USA > Mississippi > History of the upper Mississippi Valley, pt 1 > Part 33
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Continuing his explorations beyond those' of Lient. Allen and Schooleralt, he entered on the 29th of August, a tributary of the west bay of the lake, two or three feet in depthi, and from fifteen to twenty in width. While Schoolcraft and party had passed but two hours at Itasea Lake, he re- mained three days with complete apparatus, und sought the sources of the rivulets whichi feed the
lakes. With great appropriateness has he been recognized by the people of Minnesota, by the legislature, giving his name to n County.
He reached the Falls of Saint Anthony upon his return on the 27th of September, and a letter from this point, written to Major Taliaferro will be fond on the one Inmdred and second page of this work. For a time he remained a guest of Talia- ferro, near the Fort, and then accepted the hospi- tality of Mr. Sibley, at Mendota.
On the 6th of December, 1836, Alfred, a half breed, son of William Aitkin, the trader at Long Lake, was murdered at Red Cedar Lake, by an Indian who suspected him of improper intercourse with his wife. The Indian was arrested and on 20th of the next February was brought to Fort Snelling by a trader named Morrison. On the 11th of May the acensed and the father of the murdered man left Fort Snelling to attend the Court held at Prairie dn Chion, and the trial of the Indian is said to have been the first criminal case under the Territorial Law of Wisconsin. A juryman has written the following account : " As no harm can be done, I will give a brief history of this case to show how sneh things were then ur- ranged. Judge Dumm was presiding at that time, and Ezekiel Tainter who summoned me was acting Sheriff. The defendant was an Indian charged with the crime of murdering a young man named Akins | Aitkin ] whose father was prosecuting. From the evidence it appears that A-the Sen- ior was a trader at the head of the Mississippi where he had a trading house. Young A -- at- tended to the trading house department, while his father who resided in a honse some distance off furnished the goods and capital. In his inter- course with the Indians, the son had seen a re- markably handsome squaw, and taken some liking for her. The squaw was the wife of a young brave. By means of numerous presents, A- persuaded the squaw to desert her husband and live with him. When the Indian came for his squaw, A-locked the doors and refused to let her go. The Indian went away but returned the next evening about dark, and walked into the house where A-was sitting, and again asked for his squaw. A -- refused to let her go, and the Indian shot him dead on the spot. The father had the Indian bronght down for trial.
The case was condneted with very few formal- ities ; and whenever the Court took a recess, the jury were locked up in a grocery, where, for the
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TREATY AT FORT SNELLING.
sum of seventy-five cents cach, we could have all the liquor we wanted, provided we did not waste or carry any away. Imbibing was quite prevalent among all classes in that day, and if each of the jurymen drauk his seventy-five cents worth, the Judge and Counsel could not have been far be- hind in that respect ; and some individual was heard to say that the prisoner aus the only sober man in the court room. After the jury were charged, we were locked up two or three nights ; (I gener- ally got up and went home nights, but came into the Court in the morning,) and on the third morn- ing we brought in a verdiet of "not guilty," and the Indian was discharged."
The first treaty with the Chippeways for th cession of lands west of Lake Superior was made July 29, 1837, at Fort Snelling. The Commis- sioners upon the part of the United States were William R. Smith, of Pennsylvania, who subse- quently became a resident and historian of Wis- consin, and General Henry Dodge, Governor of Wisconsin Territory. In the formation of this treaty the greed of the half-breeds and Indian traders was manifested in their determination to make the tribe pay them for all the individual debts of worthless Indians.
While the treaty was pending two prominent traders among the Chippeways entered the Indian Agents office at Fort Snelling in apparent liste, and asked for pens and paper. A elim for $5,000 for certain mills on the Chippeway River was made out and handed to Mr. Van Antwerp, the Secretary of the Commissioners. The Chippeways were suprised at the bold fraud. One of the chiefs, for the sake of peace, was willing to allow $500 for that which was erceted wholly for the profit of cer- tain white men, but Old Hole-in-the-Day and oth- ers would not consent. Soon after yelling was heard in the direction of Baker's trading house which stood near Cold Spring, and Lyman War- ren, the father of William Warren, a well known Anglojibway, who died at St. Paul more than twenty years ago, was seen marching down with
some Indian sympathizers with him to compel the Commissioners to allow Warren a claim of abont $20,000.
