History of Green County, Wisconsin. Together with sketches of its towns and villages, educational, civil, military and political history; portraits of prominent persons, and biographies of representative citizens, Part 14

Author: Union publishing company, Springfield, Ill., pub. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Springfield, Ill., Union publishing company
Number of Pages: 1168

USA > Wisconsin > Green County > History of Green County, Wisconsin. Together with sketches of its towns and villages, educational, civil, military and political history; portraits of prominent persons, and biographies of representative citizens > Part 14

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

CONCERNING THE FOX INDIANS.

[By Schoolcraft, 1820. |

The first we hear of these people [the Foxes] is from early missionaries of New France, who call them, in a list drawn up for the government in 1736, "Gens du Sang" and Miskaukis. The latter I found to be the name they apply to themselves. We get nothing, however, by it. It means red earth, being a compound from misk-wau, red, and aukie, earth. They are a branch of the great Algonquin family. The French, who formed a bad opinion of them as their history opened, bestowed on them the name of Renouard, from which we derive their long standing popular name. Their traditions attribute their origin to eastern portions of America. Mr. Gates, who acted as my inter- preter and is well acquainted with their lan- guages and customs, informs me that their tradi- tions refer to their residence on the north banks of the St. Lawrence, near the ancient cataraqui. They appear to have been a very erratic, spirited, warlike and treacherous tribe, dwelling but a short time at a spot, and pushing west- ward as their affairs led them, till they finally reached the Mississippi, which they must have crossed after 1766, for Carver found them liv- ing in villages on the Wisconsin. At Saginaw they appeared to have formed a fast alliance with the Sauks, a tribe to whom they are closely allied by language and history. They figure in the history of Indian events about old Michilli- mackinac, where they played pranks under the not very definite title of Muscodainsug, but are first conspicuously noted while they dwelt on the river bearing their name, which falls into Green bay, Wisconsin." The Chippewas, with

whom they have strong affinity of language, call them Outagamie, and ever deemed them a sanguinary and unreliable tribe. The French defeated them in a sanguinary battle at Butte de Mort, and by this defeat drove them from Fox river.

Their present numbers cannot be accurately given. I was informed that the village I visited contained 250 souls. They have a large village at Rock Island, where the Foxes and Sauks live together, which consists of sixty lodges, and numbers 300 souls. One-half of these may be Sauks. They have another village at the mouth of Turkey river; altogether they may muster from 460 to 500 souls. Yet, they are at war with most of the tribes around them, except the Iowas, Sauks and Kickapoos. They are en- gaged in a deadly and apparently successful war against the Sioux tribes. They recently killed nine men of that Nation, on the Terre Blue river, and a party of twenty men are now absent, in the same direction, under a half-breed named Morgan. They are on bad terms with the Osages and Pawnees, of the Missouri, and not on the best terms with their neighbors, the Winnebagoes.

I again embarked at 4 o'clock A. M. (8th). My men were stout fellows, and worked with hearty will, and it was thought possible to reach the prairie during the day by hard and late push- ing. We passed Turkey river at 2 o'clock, and they boldly plied their paddles, sometimes ani- mating their labors with a song; but the Mississippi proved too stout for us, and some- time after night-fall we put ashore on an island, before reaching the Wisconsin.

In ascending the river this day, I observed the pelican, which exhibited itself in a flock stand- ing on a low sandy spot of an island. This bird has a clumsy and unwieldy look, from the duplicate membrane attached to its lower mandible, which is constructed so as when inflated to give it a bag-like appearance. A short sleep served to restore the men, and we were again in our canoes the next morning (9th)

*This name was first applied to a Territory in 1836.

HISTORY OF GREEN COUNTY.

before I could certainly tell the time by my watch. Daylight had not yet broke when we passed the influx of the Wisconsin, and we reached the prairie under a full chorus and landed at 6 o'clock.

Waa between the Sucs und Foxes and the Sioux.

[I .- By Mrs. H. S. Baird, of Green Bay.]

During the first half of the present century, there existed between different Indian tribes of the north and west, a succession of sanguinary wars. The conflicts between the contending parties were marked by the characteristic traits of cruelty and ferocity of a barbarous race. The tribes engaged in these hostilities were the Sioux, Chippewas, Sacs, Foxes and Winneba- goes. Their battles were not always fought in their own country, nor on their own lands. Whenever and wherever a hostile party met, a contest was sure to be the result; and many incidents connected with this warfare were observed by the early settlers of Wisconsin, one of which I witnessed, and will relate.

