The Texas tribes were of the general Caddoan stock, of which the Comanche appear to have been the largest and strongest branch. These Indians ranged through the valleys of the Brazos and Colorado and extended their conquests to the land of the Apache, along the Rio Grande, to the west. They were essentially buffalo Indians and were not agriculturalists, but presented the purest nomadic type found in the southwest. This must not be misunderstood. The Navaho are nomadic to a certain extent, but their range has been limited. Moreover they possess flocks and herds. There is no evidence that the Comanche ever domesticated sheep, goats, and cattle, although they frequently obtained stock in their raids against the Texans. As they were continually on the move following the buffalo in its migrations, or planning war parties against the white people and Mexicans alike, they were pure nomads, as stated above.
Years ago, during the height of Indian troubles in Texas, a law was passed expelling red men from that State. Indians entering the State were subjected to fine, imprisonment or expulsion. The feeling against the race was very bitter, and Indians in Texas never received just treatment.
A few of them were, in later years, taken to Indian Territory, but most of the Comanches, it is safe to affirm, were killed in action. Although the Texas rangers were superiorly armed and better mounted, the Apaches continued their warfare from the earliest times down to about 1870, when their power was permanently broken. They were very cruel and vindictive. Nelson Lee’s narrative, to which I have referred, is one of the most interesting Indian captivities ever brought to my attention. It presents a vivid picture of the Comanche as they were during the period preceding our war with Mexico.
CHAPTER IV. THE OJIBWA OF MINNESOTA
The Ojibwa commonly known as Chippewa, constitute one of the great divisions of the Algonkin stock. We shall have much to say concerning their ethnology, in a subsequent volume. But following the scope accepted for this book, we shall treat of the Ojibwa as one of the great Indian tribes (numerically), at the present time and one much “advanced” along the white man’s trail.
The year 1850 found the Ojibwa, or Chippewa, Indians located as they are at the present time, with some exceptions. A few in Wisconsin and on the shores of Lake Superior; some at Turtle Mountain in North Dakota, but most of them living in the State of Minnesota at Leech Lake, White Earth, Red Lake and Cass Lake. The number of these Indians in the year 1851 was about 28,000. In 1884 the entire number is given as 16,000. In 1905, the “Handbook of American Indians” estimates that there are 15,000 in British America and 17,144 in the United States.
Those who wish to trace the migrations, and study the interesting customs and folklore of these people would do well to consult an interesting book written by an Ojibwa, Mr. William W. Warren. The manuscript of this work was prepared between 1850 and 1853. Warren’s mother was three-fourths Ojibwa and his father a white man. He died of tuberculosis June 1, 1853, and the Minnesota Historical Society did not publish his history of the nation until 1885. Clearly, Warren was the most prominent of later-day Ojibwa; he had served in the Minnesota Legislature, and he was possessed of a brilliant mind and would doubtless have made his mark in the world had he lived.
In the early ’50’s and ’60’s a few of the fur companies still did business in northern Minnesota. It was no uncommon sight to see the “Red River ox carts” bringing supplies into northern Minnesota, or carrying loads of furs to the nearest Hudson Bay post, in the Red River valley to the north. The Ojibwa came in contact with the French-Canadian element during the activities of the fur trade, and had little in common with, or met few Americans, until white settlers from the East increased in numbers in the State of Minnesota.
While this and the succeeding chapter are confined chiefly to White Earth, a description of Leech Lake and Red Lake reservations should not be omitted.
