The Wisconsin Winnebagoes

by Moses Paquette¹

Moses Paquette

(399) I was born on the fourth of March, 1828, in the dwelling occupied by my father, Pierre Paquette, near the old agency house,² which latter is still standing on the bank of the Fox river at Portage. Besides this dwelling, my father, who was employed by the American Fur Company, had a trading house and barracks for the five or six men whom he then engaged in the business of portaging boats across the almost two miles of marsh which here separate the Fox and Wisconsin rivers. Boats coming up the Fox would be beached at a point near the mouth of the present canal. (400) The beach on the Wisconsin river was very near "where, at a later period, the Carpenter house was built,³ The intervening marsh was in those days often a mere quagmire, the transportation of heavily laden Mackinaw boats across it being a task involving much expenditure of time and patience. It took four and live yoke of oxen to haul one of these craft, which would be slung upon a huge reach cut out of a tree and mounted on broad wheels.⁴

My mother, who was a daughter of Joseph Crelie, was married at Prairie du Chien to one Lupient,⁵ before she married my father. By Lupient she had one child, Theodore, who was run over and killed by a railway train in Chicago in 1860. The elder Lupient died soon after the marriage, and his widow became united with my father in Prairie du Chien in 1818. The first fruits of this union were Xavier and Jean Baptiste, who died within a day or two of each other, before my birth. Both of them were buried in the Catholic cemetery at Prairie du Chien. My sister, Thérèse J., was born in Portage in 1826, two years before my birth. In 1864 she married Thomas Prescott, a farmer of Irish birth. The Prescotts now live in the town of Caledonia, Columbia county, on section 28, town 12, range 8 east. I remember my maternal grandfather, Crelie, quite well, but am certain that he was not as old — one hundred and thirty years — as many have made him out to be; in 1845, he told me that he was then eighty years of age, and as he died at Caledonia in 1865,⁶ he was by his own showing not over a hundred. As the years went on. having no fixed knowledge of his age, he doubtless innocently fell into the habit, common (401) enough with old men in his station of life, of claiming an age that he had never reached. He may have been over a hundred, but certainly not much over that.

In l834, my father moved from the Fox river to the Wisconsin, locating on the knoll just west of the south end of the bridge, about where the old ferry used to be. I do not think father did any transportation business after his removal, but he erected a trading house, a dwelling, and two or three farm buildings; the trading house and parts of the dwelling are still in existence, having in later years been moved by subsequent owners of the land to locations from a dozen to twenty rods distant, to do duty as farm sheds. L. W. Barden is the present owner of the place where father's establishment was situated.

As a boy, I did not often visit Fort Winnebago, so have but faint recollections of the officers in charge there, although I well remember Captain Gideon Lowe, who was one of the last officers in charge of the government property. He afterwards kept a large and well-patronized tavern, called the Franklin house, on the transportation route, within a few rods northeast of where the Wisconsin Central railway depot now is; a portion of the house is still (1887) standing and occupied as a tenement.⁷ The captain was a large, well-built man, of kindly habits and generally popular. The Indians thought a good deal of him. My sister, Mrs. Prescott, says that she remembers as far back as Captain Hooe's time.⁸ Hooe married one of Joseph Rolette's daughters, and was more or less interested in the Indian trade.

I remember very well the appearance of the small-pox scourge among the Winnebagoes in 1831, when one quarter of the tribe fell victims.⁹ The Indians had never heard of its like before. The medicine men soon abandoned their futile attempts to stay the ravages of the pest, and the survivors simply fled before it like a herd of stricken deer, (402) leaving their dead and dying behind them, unburied. My father was himself obliged to bury a great number of them, as a sanitary necessity. None of our family were afflicted with the disease, for we were vaccinated at the fort by the military surgeon, at the first appearance of the trouble.

My father, as has been amply recorded in history, was killed at Portage, near the Wisconsin river, in October, 1836, by Mauzemoneka (Iron Walker), a son of the Winnebago chief Whirling Thunder, who had at the time a camp on the high land north of the city end of the present Wisconsin river bridge.¹⁰ Pierre Paquette, at the time of his death, was considered a well-to-do man for those times. The Winnebagoes owed him $20,000 for goods which he had furnished them; he had a good deal of live stock, some of it on the farm by the bridge, but the most of it on his farm named Bellefontaine, twelve miles northeast of the fort, on the Green Bay military road; and it has been told me by Laurent Rolette,¹¹ his clerk, that he had in addition to this, $20,000 in cash, in the safe. He was not only doing a big business in the regular Indian trade, but did most of the supplying of beef and horses to the Winnebago tribe. The Bellefontaine farm¹² was conducted by a Frenchman whom he hired for the purpose, live stock being the specialty. In fact, blackbirds were so numerous in those days that it was quite useless to raise grain. Father used to hire Indian lads by the dozen, and keep them supplied with ammunition for the purpose of killing the feathered pests, which were slaughtered by the thousand each season, but with no apparent diminution of the number.

The administrators of the estate were H. L. Dousman, of Prairie du Chien,¹³ and Joseph Paquette, of Green Bay. This Paquette was a farmer, a cousin of my father.¹⁴ (403) Mr. Dousman was general agent for the American Fur Company, for Prairie du Chien, Portage, and Green Bay.¹⁵ Very soon the company and many private individuals brought in claims against the estate, all of which were allowed, the result being that everything was swallowed up except the bare Bellefontaine farm, the stock from which was driven off to Green Bay, along with the other animals, and there sold to liquidate the debts.

Among the property which was swallowed up in this way were two sections of land which were granted by the treaty of 1832 to my sister and me, near Taycheedah, — part of the land being now included in the present corporation limits of Fond du Lac. We never saw this land. It was granted to us because of my father's relation to the Winnebago tribe, and his services to the government.¹⁶

In 1829, my father and his two children were granted a section apiece by the government, in town 8, range 8 east, near Madison.¹⁷ My father's section, with some neighboring (404) property that he had purchased, also became involved in the toils in some mysterious way; and although many years afterwards I recovered it in behalf of the family, by litigation conducted at Madison, the property slipped through our fingers through over-confidence in certain persons, and was lost.

Our land at the south end of the Portage bridge was a claim, father having been permitted to settle there by the tribe, he contracting to run a ferry-boat and trading post for their accommodation. After his death, my mother, who became married to a man named Walsworth, formally entered it. There were ninety-three acres in the tract. In May, 1857, Walsworth having died some few years previous, we sold and moved from this place, both because of frequent overflows of the Wisconsin river, and the fear that it would be eaten up in taxes, the tract having become incorporated in the city limits of Portage. We removed our possessions to sections 27 and 28, town 12, range 8 east, where my mother had bought a hundred and sixty acres. She afterwards gave eighty acres of this to my sister Thérèse, — upon which the latter now lives, — and died at her home there on the sixteenth of March, 1864, aged about seventy years.

I have spoken of Rolette, my father's clerk. Our family placed great confidence in him. He had our affairs wholly in his hands to the time the administrators took charge, and, so far as we could find out, he never violated a trust. John de la Ronde was Rolette's predecessor as clerk to my father.¹⁸ I remember him, both as my father's clerk and as he was in after years. He was a wonderful story-teller, and used, I thought, to stretch the long bow about early days at the Portage. He lived on the Baraboo bluffs, where he died several years ago.

Two years after my father's death, when I was ten years (405) old, my sister and I were sent by our guardian, H. L. Dousman, for education in English, to the Presbyterian Indian mission on the Yellow river, Iowa, — the "neutral ground" of those days. Rev. David Lowrey was the superintendent.¹⁹ His assistants were two young ladies, — Minerva and Lucy (406) Brunson, sisters, — who did the teaching, while Mr. Lowrey preached to us and superintended the agency. Minerva, in after years, married one Thomas Linten, who had in early days been employed at the old agency house at the Portage. There were about forty children at the mission, all of us more or less tinctured with Winnebago blood. The English language was alone used, the grade of instruction being about the same as the average rural district school. Of course the religious teaching was wholly of the Presbyterian cast, and the children were very good Presbyterians so long as they remained at the mission; but most of them relapsed into their ancient heathenism as soon as removed from Mr. Lowrey's care. In 1840, the institution was removed to Turkey river, Iowa.

My sister was taken away in 1842, by Mr. Dousman, and placed in the Menard academy, a Catholic convent school, at Kaskaskia, Illinois, in charge of Mother Agnes, sister superior.²⁰

In 1845, at the instance of our guardian, I returned to Prairie du Chien, and after a few months spent at that place was sent to a Presbyterian university at Lebanon, Tennessee, about thirty miles east of Nashville, where I remained a little over a year. The climate there not agreeing with me, I being on the sick list fully half my time, I went back to Prairie du Chien in the spring of 1847, thence home. There had been a great flood in Kaskaskia in 1844, and the Menard academy was in consequence removed to St. Louis, whither my sister accompanied it. She returned home in the fall of 1847, having acquired a good education and so thorough a Catholic training that she remains to this day a devout partaker of that communion.

Mr. Dousman having by this time turned over his guardianship of us to Henry M. Rice, afterwards United States senator from Minnesota, and now (1887) a resident of St. Paul, I served some time as a clerk in Mr. Rice's general Indian supply store at Prairie du Chien; but I finally gave this up (407) as too confining, and returned home. For several years thereafter, I drifted back and forth, between the home farm and Prairie du Chien, but finally settled down in Portage in 1852.

In 1848 I was employed by Mr. Rice in helping remove the Winnebagoes from Wisconsin. He had a contract to remove them, at so much per head, to Long Prairie, Minnesota, on the Swan river, above St. Cloud; the exact head money I do not remember, but it was a considerable sum.²¹ Others employed by Mr. Rice in this service were Theodore Lupient, my half brother, Simon Lecuyer, a relative of Jean Lecuyer, of Portage, and John T. La Ronde. We operated independently of each other. I went, mostly, to the camps on the Lemonweir and around La Crosse, the latter being the point where the Wisconsin Indians were to be rendezvoused preparatory to their shipment to Long Prairie. I traveled alone on horseback. The Indians were (408) quite widely scattered, — not in villages, but in small encampments of two or three families each. They had no definite abode, but roved about, following the game and pitching their wigwams wherever night overtook them. Going to the Indians individually, we would ask them to come to La Crosse for shipment; no inducements were offered, but we told them that it would be better to go of their own accord than have the military after them, as the latter would be sure to appear if there was any obstinacy. Generally, they seemed willing to go. I certainly never heard any objections on their part, and the family groups gradually collected, in a peaceable manner, between June and November, at La Crosse. From La Crosse they were shipped by steamer, in parties of five or six families, to St. Paul, where open farm wagons, furnished by Mr. Rice, were provided for the women, children, and goods, the bucks marching behind. By easy stages, the party camping by night, the journey from St. Paul to Long Prairie occupied four or five days. I went up with the last lot, in November, to see how they were situated.

Upon this expedition through the woods, I met several chiefs of considerable note. Kayrahmaunee was one of the most important of them all. He was a large, fine-looking man, with a Roman nose and large features. He was quite above the average in the matter of intelligence. At that time he must have been between seventy and eighty years of age. He died in 1884, near Dexterville, on the Yellow river, in Iowa. His camping place after he returned to Wisconsin was at the head of the Kickapoo river. He and his family cultivated a piece of land there, and were in reasonably prosperous circumstances. He was certainly much respected in the tribe, and exercised considerable power among his people. While styled Kayrahmaunee by the whites, because of his relationship to the old Caramaunee (Walking Turtle), who was beside Tecumseh when the latter fell at the battle of the Thames, the Indian name of this Kickapoo river chief was Maukeektshunxka (Shaking of the Earth).

(409) Old Dandy was among those whom I went after in this expedition. He was perhaps seventy years old at the time, but his appearance did not indicate that age. A small, thin man, of rather insignificant appearance, he was nevertheless the only Winnebago who, since the breaking up of tribal relations in 1848, was generally respected as the chief of the tribe. Old Dandy went to Washington in 1828, in company with old Chachipkaka (War Eagle), Yellow Thunder, and my father, to interview the president. Old Dandy's camp was near the, Wisconsin river dells, but we could not find him. He had made up his mind that he would not go to Long Prairie, and had given notice that it was of no use to try and induce him. He finally came in to La Crosse of his own accord, however, and repeated his determination not to go. He was not disturbed.

The Winnebagoes did not like it in Minnesota. For one thing, they were afraid of the Chippewas, who were too near Long Prairie to make it a safe place for a Winnebago. They always preferred the woods and rivers of Wisconsin, where game was plenty and life untrammeled, to existence upon a reservation, where their conduct was circumscribed by set rules, where they had to work too diligently for an existence to suit them, and the hardships were greater than in their old territory. So they soon came back. A good many returned before cold weather set in, as soon as they had got their payment at Long Prairie. I came back to Wisconsin in the early winter, after a short visit, and several of the disgusted Indians were on the steamboat from St. Paul, with me. General J. E. Fletcher, the agent for all the Winnebagoes, was also aboard. It always seemed to me that the removal was unnecessary, and involved useless hardships, as well as curtailed their general fund, for the expenses of transportation were taken out of their payment. The small proportion who remained at Long Prairie were afterwards moved to Blue Earth county,²² near Mankato, Minnesota; and thence, after a time, up the (410) Missouri river to the Crow and Creek reservations.²³ But the Winnebagoes were dissatisfied with the water, the soil, and the lack of timber, so gained consent again to pull their stakes, this time to be floated down the Missouri to Dakota county, Nebraska, their present reservation.²⁴ There are at this time some thirteen or fourteen hundred Indians belonging to this reservation, but not all of them are on the government pay-roll, for many are widely scattered, and wandering like gypsies over the face of the country beyond the Mississippi.

After the futile removal to Long Prairie, and the return of the majority of the Winnebagoes to their old haunts in Wisconsin, I obtained a supply of goods from B. W. Brisbois, of Prairie du Chien,²⁵ and set up as a trader among them, on my own account. I operated near Elroy, on the Lemonweir, on the headwaters of the Baraboo river, and at other places. Other traders in the same region with me, were Naberer St. Germain, — now (1887) living at Necedah, and not at present in the trade, — who was employed by Miner & Weston of that village; and another man, with headquarters at Mauston, whose name I do not remember.

In my early days, the trader would set up a log shanty, or (411) build one of bushes covered with earth, just large enough to spread out his packs and to bunk in. This was always near a water-course, and in the neighborhood of a good hunting ground. Generally these traders were rough as to manners, morals, and intellect; the earliest of them were French, then came the New Yorker or New Englander; while only a few had Indian blood in their veins. Usually they had a quiet enough time with the Indians, about the only trouble likely to arise being over the indignation of their native customers when all the whiskey the latter wanted was refused them. On such occasions, the trader would often suffer mobbing, and the loss of his goods. His stock exhausted by trade, the forest dealer would pack up his furs and go down to Prairie du Chien or Green Bay, and stock up again, either returning to his old shanty or seeking a new field for operations, and perhaps a change of luck.

In my day, I either put up a rude log shanty or rented a building of some settler. From this central warehouse I would start out with a team, visiting the small camps, which flitted about from place to place, following the fortunes of the hunt. When the camps got too far away from my headquarters I would shift my base nearer to theirs. The trade was profitable enough, in the beginning, but both the character of the country and of the Indians began to change. Small towns sprang up, with local dealers handling Indian supplies, which increased the competition. I was obliged, like all Indian traders, to give extensive credit. When one of my customers got deeply in my debt, I found that he would give me the lurch and go and deal with some other man, thus running several accounts at the same time, without paying up any of them. It used to be that every Indian had a sense of honor about the payment of debts, and it was safe enough for the traders to trust him. But the red man soon came to take advantage of sharp competition, readily yielded to the numerous offers of credit which beset him, began to live beyond his means, learned from the whites the trick of defrauding creditors, and acquired an easy indifference to the importunities of those he (412) owed. They have come to understand, too, that old accounts are outlawed by the white man's law, and by act of congress their government pay is exempt from execution. So it came about that a loose morality about debts sprung up among our Indians, although, of course, there are numerous and notable exceptions. The result of it was that I lost two thousand dollars in the trade, and retiring from it in 1856 went to farming, with my mother, in the town of Caledonia, on the quarter section she had purchased there.

In 1859, I was married at Prairie du Chien, to Madeleine, the widow of Gabriel Brisbois, who was a nephew of B. W. Brisbois. We lived in Caledonia until 1883, when we removed to my present farm in the town of Albion, Jackson county, four miles northwest of Black River Falls, I having taken the position of government interpreter for the Winnebagoes of Wisconsin. We have had seven children, six of whom are living, and three of whom are still at home.

