Death of the Tribal Church: Keeping the Faith

Conclusion of the Death of the Tribal Church Series
A series of posts about the church history of the Stockbridge Mohicans

I. Introduction
II. Summary of Tribal Church History, 1734 - 1844
III. A "Riot" with "no Fighting"
IV. Was Jeremiah Slingerland "a Man of too much Consequence"?
V. Was Jeremiah Slingerland a Big Spender?
VI. The ABCFM Pulls out of Stockbridge
VII. The Citizen Party Makes a Request
VII. Jeremiah Slingerland Keeps on Preaching

Today's post: Keeping the Faith




This 1878 map shows the Stockbridge Reservation shrunk to 1/4 its original size. Contrary to what some say, the shrinking of this reservation cannot entirely be blamed on the Congressman/Lumber Barron Philetus Sawyer. The Indian party leaders who made closed-room deals with Sawyer (Jeremiah Slingerland as much as anybody) are also responsible.


Reverend Slingerland's death appears to have devastated his Presbyterian congregation. The three Presbyterian ministers sent to serve the tribe between 1884 and 1907 stayed for an average of only about a year. But even before Slingerland's death, the era of a unified tribal church for the Stockbridge Mohicans had already passed. Led by Stephen Gardner, some of Slingerland's political opponents (citizen party families) already had a preference for Roman Catholicism. While their neighbors, the Menominees had a long association with the Catholics, many of the Stockbridges would insist on remaining Protestant. Among them were leaders like William C. Davids and Ed Sprague who sought out Lutheran ministers in the area in 1892, giving rise not only to Immanuel Mohican Lutheran Church, but also to a Lutheran boarding school. Nevertheless, for better or for worse, there was no going back to having one church for all of the Stockbridge Mohicans.

One hundred and twenty-five years after Jeremiah Slingerland's death, there is still a Presbyterian church on the reservation. While Presbyterianism has survived, Christianity as a whole has done better. Now over one hundred and sixty years after the ABCFM withdrew its support of the Stockbridge Mohicans' mission, my estimate is that church attendance on the reservation is comparable to national averages.


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This is the last of a series of seven posts.

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Some serious issues have been covered in this series of posts.
One is the issue of white mission societies being unwilling to promote or encourage independence from Indian churches.

I made it a point to stick to the facts:
But in this case much of what we know is "He said, she said" material. Many of the facts we have are rather subjective statements, the perceptions of Cutting Marsh and Jeremiah Slingerland. I don't think either was dishonest. What Marsh saw as a "riot," Slingerland saw as an event where "excitement prevailed" but there was "no fighting, save one."

Race, religion, culture, politics, personal ownership and thrift... these are just some of the controversial issues that this series of posts has touched on. Your comments are appreciated.

Death of the Tribal Church: the Citizen Party Makes a Request

Death of the Tribal Church Series
A series of blogposts about the Stockbridge Mohicans and their relationship with the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
I. Introduction
II. Summary of Tribal Church History, 1734 - 1844
III. A "Riot" with "no Fighting"
IV. Was Jeremiah Slingerland "a Man of too much Consequence"?
V. Was Jeremiah Slingerland a Big Spender?
VI. The ABCFM Pulls out of Stockbridge

VII: Today's post:
The Citizen Party Makes a Request




This modern-day Lenape elder is doing a switch dance. This isn't necessarily the same kind of dancing that the Munsees that came to the new Shawano County reservation were doing at that time.



A new treaty made in 1856 was intended to bring together the Indian Party, the citizen Party, and other Indians, including Munsees, on some land purchased for them from the Menominees in what is now Shawano County, Wisconsin. Since the new reservation was purchased entirely with Indian party funds, much of the Indian party refused to move to the new reservation. However, Jeremiah and Sarah Slingerland made the move in February of 1857, while other Indian party leaders were still protesting (letter from Sarah Slingerland to J.N. Davidson, 9/19/1890, quoted in Davidson, page 55).

