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AMONG THE SIOUX
_A Story of The Twin Cities and The Two Dakotas_
_BY_
THE REV. R. J. CRESWELL
_Author of_ "WHO SLEW ALL THESE," ETC.
_Introduction by_
THE REV. DAVID R. BREED, D.D.
1906
THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
MINNEAPOLIS, MINN.
_OUR PLATFORM_.
For Indians we want American Education, American homes, American
rights,--the result of which is American citizenship. And the Gospel
is the power of God for their salvation!
_DEDICATION_.
TO NELLIE,
(MY WIFE)
Who, for forty years has been my faithful companion in the toils and
triumphs of missionary service for the Freedmen of the Old Southwest
and the heroic pioneers of the New Northwest, this volume is
affectionately inscribed.
By the Author,
R. J. CRESWELL.
_INTRODUCTION_
By the Rev. David R. Breed, D.D.
The sketches which make up this little volume are of absorbing
interest, and are prepared by one who is abundantly qualified to do so.
Mr. Creswell has had large personal acquaintance with many of those of
whom he writes and has for years been a diligent student of missionary
effort among the Sioux. His frequent contributions to the periodicals
on this subject have received marked attention. Several of them he
gathers together and reprints in this volume, so that while it is not a
consecutive history of the Sioux missions it furnishes an admirable
survey of the labors of the heroic men and women who have spent their
lives in this cause, and furnishes even more interesting reading in
their biographies that might have been given upon the other plan.
During my own ministry in Minnesota, from 1870 to 1885, I became very
intimate with the great leaders of whom Mr. Creswell writes. Some of
them were often in my home, and I, in turn, have visited them. I am
familiar with many of the scenes described in this book. I have heard
from the missionaries' own lips the stories of their hardships, trials
and successes. I have listened to their account of the great massacre,
while with the tears flowing down their cheeks they told of the
desperate cruelty of the savages, their defeat, their conversion, and
their subsequent fidelity to the men and the cause they once opposed. I
am grateful to Mr. Creswell for putting these facts into permanent
shape and bespeak for his volume a cordial reception, a wide
circulation, and above all, the abundant blessing of God.
DAVID R. BREED.
Allegheny, Pa., January, 1906.
_PREFACE_.
This volume is not sent forth as a full history of the Sioux Missions.
That volume has not yet been written, and probably never will be.
The pioneer missionaries were too busily engaged in the formation of
the Dakota Dictionary and Grammar, in the translation of the Bible
into that wild, barbaric tongue; in the preparation of hymn books and
text books:--in the creation of a literature for the Sioux Nation, to
spend time in ordinary literary work. The present missionaries are
overwhelmed with the great work of ingathering and upbuilding that
has come to them so rapidly all over the widely extended Dakota
plains. These Sioux missionaries were and are men of deeds rather
than of words,--more intent on the _making_ of history than the
_recording_ of it. They are the noblest body of men and women that
ever yet went forth to do service, for our Great King, on American
soil.
For twenty years it has been the writer's privilege to mingle
intimately with these missionaries and with the Christian Sioux; to sit
with them at their great council fires; to talk with them in their
teepees; to visit them in their homes; to meet with them in their
Church Courts; to inspect their schools; to worship with them in their
churches; and to gather with them on the greensward under the matchless
Dakota sky and celebrate together with them the sweet, sacramental
service of our Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ.
He was so filled and impressed by what he there saw and heard, that he
felt impelled to impart to others somewhat of the knowledge thus
gained; in order that they may be stimulated to a deeper interest in,
and devotion to the cause of missions on American soil.
