USA > Wisconsin > Monroe County > History of Monroe County, Wisconsin, past and present : including an account of the cities, towns and villages of the county [microform] > Part 2
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NICOLET COMES TO DOTY ISLAND.
Jean Nicolet was the first white man to visit the Winnebago. He was sent over these unknown lakes and rivers by Governor Champlain to make a treaty of peace between the Winnebago and the Hurons of Canada. He visited them with seven Huron savages in the summer of 1634, returning home the next year. As he approached their village, word was sent in advance to announce his mission, and the Winnebago sent out envoys to meet him. who gave him a warm welcome and carried his bag- gage. Word was sent out to the surrounding savages, and a great council was held with five thousand men, who indulged themselves in a barbaric banquet, in which the choicest dish was six score beaver tails. This was the first council held with the Indians in the region erected into the State of Wisconsin. There is no contemporary narrative inspired by Nicolet which gives a hint of the place at which this council was held, or the location of the Winnebago village, which was the objective point of Nicolet's voyage. The habitat of the Winnebago during this period must therefore be sought from other narratives and maps, and these clearly show the Winnebago village of 1634, and for two hundred years thereafter, to have been at the foot of Lake Winnebago, and from the later accounts, which give a more exact locus in quo, on Doty island, on what is now the cities of Menasha
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IHISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY
and Neenah, on the Fox river, yet on the shore of Lake Winnebago.
It has been therefore stated that Champlain's map of 1632, made two years before Nicolet's visit named the "Nation des Puans. " on "Lae des Puans. " Also the map of Jean Boissean's of 1643 which is found in Lennox Library in New York, and published in "Jesuit Relations," has "La Nation des Puans," on "Las des Puans," which discharges through "R. des Puans." The next map to mention the tribe is that of Marquette. His journal of the famous voyage through the river valley was pub- lished in Paris by Thevenot in 1681. with his real map of the voyage. It places the "Puans" village at the foot of Lake Winnebago. The master of this voyage was Joliet, and his map also places the "Puans" village at the foot of Lake of the Winne- bago. Father Hennepin also places the word "Ocitagan" against Lake Winnebago on his map. dated 1698. He also was a traveler among them and this is his attempt to spell their own name. rendered by the Nicolet century while those of the next century, which show the village, all place it at the foot of the lake, which always bore their name.
There is no historic reference narrative of travel or maps which places the Winnebago at any location other than Lake Winnebago during the century in which Nicolet visited the re- gion, nor until 1760 when they seem to have divided into three villages with their head village still on Lake Winnebago.
Perrot visited the Fox river region for a number of years, and took some of the Winnebago with the other tribes to the great council at Sault Ste. Marie when Sr. Lusson took formal posses- sion of the West. in the name of the French king. In 1690. while in this valley, the Fox tribes who resided on the west shore of the Little Lake Butte des Morts. contemplated treachery to Perrot, and he was informed of their intentions by the "chief of the Puans," who acted as his messenger and remained his stead- fast friend. He advised and helped to prevent the Foxes making an alliance with the Iroquois of New York, which they contem- plated. and Perrot was determined to prevent.
IN THE FOX WARS.
Later in the long Fox war they formed a third party in an alliance between the Foxes and Sank, and were ever present with the Foxes in that long battle which they raged against the French throughout the Fox river valley and the prairie of the
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THE WINNEBAGO TRIBE
Illinois. This was the war to save the region of the golden fleece to the fur trade of France, in which the war whoop of the Foxes was heard around the world; "a dreary half century of spas- modie conflict, which absorbed the attention and helped to drain the treasury of New France, contributing not a little to her downfall"; meanwhile, as Bancroft remarks. the "Foxes were a nation, passionate and untamable, springing up into new life from every defeat, and though reduced in the number of their warriors, yet present everywhere by their ferocious enterprise and savage daring." Throughout those long years of frontier warfare the Winnebago were everywhere the silent allies, wearing the livery of the forest and committing the terror of their name to strike dismay to the border post. And though the Foxes are mostly mentioned the French were aware of close friendship to their allies, the Winnebago. As early as 1714 Ramezay had reported the Winnebago as friendly to the Foxes, which date the colonial office at Paris had determined on the extermination of the Fox tribe. At this time Father Marest writes the governor that "the Puans were sixty brave men, all boatmen."
