Dear Jean P.S. Part Two of 10
December 2, 2019
The
First Nations
By the early 1800s the new US
government was extremely determined to grow beyond those 13 colonies, they
wanted LOTS of land and did everything in their power to remove any remaining
First Nations people from what was called the Northwest Territory, we now call
it the Midwest. Two problems here: the land was claimed by French then British,
and oh, the inhabitants were those wild people, how can the Europeans be
neighbors with people who don’t even use money? New USA created “Indian
Territorial Government” and set out to claim the land and get rid of the local
savages. The effort of indigenous American Tecumseh to gather tribes to fight
as one force for their tribal lands was not only way too late, but a new
concept, and resulted in chaos among Chieftains. Many Chiefs had varying
encounters with whites, and the relationship was occasionally one of cordial
understanding until other whites came with more determination to remove them.
Who to trust? Who had power? Who would honor their word?
First Nations folks slowly realized
that pale face often spoke with forked tongue, meaning like a snake: not to be
trusted. Treaties? Just a piece of paper. In reality, the whites were arriving
in great numbers, and they came to claim the land. The indigenous people were
up against a very accomplished and highly determined foe who often came bearing
“gifts” along with their lies. I refer you to Tecumseh’s Confederacy if you
want the sad facts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tecumseh%27s_Confederacy
Europeans only saw profit,
resources, opportunity, and land, lots of cheap beautiful land. The prevailing
attitude of many Europeans regarding American Indians was that they weren’t
people, they were savages. We now know that George Washington, yes, that
George, used First Nations warriors to greatly assist him when he fought as a
British officer in the French and Indian War of 1754 in the wilds of what is
today Pennsylvania. France claimed much of what is now Michigan, Ohio,
Pennsylvania, etc., then Great Britain fought France for the land, then new USA
fought Great Britain for same turf. Really. Yet George treated the Ohio Iroquois
accomplished warriors as he treated the slaves on his family’s Virginia tobacco
plantation, demanding they take orders from him and giving no explanation of
what was being planned, even when it put First Nations warriors in harms way
unnecessarily. The First Nations men quickly lost respect for him. More on this
by David Preston in an article, “The Trigger,” The Smithsonian magazine,
October 2019 issue. George was a jerk.
Savages. I beg to differ. Not
unlike, by the way, as the Vietnam War was sold to young American men, okay to
kill the gooks. They’re not really people. Or another popular 1966 slogan
thanks to US War Department/Pentagon/munitions manufacturers/warmongers, “Kill
a commie for Christ.” Methinks it was “Kill those people in their homeland
until they support American Commerce.”
Most interesting, perhaps if early
arriving Europeans made effort to understand First Nations culture, they would
have known that several large and independent First Nations tribes residing in
eastern and north-central North America had some important common ground. A
fresh New Yorker, July 8 & 15, 2019, has a book review by Casey Cep, where she
shares aspects of a new anthology, “The Women’s Suffrage Movement,” where
scholar Sally Roesch Wagner gives this piece of North American history. Long
before Christopher Columbus, etc., happened, there was an egalitarian society
known as the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, comprised of several powerful and
independent indigenous nations. All women in the Haudenosaunee Confederacy had
equal vote in all issues for tribal decisions, including declarations of war
and appointment of leadership. Oh that democracy! Savages, indeed. I imagine
the white guys talking this over, and agreeing that these indigenous odd ones —
can’t they wear respectable clothes and not sport their bodies? — were really
dangerous: “What if our women think they can have a say, a vote, in important
decisions?” European men knew how to keep women’s voice silent, and that was
not going to change. Hell to the no. Color them savages and shut that gender
democracy down.
More
pointed is a crime that took place where I live: Kalamazoo, Michigan.
On the outside wall of the Amtrak
train station in downtown Kalamazoo, where the large front door facing
Kalamazoo Avenue opens, there is a big bronze plaque denoting the US
government’s record of how three treaties, 1821, 1827, and 1833, were
implemented to permanently remove First Nations people from the region. By the
time of the first treaty in 1821, local indigenous folks were restricted to
living in a 9-mile zone, the “Match-E-Be-Nash-E-Wish Reserve,” (sic),
encompassing what is now modern-day downtown and surrounding neighborhoods of
Kalamazoo. The boundary was – by current understanding: Paterson St.,
Riverview, Whites Rd, Solon St. The proper name, Mach-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish, a
Band of Pottawatomi Indians, was also the name of one of the Chieftains. The
restricted area also included other Bands of Pottawatomi, each loyal to
specific Chieftain. The plaque continues:
“…three
thousand Indians gathered on this spot for nearly a week, as their Chieftains
held council, causing a weird, mournful, dramatic scene, they took up their
long line of march for the then far west, beyond the ‘Father of Waters.’
Their
tents and household goods loaded on ponies, able bodied men, women and children
accompanied by dogs, followed on foot. Sick and aged carried on litters between
ponies, papooses on backs of squaws.
Great
reluctance on leaving homes of their ancestors under Gen. Brady and Hon. Henry
Rice (Indian Land Agent) they passed single file before Judge Epaphroditus
Ransom (later Gov.) with respect doffed their ornamental headgear, elevated
their right hand to say good-bye.
Removal in 1840.”
Local folklore says that Judge
Ransom was pissed that the savages dared to show respect. He ordered his men to
tell the Chieftains to stop the gestures. The officious whites talked to the
Chieftains, then the Chieftains talked it over amongst themselves, and then
departing First Nations folks continued to make the gesture as they were forced
to leave. Class.
The plaque was created by the
Daughters of the American Revolution, and it contained several errors. They not
only could not spell the name right, but the “Removal in 1840” was myth. The
forced removal happened in 1827, how else could Kalamazoo College start in 1833
within the “reserve?” No more zone, no more Indians, and lots of land for sale.
And don’t believe for one second that it was a few white guys giving the
eviction notice to those 3,000 First Nations people, oh no. Government troops
were in plain sight, armed and loyal to the Indian Land Agent and the Judge.
The DAR plaque paints a kindly portrait of the crime, as if to brag, “we didn’t
hurt them, we just asked them to leave.” Don’t get me started about the
postcard showing weird sloppy Titus Bronson and his little log cabin on Bronson
Park turf in the heart of the “reserve” zone, first white guy, lonely settler,
pioneer, the supposed hero of our ‘zoo. White people had/have one hell of a
publicist.
Now it gets good. The three
thousand people comprised several small Bands of Pottawatomi. As they walked
away from Kalamazoo, one Band took a chance and after some days and miles broke
from the primary group, then headed north to a missionary church in Bradley,
soon to be a part of the new state of Michigan in 1837. An Episcopal church
there had been busy converting indigenous people to Christianity. The
Pottawatomi Chief and elders took a chance that the Bradley whites weren’t as
nasty as the Judge and Land Agent whites. Perhaps the church would offer safe
haven? It did.
That group grew to become the Gun
Lake Tribe, aka Nishnabek, meaning ‘first people.’ They figured out a way to
stay in what became the state of Michigan, over time became property owners,
and gained Federal recognition as a sovereign nation in 1999. You can read more
about them here: https://gunlaketribe-nsn.gov/. Now, 2019, some of their properties
have developed into a successful money-making casino. Sometimes justice wiggles
to the top.
* * * * * * * * * *
To be continued
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