In the compilation of this work the author has drawn freely from these
publications, viz.:
THE GOSPEL OF THE DAKOTAS, MARY AND I, _By Stephen R. Riggs, D.D.,
LL.D._
TWO VOLUNTEER MISSIONARIES, _By S. W. Pond, Jr._
INDIAN BOYHOOD, _By Charles Eastman_
THE PAST MADE PRESENT, _By Rev. William Fiske Brown_
THE WORD CARRIER, _By Editor A. L. Riggs, D.D._
THE MARTYRS OF WALHALLA, _By Charlotte O. Van Cleve_
THE LONG AGO, _By Charles H. Lee_
THE DAKOTA MISSION, _By Dr. L. P. Williamson and others_
DR. T. S. WILLIAMSON, _By Rev. R. McQuesten_
He makes this general acknowledgment, in lieu of repeated references,
which would otherwise be necessary throughout the book. For valuable
assistance in its preparation he is very grateful to many missionaries,
especially to John P. Williamson, D.D., of Grenwood, South Dakota; A.
L. Riggs, D.D. of Santee, Nebraska; Samuel W. Pond, Jr., of
Minneapolis, and Mrs. Gideon H. Pond, of Oak Grove, Minnesota. All
these were sharers in the stirring scenes recorded in these pages. The
names Dakota and Sioux are used as synonyms and the English
significance instead of the Indian cognomens.
May the blessing of Him who dwelt in the Burning Bush, rest upon all
these toilers on the prairies of the new Northwest.
R. J. CRESWELL.
Minneapolis, Minnesota,
January, 1906.
PART I.
_CONTENTS_
CHAPTER I.
The Pond Brothers.--Great Revival.--Conversions.--Galena.--Rum-seller
Decision.--Westward.--Fort Snelling.--Man of-the-Sky.--Log Cabin.--Dr.
Williamson.--Ripley.--Lane Seminary.--St. Peters Church.--Dr.
Riggs.--New England Mary.--Lac-qui-Parle.
CHAPTER II.
The Lake-that-Speaks.--Indian Church.--Adobe Edifice.--First
School.--Mission Home.--Encouragements.--Discouragements.--Kaposia.--New
Treaty.--Yellow Medicine.--Bitter Winter.--Hazlewood.--Traverse des
Sioux.--Robert Hopkins.--Marriage.--Death.--M. N. Adams, Oak Grove.--
J. P. Williamson, D.D.
CHAPTER III.
Isolation.--Strenuous Life.--Formation of Dakota Language Dictionary.
--Grammar.--Literature.--Bible Translation.--Massacre.--Fleeing
Missionaries.--Blood.--Anglo Saxons Triumph.--Loyal Indians.--Monument.
CHAPTER IV.
Prisoners in Chains.--Executions.--Pentecost in Prison.--Three Hundred
Baptisms.--Church Organized.--Sacramental Supper.--Prison Camp.--John
P. Williamson.--One Hundred Converts.--Davenport.--Release.--Niobrara.
--Pilgrim Church.
CHAPTER V.
1884--Iyakaptapte.--Council.--Discussions.--Anniversaries.--Sabbath.--
Communion.--The Native Missionary Society.
CHAPTER VI.
1905--Sisseton.--John Baptiste Renville.--Presbytery of Dakota.
AMONG THE SIOUX.
PART ONE.
SOWING AND REAPING.
[Illustration: FORT SNELLING.]
They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.
He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing
Precious Seed,
Shall doubtless come again
With rejoicing,
Bringing his sheaves.
_Psalm 126._
Chapter I.
_Now appear the flow'rets fair_
_Beautiful beyond compare_
_And all nature seems to say,_
"_Welcome, welcome, blooming May._"
It was 1834. A lovely day--the opening of the merry month of May!
The Warrior, a Mississippi steamer, glided out of Fever River, at
Galena, Illinois, and turned its prow up the Mississippi. Its
destination was the mouth of the St. Peters--now Minnesota River--five
hundred miles to the north--the port of entry to the then unknown land
of the Upper Mississippi.