The long enmity between the Winnebago and the Illinois was a part of the French war, and a relic of ancient days when the Winnebago had been almost destroyed by the Illinois. The Win- nebago were with the Foxes in their raids against this tribe in 1723. Captain DeLignery was sent up the river in 1724, and called a council of the tribes at the old French fort at Green Bay. Those present were the Winnebago, Foxes, and Sauk. The council to induce the tribes to cease their war on the Illinois was fruitless, as the Winnebago declared the Illinois retained some of their tribe prisoners, and an exchange must be effected before a treaty. However, the difference seemed to have been compro- mised, as at a council held hy the same officer June 7, 1726, with the Winnebago, Foxes, and Sauk, a treaty was settled by which these tribes consented not to fight the Illinois again. Very soon after this, however, war broke out afresh and the frontier rang with the savage war cry.
The French had sent an army against the Fox palisade or Fort village on the west shore of Little Lake Butte des Morts, under de Louvigny, in 1716, opposite the Winnebago village on the eastern shore. The three days' battle and siege had resulted in a treaty of peace, but in which the French had no confidence. They determined to establish a post in the border of the Sioux country to prevent an alliance with the Foxes and that powerful
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HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY
tribe of the plains. This equipment with soldiers and goods for trade made their way over Fox river towards the head of Lake Pepin. to establish this post. The journal of the voyage was made by Father Guignes. As they passed the Fox river he says of the visit to the Winnebago. August 14, 1727: "The chief met him there three leagues from their village with peace calumets and refreshments of bears' meat. and escorted them into their village mid discharge of musketry and great demonstrations of joy. requesting them to remain some time. There were sixty to eighty men in the village. Both men and women are tall and well built. They are located on the borders of a pretty lake at thirty-five miles from LaBaye and eight leagues from the Foxes." The Foxes seem to have been on the upper Fox river at this season.
When Captain DeLignery arrived at LaBaye with his expedition against the Foxes. composed of four hundred fifty Frenchmen and one thousand two hundred savages. in the month of August, 1728. he captured three Winnebago whom he handed over to the tribes. They put them to death with slow torture and ate them. He then pushed on up the Fox river to the village of the Winnebago on the Doty island, which had been abandoned several days before. and burned the wigwams and fort, and ravaged their fields of Indian corn, which is their principal article of food.
In pursuance of their policy to combine all the tribes against the Foxes. the French in some manner bought over the Winne- bago, the lifelong friends of the Foxes and Sauk. So we read that in the autumn of 1729 word was brought to Quebec by information given by the Indians, of an attack by the Winne- bago, Ottawa and Menominee on a Fox village, in which there were killed one hundred Fox warriors and seventy women and children. Among the killed of the assaulting party were four of the Winnebago. The Winnebago having broken up their neighbors and friends, the Foxes, by the treacherous and un. provoked slaughter, were now in terror for the consequences of their miserable aets. Further attempts against the Fox tribe were projected from Quebec and by the fall of 1729 Sieur Captain Marin appeared at the old French fort at Green Bay and repaired its fallen roofs. He had with him ten Frenchmen. On Septem- ber 10 the Winnebago returned from their hunt and went to Marin to assure him that they still remained faithful to the French, presenting him with three slaves. They were rewarded by powder, bullets, hatchets, guns and knives. Some days after. having ascertained that the Foxes were not in the country, the
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THE WINNEBAGO TRIBE
Winnebago took their families and camped on Dendo island, where "their former fort stood." But very soon the Foxes and Sank surprised some Winnebago fisherman, and then began a long siege of the Winnebago, by erecting on the Doty island water side two forts to command the water in all directions. The siege lasted two months; but was finally abandoned after Marin came with the Menominee to aid the Winnebago.
Before 1739, after being at enmity with the Foxes for ten years, the old friendship was revived, and at a council in Quebec, held that year with the western savages, the Winnebago chief spoke for merey for the Foxes, some representatives of whom were present. The following year, at a council held in Montreal, the Winnebago chief again spoke for the good will of the French for "their kinsman, the Foxes and Sauk." The next year they appeared in Montreal again and reported they had returned to their home on Doty island. While at a council at Quebec the next year the Mayoba, chief of the Mascoutins, whispered to Beau- harnois that the Winnebago sought refuge in their village the year before, as they feared the Foxes. At this council the Winnebago said half of their village had returned to its old home and half was at Rock river. The Rock river band were notified to join the Fox river band and form one village. Serotchon and Chelanois were Winnebago chiefs present and promised medals by Beauharnois; but he had none then to bestow, they must wait until next year. Sieur de Clignancourt had sole right in 1747 to trade at Green Bay with the Winnebago.