In 1873, there was another attempt to move the Winnebagoes from the state.²⁶ Capt. Charles A. Hunt, of Melvina, Monroe county, was awarded the contract for removal. There were then about a thousand of the tribe in Wisconsin, scattered quite generally along the water-courses leading into the Wisconsin and the Mississippi south of the Black (413) river and Wausau. Captain Hunt sent out runners among the Indians to give them notice to come into Sparta to be shipped to Nebraska. Among these runners were the late John de la Ronde, of Portage; George Goodvillage, a Winnebago, of Friendship; Joe Monekee, another Winnebago, from the Yellow-river agency, and P. Poole, who was sheriff of Columbia county in 1871-72. Most of the Indians refused to go. They had had enough of reservation life and the miseries of removal, and proposed to stay where they were until they were forced. Thereupon Captain Hunt obtained military assistance. Big Hawk was one of the chiefs among those Winnebagoes who stoutly refused to go, so it was determined to make an example of him. Big Hawk and some twenty-five or thirty others were holding a feast on the Baraboo river, three or four miles southeast of Portage. The military surprised the party, surrounded the camp, took away the arms of the Indians, and ordered them to march into Portage. They refused, whereupon Hunt went around among them and clapped handcuffs upon Big Hawk, who made no resistance. The prisoners were then marched into town, surrounded by the military. It was in December, and the roads none of the best. I saw them marched into Portage and put aboard the cars, amid considerable popular excitement, and shipped on to Sparta.

Some others were afterwards picked up easily enough, on both the Fox and the Wisconsin. As soon as they saw or heard of the troops, they came in peaceably, as a rule; in a few cases, however, the troops surrounded the camps and marched the Indians into the nearest railway towns, whence they were shipped to Sparta. In a good many camps, the troops would find only women and children, the men being off on hunting expeditions. In such cases, the women and children were put into sleighs and carried off; the men, upon their return, finding their wigwams deserted and their families gone, would perforce follow and join them. Much hardship was suffered by all of the Indians; many died on the way, while others expired from exposure, after reaching their destination in Nebraska. The attempt at removal was successful as to several hundred Winnebagoes, but (414) probably as many more evaded pursuit and remained in Wisconsin. It had been supposed that the congressional act of removal provided that there should be no force used. Certainly the Indians were much surprised and indignant at the appearance of the military.²⁷ Before the removal, several of the head men went to Indian Commissioner Edward P. Smith and pleaded for protection for their people, but they did not get it. The Indians had committed no depredations, they were in nobody's way, and all of us who were friendly to them considered the removal as unjust. There came to be much popular indignation over the manner in which this futile attempt was carried out, and since that day there has been no serious attempt to disturb the Wisconsin Winnebagoes, who have so (415) persistently clung to their native woods and streams, despite the advance of civilization around them.

There are about fifteen hundred Winnebagoes now living in Wisconsin. Some fourteen hundred are now on the pay-roll. By act of congress, January 18, 1881, it was provided that there should be a census taken of both those in Nebraska and those in Wisconsin. All those in Wisconsin before that date were to be enrolled in this state, and those then in Nebraska were to be enrolled there.²⁸ The result was that those who returned from Nebraska to Wisconsin after that date, — and one or two hundred have done so, — are not entitled to enrollment here; hence cannot, except by misrepresentation, get government pay. This is the penalty for making a change of residence, although I believe that any Wisconsin Winnebago who should care to go to Nebraska would find no difficulty in getting himself removed from the Wisconsin roll to the Nebraska. But this is not likely, for they do not enjoy life on the reservation, the universal complaint there being that they cannot earn enough from the land to support themselves, and that the government payment is too small to do any good; while the government officers and interpreters there (416) have favorites among the head men, and the average Indian gets no justice done him. Of course very much of this complaint is ill-based. The Indian does not stop to reason, but jumps at conclusions. The man who is on the Wisconsin roll considers himself fortunate, for here he has a free and easy roving life, without reservation restrictions; and he gets a cash payment from the government, whereas on the reservation it comes in the guise of tools and supplies — for the former of which he is not over desirous.

I helped take the Winnebago census in 1881, the bureau agent being Louis Morel, U. S. A. We were stationed in succession at Black River Falls, Trempealeau, La Crosse, Portage, Menasha, Stevens Point, Friendship, Madison, Baraboo, Remington, back again to La Crosse, and completed our task at Blue River, near Boscobel. Our habit was to send out runners among the Indians and invite them to come in wherever our office was established. Mr. Morel being taken sick, his clerk and I were alone in many places. About eight hundred came in readily enough, but there were some two hundred and fifty, chiefly belonging to Big Hawk's band, at Pike lake, who refused to be counted.

It seems that H. W. Lee, a Stevens Point lawyer, asserted that the Winnebagoes owed him ten thousand dollars as attorney fees. He set up the claim that during the eight years previous to 1881 he had been of great service to the tribe and had gone to Washington several times in their behalf; that, in fact, he was the cause of getting the act of March 3, 1873, passed for the relief of the Winnebagoes. This act provided for regular annual payments, although they did not, for various reasons, commence until ten years later. Lee persuaded Big Hawk and his followers to refuse enrollment until a promise should be extracted from the government that he (Lee) should be reimbursed out of the payments which were to succeed the taking of the census. Few of the Indians outside of this particular band endorsed the claim, believing that Lee had already been sufficiently compensated.

As so many refused enrollment, the attempt at census (417) taking in 1881 was a failure. In 1883²⁹ it was repeated, and this time with success. Maj. Walter F. Halleck, U. S. A., of Michigan, was appointed to complete the Winnebago census. He came to the state, and Anthony Grignon officiated as his interpreter. The roll was now made up to something over eleven hundred, and in November Major Halleck made the first payments to the Wisconsin Winnebagoes, at Black River Falls and Stevens Point, my services now being employed as interpreter, in which capacity I have since served the government, at the three payment places of Black River Falls, Tomah, and Hatley. The money had been accumulating since 1873, so there was now some forty thousand dollars to distribute among the Indians who were on the roll. Big Hawk's people refused their money at the Stevens Point payment, and indeed they have ever since declined to have anything to do with it, and all on account of Lee's claim, which they honestly believe to be a just one. But the band has fast decreased in numbers, as the temptation of the accumulating money becomes stronger, and the influence of the payment Indians — who think Big Hawk a foolish man — predominates. There are now left of his party but twenty-five or thirty persons, — Big Hawk himself, and some of the Snake family. Some of this band, who have come in lately, have received as high as nine hundred dollars per head, and one of those who still hangs out (Two Crows) would get twelve hundred and twenty dollars if he would but consent to draw it. Whatever may be said of Lee's claim, it certainly indicates a strong sense of personal honor in Big Hawk and his companions, that, sincerely believing in the demand, they are willing to sacrifice so much for a nice question of moral principle.

Big Hawk is about sixty years of age. He is a descendant of the famous chief Kayrahmaunee (Walking Turtle). He is a young-looking, finely-formed Indian, some five feet ten inches in height, with small mustaches; he is sober, of (418) good habits, and with a high sense of honor, and by those who stand by him is looked up to with much admiration. He has a regular homestead of forty acres on Pike lake, in Marathon county, a portion of which he cultivates, eking out an existence by hunting. During the removal of 1873, Captain Hunt took Big Hawk in shackles to Nebraska, because the chief declined to go unless forced. But the other members of his band made up a purse and soon brought him back to Pike lake. He is a good, peaceable man, but I am afraid will never get his accumulated bounty; for I am sure that he will remain loyal to the supposed interests of his friend Lee, and the latter seems not at all likely to ever have his claim allowed.³⁰

Although but few over eleven hundred were on the roll by November, 1883, the number enrolled at each succeeding annual payment has gradually increased, until in February, 1887, the number was about fourteen hundred. This addition was partly due from the appearance of some who had been in hiding during the census-taking of 1881 and 1883, from fear of removal; partly from the steady increase, each year, in the number of births over the deaths, and partly from Nebraska runaways, a few of whom manage to get on the rolls through misrepresentation. There are probably about one hundred more who either cannot get on the roll, or who, like Big Hawk's band, do not wish to.

The act of congress providing for payments to the Wisconsin Winnebagoes specified that each householder must take up a homestead of at least forty acres, build a house upon it with his own means, and otherwise improve it. There being no one to look after the matter and properly enforce the law, the result has been a somewhat (419) haphazard allotment of land. Some of the Indians made intelligent selections; while others would blindly point a finger down any where on a surveyor's chart, that would be placed before them, quite regardless of where the property was, so long as the duty of selection was performed, and the annuity secured. At the payments, we can be assured that the Indian has his homestead, but whether he has a house upon, or has otherwise improved it, there is no way of knowing except by general report. The result is that but a half or two-thirds of them have buildings upon their places, while the majority of the rest have probably never even seen their landed possessions; many, indeed, who have gone to hunt them up have found that they were located in swamps or on barren hill-sides. The Winnebago homesteads, mainly forty acres each, are chiefly in Jackson, Adams, Marathon, and Shawano counties, the bulk of them being in Jackson county; the soil is especially poor in Adams, and quite light in Jackson.

None of the Indian homesteaders are even fair farmers. But even a white man could not make a living on many of their small patches of sand. I presume that they chose these rather forbidding sections because they were in the neighborhood of their old hunting grounds, and because of the blueberries, which, in Jackson especially, are an important crop. The berries grow chiefly on the highlands, and the Indians are the principal gardeners. The fruit begins to ripen about the last of July, and the picking holds out until the last of August, keeping the bulk of the Indians of both sexes quite busy, and bringing them in a respectable income while it lasts. Leaving their homes, they camp in wigwams and in canvas tents upon the picking grounds. A first-rate picker, in a good season, can gather by hand from a bushel to a bushel and a half in a day; while some, who have rakes adapted to the purpose, can do very much better than this. The berries are poured into narrow boxes holding a bushel each, and one can be strapped on each side of a pony. Leaving the women and children to do the gathering, the bucks start early in the morning with the harvest of the day before and ride into the nearest town, — (420) Black River Falls is the principal market, — where the product is picked up by the buyers, who place the berries in shallow trays for shipment by express to the various centres of demand. The Indians sometimes get as high as three dollars a bushel at the commencement of the season, when the fruit is scarce, the price diving down to seventy-five cents at the flush of the supply. This of course is quite a fortune for the Indians so long as it lasts, but first-rate crops are two years apart.

After the blueberry crop is over, the Winnebagoes have before them the cranberry harvest. They are hired as pickers by the owners of the marshes, being paid from fifty to seventy-five cents per bushel.

In the winter comes the annuity payment, at Black River Falls, Tomah, and Hatley, the heads of families coming in to whichever point is the most convenient of access. Black River Falls is the chief rallying point. As the Indians generally ride free on the railroads, despite the inter-state commerce law, and time being counted as worthless, they are not usually particular about the distance they have to travel. At the payment made in February, 1887, the annuity consisted of nineteen dollars and forty cents for each person — a considerable sum for the largest families. The inducement to have a numerous progeny is powerful, and the Indians take advantage of the premium thus placed by the government on child-bearing. Between the payments of 1886 and 1887, there were fifty-six births reported, as against about thirty deaths. The annuity, however, makes the Indians dependent, shiftless creatures, being a premium on pauperism, and many of them are beginning to complain that they do not get on as well as they did without aid. Indeed, the payment is a decided evil to the poor fellows; it makes them an object of interest to rapacious traders, who follow them about at payment time, a lot of sharks, plying them with liquor, doubling their claims against them, and not content until the last dollar is gone; many a man gets home to his large family, having drank, squandered, or gambled, or been duped out of, every cent the government gave him. Some of the sights behind the (421) scenes, at an Indian payment, are enough to make one's heart bleed for the poor wretches who are too simple to take care of themselves, and need a firm, wise friend as badly as any lot of foolish boys ever did.

I have said that the Wisconsin Winnebagoes were none of them even fair farmers. They are a race of hunters. Even where they have houses upon their little reservations, few of the habitations are regularly used. The Indians prefer the wigwams which adorn every door-yard; especially is this the case in summer, when the house is scarcely used at all. But the most of them are seldom at home. In the spring they scratch up the ground a little with hoes — very few of them use plows — plant their corn in a crude fashion, and then go off into the woods, hunting and fishing, until time to hoe the crop. This task over, they go off until gathering time, and then are away for the most of the winter until spring again. Here and there is a family that has come to believe it is better to stay at home in winter, and enjoy the comforts there, than to go tramping off through the woods, with imminent danger of contracting rheumatism and deadly colds. But such philosophers are few.

The winter's hunt usually commences early in October and is kept up till the first of May. The families start out, sometimes independently and sometimes in parties of five or six lodges, following the game hither and thither. Sometimes there is established a large camp, — say from half a dozen to ten families, — from which hunting parties are sent out in different directions to beat the neighborhood for game. These parties will be gone for a week or so, and bring back their meat and skins. They are quite industrious in their hunting habits, and are fully as successful as good white hunters would be under similar conditions. In old days, when game was more plenty, an Indian would ordinarily get the equivalent of at least one hundred dollars for the product of his winter's hunt; but now the season usually nets him between fifty and seventy-five dollars. There is one source of income that the Indian hunters now have, that was unknown of old. (422) Venison can always be sold at the nearest railway station for seven or eight cents per pound for the saddle, — the only part that they sell, as a rule, for they live on the rest. A good hunter can kill four or five deer per day, when game is plenty.

They do not take many black bears now-a-days. The beavers, too, are nearly all gone, though otters and mink are quite plenty, and there are a good many fishers, although the latter are chiefly in the northern part of the state, on the hunting grounds of the Chippewas. The Chippewas come down as far south as the Chippewa river, to hunt. The two tribes do not entrench on each other's territory very much, and troubles between them are unknown, even when they meet on the same hunting ground. Around Wausau, the Chippewas, Menomonees, Pottawattomies, and Winnebagoes mingle freely and intermarry.

The Winnebagoes enjoy company. They are companionable. Their motto is, ''The more the merrier," and they will sacrifice a good deal for pleasure. The days pass with them in hunting, gossiping, gambling, and listless loafing. Some of them are inveterate talkers, and they are often confirmed practical jokers. Very few of the tribe are quarrelsome, except when in liquor. There is no social grading among them; a pure democracy exists; the days of the chieftancy are over, as the Wisconsin Winnebagoes no longer entertain tribal relations; and while there is naturally much respect entertained for the descendants of former chiefs and for those who are by nature leaders, each Indian boasts himself quite the equal of the best man among them. The result of this free-and-easy independence is, that the vicious and the dissolute of either sex are hail-fellows-well-met in any camp, whatever opinions may be entertained of them in private, by their companions.

In January, during the hunt, there are numerous formal feasts. A head man of a family will send out indiscriminate invitations to all the Winnebagoes in the neighborhood to come to a free-for-all feast at his lodge. He will then call upon others of his family to collect venison and bear-meat for the occasion. This duty generally falls on the nephews, (423) for it is a singular custom among them that the nephew is a sort of slave to the uncle and owes him far stricter obedience than he does his own father. The uncle who calls on his nephew to perform a certain act or do a certain errand expects the young man to do it at whatever risk of limb or wind. But the nephew has some privileges in return. He has but to make a present to his uncle and lay his hand on whatever belongs to the latter that he may be wanting,— a fine horse, or a new gun, for instance, — and say, "You've had this long enough; now I'll take care of it," and the thing he claims is his, without further ado. But to return to the feast. All the way from fifty to one hundred often gather at these meetings. Usually commencing at twilight, they continue all night; eating, dancing, singing and story-telling being the order of exercises. Probably the most popular of their dances is the buffalo dance. They represent themselves to be bisons, imitating the legitimate motions and noises of that animal, and introducing a great many others that would quite astonish the oldest buffalo in existence. Of course it has been a long time since any Winnebagoes ever saw buffaloes; their antics are purely traditionary, handed down from former generations of dancers. Once in a while, on such occasions, there will be some fire-water introduced by one or two reckless young scamps, but ordinarily these feasts are not drunken orgies.

After the hunting season, the Indians usually go directly home, selling their furs to the nearest trader, after they get there; unless there should chance to be a trader near the hunting grounds, when they dispose of their goods to him in order to lighten their load.

