USA > Wisconsin > Buffalo County > History of Buffalo County, Wisconsin > Part 14
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an expedition to Prairie du Chien, for which as early as 1813 can- nons and other materials of war had already been forwarded to the portage between Fox and Wisconsin Rivers. In 1815 the United States had sent up a company of regulars, and some gun- boats, also some militia recruited in Missouri. Gen. Clarke went up with them, but returned again to St. Louis, leaving Lieut. Per- kins in command of the regulars and of the old Fort Crawford, which had been hastily repaired. The commander of Fort Macki- naw sent the two hundred Sioux, the hundred Winnebagoes, and some Chippewas and Menomonees to Green Bay, together with two companies of fur-trade engages raised by Rolette and Anderson. Here they were joined by about seventy-five of the Canadian set- tlers, and then ascended by the common route the Fox and de- scended the Wisconsin. Their first attack was directed against the gun-boats, which moved down the river, carrying with them pro- visions and ammunition. Lieutenant Perkins defended the defective fort for four days, until Col. Mckay, the commander in chief of the British party. began to shoot red-hot cannon balls against the wooden stockade. A surrender was then arranged, and the Ame- rican troops were after a few days shipped to St. Louis, not without having been in great danger of being massacred during the time of their detainment, and followed by the Indians as far as Rock Island. This was the first open hostility of the Sioux against the United States. After the treaty of Prairie du Chien, the Sioux had no part in any war with the United States, though they were some- what restless during the Winnebago war. During the Blackhawk War the Sioux, at least some of them, assisted in the fights against the Sacs and Foxes, especially at and after the battle of the Bad Axe. This was partly a quarrel of their own, since they had been at war for a long time with the same tribes, and had in 1830 killed seventeen of them in the neighborhood of Prairie du Chien. The United States had as early as 1806 established a peace with them, through the agency of Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike, who purchased of them in 1805 a tract of land of about six miles wide and ten miles long above the mouth of the Minnesota River, on a part of which Fort Snelling was built in 1820, and maintained as a permanent military station, until the war of the Rebellion broke out.
We have seen where the Sioux were located about sixty years ago, At that time the Medawakautons being the nearest to our
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own location, consisted of seven bands, gentes or clans, each under a chief, the tribe being under a head-chief. We have no authentic records regarding the succession of these chiefs. Among the eastern Indians this succession was not hereditary as we have seen in the abridgement on " Wyandot Government," although a certain class of chiefs was always taken from the same gens, clan, or band. For want of better information, and because it agrees with some experiences and traditions among the earlier settlers, I will here insert what the " Minnesota Atlas" says about the matter.
"Wabasha was the leading hereditary chief of the People of the Leaf, (or M'day-wa-kautons,) and in all intertribal affairs of importance his word was law. He was living in 1819, and visited Major Forsyth at Prairie du Chien, on his expedition with Col. Leavenworth, to establish the post at Fort Snelling. Major For- syth was the first Indian agent who ever visited Minnesota, and has been considered good authority on Indian matters. He also states that he had a visit from Red Wing, another noted chief, dur- ing the same expedition. Red Wing was then an old man about sixty years of age, which would show that he was born about 1759.
The " Atlas " mentions another chief, who seems to have been appointed as such by Governor Clark, of St. Louis, but seems to have been a chief only in title. This is Ta-ha-ma, the " Rising Moose." He was one of the most remarkable men of his nation, a great orator and diplomatist, and a character of great influence among the Dakotas. He was born at Prairie aux Ailies (Alliers ?) now Winona, and in his younger days was noted for his intelli- gence, daring and activity. During a game in boyhood he lost one of his eyes, which circumstance caused the French afterward to call him " Bourgne," or " One-Eyed " a name by which he was commonly known, though he was, sometimes called the " Old Priest." ... He figured prominently in the treaty between Pike, and the Dakotota Chiefs in 1805. Pike, refers to him in terms of res- pect and confidence as "my friend." During the war of 1812 he rendered valuable service to the American cause. Governor Clark of St. Louis employed him as a scout and messenger, in which capacity he braved many dangers and hardships. The governor 1):gave him in 1816 a commission as Chief of the Sioux nation, together
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with a captain's uniform and a medal. He was very proud of these and kept them to the day of his death. His services in the American cause, his ability and intelligence, high sense of honor and noble bearing made him highly esteemed by the white people. He died in April 1860, probably about one hundred years of age.