IN OTHER BORDER WARS.
By some very ancient maps in possession of Mr. Hames B. Albrigt, of Milwaukee, which bear dates of 1755, 1756, 1757, the "Otehagras" village is marked against Lake Winnebago. About this time the De Langlades had settled in Wisconsin as the first pioneers, and in a few years the great war between France and England has its influence on this farthest frontier, where the bold warrior, Captain Charles de Langlade, was appointed to command the western tribes. With his motley throng of savages there were about one hundred Winnebago, and midst the din of Brad- doek's defeat was "mingled the blood curdling screech of the Winnebago." They were at the council, with Montcalm, on the banks of Lake George; and at the massacre of Fort William Henry, and at the fall of Quebec.
After the Fleur de Lis was hauled down from Quebec and
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HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY
England took all Canada under her authority, commandants and soldiers were sent west to assume command of the ancient border posts, which had been under the gentle sway of France since the first white men came. By 1762 Lient. James Gorrell was in com- mand of the remnants of the old French fort at Green Bay, and held a council with the Winnebago chief, who promised to send the belt he had received to the other two chiefs of his nation. Ile reports soon after that "a chief belonging to a second Puans town arrived. " In August the Winnebago chief from the third town came and declared he had never fought against the English. They all requested a gunsmith, a trader and rum. The following summer (1763). when Captain Etherington, after the massacre at Old Mackinaw, sent word to Gorrell to go to him with the garrison, the Winnebago were among the four Indian tribes which formed his escort.
In his Journal Lient. James Gorrell reports of the "Indian warriors, besides women and children depending on the post at Green Bay, " there were " Puans. 150 at the end of Puan's lake (Winnebago) and over against Louistonant." It was in 1766 that the celebrated Capt. Jonathan Carver made his voyage up the historic Fox river and pased four days enjoying the hos- pitality of the Winnebago village on Doty island, then presided over by their queen, Glory of the Morning, or Hopokoekau, who had married Sebrevoir De Carrie, an officer of the French army. who after resigning in 1729 became the first trader among the Winnebago. Three sons and one daughter were born to the union. He reentered the army and died for his flag before Que- bec. April 28, 1760. Captain Carver called the village "the great town of Winnebago," and said it contained fifty houses which were strongly built with palisades.
During the war of the Revolution there was not a friend of the colonists in all Wisconsin, and Capt. Charles de Langlade. now in the red uniform of a British officer, recruited his dusky troops from among the Winnebago to join Burgoyne's invasion, but all had abandoned the English general before his surrender. The Winnebago received a war belt from De Peyster. in command at Old Mackinaw, and had notice to be ready to go to Hamilton's aid, at Vincennes, in the autumn of 1778. In the party of savages who went down the Mississippi in the spring to aid Hamilton, but returned on receiving word of his surrender to George Roger Clark, there were Winnebago. On their return to old Mackinaw with Goutier the Winnebago were at once sent (in June. 1779) south through Michigan to commit depredations and "bring in
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THE WINNEBAGO TRIBE
some prisoners." The Winnebago repaired to Montreal with other western savages under De Langlade, and returned on news of the operations of George Roger Clark in Illinois. When Lieu- tenant-Governor Sinclair sent the army of savages under Captain de Langlade to the massacre of St. Louis, there was a band of Winnebago, as usual, in his party. The assault on the embank- ment at the stone warehouse was made by the Winnebago, who left one chief and three warriors dead on the parapet, while four others were badly wounded, the only casualty of the expedition. Governor Sinclair reports in July, 1780, sending sixty Winnebago and a party of other Indians south to the Ohio and Wabash rivers to intercept convoys of provisions intended for Americans in the Illinois region.
After the close of the Revolutionary war the British fur trader had no intention of giving up the rich fur bearing region of Wisconsin, and began at once to keep the savages in good feeling. by a liberal distribution of presents, an annual favor which was accorded the Winnebago and others for many years and until after the close of the last war in 1815. At the instance of the merchants of Montreal in 1787, after the cession of the region now Wisconsin, the British seut Mr. Ainsee up the Fox river to the Mississippi with a "canoe loaded with thirteen bales of goods" for presents to Wisconsin savages. At the Portage he "assembled all the Puants to give them a speech and made them presents of goods, rum and tobacco." In the same report Ainsee gives the number of Puants as 340 men in "the village of the Puants altogether."
