POPULAR SCIENCE HANDBOOK SERIES NO. 6

DESIGNED AND PRINTED AT

THE MILWAUKEE PUBLIC MUSEUM

PUBLISHED BY ORDER OF

THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES

MAY 1954

CHAPTER ONE

WISCONSIN’S INDIANS BEFORE THE COMING OF THE WHITE MAN

[Illustration: ROACH HEADDRESS (MUSEUM EXHIBIT).]

It is difficult now to realize that Wisconsin, famed as a dairy state

and rich in farm land and thriving communities, was once a great

wilderness. Before the land was cleared for the farmer’s plow and with

its dense forests yet to hear the lumberjack’s axe, the thick timberland

of the north and even the rolling prairies of the central and southern

portions of our state teemed with a great variety of wild life,

including animals no longer occurring in Wisconsin, such as the woodland

caribou, moose, elk, and buffalo or bison, as well as the more familiar

deer, bear, and many smaller varieties.

Before the arrival of the Europeans, this Wisconsin wilderness was the

home of Indians who were wonderfully adapted to a life in the forests.

They depended almost entirely on hunting and the gathering of natural

products for their food, shelter, clothing, tools, and weapons, although

most of them raised some garden crops such as corn, squash, beans, and

possibly tobacco.

Let’s pretend that we can travel backwards in time about 350 years and

visit a typical Indian family of that period. As we arrive on the scene

the tribe is preparing to set up a new camp. The women are busy

unpacking their household gear, including reed mats used to cover the

outer sides of the wigwam. The women themselves have carried the loads

during the journey. This is not done because of any laziness on the part

of the men, a common error of white observers, but simply because the

men need their hands free to ward off a sudden enemy attack, or to kill

any game they might chance upon during the journey.

While the women unpack, the men enter the woods to cut poles for the

framework of the wigwams, and collect birch bark for the roofs. After

the poles are set into the ground to make an oval enclosure, they are

bent and tied together at the top to form a rounded roof. The women then

tie on the reed mats, and roof the hut with the rolls of bark. This is

the typical Wisconsin Indian winter lodge. Although it is the latter

part of March, the weather is still too cold to live comfortably in a

summer lodge.

If we lift the bearskin covering the entrance and step into the lodge,

we may see the simple furnishings and personal possessions of the family

we are going to visit. A hole in the middle of the roof serves to carry

off the smoke from the fire burning in the center of the floor. This

fire serves the double purpose of heating the lodge and cooking the

family meals. We find the hut almost too smoky to endure, accustomed as

we are to our modern homes, but our Indian friends seem quite

comfortable.

Since our Indian family is fairly large, including the father’s parents

as well as the mother, father, two boys, and two girls, the wigwam is

proportionately large in order to accommodate all of them.

We look about the inside of the lodge and see the sleeping mats and

furs. The family’s spare clothing, breechclouts, shirts, leggings, and

moccasins of tanned deerskin for the men, and skirts, blouses, and

moccasins for the women, are in one corner. The garments are beautifully

decorated with designs grandma embroidered on them with dyed porcupine

quills. The work is quite fine and it takes many hours to do a small

portion of the embroidery. Father is especially fond of his headdress, a

roach made of deer and porcupine hair, and an eagle feather which

indicates that he has killed an enemy in battle.

[Illustration: WIGWAMS, OR WINTER LODGES.]

As we step outside again and look about, we can see why this particular

spot has been chosen as the campsite. A small lake and several springs

are only a short distance away, but the most important reason for

camping here at this season is a large grove of sugar maple trees

immediately to one side of the camp. March is the proper time to tap the

trees for their sap.

The next two or three weeks are spent tapping the trees, and boiling the

sap down until maple syrup, and finally only maple sugar is left. This

sugar keeps indefinitely and provides a very nourishing as well as a

delicious source of food for the entire family. The children are

especially fond of it.

It is not a case of all work and no play during this period, for the

children, Morning Star, White Fawn, Blackbird, and Little Otter, play

games when their tasks are finished, and gambling games are popular with

the men and women. Here we see mother and some neighbor women playing

the cup and pin game. Each player in turn tosses into the air small

cone-shaped cups made of antler tips or bear-toe bones, and tries to

catch one or more on a bone pin. The men are enthusiastic gamblers, too,

using marked sticks which are thrown and scored somewhat like our own

familiar dice games.

When the sugar making is finished, the tribe breaks camp and travels by

birch-bark canoe to a new location. The canoes are wonderfully light

boats and can be paddled very swiftly. Their light weight makes them

relatively easy to carry or portage from one stream to another. Our

canoe has eyes painted on the bow and stern. The father explains that

these eyes enable the canoe to “see where to go.”

[Illustration: INDIAN CHILDREN AT PLAY (PAINTING BY A. O. TIEMANN).]

[Illustration: BIRCH-BARK CANOE.]

At the new summer camp we watch our friends build summer lodges. These

are rectangular in shape with inverted-V-shaped roofs much like our own

houses. The entire lodge is covered with strips of elm or other bark.

As is often the case, the new campsite is near a river, and springs

nearby furnish cool, pure drinking water. There are also open clearings

closeby which will be utilized for gardening. The next few weeks,

however, will be used for making necessary utensils and equipment needed

by the tribe.

[Illustration: SUMMER LODGE.]

[Illustration: ANCIENT WOODLAND POTTERY VESSEL.]

One day we are interested observers of pottery making. Grandma goes to a

clay bed near the river and selects suitable materials including some

coarse sand for tempering the pottery paste, which is made of both clay

and sand. The paste is worked into long cylinders which are finally

coiled about into the desired shape. After the vessel has assumed final

shape it is paddled with a cord-wrapped tool and allowed to air-dry for

several days, and finally baked in a large outdoor fire. The finished

pot can be used to boil water or cook food, and has the advantage of

being easily replaced in case of breakage.

May soon arrives, and as this is the time to plant corn, our Indian

family selects a suitable clearing for their garden. The men burn out

the underbrush and the women and girls prepare for the planting itself.

Grandma informs us that it is always best to soak the grains in water

several days before seeding. After the seeds have been properly

softened, the women and girls dig holes in the ground, place six or

seven grains of corn in each hole, and then heap up the dirt over the

seeds in a little hillock. Squash and beans are planted in the clearing,

too.

One day we are told that the tribe is going to have a game drive, since

considerable meat is needed by the village. We go along into the forest

and watch the men chop down trees with their stone axes. These are all

felled in one direction, the cut incomplete so that the tree is still

attached to the stump, and in two rows so as to leave a gradually

narrowing corridor more than a mile long. The deer are then driven

towards the corridor where men stationed with bows are able to shoot

them easily as they approach the narrow opening between the barriers.

A number of the animals are killed in this way and taken back to the

village where their flesh can be preserved by being cut into strips and

smoke-dried. We are all too hungry, however, to wait until we return to

the village before eating. The chief says we can have some boiled

venison stew. We are puzzled at this, for no utensils have been brought

along, but we soon learn how resourceful our Indian friends are.

One of the men obtains some edible roots; another cuts the stomachs from

several of the deer. Each one of the stomachs is cleaned and tied to

form a pouch. The venison, roots, and some wild rice which some of the

men brought along, are placed in the prepared deer stomachs, water

added, and the ingenious “kettles” suspended over a slow fire. In a

relatively short time a delicious stew is set before each of us, served

in birch-bark dishes prepared in a few minutes by another of the

hunters.

While we are eating we ask the father of the Indian family we are

visiting how the chief of his tribe obtained his position. We are told

that his ability as a warrior and leader has led to his being chosen war

chief, and his ability as an orator and his power to make people like

him has kept him in authority. He says that in a nearby village the

chief is also a great war leader, but he is not well liked otherwise.

For that reason he sometimes finds it difficult to make his warriors

obey him and he is therefore not nearly as powerful as our leader. We

soon realize that the Indian chiefs depend primarily upon personal

prestige and influence to keep them in power. We are informed, however,

that in some other tribes the chief is always selected from a certain

clan.

[Illustration: YOUTH FASTING FOR A VISION (PAINTING BY A. O.

TIEMANN).]

One morning we witness a curious ceremony. Grandfather offers Blackbird,

the older boy, some charcoal as well as his food. The father seems very

proud when his son rejects the food, applies the charcoal to his face,

and leaves the village to enter the forest alone. Grandfather explains

that Blackbird, by accepting the charcoal, automatically agreed to fast

alone in the forest for one day. This one-day fast will be good training

for the day when he will feel ready to go on the long fast of four or

five days. Every man has taken this long fast in the hope of seeing a

vision of a guardian spirit who would then be his lifetime protector.

The girls, too, must fast, but in a somewhat different fashion. Soon

Morning Star, the older girl in our friend’s family, will reach

womanhood and be segregated for a number of days in a secluded lodge,

and during this period no men may approach her.

The summer season rapidly nears an end. We have enjoyed ourselves

watching the activities of our friends at work and at play. We have

learned, too, some of the beliefs of our friends. Grandfather has told

us stories about the great white bear with the copper tail who dwells

underground and is the greatest power for evil. He has told the children

how the “Indian Sandman,” a good-natured elf, would put people to sleep

at night by hitting them on the head with a soft war club. We have

learned, too, of the many spirits for good and evil who control the sun,

moon, stars, winds, rain, thunder, and all the other phenomena of

nature. One evening he pointed out the Milky Way and told us that this

was the road over which the dead travelled to the land of the spirits.