The passengers formed a motley group; officers, soldiers, fur-traders,
adventurers, and two young men from New England. These latter were two
brothers, Samuel William and Gideon Hollister Pond, from Washington,
Connecticut. At this time, Samuel the elder of the two, was twenty-six
years of age and in form, tall and very slender as he continued through
life. Gideon, the younger and more robust brother was not quite
twenty-four, more than six feet in height, strong and active, a
specimen of well developed manhood. With their clear blue eyes, and
their tall, fully developed forms, they must have attracted marked
attention even among that band of brawny frontiersmen.
In 1831 a gracious revival had occurred in their native village of
Washington. It was so marked in its character, and permanent in its
results, that it formed an epoch in the history of that region and is
still spoken of as "the great revival". For months, during the busiest
season of the year, crowded sunrise prayer-meetings were held daily and
were well attended by an agricultural population, busily engaged every
day in the pressing toil of the harvest and the hayfields. Scores were
converted and enrolled themselves as soldiers of the cross.
Among these were the two Pond brothers. This was, in reality with them,
the beginning of a new life. From this point in their lives, the
inspiring motive, with both these brothers, was a spirit of intense
loyalty to their new Master and a burning love for the souls of their
fellowmen. Picked by the Holy Spirit out of more than one hundred
converts for special service for the Lord Jesus Christ, the Pond
brothers resolutely determined to choose a field of very hard service,
one to which no others desired to go. In the search for such a field,
Samuel the elder brother, journeyed from New Haven to Galena, Illinois,
and spent the autumn and winter of 1833-34 in his explorations. He
visited Chicago, then a struggling village of a few hundred inhabitants
and other embryo towns and cities. He also saw the Winnebago Indians
and the Pottawatomies, but he was not led to choose a field of labor
amongst any of these.
A strange Providence finally pointed the way to Mr. Pond. In his
efforts to reform a rumseller at Galena, he gained much information
concerning the Sioux Indians, whose territory the rumseller had
traversed on his way from the Red River country from which he had come
quite recently. He represented the Sioux Indians as vile, degraded,
ignorant, superstitious and wholly given up to evil.
"There," said the rumseller, "is a people for whose souls nobody cares.
They are utterly destitute of moral and religious teachings. No efforts
have ever been made by Protestants for their salvation. If you fellows
are looking, in earnest, for a _hard job_, there is one ready for
you to tackle on those bleak prairies."
This man's description of the terrible condition of the Sioux Indians
in those times was fairly accurate. Those wild, roving and utterly
neglected Indians were proper subjects for Christian effort and
promised to furnish the opportunities for self-denying and
self-sacrificing labors for which the brothers were seeking.
Mr. Pond at once recognized this peculiar call as from God. After
prayerful deliberation, Samuel determined to write to his brother
Gideon, inviting the latter to join him early the following spring, and
undertake with him an independent mission to the Sioux.
He wrote to Gideon:--"I have finally found the field of service for
which we have long been seeking. It lies in the regions round about
Fort Snelling. It is among the savage Sioux of those far northern
plains. They are an ignorant, savage and degraded people. It is said to
be a very cold, dreary, storm-swept region. But we are not seeking a
soft spot to rest in or easy service. So come on."
Despite strong, almost bitter opposition from friends and kinsmen,
Gideon accepted and began his preparations for life among the Indians,
and in March, 1834, he bade farewell to his friends and kindred and
began his journey westward.
Early in April, he arrived at Galena, equipped for their strange,
Heaven-inspired mission. He found his brother firmly fixed in his
resolution to carry out the plans already decided upon. In a few days
we find them on the steamer's deck, moving steadily up the mighty
father of waters, towards their destination. "This _is_ a serious
undertaking," remarked the younger brother as they steamed northward.
And such it was. There was in it no element of attractiveness from a
human view-point.
They expected to go among roving tribes, to have no permanent abiding
place and to subsist as those wild and savage tribes subsisted. Their
plan was a simple and feasible one, as they proved by experience, but
one which required large stores of faith and fortitude every step of
the way. They knew, also, that outside of a narrow circle of personal
friends, none knew anything of this mission to the Sioux, or felt the
slightest interest in its success or failure. But undismayed they
pressed on.