The principal or head village of the Winnebago was still on Lake Winnebago, as it had been since long prior to the coming of Nicolet in 1634. The first record of any other village was the reference given from Gorrell in 1762. During the Revolution. when Gontier took to the woods on snowshoes to rouse the clans for the spring campaign in 1778. he mentions "the great village of the Puants of the lake, which was the strongest one."
Antoine LeClaire. a trader who settled in Milwaukee in 1800. mentions sending out "engages" to trade with the Indians, "on Winnebago lake to the Winnebago." The merchants of Montreal reported to the agents of the crown, in 1786, that the Winnebago numbered six hundred men, and had their first village only twelve leagues (thirty miles) from "LaBaye," and being on the road to the Mississippi, they are frequently troublesome to the traders passing. This system of claiming to own the river and exacting presents for the right to pass had been practiced for
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HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY
many years by the tribe, and had been a frequent cause of strife between the Winnebago on Doty island and the numerous traders obliged to stem the tides of the Fox river to reach their posts along the Mississippi river.
The frontier disquiet of the Indians, inspired by British agents, finally resulted in sending Mad Anthony Wayne into the border lands of Ohio, where he fought several successful battles with the savages, the most desperate and successful one being that near Manmee City. in Ohio, on the 30th day of August. 1794. The Winnebago had been led into these border troubles and were among the savages defeated in that disastrous battle. Mr. Wil- liam J. Snelling relates that he remembers a Winnebago at the Wisconsin portage who met travelers with a human hand dangling on his breast, which he had taken from a Yankee soldier at Tippecanoe, and says sixty Winnebago were killed in that battle. The last war with England was declared on June 19. 1812. by the President's proclamation. Before it was possible to reinforce the small garrison at Fort Mackinaw, on the island of that name, it was surprised and captured and held during the war as a rally outpost of the British, from which the savages of Wisconsin were constantly recruited to add to the frontier hor- rors of that war. It is said that after the eapture of Proctor's camp in the battle of the Thames, bales of scalps were discovered on which had been paid a bounty by the British agents. The Winnebago took part in many of the important movements of the British on the western border. When Col. Robert Dickson, the "Red Head." gathered the tribes for the English in 1812, he ran into Green Bay with 100 Sioux, and enlisted Tomah and the Grizzly Bear with 100 Menominee, and a large body of Winne- bago led by Teal. One-eyed Decorah and other chiefs. They voyaged over to Mackinac island and captured the fort from the Americans, July 17, 1812, without a blow. after which the Winne- bago and Sioux returned home. In the spring of 1813. when Colonel Diekson rallied the clans again for the war, there sailed out of the Fox river on his train. beside the Sioux and Menom- inee. a considerable band of Winnebago under their chiefs. Old Decorah. Carrymaunee. Winnocheek, Peshou, or the Wild Cat, Sansamaunee. Black Wolf. Sarcel, or the Teal. and Neokantah. or Four Legs, with Michael Brisbois as their interpreter. Arriving at Fort Meigs too late for the action, they retired to Detroit. from whenee they sailed under Proctor and Dickson to Sandusky and attacked the fort so gallantly defended by the young Maj. George Croghan, where they were defeated. In June, 1813.
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THE WINNEBAGO TRIBE
Colonel Dickson emerged at Mackinac from a long sojourn among the Wisconsin tribes, bringing with him 600 savages and their families, to be sent to General Proctor as a part of his force. There were 130 Winnebago in the party. After eating nearly all of Proctor's available provisions and committing wanton depreda- tions on the settlers' live stock the Wisconsin Indians returned home. During the winter of 1813-14 a delegation of Wisconsin savages visited Quebec, where they were warmly welcomed by Sir George Prevost.' The Winnebago were represented by Lassamic.