With noise and defiance they pushed into the treaty arbor. Taliaferro, the Indian Agent, roused by the impudence of the parties, pointed a pistol at Warren, and Hole-in-the-day said "Shoot, my F'ather;" but General Dodge interposed and begged that the pistol might be laid aside. In the end the traders triumphed, and in the treaty $25,000 were given to L. M. Warren, and $28,000 to W. A. Aitkin, and an additional sum of $70,000 was applied to the payment by the United States of certain claims against the Indians by the trad- ers, beside $100,000 to be paid to the half-breeds.
This treaty opened for settlement the portion of Minnesota east of the Mississippi River. The land ceded was defined by the following boundaries: "Beginning at the junction of the Crow Wing and Mississippi Rivers, between twenty and thirty miles above where the Mississippi is crossed by the forty-sixth parallel of north latitude, and run- ning thence to the north point of Lake St. Croix, one of the sources of the St. Croix River; thence to and along the dividing ridge between the waters of Lake Superior and those of the Mississ- ippi to the sources of the Ocha-san-sepe, a tribu- tary of the Chippeway River; thence to a point on the Chippeway River twenty miles below the ont- let of Lake de Flambeau; thence to the junction of the Wisconsin and Pelican rivers; thenee on an cast course twenty-five miles; thence southerly on a course parallel with that of the Wisconsin River to the line dividing the territories of the Chippe- ways and Menomonies; thence to Plover portage; thence along the northern boundary of the Chip- peway country to the commencement of the boundary line, dividing it from that of the Sioux half a day's march, below the falls, on the Chippe- wa River; thence with said boundary line to the mouth of Wahtap River, at its junction with the Mississippi; and thence up the Mississippi to the place of beginning."
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192
HISTORY OF THE UPPER MISSISSIPPI VALLEY.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
CHIPPEWAY MISSIONS IN NORTHERN MINNESOTA.
AYER AT LA POINTE - ELY AT SANDY LAKE- BOUTWELL AT LEECH LAKE -- FOND DU LAC MIS- SION -- METHODIST MISSIONS -- RED LAKE MISSION -- PEMBINA MISSION -- PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL MISSION AT GULL LAKE AND WIIITE EARTH.
A brief account of the early missions among the Chippeways will be found in the nineteenth chap- ter, to which the present chapter is supplementary.
Frederick Ayer, one of the teachers under the Rev. William Ferry, Presbyterian missionary at Mackinaw; in the summer of 1830 came to the island of La Pointe and established a school for Indian children. During the fall of 1832 he went ont to the trading post of Mr. Aitkin, and passed the following winter with him.
In the summer Mr. Ayer returned to La Pointe, and arrangements were made to send a teacher to Sandy Lake. Edmund F. Ely, from Albany, N. Y., was appointed, and on the 25th of September, 1833, he writes: "I arrived at this post on Sep- tember 19th, and am happily disappointed in the appearance of the place. I occupy a large cham- ber in Mr. Aitkin's house, which is both a school- room and a lodging-room, commanding nn eastern view of Mr. Aitkins' fields and meadows, and of the lake and hills, covered with pines, to- gother with The outlet of the Inke, running within eighty feet of the house; the Mississippi is about the same distance in the west, and their confluence is about three rods below. On the 23d Mr. Bont- well left for Leech Lake. My school was com- meneed on the same day, with six or eight schol- ars. To-day I have had fifteen." -
FIRST MISSIONARY AT LEECH LAKF.
