Produced by Al Haines
[Illustration: Cover art]
[Frontispiece: Chief Joseph. Courtesy of The American Bureau of
Ethnology.]
BOYS' BOOK OF
INDIAN WARRIORS
AND
HEROIC INDIAN WOMEN
BY
EDWIN L. SABIN
PHILADELPHIA
GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
_Copyright, 1918, by_
_George W. Jacobs & Company_
_All rights reserved_
_Printed in U. S. A._
Alas! for them, their day is o'er,
Their fires are out on hill and shore;
No more for them the wild deer bounds,
The plough is on their hunting grounds;
The pale man's axe rings through their woods,
The pale man's sail skims o'er their floods,
Their pleasant springs are dry;
* * * * * *
CHARLES SPRAGUE.
FOREWORD
When the white race came into the country of the red race, the red race
long had had their own ways of living and their own code of right and
wrong. They were red, but they were thinking men and women, not mere
animals.
The white people brought their ways, which were different from the
Indians' ways. So the two races could not live together.
To the white people, many methods of the Indians were wrong; to the
Indians, many of the white people's methods were wrong. The white
people won the rulership, because they had upon their side a
civilization stronger than the loose civilization of the red people,
and were able to carry out their plans.
The white Americans formed one nation, with one language; the red
Americans formed many nations, with many languages.
The Indian fought as he had always fought, and ninety-nine times out of
one hundred he firmly believed that he was enforcing the right. The
white man fought after his own custom and sometimes after the Indian's
custom also; and not infrequently he knew that he was enforcing a wrong.
Had the Indians been enabled to act all together, they would have held
their land, just as the Americans of today would hold their land
against the invader.
Of course, the Indian was not wholly right, and the white man was not
wholly wrong. There is much to be said, by either, and there were
brave chiefs and warriors on both sides.
This book is written according to the Indian's view of matters, so that
we may be better acquainted with his thoughts. The Indians now living
do not apologize for what their fathers and grandfathers did. A man
who defends what he believes are his rights is a patriot, whether they
really are his rights, or not.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I PISKARET THE ADIRONDACK CHAMPION (1644)
How He Scouted Against the Iroquois
II PISKARET THE ADIRONDACK CHAMPION (1645-1647)
How He Brought Peace to the Forests
III OPECHANCANOUGH, SACHEM OF THE PAMUNKEYS (1607-1644)
Who Fought at the Age of One Hundred
IV KING PHILIP THE WAMPANOAG (1662-1676)
The Terror of New England
V THE SQUAW SACHEM OF POCASSET (1675-1676)
And Canonchet of the Big Heart
VI THE BLOODY BELT OF PONTIAC (1760-1763)
When It Passed Among the Red Nations
VII THE BLOODY BELT OF PONTIAC (1763-1769)
How an Indian Girl Saved Fort Detroit
VIII LOGAN THE GREAT MINGO (1725-1774)
And the Evil Days that Came Upon Him
IX CORNSTALK LEADS THE WARRIORS (1774-1777)
How He and Logan Strove and Died
X LITTLE TURTLE OF THE MIAMIS (1790-1791)
He Wins Great Victories
XI LITTLE TURTLE FEARS THE BIG WIND (1792-1812)
And It Blows Him into Peace
XII THE VOICE FROM THE OPEN DOOR (1805-1811)
How It Traveled Through the Land
XIII BRIGADIER GENERAL TECUMSEH (1812-1813)
The Rise and Fall of a Star
XIV THE RED STICKS AT HORSESHOE BEND (1813-1814)
And the Wonderful Escape of Chief Menewa
XV BLACK-HAWK THE SAC PATRIOT (1831-1838)
The Indian Who Did Not Understand
XVI THE BIRD-WOMAN GUIDE (1805-1806)
Sacagawea Helps the White Men
XVII THE LANCE OF MAHTOTOHPA (1822-1837)
Hero Tales by Four Bears the Mandan
XVIII A SEARCH FOR THE BOOK OF HEAVEN (1832)
The Long Trail of the Pierced Noses
XIX A TRAVELER TO WASHINGTON (1831-1835)
Wijunjon, the "Big Liar" of the Assiniboins
XX THE BLACKFEET DEFY THE CROWS (1834)
"Come and Take Us!"
