The Lenâpé and Their Legends: With the complete text and symbols of the Walam olum, a new translation, and an inquiry into its authenticityBrinton, Daniel G. (Daniel Garrison)
History
The Lenâpé and Their Legends: With the complete text and symbols of the Walam olum, a new translation, and an inquiry into its authenticity
Brinton, Daniel G. (Daniel Garrison)
Delaware Indians; Delaware language -- Texts; Picture-writing, Indian
To escape its direful scenes, a part of the Delawares removed south,
to upper Louisiana, in 1789, where they received official permission
from Governor Carondelet, in 1793, to locate permanent homes.[209]
Zeisberger also, in 1791, conducted his colony of Christian Indians
to Canada, and founded the town of Fairfield, on the Retrenche river.
Thus, in both directions the Delawares were driven off the soil of the
United States. Yet those that remained in Ohio, if we may accept the
account of John Brickell, who was a captive among them from 1791 to
1796, attempted to live a peaceable and agricultural life.[210]
Peace restored, the Delawares made their next remove to the valley
of White Water river, Indiana, where they attempted to rekindle the
national council fire, under the head chief Tedpachxit. They founded
six towns, the largest of which was _Woapikamikunk_ or _Wapeminskink_,
"Place of Chestnut Trees." This tract was guaranteed them "in
perpetuity" by the treaty of Vincennes, 1808.[211] Nevertheless, just
ten years later, at the treaty of St. Mary's, they released the whole
of their land, "without reserve," to the United States, the government
agreeing to remove them west of the Mississippi, and grant them land
there.
At this time they numbered about 1000 souls, of whom 800 were
Delawares, the others being Mohegans and Nanticokes.[212] Their head
chief was Thahutoowelent, of the Turkey tribe, Tedpachxit having been
assassinated, at the instigation of Tecumseh.
They are described as "having a peculiar aversion to white people,"
and "more opposed to the Gospel and the whites than any other
Indians,"[213] which is small matter of wonder, when they had seen the
peaceful Christian converts of their nation massacred three times, in
cold blood, once at Gnadenhütten, in Pennsylvania (1756); again at
Gnadenhütten, in Ohio (1788), and finally at Fairfield, Canada (1813).
The Rev. Isaac McCoy, who visited them on the White Water, in the
winter of 1818-19, states that they lived in log huts and bark
shanties, and were fearfully deteriorated by whisky drinking.[214]
The last band of the Delawares that appeared in Ohio was in 1822.[215]
The location assigned to the Delawares was near the mouth of the
Kansas river, Kansas. They were reported, in 1850, as possessing there
375,000 acres and numbering about 1500 souls. Four years later they
"ceded" this land, and were moved to various reservations in the Indian
Territory.
There still remain about sixty natives at New Westfield, near Ottawa,
Kansas, under the charge of the Moravian Church. The same denomination
has about 300 of the tribe on the reservation at Moraviantown, in the
province of Ontario, Canada. A second reservation in Canada is under
the charge of the Anglican Church. The majority of the tribe are
scattered in different agencies in the Indian Territory.
§ 3. _Missionary Efforts in the Provinces of New Jersey and
Pennsylvania_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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