The American Indians / Their History, Condition and Prospects, from Original Notes and Manuscripts

by Henry Rowe Schoolcraft

This is the true secret of the strenuous efforts made by the northern and western Indians to sustain the French power, when it was menaced in the war of 1744, by the fleets and armies of Great Britain. They rallied freely to their aid at Detroit, Vincennes, the present sites of Pittsburg and Erie, at Fort Niagara, Montreal, and Quebec, and they hovered with infuriated zeal around the outskirts of the northern and western settlements, during the many and sanguinary wars carried on between the English and French. And when the French were beaten they still adhered to their cause, and their chiefs stimulated the French local commanders to continue and renew the contest, even after the fall of Niagara and Quebec, with a heroic consistency of purpose, which reflects credit upon their foresight, bravery, and constancy. We hope in a future number to bring forward a sketch of the man who put himself at the head of this latter effort, who declared he would drive the Saxon race into the sea, who beseiged twelve and took nine of the western stockaded forts, and who for four years and upwards, maintained the war, after the French had struck their colours and ceded the country. We refer to the great Algic leader, Pontiac.

At present our attention is called to a cotemporary chief, of equal personal bravery and conduct, certainly, but who lived and exercised his authority at a more remote point, and had not the same masses and means at his command. This point, so long hid in the great forests of the north, and which, indeed, has been but lately revealed in our positive geography, is the area of Lake Superior. It is here that we find the Indian tradition to be rife with the name of Wabojeeg and his wars, and his cotemporaries. It was one of the direct consequences of so remote a position, that it withdrew his attention more from the actual conflicts between the French and English, and fixed them upon his western and southern frontiers, which were menaced and invaded by the numerous bands of the Dacotahs, and by the perfidious kinsmen of his nation, the Outagamies and Saucs. He came into active life, too, as a prominent war leader, at the precise era when the Canadas had fallen into the British power, and by engaging zealously in the defence of the borders of his nation west, he allowed time to mitigate and adjust those feelings and attachments which, so far as public policy was concerned, must be considered to have moulded the Indian mind to a compliance with, and a submission to, the British authority. Wabojeeg was, emphatically, the defender of the Chippewa domain against the efforts of other branches of the Red Race. He did not, therefore, lead his people to fight, as his father, Ma-mongazida, and nearly all the great Indian war captains had, to enable one type of the foreign race to triumph over another, but raised his parties and led them forth to maintain his tribal supremacy. He may be contemplated, therefore, as having had a more patriotic object for his achievement.

Lake Superior, at the time of our earliest acquaintance with the region, was occupied, as it is at this day, by the Chippewa race. The chief seat of their power appeared to be near the southwestern extremity of the lake, at Chagoimegon, where fathers Marquette and Alloez found their way, and established a mission, so early as 1668. Another of their principal, and probably more ancient seats, was at the great rapids on the outlet of that lake, which they named the Sault de Ste. Marie. It was in allusion to their residence here that they called this tribe Saulteur, that is to say people of the leap or rapid.

Indian tradition makes the Chippewas one of the chief, certainly by far the most numerous and widely spread, of the Algonquin stock proper. It represents them to have migrated from the east to the west. On reaching the vicinity of Michilimackinac, they separated at a comparatively moderate era into three tribes, calling themselves, respectively, Odjibwas, Odawas, and Podawadumees. What their name was before this era, is not known. It is manifest that the term Odjibwa is not a very ancient one, for it does not occur in the earliest authors. They were probably of the Nipercinean or true Algonquin stock, and had taken the route of the Utawas river, from the St. Lawrence valley into lake Huron. The term itself is clearly from Bwa, a voice; and its prefix in Odji, was probably designed to mark a peculiar intonation which the muscles are, as it were, gathered up, to denote.