The citizen party was in power on the Shawano County reservation and within three weeks of Slingerland's arrival they sent a letter to the ABCFM in which they claimed their political troubles had finally been settled. They proceeded to ask that another missionary be sent.

The Munsee Indians still remain in darkness and ignorance - they worship the great Spirit by dancing. Our people here have had no regular teacher [of the gospel] for some time... and as their former missionaries have heretofore been sent by good white people of the east, they are led to look again that way, and...respectfully inquire [whether they will] again be favored by a minister or not (quoted from a 3/3/1857 letter from the Stockbridge Indians to the ABCFM, ABCFM Papers).

The letter itself, of course, tells us that the citizen party leaders wanted a minister. But some parts of the quote above, as well as the timing of the letter, suggests that the citizen party leaders didn't want Slingerland, a leader of the Indian party, to be their minister.

The ABCFM did not send a new missionary.



Additional sources used:
*John C. Adams Papers (State Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin)
*Schafer's Domesday Book
*Oberly's A Nation of Statesmen.

Death of the Tribal Church: The ABCFM Pulls out of Stockbridge

The ABCFM Papers are kept here at Harvard University's Houghton Library. The Papers are available in microfilm via interlibrary loan. Refer to the ABCFM Papers finding aid for a list of reels of microfilm covering missions to many nations.

The Death of the Tribal Church Series:
I. Introduction
II. Summary of Tribal Church History, 1734 - 1844
III. A "Riot" with "no Fighting"
IV. Was Jeremiah Slingerland "a Man of too much Consequence"?
V. Was Jeremiah Slingerland a Big Spender?

Today's post:
The ABCFM Pulls out of Stockbridge

Situated in Boston, the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions didn't have the luxury of closely overseeing its missionaries in the field. In making decisions, it seems they had to rely heavily on the views of their missionaries. Several months before he left the Stockbridge Mohicans, Reverend Cutting Marsh was already advising the ABCFM about what he felt should be done after his departure. During Marsh's lame duck period the ABCFM also took the opportunity to have Marsh reconsider some of his recommendations.

Asked by the ABCFM "Ought [Jeremiah Slingerland] not be encouraged to go on preaching and keep the church together?" Marsh replied that he felt Slingerland should not be ordained for a number of reasons, one being that he continued to lack confidence in Slingerland's work and another being that Slingerland had been investigated by the Green Bay Indian Agent for asking to be paid for teaching "two schools at the same time" (letter from Marsh to Greene, 9/21/1848, ABCFM Papers).

Marsh was also asked about the mission property. He made it clear that his position had not changed since 1845 when he wrote that the ABCFM was "under no obligation whatever to the tribe for any of [the mission] property excepting fifteen acres of the soil" (letter from Marsh to Greene, 7/28/1845, ABCFM Papers).

And so the ABCFM decided to withdraw from the Stockbridge mission. Cutting Marsh and his family moved out of the mission house but Jeremiah Slingerland didn't move in. Nor was he ordained.




A modern satellite photo of Wisconsin's Lake Winnebago. The village of Stockbridge is on the east shore.



The treaty made on November 24th, 1848 promised the Indian party a number of payments for lost lands as well as money to start over and a new seventy-two section reservation (a section is equal to 640 acres, or one square mile). However, exactly where the Indian party would move was not specified. The Indian party never did come to an agreement with the federal government over where they would go. As years went by, many members of both the citizen party and the Indian party remained at Stockbridge on Lake Winnebago.

Jeremiah Slingerland continued his work as a schoolteacher - paid by government funds - and on the side he preached, farmed, and attended to Indian party politics. In 1853 he married a white woman named Sarah who was also a teacher. Town records show that white ministers O.P. Clinton and J.P. Jones as well as Slingerland were paid to preach between 1850 and 1857.


This series will continue.

Death of the Tribal Church: Was Jeremiah Slingerland a Big Spender?

Death of The Tribal Church Series
A Series of Blogposts about the Stockbridge Mohicans and their relationship to the American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Missions (ABCFM)
I. Introduction
II. Summary of Tribal Church History, 1734 - 1844
III. A "Riot" with "no Fighting"
IV. Was Jeremiah Slingerland "a Man of too much Consequence"?



