History of the Ojibways - Chapter 7

Preliminary remarks--Visit of Claude Allouez to the Bay of Shag-a-waum-ik-ong, as known to the Ojibways--Definition of "Wa-me-tig-oshe," the Ojibway name for Frenchman--Antique silver crucifix found near La Pointe--Ancient prophecy foretelling the coming of the white race--The singular dream of Ma-se-wa-pe-ga--He goes in search of the white spirits--Finds them and returns to his people with presents--He makes a second journey and returns with the fire-arms and fire-water--Anecdote of the first trial and effect of fire-water--Anecdote of the effect of the fire-arm among the Dakotas--Two white traders found starving on the island of La Pointe--First white visitors to the Ojibways in the Bay of Shag-a-waum-ik-ong--Two hundred years ago--Establishment of traders and priests at the Ojibway village--Remarks, etc.

The era of their first knowledge of, and intercourse with the white race, is one of most vital importance in the history of the aborigines of this continent.

So far as their own tribe is concerned, the Ojibways have preserved accurate and detailed accounts of this event; and the information which their old men orally give on this subject, is worthy of much consideration, although they may slightly differ from the accounts which standard historians and writers have presented to the world, and which they have gleaned from the writings of the enterprising and fearless old Jesuit missionaries, and from the published narratives of the first adventurers who pierced into the heart of the American wilderness. This source of information may be considered as more reliable and authentic than the oral traditions of the Indians, but as we have undertaken to write their history as they themselves tell it, we will do so without respect to what has already been written by eminent and standard authors. The writer is disposed to consider as true and perfectly reliable, the information which he has obtained and thoroughly investigated, on this subject, and which he will proceed in this chapter to relate in the words of his old Indian informants.

A few preliminary remarks are deemed necessary, before fully entering into the narrative of the Ojibway's first knowledge and intercourse with his white brother.

Those who have carefully examined the writings of the old Jesuit missionaries and early adventurers, who claim to have been the first discoverers of new regions, and new people, in the then dark wilderness of the west, or central America, have found many gross mistakes and exaggerations, and their works as a whole, are only tolerated and their accounts made matters of history, because no other source of information has ever been opened to the public

It is a fact found generally true, that the first adventurer who is able to give a flaming account of his travels, is handed down to posterity as the first discoverer of the country and people which he describes as having visited, when mayhap, that same region, and those same people had been, long previous, discovered by some obscure and more modest man, who, because he could not blazon forth his achievements in a book of travels, forever loses the credit of what he really has performed.

Many instances of this nature are being daily brought to light, and might be enumerated. Among others, Mr. Catlin claims in his book (and is believed by all who do not know to the contrary), to have been the first white man who visited the Dakota pipestone quarry, when in fact, that same quarry had been known to, and visited by white traders for nearly a century before Catlin saw it and wrote his book.

In the same manner also, Charles Lanman, of later notoriety, claims to have been the first white man who visited the Falls of the St. Louis River, when in fact Aitkin, Morrison, Sayer, and a host of others as white as he, had visited, and resided for fifty years within sound of those same falls.1 It is thus that a man who travels for the purpose of writing a book to sell, and who, being a man of letters, is able to trumpet forth his own fame, often plucks the laurels due to more modest and unlettered adventurers.  The allusion is to Lanman's Summer in the Wilderness, published in New York, 1847.--E. D. N.

Mr. Bancroft in his standard "History of the United States," mentions that in the year 1665, the enterprising and persevering Jesuit missionary, Claude Allouez, with one companion, pushed his way into Lake Superior and discovered the Ojibways congregated in a large village in the Bay of Shag-a-waum-ik-ong, and preparing to go on a war party against the Dakotas; that he resided two years among them, and taught a choir of their youths to chant the Pater and Ave.

This is the first visit made by white men to this point on Lake Superior, of which we have any reliable written testimony. The account as given in Bancroft's "History" is not altogether corroborated by the Ojibways. It is only through minute and repeated inquiry, that I have learned the fact from their own lips, of this early visit of a "black gowned priest," but not of his having resided with them for any length of time. And they assert positively that it was many years after the first visit of the white men to their village in the Bay of Shag-a-waum-ik-ong, that the "priest" made his appearance among them. And I am disposed to doubt that as long a stay as two years was made by Father Allouez among their people, or that any of them learned to chant canticles, for the reason that the Ojibways, who are so minute in the relation of the particulars of any important event in their history, comprised within the past eight generations, do not make any mention of these facts. It is probable that the two years stay of this Jesuit in the Bay of Shag-a-waum-ik-ong, amounted to an occasional visit from Sault Ste. Marie, or Quebec, which place had already at this period, become the starting and rallying point of Western French adventurers. (Mr. Bancroft erroneously wrote in the 14th edition of the History of the United States, that Allouez "on the first day of October arrived at the great village of the Chippewas in the Bay of Chagouamigon," but Mr. Warren is also wrong in his supposition.)

