Boys' Book of Indian Warriors Part 17

They were the sons of noted fathers. Benjamin Harrison, the father of Lieutenant Harrison, had been a famous patriot and a signer of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Puck-ee-shin-wah, the father of Tec.u.mseh, also had been a patriot--he had died for his nation in the battle of Point Pleasant, in 1774, when Chief Cornstalk fought for liberty.

At the Fallen Timbers, Lieutenant Harrison was an aide to General Wayne; young Tec.u.mseh was an aide to Blue-jacket. The two did not meet, but their trails were soon to join.

The name Tec.u.mseh (p.r.o.nounced by the Indians "Tay-coom-tha") means "One-who-springs" or "darts." It was a word of the Shawnees' Great Medicine Panther clan, or Meteor clan; therefore Tec.u.mseh has been known as "Crouching Panther" and "Shooting Star."

He was born in 1768 at the old Shawnee village of Piqua, on Mad River about six miles southwest of present Springfield, Ohio. His mother may have been a Creek or Cherokee woman, who had come up from the South with some of the Shawnees. The Shawnees were a Southern people, once.

The mother's name was Me-tho-a-tas-ke.

Tec.u.mseh had five brothers and one sister. Two of his brothers were twins, and at least two, besides his father, fell in battle while he was still young.

He had not been old enough to go upon the war trail with his father and Head Chief Cornstalk; but his elder brother Chee-see-kau went, and fought the Long Knives at Point Pleasant. When he came back he took little Tec.u.mseh in charge, to train him as a warrior.

When Tec.u.mseh was nineteen, he and Chee-see-kau, with a party of other braves, went upon a long journey of adventure south to the Cherokee country of Tennessee. It is said that the mother, Me-tho-tas-ke, already had left, to return to the Cherokees. Likely enough the two brothers planned to visit her.

They swung far into the west, to the Mississippi, and circled to the Cherokees. Here Ohee-see-kau was killed, while helping the Cherokees fight the whites.

He was glad to die in battle--"I prefer to have the birds pick my bones, rather than to be buried at home like an old squaw."

Tec.u.mseh stayed in the South three years, fighting to avenge his brother, who had been a father to him, and whose spirit still urged him to be brave. He got home to Ohio just in time. In league with the Little Turtle Miamis, War Chief Blue-jacket's Shawnees had defeated the American general Harmar, and every warrior was needed.

Tec.u.mseh had left as a young brave; he returned as a young chief. He was sent out with a party to spy upon the march of the gray-haired general, Saint Clair. He did good work, but he missed the big battle.

But he was at the Fallen Timbers.

Here, in the excitement when the American infantry came scrambling and cheering and stabbing, through the down trees, he rammed a bullet into his rifle ahead of the powder, and had to retreat.

"Give me a gun and I will show you how to stand fast," he appealed, to the other Indians. He was given a shot-gun. The white soldiers were too strong, his younger brother Sau-wa-see-kau was killed at his side, and he must fall back again.

This hurt his heart. When the treaty with General Wayne was signed, the next year, he did not attend. Blue-jacket, his chief, afterwards sought him out and told him all about it: that the Indians had surrendered much land.

For some years the peace sun shone upon the Ohio country. Tec.u.mseh was careful to cast no red shadow. He bore himself like an independent chief; gathered his own band of Shawnees, married a woman older than himself, lived among the Delawares, and spent much time hunting. He became known for his ringing speeches, in the councils; no Indian was more eloquent.

He was handsome, too--a true prince: six feet tall and broad shouldered, of active and haughty mien, quick step, large flashing eye's, and thin, oval Indian face, with regular features. His face was the kind that could burn with the fire of his mind.

In 1800 the Northwest Territory of which General Saint Clair had been the first governor was divided. The name Northwest Territory was limited to about what is now the state of Ohio; all west of that, to the Mississippi River, was Indiana Territory.

Captain William Henry Harrison, who had resigned from the army, was appointed governor and Indian commissioner, of Indiana Territory. He moved to Vincennes, the capital, on the lower Wabash. Chief Tec.u.mseh was living eastward on the White River. Their trails were pointing in.

Two master minds were to meet and wrestle.

The name of one of the two twins, brothers of Tec.u.mseh, was La-la-we-thi-ka, meaning "Rattle" or "Loud Voice." He was not handsome. He was blind in the right eye and had ugly features. He was looked upon as a mouthy, shallow-brained, drunken fellow, of little account as a warrior. His band invited Tec.u.mseh's band to unite with them at Greenville, in western Ohio where General Saint Clair's Fort Jefferson and General Wayne's Fort Greenville had been built.