In the month of May, 1830, with my family, I visited Prairie du Chien, on the Mississippi; we were guests of the late Joseph Rolette, then a trader, and agent of the American Fur Company. One evening, a few days after our arrival, we were startled by hearing the con- tinual and successive reports of fire-arms, ap- parently on the Mississippi below. The firing continued for an hour or more, and was suc- ceeded by sounds of Indian drums and savage yells, with an occasional discharge of guns.

The family having retired at the usual time, were aroused from their slumbers about mid- night by hearing foot-steps on the piazza, con- versation in the Indian language, and finally by knocking on the door and window shutters. Mr. Rolette immediately arose and went out to ascertain the cause of the disturbance, when he was informed that a bloody battle had been fought, and the visitors were the victors, and had called up their trader to inform him of their victory, and to obtain necessary spirit

water to celebrate the glorious event in regular savage style. Their wants were supplied, of course, when they took their leave, but not to sleep; neither could we sleep, as the warriors kept up through the night a most horrible pow- wow, enlivened by savage yells, all plainly within our hearing.

In the morning we heard the particulars of the savage fight, and during the day witnessed one of the most disgusting and revolting exhi- bitions that human beings could display.

On the day before the battle, or rather mas- sacre, a war party of some twenty or twenty- five Sioux encamped on an island opposite Prairie du Chien. They were there joined by a few Menomonees, who volunteered to assist their friends, the Sioux. It appears that the latter had previously received information that on that day a party of Sacs and Foxes, their inveterate enemies, would leave their village, situated on the Mississippi, some distance below Prairie du Chien, intending to visit the latter place; and that they would encamp for the night at a regular camping ground, near the mouth of the Wisconsin river.

In the afternoon of that day, the Sioux war party embarked in several canoes, and descend- ed the river. Arriving near the spot where they knew their intended victims would en- camp, they drew their canoes on land, and care- fully hid them in the thick woods, and then selected a spot covered with a dense growth of bushes, and within a short gun-shot of the landing place on the camping ground. Here, with true Indian cunning, they lay in ambush, awaiting the arrival of the unsuspecting Sacs and Foxes. No fire was made, and the still- ness of death reigned in the forest. Nor had they long to wait for the arrival of their foes.

Between sunset and dark, the party, in three or four canoes, arrived at the fatal landing place, and dis-embarked. It consisted of eighteen persons, one old chief, one squaw, one boy about fourteen years old and fifteen warriors. Upon landing, the party commenced

HISTORY OF GREEN COUNTY.

unloading the canoes. The concealed war party remained perfectly quiet, scarcely breath- ing, so that their victims might be completely surprised. After all had landed, and while carrying their effects on shore, leaving their guns and war-clubs in the canoes, the party in ambush bounded to their feet, with a horrible yell, and fired a murderous volley at the sur- prised party, by which all fell except one man and the boy. The former reached a canoe, seized a loaded gun, and discharged it, mortally wounding one of the Sioux; but the poor Sac was soon dispatched, and the only one of the eighteen who survived was the boy, who hap- pened to be in a canoe. He seized a paddle, pushed into the stream, and made his escape down the swift current of the river.

After the massacre, all who yet breathed were dispatched, and horribly mutilated. Hands, feet, fingers, ears and scalps were cut off, and more horrible still, the heart of the aged chief was cut from his breast, and all taken by the victors as trophies of the bloody conflict.

On the day succeeding the murder, the victo- rious party assembled, and accompanied by a few squaws, paraded the streets of Prairie du Chien, with the monotonous sounding drum and rattle, and displaying on poles the scalps and dismembered human fragments taken from the bodies of their victims. The whole party was painted with various colors, wore feathers, and carried their tomahawks, war-clubs and scalping-knives. Stopping in front of the principal houses in the village, they danced the war-dance and scalp-dance, ending with yells characteristic of incarnate devils.

The mangled limbs were still fresh and bleed- ing; one old squaw had carried on a pole the entire hand, with a long strip of skin from the arm of one of the murdered men, elevated above her head, the blood trickling down upon her hair and face, while she kept up the death-song, and joined in the scalp-dance. After this exhi- bition, which lasted two or three hours, the

warriors went to a small mound, about 200 yards from Mr. Rolette's residence, and in plain sight made a fire and roasted the heart of the old murdered chief, and then divided it into small pieces among the several warriors, who devoured it, to inspire them with courage, and "make their hearts glad."

The whole scene was shocking and disgust- ing in the extreme, and such a one, we hope, never again will be witnessed in a civilized com- inunity.

