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He claims indeed to have so intimidated these savages that they had promised "not only to break their alliance with our enemies, but to fight them and do whatever I command." One cannot but suspect this sudden repentance on the part of the too contrite savages. At any rate, the French were greatly alarmed. "If
(1) Lettre de Bienville au Conseil de Regence. Margry, VI, 386.
(2) Lettre, Jan. 11, 1724. Margry, VI, 466.
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these nations had raised the hatchet against us," continues M. de Bourgemont, "the Mayas and Paninkas would certainly have joined them. I doubt even whether we should have been able to sustain ourselves at Fort Chart- res."
The sinister influence of the Foxes extended even into the far South. There, according to Charlevoix,' they entered into alliance with the Chickasaws, who, gathering around them all the hostile elements on the Lower Missis- sippi gained famous victories over the French. It was this diversion that saved the Foxes from utter ruin, at the crisis of their misfortunes.
Such, then, was this great confederation built up by the genius of the Foxes, one which, con- sidering the vast extent of territory over which it stretched, the number of tribes and the di- versity of races which it included, is utterly without a parallel in the history of the Ameri-
can Indians. The French pretended that it was the result of the intrigues of the English whom they saw everywhere, as people see ghosts in a graveyard. But there is no proof nor likelihood of any active co-operation on the part of the English. The league rose as we have described, the spontaneous work of
(1) History of New France, V, 309.
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HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
savages, who desired freedom and hated the French.
Nor did the Foxes, amidst the toils of diplo- macy, neglect the work of war. Their attacks upon the Illinois went on unceasingly until all the latter, excepting one tribe, were compelled to flee far southward and seek protection under the guns of Fort Chartres. The tribe which did not flee, the Peorias, had taken refuge on Rock St. Louis. This famous rock, the whilom capital of La Salle's imaginary kingdom, was one of Nature's fortresses. Standing on the very brink of the Illinois river, it rose one hun- dred and twenty-five feet above the water's level. Its front over-hanging the river and both its sides were steep as castle walls; but in the rear was a narrow path-way by which the height could be scaled. The level summit, about an acre in extent, gave ample room for defense and afforded a grand view of the sur- rounding country-the undulating prairie, the distant hills, the shining river fenced by nar- row strips of forest.
It was a formidable stronghold; but the un- daunted Foxes determined to take it. Unluck- ily we know nothing of the details of the siege, except the number of the slain; twenty Peorias and one hundred and twenty of the besiegers.
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THE GREAT CONFEDERACY.
But the bare figures are eloquent; they tell, not of a mere blockade, but of fierce assaults, storming parties, desperate attempts to scale the heights-the old story of the Foxes' fury and reckless courage. Soon, however, word was carried to the commandant at Fort Chart- res, and he prepared to march to the rescue of his allies, with a force of one hundred and forty Frenchmen and four hundred savages. But before he arrived upon the scene, the Foxes raised the siege and marched away; they saw that with so large a force threatening their rear, the capture of the Rock was impossible.
The attack seems a piece of splendid folly; but in the end its wisdom was fully justified. For, as soon as the siege was over, the besieged Peorias prepared to flee; they saw themselves at the mercy of the Foxes from whom there was no security, except on the barren summit of Rock St. Louis; and they, therefore, deter- mined to join the other Illinois tribes in the South. And no persuasion of the French could keep them from instantly putting this project into execution. "It was a grave dis- aster for the French," Charlevoix says.1 "For now, that there was nothing to check the raids
(1) History of New France, VI, 71.
-
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of the Foxes, communication between Canada and Louisiana became much less practicable.
The French, however, made every effort to keep control of the Illinois river. Not long after the events just narrated, Sieur de St. Ange drew a large body of the Foxes into an ambus- cade and cut them to pieces. Other of their bands met with a similar fate. "But," writes Charlevoix, "their fury increased as their forces diminished. On every side they have raised up new enemies against us. The whole course and neighborhood of the Mississippi is infested with Indians with whom we have no quarrel, and yet who give to the French no quarter."
CHAPTER VIII.
EXTERMINATION BY FAMINE.
1726-1728.