Whatever be the facts of their origin, they had taken the route up the straits of St. Mary into lake Superior, both sides of which, and far beyond, they occupied at the era of the French discovery. It is evident that their course in this direction must have been aggressive. They were advancing towards the west and northwest. The tribe known as Kenistenos, had passed through the Lake of the Woods, through the great lake Nipesing, and as far as the heads of the Saskatchewine and the portage of the Missinipi of Hudson's bay. The warlike band of Leech Lake, called Mukundwas, had spread themselves over the entire sources of the Mississippi and extended their hunting excursions west to Red River, where they came into contact with the Assinaboines, or Stone Sioux. The central power, at this era, still remained at Chagoimegon, on Superior, where indeed, the force of early tradition asserts there was maintained something like a frame of both civil and ecclesiastical polity and government.

It is said in the traditions related to me by the Chippewas, that the Outagamies, or Foxes, had preceded them into that particular section of country which extends in a general course from the head of Fox River, of Green Bay, towards the Falls of St. Anthony, reaching in some points well nigh to the borders of lake Superior. They are remembered to have occupied the interior wild rice lakes, which lie at the sources of the Wisconsin, the Ontonagon, the Chippewa, and the St. Croix rivers. They were associated with the Saucs, who had ascended the Mississippi some distance above the Falls of St. Anthony, where they lived on friendly terms with the Dacotahs or Sioux. This friendship extended also to the Outagamies, and it was the means of preserving a good understanding between the Dacotahs and Chippewas.

The Fox tribe is closely affiliated with the Chippewas. They call each other brothers. They are of the same general origin and speak the same general language, the chief difference in sound being that the Foxes use the letter l, where the Odjibwas employ an n. The particular cause of their disagreement is not known. They are said by the Chippewas to have been unfaithful and treacherous. Individual quarrels and trespasses on their hunting grounds led to murders, and in the end to a war, in which the Menomonees and the French united, and they were thus driven from the rice lakes and away from the Fox and upper Wisconsin. To maintain their position they formed an alliance with the Sioux, and fought by their side.

It was in this contest that Wabojeeg first distinguished himself, and vindicated by his bravery and address the former reputation of his family, and laid anew the foundations of his northern chieftaindom. Having heard allusions made to this person on my first entrance into that region, many years ago, I made particular enquiries, and found living a sister, an old white-headed woman, and a son and daughter, about the age of middle life. From these sources I gleaned the following facts. He was born, as nearly as I could compute the time, about 1747. By a singular and romantic incident his father, Ma-mongazida, was a half-brother of the father of Wabashaw, a celebrated Sioux chief, who but a few years ago died at his village on the upper Mississippi. The connexion happened in this way.

While the Sioux and Chippewas were living in amity near each other, and frequently met and feasted each other on their hunting grounds and at their villages, a Sioux chief, of distinction, admired and married a Chippewa girl, by whom he had two sons. When the war between these two nations broke out, those persons of the hostile tribes who had married Chippewa wives, and were living in the Chippewa country, withdrew, some taking their wives along and others separating from them. Among the latter was the Sioux chief. He remained a short time after hostilities commenced, but finding his position demanded it, he was compelled, with great reluctance, to leave his wife behind, as she could not, with safety, have accompanied him into the Sioux territories. As the blood of the Sioux flowed in the veins of her two sons, neither was it safe for her to leave them among the Chippewas. They were, however, by mutual agreement, allowed to return with the father. The eldest of these sons became the father of Wabashaw.

The mother thus divorced by the mutual consent of all parties, remained inconsolable for some time. She was still young and handsome, and after a few years, became the wife of a young Chippewa chief of Chagoimegon, of the honoured totem of the Addick or reindeer. Her first child by this second marriage, was Ma Mongazida, the father of Wabojeeg. In this manner, a connexion existed between two families, of separate hostile nations, each of which distinguished itself, for bravery and skill in war and council. It has already been stated that Ma Mongazida, was present, on the side of the French, in the great action in which both Montcalm and Wolf fell, and he continued to exercise the chieftainship till his death, when his second son succeeded him.