The incidents just related occurred in a town containing a civilized (?) population of 600 or 800 inhabitants, under the walls of the U. S. garrison, and within musket shot of the fort. Neither civil nor military authorities made any effort to prevent the exhibition of the revolting and savage trophies of the sanguinary battle. In the afternoon, the party of Sioux warriors embarked in their canoes and ascended the Mis- sissippi, on their return to their own village, leaving on the minds and memories of those who witnessed these horrible and frantic orgies recollections not soon to be forgotten.

II .- By James H. Lockwood.

In 1830 a party of Sauks and Foxes killed some Sioux, on or about the head-waters of Red Cedar river, in the now State of Iowa; and the same season a band of Fox Indians, who resided about where Dubuque now is, had occasion to visit Prairie du Chien on business with the agent, whom they had previously informed that they would arrive on a certain day. An Indian called the Kettle was their chief. It was gener- ally believed that John Marsh gave the Sioux information of the coming of the Foxes, and of the time they were expected; and on the morn- ing of the day appointed for the arrival of the Foxes at Prairie du Chien, a small war party of young Sioux made their appearance here, and joined by a few of the Menomonee young men, proceeded down the Mississippi to the lower end of the Prairie du Pierreaux, some twelve or fifteen miles below Prairie du Chien, where a narrow channel of the Mississippi runs close to

HISTORY OF GREEN COUNTY.

that end of the prairie, fringed with small trees, bushes and grass. They knew the custom of the Indians in going up stream to avail them- selves of all such side channels, as there was less current in them than in the broad river; and secreting themselves among the bushes, trees and grass, awaited their unsuspecting vic- tims. When the Foxes came within point blank shot, they all fired upon them, killing their chief Kettle and several others. The Foxes finding their chief killed, returned down the river to carry the news of their misfortunes to the tribe, while the Sioux and Menomonees returned home with the tidings of their victory and to dance over it. They passed through Prairie du Chien, and remained a short time here, but for some unaccountable reason no no- tice whatever was taken of it.

The signs of several war parties of the Foxes were reported to have been seen on the opposite side of the river during the year; but they ef- fected nothing until sometime, I think, in June, 1831, when a considerable number of Menomo- nees had collected at Prairie du Chien, and en- camped on an island near the eastern shore of the Mississippi, about one-fourth of a mile from the old Fort Crawford. They had obtained whisky enough for all to get socially drunk np- on-and it is rare to find a Menomonee who will not get drunk when he has a chance-and they had carried their revels far into the night, until men, women and children were beastly drunk. About two hours before day a Fox war party, that had been watching their movements, fell upon them in that helpless state and killed about thirty of them. By this time some of the more sober of them were aroused, and com- menced firing upon the Foxes, who fled down the river, pursued a short distance by the Me- nominees.

Thomas P. Burnett, the sub-Indian agent, was sleeping with me in my store. It being very warm weather, we had made a bed of blankets on the counter, when about two hours before daylight we were awakened by the cries of a

Menomonee woman at the store door. We let her in, when she told us.of the disaster to the Menomonees. Mr. Burnett took my horse and went to inform Gen. Street, the Indian agent, who lived about four miles above this, and who arrived about daylight and gave the first infor- mation to the fort. Although there had been a great firing of guns and hallooing among the Indians, the sentinels had reported nothing of it to the officers; but on hearing of the affair, the commandant immediately dispatched a com- pany of men in boats after the Foxes, but they did not overtake them. The government de- manded of the Sauks to deliver up the perpe- trators of this deed. The Foxes fled to the Sauks, and their chief, Kettle, being dead, they remained among and amalgamated with them, and have not since continued a separate Nation or tribe. I have always believed this to be the origin of the Black Hawk War. There were, I suppose, other causes of discontent, but I believe that this transaction was the immediate cause of the movements of Black Hawk.

III .- By John H. Fonda.

The same year, 1830, the Fox and Sauk Indi- ans killed some Sioux, at the head of Cedar river, in Iowa. Capt. Dick Mason* started with a number of troops for the scene of dis- turbance, and I went along as guide. We ar- rived at the place of the fight, found every- thing quiet and all we did was to turn about and go back the way we came.

Soon after, the Sioux and a number of Menom- onees attacked a party of Sauks and Foxes at Prairie du Pierreaux and killed some ten Indi- ans, among whom was Kettle, the great Fox chief.t

The Sauks and Foxes were coming up to a treaty unarmed, and the Sioux, made aware of this through their runners, got the Menomonees

*Richard B. Mason, a native of Virginia, was a Ist. l'eu- tenant in 1817, captain in 1819; served in the Black Hawk War; major of dragoons in 1833, lieutenant-colonel in 1836 aud colonel in 1846. He commanded the forces in California and was ex-officio governor 1847-18; brevetted brigadier-gen- eral and died at Jefferson Barracks, Mo., July 25, 1850. +This was in 1830.