It seems to me, and must appear to a number of other per- sons, who happened to have been residents of this county before 1860 that this Indian was the one, who came, as soon as the weather permitted, every spring along the banks of the Missis- sippi, with a small crowd of women and younger men, setting up their te-pees on certain places more or less frequented by them every year at the same time. The people called him Tomahaw, which they interpreted as meaning One-eyed. I think, also, that I was told, that the old man was a priest, but could never connect these stories. I am inclined to think that he lived yet in 1862, but as he never appeared afterwards, we began to think he might have been transported with the other Sioux in 1863. His partici- pation in the outbreak of 1862 was a physical impossibility, as he was not only old but also very feeble and emaciated.
I find by comparing notes that others agree with me regard- ing Ta-ha-ma or To-ma-ha having lived beyond 1860. Mr. M. Polin, who lived in Wabasha in 1861 and knew the old chief quite well, says that the captain's uniform presented to Ta-ha-ma by Gen. Clark, as mentioned above, was very useful to its owner by reminding steamboat travelers, at that time a very numerous class, of his presence, his services, and his old age and infirmities. He would meet the boats at some landing or woodyard, go up into the cabin, show his papers, and beg for money among the passengers. These were at that time a numerous and usually well-to-do class, each giving the old chief according to inclination, either for the fun of his appearance, or out of compassion, or perhaps to get rid of his importunities. Sometimes the gift would be a drink of whiskey, and being repeated by others inclined to make sport of the Indian, the old man, then probably nearly one hundred years of age, would succumb to liberality and temptation. Often, how- ever, he collected a sum quite considerable for an Indian to pos- sess, and which furnished him with some necessities of life, and usually with a spree for several days, after which he was ready to
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display his blue coat, brass buttons, shoulder-straps, and beaver hat again on a new raid on the compassion, etc. of travelers.
Another chief of prominence was To-way-a-ta-doo-tah or Lit- tle Crow. There were two of the same name, father and son. The old chief was very anxious that his people should be taught to rely for subsistence upon the products of the soil, rather than the precarious fruits of the chase, and set them a good example by working industriously in his own field. It would have been well for the whole tribe if his oldest son, who succeeded him in the chieftainship, although the father was very sorry, that he had no other son left, on whom the dignity could be bestowed. Gen. H. H. Sibley, who relates his last visit to the old chief, in company with Alexander Faribault the interpreter, mentions his admoni- tions to the young man, but forgets to state when the event hap- pened. Little Crow, sr., died the next day ..
Originally the power of the chiefs was very great, but from the date of the first treaties with the government it began to decline, until finally the chief was merely considered as the mouth-piece of the Soldiers Lodge, the members of which constituted the only real power in the bands.
We must now return to events next following the often men- tioned treaty of 1825. Sept. 29th 1837 a treaty was concluded by which the Sioux ceded to the United States all their lands East of the Mississippi. This included all the land they had in what is now Wisconsin and a larger tract in Minnesota between the St. Croix and the Mississippi including, among other things the sites of St. Paul and Minneapolis.