XXI THE STRONG MEDICINE OF KONATE (1839)
The Story of the Kiowa Magic Staff
XXII RED CLOUD STANDS IN THE WAY (1865-1909)
The Sioux Who Closed the Road of the Whites
XXIII STANDING BEAR SEEKS A HOME (1877-1880)
The Indian Who Won the White Man's Verdict
XXIV SITTING BULL THE WAR MAKER (1876-1881)
An Unconquered Leader
XXV CHIEF JOSEPH GOES TO WAR (1877)
And Out-Generals the United States Army
XXVI THE GHOST DANCERS AND THE RED SOLDIERS (1889-1890)
And Sitting Bull's Last Medicine
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Chief Joseph . . . . . . . . . . . _Frontispiece_
King Philip (missing from book)
Pontiac, The Red Napoleon
An Indian Brave
Young Kiowa Girl (missing from book)
Red Cloud
Standing Bear
Sitting Bull
BOYS' BOOK OF INDIAN WARRIORS
CHAPTER I
PISKARET THE ADIRONDACK CHAMPION (1644)
HOW HE SCOUTED AGAINST THE IROQUOIS
It was in early spring, about the year 1644, that the warrior Piskaret
of the Adirondack tribe of the Algonkins set forth alone from the
island Allumette in the Ottawa River, Canada, to seek his enemies the
Iroquois.
For there long had been bitter, bitter war between the vengeful
Algonkins[1] and the cruel Hurons on the one side, and the proud, even
crueler Five Nations of the Iroquois on the other side. At first the
Adirondacks had driven the Mohawks out of lower Canada and into
northern New York; but of late all the Algonkins, all the Hurons, and
the French garrisons their allies, had been unable to stem the tide of
the fierce Iroquois, rolling back into Canada again.
"Iri-a-khoiw" was the Algonkin name for them, meaning "adder." The
French termed them "Mingos," from another Algonkin word meaning
"stealthy." The English and Dutch colonists in America knew them as
the Five Nations. Their own title was "People of the Long House," as
if the five nations were one family housed all together under one roof.
The Mohawks, the Senecas, the Onondagas, the Oneidas and the
Cayugas--these composed the Iroquois league of the Five Nations against
the world of enemies. The league rapidly spread in power, until the
dreaded Iroquois were styled the Romans of the West.
But nearly three hundred years ago they were only beginning to rise.
Their home was in central New York, from the Mohawk country at the
Hudson River west to the Seneca country almost to Lake Erie. In this
wide tract were their five principal towns, fortified by ditches and
log palisades. From here they carried war south clear to the Cherokees
of Tennessee, west clear into the land of the Illinois, and north to
the Algonkins at Quebec of the lower St. Lawrence River.
Twelve or fifteen thousand people they numbered. Mohawks, Senecas,
Onondagas, Oneidas and Cayugas still survive, as many as ever and
ranking high among the civilized Indians of North America.
The Hurons lived to the northwest, in a smaller country along the
shores of Georgian Bay of southeastern Lake Huron, in Canada.
"Hurons" they were called by the French, meaning "bristly" or "savage
haired," for they wore their coarse black hair in many fantastic cuts,
but the favorite fashion was that of a stiff roach or mane extending
from the forehead to the nape of the neck, like the bristles of a wild
boar's back or the comb of a rooster. By the Algonkins they were
called "serpents," also. Their own name for themselves was "Wendat,"
or "People of the Peninsula"--a word which the English wrote as
"Wyandot."
They were of the Iroquois family, but for seventy-five years and more
they had been at war with their cousins of the south. They, too, had
their principal fortified towns, and their league, of four independent
nations and four protected nations, numbering twenty thousand. Like
those of the Iroquois, some of their bark houses were five hundred feet
long, for twenty families. Yet of this powerful people there remain
today only about four hundred Hurons, near Quebec, and as many Wyandots
in Canada and the former Indian Territory of Oklahoma.
The Algonkins lived farther north, along the Ottawa River, and the St.
Lawrence to the east. "Place of spearing eel and fish from a canoe,"
is the best that we may get from the word "Algonkin." The "Raised
Hair" people did the French first term them, because they wore their
hair pompadoured. But Adirondack was a Mohawk word, "Hatirontaks,"
"Eaters of Trees," accusing the Adirondacks of being so hungry in
winter that they ate bark.
In summer the men went naked; in winter they donned a fur cape. They
were noted warriors, hunters and fishers, and skillful in making shell
ornaments. As the "Nation of the Island" also were they known to the
French explorers, because their headquarters were upon that large
island of Allumette in the Ottawa River above present Ottawa of Canada.