HISTORY OF GREEN COUNTY.

and laid in ambush on the east shore. The unsuspecting Foxes were fired into from the ambuscade and their best warriors lost their scalps.

After the fight the Manomonees and Sioux came up here to have a dance over the scalps. The Indians presented a horrid appearance. They were painted for war and had smeared themselves with blood and carried the fresh scalps on poles. Some had cut off a head and thrust a stick in the throttle and held it on high; some carried a hand, arm, leg or some other portion of a body, as trophies of their success. They commenced to dance near the mound over the slough, but Col. Taylor soon stopped that by driving them across the main channel on to the Islands, where they danced until their own scalps went to grace the wigwams of the Sauks and Foxes.

In April, of 1831, I was in the hospital at Fort Crawford, when, through the influence of Col. Taylor and Dr. Beaumont, I got my dis- charge. When I was convalescent, which was about June, a war party of Sank and Fox Indi- ans came up from their part of the country to the bluff north of Bloody Run, from where they watched the Menomonees, who were encamped on an island opposite Prairie du Chien, a little north of the old fort. One night the Menomo- nee camp was surprised by the Sauk and Fox war party, and all in the camp killed except an Indian boy, who picked up a gun and shot a Fox brave through the heart and escaped. Af- ter massacreing, scalping and mutilating the bodies, the Fox Indians got into canoes and paddled down the river past the fort, singing their war songs and boasting of their exploits. Soldiers were sent to punish them, but I believe they failed to catch them. In the morning I helped to bury those killed. There were twenty- seven bodies, all killed with the knife and tom- ahawk, except the Fox brave shot by the boy. They were buried in three graves on the land- ing below the present Fort Crawford, and until within a few years the spot was marked by a

small muslin flag kept standing by the few Menomonees who lingered in this vicinity; but nothing is now left to preserve the graves from sacrilege, and soon the iron horse will course o'er the bones of those red men, long since gone to their happy hunting grounds.

After the Menomonee massacre, a warrior of that tribe was found in the old Catholic grave- . yard and buried. He had no wounds and it is thought that when the Foxes attacked the Indi- ans on the island, he got away and ran so fast that he had to lean against the wall to rest, and that he rolled over and died.

The Indian agency was removed this year to Yellow River and the Rev. Mr. Lowrey ap- pointed agent. It was afterwards removed to Fort Atkinson, Iowa. The mission buildings can be seen now on Yellow river, about five miles from its mouth.

II .- THE WINNEBAGOES.

The Nation which displaced the Sacs and Foxes npon the Wisconsin river and its contig- nous territory, including what is now Green county, was the Winnebago. It is now 250 years since the civilized world began to get a knowledge of the Winnebagoes-the "men of the sea," as they were called, pointing, possibly, to their early emigration from the shores of the Mexican gulf, or the Pacific. The territory now ineluded within the limits of Wisconsin, and so much of the State of Michigan as lies north of Green bay, Lake Michigan, the Straits of Mackinaw and Lake Huron were, in early time, inhabited by several tribes of the Algon- quin race, forming a barrier to the Dakotas, or Sioux, who had advanced eastward to the Mis- sissippi. But the Winnebagoes, although one of the tribes belonging to the family of the latter, had passed the great river, at some un- known period, and settled upon Winnebago lake. Here, as early as 1634, they were visited by John Nicolet, an agent of France, and a treaty concluded with them." Little more was

* C. W. Butterfield's History of the Discovery of the North- west, in 1634.

HISTORY OF GREEN COUNTY.

heard of the Winnebagoes for the next thirty- five years, when, on the 2d of December, 1669, some of that Nation were seen at a Sac village on Green bay, by Father Allonez.

As early at least as 1670, the French were ac- tively engaged among the Winnebagoes trading. "We found affairs," says one of the Jesuit mis- - sionaries, who arrived among them in September of that year, "we found affairs there in a pretty bad posture, and the minds of the savages much soured against the French, who were there trading; ill-treating them in deeds and words, pillaging and carrying away their mer- chandise in spite of them, and conducting themselves toward them with insupportable in. solences and indignities. The cause of this disorder," adds the missionary, "is that they had received some bad treatment from the French, to whom they had this year come to trade, and particularly from the soldiers, from whom they pretended to have received many wrongs and injuries. It is thus made certain that the arms of France were carried into the territory of the Winnebagoes over 200 years ago.