The Rev. W. T. Bontwell, born in 1803, nt Lyndboro, New Hampshire, a graduate of Dart- month College in 1828, and of Andover Theologi- cal Seminary in 1831, joined the Mackinaw mission in July of the same year. The next year he necompanied Schoolcraft in his tour to Inke
Itasca, and in June, 1832, upon his return, joined his classmate, the Rev. Sherman Hall, at the La Pointe mission. In the fall of 1833 he began a mission at Leech Lake. His letters from that point will be read with interest. He writes: "I arrived at this place on October the 4th. When I arrived the men, with few exceptions, were mak- ing their fall hunts, while their families remained at the Lake and in its vicinity, to gather their own corn and make rice. A few lodges were eneamped quite near. These I began to visit, for the pur- pose of reading, singing, etc., in order to interest the children, and awaken in them a desire for in- struction. I told them also abont the children at Mackinaw, the Sault and La Pointe, who could read, write and sing. To this they would Esten attentively, while a mother would often reply, ' My children are poor and ignorant.'"
MISSIONARY PROSPECTS.
* * "Nowhere between Lake Supe- rior and the headwaters of the Mississippi has God so bonntifully provided for the subsistence of man. In addition to rice and several species of lish which this lake affords, the soil is also of a rich quality, and highly susceptible of enltivation. All the English grains, in my opinion, may be enlti- vated here.
At present an Indian's garden consists merely of a few square rods, in which he plants a little corn and a few squashes. Very few as yet culti- vate the potato, probably for want of seed. Fish, instead of bread, is here the staff of life.
The traders here have found it impracticable to keep any domestic animals save the dog and cat. For the least offence an Indian will shoot n horse or a cow for revenge, sooner than a dog. If the Indians can be induced by example and other helps, such as seed and preparing the ground, to cultivate more largely, they would, I have no doubt, furnish provisions for their children in part.
If a mission here shall furnish the means of
193
COY INDIAN CHILDREN.
feeding, clothing and instrucling the children, as ut Mackinaw, I would venture to say there wonld be no lack of children. But such an establishment is not only impracticable here; it is such as could ill meet the exigencies of this people.
'To a person unaccustomed to Indian manners and Indian wildness, it would have been amusing to have seen the little ones, as I approached the lodge, running and screaming, more terrified, if possible, than if they had met a bear robbed of her whelps.
It was not long, however, before most of them overcame their fears, and in a few days my dwell- ing (a lodge which I occupied for three or four weeks) was frequented from morning till evening by an interesting group of boys, all desirous to learn to read and sing.
A PRETTY PICTURE.
To have seen them hanging, some upon one knee, others upon my shoulders, reading and sing- ing, while others, whether from fear or shame I know not, who dared not venture in, were peep- ing in through the sides of the lodge, or lying flat upon the ground and looking under the bottom, might have provoked a smile, especially to have seen them as they canght a glance of my eye, springing upon their feet and running like so many wild asses' colts. The rain, cold and snow were alike to them, in which they would come day after day, many of them clad merely with a blanket, and a narrow strip of cloth about the loins.
Hester Crooks, the daughter of Ramsey Crooks, a prominent fur trader, and un Indian mother, in Muy, 1817, was born at Drummond's Island, and became a teacher at a mission station established by Mr. Ayer after he left Sandy Lake, at Yellow Lake in Wisconsin. Al Fond-dn. Le, Minnesota, on The 11th of September, 1834, she was married lo the Rev. W. T. Bontwell, and proceeded to Leech Lake.
PRIMITIVE HOUSEKEEPING IN A BARK LODGE.
Mr. Bontwell has described his carly attempts at housekeeping as follows: "The clerk very kindly invited me to ocenpy a part of his quarlers natil I could prepare a place to put myself. I thought best to decline his offer, and on The thirteenth instant (October ) removed my effects and com- menced housekeeping in a bark lodge. Then, here I was, without a quart of corn or Indian rice, to ent myself, or give my man, us I was too late to purchase any of the mere pitlanee which
was to be bought or sold. My wits, under God, were my sole dependence to feed myself and my hired man. I had a barrel and a half of flour, ninety pounds of pork only for the winter. But on the seventeenth of the month I sent my fish- erman, ten or twelve miles distant, to gather our winter's stock of provisions out of the deep.