On the 7th of June, 1726, at Green Bay, a grand council with the Sauks, Winnebagoes and Foxes was held by M. de Lignery, with whom were D'Amariton, the commandant of the post, and Chardon, its missionary. As usual upon such occasions, the savages were contrite and apologetic. They threw the
blame for the past upon the impetuosity of their young warriors. "It is not without diffi- culty," said the chief of the Sauks, "that we have gained over our young men." The Win- nebago chief spoke in the same strain. "We old men do not agree with our young men, for if they sustained us they would never do any of these bad things." Then he began to ac- cuse the Foxes. "They are numerous, my father. It is they who invite our young men to do as they do for the fear they have of them." I
(1) Cass Manuscripts. Wis. His. Coll., III, 152, 3. 8
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HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
On all sides there was a great clamor for peace. "The chiefs of the nations said, with tears, that there was no hope except in obedi- ence." But on both sides it was all a farce -- the handshaking of pugilists in the prize ring, before the brutal fight begins. The French neither expected nor desired peace; they were bent upon the destruction of the Foxes.
Even before the convening of the council, M. de Siette, commanding in the Illinois country, had written to M. de Lignery "that the Foxes were afraid of treachery, and that the surest mode of securing our object is to destroy and exterminate them."' But the French authorities hesitated, not from any horror of such butchery, but because the at- tempt would be dangerous and expensive. "We agree that this would be the best expedi- ent, but we maintain that nothing can be more dangerous or more prejudicial to the colonies than such an enterprise, in case it should fail." The King of France wrote the governor gen- eral to the same effect-"for there is the un- certainty of success, and the consequences of a failure might be frightful, besides the enter- prise would cause a heavy expenditure."2
(1) Ibid., p. 148.
(2) Memoire of the French Kingl to Beauharnois and Dupuy, on the Fox War, 29th April, 1727.
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EXTERMINATION BY FAMINE.
The French, therefore for the time being, assumed a gentler tone. For the sake of con- ciliation they were willing even to forego the pleasure of burning their prisoners. "The Foxes testified to me," writes M. de Lignery, "that some of their nation had been given to the French, who had burned them upon the spot; this had completely exasperated them and made them anxious to kill." An order was now issued by the governor general to discontinue this practice; but in the order there was no tinge of a blush for the past. Burning men alive was simply inexpedient. "It has only served to irritate the Fox people and arouse the strongest hatred against us."1
A peculiar piety lingered about this ferocity of the French. A little before the meeting of the council at Green Bay, the governor had addressed a deputation of Chippewas at Que- bec; and had condoled with them on account of their losses in war. "But it appears to me," he added, "that Heaven has revenged you for your losses, since it has given you the flesh of a young Fox to eat."? What shall be said of a religion that could speak of the Supreme Being as actively engaged in provid-
(1) Ibid., p. 149.
(2) Ibid., p. 166.
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HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
ing young and tender victims for a cannibal feast?
The peace of 1726 then was a mere mock- cry. It was a temporary truce during which the French were busily preparing for the slaughter of the Foxes. "In the meantime," writes De Lignery,' "we are laboring by way of La Pointe to detach the Sioux from their alliance. We endeavor also to stop their passage to the Iroquois, those Indians having offered them an asylum." Thus all avenues of escape, either to the cast or the west, were to be closed against the doomed nation.
To carry out this purpose so far as the Sioux were concerned, the French had been long trying to establish a trading post on the Mis- sissippi. But the art and fury of the Foxes had prevented. In 1725, Chardon, missionary at Green Bay, had written to his Superior that it was impossible to send an expedition or mis- sionaries to the Sioux on account of the Foxes who declared defiantly that they would never permit the French to pass because it would greatly diminish their own trade; and they had killed several Frenchmen who at different times had attempted it.2 But now that the
(1) Letter to M. de Siette, June 19, 1726. Ibid., p. 154.
(2) Lettre de Longueil et Begon au Minister de Marine. Margry, VI, 513.
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EXTERMINATION BY FAMINE.
truce was established, another effort was made. A trading corporation, the company of the Sioux, was formed; and in June, 1727, an ex- pedition commanded by La Perriere de Boucher, of infamous memory, with a few soldiers and traders and two missionaries, was dispatched from Montreal.
The voyagers reached Green Bay safely, thence pushed up the river past the village of the Winnebagoes, and about eight leagues be- yond came in sight of the long, low cabins of the Foxes. The town built upon a slight eminence by the river side, contained -accord- ing to Inignas, one of the missionaries, who gives an account of the voyage™-only two hundred warriors. But it fairly swarmed with boys from ten to fourteen years of age who would soon be able to fill the places of the countless braves slain in the long warfare against the French.
