In the winter and spring of 1831, father built a log house on the south-east side of the Big Island, as it was called, a circular forest, of about a mile in diameter, with prairie all around it. This was known far and wide, and had been, for hundreds of years, the camping ground of Indians, traveling east and west. It was almost impassable from the thickets and windfalls of great trees, and filled with game of all kinds. So, in the spring, we bade adieu to our good host, Calhoun, and moved into a house of our own. This place soon became known as Schoolcraft, and a village plat was surveyed, with streets and a park. It was many years, though, before we knew just where these luxuries were located, without looking on the map. One street, Eliza street, was named after my mother. We soon had neighbors, however, and Schoolcraft and Big Prairie Ronde were known as the garden and grain supply of the state of Michigan.
I must have been about six years old when I attended my first school, which was taught by my aunt, Miss Mary A. Parker, in a log house on the bank of E. L. Brown's marsh; then later in a little frame building near where Thos. Westveer now lives. I became acquainted, as a pupil, with Miss Pamela Brown, now the widow of Dr. N. M. Thomas, and my respect and reverence for her was dated from the time of her flogging a certain bad boy, Archibald Finlay, by name. It was over his shoulders, with nothing but a shirt between and administered with such good effect that, in spite of his determined obstinacy and combativeness, he promised reformation. I was also a bad boy, but was so impressed by this example of thoroughness that my good resolutions were effectually strengthened.
One more Indian story and I am done. In the summer of 1829, father traveled over the southern prairies of the state on foot and alone, to look for a new home. At Ann Arbor, on his way west, he heard of a notorious Indian robber, Shavehead, known as a dangerous customer to lone travelers. Not wishing, just then, to part with his scalp, he made a circuit of 30 miles or more to avoid meeting him. He was reported to have killed and scalped 90 or more white persons, and as being in his war paint, and wearing these scalps, at all times. Father was tired ere noon, and, secure in the thought that all danger was passed, seated himself on a fallen log and proceeded to eat his dinner of bread and cheese, and make himself comfortable for a noon-tide rest. He was delighted with the fresh woods and prairies, and gave himself up to air-castles, when he could make his home in this western paradise and have his family about him. Suddenly, in the midst of these reveries, a light hand was laid upon his shoulder, and looking up he was confronted by a tall, brawny, fierce looking Indian, in scalp-lock and paint, sharp, keen eyes, divided by a prominent, hawk's beak nose, looked down upon him in stern silence. Father, in describing it afterwards, never said he was scared, but admitted it was a "surprise party" to him, and that he instinctively thrust his hand into his pocket and grasped an old pistol, which would hardly kill at three paces under any circumstances. However it also flashed through his mind that if this bronzed old warrior had intended murder he could have committed it as easily with his wicked looking tomahawk as thus to have laid his hand upon his shoulder, so he smiled on Shavehead and offered his hand, and they shook, but with unbending sternness on the part of Shavehead. Then they sat down together on a log and proceeded to get acquainted as best they could, mostly by signs. Father took out his pipe and tobacco, divided the plug with Mr. Red-man, which pleased him very much, and thus they talked in pantomime with each other for an hour or more, when the interview ended by mutual consent. They again shook hands, this time more cordially, but yet no smile softened the face of old Shavehead. And they parted, the Indian silently melting into the forest, and father sturdily trudging along his trail towards the west, now and then glancing backward at the vacancy made by his strange visitor.
In 1831, a few weeks after we were settled at Big Island, father came into the house, from his work, one day, and there, seated complacently by the stove, watching mother about her cooking, was the veritable Shavehead, still with his head shaved, save the scalp-lock. This time they shook hands as friends indeed, but the stolid face wore no smile as before. From that time he was a frequent visitor and we all learned to like him and respect him. He belonged to no tribe about us; did not associate with other Indians. If he happened to be in the house, with them, when mother was distributing food, as was often the case, they would divide it among themselves, leaving out Shavehead, who received his portion direct from mother, and ate it in stern silence, amid the sociable chattering of the others. Shavehead was very peculiar. He never carried a gun, but was always armed with a powerful bow and arrows and a murderous looking tomahawk and knife, but the 90 scalps at his belt we never saw. He never rode a pony, like the others, and never got drunk, as the others surely did, whenever they could get the fire water of the whites.
So far as we could know, he was without an Indian fault or foible. Long afterwards, when the Potawatomies were gathered up by the government and taken away to a new reservation, in the west, there was one Indian they could never find. They searched the woods diligently for months, but Shavehead mysteriously melted out of all knowledge, leaving only kindly memories of a brave old chief and a steadfast, though silent friend.
EARLY DAYS IN PRAIRIE RONDE.
BY O. H. FELLOWS.
Read by Miss Anna Fellows.
This old story that has been so often told and with so many variations had its beginning for me nearly seventy years ago.
It was October 24, 1829 that I, a lad nine years old, reached what is now Prairie Ronde township. We—my mother, brothers and sisters—were about twenty days on the road not-with-standing we drove horses, three on one wagon and two on another. My father, Col. Abiel Fellows, and two oldest brothers had preceded us and had a home built ready to receive us. The transition though slow from a roomy home of plenty to a temporary house of one room, where six wayfarers had found shelter previous to our arrival, naturally filled the mind of a small boy with consternation, his heart with homesickness. Where was the school-room, the clock-room with its glowing coal grate? Where was the square-room, the bed-rooms, the cheerful kitchen? And where, Oh where, was the buttery? Thoughts of the contents of the one left behind increased in size the big lump in my throat. And the mountains, the hills, the cool spring bubbling from the rocks, where were they? But an extenuating fact, did we not have in this new land the Indian? He lurked in every dark corner, was behind every tree and bush, I fancied. The strangers our humble home already sheltered were William Duncan, two sons and one daughter—William, Delamore, and Eliza Ann—, Lydia Wood and Samuel Hackett.