In the meantime I must build a house, or winter in an Indian lodge. Rather than do worse, I shouldered my axe and led the way, having pro- cured a man, of the trader, to help me; and in ten days had my timbers cut and on the ground, ready to put up.
On the twelfth of November I recalled my fish- erman, and found on our scaffold six thousand tulibees for our winter supplies. On the sceond of December I quit my bark lodge for a mud- walled house, the timbers of which I not only assisted in cutting, but also carrying on my back, until the rhematism, to say the least, threatened to double and twist me, and I was obliged to desist. My house, when I began to occupy it, had a door, three windows, and a mud chimney; but neither chair, stool, nor bedding. A box served for the former, and an Indian mat for the latter two. A rnde figure, indeed, my house would make in a New England city, with its deer-skin windows, a floor that had never seen a plane or saw, and a mud chimney, but it is nevertheless comfortable.
While a mission proffers them aid, they must be made to feel that they must try, at least, to help themselves. It should be placed on a fooling that will instruct them in the principles of political economy. At present there is among them noth- ing like personal rights. They possess all things in common. If an Indian has anything to cat his neighbors are allowed to share it with him. While, therefore, a mission extends the hand of charity in the means of instruction, and occasionally an arti- cle of clothing, or perhaps some aid in procuring the means of subsistence, it should be only to such indi- viduals as will themselves use the means, so far as they possexx them. * * * * *
As it respects furnishing them with seeds and im- plements of husbandry, this may be done, but only to a certain extent. An Indian would, most surely, take advantage of your liberality."
FOND DU LAC MISSION.
During the summer of 1835, Mr. Ely removed from Sandy Lake, and established a school at Fond-du-Lae, on the Saint Louis River. This
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HISTORY OF THE UPPER MISSISSIPPI VALLEY.
summer George Copway, his cousins John Jolm- son and Peter Marksman young Chippeways nn- der the patronage of the Methodist Missionary Society arrived at La Pointe on their way to es- tablish a mission among the Chippeways of Wis- consin, at Ottaway Lake. Two of them conelnded to pass the winter with the Rev. Sherman Hall, at the La Pointe Mission, and the third found Mr. Ely at Fond-du-Lac. . On the 20th of August, Mr. Ely was married at La Pointe, to Catherine Bis- sell, who in November, 1817, was born at Sault St. Maric.
The Indians having abandoned the neighbor- hood Mr. Ely and wife were in the summer of 1839 sent to Pokegnma as assistants. A notice of the Pokeguma Mission appears on the one hun- dred and ninth page.
The Rev. Mr. Boutwell in consequence of the hostile spirit of the pillager band of Leech Lake, in August, 1838, joined the Mission at Pokeguma.
METHODIST MISSIONS.
Copway, Johnston and Marksman, the young Chippeways, of whom mention has been made, were sent to be educated, at a Methodist School, in Jacksonville, Illinois. In 1839, Spates, Huddles- ton, Johnston and Marksman established a Chip- peway mission school at Elk River. On the 30th of December, 1840, the Rev. Allan Huddleston died of dysentery, and was buried in sight of the Mississippi. Old Hole-in-the-Day, the celebrated Chippewa, threw a heap of stones on the grave. " In order," he said, "that all may see and know where the good man is; he who came to bless us.''
The fear of the Sioux caused the Chippeways to leave the Elk River region, and in the fall of 1840 the Rev. Mr. Spates established a school at Sandy Lake. In 1811, Mr. Spates was nssisted by the Rev. 11. J. Bruce, and John Johnston had a sta- tion at White Fish Lake, and at Fond-du-Lac was the Chippewa George Copway, his wife, a white woman, her sister, and James Simpson, acting as teachers.