The little party drew near to the town with many misgivings; for this was the critical point of their journey. But peace had been recently established, and the savages were on their good behavior. "Of all nations, the Foxes are the most dreaded by the French," Guignas says, "but we found in them nothing to fear. As
(1) Lettre a Beauharnois. Margry, VI, 554.
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soon as our canoes touched the shore they came to us with their pipes lighted, although it was raining heavily. And everybody smoked."
A council was called; the French were read- ily permitted to procced, and went on their way rejoicing, They soon arrived at Lake Pepin. There, at about the middle of the west side of the lake, upon a low spit of sand nearly opposite to the famous Maiden Rock, they built Fort Beauharnois.1 So much at least, the French had gained by their treaty of peace with the "faithless Foxes."
This accomplished, the French threw aside the mask, declaring that peace was no longer possible. They claimed that war parties were still going from Wisconsin against the Illinois. They were alarmed at the encroachments of the English who had recently built a stone fort at Oswego, on Lake Ontario, and were said to be intriguing with the Indians for the expulsion of the French from the West. The Foxes, it was reported, had accepted the belts of the English, and had declared that they would not suffer the French to remain in their country. "The colony," wrote the governor and intend-
(1) Neill. Early Wisconsin Exploration. Wis. Hist. Coll., X, 302. Also Draper, Ibid., p. 371.
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EXTERMINATION BY FAMINE.
ant to the king, "is reduced to an extremity which justifies war."
The colonial authorities were so eager to begin their fiendish crusade that they did not even wait for the approval of the king; and for this they were censured by the home government. But they amply justified themselves on two grounds. First; "it was already known that the court had nothing so much at heart as the destruction of the Foxes."1 Secondly; "the intrigues of the English and thewar part- ies which the Foxes were raising every day did not allow them to defer this expedition for a year without endangering the loss of the whole country."?
The preparations for the campaign were car- ried on with the utmost secrecy. The Cana- dians and friendly Indians were notified to hold themselves in readiness for a movement the next spring against the new English fort at Oswego; and until the last moment they knew nothing of their real destination. "It is the intention," wrote De Beauharnois to the king,
(1) Cass Manuscript. Wis. Hist. Coll., III, 164.
(2) Memoire of De Beauharnois. Smith, History of Wisconsin, I, 343. Note. Just before the starting of the expedition, the king wrote: "His Majesty is persuaded of the necessity of destroying the Fox nation." Letter of the king, 14 May, 1728. N. Y. Documents, IX, 1005.
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"to make this war a brilliant affair; and it is therefore of the utmost importance that the Foxes should not be informed of the design."1
The expedition, commanded by M. de Lig- nery, left Montreal on the 5th of June, 1728. It was composed of four hundred Frenchmen and nearly nine hundred savages from many nations, but chiefly converted Iroquois and Hurons. A large re-enforcement of Indians was expected at Mackinac. The commandant in the Illinois country had also been ordered to meet the expedition at Green Bay with all his force, French and Indian.2 All this against a · handful of savages that did not now prob- ably number five hundred fighting men.
The army toiled painfully over the usual route by way of the Ottawa river. In strug- gling through the wilderness, by narrow trails and difficult portages the force was necessarily split into small detachments; but by July 26th, all had reached the rendezvous on the shore of Lake Huron. Here mass was celebrated be- fore the reunited army. The place of worship was a green prairie, smooth as a temple floor, walled in upon the one side by the dim arches of the forest, on the other by the glistening
(1) Wix. Hist. Coll., III, 163 and 164.
(2) Letter to M. de Siette, Aug. 20, 1727. Ibid., 163.
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EXTERMINATION BY FAMINE.
waters of the inland sea. In the center stood three priests clad in the stately vestments of their office; before them an altar transported with infinite pains through the wilderness. Roundabout was a motley host. Soldiers in uni- form and Canadian hunters in their many- colored garb stood beneath the banners of France; scantily costumed savages crouched or lay flat on the ground, with eyes and ears intent upon the "great war medicine" of the French. After these pious exercises the mul- titude set out with new ardor to exterminate the Foxes.