The expedition under the British Col. William MeKay, which surprised and captured the American fort Shelby at Prairie Du Chien, July 17. 1814, had with them a band of 100 Winnebago under their chiefs, Pesheu or Wild Cat. Sarcel or Teal, Carry- maunee, Winnocheek, Sar-ra-chau, Neokantah or Four Legs, and Black Wolf. As MeKay's fleet of barges and canoes floated down the Wisconsin, a Winnebago was in the party of seouts, who went under cover of night into the town and captured a citizen. whom they carried away to get information. In deploying before the fort the Winnebago took post above the fort. Two of the Winnebago, discovering some hams in a house, mounted to the roof and began to tear off the shingles to gain an entrance and were both shot in the thigh. On the second day of the siege Colonel MeKay assembled the Indian chiefs and requested their consent to an assault, but the Winnebago chief, Sarcel or the Teal, demurred, saying he and his people remembered taking part with the English in assaulting an American fort, when they were beaten back with terrible slaughter. Sarcel proposed to dig a trench in the sand and blow up the fort, to which Colonel MeKay agreed : but after a few hours' labor the Indians tired of the work and refused to go ahead. After the surrender, and just before the time appointed for the Americans to give up their arms, a Winnebago cut off the finger of a soldier whose hand was thrust through a port hole in friendly greeting. In his reports Colonel MeKay mentions the Winnebago as in the Indian contingent, and says of them that they were "perfectly useless to him," and severely criticises them. They would not receive officers' orders unless he "held a blanket in one hand and a piece of pork in another."
Col. Robert Diekson on his way to the British garrison at Prairie Du Chien in the fall of 1814, caught by the freezing of Lake Winnebago at Doty Island and forced to remain the winter, writes in the spring: "I shall move from this as soon as I can,
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HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY
as the Puants are beginning to draw around me, and one had as well be in hell as with them." After the peace the British hekl a couneil June 3. 1815, at Mackinaw, between Sau-sa-man-nec. Black Wolf, Neokantah or Four Legs, and forty warriors. Sau- sa-man-nee was the orator for his people and his speech is recorded. Judge Lockwood reports their number in 1816 as 900 warriors, from estimates of the traders best acquainted with them. The treaty made with a portion of the Fox tribes Novem- ber 3, 1804, which caused so much dissatisfaction among members of that tribe, was confirmed at a council held at St. Louis, May 18. 1816, at which those Winnebago present. residents of Wis- consin, confirmed that part of the treaty which was supposed to grant their rights in the lands of the lead region.
THE NEW YORK INDIANS.
The Winnebago were involved in the immigration of the New York Indians by the range of their hunting grounds. The Winno- bago and Menominee, August 18. 1821, granted to the New York tribes a ribbon of land diagonally across the state five miles wide. the strip crossing the Fox river at Little Chute. At this time the Menominee claimed all Green Bay and the shore of Lake Michigan to the mouth of the Milwaukee river and west to the Mississippi river in a northwest direction. The Winnebago claimed all the balance of the state north and west of the Fox river and Lake Winnebago. The following summer the New York Indians returned to urge a larger grant: but on coming into a council the Winnebago refused to concede any further grants and left in a body to go on their hunt. Before leaving. however, they were induced to favor the visitor with an exhibi- tion of their war dance, pipe dance and begging dance, which are graphically described by General Ellis, who adds: "The Winnebago exhibited the largest. most perfectly formed men and women ever seen anywhere. The display of action and muscle in the danees struck the beholder with admiration and terror. The ring around the dancers of several thousand. all singing in «horns to the chief drummer, the voices of the Winnebago women prevailing in clarion tone above the whole." August 11. 1827. was a treaty concluded at the Little Butte des Morts. "the Hill of the Dead." on the west bank of the lake of that name. now in the town of Menasha, between the Winnebago. Menominee and New York Indians, by which the above tribes ceded their lands in the Fox valley to the United States. Lewis Cass and
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THE WINNEBAGO TRIBE
Thos. L. Mckinney were the commissioners. This council was held during the Winnebago war, so called. It was attended by five thousand savages. Colonel Whistler, while on his journey up the Fox river from Fort Howard to join General Atkinson at Portage. remained with his regiment at the Little Butte des Morts as the Governor's guard until the close of the council, when he resumed his journey up stream. During the council the Winne- bago were notified that they must give up the murderers. It is said to have been due to this council that brought the surrender at Portage the next month on the arrival of Colonel Whistler. There is a painting of the Little Butte des Morts council made by Lewis, "painted on the spot," in his rare portfolio of frontier scenes.
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