As among nearly, if not quite, all the tribes of American aborigines, a secret society exists among the Winnebagoes.³¹ The only name I ever heard it called is "'Medicine."So far as I have been able to learn, the chief theoretical object of the fraternity is, to keep the virtues of medicinal herbs and the details of medical practice generally, as secrets (424) among a chosen few, and hand them down from one generation to another. Medical practice among the Indians³² — and when I speak of Indians I must be understood as referring to the Winnebagoes, with whose customs and language I am alone familiar, — is very crude, yet in certain classes of cases it seems to be sufficient. In the treatment of wounds and chronic sores, the Indian medicine men are more successful, so far as my observation goes, than the average white surgeons. In such cases, they dress the wounds very carefully, and apply poultices of herbs. In cases of sickness, peculiar concoctions of herbs and roots are used, with sweats and rubbings. Of course this is accompanied by mystic ceremonials and incantations, which I imagine are chiefly thrown in for effect: I do not think the medicine men themselves believe in them. When a medicine man is needed, it is customary to tender him a present in advance, as a sort of retaining fee. Indeed, many will not respond to a call without such fee. If, in due course of time, the patient dies on the medicine man's hands, or is thought by the family to be unimproved, the latter is discharged and is expected to give back all of the fees he has received up to date. A new man is then patronized, on the same terms — "No cure, no pay."

The secret society is conducted by these medicine men. Fully one-half of the tribe — men and women, and youths of both sexes — belong; possibly a majority of them do. When a person wishes to join, and is accepted by the fraternity, he must accumulate a heap of goods as an initiation fee. Before the government payments, it sometimes took years to make this accumulation; but since the inauguration of the payments, money is somewhat easier among them. Indeed, the demands of the society swallow up no small portion of the government annuity. These initiation fees are given to the head medicine man of the neighborhood, who is supposed to divide them among the fraternity, but it is a matter of general notoriety that he keeps the lion's share. The medicine meetings³³ are usually (425) held just after the return home from the payment. Sometimes one novice is initiated at once, sometimes two or three. The meeting will ordinarily last all day and sometimes through the succeeding night, for time is no object to the Indian. The meeting is held in a long lodge, especially erected for the purpose, and is open to all comers. There is a great deal of mystification, in the way of secret whisperings from ear to ear, and seemingly nonsensical ceremonial, interspersed with long and tiresome harangues about the traditions of the tribe and its spirit mythology. In the midst of all this, and without interrupting the performance in the lodge, the candidate is led off into the bushes by two or three "big" medicine men. What transpires there, I do not know but the candidate always comes back, after about ten minute's absence, pale with fright and much exhausted. He is given a medicine bag, consisting of the dried skin of an otter or beaver, with the head and tail preserved, made into the form of a pouch. There is more talking, dancing, whispering, and jerky movements, and the novice is then declared a full-fledged medicine man. As a matter of fact, however, very few among them ever practice. The instruction is altogether too brief to be of service. Usually only persons well on in years take upon themselves the office and title of medicine men — and but few of those, for the position is not very lucrative. Belonging to the secret society, of itself, merely gives them the right to practice. Occasionally an Indian doctor gets employment among the whites. For instance, a Winnebago woman has just now a fair practice in Black River Falls; and "Doc" Decorah, of Adams county, — nephew of Spoon Decorah, — had, some years back, a good run of patronage in Reedsburg. But the Indian practitioners complain that many of the whites are not the best of pay, and, while pleased to boast of their white patronage, are generally less anxious to respond to such calls than to those of their own race.

I have spoken of gambling among the Indians. It is their commonest vice. The moccasin game is the chief one. It somewhat resembles three-card-monte, except that (426) I do not think there is any cheating about it. The players squat on the ground in two groups, facing each other; any number may be on a side, — one or a dozen, — and the sides need not be equal in numbers. On the ground between the two groups, four moccasins are placed in a row. The leader of the side that has the "deal,'' so to speak, takes a small bead in his right hand and deftly slides the hand under each moccasin in turn, pretending to leave the bead under each one of them; he finally does leave the bead under one, and the leader of the opposition side, watching him closely, is to guess which moccasin covers the bead. The opposition leader then takes a slender stick and lifts up and throws off the three moccasins under which he thinks nothing has been left, leaving the one under which he guesses the bead has been left. Should the bead be discovered under one of the three which he throws off, then he loses four points for his side; should he be correct in his guess, and the bead found under the one moccasin left, he gains four for his side. Ten small twigs or chips are conveniently at hand, and as each side wins at a play, the leader takes four from the pile. When the ten are all taken, by either or both sides, the game is ended, the side having the most sticks being the winner. Usually five such games are played, the side getting the greater number taking the stakes, which are commonly goods — although once in a while they gamble for money.

The vigorous game of la crosse now-a-days familiar to patrons of state and county fairs of this section, at which professional bands of Chippewas exhibit their skill — was in earlier days much played by the Winnebagoes. It was usually played at La Crosse, — Prairie la Crosse deriving its name from this fact,— during the general rendezvous after the winter's hunt. The Winnebagoes having always clung to the water-courses and heavy timber, during their winter's trapping and hunting, would float down the rivers to La Crosse, and there have their feasts and la crosse games, meet the traders and indulge in a big spree. Occasionally they played la crosse in their villages, but this was not common. It was considered to be more (427) especially a spring festival game. I never hear, now-a-days, of the Wisconsin Winnebagoes playing it, and in fact I never saw it in this state, but when I was at the mission on Turkey river, I frequently saw the Indians there indulge in it. It is needless to add, I presume, that these games were always for heavy stakes in goods; you will seldom get an Indian to play "for fun.''

Among the Winnebagoes, the institution of the family is held in high regard, and relations are very tenacious of each other's rights.³⁴ No marriage ceremony is known. Presents to the parents of a woman, by either the parents of the man or the man himself, if accepted, usually secure her for a partner. However much the woman may dislike the man, she considers it her bounden duty to go and at least try to live with him. Divorce is easy among them. There are no laws compelling them to live together. Sometimes there are marriages for a specified time, say a few months or a year. When separations occur, the woman usually takes the children with her to the home of her parents. But so long as the union exists, it is deemed to be sacred, and there are very few instances of infidelity. I think that, considering the lack of all marriage law among them, these Indians make a better showing of marital fidelity and constancy than would be exhibited in the average white community. Quite a number of the bucks have two wives, who live on apparently equal, free-and-easy terms; but although there is no rule about the matter, 1 never heard of any of the men having more than two wives. With all this ease of divorce, numerous Indian couples remain true to each other for life. For instance, old Kayrahmaunee, whom I knew, had never but the one wife with whom he always lived. On the other hand, I could mention Doc Decorah, who is living with his tenth wife, but he has had her since 1873 and they appear to agree very well. The young, unmarried women of to-day are, as a result of white influence, not as strict in their behavior as was the rule in earlier days.

(428) The Winnebagoes are by no means the worst Indians in the state. In some respects they are the best. Socially they are more moral than most of the others; they are good-hearted, have always been friendly to American interests, — the Red Bird affair in 1827 was in no sense a tribal outbreak, — they are extremely tractable, injure no one's legitimate interests, and mind their own business; the remarkable pertinacity with which they have clung to the Wisconsin streams and forests, despite numerous attempted removals, argues a degree of patriotism for their native state, to which no white Badger, who entertains any pride of birthplace, should object. Could they but have a government agent settled amongst them, as was recommended to congress by the commissioner of Indian affairs in 1886, their condition might be materially bettered. The homestead improvement law should be enforced; they should be instructed in better agricultural methods than they have thus far adopted; they should be taught that a nomadic life is not in the end as profitable as staying at home and carrying on legitimate farming; they should be forced to send their children to the district schools, where the white teachers and pupils are willing and anxious to receive them, and where the few young aborigines who have thus far attended have made encouraging progress; in short, these people are like a pack of children, who need a patient instructor and friend; they are willing enough to advance, if continually urged to the task, in season and out of season. Agents who have the necessary qualifications, and who are above collusion with tricky traders, are unfortunately rare, as the history of our Indian agencies too well shows; but it is not impossible to get such a man for the Wisconsin Winnebagoes. Given a practical guide of this sort, these people would, I am sure, make speedy and substantial advancement.

In the course of my life-long experience with the Winnebagoes, I have met many chiefs whose names are prominently connected with the history of the tribe. Among these was Yellow Thunder. He was forcibly removed to Iowa, with Black Wolf, but was soon allowed to return to (429) Wisconsin because he was a land-owner. When I knew him, he lived on a forty-acre patch that he had bought from the government, some sixteen miles above Portage, on the Wisconsin river. He died in the fifties. He was a fine-looking Indian, tall, straight, and stately, but had an overweening love for fire-water, — his only vice. He died well advanced in age, but I think never had any children.³⁵ It is seldom you see a childless lodge among the Winnebagoes; large families are the rule. I remember that in 1883, Green Grass, a son of the famous Kayrahmaunee, came to the payment at Black River Falls and wanted to draw for fifteen children, but he was unable to either count or name them all; so Major Halleck, the agent, told him to bring his family in and stand them in a row, so that we could count them for ourselves and ask each one his name. Green Grass soon returned with his brood, and stood them in a double row across the room. There was the full number certified, and the incident occasioned much hilarity among both Indians and officials.

The oldest Wisconsin Winnebago now living (1887) is Little Decorah, who has a place near Millston, Jackson county.³⁶ He is the oldest son of the late Grey-headed Decorah. I suppose that Little Decorah must be about one hundred years of age. 1 remember that he seemed to me an old man as far back as 1836. He is now a childish, helpless (430) wreck. Spoon Decorah, of Adams county, a cousin of this man, is the oldest of the tribe in this state, whose faculties are well preserved;³⁷ although Four Deer, also of Adams county, is accounted to be nearly as old. Each of them claims to be upwards of ninety years, but they are probably much younger than that. Black Hawk, who has a homestead four miles northeast of Black River Falls, in the town of Albion, Jackson county, claims to be seventy, probably an exaggeration of ten years. He is a large, imposing fellow, of good habits, and a good reputation among the whites. He has two wives, and although he has lost several children he still has nearly a dozen left. This Black Hawk is a distant relative of a Winnebago warrior named Black Hawk, who claimed to have discovered the celebrated Sac chief of the same name, when the latter was a fugitive after the battle of Bad Axe, in August, 1832. It is related by the descendants of the Winnebago Black Hawk of that day, that One-eyed Decorah (Big Canoe) had a village at the mouth of the Black river, and every day various hunting parties would go out into the neighborhood after game.³⁸ The Winnebago Black Hawk was out one day, when he came across the Sac fugitive, and immediately returned to camp and notified his companions. There was a council as to who should go and take the Sac, the Indian agent at Prairie du Chien having given general instructions to all Winnebagoes to bring in the runaway. Winnebago Black Hawk declined to go himself, as he claimed to entertain a superstitious notion that he was not "called" by the Great Spirit to do that kind of work. (431) So One-eyed Decorah took the task upon himself, went and found the Sac leader, and took him into Prairie du Chien.³⁹ I knew One-eyed Decorah, when I was a boy at school, on Turkey river. He was an old man then; quite stout and hale, with heavy features, and hair somewhat sprinkled with gray.

Young Winneshiek is now living on the Black river, seven miles above Black River Falls. He is about sixty years old, and a good Indian; he is the head man in Jackson county, being a descendant of the famous Winneshiek. He has but one wife and no children. He returned from the reservation to his native state in 1872 or 1873, and is now doing fairly well on his little purchased farm of forty acres, his homestead being some four or five miles away. Cultivating his land with reasonable display of energy, he is regarded by the whites as a progressive Indian, and has a good reputation among them.⁴⁰

White Pawnee (Pania Blanc), a son of the one-eyed chief White Crow,⁴¹ accompanied my father as guide during the Black Hawk war. He died in 1837, in a drunken fracas with a white man named Abraham Wood. The affair took place in a whiskey shop near where the Carpenter house was afterwards located, — the neighborhood of the Wisconsin-river end of the old transportation route at the Portage. The Pawnee was buried in a large conical mound some five or six feet high, at what is now the city end of the Wisconsin-river bridge — just across the river from where our house was afterwards located. These ancient earthworks were frequently selected as burial places by the Indians, because of their prominence in the landscape. I never heard the Winnebagoes talk about the origin of these mounds. I presume that they have always taken them to be of natural formation. Their name for them is "hchi-a-shoke," which simply means, "a small rising of ground." This particular mound (432) has lately been graded down, in street improvements, but whether the Pawnee's bones were found in it or not I do not know.

Little Hill used to camp on the knoll at the country end of the Wisconsin-river bridge at Portage, — about where our house was subsequently built. In a fire-water row there, in 1837 or 1838, he murdered another Indian, whereupon he fled to the west of the Mississippi to escape vengeance. I afterward frequently met him at the Yellow river agency. He was a short, thick-set man. He afterwards became a very good Indian, and old Mr. Lowrey made a chief of him as a reward of merit.⁴² Little Hill died a good many years ago.

I want to close my narrative with an account of the condition of the grave of my father, Pierre Paquette.⁴³ His remains were originally buried under the Catholic chapel which had been built by him on what is now known as Conant street, near the northeast corner of Adams. The land then belonged to the government, but afterwards a strip of territory was granted to Lecuyer, across the marsh, along the transportation route, and it included this place. Webb & Bronson⁴⁴ succeeded to the possession of the Lecuyer claim. The little chapel was afterward burned down, and a wooden railing was placed around the grave, to mark the spot. A wooden cross, unpainted and uninscribed, was the only monument. In 1857⁴⁵ the remains were removed and placed under the rear doorway of the new church, built on the old site; but there was nothing ever put up to mark the grave, nothing to show to the world that under the door-sill my father lay.

In 1859 or 1860⁴⁶ the church authorities purchased the old Baptist church lot, in another part of the city, and (433) abandoned their building on the northeast corner of Adams and Conant streets. They sold the old church lot, but the remains of Pierre Paquette are still where they were. The old building has been removed, and no one can tell exactly where the grave is, except that it is in a dingy alleyway, over which teams travel daily. Two years ago, the church people made a meagre attempt to find the bones, but the workmen never went low enough or far enough, and the search has not been pushed.

I submit that this treatment of Pierre Paquette's bones by the successors of those for whom he erected the first mission chapel at the Portage is ungenerous.⁴⁷