He also warned us about entering the woods alone at night because of the

evil, living skeleton which haunts the forest paths seeking unwary men.

[Illustration: TALES OF THE SPIRIT WORLD (PAINTING BY A. O.

TIEMANN).]

[Illustration: THE RICE GATHERER.]

Autumn, the time for harvesting garden crops as well as various wild

vegetable foods, is a season of hard work for all. Corn is the most

important garden crop, and from time to time we have sampled the ripe

grain. The women have served us some roasted on the cob, or the fresh

kernels ground with a wooden mortar and pestle and served as a sort of

porridge. The ripe corn is now gathered and the ears will be allowed to

dry. The dried kernels can then be ground into a meal, as needed, since

the dry corn will remain edible for a long time.

Wild rice is the most important vegetable food provided for the Indians

by nature. One day, in the middle of September, we all go a short

distance up the river in our canoes and enter a small lake. Here the

wild grain grows in great quantities. The men selected by the chief to

determine when the rice is ready to be gathered have already given us

the signal that the grain is ripe. We learn, however, that one more

function is required before we can proceed with the harvesting of the

rice.

The chief medicine man of our village approaches the edge of the water

and blows tobacco smoke towards the heavens as an offering to his

“Grandfather,” the “Master of the Rice.” He then buries a small portion

of tobacco in the ground, and we are ready to proceed.

In each canoe, as the man poles the boat slowly through the rice, the

woman, who sits facing the man, pulls the stalks over the canoe with one

cedar stick, while with another stick she beats the ripe grain into the

boat. When the canoes are full, we head back for camp where the rice is

spread out to dry.

Then the women heat the unhusked kernels in a pot over a slow fire until

all have partially popped open. Next a small pit is dug and a stake set

into the ground beside it. The depression is lined with buckskin and

filled with the parched grain. The father then takes hold of the stake,

steps into the grain-filled pit, and begins treading the grain with his

feet to loosen the husks from the kernels.

The women take the grain from the pit and toss it up and down in bark

winnowing trays. The wind blows away the light chaff as the grain is

tossed into the air, and allows only the kernels to fall back into the

tray.

The time soon arrives for our friends to break camp and seek a winter

campsite where the hunting is known to be good. Hunting and fishing will

be the main source of food during the winter season.

At the new campsite, storage pits lined with birch bark are dug in the

ground to be used for storing the nuts, dried berries, dried corn, and

rice that have been gathered and prepared during the Autumn. If hunting

is poor, or if a severe winter threatens famine to the village, this

stored food may be the sole means of preventing starvation.

It is now time for us to leave our Indian friends, but before we go we

learn that the winter season will be spent not only in the pursuits of

fishing through the ice and hunting, but also, in the telling of

stories, singing, and playing many different games. When the snows are

deep, the tribe will don snowshoes for their hunting trips. We will miss

seeing them play snowsnake. In this game the Indians compete with each

other to see who can hurl the wooden “snake” the greatest distance

across the snow or ice. We are sorry to miss all these things, but the

time has come for us to end our visit.

As we say farewell to our friends from the distant past, we reflect

regretfully that the coming of the white man will change the old ways of

life for these people of the forests, and soon their independence and

freedom will vanish forever. The Indians seem destined to become largely

dependent upon the whites for their livelihood, and even for the few

remnants of land to be left them for their homes.

[Illustration: THRASHING RICE (MUSEUM EXHIBIT).]

CHAPTER TWO

WISCONSIN’S INDIANS UNDER FRENCH RULE

[Illustration: THE FUR TRADERS (MUSEUM MURAL BY A. O. TIEMANN).]

Few of us realize that the early history of Wisconsin is as romantic as

any our eastern seaboard states can boast. The area that is now the

State of Wisconsin became the gateway into the Middlewest and the

meeting place for the French and the Indian tribes of what was then

regarded as the West. This early period of French control was an era in

which Jesuit missionaries carried the doctrine of Christianity from

village to village, often visiting tribes that had never before seen

white men. It was a time when the French traders, lured by the love of

adventure and romance as well as the wealth to be obtained in the fur

trade, pushed through the forests and followed strange rivers until they

reached the villages of unknown Wisconsin Indians. It was in these

villages that such traders, including the “noblest” youth of New France,

lived with the Indians, sat in their councils, took part in their war

dances, accompanied their war parties to battle, and often married their

women.

It was in this early French Regime that Wisconsin’s Indian tribes

underwent great changes in their manner of life due to contacts with the

white man’s civilization, It was a time of warfare and a struggle for

supremacy in North America between the British and the French, and their

Indian allies, with Wisconsin’s tribes espoused to the cause of the

French. It was the heyday of the fur trade with literally millions of

beaver and other skins being taken from Wisconsin to enrich the trader

and obtain white man’s goods for the Indians.

Despite the fact that Wisconsin’s Indians all lived in pretty much the

same manner, most of us are aware that there were different tribes in

our state at various times, and that they spoke different languages in

some instances. If we use a comparison from European languages, we might

better understand the character of these Indian languages. German,

English, and Swedish all originated from the same parent tongue and

belong to the same basic language division. English and Chinese are

unrelated tongues belonging to different basic language stocks. Thus,

while many words are very similar in English and German, in English and

Chinese no apparent similarity exists.

Three basic language divisions, Algonkian, Siouan, and Iroquoian, were

represented by Wisconsin’s Indians. Algonkian was represented by such

tribes as the Menomini, Potawatomi, Chippewa, Mascouten, Sauk, Fox,

Ottawa, and Kickapoo. Relatively late arrivals to Wisconsin (in the

1800’s), also speaking Algonkian tongues, were the Munsee, Brotherton,

and Stockbridge tribes. The Siouan group included the Winnebago, and the

Santee division of the Dakota Sioux. The Huron and the Oneida (the

latter also arriving in the 1800’s) were Wisconsin representatives of

the Iroquoian language stock. The differences become more apparent when

we realize that languages in the Iroquoian division would be as

different from those in the Algonkian stock as English is from Chinese.

The historic period in Wisconsin began when Jean Nicolet, the first

known white man to visit Wisconsin, landed near what is now Green Bay,

in 1634. Nicolet’s mission was to arrange a peace between the powerful

Winnebago tribe, or Puans, as they were known to the French, and the

Ottawa who were then acting as middlemen between the French and the

Indians of the unknown Middlewest.

[Illustration: THE LANDING OF NICOLET (MUSEUM MURAL BY GEORGE

PETER).]

Nicolet’s journey into the Wisconsin wilderness, a mere fourteen years

after the landing of our pilgrim forefathers at Plymouth Rock, was the

beginning of the period of French exploration and rule in Wisconsin

which is as romantic and fascinating a story as any in our country’s

history. Imagine Nicolet’s emotion as he approached his destination, a

lone white man with seven Indians for companions, in a country which, as

far as was known, had never before been visited by a white man. He had

no idea as to what sort of reception he would receive from these strange

people he was to visit. Their friendliness or enmity would be determined

upon arrival. Fortunately he was hailed as a great visitor, and feasted

and entertained accordingly.

Only three Indian tribes are definitely known to have been residents of

Wisconsin when Nicolet visited here in 1634. These were the Winnebago;

the Menomini, who resided along the shores of the Menominee River above

Green Bay; and the Santee Sioux, whose villages were scattered along the

upper reaches of the Mississippi River in northwestern Wisconsin and

eastern Minnesota.

Documentary evidence strongly suggests that some other tribes, often

mentioned as early residents, as, for example, the Mascouten, did not

arrive until a generation later. Archaeological findings conclusively

show the prehistoric occupation of Wisconsin by the Santee Sioux and the

Winnebago, and support the probability of prehistoric occupation by the

Menomini. Thus Wisconsin was controlled primarily by Siouan speaking

peoples in 1634. The peaceful Menomini were far outnumbered by their

powerful neighbors, the Winnebago, but this situation was soon to change

radically.

[Illustration: WINNEBAGO VILLAGE (PAINTING BY A. O. TIEMANN).]

Events occurring far to the East, in what is now New York State and

eastern Canada, were to profoundly affect and change the Indian

population of Wisconsin. When the French began permanent settlement

along the St. Lawrence they found the Huron and the Iroquois Confederacy

engaged in a death struggle for supremacy in the area. The French

espoused the cause of the Hurons who quickly became the middlemen in the

fur trade between the French and the western Indians.

The Iroquois, who were farmers and hence controlled less land than

hunting tribes who were their neighbors, soon depleted their land of fur

bearing animals and began to plan acquisition of land held by nearby

tribes. At about this time the Dutch considerately gave the Iroquois

guns, and by this act unleashed what was probably the most potent Indian

military confederacy in North America upon the Hurons, who were

practically exterminated in an amazingly short time. The Erie, Tobacco

Nation, and Neutrals soon suffered the same fate as the Hurons.

The Algonkian tribes, attacked first by the Neutrals and then by the

victorious Iroquois, fled pell-mell into eastern Michigan and the Sault

area. Eventually most of these tribes either went around the southern or

the northern extremity of Lake Michigan to arrive in the relative

security of wilderness Wisconsin.

The exact dates for the arrival of these various dispossessed eastern

tribes are not certain. We do know that they probably came to Wisconsin

sometime after Nicolet’s visit in 1634. The Mascouten, Potawatomi,

Kickapoo, Sauk, and Fox were coming into Wisconsin before 1654. Some

Huron and Ottawa settled here temporarily at this time, but by 1678 were

compelled by the Sioux to flee back to the Sault. The Chippewa stayed

around and west of the Straits of Mackinac and actually did not settle

in Wisconsin until about 1670.