Mackinac was soon reached and here ensued an inexplicable delay. Everything depended upon a swift, unexpected swooping down upon the enemy; and yet M. de Lignery loitered for nine days. The whole army murmured; the Indians, always restless when on the war- path, were almost frantic over the detention. No excuse was ever offered for thus lingering except that "M. de Lignery was too ill to go on." But a more probable explanation is sug- gested by a statement made by Montcalm con- cerning this officer when long afterward he was in command at Fort Duquesne: "the Indians do not like M. de Lignery who is drunk every day."I
(1) Parkman. Montcalm and Wolfe, II, 169.
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HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
The expedition finally got under way, and on the 15th of August reached the abode of the Menominees, on the river of the same name. "This people," writes the chaplain of the army,' "are some of the tallest and hand- somest men in Canada." He coolly adds, that "we landed with a view to provoke them to oppose our descent; they fell into the trap and were entirely defeated."
After this brilliant exploit, the French moved on to within eight or ten miles of the village of the Sauks at Green Bay. Here the expedi- tion was halted until night, and then paddled silently on under cover of the darkness. The Sauk village was reached about midnight; a part of the force was sent around to the rear to surround the sleeping foe; the rest made a brave dash on the front. Of course, the in- habitants amply warned, had fled. Four poor creatures, however, were found lurking in the cabins; and these were handed over to the French Indians, who "made them suffer the pain of twenty deaths before depriving them of life."
Then the invaders passed up the river to the town of the Winnebagoes. "Our people were
(1) Crespel. Expedition against the Foxes. Wis. His. Coll., X, 50.
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EXTERMINATION BY FAMINE.
well disposed to destroy those that might be found there, but the flight of the inhabitants saved them and we could only burn their huts and destroy the harvest of Indian corn on which they subsist."
Then, after celebrating mass, these devout vandals moved on to the chief settlement of the Foxes. But the savages, unwilling to be exterminated, had fled four days before. An old man, two women and a girl were captured however, and burned at a slow fire.
The French still paddled up the river until they reached another town of the enemy and found this too, a solitude. Their savage allies re- fused to go further, saying that the fugitives hav- ing four days the start, could not be overtaken. Winter, also, was rapidly approaching and the French were four hundred and fifty leagues from home; outwitted and foiled, they were compelled to return. On their way back they demolished the fort at Green Bay, believing that it could not be held any longer; took with them its garrison and missionary and has- tened homeward.
Was then the tiger to be baulked of his prey? No, malignity has many resources. Before setting out on their return the French army had "employed several days in laying
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HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
waste the country, to deprive the enemy of the means of subsistence." Nothing escaped them. They burned the villages, they "des- troyed all that they could find in the fields, Indian corn, peas, beans and gourds, of all which the savages had great abundance." I Thus the Foxes, against whom all other arts had failed, were left to the mercies of winter and starvation.
It seems, too, as if that mysterious and ma- lign element, so often found in Nature, had come to the aid of human hate. The next winter, according to the chief historian of New France, was one of unusual severity; such in- tensity of cold had hardly ever been known since the first settlement of Canada.2 To this, thousands of Fox women and children were left exposed, without shelter or food. The lambs had been shorn but the winds were not tempered.
The glee of the French was great. "Neither the glory nor the arms of the king will suffer by this expedition," the official dis- patch declares. The more misery, it seemed to be thought, the more glory for the king;
(1) Ibid., 53.
(2) Ferland, Cours d Historie du Canada, II, 435. Fer- land mentions this without any reference to the attempted starvation of the Foxes.
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EXTERMINATION BY FAMINE.
and therefore the mathematical Frenchmen carefully computed the number of the perish- ing. "It is certain," wrote the Marquis de Beauharnois, triumphantly, "that one half of these nations who number four thousand souls, will die of hunger, and that the rest will come in and sue for mercy."
CHAPTER IX. EXTERMINATION BY FIRE.
1728-1736.
In the first days of September, 1728, four thousand exiles, their homes burned and their fields laid waste, were fleeing for their lives along the Wisconsin. The women and chil- dren were carried in canoes, but the warriors traveled on foot, struggling through the thick- ets and across the swamps and sands that lined the river.' Reaching the Mississippi, they turned to the North, and very soon a host of savages, wild with hunger and with rage, were peering through the leafy forests that rose above Fort Beauharnois on Lake Pepin. They had come expecting aid in the hour of their distress, from their friends and allies, the Sioux. But they found, as countless other poor wretches have found, that friendships are like reeds; they must not be leaned on too heavily. The Sioux had been won over to the French by the planting of the trading post in their midst the year before; and they turned a deaf ear to the entreaties and reproaches of their
(1) Lettre au Ministre de Marine, Oct., 1729. Margry, VI, 561.