Notes to the Text

¹ March 25, 1887, I started from Madison with Moses Paquette, government interpreter for the Wisconsin Winnebagoes, to visit Spoon Decorah and other head men of the tribe in Adams county. Our expedition closed at Portage, March 30. What information I was able to obtain from Paquette, in conversations during our trip, I have formulated into a continuous narrative, following his manner of expression as closely as practicable. The prepared MS. I carefully read over to him on the eighteenth of May following at Black River Falls, and made such changes as he suggested. As it is now printed, it received his approval. I found Paquette an earnest, truthful man, and bearing an excellent reputation as such in his community and among the Winnebagoes. To the latter, he is a counselor and friend, arbitrating their little disputes as far as possible, offering them advice, and acting as their spokesman on many occasions; all of which he does out of pure good nature and at much sacrifice of time and convenience, for the government merely grants him a per diem for attendance on the payment of annuities. He is a familiar figure on the streets of Black River Falls, every Saturday, when he may be seen throughout the day surrounded by groups of Indians who look up to him as an oracle, — and the son of an oracle, for his father, Pierre Paquette, was long a power among the Winnebagoes. His influence among these simple people seems always for the best. — Eᴅ.
² See diagram of Ft. Winnebago in 1835, Hist. Columbia Co. (West. Hist. Co., 1881), p. 342, and frontispiece. — Eᴅ.
³ In 1837. Hist. Columbia Co., p. 588. — Eᴅ.
⁴ Wis. Hist. Coll., vii, p. 371. — Eᴅ.
⁵ Probably Theodore Lupin, mentioned as an early settler at Prairie du Chien "before the year 1820." Hist. Crawford Co. (West. Hist. Co., 1881), p. 281. — Eᴅ.
⁶ January 27, 1866. See Wis. Hist. Coll., ix., p. 293, where it is computed that Crelie was about ninety-four years of age at the time of his death. He contended that he was one hundred and thirty, but it is abundantly shown in various volumes of Wis. Hist. Coll., that such was not the case. — Eᴅ.
⁷ Hist. Columbia Co., pp. 355, 588. Wis. Hist. Coll.. vi., p. 406, note. — Eᴅ.
⁸ Wis. Hist. Coll., vii., p. 350. — Eᴅ.
⁹ Wis. Hist. Coll., v., p. 264. — Eᴅ.
¹⁰ For contemporary statements of the affair, see Hist. Columbia Co., pp. 499-508. — Eᴅ.
¹¹ A brother of Joseph Rolette, of Prairie du Chien. — Eᴅ.
¹² Wis. Hist. Coll., vii., p. 371. — Eᴅ.
¹³ See Hist. Crawford Co., p. 300, for sketch of his career. — Eᴅ.
¹⁴ Morgan L. Martin, of Green Bay, wrote me, under date of October 14, 1887: "1 knew Joseph Paquette well. When I came here first [1827] he was occupying a small farm of Judge Lawe, under lease, and was then lately married to a Miss Lecuyer. He was an uneducated Frenchman, but quite thrifty and enterprising, and soon acquired a competence by his own unaided labor; and when he died, left a comfortable estate for his children. Pierre Paquette, who was killed at Portage, was a relative (perhaps a cousin) of Joseph, and his estate was administered by him and H. L. Dousman, who represented the creditors of deceased." — Eᴅ.
¹⁵ General Dousman became, in 1834, in company with Joseph Rolette, Sr., one of the co-partners of the American Fur Company, with especial charge of the Prairie du Chien agency, which embraced the country north and west of that village, to the British boundary, except the headwaters of the Mississippi and St. Croix, See Hist. Crawford Co., p. 300. — Eᴅ.
¹⁶ Article 10 of the treaty concluded September 15, 1832, between the United States and the Winnebagoes, at Rock Island, says: "At the special request of the Winnebago nation, the United States agree to grant, by patent, in fee simple, to the following named persons, all of whom are Winnebagoes by blood, lands as follows: To Pierre Paquette, three sections; to Pierre Paquette, Junior, one section; to Therese Paquette one section; and to Caroline Haney, one section. The lands to be designated under the direction of the president of the United States, within the country herein ceded by the Winnebago nation." — Ed.
¹⁷ Article 5 of the treaty concluded August 1, 1829, between the United States and the Winnebagoes, at Prairie du Chien, grants to Pierre Pacquette two sections; and to his two children, Therese and Moses, each one section," of "land located without the mineral country, under the direction of the president." — Eᴅ.
¹⁸ Wis. Hist. Coll., viii., p. 320. See also, De la Ronde's narrative, Wis. Hist. Coll., vii., pp. 345 et seq. — Eᴅ.
¹⁹ David Lowrey, D. D., Cumberland Presbyterian preacher, was born in Logan county, Kentucky, January 20, 1796. He was licensed and ordained to the care of Logan presbytery. December 16, 1830, he began the publication, at Princeton, Kentucky, under church auspices, of a weekly journal called The Religious and Literary Intelligencer. Some years afterward, he was editor of The Cumberland Presbyterian, published at Nashville, Tennessee. During this latter experience, he was also pastor of the Cumberland Presbyterian church, in Nashville; "and for his year's pastoral labor he received, as compensation, the astonishing sum of one wagon load of corn in the shuck." In 1832, he was appointed by his friend, President Jackson, as teacher to the Winnebagoes, arriving at Prairie du Chien in November of that year. By the treaty of Rock Island, September 15, 1832, the government had agreed (Article 4) to "erect a suitable building, or buildings, with a garden and a field attached, somewhere near Fort Crawford, or Prairie du Chien, and establish and maintain therein, for the term of 27 years, a school for the education, including clothing, board, and lodging, of such Winnebago children as may be voluntarily sent to it. The school to be conducted by two or more teachers, male and female, and the said children to be taught reading, writing, arithmetic, gardening, agriculture, carding, spinning, weaving, and sewing, according to their ages and sexes, and such other branches of useful knowledge as the President of the U. S. may prescribe." The school was to cost not to exceed $3,000 per annum. The commandant at Fort Crawford was to frequently visit and inspect the institution, — so also were the Indian agents of the district, and the governor of Illinois. It was to tho charge of this enterprise, which was located on Yellow river, in what is now Fairview township, Allamakee county. Iowa, — the first permanent white settlement in that county, — that Dr. Lowrey was ordered with Colonel Thomas as farmer. The mission building was erected in 1834 and opened in 1835. Dr. Lowrey, however, had previously conducted his educational labors among the Winnebagoes at Prairie du Chien. In 1840, the mission, still in his charge, was removed to Turkey river, also in Iowa. Dr. Lowrey appears to have been an able and energetic man, but his attempts to convert and educate the Indian children were not very successful, as the narrator points out. In 1848, the tribe were removed to Minnesota, their instructor remaining with them until they were removed to Crook creek, Dakota, in 1863. Lowrey died in Pierre county, Missouri January, 1877, leaving an aged wife, and two sons. — Eᴅ.
²⁰ Opened in 1836, under the patronage of Pierre Menard, a prominent Illinois pioneer fur-trader. — Eᴅ.
²¹ The treaty of October 13, 1846, concluded at Washington, sought to remove the Winnebagoes from the "neutral ground" in Iowa, to a point more remote from the centres of civilization. The movement also sought to include the Wisconsin Winnebagoes, who had not yet removed to Iowa. The Long Prairie location was selected by Henry M. Rice, who obtained it from the Ojibways. June 6, 1848, was the time that the Winnebagoes had agreed to start; but the Indians grew obstinate, wished to remain at the Winona prairie, and threatened trouble. It required shrewd management and some bravery on the part of Mr. Rice and Agent J. E. Fletcher, before the Indians could be induced peaceably to move. The sum of $20,000 was allowed by government to cover the cost of removal. For details, see Neill's History of Minnesota (4th edition, 1882), pp. 483-487.
     A letter to me from Mr. Rice, dated St. Paul, October 14, 1887, says: "The Winnebago agency and a part of the Indians were removed to Long Prairie in 1848, under the treaty of 1846. Subsequently, straggling bands or parts of bands were removed in 1850. Long Prairie was a good country and had they been properly cared for they would have remained; but for personal motives they were induced to exchange it for a country south of the Minnesota river, which it was well known they would not be permitted to retain, — and the Sioux outbreak (some of their young men having been accused of joining the hostiles) made their removal imperative. Wisconsin was always the region they desired, and it is doubtful if the generation of that day would have ever been content elsewhere."
     See also Wis. Hist. Coll., v., pp. 279-282. For account of removal of Winnebagoes from Jefferson county, see Id., xi., pp. 430, 431. — Eᴅ.
²² The treaty of February 27, 1855, proclaimed March 23, gave them a tract eighteen miles square, on the Blue Earth river. — Eᴅ.
²³ Because of their general distrust of all Indians, engendered by the Sioux massacre of 1862, the people of Minnesota secured the passage by congress of an act approved February 21, 1863, removing the Sioux and Winnebagoes to Usher's landing, on the Missouri river, in Dakota, where the latter were placed under Superintendent Thompson. For an account of the very great hardships suffered by these people because of this hasty removal, see Senate Report No. 156, "Condition of Indian Tribes," 39th Cong., 2d Sess., p. 363. The report says: "No government can permit such injuries [as the Winnebagoes have received] to go unredressed without incurring the penalty of treaties broken and justice violated." See also, A Century of Dishonor, by H. H. Jackson, pp. 229, 393; Mrs. Hunt gives a generally faithful account of Winnebago removals. A good statement is also in Senate Docs., 41st Cong., 1st Sess., Miscel. Doc. No. 136, p. 5. — Eᴅ.
²⁴ Treaty of March 8, 1865; ratification advised, with amendment, February 13, 1866; amendment accepted, February 20; proclaimed, March 28. This treaty gave them a tract of a hundred and twenty-eight thousand acres in the Omaha reservation, purchased from the Omahas for that purpose. They moved upon this tract in May, 1866. — Eᴅ.
²⁵ See Brisbois' narrative, Wis. Hist. Coll., ix., pp. 282 et seq. — Ed.
²⁶ In a memorial to congress, March 15, 1870, the Wisconsin legislature represented that "the interests of the residents of the northern and northwestern portions of this state, as well as the interests of the stray bands of Indians therein, imperatively demand that the said stray bands of Indians be removed and located upon a reservation at or near the headwaters of the Eau Plaine river, in the northern portion of the said state." Act of congress, July 15, 1870, appropriated fifteen thousand or fifteen dollars per head for "the removal of stray bands of Pottawatomies and Winnebagoes in Wisconsin to the tribes to which they respectively belong." But as, for various reasons, the act was not carried into effect, a supplementary act of May 29, 1872, appropriated thirty-six thousand dollars for the removal of the Winnebagoes alone. The removal finally took place during the winter of 1873-74. See Reports of Com. Ind. Affs. for 1870 [228, 240-241, 323], 1872-74 [1872: 213, 219*; 1873:185, 191; 1874: 37-38, 200, 211]. One-half of the number removed, returned. The Wisconsin "strays" were of inferior quality to the reservation Indians, and were not welcomed by the latter, who were glad to get rid of them. — Eᴅ.
²⁷ Instructions for military assistance to Charles A. Hunt, who represented the bureau of Indian affairs, were issued by the general of the army (Report Secy. of War, 1874, p. 88). Company C, 20th infantry, and a detail from Company H, were ordered December 12, 1873, under command of Lieutenant Joseph S. Stafford, to proceed from Fort Snelling to Sparta. They arrived there by train, December 17, and were quartered in the skating-park building. From Sparta, detachments were sent out to Portage and Leroy, when needed, and to places in Iowa. Friday, December 18, Stafford, with twenty men, accompanied Agent Hunt, and captured eighty-six Winnebagoes, including Big Hawk, "on the Baraboo river, near the Crawford bridge." — (Portage Register, December 27, 1873.) They were lodged in Sparta over Sunday, and at 11 A. M. of Monday, December 22, left by train for Nebraska, in charge of Sheriff David Bon and six citizens. On the 23d of December, seventy-three Indians were captured near Leroy station; two days later, fifty-six in Trempealeau county; and on the 27th, Mr. Cash, of New Lisbon, headed a party of soldiers who captured thirty eight near Reedsburg. — See Sparta Herald during December, 1873.
     H. W. Lee, of Stevens Point, interested himself in seeking to obtain writs of habeas corpus for the imprisoned Indians, but in vain. See his letter copied from Chicago Times, in Sparta Herald, December 30, 1873, The United States attorney-general gave it as his opinion, June 17, 1873, that "no authority is given in any of the acts of congress, providing funds for the removal of said Indians, to employ force against the will of said Indians." On the 19th of January, 1874, the object for which the troops were detailed having been accomplished, they were ordered by Brigadier General A. H. Terry, division commander, to return to Fort Snelling. — Eᴅ.
²⁸ Section 15, act of congress approved March 3, 1875, provided that any Indian who was head of a family and twenty-one years old, and had abandoned tribal relations, should be entitled to the benefits of the homestead act of May 20, 1862. Such Indian homestead is declared not subject to encumbrance or alienation, and any such Indian homesteader is entitled to his share of tribal annuities, funds, lands, and other property, the same as though he had maintained tribal relations. Under this act, a great many Wisconsin Winnebagoes took up claims of forty acres each. Act of congress approved January 18, 1881, directed the secretary of the interior to have separate censuses taken of the Winnebagoes in Wisconsin and Nebraska, and adjust the accounts between the two bands. Under the act of June 25, 1861, a fund amounting to $90,089.93 had accumulated in the United States treasury to the credit of the Wisconsin band; besides much that was due them out of sums already paid to the Nebraska band. The act of 1881 sought to secure the pro rata payment of interest on the fund due the former, but only to those heads who had taken up homesteads or who should promise to spend the money in at once taking up and improving land. — Eᴅ.
²⁹ Act approved March 3, 1883, appropriated $2,500 to complete the census. — Eᴅ.
³⁰ Big Hawk called on me in 1890, and he and his son Jasper were photographed for the Society's collection of portraits of typical Wisconsin Indians. Paquette's description of the old man is just. He proved a courteous and intelligent visitor, and has no appearance of having been physically or morally injured by contact with the whites. Jasper, a young man of some twenty-four years, told me with much pride that he was sending his children to a district school, and believed thoroughly in white men's civilization. — Eᴅ.
³¹ Schoolcraft's History of the Indian Tribes of the United States (1851-57), iii., p. 286. — Eᴅ.
³² Ibid., p. 497. — Eᴅ.
³³ Ibid., p. 286. — Eᴅ.
³⁴ Id., ii., p. 48 [?]. — Eᴅ.
³⁵ An oil portrait of Yellow Thunder may be seen in the portrait gallery of the Society. References to most of these chiefs mentioned by the narrator may be found in the earlier volumes of Wis. Hist. Coll. But in tracing the careers of Indian chiefs, much discrimination must be exercised on account of the conflict of names. Often a half-dozen Indians of the same family bore nearly identical names among the whites, who did not care to discriminate; while the official interpreters were generally careless in this matter. The Indians, in a spirit of courtesy, would ofttimes adopt the fanciful names given to them by their white neighbors. In interviewing old Winnebagoes, I have, more than once, been wholly unable to make known to my would be informants what particular chief I meant to inquire after, — their name for him, and that set down in the records, being wholly at variance.  — Eᴅ.
³⁶ Little Decorah died near Tomah, at Blue Wing's settlement, a few days after the above interview, about April 1, 1887. — Eᴅ.
³⁷ Spoon Decorah died October 13, 1887, near Necedah, at the probable age of eighty-four. I interviewed him the March preceding, in company with Moses Paquette, and the venerable savage paid him a return call in Madison during the intervening summer, in company with Four Deer, Doctor Decorah, and a half breed interpreter from Portage. Spoon was a fine specimen of his race, physically and mentally. Four Deer is the orator of his tribe, and has a somewhat stately appearance. Doctor Decorah is the head medicine man, has a comical physiognomy, and is much of a wit. — Eᴅ.
³⁸ Some say that this village was on the La Crosse river, near where [West] Salem now is (ca. 3.907954, -91.097828). — PAQUETTE.
³⁹ See ante, p. 261, note. — Eᴅ.
⁴⁰ Young Winneschick died about May 20, 1887. — Eᴅ.
⁴¹ See ante, p. 245, note. — Eᴅ.
⁴² Shogonikkaw (Little Hill) furnished Agent Jonathan E. Fletcher with some Winnebago myths, to be found in Schoolcraft, iv., p. 228; see also Wis. Hist. Coll., v., p. 309. — Eᴅ.
⁴³ Wis. Hist. Coll., viii., p. 319; Hist. Columbia Co., p. 620 [?].— Eᴅ.
⁴⁴ Hist. Columbia Co., p. 591. — Eᴅ.
⁴⁵ Ibid. says 1852. — Ed.
⁴⁶ October 29, 1859. — Eᴅ.
⁴⁷ In March, 1887, I visited the site of Pierre Paquette's grave, in company with the narrator. An old settler, who was present, agreed with the narrator as to the general location, both estimating that they could fix the locality within a radius of a dozen feet. In regard to the merit of the narrators protest, I know nothing. — Eᴅ.

Commentary.

"Pierre Paquette" — his name is variously rendered as "Pauquette, Poquette, Boquette." Satterlee Clark in his memoir of this period, has an interesting account of Pierre Pauquette (1796-1836):

(2) I now come to that part of my recollections in which the people of Portage and the Fort Winnebago region, feel the greatest interest, and have the most curiosity. I allude to my acquaintance with Peter Pauquette. His strength was so immeasurable, and his exploits so astonishing, that while relating what I have seen I shall tell only the exact truth, I will promise not to be offended if some of my readers should be a little skeptical. Peter Pauquette was born in the year 1800 of a French father and a Winnebago mother; the latter was buried nearly in front of the old agency house opposite the fort. He was thirty years old when I first knew him, and was the very best specimen of a man I ever saw. He was six feet two inches in height, and weighed two hundred and forty pounds — hardly ever varying a single pound. He was a very handsome man, hospitable, generous and kind, and I think I never saw a better natured man. I had heard much of his strength before I left Green Bay, and of course, was anxious to see him perform some of the wonderful feats of strength of which I had heard. From my first acquaintance with him to the day of his death, I was his most intimate friend, and consequently had a better opportunity to know him than any other person. I will now endeavor to give an idea of his strength and activity, which to me seemed almost superhuman. He often told me that all persons seemed alike to him. When I was nineteen or twenty years old, my business kept me constantly in training, and though I weighed less than one hundred and fifty pounds, my muscles were like iron; notwithstanding he often said it was no more trouble to take me across his lap than a child one year old, and so it seemed to me. I was told that on one occasion when he was making the portage with a heavy boat, one of his oxen gave out, and he took the yoke off, and carried the end against an ox all the way over. I did not see this, but I asked him if it was so, and he replied it was. I once saw him take hold of the staple to a pile driver weighing 2,650 lbs., and lift it apparently without any exertion, and swing it back and forth a minute of time. I have several times seen him get under a common sized horse, put his arms round the hind legs, his back under the horse's stomach and lift the horse clean off the ground. A great many other things I have seen him do which would tire the reader's patience were I to relate them. It can readily be imagined, however, that scarcely anything could be impossible to such a man. He was employed by the American Fur Company up to the day of his death. For the last four years of his life he had a bookkeeper, but previous to that time (not being able to read or write), he gave credit to hundreds of Indians, relying entirely on his memory, and their honesty. ...