[Illustration: SAUK AND FOX INDIANS (FROM MAXIMILIAN).]

[Illustration: CHIPPEWA INDIANS (FROM GEO. CATLIN).]

The Winnebago at first defended themselves vigorously against the

invading refugee tribes; however, this constant warfare greatly reduced

their numerical strength. Further decimated by plagues, probably

smallpox introduced by the whites, and by famine, the Winnebago were

compelled to make peace with the invading Algonkians who eventually

settled in great numbers along the Upper and Lower Fox rivers, the lower

reaches of the Wolf River, and in the vicinity of Green Bay.

Fur trade with the western Indians was successfully blocked by the

rampaging Iroquois for twenty odd years after Nicolet’s voyage of

exploration into the Middlewest, but with the establishment of a brief

peace, the Ottawa, who had assumed the position of middlemen in the fur

trade, sent a large canoe fleet to the western Indians and soon returned

with large quantities of furs which had been accumulated by the Indians

during the Iroquois War.

On the return journey two young Frenchmen, Radisson and Groseilliers,

went into Wisconsin with the Ottawa and became the first known white

traders in the area. Other traders quickly followed their example, and

by 1670, the fur trade in Wisconsin was proceeding at a good pace.

The Indians, even before actually being visited by the whites, had

received European implements by trade with other Indians and soon

learned the superiority of iron knives and axes over those of stone. The

arrival of the white traders with their guns, kettles, cloth, brandy,

and many other trade items was eagerly awaited by the Indians of what is

now Wisconsin.

As early as 1668, Perrot and traders with him had brought furs to Green

Bay (La Baye). Great activity in the fur trade was quick to follow with

the French traders using guns and brandy particularly as an inducement

to increase the tempo of fur trapping by the Indian. The Indian was as

anxious to obtain the white man’s goods as the trader was to obtain the

Indian’s furs. This formed the basis for an understanding mutually

agreeable to Indian and trader alike.

The fur trade, during the French Regime, went through many changes due

to changing circumstances, and the issuing of different regulations from

time to time. The discovery of new western lands and tribes spurred

literally hundreds of Canadian youths to seek these virgin territories

and the riches in furs to be had there. At first traders persuaded the

Indians to make the long trip to Montreal with their furs. The presence

of so many traders in the forests, however, soon made these long trips

unnecessary. By the time Perrot began trading in Wisconsin the traders

were carrying their goods to the Indians in their own country.

Regulations required that all traders must be licensed, or buy _Conges_

as they were called. Twenty-five of these were issued each year and

permitted the trader to take a designated load of goods into the

interior to be traded for the Indian’s furs. The presence of great

numbers of unlicensed traders in the woods was responsible for an edict

from the king declaring such illegal traders to be outlaws. The

punishment for such activities was death. These outlaw traders were

known as _coureurs de bois_ and were actually never hampered too much by

the stringent laws passed against them.

During the latter part of the 17th century outposts were built to help

control the trade. Nicolas Perrot built posts at Mt. Trempealeau, at

Lake Pepin, and at the mouth of the Wisconsin River. The Sieur DuLhut

(Duluth) built posts in the Lake Superior region.

Since these terms are often misused, it might be best to briefly

describe the following occupations: A _bourgeois_, was an owner of goods

and a license; the hired men were called _engages_; those hired men who

only carried the goods and paddled the canoe for a stipulated daily hire

were called _voyageurs_. The _coureurs de bois_ and sometimes the

_voyageurs_ were usually the ones who often remained in the forests and

“went native.”

[Illustration: uncaptioned]

[Illustration: PIERRE RADDISON (COURTESY OF WISCONSIN STATE

HISTORICAL SOCIETY).]

The impact of the white man’s civilization was bound to profoundly

change the life and geography of the Indians, and, particularly in the

early French period, this change was extremely rapid. Three groups were

actively working to institute changes in the Indian pattern of life.

These were the fur trader, whose goods revolutionized the material

culture of the natives, the Jesuit missionaries who hoped to convert the

tribes to Christianity, and the French government itself, which

attempted at various times to relocate the tribes, form confederacies,

and even to “civilize” them.

The fur trader was the only one of the three groups who really succeeded

in materially changing the Indian’s way of life, although his success

was unintentional. So completely did the materials of the white man

replace those of the Indian that within a few short generations almost

no one knew how to make stone tools and weapons, pottery vessels, bows

and arrows, and many other aboriginal products which were abandoned as

rapidly as superior goods of the whites were made available.

The change in tools and weapons naturally changed the Indians’ pattern

of life in many ways, but the entire economy of the tribes was affected

greatly by the fur trade. The Indian’s need for the white man’s goods

was great and he became more and more dependent upon the trader. As the

tempo of fur trading increased, the Indian began devoting almost all of

his time to hunting and trapping until, in a sense, he became an

employee in a great “fur-trade factory” with the goods he received from

the trader representing his wages. Much of the Indian’s old life of

freedom gradually disappeared, since failure to obtain guns or powder

and bullets meant starvation for the Indian and his family.

[Illustration: JESUIT MISSIONARY.]

[Illustration: uncaptioned]

Perhaps the worst effect of the contact between the Europeans and the

Indians was the introduction of brandy, always an effective persuader in

bargaining, and the introduction of European diseases, particularly

venereal disease and smallpox, the latter in some instances wiping out

entire tribes. The tendency for tribes to congregate around fur-trade

areas at the behest of the traders also had a detrimental effect upon

the Indians. In the Fox River valley and around Green Bay this

overpopulation resulted in famine and the voluntary exodus of some

tribes before 1700, among them the Miami and some of the Kickapoo and

Mascouten.

It should be noted that the adoption of new materials and living habits

was not entirely one-sided. The white man learned how to use the

Indian’s birch-bark canoe, many of his foods, tobacco, moccasins, snow

shoes, and often buckskin clothing.

Both the Jesuits and the French military deliberately aimed at changing

the Indian’s way of life but their aims were in direct opposition to one

another. The Jesuits were not interested in “civilizing” the Indians.

They desired to see these simple people maintained in their original

ignorance except for their belief in the “One True God,” and such simple

improvements in agriculture and other techniques as would improve their

lot as mission Indians. The Jesuits, not without some justification,

regarded contact between their charges and the French traders and

soldiers as having a demoralizing influence.

[Illustration: MENOMINI INDIAN MEDICINE LODGE CEREMONY (PAINTING BY

A. O. TIEMANN).]

Despite great heroism and prodigious efforts on the part of the

missionaries, permanent effects on the Indians by the Jesuits was to

prove almost negligible. The Wisconsin Indian was highly war-like and

found it difficult to appreciate the humility preached by the

missionary. The Indian regarded such behavior as effeminate.

[Illustration: FATHER JACQUES MARQUETTE (COURTESY OF MARQUETTE

UNIVERSITY).]

Nevertheless, the story of their efforts to Christianize the tribes, and

the valor of these missionaries in exploring unknown territory, makes a

fascinating story in our state’s history. Not the least among such

heroic deeds was the great voyage of exploration by Father Jacques

Marquette and Louis Joliet. Traveling up the Fox River, crossing over on

foot at what is now Portage, Wisconsin, and proceeding down the

Wisconsin River, the two explorers entered the Mississippi River on the

seventeenth of June, 1673. They explored the great river as far south as

the Arkansas River and then returned, by way of the Illinois River. This

great discovery made known a continuous water route from the Atlantic

Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico, and opened to the French the interior of a

vast continent.

It was the desire to exploit and unify this vast wilderness empire that

led the French leaders to attempt deliberate changes in the Wisconsin

Indian geography and political structure. This was necessary in order to

strengthen the Wisconsin tribes and keep them fighting the Iroquois who

consistently raided the western Indians and the French settlements along

the St. Lawrence.

LaSalle conceived the idea of a great Indian confederacy which, it was

hoped, would be able to successfully oppose the mighty Iroquois, and so

built forts in the Illinois country to help defend the area. The

Wisconsin Mascouten and Kickapoo left this area, partly because of their

desire to join the confederacy and partly because of population pressure

in the Fox River valley.

The year before the Iroquois invasions of 1680, DuLhut helped to

strengthen the French cause by negotiating peace between the Dakota

Sioux and their enemy of long standing, the Chippewa, and also

reconciling the Dakota Sioux and Assiniboine, who had been warring for

thirty years.

Nicolas Perrot probably was the most influential French officer ever to

have worked with the Wisconsin tribes. It was mainly through his

constant efforts that they were kept from going over to the Iroquois

when the tribes felt that the French had abandoned them. Perrot was

probably the only Frenchman to remain consistently on friendly terms

with the Foxes, who eventually were to engage the French in the

bloodiest Indian war ever to be fought on Wisconsin soil. Perrot

constantly travelled from village to village organizing raids against

the Iroquois, raids which eventually assisted in forcing the Iroquois to

sue for peace. The French, through the efforts of men like LaSalle,

Perrot, and DuLhut, had once again secured a firm hold on the western

tribes, but the Iroquois warfare of the 1680’s had caused a slump in the

fur trade. The trade was, moreover, soon to receive a blow which was to

almost completely kill all official commerce between the Indians and the

French for a number of years. This was the issuance of a royal edict by

the French King, May 21, 1696, revoking all fur trade licenses and

prohibiting all colonials from carrying goods to the western country.