The scenery of the Upper Mississippi is still pleasing to those eyes,
which behold it, clothed in its springtime robes of beauty. In 1834,
this scenery shone forth in all the primeval glory of "nature unmarred
by the hand of man."
[Illustration: SAMUEL W. POND,
20 Years a Missionary to the Sioux.]
[Illustration: GIDEON H. POND,
For Twenty years Missionary to the Dakotas.]
As the steamer Warrior moved steadily on its way up the Mississippi,
the rich May verdure, through which they passed, appeared strikingly
beautiful to the two brothers, who then beheld it for the first time.
It was a most delightful journey and ended on the sixth day of May, at
the dock at old Fort Snelling.
This was then our extreme outpost of frontier civilization. It had been
established in 1819, as our front-guard against the British and Indians
of the Northwest. It was located on the high plateau, lying between the
Mississippi and the Minnesota (St. Peters) rivers, and it was then the
only important place within the limits of the present state of
Minnesota.
While still on board the Warrior, the brothers received a visit and a
warm welcome from the Rev. William T. Boutell, a missionary of the
American Board to the Ojibways at Leach Lake, Minnesota. He was greatly
rejoiced to meet "these dear brethren, who, from love to Christ and for
the poor red man, had come alone to this long-neglected field."
A little later they stepped ashore, found themselves in savage
environments and face to face with the grave problems they had come so
far to solve. They were men extremely well fitted, mentally and
physically, naturally and by training for the toils and privations of
the life upon which they had now entered. Sent, not by man but by the
Lord; appointed, not by any human authority but by the great Jehovah;
without salary or any prospects of worldly emoluments, unknown,
unheralded, those humble but heroic men began, in dead earnest, their
grand life-work. Their mission and commission was to conquer that
savage tribe of fierce, prairie warriors, by the two-edged sword of the
spirit of the living God and to mold them aright, by the power of the
Gospel of His Son. And God was with them as they took up their weapons
(not carnal but spiritual) in this glorious warfare.
They speedily found favor with the military authorities, and with one
of the most prominent chieftains of that time and region--Cloudman or
Man-of-the-sky.
The former gave them full authority to prosecute their mission among
the Indians; the latter cordially invited them to establish their
residence at his village on the shore of Lake Calhoun.
The present site of Minneapolis was then simply a vast, wind-swept
prairie, uninhabited by white men. A single soldier on guard at the old
government sawmill at St. Anthony Falls was the only representative of
the Anglo-Saxons, where now dwell hundreds of thousands of white men of
various nationalities.
Busy, bustling, beautiful Minneapolis, with its elegant homes; its
commodious churches; its great University--with its four thousand
students--; its well-equipped schools--with their forty-two thousand
pupils--; its great business blocks; its massive mills; its humming
factories; its broad avenues; its pleasant parks; its population of a
quarter of a million of souls; all this had not then even been as much
as dreamed of.
Four miles west of St. Anthony Falls, lies Lake Calhoun, and a short
distance to the south is Lake Harriet, (two most beautiful sheets of
water, both within the present limits of Minneapolis). The intervening
space was covered by a grove of majestic oaks.
Here, in 1834, was an Indian village of five hundred Sioux. Their
habitations were teepees, made of tamarack bark or of skins of wild
beasts. Their burial ground covered a part of lovely Lakewood, the
favorite cemetery of the city of Minneapolis. This band recognized
Cloudman or Man-of-the-sky as their chief, whom they both respected and
loved. He was then about forty years of age. He was an intelligent man,
of an amiable disposition and friendly to the approach of Civilization.
Here, under the auspices of this famous chieftain, they erected for
themselves a snug, little home, near the junction of Thirty-fifth
street and Irving Avenue South, Minneapolis.
It was built of large oak logs. The dimensions were twelve feet by
sixteen and eight feet high. Straight tamarack poles formed the timbers
of the roof. The roof itself was the bark of trees, fastened with
strings of the inner bark of the basswood.
