CAPTURE AND RELEASE OF JOE BROWN’S INDIAN FAMILY.
We knew Major Brown well. He was known to nearly all early settlers, because he came to Minnesota when the white people were very few. He felt that it was not well for man to live alone, a white man especially, and so he took unto himself a dusky bride. He was in government employ and a big white chief among his new found wife’s people and to whom he was a friend.
As he grew in years his family grew also, and the dusky mother’s household cares increased. Yes, they lived in a fine stone house, elegantly furnished, down on the Yellow Medicine below the agency, but which came in the way of his red brother’s vengeance, and it was destroyed. The Brown family lived happily in their rather modern home. The Major attended to his official duties, and the wife and boys cultivated the land; but in common with all the others during these sad days, their only safety was in flight. Their home, including books and furniture, was totally destroyed. The father was a fugitive and his family prisoners. They did not suffer as some others did, because the wife and mother was a full blood and was related to the Sisseton tribe and had powerful friends among them. Their capture, captivity, and final release, as related by Samuel Brown, the fifteen-year-old boy, is an interesting recital. He says:
On Monday, the 18th day of August, I went to Yellow Medicine with my sister Ellen upon an errand. We met on the way an Indian named Little Dog, who told us that the Indians had killed a family at Beaver Creek, and were going to kill the whites as far as St. Paul, and that we must not tell any one about it, or they would kill us. He said he warned us at the risk of his own life. This was about noon. Soon after our arrival at Yellow Medicine an old squaw told us that we had better be getting away, as there would be trouble. We asked many of the other Indians about it, but they said they had heard of nothing of the kind. Another squaw afterward told us that she thought it must be the Yanktonais who were coming down to take the agency. We left them about half-past three o’clock. George Gleason had just left with Mrs. Wakefield and her children for below. When we reached home we told mother what we heard. She was very much scared and did not sleep any that night. About four o’clock next morning I heard some one outside calling in a loud voice a number of times for my mother, and then I heard Charles Blair, my brother-in-law (a white man), ask what was the matter, and the man, who was a half-breed named Royer, said that four hundred Yanktonais had arrived at the upper agency and were killing everybody. We then became very much alarmed, and had our oxen yoked at once to the wagon, put everything in we could, and started for Fort Ridgely. We had all the neighbors warned, and they went with us. They had three wagons, with ox teams. Four or five white men overtook us on the road, among them Garvey’s cook (Garvey was the trader wounded at the agency, and who afterward died at Hutchinson.)
When we had gone about five miles we saw some men two miles ahead, near the bank of the river, but supposed they were farmers. The Yanktonais, whom we were afraid of, lived above us. We thought nothing about the men until we saw an Indian on a hill ahead of us. He beckoned to others, and before we knew it we were surrounded. De-wa-nea, of Crow’s band, and Cut-Nose and Shakopee, three of the worst among the Lower Indians, came to us first. We were in the head wagon. Mother told them who we were, and they said we must follow them, and that we were all as good as dead. De-wa-nea said that the whites had taken him prisoner a good many times and that it was now his turn. He wanted the rest of the Indians to kill us all. There was an Indian in the party, John Moore’s brother-in-law, who took our part, and he and his friends saved us from the others. This Indian had once come to our house when he was freezing and my mother took him in and warmed him. He told the other Indians that he remembered this, and that we should live. They insisted that my brother Angus should shoot one of the white men, but he refused to do so. Each of the Indians had one of the whites picked out to shoot as they came up. My mother said they were poor men and it would do no good to kill them. John Moore’s brother-in-law said they should live if she wanted them to. The Indians made a great fuss about it, and said she ought to be satisfied with what she had got, but afterwards consented and told the men to start off. The women stayed with us. After the men had got off a little, Leopold Wohler, who had a lime-kiln at the agency, came back to the wagon after his boots, and an Indian told him if he didn’t go away he would kill him. He started off with one boot, and came back again for the other, and the Indian drove him away again with the same threat. He went a short distance and came back again to kiss his wife. The Indians then became very much enraged, and acted so fiercely that he was glad to escape without further difficulty. There were ten Indians close to us, and twenty-five or thirty near, running into the houses. They made Angus and Charles Blair, who were riding horses, give them up. De-wa-nea put on my sister’s bonnet and began singing a war song. He was very merry. He said the Indians were now going to have a good time, and if they got killed it was all right; that the whites wanted to kill them off, and were delaying the payment in order to do it by starvation, and that he preferred to be shot. We saw three men and a woman on the road terribly hacked up. This party had committed the murders. The men had been mowing together; their scythes and pitchforks were lying near by. Cut-nose showed us his thumb, from which a piece had been bitten near the nail, and he said it was done by one of these men while he was working the knife around in his breast; that he was very hard to kill, and he thought he would never die.
Cut-nose afterward went to a wagon and told a Scotch girl who was in it that he wanted her for his wife, and to get out and follow him. She refused, and he then drew his knife and flourished it over her, and she got out and went away with him. That was the last I saw of him until we got to camp. He was called Cut-nose because one of his nostrils had been bitten out. This was done by Other Day in a quarrel.
When we reached the camp of the Red Creek Indians, four miles above the Redwood River, they told us that the Agency Indians had sent word for all to come down there, and that those who did not come would be taken care of by the “Soldiers’ Lodge.” They were then about starting, and an Indian made Augus and myself hitch up a mule team which he said he had taken from Captain Marsh’s men the day before. He said they had just heard a cannon at the fort and they wanted to go down and whip the whites there. This was about noon. We then went down to John Moore’s house (this was where Other Day’s horse was stolen), and they put us upstairs, where they had two or three women captives. We were there about an hour, when three Indians told us to come up to their camp on the hill, where we were to stop with John Moore’s mother, or grandmother. We followed them, and when we got halfway up suddenly missed them. We supposed they hid from us, and we wandered on. We met a German woman who had seven or eight children with her, all under eight years of age,—two on her back, one under each arm and two following behind. They came along with us. We went to Moore’s relative, but she said she knew nothing about us and couldn’t take us, and that we had better go down to Crow’s Village. We started, not knowing where to go, when a squaw, who was crying about the troubles, met us, and took us home with her. The Indians sent our team back to camp. They gave Augus and I blankets and moccasins, and we put them on and went down to see Little Crow. He told us to bring our folks down there, and no one should hurt us. This was Tuesday evening, about seven o’clock. He was in his own house, and the camp was pitched around it. We went back and brought our folks down. Little Crow put us up in the top room of the house, and gave us buffalo robes and everything to make us comfortable. He brought us a candle as soon as it was dark; he was very kind to us; he said he would take as good care of us as he could, but he didn’t believe he could keep Charley Blair alive until morning. He gave him a breech clout and leggings, which he put on.
During the night an Indian or a half-breed came in the room downstairs where Crow was, and told him that we ought to be killed. We overheard what they said. The man was very ugly, and said no prisoners ought to be taken, and that we were related to the Sissetons, and had no claim on the Lower Indians, and there was no reason why we should be spared. He said he wanted Crow to call a council about it immediately. Crow told him that he saved us because we were his friends, and that he would protect us; that it was too late to hold a council that night, and he compelled him to leave.