Historic Notes on the Northwest

PREFACE.

In the following pages the writer has limited himself, for the most part, to the territory watered by the Illinois, the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan, the Maumee and the Wabash rivers. He has chosen to do so to the end that the early history of the country treated of might be the more fully considered. The topographical features of, and the military and civil events occurring in, localities beyond these limits have been noticed only in so far as they are directly connected with, or tend to illustrate the field occupied.

It has been an aim of the writer to perpetuate the history of the relations which the discovery and early commerce of the northwest has sustained to its peculiar topographical features. Nature made the routes and pointed out the means of our inland communication. The first explorations of the northwest were made by way of the lakes, the Fox and Wisconsin Rivers, the St. Josephs of Lake Michigan, the Illinois River and Chicago Creek, the Maumee and the Wabash and their connecting portages. These were also the routes by which the first commerce was carried on. Formerly the country was a wilderness of forests and prairies, and the abode of wild animals and the wild men who hunted them for their furs and skins, which were the only commodities for export. In the progress of time the fur-bearing animals and the Indians have disappeared. The wilderness has been subdued, and the products of its cultivated fields now find their way to the marts of Europe. The canoe which carried the furs and peltries to tide water gave way to the canal boat, and the canal boat has been supplanted by the steamer and the railway car. The routes have always remained essentially the same. They have merely been enlarged and perfected from time to time, to meet the ever-increasing demands of the west in the successive stages of its development.

The country drained by the rivers we have named is rich in the poesy and romance of history, reaching back nearly two centuries in the past, where the outlines of written records fade away in the twilight and charm tradition. By the routes we have named came the Jesuit Fathers, with crucifix and altar, bearing the truths of Christianity to distant and savage tribes. Along these routes passed the Coureurs-de-bois and the Voyageurs,―gay and happy sons of France-with knives, guns, blankets and trinkets to exchange with the Indians for products of the chase. Following the traders came French colonists, who, on their way from Canada to Louisiana, passed up the Maumee and down the Wabash, nearly three-quarters of a century before the Declaration of Independence was proclaimed.

Along these streams were the villages of the most powerful Indian confederacies. It was but natural that they should defend their country against the encroachment of another race; and the strife between the two for its possession furnishes material for many thrilling events in its history. In treating of the Indians, the writer has had no theories to advocate or morbid sentiments to gratify; he has only quoted what he has found in volumes regarded as standard authorities, without prejudice in favor or against this people. They have given away before an inexorable law, the severity of which could have been only modified at best. The writer believes the dominant race, out of their love for truth, will accord the Indian that even-handed justice to which he

is historically entitled. Our knowledge of this people is fragmentary at best. They kept no records, and have no historians. All we know of them is to be found in the writings of persons who, if not their open enemies, at least had little interest in doing them justice. As a rule, early travelers have only alluded in an incidental way to the aboriginal inhabitants, or their manners and customs. We know, at best, but very little of the Indians who formerly occupied the country east of the Mississippi. They have passed away, and the information that has been preserved concerning them is so scattered through the volumes of authors who have written from other motives, and at different dates or of different nations, without taking thought to discriminate, that anything like a satisfactory account of a particular tribe is not attainable. However, the writer has in the following pages given the result of his gleanings over a wide field of authors,- French, English and American,-so far as they relate to the several tribes who formerly occupied that portion of the Northwest to which the attention of the reader has been called. The writer has preserved the aboriginal, as well as the French and early English names of the lakes, rivers, Indian villages and other localities possessing historical interest, whenever attainable from books, maps or manuscripts to which he has had access.'

Commercial enterprise led to the exploration of the northwest. It was competition for the fur trade between rival races, the French and the Anglo-Saxon, that produced the collision between the subjects of the two colonies in America, that finally culminated in a war between France and England, aided by their respective colonies, that resulted in the loss of the whole Mississippi valley to its first discoverers. It was a desire to retain control of the fur trade that contributed largely to the bitterness of the Indian border wars that commenced as soon as emigration began to extend itself west of the Alleganies; and the same cause prolonged the Indian troubles for years after the country had ceased to be a part of the dominion of either France or Great Britain.

Beginning with the mission work of the Jesuit Fathers on the southern shore of Lake Superior, in 1660, and extending down to 1800, but little is known of the country lying north and west of the Ohio river; and the meagre material is only to be found in antiquated books and maps long out of print, or in manuscript correspondence of a private or official character, none of which is accessible to the general reader. It is chiefly from these sources that most of the matter contained in the present volume has been collated. As far as practicable the writer has preferred to introduce his authorities upon the stand and let them tell their stories in their own language, leaving the readers to draw their own conclusions from what the witnesses have stated. Wherever attainable, original sources of information are given.

Besides such authors as Hennepin, Charlevoix and the invaluable translations and contributions of Dr. John G. Shea, the writer has availed himself freely of the Jesuit Relations and the publications of the historical societies of Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New York and Wisconsin.

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