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EXTERMINATION BY FIRE.
old confederates. "There is no doubt," the governor general wrote to the colonial minister, 1 "that the Foxes would have found an asylum with the Sioux, if the French fort had not been established there."
Thus the confederacy formed by the Foxes with so much pains and skill began to crumble; not long after, these hapless savages were also deserted by their oldest and closest allies, the Mascoutins and Kickapoos. On the approach of the terrible Foxes, Fort Beauharnois had been temporarily abandoned, and a large part of its garrison, including Guignas, the mission- ary, had fled southward, hoping to find refuge among the Illinois, nearly six hundred miles away. But they were intercepted in their flight by the Mascoutins, who had been driven from Wisconsin into Northeastern Iowa. At first the captives were very roughly handled, and Guignas narrowly escaped being burned alive, According to his own account, however, he finally so ingratiated himself with the savages that they released him after five months of captivity, and sent with him envoys to the Illinois and the French to sue for peace .?
(1) Lettre au Ministre de Marine, Oct. 1729. Margry, VI, 561.
(2) Lettres Edifiantes, I, 771. Lettre du Pe're Le Petit 12 Juillet, 1730.
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HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
Probably more potent reasons than the wheedling of the Jesuit, influenced the Mas- coutins. At any rate it is certain that in the spring of 1729, they declared war against the Foxes.' The Sauks also fell away and re- turned submissively to their old home at Green Bay. The Winnebagoes having fled from their devastated land, found refuge among the Sioux, and for the next nine years dwelt peacefully around Fort Beauharnois.2 Under the press- ure of cajolery and violence the league had gone to pieces; the Foxes were left alone to face the storm of French vengeance.
Driven away by the Sioux, they found some sort of an asylum in the land of the Iowas. 3 But subdued by hunger and cold, crushed by the desertion of all their allies, longing for home, they returned the next season to Wisconsin. They were broken in spirit, willing to yield everything to the insatiable French. "The Foxes are begging for peace," Beauharnois wrote triumphantly to the King. 4 But their
(1) Beauharnois to the Minister, May 19, 1729. Cana dian Archives, 1886, p. XCV.
(2) Memoir upon the Indians of Canada, 1736. New York Coll. Docs., X, p. xcv. Also Margry, VI, 575.
(3) Memoir of Beauharnois, 1729. Smith's Hist. Wis- consin, 344.
(4) Letter to the minister, Aug. 17, 1729. Canadian Archives, 1886, p. XCV.
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EXTERMINATION BY FIRE.
peaceful proposal was answered only by a fierce assault upon one of their encampments by a body of French Indians. 1
Somewhat later, probably about the close of 1729, another expedition, composed of Ottawas, Chippewas, Menominees and Winnebagoes, was sent against the returning exiles, and succeed- ed in ambuscading a detachment of them. The latter had only eighty warriors; but they fought with their wonted valor, until all excepting three were either killed or captured. Three hundred women and children were also taken prisoners. All were burned to death.
The French authorities were delighted. Beauharnois wrote to the minister exultantly: "I communicate this news with so much the more pleasure because there is no doubt of it."I
The French used to apologize for their burning of prisoners as a lesson taught them by the savages. "Among the wolves we have learned to howl," wrote Cadillac flippantly.2 But the savages burned men-conceiving that death at the stake was that final and supreme test of courage from which no brave man ought to shrink. The burning of women and chil-
(1) Letter of Oct. 25, 1729. Ibid., p. XCVII .Also N. Y. Coll. Docs., IX, 1017.
(2) Relation, etc. Margry, V, 100.
9
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HISTORY OF WISCONSIN.
dren, however, subserved no such purpose, and was something quite unknown to the prim- itive red man. He regarded children, especially, with so passionate and indulgent a love that his indignation was aroused by even the sight of the whippings and other severities visited upon the young in the white man's settlements; and to torture the little ones at the stake was a devel- opment of malignity far beyond the reach of his unprogressive nature. That was the in- vention of the French-one of those depths of infamy into which it would seem that only the civilized can sink, as a stone descends with the greater force when it falls from the greater height.
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