Possessing a genius which must have made him eminent in any age or country, like Brant, Pontiac and King Philip, his illustrious predecessors, he had failed yet like them he was great in defeat. He was the first great chieftain to prohibit the massacre of prisoners.
Trumbull, in his "Indian Wars," thus refers to this renowned leader: "He was the most extraordinary Indian that has ever appeared in history. His acute understanding very early in life informed him that his countrymen had lost their importance that they were gradually yielding to the whites, who were acquiring an imposing influence over them. Instigated by these considerations, and perhaps by his natural ferocity and attachment to war, he became a decided enemy to the whites, with an invincible determination to regain for his country the proud independence she had lost.
"Aware, at length, of the extent, number and power of the United States, he became fully convinced of the futility of any single nation of red men attempting to cope with them."
"He formed, therefore, the grand scheme of uniting all the tribes east of the Mississippi into hostility against the United States. This was a field worthy of his great and commanding genius."
Besides several towns in different States christened in his honor, his name was also borne by one of the greatest of American generals.
At the meeting of the Republican National Committee in Washington, November 23, 1891, to select a city in which to hold a Presidential convention, President Palmer, of the World's Fair Commission, gave in an eloquent plea for the selection of Detroit, the promise to take the visitors thirty miles over into Canada to view the spot where Tecumseh, "the greatest Indian the American continent ever knew, was slain."
Paradoxical as it may seem, he was a savage, yet one of nature's noblemen.
The words of Hamlet apply to this "King of the Woods" in a striking manner:
"See, what a grace was seated on this brow Hyperion's locks; the front of Jove himself; An eye like Mars, to threaten and command A station like the herald Mercury, New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hill A combination, and a form, indeed, Where every god did seem to set his seal, To give the world assurance of a man."