Today's post:
Was Jeremiah Slingerland a Big Spender?


Although Jeremiah Slingerland was a Stockbridge Mohican, Cutting Marsh described him as the kind of man who might wear the same kind of clothes as the Englishmen in this drawing.



One of Cutting Marsh's biggest charges against Jeremiah Slingerland regarded his handling of money. Marsh felt that "if an Indian has money he will lay it out for anything he may fancy he needs....[and] I find Mr. S an Indian still in this respect"(letter from Marsh to Greene, 11/18/1847, ABCFM Papers). Slingerland had asked the ABCFM for money more than once and he had explained that he needed it to buy clothes. When asked about the matter Marsh opined

His complaint about clothes would appear strange to one who should have seen...his wardrobe, the genteel manner in which he dressed daily and on the Sabbath and especially the pile of clothes he would furnish Monday morning for the wash. Mrs. M[arsh] repeatedly remarked whilst he lived with us [that] she would rather do the washing and ironing of two common men than Mr. S[lingerland] (quoted from Marsh's letter to Greene of 11/11/1847, ABCFM Papers).

Given the opportunity to defend himself, Slingerland wrote,

Respecting my economical habits, I suppose I have not shown them to that degree I might have done. But Sir, I ask who does? Who is not conscious of greater indulgences than what he ought to have allowed upon himself? (quoted from Slingerland's letter to Greene of 2/9/1848, ABCFM Papers).

Although we know that racism prevented Native ministers of earlier generations from making a decent living, there is really no way for us to determine whether or not Slingerland received enough pay for his work or whether or not he was disciplined enough to budget it properly. From our modern perspective it is nobody's business how one spends one's own money, but Marsh believed that the repairs on the mission property that Slingerland would make "would amount to five times as much as they would under a white man's direction." Furthermore, Marsh predicted that the mission property, if turned over to Slingerland, would be mortgaged within five years in order to pay debts. Marsh went into further detail explaining why he felt this way, bout, once again, it is impossible for us to know with any certainty how fair or unfair his opinion of Slingerland's spending habits were (letter from Marsh to Greene, apparently undated, ABCFM Papers).

But when it came to budgeting, it wasn't just Slingerland that Marsh complained about to the ABCFM, it was the tribe as a whole:

I have long felt and others have said the same that the Stockbridges ought to do something themselves towards [financially] supporting he gospel. when they want to send a delegation to Washington[,] which has been often since I resided amongst them[,] they will always find a way to get the means. When they want to employ a lawyer[,] which they often do[,] they will raise enough money to pay him. And it has appeared to me that the gospel ought to be considered as being worth something as well as the services of lawyers (quoted from Marsh's letter to Greene of 10/18/1847, ABCFM Papers).

Marsh acknowledged that the Indians were poor. but he noted that the neighboring Brothertown Indians provided some of the financial support for their missionary (letter from Marsh to Greene, 4/12/1848, ABCFM Papers).

Death of the Tribal Church: Was Jeremiah Slingerland "a Man of too much Consequence"?

The Death of the Tribal Church Series:
I. Introduction
II. Summary of Tribal Church History 1734 - 1844
III. A "Riot" with "no Fighting"

Today's post:
Was Jeremiah Slingerland "a Man of too much Consequence"?



After the act of 1843 was passed, frontier businessman Daniel Whitney and other whites eagerly bought up pieces of what had been the Stockbridge Reservation from Indians who had "acquired the rights of citizenship."



The Stockbridge Mohicans' bitter inter-tribal politics alienated Cutting Marsh and Jeremiah Slingerland from each other. The partisanship went back at least as far as 1843 when the tribe's citizen party succeeded in getting the United States Congress to declare all Stockbridges citizens of the United States. This essentially dissolved the tribal government and turned the reservation into private allottments. While leaders of the Indian party worked to nullify the act of 1843, members of both parties went ahead and proceeded to sell land. In 1846 the Indian party - of which Jeremiah Slingerland became a member - succeeded in getting the act of 1843 overturned. Something about the act of 1846 (which overturned the act of 1843) disturbed Cutting Marsh.