A partition of small logs divided the house into two rooms. The ceiling
was of slabs from the old government sawmill at St. Anthony Falls. The
door was made of boards, split from a tree with an axe, and had wooden
hinges and fastenings and was locked by pulling in the latch-string.
The single window was the gift of the kind-hearted Major Taliaferro,
the United States Indian agent at Fort Snelling. The cash cost of the
whole was one shilling, New York currency, for nails, used about the
door. The formal opening was the reading of a portion of Scripture and
prayer. The banquet consisted of mussels from the Lake, flour and
water. This cabin was the first house erected within the present limits
of Minneapolis; it was the home of the first citizen settlers of
Minnesota and was the first house used as a school-room and for divine
worship in the state. It was a noble testimony to the faith, zeal and
courage of its builders. Here these consecrated brothers inaugurated
their great work. In 1839 it was torn down for materials with which to
construct breastworks for the defense of the Sioux, after the bloody
battle of Rum River, against their feudal foes, the Ojibways. Here amid
such lovely natural surroundings were the very beginnings of this
mighty enterprise.
The first lesson was given early in May, by Samuel Pond to Big Thunder
chieftain of the Kaposia band, whose teepees were scattered over the
bluffs, where now stands the city of St. Paul. His chief soldier was
Big Iron. His son was Little Crow, who became famous or rather
infamous, as the leader against the whites in the terrible tragedy of
'62. Later in May the second lesson was taught by Gideon Pond to
members of the Lake Calhoun band. Both lessons were in the useful and
civilizing art of plowing and were the first in that grand series of
lessons, covering more than seventy years, and by which the Sioux
nation have been lifted from savagery to civilization.
While God was preparing the Pond brothers in the hill country of
Connecticut for their peculiar life-work, and opening up the way for
them to engage in it, He also had in training in the school of His
Providences, in Massachusetts and Ohio, fitting helpers for them in
this great enterprise. In the early 30's, at Ripley, Ohio, Dr. Thomas
S. Williamson and Mrs. Margaret Poage Williamson, a young husband and
wife, were most happily located, in the practice of his profession and
in the upbuilding of a happy Christian home. To this young couple the
future seemed full of promise and permanent prosperity. Children were
born to them; they were prosperous and an honorable name was being
secured through the faithful discharge of the duties of his most noble
profession and of Christian citizenship. They regarded themselves as
happily located for life.
The mission call to Dr. and Mrs. Williamson was emphasized by the
messenger of death. When the missionary call first came to them, they
excused themselves on account of their children. God removed the
seeming obstacles, one by one. The little ones were called to the arms
of Jesus. "A great trial!" A great blessing also. The way was thus
cleared from a life of luxury and ease in Ohio to one of great denial
and self sacrifice on mission fields. The bereaved parents recognized
this call as from God, and by faith, both father and mother were
enabled to say, "Here are we; send us."
"This decision," says an intimate friend, "neither of them after for
one moment regretted; neither did they doubt that they were called of
God to this great work, nor did they fear that their life-work would
prove a failure." With characteristic devotion and energy, Dr.
Williamson put aside a lucrative practice, and at once, entered on a
course of preparation for his new work for which his previous life and
training had already given him great fitness.
In 1833, he put himself under the care of the Presbytery of
Chillicothe, removed with his family to Walnut Hills, Cincinnati, and
entered Lane Seminary. While the Pond brothers in their log cabin at
Lake Calhoun were studying the Sioux language, Dr. Williamson was
completing his theological course on the banks of the beautiful river.