(3) [On the 18ᵀᴴ day of October, 1836,] Pauquette came to my store to rejoice over our victory [in frustrating Gov. Cass in buying the lands of the Winnebago]. On this occasion he drank too much wine, and became just enough intoxicated to be impatient of contradiction. In this condition he started home on foot, and when within about one quarter of a mile of the ferry, opposite his house, he found an Indian and his wife sitting by a little fire in the bushes. The Indian was Mahzahmahneekah [Mą́zamąnį́ga], or Iron Walker, who was also drunk. What there occurred, is only known as related by the squaw that night. She said Pauquette kicked the fire apart, the Indian arose up and said something that offended Pauquette, who slapped the Indian's face, knocking him down. The Indian (319) got up, saying, "You knocked me down; but I got up. I will knock you down, and you will never get up. I will go for my gun." Pauquette only laughed, and sat down. The Indian returned, when Pauquette stood up, pulled open his coat, placed his hand on his breast and said, "Strike and see a brave man dies." The Indian fired, killing him instantly, the ball severing one of the main arteries leading from the heart. No man in Wisconsin could have died who was so much regretted. His death can safely be attributed to intoxication, though it was the first time I ever knew or heard of his being in that condition.¹

For other references to Pauquette, see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

Portage, Wisconsin

"Portage" — now the city of Portage, Wisconsin (43.547565, -89.464067). To the Hocągara it was Wawá’ą, essentially of the same meaning. (Kinzie, Jipson, Miner) With respect to Europeans, the place was first used as a portage by the explorers Marquette and Joliet on June 14, 1673. To the French, it became known simply as le portage. A trading post was set up in 1792, after which a thriving business was conducted porting boats of any size over the mud flats using teams of oxen. In 1824, the American Fur Company hired the Hocąk translator, Pierre Pauquette, who was fluent in Hocąk, French, and English, to run its operations there. On the Fox River side of the portage, the government built Fort Winnebago in 1828.²

The American Fur Co. in Fond du Lac by J. O. Lewis

"American Fur Company" — the story of this company is essentially that of its founder, John Jacob Astor, who at one time was the richest man in the world. He was born in Germany, and joined his brother in London to pursue their musical instrument business there, but set out in 1784 to seek his fortune in the newly independent United States. There he set up fur trading enterprises, operating out of Montreal and New York. By 1808, when his new American Fur Co. was chartered in New York City, he had already achieve considerable wealth. He had great difficulty competing against the British Companies operating out of Canada, but with the favorable peace terms that ended the War of 1812, his competitors were excluded by law from the newly opened frontier areas in the American west. He built America's first monopoly, and had the good sense to bail out of the company at a time, in the later 30's and early 40's, when Europe's passions for fur gave way to a new love for oriental silk. By the 1850's, the company had become extinct, but due to astute real estate investments, Aster himself became richer than he had ever been.³

"Carpenter house" — the house of Henry Carpenter (1814-1894), the first white settler in Portage. In his own words, "I landed in July 1837, — my wife and I and a Mr. and Mrs. Hart. Henry Merrel was a keeping a sutler's store when I came in a building close by the old Fort Winnebago. The first white woman who came to portage and permanently settled there was Sarah Carpenter, my wife; the first white child born at the portage was George Carpenter, my son. Silas Walsworth kept a small grocery on the Wisconsin river, near which, in what is now the First ward, I soon erected my United States hotel." The First Ward is shown in yellow on the 1890 plat map of Portage, its center being around 43.544149, -89.443031. The Pauquette St. that terminates at the edge of the river just east of the railroad and canal (shown on the 1890 map) may mark the site of the Carpenter house under the assumption that it was so named named in relation to the incident that took place there.⁴

A Mackinaw Boat

"Mackinaw boats" — a modification of the canoe design, introduced ca. 1700, to accommodate a mast and sail.

Joseph Crelie

"Joseph Crelie" — Joseph Crelie was the father-in-law of Pierre Paquette. He had been a voyageur and small fur-trader at Prairie du Chien as early as 1791, and in the early coming of the whites (about 1836) obtained much notoriety from claiming to be of phenomenal age. He died at Caledonia, Wis., in 1865, at a time when he asserted himself to be one hundred and thirty years old; but a careful inquiry has resulted in establishing his years at one hundred.⁵ 

Prairie du Chien in 1830 by Henry Lewis

"Prairie du Chien" — its French name means, "Prairie of the Dog," and denotes a plain about 9 miles north of the confluence of the Wisconsin and Mississippi Rivers. On an elevation near the Turkey River, the Fox tribe had a large village at the base of which the Dog Band resided. It is from this Dog Band that the whole prairie took its name. The site of the present town was "the principal trading post on the Mississippi; the depot of the fur traders; the ancient meeting-place of the Indians tribes."⁶ The area was gradually settled by French farmers, and once it fell under the sovereignty of the British Crown, many new British settlers as well. During the War of 1812,

The peculiar position which Prairie du Chien occupied in the Indian country at once pointed it out as a most important place — of the value of which both the hostile Powers were fully cognizant — from the fact that whichever army took possession of it could command that immense territory inhabited by the warlike tribes of the West ... which lay along the west frontier of the United States ...⁷  

The expedition of Zebulon Pike passed through the area and he noted the strategic character of this site and recommended to the War Department that they build a fort there, which was done in 1816 with the erection of Ft. Crawford. It was the frequent site of Indian gatherings for treaties with the United States government, and by 1823, Prairie du Chien was a major steamboat port, although in just a couple of decades, it was eclipsed by Minneapolis.⁸

"Lupient" — this was Theordore Lupient, sr. (17 Mar 1781 - ca. 1818). He was born in Louiseville, Maskinonge, Quebec, but at the turn of the century, moved to Prairie du Chien. His first wife was Angelique Ghiar, whose mother was Ma-koch-i-koue, tribe unknown. He married his second wife, Theresa Josephine Crely (b. 1798), on May 16, 1817. It appears that Theodore senior died the same year in which his son Theordore jr. was born. Theresa then married Pierre Paquette.⁹

"Caledonia" — a township centered on 43.485653, -89.525327.

"the knoll" — located at 43.535614, -89.474917. See the Barden place on the 1881 map of Portage, Section 7.

The Indian Agency House at Ft. Winnebago		Ft. Winnebago by Juliette Kinzie

"Fort Winnebago" — a fort built in 1828 in response to the Winnebago War of the previous year. It was situated at the Portage in order to control traffic that passed from the Lakes to the Mississippi River. The only military activity in which the fort was involved was the Black Hawk War of 1832. Given the pacification of the region after that war, the fort was decommissioned in 1845. Still extant is the Indian Agency House built as a residence for John and Juliette Kinzie in 1832. The painting of Ft. Winnebago, done in 1831, is by talented Juliette Kinzie herself.

Captain Gideon Lowe

"Captain Gideon Lowe" — a Captain in the 5th Infantry Regiment whose Company D garrisoned Ft. Winnebago beginning in 1838.¹⁰ "Capt. Gideon Lowe left the army in 1839, and settled on the Portage, where he kept a public house a number of years."¹¹

"Capt. Hooe" — an older history gives a short summary of his life: "Alexander Seymour Hooe, of Virginia, was a cadet from 1823 to 1827, when he entered the army as a Brevet Second Lieutenant. He became First Lieutenant in 1833;¹² a Captain in 1838; Brevet Major, for gallant and distinguished conduct in the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma, May 9, 1846; lost an arm in August following; died at Baton Rouge, La., December 9, 1847."¹³

"Joseph Rolette" — Jean Joseph Rolette (1781-1842) was born in Quebec and entered a Jesuit seminary to train as a priest of that order, but at some point, around the turn of the century, he abandoned his initial ambition to establish a trading post in Prairie du Chien. When the War of 1812 broke out he accepted a commission in the British Army in command of militia. After the war, he entered into an ill-fated marriage with Jane Fisher (see below), and eventually rose to become an associate justice in Crawford County. In 1830 was made chief justice. During this period his trading business prospered, but with the arrival of Hercules L. Dousman as the sole agent for the American Fur Company, Rolette's fortunes began to wane. In 1836, he and his wife Jane Fisher separated and as part of their divorce agreement, he constructed what is now known as the "Brisbois House." In the Panic of 1837, Rolette lost most of his wealth. Nevertheless, he gain a stake in the ownership of a new company with Dousman as one of his partners. Rolette died in 1842 in debt, and most of his property was claimed by his partners. His son Joe Rolette rose to great prominence in territorial Minnesota, and was instrumental in securing its statehood.¹⁴

"Mauzemoneka" — for Mą́zamąnį́ga, from mąza, "iron"; mąnį, "to walk"; and -ga, a personal name suffix. Mą́zamąnį́ga was the son of Whirling Thunder, and succeeded Old Fox as chief of Elk Village at what is now Horicon. Iron Walker is chiefly known for having killed Pierre Pauquette, a prominent government translator and businessman in Portage. There exist many accounts of this incident, mostly sheer fiction, but John T. de la Ronde recorded the actual facts of the matter. On Oct. 17, 1836, the government conducted a council with the Hocągara to explore their selling a vacating their lands east of the Mississippi. On this occasion, Pierre Pauquette demanded that as part of any settlement, that $21,000 be paid by the Hocągara on the debt that he contended that they owed him. Iron Walker objected that he, as a chief of a Rock River band, owed Pauquette nothing, and that taking from his share of the payment to pay him off was unfair. This point of contention brought the meeting to a close with no result. Pauquette was a "muscle man" and something of a thug. While drinking in a saloon on the site of what would become the Carpenter house, Pauquette beat up Iron Walker no less than twice in a single night. Iron Walking retired to a cabin in the northern part of the town. The next day, after beating up several other prominent Indians at Paul Grignon's house, he headed for Iron Walker's cabin. Rascal Decorah, who fled the place, informed Iron Walker that Pauquette was headed his way to beat him up again. Iron Walker stepped outside with a gun. Pauquette, upon reaching the place, put his hand over his heart and said, "Shoot if you're brave!" whereupon, Iron Walker shot him through the heart. Iron Walker was taken into custody by White French, the chief who succeeded Old Decorah. After two trials, Iron Walker was finally acquitted of murder on the grounds of self-defense.¹⁵

R. A. Lewis

Whirling Thunder

"Whirling Thunder" — this portrait of Whirling Thunder was made by R. A. Lewis in 1865. His name in Hocąk, Wakąjagiwįxga, actually means "Whirling Thunderbird," and is a clan name in the Thunderbird Clan. He was chief of one of the largest villages, Turtle Village, where Beloit now stands. At one time he had a village on Lake Koshkonong.¹⁶ Jipson says of him,

Under date of December 22, 1832, Henry Gratiot, sub-Indian agent writing to Governor Cass, designated Whirling Thunder as head chief of Turtle Village. Whirling Thunder was said to be a man of great reputation for sagacity and wisdom in council.¹⁷ At the close of the Black Hawk War, Whirling Thunder, with a large band of his Rock River followers, went to Iowa county, Wisconsin. A letter from Henry Dodge, Indian Agent, to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, stated he was there with a relative, John Dougherty, a white trader, formerly of "Old Sugar River Digging," who had married a near relative of Whirling Thunder. Whirling Thunder lived to an advanced age and died in Nebraska.¹⁸

He died in 1850, but his wife lived to be one-hundred years old, dying ca. 1889. They had a son Mą́zamąnį́ga, "Iron Walker," whose chief claim to fame was that he killed the government translator Pierre Pauquette.¹⁹

Hercules L. Dousman		Jane Fisher

"H. L. Dousman" — Hercules Dousman (1800-1868) was born in Mackinac, Michigan, to a prosperous fur trader. He was educated in New Jersey, did some work as a clerk in New York City, then 1826 moved west to work for Joseph Rolette in his fur trading business. He eventually bought a share of the western branch of the American Fur Company in partnership with Shibley and Rolette, but in 1842, the company went out of business. A new partnership lasted but two years as Rolette died in debt in1842, and Dousman collected much of Rolette's estate, then married his widow, Jane Fisher. Dousman had made good investments in Wisconsin lumber mills and future urban real estate. As the fur trade business declined, Dousman shifted to investments in transportation including the Madison & Prairie du Chien Railroad. These astute business moves made him Wisconsin's first millionaire.²⁰

"Taycheedah" — located at 43.809483, -88.393928. Built on the site of a Hocąk village called Te Cira, "Lake Lodges."

"Walsworth" — Henry Carpenter mentions him as one of the earliest settlers of Portage: "Silas Walsworth kept a small grocery on the Wisconsin river, near which, in what is now the First ward, I soon erected my United States hotel."²¹ The First Ward is shown in yellow on the 1890 plat map of Portage, its center being around 43.544149, -89.443031.

"removed" — sections 27 and 28, town 12, range 8 east, can be found on the 1890 plat map. The area includes the fork of Rowley Creek, located at 43.476085, -89.580776. The 1873 plat map for Caledonia shows 80 acres of M. Paukette whose house was at 43.476387, -89.582435.

"John de la Ronde" — "was one of the noted characters in the early annals of Columbia county and of Wisconsin. He was a son of Louis Denys, Chevalier De La Ronde, a native of Detroit, a grandson of Francis Paul De La Ronde, a French officer in Canada, and a great-grandson of Louis Denys De La Ronde, an early commandant at Chegoimegon, on Lake Superior. John T. De La Ronde was born at Bordeaux, France, February 25, 1802, received a superior education in the College of Montreal, Canada, and read medicine for a time, but soon became a clerk in the employ of the Northwest Company and later was with the Hudson Bay Company when the two were merged. In 1828 he came to enjoy the hunting at 'The Portage' in Wisconsin, now the city of Portage, arriving here in May of that year. There were, at that time here, a trading post of the American Fur Company, in which resided Peter Pauquette and his family, and a few other whites. Mr. De La Ronde was here but a short period at this time, returning to Canada late in the season. In 1832 he became a clerk for the American Fur Company and during the spring of that year returned to 'The Portage.' While here he took part in the expedition against the Indians which culminated in the battle at Rock river. For a number of years he engaged in visiting various localities contiguous to 'The Portage,' buying fur, settling disputes and acting as interpreter. In 1834 he established a trading post at the head of the Lemonweir, and in 1837 accompanied a select band of Indians as interpreter to go to Washington to arrange with the Government for the remainder of their lands lying east of the Mississippi river. About this time he had a trading post at To-kau-nee's village, where Mauston now stands, but, much of the game having vanished with the coming of the whites, Mr. De La Ronde opened a farm in what is now the town of Caledonia in 1838, this being the third farm put under cultivation in the township. In 1840 he was one of the interpreters employed in the removal of the Indians, and four years later his services were required in the search for the recalcitrant Indian Chief Dandy. A volume could be written on the experiences and exploits of this pioneer in this locality, but the limits necessarily assigned to this review preclude the saying of more than that his life was one of ceaseless activity, crowded with ventures and adventures which required the highest order of physical courage and which often placed his life in jeopardy."²²

Negative #6 (O-772), Effigy Mounds NM

The Winnebago Yellow River Mission School and Farm

"the Presbyterian Indian mission" — Mahan relates the history of this school which was the brain child of Gen. Street, the Winnebago Indian Agent:

(207) When Street returned to Prairie du Chien late in 1834 he turned his attention to the task of starting the Winnebago school and farm. It was too late in the season for active operations on the new farm, but the school was begun as soon as the building, a good, plain, stone structure of permanent and useful character, was ready. In the meantime Reverend David Lowry, a Presbyterian minister, who had been appointed by President Jackson as a teacher for the Winnebago, had arrived at Prairie du Chien. Early in 1835, he opened the school, with his wife, Mary Ann Lowry, acting as his assistant. Street employed hands for the farm and set them to work on the experimental plot near the school. Through a friend in Illinois he procured four yoke of oxen and two horses ... At first few pupils came to the new school, but when Street inspected the institution on April 30, 1835, he found six pupils attending regularly, and Indians were visiting the place daily, showing a lively interest in both the school work and the adjoining farm. In May three new pupils enrolled. "Everything now", said Street, "bids fair for the entire success of these interesting experiments". ... (214) With the return of Street to Prairie du Chien in 1837, however, he exerted himself in coöperation with Reverend Lowry, the superintendent, to put the school in full operation. By December, 1837, the enrollment had increased to forty‑one pupils — fifteen boys and twenty‑six girls. Eleven of these boarded and lodged at the school while the remainder lived in the tepees of their parents to which they returned at the close of the school day taking with them rations of pork, salt, and meal which they added to the potatoes and corn of the family larder. The institution furnished clothing to all the pupils, supplying each boy and girl with new garments whenever they were needed. ... (216) The year 1839 marked the peak of attainment for the school on Yellow River. A report in December showed an enrollment of seventy-nine pupils — forty-three boys and thirty‑six girls. ... (217) A visit to the school in August, 1840, by J. H. Lockwood and B. W. Brisbois, prominent citizens of Prairie du Chien, caused them to exclaim in surprise that they had never seen a more orderly or ambitious school even of white children. They were astonished at the progress made by the children in the three years interval since their previous visit. But the days of the Indian school on Yellow River were numbered. On October 1, 1840, the teachers were notified that their services would be needed no longer. Sub‑agent Lowry had received orders to sell the buildings preparatory to reëstablishing the agency and school at a new location farther west in Iowa, somewhere on Turkey River in the Neutral Ground.²³ 

Willard Barrows

The Neutral Ground

"neutral ground" — the swath of land opposite Prairie du Chien in Iowa shown in the map above. As a result of the agreement reached at Prairie du Chien, August 19, 1825, the Sioux agreed to cede certain lands in Iowa to the Sauk and Fox, who agreed to move west of the Mississippi. To separate further these traditional enemies, it was agreed in 1830 that a 40 mile wide strip of land would separate the warring tribes and serve as a neutral zone between them. In 1837, the Hocągara were made to sign a treaty that removed them to this strip of land, an arrangement that left no one satisfied, since the Hocągara were traditional enemies to both their neighbors. They were not happy to move, and considered that the treaty had been negotiated with Hocąk leaders who were not authorized to engage in such talks. So suggestions that their new lands be carefully examined could hardly be greeted with approbation.