In 1849, the school at Sandy Lake had forty- two scholars enrolled, with an average attendance of twenty-five. The school at Fond-dn-Lae, tanght by the Rev. J. W. Holt and wife, had twenty-eight scholars enrolled, with an average attendance of fifteen.
RED LAKE MISSION.
The zeal of Frederick Ayer for the mental and moral improvement of the Chippownys, did not
abate after the Pokegnma mission was broken up, by the attack of the Sionx. During the winter of 18-12 -43 he visited Red Lake. The Chief received the proposition to establish a mission with favor, and thus addressed the band: "My braves! I should be ashamed to suffer one who has come so l'ar to visit us, to turn back again. We should not treat our trader in that way; we should run to meet him. My Braves! You have listened to what he said. I believe what he says. Let us try him four years, and if we do not find him trne, then we will send him away." In the spring Mr. Spencer and E. F. Ely joined Mr. Ayer, and assist- ed the Indians in their ploughing, and in seeding.
Soon after missionaries from Oberlin, Olio, arrived. In 1845 Mr. Bardwell was the agent of the Ohio band, and his assistants were stationed at Red Lake and Lecch Lake. Messrs. Ayer and Spencer during the winter visited the Selkirk set- tlement of the British Possessions, near Winepeg, Manitoba, and were well received by Episcopalians and Presbyterians, and encouraged to persevere.
PEMBINA MISSION.
The first missionary to labor among the Chip- peways and half-breeds near Pembina, was the Rev. G. A. Belcourt, of the Roman Catholic Church. He was born in Lower Canada in 1803, und in 1827 became a priest, and in 1831 he came to the Selkirk Settlement. A controversy with Governor Simpson of the Hudson Bay Company, caused him to cross the British boundary line, and to establish a mission in 1849 at Pembina. He was a man of great energy and erected a saw mill, and introdneed "sisters " as teachers. Abont the year 1859 his labors ceased, and he is said to have removed under a cloud.
BAPTIST MISSION.
Upon the eighty-eighth page of this history, is a notice of a half-breed, James Tanner. Failing to impose upon the Presbyterian minister at Saint Paul, who was acquainted with his worthlessness, he sought the acquaintance of the Rev. T. R. Cres- sey, the pastor of the Baptist Church, of the same place, expressed a desire to become a member, and in the winter of 1852, a hole being ent in the ice, he was the first person in that place received into that comnnmion, by immersion. He soon obtained um appointment as a Baptist missionary, and persuaded Elijah Terry, a most excellent young man in Saint Paul, to be his assistant.
After Terry reached Pembinn, he went one day
195
A MISSIONARY'S WIFE SHOT.
to obtain logs for the erection of a sehool house, and while in the woods was pierced by the arrows ยท
of a party of Sioux, and his scalp taken.
MISSIONARY'S WIFE MURDERED.
About this time the Rev. Mr. Spencer, who had been connected with the Red Lake Mission, came to Pembina, but n sad occurence terminated his work at that point. After he and his wife had retired for the night, a shot was fired through the window which resulted in the death of Mrs. Spencer.
In a letter to a friend, Mr. Speneer wrote: " What a seene for a husband and a father! Oh, the agony of that hour! I hardly know how I lived through the remainder of that night. Mrs. Speneer lived for nearly three hours after she was shot, perhaps half the time in a state of uneon- sciousness, and in great bodily suffering. She frequently called for water, which I gave her from a sponge and it was very gratifying. At times she would remark, 'I feel so strangely. What is the matter? Have I been shot?' At length, eom- prehending that she had not long to live, she engaged in ejaculatory prayer to her Savior. At one time she said, speaking of her child, "Tell Anna to love her Savior.' Toward the close she said, ' I cannot die.' At first I did not know but it was unwillingness, but my mind was relieved by the prayer, 'O, Jesus! if it is Thy will, let me die, but grant me patience!' The stroke, thongh so severe, has been so emphatically of the Lord, that the language of my heart has been, 'I am dumb because Thon didst it. To- wards her murderers, I have had no feelings but those of pity and compassion."
GULL LAKE MISSION.
In the your 1849, the government opened au Indian farm at Gull Lake, a few miles northeast of the Crow Wing River, and in 1852, the Protestant Episcopalians established u mission there, in
charge of Rev. J. Lloyd Breek, who eontinned in charge for four years. He was succeeded by Rev. E. S. Peake, and it was soon after abandoned.
LEECHI LAKE MISSION.
The Rev. S. G. Wright, a Congregationlist, will always be remembered for his labors nt this and Red Lake stations, where Boutwell had been the pioneer. He was an efficient missionary, established a manual labor school, and did not retire from work until ineapaeitated by age. The Rev. Mr. Bontwell, connected with this station, aeted for a short period as Indian Agent, and died at Leeel Lake.
WHITE EARTH MISSION.
The Rev. Mr. Boutwell was succeeded in the Ageney by the Rev. E. P. Smith, a Congrega- tional minister, who resideded at White Earth, did a good work for the Indian. He was appointed United States Commissioner of Indian affairs, and after leaving Washington, went to Afriea and died there while looking after missionary interests. Sinee Mr. Smith's departure the religious interests of the Chippeways in that region have been taken eare of by missionaries of the Protestant Episco- pal and Roman Catholic Churches.
The Chippeways have lately received instrue- tion from Free Will Baptists, Protestant Episco- palians and Roman Catholics.
The Indian Agent for this people, in his report for 1879, writes: "Christian worship had been maintained upon all the reservations, sustained and encouraged by the different seets of the Christian faith. A general and growing interest has been manifested by the Indians, in the differ- ent religious organization, existing within the limits of the Ageney, and whenever material aid has accompanied the religious solicitude of the devoted missionari s, a gratifying number of pro- selytes has been seenred."
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HISTORY OF THE UPPER MISSISSIPPI VALLEY.
CHAPTER XL.
NOTED CIHIPPEWAY CHIEFS.
CURLY HEAD OF SANDY LAKE-STRONG GROUND -- THIE ELDER HOLE-IN-THE-DAY - BIANSWAI - MASSACRE OF THE SIOUX-EXCITED SPEECH- HOLE-IN-THE-DAY AT FORT SNELLING - FRUS- TRATES A CONSPIRACY-THE JUNIOR HOLE-IN- THE-DAY-ATTENDS TREATY AT FOND-DU-LAC- TAKES A SCALP NEAR ST. PAUL-TAKES A WHITE GIRL AS ONE OF HIS WIVES-KILLED NEAR CROW WING.
When Governor Cass, of Michigan, in 1820, visited Sandy Lake, Ba-ba-see-keen-dase, written by some Ba-be-si-ken-da-bi, and called by the English Curly Head, was the leading Chippeway chief. He and Flat Mouth had then been leaders of their people against the Sioux, in the valley of the Long Prairie River.
Curly Head was present in 1825 at the great gathering of Indian tribes at Prairie dn Chien to confer with United States Commissioners. Re- turning from this council he was taken sick and dicd before reaching his home.
Before he expired he called two brothers who had been, when young, his pipe bearers, and com- mitted to them the care of the Mississippi Chip- peways. The names of these brothers were Song-nk-um-eg, or Strong Ground, and Pug-on- a-ke-shig, or Hole-in-the-Sky, generally known us Hole-in-the-Day.
William, the son of Warren the old trader at La Pointe, by an Indian mother, wrote that Strong Ground was a very brave man. When a boy he was present at the Long Prairie fight with the Sionx, and was also one of those at Fort Snelling who killed the four Sioux who, in May, 1827, were surrendered by Colonel Snelling, an account of which is found on the ninety-eighth page of this book.
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