The Ghost-dance religion and the Sioux outbreak of 1890 : $b Fourteenth annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology, part 2.Mooney, James
Religion
The Ghost-dance religion and the Sioux outbreak of 1890 : $b Fourteenth annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology, part 2.
Mooney, James
Dakota Indians -- Wars, 1890-1891; Ghost dance
This portrait is a copy of the one given by Lossing in his American
Revolution and the War of 1812, +III.+ (1875), page 283. He quotes
a description of Tecumtha’s personal appearance by a British
officer who saw him in 1812, and then goes on to give the history
of the portrait. “Captain J. B. Glegg, Brock’s aid-de-camp, has
left on record the following description of Tecumtha at that
interview: ‘Tecumseh’s appearance was very prepossessing; his
figure light and finely proportioned; his age I imagined to be
about five and thirty [he was about forty]; in height, 5 feet 9
or 10 inches; his complexion light copper; countenance oval, with
bright hazel eyes, bearing cheerfulness, energy, and decision.
Three small silver crosses or coronets were suspended from the
lower cartilage of his aquiline nose, and a large silver medallion
of George the Third, which I believe his ancestor had received from
Lord Dorchester when governor-general of Canada, was attached to
a mixed-colored wampum string and hung round his neck. His dress
consisted of a plain, neat uniform, tanned deerskin jacket, with
long trowsers of the same material, the seams of both being covered
with neatly cut fringe, and he had on his feet leather moccasins,
much ornamented with work made from the dyed quills of the
porcupine.’ The portrait of Tecumtha above given is from a pencil
sketch by Pierre Le Dru.... In this I have given only the head by
Le Dru. The cap was red, and in front was a single eagle’s feather,
black, with a white tip. The sketch of his dress (and the medal
above described), in which he appears as a brigadier-general of
the British army, is from a rough drawing, which I saw in Montreal
in the summer of 1858, made at Malden soon after the surrender of
Detroit, where the Indians celebrated that event by a grand feast.
It was only on gala occasions that Tecumtha was seen in full dress.
The sketch did not pretend to give a true likeness of the chief,
and was valuable only as a delineation of his costume. From the
two we are enabled to give a pretty faithful picture of the great
Shawnoese warrior and statesman as he appeared in his best mood.
When in full dress he wore a cocked hat and plume, but would not
give up his blue breechcloth, red leggings fringed with buckskin,
and buckskin moccasins.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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