Rev. David Lowery

"Rev. David Lowrey" — Rev. David Lowery was born on January 20, 1796 in Kentucky. Within two years he was orphaned. He was taken in by a family that some have described as "reckless and intemperate," but on turning 18, he attended a Presbyterian revival meeting, and became a passionate convert to that denomination. Not long after he was ordained, he did work in frontier Indiana. Back in Kentucky in late 1830, he initiated the newspaper, the Religious and Literary Intelligencer, the first of his denomination. Having moved to Tennessee, where he became a friend of Andrew Jackson, he published the Cumberland Presbyterian. In 1832, Jackson appointed him to be a teacher for the Winnebago tribe. In 1833, he held a powwow with the Winnebago chiefs to discuss his plan, and although Wakan Decorah spoke against the idea of his mission, the remainder of the attendees at least found it acceptable. After several moves by the Hocągara, he was able to establish a mission school on the Yellow River in Iowa. When the tribe was exiled to Nebraska, Rev. Lowery moved to St. Cloud, Minnesota. He eventually moved back to Iowa where he died of what the pseudo-science of the time called "paralysis of the brain."²⁴ See also footnote 19.

Menard Academy

"Menard academy" — a school established in frontier Kaskaskia, Illinois, by the Sisters of the Visitation. The sisters originally emigrated from France to Georgetown in Washington D. C. In 1833, eight sisters were selected to establish a school in Kaskaskia. Upon arriving, they bought a hotel which they converted into a school with the financial support of Col. Menard. It soon became the school of choice for the western elite. The school thrived until 1844, when it was inundated by a flood of the Owan River. Thereafter, the sisters moved the school north to St. Louis.

Cumberland University, ca. 1858

"Presbyterian university" — a university founded by the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in 1842. In 1847, Cumberland University opened a law school. In its early days, more of its graduates were elected to Congress than any other school. During the Civil War, the school's chief inspiration seemed to be pyromania, as the Confederate Army burned down one hall and the Union Army burned down another. After the war, the school managed to recover, and exists today under the control of the Baptists.

Julian Vannerson

Henry Mower Rice (1816-1894) in 1859

"Henry M. Rice" — Henry Mower Rice (November 29, 1816 – January 15, 1894) was born in Vermont, and went west to Michigan in 1834 to do survey work. In 1839, after securing employment at Ft. Snelling in Minnesota, he became a fur trader to the Ojibwe and Hocąk nations. In the 40's and early 50's he facilitated the establishment of treaties and removals involving the Ojibwe, Dakota, and Hocąk nations. In 1849 he helped establish Minnesota as an independent territory, and as a territorial representative, contributed to the establishment of Minnesota as a state in the Union. He was prominent in the Democratic party in the late 50's and was elected U. S. Senator, a seat he held from May 11, 1858 to March 3, 1863. His attempt to become the Governor of Minnesota in 1865 fell short.²⁵

"Long Prairie, Minn." — this is the territory assigned to them briefly in Minnesota. Publius Lawson give an account of this short episode in the wanderings of the nation:

In 1853, a new treaty was made, by which they were allowed to remove to the Crow river. This treaty was not ratified because of the remonstrance of the people of Minnesota (U. M., 188). On February 27, 1855, they ceded their Long Prairie reservation and were granted a tract of land eighteen miles square on the Blue Earth river, just south of Mankato, in southern Minnesota (19 [?], B. E., 804). They settled here in the spring of that year and immediately began the erection of dwellings and improvement of the land. The teacher of the reservation school reported in 1860 the enrollment of 118 pupils. In the midst of their prosperity, in June, 1862, came the "Sioux massacre," which completely wrecked their future prospects. Although they took no part in that affair, and even though they offered to the government their services in punishing the Sioux, the frightened inhabitants of Minnesota demanded their removal (U. M., 138).²⁶

George Catlin

The Ball Play of the Women at Prairie du Chien

"La Crosse" — located at 43.838203, -91.238397. As he says farther down below, the city took its name from the fact that it was a favorite site for lacrosse games. One such game at Prairie du Chien was depicted in George Catlin's painting of 1835 shown above.

"Kayrahmaunee" — also known as "Keramąnį the Younger," he is the nephew of the older Keramąnį. Grignon says, "Car-ry-mau-nee, the chief who served in the last war, was a son of a chief of the same name, who was a very worthy man. The younger Car-ry-mau-nee was also a chief of good character, and migrated, with his people, beyond the Mississippi."²⁷ Draper points out, as does Lurie, that this second Keramąnį is the nephew of the older one.²⁸

"Dexterville" — located at 44.377037, -90.111052.

Nąga Keramąnįga

"old Caramaunee" — two people named Nąga Keramąnįga signed the Treaty of 1829, the younger of whom is said to have been the nephew of the other.²⁹ The latter name is for Keramąnįga, "Walking Turtle." This name is rendered in a bewildering variety of ways: Karimine, Karrymaunee, Carrymaunee, Cari-maunee, Carimimie, Caramaunee, Calimine, Carramana, Kay-rah-mau-nee, Kerry-man-nee, and Kariminee.³⁰ He was also known as Nąga, "Wood" or "Tree." The name Nąga is his clan name (Thunderbird Clan), and refers to the Thunders' habit of striking trees with their lightning weapon. Powell has this to say about him,

There lived for many years a very aged Winnebago chief, called Caramaunee, at a little village composed of only three or four bark lodges belonging to himself and his sons-in-law, located about two miles east [south] of what is since called Waukau.³¹ East of Fox River, about two miles above Omro, is Delhi. Some two miles back east [south] of Delhi was Waukau, on the old Fort Winnebago trail from Green Bay to the Fox-Wisconsin portage. About two miles east [south] of Waukau, on the west [east] bank of [the outlet of] Rush or Mud Lake, near the centre of the stream, was Caramaunee's village. He was a. large, square-shouldered, stout man, not very tall, but with a powerful frame and long face. While his people were generally regarded as unreliable and thievish, Caramaunee bore a most excellent character, was liked by all traders, and was friendly to the whites. "When I saw him last, about 1830, he seemed nearly a hundred years of age. He said he was out with Colonel Dickson in the War of 1812, went with the Menominee to Sandusky, and was at Mackinac when Major Holmes was shot by L'Espagnol."³²

Grignon referred to him as "a very worthy man."³³ He fought with Tecumseh and was at his side when he was killed in 1813.³⁴ Keramąnįga was the father-in-law of Spoon Decorah, the first cousin once removed of Wakąhaga. During the year in which these events took place (1828), Keramąnįga moved his people to a site on the Baraboo River, where became known as "the Counselor of the Baraboo."³⁵ He died in Dexterville, Iowa.³⁶ See also, McKenney-Hall.

"Maukeektshunxka" — for Mągíksųcka, "He Who Shook the Earth," This name is listed in those of the Thunderbird Clan by Radin and Sam Blowsnake, and as a Buffalo Clan name by Dorsey. In 1832, someone of this name is recorded as living in Koshkonong Village (42.884404, -88.981628).³⁷ This same name appears at the Middle Baraboo Village (43.466102, -89.742290).³⁸ Pauquette says that one of these two was also known as "Keramąnį the Younger," for whom see above. However, this seems doubtful. In both the afore-named villages, there also lived a man named Keramąnįga.

"Old Dandy" — known by his tribal name "Little Soldier," he was called "Dandy" on account of his ostentatious dress and his constant attention to the same. He is discussed at some length in Lawson, The Winnebago Tribe, 147-148.

"Chachipkaka" — for Caxšépskaga, the clan name of Old Gray-headed Decorah, for whom see below.

Yellow Thunder Late in Life

"Yellow Thunder" — the proper form of the name is Wakąjaziga, "Yellow Thunderbird," although the shortened name stuck in English. It is a Thunderbird Clan name. Lawson says this about him:

[Yellow Thunder] was a fine looking Indian, tall, straight and stately" (12, W. H. C., 429). His old encampment was about five miles below Berlin on the Fox river, at the Yellow Banks (10, W. H. C., 221) This would locate his village near Eureka, in Winnebago county. ... In 1828, Yellow Thunder and his squaw made a journey to Washington to interview the President (7, W. H. C., 346), and thereafter this squaw was known as the Washington Woman. Yellow Thunder was a convert to the Catholic church, and became zealous in its offices (10, W. H. C., 221). He was called the head war chief of his tribe (12, W. H. C., 429). By false pretenses he was induced with others to visit Washington in 1837, and signed the false treaty which ceded to the government all the Winnebago possessions east of the Mississippi river. Three years after, he was one of the first to suffer under this cession by being forcibly put in irons at Portage, and removed to Turkey river, in Iowa, He soon returned and requested La Ronde to go with him to Mineral Point to enter a forty of land, on the west bank of the Wisconsin river (7, W. H. C., 339). He was again forcibly removed to Iowa with Black Wolf but was allowed to return as he was a land owner, (12, W. H. C., 429). Yellow Thunder owned the S. W. quarter of the S. E. quarter of Section 36, on the Wisconsin river, in the town of Delton, Sauk county. On this land two log huts were constructed for his own use, and that of the families who lived with him. About five acres of land was cultivated, corn, beans and potatoes being raised. During big feasts as many as 1,500 Indians gathered in the vicinity. Shortly before his death he sold his land to Mr. John Bennett. It is related that when he paid his taxes he placed a kernel of corn in a leather pouch for each dollar of taxes paid, and when he sold the land he demanded as many dollars as there were kernels of corn in the old pouch. His summer village was sixteen miles up the river from Portage in 1840 (7, W. H. C., 398). He died in 1874 and was buried on a sandy knoll near his homestead. Nearby are the graves of the Washington Woman and several other Indians (5, W. A., 239-40). The reference (above), giving his death as in the fifties is an error. It is probable that the date of his birth was close to the year 1800. An oil portrait of Yellow Thunder hangs in the halls of the Wisconsin Historical Society.³⁹

Late in life, Yellow Thunder was able to return to Wisconsin, since he had managed to purchase 40 acres of land about 16 miles above Portage. Thatcher recounts his later life:

A few Winnebago, those who owned land and lived on it in more or less the manner of the whites were well accepted and even highly respected by their white neighbors. Outstanding among these few was Chief Yellow Thunder. Along with the rest of his tribe he had been forcibly removed to the west of the Mississippi River in 1840, and like many of his fellow tribesmen he had returned as soon as he could, he and his wife walking nearly 500 miles. On his return he bought forty acres in northeastern Sauk County, built a log house on his land, and settled there with his wife. After his wife’s death in 1868 he seldom stayed in the log house, but lived most of the time in a tent that he pitched near the Wisconsin River. Tall, stately, he dressed much like a white man except for the inconspicuous black ribbon ornament in his hair and the blanket he wore in resentment on account of the dispossession of his people. In the fall of 1873 a knee injury led to blood poisoning for Yellow Thunder, and his white neighbors helped to care for him in his final illness.⁴⁰

His wife, who was the daughter of White Crow, was buried on a sandy knoll outside Delton, but in 1909, her body, and that of her husband, were disinterred and reburied by the Sauk County Historical Society under a monument about 5 miles north of Baraboo.⁴¹ 

"General J. E. Fletcher" — The following account is given of the life of Jonathan E. Fletcher: "A native of Thetford, Vermont, born in January, 1806. He came to Muscatine in the summer of 1836, when Iowa was made a separate territory. He attended the first land sale in the territory, in November, 1838, at which he bought lands six miles west of the city, upon which he located in the fall of 1839, and went to farming, having previously returned to Vermont. He was married to Frances L. Kendrick in 1839. He had resided a few years in Ohio before he came to Iowa. In 1846, he was appointed, by President Polk, an agent for the Winnebago Indians. His valuable services in his long career as Indian agent, to the government, and to the country, are incalculable. General Fletcher held many responsible offices in this territory and state. He represented Muscatine County in the Fourth Iowa General Assembly, 1852. He was a member of the convention which framed the old constitution, taking an important part in the formation of our fundamental law."⁴² On a book of old houses in Minnesota, his was described as, "... occupied by a great man who deserves wider recognition, Jonathan E. Fletcher."⁴³

"Mankato" — 44.184520, -94.001932. This is Dakota (maŋka-to) for "Blue Earth," the designation for the clay most desirable for making pottery. The cognate name in Hocąk, Mąnico Horuzᵉra, "The Place Whence They Take Blue Earth," applies to the Twin Cities.

"their present reservation" — this is still extant, centered on the town of Winnebago, Nebraska (42°14'04.8"N 96°28'21.5"W).

Edward Marek		Edward Marek
The Brisbois House		The Brisbois Store

"B. W. Brisbois" — (1808–1885), like his father, was a fur trader, but in the employ of the American Fur Company. He later expanded his enterprise into general merchandise. He married Thérèse LaChappelle who was the granddaughter of the Ojibway chief Etoukasahwee. Bernard Brisbois was a life-long resident of St. Feriole Island in Prairie du Chien except for a period in which he was made consul at Verviers, Belgium. The Brisbois House and the Brisbois Store are important historical sites on St. Feriole Island (43.055282, -91.159991) in Prairie du Chien. The property on which these buildings rest was purchased from the American Fur Company in 1851. The house was built by Joseph Rolette in 1837, and the store was constructed in 1851-1852.⁴⁴

"Elroy" — located at 43.742082, -90.271795.

"Gabriel Brisbois" — Gabriel Adolphus Brisbois (1829-1887) was the son of George Pascal and Catherine (Provost) Brisbois, who had a small farm in the Prairie du Chien area. He served in Knowlton's Wisconsin Infantry, in the Mexican War, although he is said to have deserted. He was married twice: (1) Madeline la Riviere (b. 13 Mar 1832 in Prairie du Chien), daughter of Julian la Riviere and Madeline Agnes Lapointe, on 11 Jul 1852 in Crawford County; (2) Theresa A. Lupient (b. 20 Oct 1842 in Prairie du Chien), daughter of Theodore Lupient and Madeleine Provost, on 6 Nov 1865 in Sauk County.⁴⁵

"Albion" — the township is located at 44.284722, -90.950000. On the 1901 plat map for Jackson County, T21N, R4W, Section 18, is found a 121 acre allotment belonging to Dora C. Poquette, which is doubtless the land to which this passage refers. The location of their house was probably very near 44.303967, -90.915505.