Allouez upon invitation of traders came with them to Chagouamigon Bay in October 1665. At that time there was no permanent Ojibway village beyond Sault Ste. Marie. He built a bark chapel on the shores of the Bay between a village of Petun Hurons, and a village comprised of three bands of Ottawas. On the 30th of August 1667, he returned to Montreal, and in two days departed again for Lake Superior, where he remained until 1669, when a mission was established among the Ojibways at Sault Ste. Marie. In 1669 Marquette succeeded Allouez, in the words of the Relation of 1669--70, "at Chagouamigong where the Outaouacs and Hurons dwell." He remained with them until they were driven out of Lake Superior in 1671 by the Sioux.--E. D. N.

In those days there appears to have been a spirit of competition and rivalry among the different sects of the Catholic priesthood, as to who would pierce farthest into the western wilderness of America to plant the cross.

Imagination in some instances, outstripped their actual progress, and missionary stations are located on Hennepin's old map, in spots where a white man had never set foot. That the Catholic priests appeared amongst their earliest white visitors, the Ojibways readily acknowledge. And the name by which they have ever known the French people is a sufficient testimony to this fact, Wa-me-tig-oshe. For many years this name could not be translated by the imperfect interpreters employed by the agents of the French and English, and its literal definition was not given till during the last war, at a council of different tribes, convened by the British at Drummond's Isle. The several Ojibway interpreters present were asked to give its definition. All failed, till John Baptiste Cadotte, acknowledge to be the most perfect interpreter of the Algics in his time, arose and gave it as follows: "Wa-mit-ig-oshe is derived from wa-wa, to wave, and metig, wood or stick, and means literally, people or 'men of the waving stick,' derived from the fact that when the French first appeared among the Algonquins who have given them this name, they came accompanied with priests who waved the Cross over their heads whenever they landed at an Indian village."

The circumstance also is worthy of mention, that a few years ago, an old Indian woman dug up an antique silver crucifix on her garden at Bad River near La Pointe, after it had been deeply ploughed. This discovery was made under my own observation, and I recollect at the time it created quite a little excitement amongst the good Catholics of La Pointe, who insisted that the Great Spirit had given this as a token for the old woman to join the church. The crucifix was found about two feet from the surface of the ground, composed of pure silver, about three inches long and size in proportion. It has since been buried at Gull Lake, in the grave of a favorite grandchild of the old Indian woman, to whom she had given it as a plaything. (Another article in this volume shows that silver crosses were sold by French and English traders.--E. D. N.)

The Ojibways affirm that long before they became aware of the white man's presence on this continent, their coming was prophesied by one of their old men, whose great sanctity and oft-repeated fasts, enabled him to commune with spirits and see far into the future. He prophesied that the white spirits would come in numbers like sand on the lakeshore, and would sweep the red race from the hunting grounds, which the Great Spirit had given them as an inheritance. It was prophesied that the consequence of the white man's appearance would be, to the An-ish-in-aub-ag, an "ending of the world." They acknowledge that at first their ancestors believed not the words of the old prophet foretelling these events; but now as the present generation daily see the foretold events coming to pass in all their details, the more reflective class firmly believe that they are truly a "doomed race." It was through harping on this prophecy, by which Te-cum-seh and his brother, the celebrated Show-a-no prophet, succeeded so well in forming a coalition among the Algic and other tribes, the main and secret object of which, was the final extermination of the white race from America.

The account which the Ojibways give of their first knowledge of the whites, is as follows:--
While still living in their large and central town on the Island of La Pointe, a principal and leading Me-da-we priest, whose name was Ma-se-wa-pe-ga (whole ribs), dreamed a dream wherein he beheld spirits in the form of men, but possessing white skins and having their heads covered. They approached him with hands extended and with smiles on their faces. This singular dream he related to the principal men of the Ojibways on the occasion of a grand sacrificial feast to his guardian dream-spirit. He informed them that the white spirits who had thus appeared to him, resided toward the rising sun, and that he would go and search for them. His people tried to dissuade him from undertaking what they termed a foolish journey, but firm in his belief, and strong in his determination, he was occupied a whole year in making preparations for his intended journey. He built a strong canoe of birch bark and cedar wood; he hunted and cured plenty of meat for his provisions; and early in the spring when the ice had left the Great Lakes, and he had completed his preparations, Ma-se-wa-pe-ga, with only his wife for a companion, started on his travels in quest of the white spirits whom he had seen in his dream.

conclude chapter 7