Then, almost immediately, or in the fall of 1805, "Loud Voice" arose as the Prophet.

While smoking his pipe in his cabin he fell backward in a pretended trance, and lay as if dead. But before he was buried, he recovered.

He said that he had been to the spirit world. He called all the nation to meet him at Wapakoneta, the ancient princ.i.p.al village of the Shawnees, fifty miles northeast, and listen to a message from the Master of Life.

The message was a very good one. It was a great deal like the message of the Delaware prophet, as used by Pontiac. The Indians were to cease white-man habits. They must quit fire-water poison, must cherish the old and sick, must not marry with the white people, must cease bad medicine-making (witch-craft) and tortures; and must live happily and peacefully, sharing their lands in common.

As for him, he had been given power to cure all diseases, and to ward off death on the battle-field.

He changed his name to Ten-skwa-ta-wa--the "Open Door," but is generally styled the Prophet. His words created intense excitement.

Shawnees, Delawares and other Indians came from near and far to visit him. Tec.u.mseh was very willing. It was a great thing to have a prophet for a brother--and whether this was a put-up job between them, is to this day a mystery. But they were smart men.

The Prophet enlarged his rant. To the whites he proclaimed that he, the Open Door, Tec.u.mseh, the Shooting Star, and the other twin brother all had come at one birth. He a.s.serted that their father had been the son of a Shawnee chief and a princess, daughter of a great English governor in the South.

Anybody whom he accused of witch-craft was put to death. They usually were persons that he did not like. The Delawares and Shawnees killed old chiefs who were harmless, and friends of the settlers.

Although the Open Door's teachings seemed to be for peace and prosperity among the Indians, they brought many Indians together, and aroused much alarm among the settlers of Ohio and Indiana Territory.

Moreover, the gatherings at Greenville were upon ground that had been sold to the United States, under the treaty after the battle of the Fallen Timbers.

Governor Harrison sent a message to the Delawares, in the name of the Seventeen Fires--the United States.

"Who is this pretended prophet who dares to speak for the great Creator? If he is really a prophet, ask of him to cause the sun to stand still, the moon to alter its course, the rivers to cease to flow, or the dead to rise from their graves!"

And--

"Drive him from your town, and let peace and harmony prevail amongst you. Let your poor old men and women sleep in quietness, and banish from their minds the dreadful idea of being burnt alive by their own friends and countrymen."

The Delawares listened, even the Shawnees were sickening of the witch-craft fraud--but the Prophet seized upon an opportunity.

In this 1806 an eclipse of the sun was due, and he knew, beforehand.

Perhaps he was told by British agents, for the war of 1812 was looming, and there was bad feeling between the two white nations.

"The American governor has demanded of me a sign," he proclaimed. "On a certain day I will darken the sun."

And so he did.

His fame spread like a wind. Runners carried the news of him and of his power through tribe after tribe. He made long journeys, himself.

In village after village, from the Seminoles of Florida to the Chippewas of the Canada border, from the Mingos of the Ohio River to the Blackfeet of the farthest upper Missouri, either he or some of his disciples appeared.

They bore with them a mystic figure, the size of the body of a man, all wrapped in white cloth and never opened. This they tended carefully.

They bore with them a string of white beans, said to be made from the Prophet's flesh.

They preached that dogs were to be killed; lodge fires were never to go out; liquor was not to be drunk; wars were not to be waged, unless ordered by the Prophet. Each warrior was obliged to draw the string of beads through his fingers; by this, he "shook hands" with the Prophet, and swore to obey his teachings.

It was rumored that within four years a great "death" would cover the entire land, and that only the Indians who followed the Prophet would escape. These should enjoy the land, freed of the white men.

Tec.u.mseh bowed before his talented brother, and had his own dreams; dreams of a vast war league against the Americans. The Prophet was in control of eight or ten thousand warriors.

The Prophet's band at Greenville increased to four hundred--Shawnees, Delawares, Wyandots, Chippewas, and others; a regular hodge-podge.

Captain William Wells, who was the Indian agent at Fort Wayne, asked them to have four chiefs come in, to listen to a message from their Great Father, the President.

On a sudden Tec.u.mseh took the lead, as head chief.

"Go back to Fort Wayne," he ordered of the runner, a half-breed Shawnee, "and tell Captain Wells that my fire is kindled on the spot appointed by the Great Spirit above; and if he has anything to say to me, he must come here. I shall expect him in six days from this time."

Captain Wells then sent the message. The President asked the Indians to move off from this ground which was not theirs. He would help them to select other ground.

Tec.u.mseh replied hotly, in a speech of defiance.