Capt. Charles A. Hunt

"Capt. Charles A. Hunt" — Captain Charles A. Hunt was born in New York on 17 Apr 1829, and in 1845 went west to establish a mill in Grant County, Wisconsin. When gold was discovered in California, he became a ’49er, but returned home after a year. In 1865 he purchased 300 acres in Monroe County, and help found the village of Melvina (named after his first wife). He joined the 25th Wisconsin when the Civil War broke out, and under the command of Sherman, was made a lieutenant and later a captain. In 1862 his unit was temporarily diverted to the suppression of the Dakota uprising in Minnesota. When the War was over, he adopted a number of orphan children of veterans. He was elected to the Assembly 1868-1870, and was appointed superintendent of the removal program in 1873. This was the last attempt at removal. He died 24 Aug. 1899, and was given a stately funeral by the veterans of the Grand Army of the Republic.⁴⁶

Big Hawk

"Big Hawk" — the photo above was taken in 1899. See footnote 30 above.

"Sparta" — located at 43.939190, -90.817789.

"Edward P. Smith" — Edward Parmelee Smith (1827–1876) was a Connecticut born Congregational Minister active in hospital work during the Civil War, and later one of the founders of Fisk University. Ulysses Grant appointed him U. S. Commissioner of Indian Affairs in 1873. His administration was plagued with scandal, although he himself was acquitted of any wrong doing. He resigned in 1875, and died in 1876 from a fever contracted while touring Africa.⁴⁷

"Louis Morel" — his obituary reads:

Louis Morel, a clerk in the Indian Bureau, died on the 23d Inst, and was burled at Congressional Cemetery yesterday afternoon at three o'clock. He leaves a wife and four children. Mr. Morel was born in Berlin in 184_, and received a full academic education. He came to this country at the age of seventeen, and at once enlisted in defense of his adopted country. At Gettysburg he received three terrible wounds, one of them resulting in the loss of an eye, another penetrated his abdomen, and the third disabled his left leg. In 1863 he was appointed to the Surgeon-General's Office, and subsequently was appointed in the Indian Office. Last year he was appointed a special agent to superintend the taking of the census of the Winnebago Indians of Wisconsin. His death was caused by hemorrhage, as a result of said wounds, and was undoubtedly hastened by his arduous labors in connection with the taking of said census. Lincoln Post, No. 3, of the Grand Army took out the charge of the funeral arrangements. Iter. Dr. Addison assisted at the service. In the absence of the commander, Paul Brodie, the senior vice officiated. Beautiful floral offerings were sent by Mr. Morel's fellow-clerks in the Indian Office and from his German friends, as well as his neighbors. Mr. Morell was a brave soldier, an affectionate husband and father, and a devoted friend. National Republican (Washington, District of Columbia), February 27, 1882, Page 4.

"Black River Falls, Trempealeau, La Crosse, Portage, Menasha, Stevens Point, Friendship, Madison, Baraboo, Remington, back again to La Crosse, and completed our task at Blue River, near Boscobel" — the location of these various sites is shown in the table below:

Locale	Coördinates	Comment
Black River Falls	44.296659, -90.848675
Trempealeau	44.003212, -91.434271
La Crosse	43.838203, -91.238397	See above.
Portage	43.547565, -89.464067	See above.
Menasha	44.219598, -88.425334
Stevens Point	44.518042, -89.564424
Friendship	43.971350, -89.819916
Madison	43.073953, -89.395020	State capital.
Baraboo	43.467931, -89.744913
Remington (Babcock)	44.304257, -90.111367	A township containing the unincorporated community of Babcock.
Blue River, near Boscobel	43.187704, -90.571140

"Pike lake" — located at coördinates 43.313270, -88.341870.

"Maj. Walter F. Halleck" — the following is a tribute to this officer which is here given in full:

Among the other changes in the officials of the Interior Department at Washington, D.C., Major Walter F Halleck (captain, U.S. Army retired) has, of his own volition, tendered his resignation as captain of the watch, to take effect May 1, 1911. In accepting his resignation, which was tendered February 4, Secretary Verballing complimented him upon his services, especially for the able assistance given in reorganizing the watch force of the department. He will remain in Washington, where he has resided so long and made a host of friends. Major Halleck is well known by many friends in Jackson county; also the years which have elapsed since his last visit here. Major Halleck first entered the Department of the Interior as special Indian and disbursing agent in 1882 and complimented for his service in the annual reports of the secretary of the Interior and the commissioner of Indian Affairs for 1884-85. He was appointed captain of the watch, Department of the Interior, November 24, 1894. His military history from "Records of Living Officers of the United States Army," compiled from the record in adjutant general's office, War Department, Washington, D.C., will be of much interest to those who know the man. He was born in Detroit, Mich., August 25, 1845. Appointed from Michigan private 11th Michigan volunteer infantry, July 25, 1862; engaged with regiment in pursuit of the confederate General Morgan through Kentucky July, August, and September, 1862, taking part in the actions at Gallatin, Tenn., August 13, 1862, and with guerrillas at Fort Riley, on the Cumberland River, Tenn., October 25, 1862, besieged in Nashville prior of advance of the Army of the Cumberland, under General Rosecrans, in December, 1862; while serving with regiment in the second brigade, 2d division, 14th corps, at the battle of Stone River, Tenn., December 31, 1862, received gunshot wound resulting in total loss of left eye; also severe wounds under the left eye, and in right cheek causing capture and confinement in Libby Prison; after exchange rejoined regiment, taking part in the advance on Tullahoma, action at Elk River, Tenn., July 1, 1863, and march into Georgia; discharged August 13, 1863, for disability arising from wounds received in battle; commissioned by President Lincoln, as second lieutenant veteran reserve corps, April 14, 1864; served in the defense of Washington, D.C., commanding company during the confederate raid of July, 1864, and while field officer of the day, July 16, 1864, received severe injury to right foot; engaged in conducting confederate prisoners from Washington to New York, Indianapolis, and Johnson's Island; commanding company detailed to guard the conspirators during the trial for the assassination of President Lincoln; member of board to ascertain amount of damage done private property in the construction of fortifications in and around the national capital in 1864-65; resigned September 6, 1865; appointed second lieutenant, 18th U.S. infantry, May 30, 1866; promoted first lieutenant, January 31, 1867; post adjutant and A.A.Q.M. and A.C.S. at Fort Sedgewick, Colo., 1866-67; acting assistant quartermaster and commissary of subsistence at Fort C. F. Smith, on the Big Horn River, Mont., having charge of the construction of the post; engaged in action with the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. Fish Creek. Wyo., and at Hayfield, near Fort C. F. Smith, Mont., 1867-68; retired September 29, 1868, for disability resulting from wounds and injury received in line of duty; member of general court-martial and board of survey, state of Texas, 1868-69; captain, U.S. Army, retired, April 23, 1904. It was during his service as disbursing officer of the Indian bureau that Major Halleck came to Black River Falls. He became much interested in the town and its people, and during all the years that have followed he has kept in touch with our local affairs, particularly in regard to his old friends. Major Halleck is still young and vigorous in action and appearance, and his many friends trust that he will find ample pleasure in private life after so long and varied a life in the public service. He is a good man, a loyal man, and one of the kind to be depended upon in emergencies, and the honors he has received from his country were earned many times over in the ability and energy with which he has accepted every responsibility. "Tribute to Captain Halleck," Army-Navy-Air Force Register and Defense Times, Volume 50 (July 1, 1911): 30b-c. Reprinted from the Journal of Black River Falls, Wis.

Berean Hunter

A Wild Blueberry Plant in Bloom

"blueberries" — one of various species of the genus Vaccinium having blue berries growing on bushes that vary in height from about 4 inches to 13 feet. Blueberries are related to cranberries, bilberries and grouseberries. The harvest season runs from mid-July to the beginning of September in Wisconsin.

Cranberries		Picking Cranberries, 1900

"cranberries" — Vaccinium macrocarpon, an evergreen dwarf shrub or trailing vine, typically found in acidic bogs in the cooler regions of the United States and Canada. They ripen (usually turning red) from September through early November. The Hocągara made good use of cranberries for medicinal purposes as well as for food:

Often groups of Indians would travel along the course of the Black River, passing the [George] Frantz log house. They would stop, wanting to view the inside of the home. On one of those visits, an elderly Indian lady noticed one of the Frantz boys, George (1865-1953), was suffering from a skin ailment. She announced that she could cure the malady. His parents welcomed her help. She gathered some cranberries, mashed them, and spread the paste around George’s arm, covering it with an old pillow case, which healed the skin back to normal....”⁴⁸

"a considerable sum" — $19.40 in 2018 dollars is estimated to be $505.

"one hundred dollars" — in 2018 dollars this would amount to $2,600.

Plate 39

Men Playing the Moccasin Game

"moccasin game" — the particulars of this game are given by Radin:

One of the favorite games of the Winnebago. Five men took positions directly opposite their five opponents. Between the two rows of players, in front of each man was a receptacle, generally a moccasin, in which a small object was secreted. The sides in turn guessed in which moccasin it was secreted. The guesser pointed in turn with a long stick to each moccasin, all the time carefully scrutinizing the expression on the face of each man whose moccasin he touched. The bystanders and the other players on his side meanwhile sang songs and made all sorts of remarks and allusions in an attempt to catch off his guard the man in whose moccasin the object was secreted, so that he might disclose the fact by some gesture or expression. The person guessing had the right lo touch each moccasin without forfeiting his chance. As soon as he wished to guess he overturned with his stick the moccasin in which he thought the object was hidden. The seriousness with which a player scrutinized his opponents is well shown in plate 39.⁴⁹

"Doc Decorah" — Thwaites says of him, "The Doctor is a medicine-man, held in high esteem by the Decorah. or mixed-blood element of the Wisconsin Winnebagoes, who live chiefly upon homesteads in Adams, Marquette, and Jackson counties." Spoon Decorah mentions him: "I am the nephew of Big Canoe; and Doc Decorah the medicine man, who lives near me, is my nephew. Doc's father, who was named Bad-Spirit Killer, was my brother-in-law. Bad-Spirit Killer died of smallpox, when [in 1832-33] so many of our people were taken away by that disease. We were at Mauston, then, picking blueberries. Several of our party died."⁵⁰ The note above says of him, "Doctor Decorah is the head medicine man, has a comical physiognomy, and is much of a wit."

J. O. Lewis

Black Wolf

"Black Wolf" — Šųkjągᵉsépka in Hocąk. His village was located seven miles south of Oshkosh on the shore of Lake Winnebago,⁵¹ still remembered in "Black Wolf Point" (43°55'39.0"N 88°28'17.0"W) and the town of Black Wolf. The village had only about 40 lodges. Hocąk campfires were seen there as late as 1846. Black Wolf was a large man and rose to the rank of War Chief. He fought on the side of the British and was at Mackinac and Prairie du Chien in the War of 1812.⁵² He was one of four chiefs, accompanied by 40 warriors who appeared in the peace negotiations between the British and Americans at Mackinac on June 3, 1815.⁵³ He is believed to have died at Portage in 1847.

"Green Grass" — went by the name "George Greengrass Carimon," the last name being a form of Keramąnį. His obituary reads,

George Greengrass Carimen died 2 March 1936 at the age of 82, at Neillsville Hospital, Neillsville, Clark Co, Wisconsin. He was one of the oldest Winnebago’s in the area, having been born on the banks of the Black River, south of Neillsville and lived in the area all of his life. He was also very religious and in the summer of 1934 when the drought was at its worst he said that in running his memory back over 70 years he had never seen so destructive a drought. He held to the theory that mankind; especially the white race had become so puffed up with pride of their accomplishments and had forgotten their dependence upon God that the drought had been sent to humble their pride. His wife died many years before him and a son James Carimon, who served overseas during WW I and had been gassed on the battlefield had died a few years later. He left a widow and and a young son. Government insurance left by James Carimon to his father had kept him in comfortable circumstances till his death. About five weeks before his death he had become ill and was cared for at the Neillsville Hospital until his death. Burial took place in the Indian Cemetery near Dells Dam with the Indian ceremony being used. Respecting his wishes his body was wrapped in deerskins and a hole made through the rough box and coffin so that the spirits could enter with food. The funeral rites included four days of feasting, friends of Mr. Greengrass assembling each evening to feast at sundown and eulogize his memory. On the fourth evening the feast and services lasted all night with the men playing cards and other games while the women spent the evening in visiting.⁵⁴

R. A. Lewis

Little Decorah, 1866

"Little Decorah" — Lawson says of him, "Little Decorah died near Tomah, at Blue Wing's village about April 1, 1887, a very old man, about 100 years old. He was the oldest son of Old Gray-headed Decorah. His place was near Millston, Jackson county (44.192504, -90.647517), when he died."

George Catlin

Warawaiguga, Old Gray-headed Decorah, 1830

"Grey-headed Decorah" — a much beloved chief whose clan name was White War Eagle (Hicawaxšepskaga, or Caxšépskaga). His village was near the mouth of the Baraboo River where it meets the Wisconsin (see Kinzie's Receipt Rolls). De la Ronde says this about the death of White Eagle, more popularly known as "Old Gray-headed Decorah":

(355) In 1836, the Indians had the misfortune of losing the best of (356) their chiefs, Scha-chip-ka-ka [Caxšépsgaga], or De-kau-ry. His death occurred April 20, at the age of ninety, at his village ... Before he died, De-kau-ry called the Catholic priest, Mr. Vanderbrook, who was at the Portage at the time, by whom he was baptised, according to Catholic rites, the day of his death, and was buried in their cemetery near the present Court House in Portage City; and since the abandonment of that burial ground, the old chief's resting place cannot be identified. He was succeeded by his son, called by the whites Little De-kau-ry, whose Indian name was Cha-ge-ka-ka; and he did not long survive, dying six months after his father. He was succeeded by his brother, Ho-pe-ne-scha-ka [Xopíniskága], or White French.⁵⁵

Spoon Decorah, 1887

"Spoon Decorah" — Reuben Gold Thwaites commenting upon his interview with Spoon said, "Spoon, who died in a cranberry marsh northwest of Necedah, Oct. 13, 1880, was a tall, well-formed, manly-looking fellow, with a well-shaped head, pleasant, open features, and dignified demeanor — quite superior in appearance to the majority of Wisconsin Winnebagoes. He was living with his aged squaw in a reasonably neat small frame cottage, while his progeny, reaching to the fourth generation, were clustered about the patriarchal lodge in family wigwams. The old man told his story in a straightforward, dignified manner ..." for which see the Narrative of Spoon Decorah in this collection.

"Four Deer" — as stated in the note above, "Four Deer is the orator of his tribe, and has a somewhat stately appearance." He was already old enough to be on Kinzie's Receipt Roll in 1832 (q.v.). In June, 1887, he was in a deputation from the tribe to secure from the state government an agent for their people, a mission that failed.⁵⁶

Winnebago Blackhawk, 1897

"Black Hawk" — in Hocąk, Kerejųsepka, listed by Radin as a name in the Bird Clan. Lurie, more specifically, lists him as a member of the Hawk Clan (Warrior Clan).⁵⁷ Jipson recognizes him as one of the important chiefs of the Hocągara.⁵⁸ We learn from his son Walking Cloud (Mąxíwimą̀nįga):

During the Black Hawk War, my father had his lodge near La Crosse. I did not go to the war; I was too young. But my brother did. His name was Seeoroouspinka [Sikuruspįga]. General Dodge sent a messenger down to Prairie du Chien, and said he wanted the Winnebagoes to go into the war and help the Great Father punish the Sacs. Our people, who were named in this call, did not want to go to war. But the messenger, after we had all arrived in Prairie du Chien, picked out Winnebago Black Hawk (my father), and my brother, and they went up the Wisconsin River with a party of white soldiers and officers from Fort Crawford. They met a number of Sacs coming down on a raft made of canoes tied together. The Winnebagoes and the white killed most of the Sacs in this party. Winnebago Black Hawk was the guide of this epedition.⁵⁹

His obituary reads, "Black Hawk, the most noted chief of the Wisconsin Winnebago Indians, age 90, died in the town of Brockway, a few miles from Black River Falls. The chief has been well known in the western part of Wisconsin. For the last 50 years, he was always a friend of the whites and on several occasions prevented the Winnebagos from taking the warpath to settle differences with the whites."⁶⁰ It transpires that he was a Warbundle owner:

An Indian Chief's war bundle — one of the few owned by museums in the country — was recently given to the Wisconsin State Historical museum, by John Blackhawk, of Greenwood, Wisconsin, great grandson of "Winnebago Blackhawk," an Indian chief of the Mississippi River Valley tribes. Most of these bundles are kept in the possession of the family and are handed down from generation to generation. The entire bundle is wrapped first in matting and then in skin and is worth about $200. It contains several ermine, the sacred animal of that tribe, medicine, herbs of various kinds, charcoal tied in a skin bag, three war clubs, several flutes, fire-hearths and dagger sheath. The only other bundle of this kind that is in the Wisconsin Museum at the present time belongs to the same tribe but to a different clan.⁶¹

J. O. Lewis

Wajᵉxetega, "Big Canoe," 1825

"One-eyed Decorah" — the third son of "Old Decorah." He is also known by the name "Big Canoe." He distinguished himself in action against the British, for which see, "The Origin of Big Canoe's Name."

Peter Rindisbacher
Isaac Winneshiek, Chief of the La Crosse Village (1829)		Wakąjaguga		Little Winneshiek

"Young Winneshiek" — massive confusion revolves around the three generations of Winneshieks mentioned in historical accounts. This arose from the succession of one Chief Winneshiek by another so that for one generation Winneshiek¹, Mawaruga, was "Old Winneshiek" (d. 1835), and his son, Winneshiek^2a, Wakąjaguga [Coming Thunderbird], was "the younger Winneshiek." However, a generation later, Winneshiek^2a had become the "old Winneshiek," and his son, Winneshiek³, was then the "younger" Winneshiek, commonly called "Little Winneshiek" (Nójįga). To further complicate matters, for the older generation, "Young Winneshiek," Winneshiek^2b, whose Hocak name was Ahušipka, "Short Wing," denoted the (older ?) brother of Winneshiek^2a. This is confirmed by Little Winneshiek³ himself who identifies "Young Winneshiek" as his father's brother, that is, the son of Winneshiek¹. Ahušipka adopted the Anglo first name of "Isaac." Lawson says,

Winneshiek the Younger, son of the old chief, was held as a hostage in 1827 by Colonel Dodge for the good behavior of the tribe. (2, W. H. C., 331.) His village in 1852, was in Iowa opposite a point in Wisconsin, five miles below the Bad Axe river. (1852, G. W., 44, 502.) In 1855; he was head chief of the Winnebago on the Turkey river in Iowa. (2, W. H. C., 331.) In 1857, he was called a worthy chief and ruler of his band. (3, W. H. C., 287.)

Footnote 40, above, says that he died in 1887. This suggests that Winneshiek^2a was also head chief, which is confirmed by his son Little Winneshiek who often refers to him as "Chief Winneshiek." This obituary must refer to him, that is, Wakąjaguga:

January 1882: Old Winneshiek, head chief of the Winnebagos, residing near Black River Falls, died December 30th aged 78 years. The old chief was well known in this region and generally esteemed for uprightness and honesty. The Indians are all in deep mourning on account of his death. He had in his possession a medal presented to his father as a token of friendship by James K. Polk, president (1845-1849) of the United States, many years ago. It was highly prized by him. Winneshiek had several times represented his tribe as a delegate to Washington, and had been present at many important Indian tribe councils in the West. He left a son, Big Fire (or Medicine Smoke) who will probably succeed him.⁶²

"White Pawnee" — Pani is a loan word from Algonquian languages that means "slave." It is also the term for a Pawnee. This individual, however, was a person of note, the son of White Crow, whose name is variously rendered as Pania Blanc, Pawnee, Paneewasaka, "Pony Blaw," Vane Blanc, and "White Pawnee." After recounting how the nephew of Four Legs was quite the dandy, Mrs. Kinzie tells us,

This devotion to dress and appearance seemed not altogether out of place in a youthful dandy; but we had likewise an old one of the same stamp. Pawnee Blanc, or the White Pawnee, surpassed his younger competitor, if possible, in attention to his personal attractions. Upon the present occasion he appeared in all his finery, and went through the customary salutations with an air of solemn dignity, then walked, as did the others, into the parlor (for I had received them in the hall), where they all seated themselves upon the floor. ... (83) Pawnee was among the happy number remembered in the distribution; so, donning at once his new costume, and tying a few additional bunches of gay-colored ribbons to a long spear, that was always his baton of ceremony, he came at once, followed by an admiring train, chiefly of women, to pay me a visit of state. The solemn gravity of his countenance, as he motioned away those who would approach too near and finger his newly-received finery — the dignity with which he strutted along, edging this way and that to avoid any possible contact from homely, every-day wardrobes — augured well for a continuance of propriety and self-respect, and a due consideration of the good opinion of all around.⁶³

"White Crow" — Kau-ray-kaw-saw-kaw would seem to correspond to Karekasaga, which is unattested and is probably a corrupted form of the name. His name given elsewhere as Kau-kish-ka-ka⁶⁴ better approximates the expected Kaǧískága, which means "White Crow." He was nicknamed "The Blind," or Le Borgne since he had lost an eye.⁶⁵ He was chief of a village by Lake Koshkonong of about 1200 people who lived in white cedar bark lodges.⁶⁶ He was the father of "the Washington Woman," who married Yellow Thunder.⁶⁷ At the beginning of the Sauk War he believed that the Sauks would vanquish the whites and tried to warn them.

The White Crow had told Capt. Beon Gratiot, that he was friendly towards him as his brother was the Winnebago Indian Agent; that he did not wish to see him killed, and that he had better leave Col. Dodge and go home; that the Sauks and Foxes would kill all the whites; that the whites could not fight, as they were a soft-shelled breed; that when the spear was put to them they would quack like ducks, as the whites had done at Stillman's Defeat; and he proceeded to mimic out, in full Indian style, the spearing and scalping in the Stillman affair; and that all the whites who persisted in marching against the Indians, might expect to be served in the same manner.⁶⁸

He died in 1836 and is buried near the village of Cross Plains.⁶⁹ 

"the city end" — it would have been located somewhere near 43.537573, -89.474118.

"hchi-a-shoke" — for xeoš’ók, from xe, "hill"; and hoš’ók, "lump, knoll, hill."

Joel Emmons Whitney (1822-1886)

Šoǧogᵉnįka, before 1881

"Little Hill" — a photograph of Šoǧogᵉnįka taken by the Whitney studio is seen above. He was a member of the Buffalo Clan. His stories, referenced in the footnote above, are found here: Creation of the World (v. 3), Creation of the World (v. 13), Creation of Man (v. 9). Graphic by Little Hill: Pictograph of a Waterspirit.

Notes to the Commentary

¹ Satterlee Clark, "The Early History of Fort Winnebago as Narrated by Hon. Sat. Clark at the Court House in Portage, on Friday Eve., Mar. 21, ’79," The Portage Democrat, March 28, 1879 = Satterlee Clark, "Early Times at Fort Winnebago, and Black Hawk War Reminiscences," Wisconsin Historical Collections, VIII (1879): 316-320. Reuben Gold Thwaites, Notes to Wau-Bun, Caxton Club Edition (1901), 403 nt. 41.
² from the official City of Portage website (> History), viewed 1/2/18.
³ Hiram Martin Chittenden, The American Fur Trade of the Far West: A History of the Pioneer Trading Posts and Early Fur Companies of the Missouri Valley and the Rocky Mountains and the Overland Commerce with Santa Fe, 3 vols. (New York: F. P. Harper, 1901) Vol. 1, Ch. 8, et passim.
⁴ History of Columbia County (Chicago: Western Historical Co., 1880) 588. "A Portage Pioneer. Henry Carpenter's Protracted Illness Terminates Fatally," Portage Weekly Democrat, Friday, February 9, 1894. Reprinted in the website Find a Grave > Sgt. Henry Carpenter.
⁵ Notes of Reuben Gold Thwaites, the 1901 edition of Wau Bun, nt. 99.
⁶ Alfred Edward Bulger, "Events at Prairie du Chien Previous to American Occupation, 1814," Collections of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 13 (1895): 1-9 [1-2].
⁷ Bulger, "Events at Prairie du Chien Previous to American Occupation, 1814," 2.
⁸ Mary Elise Antoine, Prairie Du Chien (Charleston: Arcadia Publishing, 2011) 7.
⁹ The website, "History of the Lupient Family," contributed by Sandra H. Coggeshall. Viewed 3/8/2018.
¹⁰ George Croghan, Army Life on the Western Frontier: Selections from the Official Reports Made Between 1826 and 1845 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, Apr 14, 2014) 25.
¹¹ Satterlee Clark, "Early Times at Fort Winnebago," Collections of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, VIII (1879): 309-321 [320].
¹² Nile's Register, page 192, Army Order #97, Oct. 1, 1833, under "Fifth Infantry," shows Alexander S. Hooe being promoted to First Lieutenant.
¹³ History of Columbia County, Wisconsin (Chicago: Western Historical Co., 1880) 395 note.
¹⁴ See also James H. Lockwood, "Early Times and Events in Wisconsin," Wisconsin Historical Collections II (1855/1903): 98-196 [173-175].
¹⁵ John T. de la Ronde, "Personal Narrative," Wisconsin Historical Collections, VII (1876): 345-365 [356-358].
¹⁶ 10, W. H. C., 186.
¹⁷ 10, W. H. C., 253.
¹⁸ Dr. Norton William Jipson, "Winnebago Villages and Chieftain of the Lower Rock River Region," The Wisconsin Archeologist, 2, #3 (July, 1923): 125-139 [130-131].
¹⁹ Jipson, Story of the Winnebagoes, 235-237.
²⁰ Dictionary of Wisconsin Biography, ed. P. L. Scanlan (Prairie du Chien and Menasha, Wis., 1937) 107-108.
²¹ History of Columbia County (Chicago: Western Historical Co., 1880) 588.
²² James Edwin Jones, A History of Columbia County, Wisconsin, 2 vols. (Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co., 1914) 2:641. John T. de la Ronde, "Personal Narrative," Wisconsin Historical Collections, VII (1876): 345-365.
²³ Bruce E. Mahan, Old Fort Crawford and the Frontier (Iowa City, Iowa: The State Historical Society of Iowa, 1926) 207-217.
²⁴ The Cumberland Presbyterian, April 12, 1877, page 2.
²⁵ AOC (Architecture of the Capital) website, "Henry Mower Rice." Viewed: 2.28.2018.
²⁶ Publius V. Lawson, "The Winnebago Tribe," Wisconsin Archeologist, 6, #3 (July, 1907) 78-162 [114].
²⁷ Augustin Grignon, "Seventy-two Years' Recollections of Wisconsin," Wisconsin Historical Collections, III (1857): 197-295 [287].
²⁸ John T. Kingston, "Early Western Days," Wisconsin Historical Collections, VII (1876): 297-334 [332 note]. Nancy Oestreich Lurie, "A Check List of Treaty Signers by Clan Affiliation," Journal of the Wisconsin Indians Research Institute, 2, #1 (June, 1966): 50-73 (##2-3, p. 53).
²⁹ Nancy Oestreich Lurie, "A Check List of Treaty Signers by Clan Affiliation," Journal of the Wisconsin Indians Research Institute, 2, #1 (June, 1966): 50-73 [##2-3, p. 53).
³⁰ Publius V. Lawson, "The Winnebago Tribe," Wisconsin Archeologist, 6, #3 (July, 1907) 78-162 [151].
³¹ a note by Draper, states, "Captain Powell suggests that this may be a slight change or corruption for Nahkaw." William Powell, "William Powell's Recollections, In an Interview with Lyman C. Draper," Proceedings of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin for 1912, 3-178 [151-152].
³² Powell, "William Powell's Recollections," 151-152.
³³ Grignon, "Seventy-two Years' Recollections of Wisconsin," 287.
³⁴ Lawson, "The Winnebago Tribe," 151.
³⁵ John T. de la Ronde, "Personal Narrative," Wisconsin Historical Collections, 7 (1876) 345-365 [350].
³⁶ Lawson, "The Winnebago Tribe," 152.
³⁷ See Kinzie's Receipt Roll, Koshkonong Village.
³⁸ See Kinzie's Receipt Roll, Middle Baraboo Village.
³⁹ Lawson, "The Winnebago Tribe," 149-150.
⁴⁰ George W. Thatcher, “The Winnebago Indians, 1827-1932” Master’s thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1935.
⁴¹ Thwaites, Notes to Wau-Bun, Caxton Club Edition (1901), 404 nt. 50. Brown, "The White Crow Memorial Pilgrimage," 10b.
⁴² From the website, The Iowa Legislature, viewed: 5/18/2012. For more on Gen. Jonathan E. Fletcher (Jan. 1, 1806 - April 6, 1872), see Clement Augustus Lounsberry, Early History of North Dakota: Essential Outlines of American History (Washington, D.C.: Liberty Press, 1919) 151-152.
⁴³ Roger G. Kennedy, Minnesota Houses: An Architectural & Historical View (Minneapolis: Dillon Press, 1967) 44.
⁴⁴ Wisconsin thru my eyes > Prairie du Chien's St. Feriole Island. B. W. Brisbois, "Recollections of Prairie du Chien," Wisconsin Historical Collections, IX (1882/1909): 282-302.
⁴⁵ Lucy Eldersveld Murphy, Great Lakes Creoles: A French-Indian Community on the Northern Borderlands, Prairie du Chien, 1750–1860 (Cambridge University Press, 2014) 221. See the website, Choice Minnesota Main Page > Ancestors of Haslerud/Hill/Olness/Bakken Tree > Gabriel A. Brisbois.
⁴⁶ Monroe County Democrat, Friday, Sept. 1, 1899.
⁴⁷ "Rev.. Edward P. Smith" (Obituary), The New York Times, Aug. 16, 1876.
⁴⁸ Dee Zimmerman, Clark County’s Early Settlers (Clark County Press).
⁴⁹ Paul Radin, The Winnebago Tribe (Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1923) 122.
⁵⁰ Spoon Decorah, "The Narrative of Spoon Decorah," in an Interview with Reuben Gold Thwaites, Wisconsin Historical Collections, XIII (1895): 448-462 [461].
⁵¹ Augustin Grignon, "Seventy-two Years' Recollections of Wisconsin," Wisconsin Historical Collections, III (1857): 197-295 [208, 288].
⁵² Lawson, "Summary of the Archaeology of Winnebago County, Wisconsin", 66.
⁵³ "Papers of Capt. T. G. Anderson, British Indian Agent," Wisconsin Historical Collections, X (1888): 142.
⁵⁴ Neillsville Press, 5 March 1936.
⁵⁵ John T. de la Ronde, "Personal Narrative," Wisconsin Historical Collections, VII (1876): 345-365 [355-356]. 
⁵⁶ "Narrative of Spoon Decorah," Wisconsin Historical Collections, XIII (1895): 448-462 [462 nt. 4].
⁵⁷ Lurie, "A Check List of Treaty Signers by Clan Affiliation" (Kerεjúŋsεpgǝ, 61, #44).
⁵⁸ Norton William Jipson, The Story of the Winnebagoes (Chicago: Chicago Historical Society [unpublished], 1924) 263.
⁵⁹ "Narrative of Walking Cloud," Wisconsin Historical Collections, XIII (1895): 463-467 [463-464].
⁶⁰ Clark County Press, September 1899.
⁶¹ Owen Enterprise, January 6, 1921. For a Hawk Clan Warbundle, see "Artifacts."
⁶² Clark County Press, January, 1882.
⁶³ For more on Pania Blanc, see the Commentary to Juliette Kinzie's Wau Bun.
⁶⁴ John T. de la Ronde, "Personal Narrative," Wisconsin Historical Collections, VII (1876): 345-365 [350].
⁶⁵ Daniel M. Parkinson, "Pioneer Life in Wisconsin, Wisconsin Historical Collections, II (1903 [1856]): 326-364 [338-340]; Charles Bracken, "Further Strictures on Ford's Black Hawk War," Wisconsin Historical Collections, II (1903 [1856]): 402-414 [404-410].
⁶⁶ Charles E. Brown, "The White Crow Memorial Pilgrimage," Jefferson County Union (Oct. 20, 1918) 1-10 [8].
⁶⁷ Brown, "The White Crow Memorial Pilgrimage," 3.
⁶⁸ Col. Daniel M. Parkinson, "Pioneer Life in Wisconsin, Wisconsin Historical Collections, II (1903 [1856]): 326-364 [339].
⁶⁹ Brown, "The White Crow Memorial Pilgrimage," 7. "Additions and Corrections,"Wisconsin Historical Collections, X (1888): 496 (to II, 354).

Source

Moses Paquette, "The Wisconsin Winnebagoes," Wisconsin Historical Collections, XII (1892): 399-433.