The several tribes of Algonkins found by the French in Canada were only
a small portion of those American Indians speaking in the Algonquian
tongue. The immense Algonquian family covered North America from the
Atlantic to the Mississippi, and reached even to the Rocky Mountains.
The Indians met by the Pilgrim Fathers were Algonquians; King Philip
was an Algonquian; the Shawnees of Tecumseh were Algonquians; the Sacs
and Foxes of Chief Black-hawk were Algonquians; the Chippewas of Canada
and the Winnebagos from Wisconsin are Algonquians; so are the Arapahos
and Cheyennes of the plains and the Blackfeet of Montana.
The bark lodges of the Algonkins were round and peaked like a cone,
instead of being long and ridged like those of the Iroquois and Hurons.
Of the Algonkins of Canada there are sixteen hundred, today; there are
no Adirondacks, under that name.
Now in 1644 the proud Iroquois hated the Algonkins, hated the Hurons,
and had hated the French for thirty-five years, since the brave
gentleman adventurer, Samuel de Champlain, having founded Quebec in
1608, had marched against them with his armor, his powder and ball, and
the triumphantly whooping enemy.
The Iroquois never forgave the French for this. And indeed a truly
savage warfare it had become, here in this northern country on either
side of the border between New York and Canada: where the winters were
long and piercingly cold, where hunger frequently stalked, where travel
was by canoe on the noble St. Lawrence, the swift Ottawa, the
Richelieu, the lesser streams and lakes, and by snowshoe or moccasin
through the heavy forests; where the Indians rarely failed to torture
their captives in manner too horrid to relate; and where the only white
people were 300 French soldiers, fur-traders, laborers, priests and
nuns, mainly at Quebec, and new Montreal, on the St. Lawrence, and the
little trading-post of Three Rivers, half way between the two.
Algonkins and Hurons were accepting the French as allies. They
listened, sometimes in earnest, sometimes in cunning, to the teachings
of those "Black Robes," the few fearless priests who sought them out.
The priests, bravest of the brave, journeyed unarmed and far, even
among the scornful Iroquois, enduring torture by fire and knife, the
torment of mosquitoes, cold and famine, and draughty, crowded bark
houses smotheringly thick with damp wood smoke.
In spite of cross and sword, (trying to tame them,) the Iroquois were
waxing ever bolder. They were well supplied with match-lock guns
obtained by the Mohawks from the Dutch of the Hudson River. From their
five towns ruled by a grand council of fifty chiefs they constantly
sent out their raiding parties into the north. These, darting
half-crouched in single file through the dark timber, creeping silently
in their canoes by road of the dark rivers, suddenly fell like starved
wolves upon whomsoever they sighted, be that near Quebec itself; killed
them, or captured them, to hustle them away, break their bones, burn
their bodies, eat of them; and returned for more.
Algonkins and Hurons were cruel, too, and crafty; but they were being
beaten by greater craft and better arms.
So now we come again to Piskaret, of the Adirondacks, whose home was
upon that large island of Allumette, governed by the haughty Algonkin
chief Le Borgne, or The One-Eye.
Simon Piskaret was his full name as recorded in the mission books, for
he and others of Allumette Island had been baptised by the priests.
But with them this was much a method of getting protection, food and
powder from these French; and an old writer of 1647 says that Piskaret
was a Christian only by "appearance and policy."
However, the case of the Algonkins and the Hurons was growing very
desperate. They risked their lives every time they ventured into the
forests, and Piskaret was ashamed of being cooped in. Once the
Adirondacks had been mighty. Hot desire to strike another blow flamed
high in his heart. Therefore in this early spring of 1644, ere yet the
snows were fairly melted, he strode away, alone, with snowshoes, bent
upon doing some great deed.
His course was southeast, from the river Ottawa to cross the frozen St.
Lawrence, and speed onward 100 miles for the Lake Champlain country of
the New York-Canada border line, where he certainly would find the
Iroquois.
By day and night he traveled, clad in his moccasins and fur mantle.
Then when he reached the range of the Iroquois he reversed his
snowshoes, so that they pointed backward. The Iroquois who might see
his trail would know that these were the prints of Algonkin snowshoes,
but they would think that here had been only an Algonkin hastening
home. If they followed, they would be going in one direction and he in
another!