Two treaties, one in 1830 and the other in 1836 relate almost exclusively to changes in the southern boundary line. In the treaty of 1851 the Sioux, or those bands of them that were parties to the treaty ceded all their lands in Iowa and Minnesota to the United States, receiving instead of it a reservation, from the west boundary line of the tract ceded along the Minnesota River, to Yellow Medicine River on the south side and Tchay-tam Bay River on the northside, being not less than ten miles on each side of the general course of the river. The treaty was changed by the Senate of the United States. This change was a radical one, as it involved the removal of the Indians to the westside of the line where the reservation was to begin. The Indians being dissatis-
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fied, they were allowed to stay on a smaller reservation, the re- mainder being sold for their benefit. From about that time dates the effort made for the civilization of the annuity Indians. This was strenuously opposed by most of the tribes and their members, because it involved some ceremonies, that cast an indirect reproach on their mode of life and their ancient legends and traditions, be- sides conferring upon individuals some benefits, to which the greedy crowd also considered themselves entitled. To tell the truth, the annuity system was corrupting the Indians more and more and their idea was that each of them had a right to claim all the desires of his savage heart, and some one to do his biddings besides. His money he squandered and gambled away, and when he suffered he charged it to the government, and, as that was way off, he hated the white people, because they were under that gov- ernment. This, of course, was the state of mind among other Indians besides the Sioux. But the latter being a numerous, and as they thought, powerful nation, were proud and testy, and although under such agents, as understood their ways and notions and at ordinary times, when payments were made punctually, they remained manageable and quiet, yet it was only because there was a sufficient military force among them to keep some order and subejction. Hence, when in 1861 the war began, and troops had to be called to the defence of the nation's capital even from the most distant posts, and when whole regiments of men were enlisted and sent off, the Indians began to become restless. Emissa- ries from the rebellious states or from the sympathizing British settlements of the Northwest, came among them and told them of the danger of the government, of its financial embarrassments, and that their annuities would not be paid. The government has always been proverbially stupid in the selection of its Indian agents, and in displacing those, who did well enough in such agen- cies, for partisan reasons. Hon. Joseph .R. Brown, who had been among Indians for almost forty years, and understood their ways, and how to manage them, was dismissed in 1861, and one Gal- braith appointed in his place. The latter was a stranger, and, as his actions show, a sort of an erratic character, in whom the In- dians had no confidence. There being no military guard to subdue the Indians, and no confidence, but numerous causes of complaint, true and imaginary, it needed but the spark to explode the whole
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powder-magazine. This was done by the outbreak commencing August 18th 1862, and lasting until about October of the same year. None of the actions of this struggle having happened on our soil we may refer the curious to other sources of [information about it. But we cannot omit to mention the effect this outbreak had on the people in this neighborhood. In Minnesota every one was scared out of his wits, even sometimes fifty or hundred miles from the point of danger, and well they might be. Of course, some resistance was soon organized, but if one-half of the men who ran away, would have united in small squads, armed as they probably all were, they would soon have found themselves superior in num- ber and equipment to those Indians, who were actually engaged in the work of destruction either from their own choice or by com- pulsion. Yet I do not want to cast any doubts upon their cour- age, considering that in Wisconsin, perhaps two hundred and fifty miles from the outskirts of the depredations so many sensible per- sons were scared out of all powers of reasoning.
I was at that time mayor of the City of Buffalo in this county. Knowing the distance between our place and the Indians, and the fact that the most populous part of Minnesota lay. between them and the Mississippi, I laughed at the idea that the war would ex- tend to us. But then there were a few hundred Chippewas up somewhere above Eau Claire, who in the imagination of some of my valiant fellow-citizens could be expected every moment. So one evening two men, both of them friends of mine, but neither of them fit for military service, rushed into our house, where my wife lay in confinement, clamoring about the supposed danger, scaring every one in the house, excepting myself. I did not attempt to allay their fears, but told them to go to- drilling their company, if they wanted to do so. The company. was never formed, nor attempted to be formed, the only effect of the rude intrusion was a more or less serious attack of sickness of Mrs. Kessinger, caused by fright.
But it was not only at Buffalo City that people were scared, for in the words of T. E. Randall in his history of the Chippewa Valley: "Many other villages were equally alarmed, and just as prompt to defend their homes; and all that seems wanting to make a bright page in our valley's history is the enemy. " . This last out- break of the Sioux was, among other things the cause of the
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twenty-fifth regiment of Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry being sent up into Minnesota, In this regiment quite a number of young men from this county had enlisted, as will be seen by reference to the tables on Volunteer Militia.