The Fox river of Green bay was found at that date a difficult stream to navigate. Two Jesuits who ascended the river in 1670, had "three or four leagues of rapids to contend with, when they had advanced one day's journey from the head of the bay, more difli- cult than those which are common in other rivers, in this, that the flints, over which they had to walk with naked feet to drag their ea- noes, were so sharp and so cutting, that one has all the trouble in the world to hold one's self steady against the great rushing of the waters. At the falls they found an idol that the savages honored; never failing, in pass- ing, to make him some sacrifice of tobacco, or arrows, or paintings, or other things, to thank him that, by his assistance, they had, in ascend- ing, avoided the dangers of the waterfalls which are in this stream; or else, if they had to ascend, to pray him to aid them in this perilous

navigation. The missionaries caused the idol to be lifted up by the strength of the arm, and cast into the depths of the river, to appear no more to the idolatrous savages."

The Winnebagoes, by this time, had not only received considerable spiritual instruction from the Jesuit fathers, but had obtained quite an insight into the mysteries of trading and traffic- ing with white men; for, following the foot- steps of the missionaries, and sometimes pre- ceding them, were the ubiquitous French fur traders. It is impossible to determine precisely what territory was occupied by the Winneba- goes at this early date, farther than that they lived near the head of Green bay.

A direct trade with the French upon the St. Lawrence was not carried on by the Winneba- goes to any great extent until the beginning of the eighteenth century. As early as 1679, an advance party of LaSalle had collected a large store of furs at the mouth of Green bay, doubtless in a traffic with this tribe and others contiguous to them; generally, however, the surrounding Na- tions sold their peltries to the Ottawas, who disposed of them, in turn to the French. The commencement of the eighteenth century found the Winnebagoes firmly in alliance with France, and in peace with the dreaded Iroquois. In 1718, the Nation numbered 600. They had moved from the Fox river to Green bay. They were afterward found to have moved np Fox river, locating upon Winnebago lake, which lake, was their ancient seat, and from which they had been driven either by fear or the prowess of more powerful tribes of the west and south- west. Their intercourse with the French was gradually extended and generally peaceful, though not always so, joining with them, as did the Menomonees, in their wars with the Iro- quois, and subsequently in their conflicts with the English, which finally ended in 1760.

When the British, in October, 1761, took pos- session of the French post, at the head of Green bay, the Winnebagoes were found to number 150 warriors only; their nearest village being

HISTORY OF GREEN COUNTY.

at the lower end of Winnebago lake. They had in all not less than three towns. Their country, at this period, included, not only that lake, but all the streams flowing into it, espe- cially Fox river; afterward extended to the Wisconsin and Rock rivers. They readily changed their course of trade-asking now of the commandant at the fort for English traders to be sent among them. In the Indian outbreak under Pontiac, in 1763, they joined with the Me- nomonees and other tribes to befriend the British garrison at the head of the bay, as- sisting in conducting them to a place of safety.

They continued their friendship to the Eng- lish during the revolution, by joining with them against the colonies, and were active in the Indian war of 1790-4, taking part in the at- tack on Fort Recovery, upon the Maumee, in the present State of Ohio, in 1793. They fought also on the side of the British in the War of 1812-15, aiding, in 1814, to reduce Prairie du Chien. They were then estimated at 4,500. When, in 1816, the government of the United States sent troops to take possession of the Green bay country, by establishing a garrison there, some trouble was anticipated from these Indians, who, at that date, had the reputation of being a bold and warlike tribe. A deputation from the Nation came down Fox river and re- monstrated with the American commandant at what was thought to be an intrusion. They were desirous of knowing why a fort was to be established so near them. The reply was that, although the troops were armed for war if nec- essary, their purpose was peace. Their response was an old one: "If your object is peace, you have too many men; if war, you have too few." However, the display of a number of cannon, which had not yet been mounted, satisfied the Winnebagoes that the Americans were masters of the situation and the deputation gave the garrison no further trouble.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Green County, Wisconsin. Together with sketches of its towns and villages, educational, civil, military and political history; portraits of prominent persons, and biographies of representative citizens, Part 14

Author: Union publishing company, Springfield, Ill., pub. [from old catalog] Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Springfield, Ill., Union publishing company Number of Pages: 1168

Author: Union publishing company, Springfield, Ill., pub. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Springfield, Ill., Union publishing company
Number of Pages: 1168