There were really two main causes for the issuance of this edict. One

was a slump in the beaver market caused by the great flood of furs into

France and a decline in beaver hat production, due partly to the

emigration of the Huguenots who were the main hat felters; the other

cause for the edict was the anger of the Jesuits, aroused by the sale of

brandy to the Indians by the traders and soldiers.

It was hoped that the Indian tribes would make the journey to Montreal

themselves to trade their furs, but it was soon discovered that most

tribes either would not or could not make such a journey for purposes of

trade. The result, of course, was severe hardship for the Indians of

Wisconsin. Lack of gunpowder and lead restricted their hunting abilities

and made it more difficult for them to defend themselves against the

Iroquois and other hostile tribes. The Indians were becoming

increasingly dependent upon the French to the extent that they had lost

much of the freedom they had enjoyed as a self-sufficient people.

The rapid abandonment of the western posts followed the fur trade ban.

The commanders of these outposts, for the most part, did not consider it

worthwhile to stay on in that capacity if they could not enrich

themselves by means of the Indian trade.

Peace was finally arranged between the Iroquois and the French and their

Indian allies in 1700. The Iroquois had suffered heavily from the raids

by the western Indians. They claimed to have lost more than half their

warriors. With the fear of Iroquois raids ended, the confederacies of

western tribes quickly fell apart, and the latter turned to fighting

among themselves as they had always done in the past.

The French military now decided on a concentration policy. The western

posts were to be restricted to three main centers. These were to be at

Detroit, New Orleans, and near Tonty’s post in the Illinois country.

Fairly large numbers of troops were stationed at these posts to provide

adequate defense, and the western tribes were to be concentrated in

these areas. This would facilitate the fur trade by permitting the

Indians to trap their furs and bring them directly to the trading

centers. The French government also hoped to “civilize” the Indians,

teaching them to farm the land, learn the French language, and

eventually even participate in the colonial economy.

The concentration policy was foredoomed to failure. The Wisconsin

tribes, of whom many were hereditary enemies, only needed a spark to set

them at one another’s throats. This led to trouble at Detroit which

resulted in the bloody Fox Wars, long, costly fighting for the French

which contributed much towards their final downfall in the New World.

CHAPTER THREE

THE FOX WARS AND THE FALL OF NEW FRANCE

[Illustration: SAUK AND FOX WARRIORS (FROM MAXIMILIAN).]

Events occurring in Wisconsin during the first half of the Eighteenth

Century were to bode little good for the French, and were to contribute

towards the final downfall of New France at the hands of the British.

For a good share of the years between 1701 and 1738 the French were to

be largely occupied with the attempt to subjugate the Fox Indians and

their allies.

Not only were the expeditions against the Fox to prove costly to the

French, but the enmity of the Fox required shiftings of trade routes. As

an inevitable result, friction between the French and English traders

developed, since the Fox at times blocked both the Fox River in

Wisconsin and the Illinois River to the French traders. The determined

resistance of the Fox also prevented the fruition of French hopes to

dominate the western tribes and influence them to espouse the French

cause. Furthermore, the difficulty experienced by the French military in

conquering a relatively small group of Wisconsin Indians did little to

further French prestige among other western tribes.

The First Fox War was actually the result of the French concentration

policy. Within a few years after the founding of Detroit in 1701 by the

Sieur de Cadillac there were almost 6000 Indians in the vicinity of the

fort. The Fox, meanwhile, determined to prevent the carrying of guns to

their enemy, the Dakota Sioux, were halting French traders attempting to

proceed up the Fox River on their journey to the Sioux country on the

Upper Mississippi. A French fort in the Sioux country was also abandoned

after the loss of several men due to attacks by the Fox.

Cadillac, realizing the need for some measure to bring these warlike

tribesmen under control, in 1710 invited the Fox, along with the other

tribes resident around Green Bay, to come and reside near Detroit. At

this crucial time, when so much depended on the leadership of a

Frenchman experienced in handling the tribes, Cadillac, probably the

most capable Colonial officer of the times, was sent to Louisiana as

governor of that colony. The new commandant at Detroit had none of

Cadillac’s ability with the Indians.

The arrival of the Fox and their allies, the Kickapoo, Sauk, and

Mascouten, was the signal for trouble. These tribesmen were feared as

well as hated by the other Indians about Detroit. After a band of

Mascouten were attacked by the Ottawa near the St. Joseph River, during

the winter of 1711-1712, the Fox, in revenge, immediately attacked the

Ottawa and Huron at the Detroit post.

The Detroit commandant sided with the Ottawa and Huron and permitted

them to seek refuge in the French fort. Shortly after, the Fox erected a

stockade of their own and made preparations for a long fight. The French

and their allies were reinforced by a large band of Illinois, Missouri,

Osage, Potawatomi, and Menomini. This greatly superior force laid siege

to the Fox fort and the latter soon offered to surrender. The French and

their Indian supporters, however, were now determined to completely

exterminate their enemies.

After a siege of nineteen days, the Fox attempted to escape by taking

advantage of cover offered on a dark, rainy night. They were pursued,

overtaken, and the great majority of them were slaughtered. This was a

victory for the French, but a very costly one, for the Fox and their

allies still had a great many warriors in the forests of Wisconsin.

These, in retaliation, began a war of extermination against the allies

of the French who had participated in the Detroit massacre and the

hunted tribesmen soon complained that their people were starving because

they dared not hunt in the forests lest their men be slain by the

vengeful Fox.

The summer of 1716 saw the first white army ever to invade the forests

of Wisconsin. The Sieur de Louvigny, in May of that year, left Montreal

with an army of several hundred French and a force of mission Indians

determined to compel the Fox to sue for peace. He arrived in Wisconsin

with his army augmented by western tribesmen, and _coureurs de bois_ who

had been granted pardons for joining the expedition at their own

expense. With this total force amounting to about 800 men, Louvigny

besieged the fortified Fox village, situated near Little Lake Butte des

Morts. While the French kept up a fire with two small cannon and a

grenade mortar, they sank a trench towards the Fox fort determined to

mine the place and blow it up.

The Fox surrendered after three days of fighting and agreed to accept

terms which Louvigny thought very severe, but which his Indian allies

regarded as overmild. The terms included the requirement that the Fox

pay for the costs of the expedition against them by means of furs yet to

be gathered, to give up prisoners taken from the allies of the French,

to furnish a number of hostages to guarantee their future good behavior,

and to cede their territory to the French King.

The peace temporarily halted the bloody warfare of the four preceding

years and permitted the fur trade to be resumed. The concentration

policy had proven to be a failure, and shortly after the death of Louis

XIV, in 1715, the posts were once more occupied and the licensing system

for the fur trade was restored. A fort was built at La Baye (Green Bay)

in 1717, and a post was occupied at Chequamegon Bay to keep the Chippewa

from attacking the Fox and causing a resumption of war, and also to

regulate the fur trade in that area.

[Illustration: EARLY FORT AT MICHILLIMACKINAC (MUSEUM MURAL BY

GEORGE PETER).]

The quite considerable friction between the colonies of Canada and

Louisiana provided the background for the events which led directly to

the Second Fox War. There was considerable argument as to the exact

boundaries of Illinois which now was annexed to Louisiana, although

originally settled by Canadians. The Fox took advantage of these

feelings of hostility by attacking the Illinois in the vicinity of

Kaskaskia, even killing Frenchmen in this area. The Fox claimed the

Illinois would not return Fox prisoners as they had promised according

to treaty. The Canadian governor, Vaudreuil, tended to side with the Fox

in the argument.

After the death of Vaudreuil, his temporary successor, Baron de

Longueuil ordered the Sieur de Lignery, commandant at Mackinac, to

enforce a peace between the Fox, Kickapoo, and Mascouten, and their

enemies, the Illinois. The Fox promised to obey this demand, and in

order to ensure their obedience, a new post was built in the Sioux

country. This was rendered necessary by the fact that the Dakota Sioux

had now become allies of the Fox, and the French intended to make sure

that no aid would be coming to the Fox from that warlike tribe. The

three forts in the northwest, at Chequamegon Bay, La Baye, and on the

upper Mississippi in the Sioux country were to be maintained rather

steadily until near the end of the French regime.

Meanwhile the Fox chief Kiala had succeeded in forming an alliance

against the French between the Fox and their long-time allies the

Kickapoo and Mascouten, and a series of other tribes including, in

addition to the nearby Winnebago, such far distant tribes as the Abnaki

and Seneca in the East, and the Dakota Sioux, Missouri, Iowa, and Oto in

the West. Kiala hoped by this means to form a hostile circle about the

French which would end in their complete defeat, a plan similar to that

later attempted by Pontiac, and Tecumseh.

The Marquis de Beauharnois, appointed governor of Canada to replace

Vaudreuil, was determined that the raids on the Illinois and the French

at Kaskaskia must be stopped. A French army once more was sent against

the Fox. This time, headed by the Sieur de Lignery, the expedition

numbered about four hundred French and approximately one thousand

Indians. Warned by the Potawatomi, the Fox escaped from their villages

and the army arrived at each to find it deserted. At Little Lake Butte

des Morts the soldiers refused to go farther and Lignery had to be

satisfied with the burning of the Fox and Winnebago villages and their

stores of food.

Despite the poor showing of Lignery’s expedition against the Fox,

Kiala’s confederacy began to fall apart. Even their old allies, the

Mascouten and Kickapoo, were persuaded by the French to turn against

them, and the Sioux, closely watched by the French, no longer could give

the Fox refuge in their country. Discouraged by these losses and

defeated by the French under the capable Paul Marin, the Fox decided to

flee to the Iroquois country. The Fox had long been secretly treating

with the English and the Seneca, a member tribe of the Iroquois

Confederacy and hoped to find a friendly reception in their country.

Warned by the Mascouten and Kickapoo regarding the plans of the Fox,

French officers from nearby posts hastily gathered together Indian

allies and prepared to attack their fleeing enemies. The Fox, warned by

their scouts of the force advancing against them, hastily erected a

stockade and prepared to fight for their lives. They managed to fight

off the besiegers for twenty-three days. Then on a stormy night they

attempted flight but were quickly overtaken. Almost all of the band were

either slaughtered or taken as slaves.

After the few survivors of this disaster, seeking refuge in their

village near the mouth of the Wisconsin River, were attacked by Detroit

Indians, Kiala and three other chiefs offered to give themselves up,

asking mercy for themselves and the fifty surviving warriors, supposedly

all that were left of the entire tribe. De Villiers accepted the

surrender and hastened to Montreal with his prisoners. De Villiers was

ordered to return and kill off the rest of the Fox, taking only the

women and children as prisoners. These were to be sold into slavery,

like Kiala, who was fated to end his days as a slave in the West Indies.

De Villiers returned to the Sauk village at Green Bay and demanded that

the Sauk release the remnant of Fox survivors. The Sauk declined to

release warriors with whom they had strong blood ties, and in an attempt

to force an entrance, one of de Villiers’ sons was killed. The French

quickly retaliated and in the exchange of fire de Villiers himself was

killed by a twelve year old boy, who later became renowned as the Sauk

Chief Blackbird. In the battle that followed, the Sieur Duplessis, the

Sieur de Repentigny, and six other Frenchmen quickly met the same fate.

The Sauk and Fox, too, lost heavily and fled to the vicinity of the

present-day city of Menasha. The bloody battle that ensued there, it is

said, accounts for the name Butte des Morts, or Hill of the Dead.

As a result of this battle, the remainder of the Fox and the Sauk

amalgamated and for all practical purposes became one tribe. They fled

into Iowa where they erected a new fort, and gradually their ranks were

swelled by Fox released from captivity by tribes now secretly in

sympathy with the Sauk and Fox. One more expedition was sent against

them, led by the Sieur de Noyelles, but although he followed the Sauk

and Fox to the vicinity of the Des Moines River, they were so well

entrenched that it was impossible to dislodge them and the expedition

returned home without success. Eventually the Fox Wars were brought to

an end through a policy of conciliation inaugurated in 1740 by Paul

Marin, the new commandant at La Baye. Force had, in the long run, proven

a failure in the campaign to completely subjugate the Fox.

[Illustration: SAUK AND FOX CHIEF (FROM GEO. CATLIN).]

Throughout the first half of the Eighteenth Century the French, as we

have seen, had been occupied with more or less constant warfare with the

Fox. This warfare was the dominant note in the history of Wisconsin for

this period, and in general, the role of other Wisconsin tribes during

this era was that of serving as allies either of the French or of the

Fox.

The failure of Noyelles’ expedition against the Fox had helped to lower

French prestige among the western tribes, and in 1736 the Sioux, angered

by French friendship for the Chippewa and Cree, murdered a French

officer, a priest, and a party of nineteen _voyageurs_. From this time

on the Sioux could no longer be numbered among the allies of the French.

By 1739, the Sioux-Chippewa War flamed into action and the Sioux were

driven westward from the areas in Wisconsin now held by the Chippewa.

Warfare between the English and the French in America again was to

seriously affect the western tribes. This conflict, lasting from 1744 to

1748, saw the fur trade with the western tribes reach extremely low

proportions. Goods were very scarce due to the loss of French ships at

the hands of British fighting vessels, and this failure to produce

sufficient goods for the Indians, in addition to the already declining

prestige of the French, encouraged some of the western tribes to seek

more favorable relations with the British. Most of the Huron, under

Chief Nicolas, began trading with the British, and many other western

tribes exhibited the same inclination.

The end of the current conflict with the English enabled the French to

regain control of these tribes, but the Miami had moved into Ohio and

established a large village called Pickawillany which became a fairly

permanent camp for a number of English traders. Several expeditions

against this village by the French failed. In 1752, however, Charles de

Langlade, later famed as one of Wisconsin’s pioneer French settlers at

Green Bay, who was part French and part Ottawa and who thus had

tremendous influence among the Indians, led an expedition against

Pickawillany which enjoyed remarkable success. The village was

destroyed, the English traders captured, and the Miami returned to

French allegiance.

For a while France again enjoyed supremacy in the West. In 1755,

Langlade and his contingent of Wisconsin and Mackinac braves

participated in the famous battle culminating in “Braddock’s Defeat”.

Chippewa, Menomini, Potawatomi, and Winnebago were said to be present at

this engagement, and for many years thereafter trophies of this battle

were to be found in Wisconsin Indian lodges. Despite this severe defeat

of the British and American Colonials, the fortunes of the French were

destined to take a turn for the worse. By 1761, Wisconsin was under

British control, and in 1763, France formally surrendered the rest of

her American possessions to England. She had ceded Louisiana to Spain

the year before.

Much had happened to Wisconsin’s Indians during this period, roughly

from 1700 to 1760. The long and bloody Fox Wars had wrought hardship on

the other tribes as well as on the Fox. The Sioux-Chippewa war had

resulted in the Sioux being forced to relinquish most of their Wisconsin

territory to the Chippewa. The Potawatomi Indians, who had fought under

Langlade and participated in the killing of the unarmed English and

Americans at Fort William Henry, were visited by a grim vengeance in the

form of smallpox, contracted from the English soldiers and brought back

by the tribes to their own country where it raged virtually unchecked.

Great numbers of Indians lost their lives as a result.

Other tribes left Wisconsin, some never to return. The Kickapoo and

Mascouten were now in Illinois and Indiana. The Potawatomi were below

Lake Michigan at St. Joseph. Thus many of the tribes here when the

French traders and missionaries first arrived, no longer were in the

Wisconsin scene. The tribes remaining here were destined to know new

masters, the British, who were to control the fur trade in Wisconsin

until the end of the War of 1812.

[Illustration: uncaptioned]

[Illustration: uncaptioned]

CHAPTER FOUR

THE PERIOD OF BRITISH CONTROL

[Illustration: PONTIAC.]

British military control of Wisconsin was ushered in with the arrival of

Ensign James Gorrell at Green Bay on the twelfth of October, 1761. With

the aid of his two non-commissioned officers and fifteen privates,

Gorrell set about to restore the old French fort which he renamed Fort

Edward Augustus, in honor of the Duke of York. His next task was to win

over the French _habitants_ about the fort and to gain the sympathy of

the Indians in the area for the British cause. Apparently Gorrell was

quite successful in both tasks.

The French _habitants_ about the posts taken over by the British found

it rather easy, for the most part, to transfer their allegiance to the

British Crown since they were given the same privileges they enjoyed

under French authority. Moreover, the British traders found it more

advantageous to form partnerships with the more experienced French

traders than to attempt to supersede them.

British success with the Indians varied according to local conditions at

the different forts. The British were not inclined to give presents as

liberally as the French had done, and it was not British policy to

fraternize or intermarry with their savage allies. The feeling of

inferiority prompted by this treatment caused resentment among many

tribes.

[Illustration: TRADERS PORTAGING (PAINTING BY T. LINDBERG).]

In central Wisconsin, however, Gorrell’s diplomatic treatment of the

Indians, added to the fact that the Sauk, Fox, Winnebago, and Menomini

held a certain amount of resentment towards the French, swung these

tribes over to the British. The promises of medals and commissions to

the Indian chiefs, and the fact that the British trade goods were

cheaper by far than those offered by the French, also tended to offset

the more arrogant treatment of the tribes by the British.

Gorrell’s success with the Indians of central Wisconsin was very

important to Wisconsin history, for in 1763 the British were compelled

to deal with a widespread Indian uprising largely led by Pontiac, chief

of an Ottawa tribe from around the Straits of Mackinac, and one of the

most able Indian leaders who ever lived. It was Pontiac’s plan to drive

all the British and Colonials into the sea by means of an alliance of

Indian tribes from the Alleghenies to the Mississippi River, and from

the Ohio River to the Great Lakes. Pontiac’s chief claim to greatness

lies in his remarkable feat of keeping a number of tribes together for a

seven-month siege of Detroit, a unique event in Indian warfare.

In addition to the attack on Detroit, concerted attacks were made on

other British posts, of which a number fell, including the one at

Mackinac. The failure of the Indians to take Forts Detroit, Pitt, and

Niagara assured defeat for Pontiac’s campaign.

On June 2, 1763, the Chippewa Indians took Fort Mackinac by a clever

subterfuge. They faked a game of LaCrosse in front of the stockade and

pretended accidentally to knock the ball into the fort. As the players

rushed after the ball they seized guns from the watching Indian women

who had concealed the weapons under their blankets. Most of the garrison

was massacred before they had a chance to defend themselves.

The loyalty to the British of Wisconsin’s Sauk, Fox, Winnebago, and

Menomini Indians, and the timely arrival of a delegation of Sioux, sworn

enemies of the Chippewa, probably saved Green Bay from a similar fate.

Etherington hastily summoned Gorrell to his assistance. Gorrell

abandoned Fort Edward Augustus at Green Bay and with the aid of 90 men

of the Sauk, Fox, Menomini, and Winnebago tribes succeeded in obtaining

the prisoners’ release from the Indians. The party then proceeded on to

Montreal. British military occupation of Wisconsin was not resumed until

the War of 1812.

The Pontiac rebellion also served to bring the problems relating to the

Indians home to the British Government and probably helped as an

incentive to the issuance of the Proclamation of 1763. British subjects

were now forbidden to purchase lands west of the Appalachian mountains

without special license. It was hoped that this would prevent further

encroachments by white settlers upon Indian lands. Trade with the

Indians was to be permitted where licenses with the various colonial

governments had been procured. Moreover, since Wisconsin was not

included in the limits of any of the colonies, Wisconsin was left

without any government other than that exercised by the military at

Mackinac. This matter was not rectified until 1774 when the Quebec Act

placed Wisconsin under the authority of the Governor of Canada.

Mackinac became the seat of Wisconsin’s fur trade when the fort was

rebuilt there in 1764. It was the only fort northwest of Detroit with

government officers and Indian agents. By 1767, large numbers of traders

were coming into the Wisconsin area. The Indians by this time were so

dependent on the white trader that any interruption in the supply of

goods flowing to the Indians worked severe hardships upon them.

Wisconsin’s fur trade was still largely controlled by Montreal

investors, mostly British. The actual traders, however, who contacted

the Indians were still primarily Frenchmen, and this was to remain so

throughout Wisconsin’s fur-trade period. Some competition in Wisconsin

was given to the British by Spanish and French traders from Louisiana,

which had become Spanish territory by the peace treaty in 1763. But the

British managed to retain the bulk of the northwest fur trade with the

Indians.

Wisconsin’s Indians did not participate strongly in the American

Revolution, but they did take part in some action. Charles de Langlade,

half French, half Ottawa Indian leader who helped the French so

efficiently during the French and Indian War, now espoused the British

cause as ardently as he had the French. Langlade’s tremendous influence

over the Indians was well known, and the British hoped to persuade him

to obtain Wisconsin Indian help in fighting the Colonists. Langlade did

succeed in leading Chippewa and Ottawa east to help Burgoyne in 1777,

and in 1778 Wisconsin Indians went to Detroit to help General Hamilton.

On the whole, however, Wisconsin’s Indians were too disinterested in the

white man’s war to be enthusiastic about long trips east to aid the

British.

[Illustration: MICHILLIMACKINAC, RESTORATION OF LAST FORT.]

The American Revolutionary War hero, Major George Rogers Clark, whose

capture of Vincennes and Kaskaskia, and the French villages of the

Illinois country, provided the basis for United States claims to the

Northwest Territory during the peace negotiations between the British

and the United States, called together a great assembly of Indians at

Cahokia, Illinois, in 1778, and succeeded in obtaining their pledges of

allegiance to the United States. Many Wisconsin Indians attended the

meeting, including the noted Blackbird, chief of a Milwaukee village

composed of Ottawa, Chippewa, and Potawatomi. Blackbird apparently

remained loyal to the American cause. Major Clark’s influence with the

Wisconsin Indians tended to nullify the efforts of Charles Langlade, and

other French officers in the service of England, to mobilize the

Wisconsin Indians against the United States.

In 1780, England utilized some Wisconsin Indians in an attack on the

Spanish with whom she was then at war. Twelve hundred warriors were

assembled at Prairie du Chien, and marched on St. Louis. Aided by the

fact that they had advance knowledge of the enemy movements, that some

of the tribesmen were more or less sympathetic with the American cause,

and that the Indians showed no enthusiasm for attacking in the face of

cannon fire, the Spanish and Americans succeeded in routing the

attackers. After this action Wisconsin’s Indians were not involved in

any important campaigns during the remaining years of the American

Revolution.

[Illustration: CHIEF OSHKOSH (PORTRAIT BY S. M. BROOKS, COURTESY OF

THE WISCONSIN STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY).]

British control of Wisconsin’s Indians did not cease with the end of the

Revolutionary War. Despite the British agreement in the Treaty of Paris,

in 1783, to turn over their posts at Niagara, Detroit, and

Michillimackinac, they continued to hold these forts until after the Jay

Treaty of 1794. It was not until October, 1796, that Mackinac, the last

post to be turned over by the British, was officially occupied by

American troops. The British, however, still maintained their control

over Wisconsin’s Indians through the fur trade now operating from posts

just across the Canadian border.

Within a month after the declaration of war against England by the

American Congress in 1812, Mackinac was retaken by the British and

Menomini and Winnebago Indians from Wisconsin. Among the Menomini were

chiefs Tomah and Oshkosh, the latter destined to become a famous

Menomini leader and friend of the Americans. Within another month Fort

Dearborn (at Chicago) was attacked by Indians and most of its civilian

and military inhabitants massacred. Menomini, Potawatomi, and Winnebago

Indians from Wisconsin took part in this attack.

[Illustration: MENOMINI WARRIOR (FROM INDIAN TRIBES OF NORTH

AMERICA).]

The Americans were well aware of the strategic importance of Prairie du

Chien in any attempt to control Wisconsin’s Indians. In June, 1814, Fort

Shelby, probably the first building over which an American flag ever

flew in Wisconsin, was erected at this strategic location. Lt. Perkins

and sixty men were left in charge at the fort.

The British quickly determined to drive out the Americans and succeeded

in forcing Perkins to surrender the fort on July 19, 1814. About 500

Indians, mostly Menomini, Chippewa, Winnebago, and Sioux, took part in

the assault on the American post.

The British renamed the post Fort McKay and managed to hold it against

the Americans until, in agreement with the Treaty of Ghent, they finally

abandoned the fort in May, 1815, and British control of Wisconsin’s

Indians was finally at an end. The fate of Wisconsin’s Indians was now

in the hands of the United States Government.

CHAPTER FIVE

THE PERIOD OF AMERICAN SETTLEMENT

[Illustration: uncaptioned]

Wisconsin’s Indians, under the French and British had become

increasingly dependent upon the white man. Without the invaders’ tools,

weapons, utensils, and various other things which the Indian had come to

depend upon, he found himself unable to supply himself with the

necessities of life. The French and British traders, of course, were

interested almost exclusively in procuring furs from the Indians, and as

long as the aborigines could obtain furs for them, the traders would

supply their needs.

The Americans, however, were primarily interested in exploiting and

settling the Indians’ land; fur trading was secondary. As they pushed

into the new territory in ever increasing numbers, first to exploit the

lead mines of southwestern Wisconsin, and then to farm the fertile soil,

the Indian was doomed to be relentlessly pushed aside. He had lost his

independence. Now he was to lose his land and the very means of his

livelihood.

The arrival of the Americans upon the Wisconsin scene pleased neither

the Indians nor the French traders. Both relied to a great extent on the

fur trade, and they knew that the clearing of land by the settlers would

hasten the end of this activity. Many of the French, too, had Indian

blood and considered their cause as one with the Indians. The United

States government first showed poor judgment in its attempt to make

these people conform to American standards. For example, the French and

Indians were warned that common-law marriages between the two races

would no longer be tolerated, but must be legalized by either a civil or

church ceremony, and violators would face punishment. Both the French

and Indians bitterly fought what seemed to them oppression, and

eventually later decisions recognized the legality of common-law unions

of earlier regimes.

Wisconsin’s Indian agents were for a time under the authority of two

superintendents of Indian affairs. Lewis Cass, Governor of Michigan

Territory, of which Wisconsin was a part from 1818 to 1836, was in

charge of the Indian agent at Green Bay. The agent at Prairie du Chien

worked under the direction of William Clark who, as Superintendent of

St. Louis from 1807 to 1838, had authority to the source of the

Mississippi River. These agents distributed annuities and payments due

the Indians and attempted to keep white settlers from squatting on

Indian land. The settlers, however, rudely took over Indian land and, in

the inevitable conflict that followed, the militia and army would be

called out to protect the whites. In the ensuing “peace treaty” the

Indians would be forced to cede their lands and move westward.

[Illustration: INVADING SETTLERS (PAINTING BY A. O. TIEMANN).]

Wisconsin’s early territorial period was also the era of the frontier

fort manned by the regular U. S. Army. Since the pay for the ordinary

soldier was very small, the army attracted men who could not succeed

elsewhere, or immigrants who wished to desert at the first opportunity

and travel westward. The officers, however, were of different character

entirely. Educated at West Point, they were by far the most educated and

cultured men in the frontier settlements. With their wives, they

represented the cream of Wisconsin society of this period.

[Illustration: THE ENFORCING OF LEGAL MARRIAGE (PAINTING BY A. O.

TIEMANN).]

Wisconsin had three main forts along the Fox-Wisconsin waterway. Fort

Howard was erected at Green Bay in 1816, the same year that Fort

Crawford was established at Prairie du Chien. Fort Winnebago was built

at what is now Portage in 1828, shortly after the Red Bird rebellion.

The United States army did its best to maintain peace between the

Indians and whites, and to protect the Indians from unlicensed traders,

and sometimes legitimate ones, who illegally sold whiskey to them. In

their efforts in this direction they often found themselves in conflict

with civil authorities who sometimes protected the traders apprehended

in such violations.

The fur trade continued in Wisconsin while the population was primarily

Indian, but by 1835 it was no longer of any significance in this area.

Following the War of 1812, the United States Government set up fur trade

“factories” at Prairie du Chien and Green Bay, hoping by this means to

control some of the evils, one of the most vicious of which was the

peddling of whiskey to the Indians. The whiskey was usually diluted with

water, and adulterants such as turpentine, or even corrosive acids,

added to restore the “bite.”

The government entry into the fur trade was unsuccessful. The factors,

as the proprietors of the trade “factories” were called, lacked

experience in dealing with the Indians. They did not give credit

advancements to them as did the other traders, and the American Fur

Company applied pressure on Congress to end this system. Gradually this

Company acquired the fur trade monopoly in this area; Solomon Juneau,

Milwaukee’s famous founder, was one of the American Fur Company’s agents

in what is now the State of Wisconsin. The gradual decadence of the fur

trade, of course, increased the hardships of Wisconsin tribes.

[Illustration: OLD FORT WINNEBAGO (COURTESY OF THE WISCONSIN STATE

HISTORICAL SOCIETY).]

[Illustration: THE SECOND OR STONE FORT CRAWFORD (COURTESY OF THE

WISCONSIN STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY).]

[Illustration: THE FIRST OR LOG FORT CRAWFORD (COURTESY OF THE

WISCONSIN STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY).]

As settlers began encroaching on the Indians’ land, conflicts were

inevitable. John C. Calhoun, the Secretary of War in 1825, sponsored a

plan for the removal of eastern tribes across the Mississippi to the

western plains. It was believed that by furnishing them with equipment

for hunting and farming they could survive readily and would be safe

from further pressure by white homesteaders. No one realized at this

time how soon these western lands would be overrun by the relentless

pressure of the American pioneer. The land purchased from the Indians

was to be made available to American settlers. The lands of certain

tribes of Wisconsin Indians were to be included in this overall plan.

[Illustration: SOLOMON JUNEAU, AGED 60.]

Unfortunately for the smooth functioning of this operation, the Indians

did not care to leave the land on which they and their ancestors had

hunted for so long a time, and travel to new hunting grounds. In many

instances they were not removed without a show of force, sometimes with

considerable blood being shed by both whites and Indians.

In 1825, Lewis Cass and William Clark held a conference of Wisconsin

tribes at Prairie du Chien. They hoped to establish definite boundaries

for the holdings of the different tribes in order to eliminate friction

between them. This would also facilitate future land purchases from the

Indians. Roughly these boundaries were recognized: the southwest and

southeast corners of Wisconsin were allotted to the southern Chippewa,

Ottawa, and Potawatomi; the Winnebago held the remainder of southern

Wisconsin; the Menomini kept the northeast part of the state from the

Milwaukee River up; and the Chippewa held all of northern Wisconsin west

of the Menomini. These Indian territories were not to be respected for

very long by white squatters, however, and the Winnebago were to be

among the first to encounter trouble from this source.

The fact that southwestern Wisconsin was very rich in lead was

discovered quite early in the French regime, and it is probable that the

French taught the Indians how to mine and smelt the ore. By 1811, the

Sauk and Fox are reported to have devoted almost all their attention to

lead mining, only hunting to supply themselves with meat. They exchanged

the metal with Canadian traders for the goods they needed. Some early

American traders who attempted to get in on this trade were killed by

the Indians, who feared that once the Americans learned of the value of

the lead deposits their cupidity would be aroused and the Indians would

lose their land. Later events were to prove the excellence of this

reasoning.

Aroused by the rich deposits, Cornish miners, particularly, began to

arrive in force by 1827. The Indians were rudely expelled from their

diggings and their mines appropriated by armed whites. In the same year,

Red Bird, a young Winnebago chief, killed two settlers and scalped a

baby who, interestingly enough, survived to become the mother of a large

family and live to a ripe old age. Following this attack Red Bird and

his warriors, about forty in number, celebrated the scalp taking with a

drunken carousal at the mouth of the Bad Axe River, about forty miles

north of Prairie du Chien. Two keelboats on their way from Fort Snelling

to St. Louis were fired upon by the drunken Winnebago braves, and after

a battle of about three hours, the keelboats escaped with a loss of four

men dead and several wounded. The Indians were reported to have suffered

losses of seven dead and fourteen wounded.

[Illustration: JUNEAU’S TRADING POST, MILWAUKEE (PAINTING BY A. O.

TIEMANN).]

[Illustration: MENOMINI INDIANS OF THE EARLY 19TH CENTURY (PORTRAIT

BY S. M. BROOKS).]

[Illustration: THE PIONEERS (PAINTING BY A. O. TIEMANN).]

United States troops rapidly arrived at the scene, and after fleeing up

the Wisconsin River, Red Bird found himself and his tribe surrounded.

The Americans agreed to forget the matter of the keelboats providing the

murderers of the settlers would give themselves up for trial. On Sept.

3, 1827, Red Bird, rather than engage his people in a hopeless war

against the whites, voluntarily surrendered to Major Whistler at

Portage. Arrangements were made for the Americans to use the lead mines

until a treaty could be arranged, and in July, 1829, another Grand

Council was held at Prairie du Chien. The Winnebago, southern

Potawatomi, Chippewa, and Ottawa agreed to cede their land. The United

States Government now owned the rich lead mining country of southwestern

Wisconsin.

[Illustration: WINNEBAGO CHIEF (PORTRAIT BY S. M. BROOKS).]

During this period of American settlement, beginning as early as 1821

and lasting through 1834, a migration of Indians from New York occurred

which was to add some permanent residents to Wisconsin’s Indian

population. The Oneida and Munsee settled near Green Bay, and the

Stockbridge and Brotherton Indians settled along the eastern shore of

Lake Winnebago. The Menomini ceded 500,000 acres of their land to these

tribes in 1831.

Meanwhile the stage had been set for what was to become the most famous,

and also, perhaps, the most infamous Indian and white conflict in the

Wisconsin area. This was the so-called Black Hawk War, although it was

more of a systematic extermination of Indians by whites, hardly

deserving the term “war.”

Black Hawk was leader of the “British band” of the Sauk with a large

village, said to number about 500 families, situated near the mouth of

the Rock River in Illinois. His people were known as the “British band”

because of their known sympathies with the English, and also since Black

Hawk and his warriors had fought with Tecumseh and the British against

the Americans in the War of 1812.

White settlers began squatting on Black Hawk’s land as early as 1823,

despite the fact that according to treaty the Indians were not required

to give up their land until land offices had been set up, an event which

had not occurred. The Indians’ cornfields were fenced in, wigwams were

burned, and the women mistreated. Black Hawk went to the British agent

in Canada, near Detroit. He was advised that the treaties of 1804 and

1816 were being violated and that he rightfully could resist the

settlers and expect the backing of the United States Government. Black

Hawk returned and warned the settlers that they would be attacked unless

they left at once.

[Illustration: I-TWA-KU-AM, MOHICAN LEADER (PORTRAIT BY HAMLIN).]

The alarmed settlers sought help from the Illinois militia which was

rapidly called to arms in 1831. This show of force compelled Black Hawk

to retire to the west side of the Mississippi River with his people, and

promise not to return without government permission. Chief Keokuk, head

of the combined Sauk and Fox tribes, had already taken all of his

people, except the rebellious Black Hawk and his band, into what is now

Iowa in 1830, realizing the futility of fighting the tremendously

superior white forces.

[Illustration: BLACK HAWK (FROM INDIAN TRIBES OF NORTH AMERICA).]

On April 6, 1832, Black Hawk crossed back into Illinois with

approximately 1000 of his people, about 400 of whom were warriors. He

had been promised aid by emissaries of the Potawatomi, Winnebago,

Ottawa, and Chippewa, but before a month had passed Black Hawk realized

he would get little aid either from these tribes or from the British in

a war against the settlers. The militia had been called out again in the

meantime, and Black Hawk now only desired to make peace and get his

people back to Iowa. He sent messengers under a white flag to Major

Stillman who was encamped nearby with about 400 volunteers. The white

flag was ignored, and three of the Indians were killed. Black Hawk had

only forty warriors with him at the time, but angered by this treachery,

he attacked Stillman’s men in what he himself called a “suicide charge.”

The tremendously superior force of volunteers, upon seeing Black Hawk’s

charging braves, fled frantically with the first volley fired by the

Indians. As they fled they spread the alarm over most of northern

Illinois, and maintained that Black Hawk had ambushed them with 2000

warriors. Following this event Black Hawk removed his women and children

to the Lake Koshkonong area in Wisconsin, so that they could forage for

desperately needed food and be relatively safe from attack. Black Hawk

and his warriors spent the following two months attacking settlements

along the Wisconsin-Illinois frontier. Two hundred whites and possibly

as many Indians were killed in these border skirmishes.

Black Hawk soon found himself pursued by a greatly superior force of

militia and regular U. S. Army troops. He and his band fled through the

Madison, Wisconsin, area and were overtaken attempting to cross the

Wisconsin River, where the Battle of Wisconsin Heights took place on

July 21, 1832. Black Hawk’s braves succeeded in holding back the

Americans while the tribe crossed the river, and the following morning

one of his men made a surrender speech in the Winnebago language. No one

in the American camp understood the plea for surrender terms, since the

Winnebago followers of the Americans were not in their camp at the time.

The Indians were again compelled to flee.

Black Hawk then divided his people into two groups, one of which

obtained rafts and canoes from friendly Winnebago, and proceeded down

the Wisconsin River, hoping to reach the Mississippi River and cross

back to Iowa. Soldiers from Prairie du Chien captured or shot most of

them. Some others were hunted down in the woods by Menomini Indians led

by white officers. As the rest of Black Hawk’s band fled overland toward

the Mississippi River, they were pursued by the combined forces of

General Atkinson, General Henry, and Major Dodd, a total force of some

four thousand men.

When Black Hawk’s band arrived at the Mississippi River, they were met

by the steamboat “Warrior.” Black Hawk again attempted to surrender, but

the “Warrior’s” captain preferred to believe this a trick and opened

fire on the Indians. The infantry then arrived and attacked the Indians

from the rear. Men, women, and children were forced into the river at

bayonet point. Many were drowned as they attempted to swim the river,

and others were picked off by American sharpshooters from the shore.

This was the massacre of the Bad Axe River, which lasted three hours,

and in which 150 Indians were killed and as many more drowned. A band of

Sioux, brought there for the purpose by General Atkinson, set upon the

300 Indians who reached the other bank and killed about half of them.

Only about 150 survivors remained of the thousand Indians who had

crossed with Black Hawk into Illinois in April only four months before.

Black Hawk fled to the Winnebago, who later surrendered him to the

Americans. He was then taken on a tour through the eastern states to

impress him with the power of the American Government, and released in

June, 1833. His tribe was given a small reservation in Iowa on the Des

Moines River, where he died October 3, 1838. The treatment of Black Hawk

and his people in the so-called “Black Hawk War” will always remain a

blot on American history and a discredit to the Government.

From the time of the “Black Hawk War” on, Wisconsin Indians were rapidly

deprived of their land. In September, 1832, the Winnebago ceded the rest

of their holdings south and east of the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers. Upon

promise of payment of about one million dollars to the Indians and their

creditors, the southern Chippewa, Ottawa, and Potawatomi, in a treaty at

Chicago, Illinois, turned over their holdings in southern Wisconsin in

1833. The Menomini ceded almost four million acres between Green Bay and

the Wolf River to the United States Government in 1836. In 1838, the

Oneida ceded most of their land in this same area to the United States.

The Chippewa, Sioux, and Winnebago, in three separate treaties, ceded

the western half of Wisconsin, above the Wisconsin River, in 1837. With

the final cession of some small holdings of the Menomini in the east

central part of the state, in 1848, the United States Government now had

possession of all Indian land in Wisconsin.

The Indians, in most cases, had western lands assigned to them. The

United States army forcibly removed many Winnebago to Nebraska, some of

whom remain there today. Other Winnebago, homesick for Wisconsin and

afraid of the Sioux, gradually wandered back to Wisconsin where they

still are. In 1854 the Menomini were placed on a reservation on the

Upper Wolf River. Shortly after this, they sold two townships to the

Stockbridge Indians. In 1854, also, three large reservations: Lac Court

Oreilles, Lac du Flambeau, and Bad River, were assigned to the Chippewa.

[Illustration: SURRENDER OF BLACK HAWK (MURAL BY CAL PETERS, VILLA

LOUIS, COURTESY OF THE WISCONSIN STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY).]

CHAPTER SIX

WISCONSIN’S INDIANS TODAY

[Illustration: MIXED COSTUME IN FOX CEREMONIAL DANCE.]

In considering the story of those Indians who were important in the

history of our state, we have seen that from time to time some tribes

have left the Wisconsin scene. We might well wonder what has been their

final fate and where they may be found today. As we remember the United

States Government removal plan, we are not too surprised to find many of

them located at reservations and agencies in our western United States.

The Sauk and Fox are at agencies in Iowa, Kansas, and Oklahoma. The Sauk

and Fox reservation in Iowa has an Indian population of 473, and there

are 129 Sauk and Fox at the Kansas reservation and an additional 910 at

the Sauk and Fox reservation at the Shawnee agency in Oklahoma.

The Kickapoo have small reservations in Oklahoma and Kansas. The Indian

population at the Kickapoo reservation in Oklahoma numbers 269; and at

the Kickapoo reservation in Kansas, 343. In addition, there are some 350

Kickapoo living in the state of Coahuila, Mexico, having split off from

the Oklahoma band in 1852. Population figures given here for the Sauk,

Fox, and Kickapoo are from the estimates of the Office of Indian Affairs

of the United States Department of the Interior for the year 1940.

The present whereabouts of the Mascoutens presents somewhat of a

mystery. Most students of the subject at present believe that members of

the Prairie Band of the Potawatomi, who also call themselves the

Mascoutens, are the descendents of that tribe, which is so often

referred to in early Wisconsin history. The early Mascoutens were

closely related to the Sauk, Fox, and Kickapoo, according to early

reports, in language and culture, and usually were the political allies

of these tribes as well. Some bands of the Prairie Potawatomi are found

associated with the Kickapoo in Oklahoma and Kansas, and also in Mexico.

As for the Santee Sioux, who were in northern Wisconsin even before the

arrival of the white man, it is again difficult to give accurate present

population figures. The term Santee originally designated one band of

Indians, but eventually came to mean all of the forest bands of the

Sioux, of whom, in all probability, many never resided in Wisconsin.

There are, according to the 1940 estimate, 1,197 Sioux living on the

Santee reservation in Nebraska, and there are 585 Sioux in Minnesota who

would be included in the Santee division. If we were to include all

tribes generally classed as Santee Sioux today, expressed in round

numbers, 5,000 would probably be a conservative estimate. However, many

of these are not derived from those bands formerly living in Wisconsin.

Returning to the Wisconsin scene today, we learn from the 1940 estimates

of the Office of Indian Affairs that the present Indian population in

Wisconsin is 13,678. Of this total, 5,605 are Chippewa, residing at the

Bad River, Lac Court Oreilles, Lac du Flambeau, and Red Cliff

reservations. Also included in this figure are the Mole Lake Chippewa

and the St. Croix band.

[Illustration: FOX INDIAN, IOWA.]

[Illustration: THE CHIPPEWA STILL PREPARE BUCK-SKIN.]

Included in Wisconsin’s present Indian population are also 2,454

Menomini, located at their reservation in Shawano County; 460

Stockbridge and Munses, on their reservation adjoining that of the

Menomini; 1,700 Oneida, scattered around the village of Oneida, 10 miles

southwest of Green Bay; 1,498 Winnebago, on public domain land

allotments, primarily in Jackson, Wood, and Shawano counties; and 310

Potawatomi, in Forest County. While only a small number of Potawatomi

have returned to this state since their removal, over half of the

Winnebago are now back in their Wisconsin homeland. In addition to the

Winnebago who returned to Wisconsin after their removal by the United

States Army, 1,268 remained at their reservation in Nebraska. Thus of

this reportedly numerous and powerful tribe first encountered by the

French when Nicolet landed near Green Bay, in 1634, about 2,766 still

survive.

[Illustration: A CHARACTERISTIC WISCONSIN ONEIDA.]

[Illustration: ELDERLY ONEIDA WOMAN.]

[Illustration: DECORAH HENRY THUNDER, WISCONSIN WINNEBAGO.]

[Illustration: THE CRADLE-BOARD BARELY SURVIVED AMONG THE WISCONSIN

CHIPPEWA.]

[Illustration: YOUNG POTAWATOMI FACES A DIFFICULT WORLD.]

The future status of Wisconsin’s Indians presents a considerable problem

to the United States Government. Their life on reservations is hardly an

easy one for the majority. Even among the Menomini, whose tribal

lumbering industry makes them economically the most prosperous in the

state, the standard of living is not high. Finding a means whereby they

can earn a decent living is probably the greatest difficulty. For the

most part they suffer for lack of adequate clothing and food,

particularly during the winter season. To alleviate the situation, a

considerable number have migrated to the cities to obtain employment,

and there are an estimated one thousand Indians living in Milwaukee, for

example, of which the largest group is Oneida.

So far no satisfactory solution to the problem has been reached,

although some sincere attempts have been made in that direction. The

hope, of course, is that eventually the Indians will be assimilated by

the rest of our population and be able to live normal lives as United

States citizens. Without intelligently directed help this process will

take a long time, and during that period the Indians will continue to

suffer.

The Wisconsin Indians of today are acculturated to a greater or lesser

degree: among the Chippewa, Potawatomi, Menomini, and Winnebago a

considerable amount of the traditional culture survives; among the

Stockbridge and Oneida nearly all of the old culture is lost. It is to

be hoped that all of the colorful pattern of Indian culture and

tradition is not lost in the process of assimilation.

One thing is certain, the Indians of Wisconsin, along with most of those

of the entire United States, have suffered much at the hands of the

white man. They deserve constructive help now toward accomplishing the

ultimate adjustment to the final demands made on them by the white man’s

civilization.

[Illustration: MODERN POTAWATOMI.]

[Illustration: YOUNG FOLKS IN ANCIENT DRESS.]

[Illustration: POTAWATOMI TAR-PAPERED SHACK.]

[Illustration: uncaptioned]

[Illustration: CABIN TYPE OF ONEIDA HOUSE.]

[Illustration: BETTER TYPE OF ONEIDA HOUSE.]

[Illustration: MENOMINI SAWMILL AT NEOPIT.]