His progress was slower, now, for it is hard to make time in snowshoes
pointing backward; and presently he took pains to pick a way by keeping
to the ridges and the south slopes from which the snow had melted. His
eyes and ears needs must be alert; no sharper woodsmen ever lived, than
the keen wolfish Iroquois.
At last, in the forest, he came upon Iroquois sign; next, peering and
listening and sniffing, he smelled wood smoke; and stealing on, from
tree to tree, he discovered the site of an Iroquois winter village, set
in a clearing amidst the timber.
For the rest of that day he hid out; that night, after all had quieted,
with war-club and knife ready he slipped like a shadow in among the
very lodges. Not even a dog sensed him as he stood questing about for
another hiding place.
Aha, he had it! Both the Hurons and the Iroquois laid in large stocks
of fire wood, by forming piles of logs slanted together on end; and in
one pile, here, was an opening through which he might squeeze into the
center space, there to squat as under a tent. The ground in the
village had been scraped bare of snow; he would leave no tracks.
Having thus experimented and arranged, Piskaret drew a long breath,
grasped his war-club, and stealthily pushing aside the loose birch-bark
door-flap of the nearest lodge, peeped inside. By the ember light he
saw that every Iroquois, man and woman, was fast asleep, under furs, on
spruce boughs around the fire.
Now Piskaret swiftly entered, without a sound killed them all, scalped
them, and fled to his wood-pile.
Early in the grayness of morning he heard a great cry, swelling louder
and louder until the forest echoed. It was a cry of grief and of rage.
The strangely silent lodge had been investigated and his bloody work
was known. Feet thudded past his wood-pile, hasty figures brushed
against it, as the best warriors of the village bolted for the timber,
to circle until they found the tracks of their enemy. But if they
found any snowshoe tracks made by a stranger, these led out, not in.
So that day the Iroquois pursued furiously and vainly, while Piskaret
crouched snug in his wood-pile, listened to the clamor, and laughed to
himself.
At evening the weary Iroquois returned, foiled and puzzled. Their
nimblest trailers had not even sighted the bold raider. This night
Piskaret again waited until all was quiet; again he ventured forth,
slipped inside a lodge, killed and scalped, and retreated to his
wood-pile.
And again, with the morning arose that shrill uproar of grief and
vengeance and the warriors scurried into the forest.
By evening the Iroquois were not only mystified but much alarmed. Who
was this thing that struck in the night and left no trail? An evil
spirit had come among them--roosted perhaps in the trees!
If a squaw had removed a log or two from the pile Piskaret would have
been torn to pieces, but fortune still stayed with him and he was not
molested save by cold and hunger.
Tonight, however, the Iroquois chattered affrightedly until late; and
when, after the noises had died away, Piskaret, cramped and chilled but
eager, for a third time stole through the darkness to a lodge, he knew
that his game was up. In this lodge two watchers had been posted--one
at either end; and they were awake.
The same in the next lodge, and the next. Wherever he applied his eye
to a crack in the bark walls, he saw two sentries, armed and
alert--until finally he arrived at a lodge wherein one of the sentries,
the one near the door, was squatted drowsy and half asleep.
So Piskaret softly placed his bundle of scalps where he might find it
instantly, on a sudden threw aside the birch-bark door-flap, struck
terribly with his club, yelled his war-cry that all might hear, grabbed
his bundle of scalps and ran hard for the forest. From every lodge the
Iroquois poured in pursuit.
All the rest of this night he ran, making northward, with the Iroquois
pelting and whooping after; but the records say that he was the
swiftest runner in the North--therefore he had little fear of being
overtaken.
All the next day he ran, only now and then pausing, to show himself,
and yell, and tempt the Iroquois onward; for he had another plan. At
night-fall there were but six Iroquois left on his trail, and these
were about worn out.
Now in the gathering darkness, noting his enemies falter, Piskaret
sprang aside to a hollow tree and hid himself again. The tired
Iroquois straggled near, and when they lost the trail they willingly
quit, in order to roll in their bear-skins and sleep until the light of
morning.
Whereupon, after granting them a little time, Piskaret crept out,
killed every one of them, added their six scalps to his package, and
having rested until day, sped north, with his dreadful trophies, to
report at the island of Allumette.
That this is a true story of the famous Adirondack warrior Piskaret may
be proved by the old French chronicles of those very times.
[1] The noun Algonkin, meaning an Indian, is also spelled Algonquin.
But the adjective from this noun is spelled Algonquian when applied to
Indians, and Algonkian when applied to a time or period in geology.