He was ordained to the office of the gospel ministry in 1834. And in
May, 1835, he landed at Fort Snelling with another band of
missionaries. He was accompanied by his quiet, lovely, faithful wife,
Margaret, and one child, his wife's sister, Sarah Poage, afterwards
Mrs. Gideon H. Pond, Mr. and Mrs. Alexander G. Huggins and two
children. Mr. Huggins came as a teacher and farmer. During a stay of a
few weeks here, Dr. Williamson presided at the organization of the
first Protestant congregation in Minnesota, which was called the
Presbyterian church of St. Peters. It consisted of officers, soldiers,
fur-traders, and members of the mission families--twenty-one in all;
seven of whom were received on confession of faith. It was organized at
Fort Snelling, June 11, 1835, and still exists as the First
Presbyterian church of Minneapolis, with more than five hundred members.
[Illustration: The Old Fort Snelling Church Developed.]
[Illustration: AT LAKE MINNETONKA.]
Early in July, Dr. Williamson pushed on in the face of grave
difficulties, two hundred miles to the west, to the shores of
Lac-qui-Parle, the Lake-that-speaks. Here they were cordially welcomed
by Joseph Renville, that famous Brois Brule trader, the half-breed
chief who ruled that region for many years, by force of his superior
education and native abilities, and who ever was a strong and faithful
friend of the missionaries. He gave them a temporary home and was
helpful in many ways. Well did the Lord repay him for his kindness to
His servants. His wife became the first full-blood Sioux convert to the
Christian faith, and his youngest son, John Baptiste Renville, then a
little lad, became the first native Presbyterian minister, one of the
acknowledged leaders of his people.
June, 1837, another pair of noble ones joined the ranks of the workers
by the Lakeside. These were the Rev. Stephen Return Riggs and his sweet
New England Mary, he was a native of the beautiful valley of the Ohio;
she was born amid the green hills of Massachusetts. His father was a
Presbyterian elder of Steubenville, Ohio; her mother was a daughter of
New England. She herself was a pupil of the cultured and sainted Mary
Lyon of Mount Holyoke.
They were indeed choice spirits, well-fitted by nature and by training
for a place in that heroic band, which God was then gathering together
on the shores of Lakes Calhoun and Harriet and Lac-qui-Parle, for the
conquest of the fiercest tribe of prairie warriors that ever roamed
over the beautiful plains of the New Northwest. He was a scholar and a
linguist; courageous, energetic, firm, diplomatic; she was cultured,
gentle, tactful, and withal, both were intensely spiritual and deeply
devoted to the glorious work of soul-winning. Both had been trained as
missionaries, with China as a prospective field of service. Step by
step in the Providence of God, they were drawn together as life
companions and then turned from the Orient to the Western plains.
During these years of beginnings, Dr. Williamson formed the
acquaintance of Stephen R. Riggs, then a young man, which culminated in
a life-long alliance of love and service. During his seminary course,
Mr. Riggs received a letter from his missionary friend, to which he
afterwards referred thus: "It seems to me now, strange that he should
have indicated in that letter the possible line of work open to me,
which has been so closely followed. I remember especially the
prominence he gave to the thought that the Bible should be translated
into the language of the Dakotas. Men do sometimes yet write as they
were moved by the Holy Ghost. That letter decided my going westward
rather than to China." It was a lovely day, the first of June, when
this young bride and groom arrived at Fort Snelling. Though it was
their honeymoon, they did not linger long in the romantic haunts of
Minnehaha and the Lakes; but pressed on to Lac-qui-Parle and joined
hands with the toilers there in their mighty work of laying foundations
broad and deep in the wilderness, like the coral workers in the ocean
depths, out of sight of man.
What a glorious trio of mission family bands were then gathered on
Minnesota's lovely plains, on the shores of those beautiful lakes!
Pond, Williamson, Riggs. Names that will never be forgotten while a
Sioux Christian exists in earth or glory.
[Illustration: A PARK DRIVE, LAKE CALHOUN.]
[Illustration: SOLDIERS' HOME.]
When the American Mission Hall of Fame shall be erected these three
names will shine out high upon the dome like "apples of gold in
pictures of silver," Pond, Williamson, Riggs. "And a book of
remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord
and that thought upon his name. * * * And they shall be mine, saith
the Lord of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels."