of agency, 277,526 acres.
Mackinac Agency, Michigan, Chippewa, Ottawa and others, 7,537
Area of agency, 55,033 acres.
Medawakanton Sioux, in vicinity of Redwood, Minnesota, 907
No reservation. On land purchased for them individually.
Lower Brule agency, South Dakota, Sioux, . . . . . 9I4
Area of agency, 472,550 acres.
Omaha and Winnebago agency, Nebraska, . . . . . 2,375
Area of agency, 250,352 acres.
Pine Ridge agency, South Dakota, Sioux–Cheyenne, , , 6,456
Area of agency, 3, 155,200 acres.
Rosebud agency, South Dakota, Sioux, . - - 4, 45 I
Area of agency, 3,228, 160 acres.
Sac and Fox agency, Iowa, - - - - - - 388
Area of agency, 2,965 acres.
Santee agency, Nebraska, Sioux–Ponca, . . . . . . I,542
Area of agency, IOO,275 acres.
Sisseton agency, South Dakota, Sioux, . . . . . . . I,871
Area of agency, 344,092 acres.
Standing Rock agency, North Dakota, Sioux, . . . . 3,726
Area of agency, 2,672,640 acres.
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White Earth agency, Minnesota, Chippewas, . . . . . 7,833
Area of agency, I,978,963 acres.
Yankton agency, South Dakota, Sioux, . . . . . . . I,728
Area of agency, 269,821 acres.
To this list is added that of the Indians now on other Western reser-
vations.
Blackfeet agency, Montana, Blackfeet, Bloods and Piegans, 2,022
Area of agency, I,760,000 acres.
Colorado River agency, Mojaves and Chemehuevi, . . . 2,533
Area of agency, 240,640 acres.
Colville agency, Washington, Nez Perces and others, . . 3,439
Area of agency, 2,977,820 acres.
Crow agency, Montana, Crows, . . . . . . 2,003
Area of agency, 3,504,000 acres.
f Flathead agency, Montana, Flatheads and others, . . . I,998
|- Area of agency I,433,600 acres.
Fort Apache agency, Arizona, Apache, . . . . . . . I,838
Area of agency, I,681,920 acres.
Fort Belknap agency, Montana, Assiboine, . . . . . I,290
Area of agency, 537,600 acres.
Fort Hall agency, Idaho, Shoshone and Bannock, . . . I,446
. Area of agency, 864,000 acres.
º Fort Peck agency, Montana, Sioux, . . . . . I,839
| Area of agency, I,776,000 acres.
Grand Ronde agency, Oregon, Umpqua and others, . . 398
Area of agency, 59,699 acres.
º Hoopa Valley agency, California, Klamath, . . . . . I, 183
Area of agency, 128,263 acres.
Hualapai agency, Arizona, Hualapai, - - - 859
Area of agency, 730,880 acres.
Klamath agency, Oregon, Klamath, . . . . . I, O72
Area of agency, I,056,000 acres.
Lemhi agency, Idaho, Shoshone, . . . 503
Area of agency, 64,000 acres.
Mescalero agency, New Mexico, Apache, . . . . . . 444
Area of agency, 474,240 acres.
Mission —Tule River agency, California, Mission and others, 3,848
Area of agency, 276,755 acres.
Navajo agency, Arizona, Navajo and Moquis Pueblo, . . 23, I4I
Area of agency, 7,698,560 acres.
Neah Bay agency, Washington, Makah and others, . . 735
Area of agency, 24,517 acres.
Nevada agency, Nevada, Utes, . . . . . . .
Area of agency, 640,815 acres,
Nez Perces agency, Idaho, Nez Perces, . . . . . . . I,658
Area of agency, 2I4,560 acres.
- 562
Pima agency, Arizona, Pima, . . . . . . . 7,870
Area of agency, 495,433 acres.
Pottawattomi and Great Nemaha Agency, Kansas, Potta-
wattomi, Sac, Fox and others, ------ I, I52
Area of agency, I21,981 acres.
Pueblo and Jicarilla agency, New Mexico, Pueblo and
Apache, . IO,334
Area of agency, I,322,838 acres.
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Puyallup agency, Washington, Puyallup and others, I,766
Area of agency, 257,823 acres. -
Round Valley agency, California, Ukie and others, 62I
Area of agency, 38,061 acres.
San Carlos agency, Arizona, Apache, . . . . 3,366
Area of agency, 1,834,240 acres.
Shoshone agency, Wyoming, Shoshone, . . . I,671
Area of agency, 1,810,000 acres.
Siletz agency, Oregon, Siletz, . . . . . . . 487
Area of agency, 225,279 acres.
Southern Ute agency, California, Utes, . . . . I, OOI
Area of agency, 1,094,400 acres.
Tongue River agency, Montana, Cheyenne, I, 349
Area of agency, 371,200 acres.
Tulalip agency, Washington, Tulalip, . I,455
Area of agency, 52,623 acres. -
Uintah and Ouray agency, Utah, Utes, . . . . I, 7 II
- Area of agency, 3,972,480 acres.
Umatilla agency, Oregon, Walla Walla and others, I, OI3
Area of agency, I57,733 acres.
Walker River agency, Nevada, Utes, - - 596
Area of agency, 318,815 acres.
Warm Springs agency, Oregon, Wasco, - - 962
Area of agency, 463,999 acres.
Western Shoshone agency, Nevada, Shoshone, 556
Area of agency, 312,320 acres.
Yakima agency, Washington, Yakima, - I,909
Area of agency, 800,000 acres.
SUMMARY.
Total number Indians in original Northwest (1899), . 48,878
Total Indian Land Acreage of same (1899), . . . I7,309, II5
Total Indians on Reservations (1899), . . . . . . 2OI, 3 I5
Non-tax Paying Indians in the United States (1900), 89,54I
Indians in Public Schools (1898), . . . . . . . 340
Indians in Contract Schools (1899), I,439
Value Indian Government School Plants (1899), . . $3,562,760
º
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“WESTWARD THE COURSE OF EMPIRE TAKES ITS WAY.”—BISHOP BERKELEy.
“No pent up Utica contracts our powers, “The spirit moves with its allotted spaces,
But the whole boundless continent is ours.” The mind is narrowed in a narrow sphere.”
—JonATHAN M. SEwALL. —JonATH AN M. SEwALL.
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