Before we take final leave of the Dakotas we will take a look into their tepees and see what sort of a life they led in them. The very first report we have of them asserts that they were polyga- mists, at least those among them who could afford to buy and support a plurality of wives. That almost unrestrained sexual in- tercourse and disregard of all decency chargeable to some tribes of the Iroquois-Huron relationship, has never been charged against the Sioux, but there seems to have been a feeling of jealousy dan- gerous to any intermeddler, and preservative of family connec- tions. Their government did most probably in ancient times have a similar organization to the one related in the "Wyandot Gov- ernment," and this organization was destroyed by the corrupting influence of the many treaties. The "Soldiers' Lodge" took its place, without formally superseding it. This process of disintegra- tion was encouraged by the government in the attempts of civiliz- ing the individual members of the bands nearest to the civilized people. Knowing that uncultured minds are greatly influenced by outward appearances, the government demanded the adoption of civilized dress, and the cutting off of the long hair, inclusive of the scalplock, as an outward sign of separation from the tribe and renunciation of its customs. This offended the Indians of the old style, and the blanket was made the honorary distinction of those who professed to be unmitigated savages. The half-breeds, of whom therere was, and still is, quite a number across the river in our immediate neighborhood, were seldom so savage, but always as careless and improvident as their relations of the full blood. As they were in many ways cared and provided for by the govern- ment by gifts of land and money, and had the selection of the best land in a fertile district, each of them might be well off, if they had been as willing to work, as they generally were to live very econ- omically. The Sioux after their transportation to the Wild West, are no longer of much interest to us as citizens of this [county or. state. The last time the nation made itself somewhat formidable, was, when " Sitting Bull " the chief of the " Ouc-pa-paws" defeated. Gen. Custer in the Big Horn district.
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We now turn to their ancient and constant enemies: THE OJIBWA CONFEDERATION.
Indian government, including what might be called " foreign affairs," which in this case means simply the relations to neighbor- ing and related tribes, was largely based on, and probably influ- enced by kinship. On that basis we might expect to hear of an Algonquin confederacy, but when we reflect on the relative situation of the tribes belonging to the great Algonquin relationship, we need not be surprised at the absence of a confederacy based on the common stock of language. I am rather unwilling to admit the stories told of the Ojibwas and much inclined to think it one of shallow accounts of the French, who never entered into the original meaning of a nation's name, but substituted one of their own, ex- pecting every other nation to submit to this incongruous nomen- clature. Their ancient prestige having departed, we take the lib- erty to reject the name of Sauteurs, Jumpers in English, for the Ojibwas. They, or at least a tribe of their name, were first noticed as dwelling on the east side of the straits connecting Lake Superior with Lake Huron, said straits being called, from the falls and rapids in the same, Sault St. Marie. This circumstance induced the superficial French to call them Sauteurs. Their nearest of kin were the the tribe of Missasaguas, though the latter name never became popular. They were also by language related to the Me- nomonees, or People of the Wild Rice, and to the Kinisteneaux, Kilistinaux, Cristineaux, or Cris, written Crees, who are yet exist- ing in Manitoba and the adjoining British possessions. It appears that the Menomonees, who gave their name to one of the rivers in the northeastern boundary of our state, were really never a very strong or numerous nation, and their habitat was east of the Me- nomonee River toward Little Bay de Noquet, and that at some time the Ojibwas began a movement toward the Gitchi Gummee, the Shining Big Sea Water, as it is called in Hiawatha, and that they thereafter occupied the southern shores of Lake Superior. They were the neighbors of the Dakotas, probably of the Assini- boin band of them, and found reason to call them " Nadonussioux," that is enemies, a name naturally reduced to Sioux (Soo) for con- venience. It seems that the Kristineaux and the Assiniboins were also at fighting terms, and that about 1679 Capt. Daniel Greysolon Du Luth negotiated the first peace between the contending parties,
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who lived about the southwest corner of Lake Superior. Some Sioux of the southern bands found Kristineaux among the Assini- boins, and killed them, which exasperated the latter so much that they separated from the Dakota confederacy and made common cause with the Ojibwas and Kristineaux. There was, after the Indian manner, a continued state of war, the issue of which was the extension of the Chippewa power and the gradual forcing of the Sioux towards the Mississippi. At the treaty of Prairie du Chien in 1825 almost every one was astonished at the claims of Hole-in-the-day regarding the boundary line between his people and the Dakotas. Being questioned in regard to it, he raised him- self up in his full dignity and said: "We conquered it!" This boundary line is fully described in the history of the Dakota Con- federation . The Chippewas, like most other Indian tribes or na- tions bartered away their lands in Wisconsin to the United States, and but very few of them remain in Wisconsin on reservations, some located on the shores of the lake, others on the headwaters of the river, which bears their name and drains a very considerable part of our state. There is no evidence of their ever having held possession of any part of this county, but it is very probable that they made frequent incursions into the land claimed by the Da- kotas. These incursions continued even after the Sioux had sold their lands east of the Mississippi to the United States which hap- pened in 1837. Both sides acted in perfect disregard of this treaty. In 1841 a party of Sioux came up to Eau Claire by invitation of the Chippewas to hold a friendly meeting and to smoke the pipe of peace.
A still more formal meeting was held in October 1846, when 150 braves, all mounted on ponies, came up to the Falls, and thence to Chippewa City and held a treaty of peace with their hereditary foes. Thomas E. Randall, the historian of the Chippewa Valley, was present on the occasion and describes it as follows:
Among them were the great chiefs, Wabasha, Red Wing and Big Thunder. Their first meeting took place at the Falls, about sunset, and was rather informal, owing to some misunderstanding. as to the place of meeting. The writer, (Mr.Randall) was present and heard part of the Reception Address, and subsequently learned from Ambrose -- one of the -- interpreters the substance of what was said on both sides. The Sioux remained mounted on their ponies during
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the entire interview. The Chippewa chiefs and braves were painted after their mode indicating peace, and the head chief advanced toward their guests with a large red pipe, made of stone from Pipe- stone mountain, in one hand, and in the" other a hatchet, which was thrown with considerable force, so as to partially bury it in the earth; then raising the pipe to his mouth, and taking a whiff or two, and, turning the stem toward the Sioux Chief, presented it to his acceptance. All was done in silence; the Sioux Chief re- ceived the pipe of peace also in silence, smoked a few whiffs, bowed respectfully as he handed back the pipe, reined his pony to the right, and awaited the next salution. The substance of it was: " Friends, we are glad you have come; we are anxious to make peace with the Sioux nation. As you have seen us throw down and bury the hatchet, so we hope you are inclined to make peace." The Sioux Chiefs then threw down whatever arms they held, and declared their purpose to maintain permanent peace. They said, their great father, the President, with whom they had never been at war, had requested them to conclude a lasting peace with the Chip- pewa nation; and although they had sold their lands on the east- side of the Mississippi, they still wanted to hunt there, and were glad that in future they could do so without fear."-This was all done through interpreters, several of whom were present on each side, and closed every sentence they repeated with the expression: "That's what we say."
The delegation met a much larger number of Chippewa Chiefs and braves the next day at Chippewa City, where the ceremonies were still more imposing, and a dinner was served, of which both parties partook. These demonstrations were so earnest, and seemed so sincere, that outsiders really supposed these hitherto mortal enemies had become fast friends. But in the summer of 1849 an event occurred that showed that one party to this treaty reposed very little confidence in the faith of the other.
This event, which Mr. Randall details fully, was the hanging of an Indian by some lawless ruffians at Chippewa Falls, for hav- ing wounded a Frenchman in defense of his home and honor. Hole-in-the-day, the Chippewa Chief, demanded the punishment of the parties, and they were arrested and sent to Prairie du Chien to jail under a guard of eight Chippewa braves, who volunteered for the purpose. But as the party approached that point on the
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Chippewa "half a day's march from the Falls;" alarm and terror seized the brave escorts, and nothing could induce them to go an- other rod, in such constant dread were they of the Sioux, who twenty months before had promised eternal friendship.
This treaty is probably a fair sample of treaties made in the latter days between the contracting parties in question. They remind one forcibly of the proverb of the pot calling the kettle black .- It is almost impossible to locate the smaller bands of the Chippewas by the descriptions of the multifarious treaties between them and the United States, and as none of them live near our own borders, we are not specially interested in them. The nation has become more and more dependent upon annuities, and in the course of time its character has been corrupted, so that but little good is to be expected of them. The earlier records, however, de- scribe them as brave and tractable, and more reliable than some of their neighbors. There was from very early times a large number of half-breeds among them, the French voyayeurs, coureurs de bois and traders having intermarried with them, as also many of the early settlers. Thomas E. Randall, who from his early settle- ment in the Chippewa Valley knew of numerous cases of such in- marrying, speaks in terms of praise of such of the Chippewa women, as had the good fortune to get decent husbands among the white settlers. He says they were faithful wives, tender mothers and careful housekeepers, remarking that if the males of the tribe would have shown themselves as capable of being civilized as those women, the problem of Indian civilization would have been easy to solve. He also mentions the custom of carrying about on their travels wooden representations of deceased children by the mothers, as the reader may remember to have found a description of the custom of widows of this nation.
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