Although the Indian Party sold land and gave warantee deeds unconditionally [under the] act of 1843[,] still in the act of 1846 they got a clause inserted declaring all land sales under the former act null and void. They now suppose that all the lands they have sold have come back without compensation to the purchasers of any kind; and the leading man in the party I understand is determined they shouldn't be paid anything in return... I am very much tried upon the subject. And Mr. S[lingerland,] speaking of the subject[,] called them in my presence 'the supposed claims of white men' (letter from Marsh to Treat, 6/21/1847, ABCFM Papers).

In addition to the fallout from Slingerland's political activities, Marsh had other concerns. According to Marsh's brand of Christianity, pride was a great sin and he didn't like the praise and attention that he believed was lavished upon Slingerland for being a well-educated Indian. Marsh complained to the ABCFM that "Good people of the East have flattered [Slingerland]" with the result that Slingerland had "become a man of too much consequence" (letter from Marsh to Greene 9/13/1847, ABCFM Papers). On the same day that Marsh wrote those words, the tribal government - members of Slingerland's Indian Party - wrote their own letter to the ABCFM, asking that Slingerland be appointed in Marsh's place. The tribal leaders were careful to praise both men, but in noting that Slingerland was "now thirty-one years old," they may have hoped to cast doubt on Marsh's claims that Slingerland needed more experience before he could exhibit good judgement (letter from tribal leaders to the ABCFM, 9/13/1847).

Death of the Tribal Church: A "Riot" with "no Fighting"

The Death of the Tribal Church Series:
I. Introduction
II: Summary of Tribal Church History, 1734 - 1844

Today's post:
III. A "Riot" with "no Fighting"

Today's community of Stockbridge, Wisconsin is still a rural village of about 600 people. By 1845 some combination of the Stockbridge Mohicans' conflicts and struggles and Cutting Marsh's own stern stubbornness had greatly compromised his effectiveness as the missionary. However, a member of the tribe was studying to become a minister and Marsh mentioned him in a letter to the ABCFM. "Jeremiah Slingerland[,] now in the Theological Seminary in Bangor [Maine] will leave there this fall and he intends to visit his people. I have thought that it would be best to have him take my place here." Marsh added "perhaps he would do more good than a white man"(Letter from Marsh to David Greene, 7/28/1845, ABCFM Papers).

By the time Marsh wrote that letter, Jeremiah Slingerland had already served the ABCFM in mission work with the Penobscots at Old Town, Maine. Slingerland did return to the Wisconsin Territory in the fall of 1845. He moved in with Rev. Marsh and his family and began working as a schoolteacher and assistant minister. Marsh's first reports of Slingerland's labors to the ABCFM, were positive. Marsh observed that Slingerland "appears to take great interest in the welfare of his people, takes hold and labors harmoniously"(letter from Marsh to Greene, 2/17/1846, ABCFM Papers). However, by the summer of 1846, Slingerland had become involved in tribal politics and, in so doing, he alienated some members of the church and also Rev. Marsh (Marsh to Greene of 8/11/1846, ABCFM Papers). From that point on, Marsh was convinced that Slingerland didn't have good enough judgement to take over his post (see especially Marsh's letter to Greene of 4/1/1847, ABCFM Papers).

The first significant political activity Slingerland was involved in was described as a "riot" by Marsh. but in his own report to the ABCFM, Slingerland asserted that there had been "no fighting... save one." Nevertheless, Slingerland admitted that "excitement prevailed" and explained that his party, after seeking legal counsel, decided it was appropriate to use physical force to prevent a white tax collector from seizing their property. After describing his version of the event in question, Slingerland asked the ABCFM for a different assignment, noting that the "labor here is just enough to employ one." He felt members of the church preferred him to Marsh but his own preference was "I should wish Mr. Marsh remain and have me go some where" (letter from Slingerland to Greene, 4/6/1847). However, the ABCFM did not act and both men stayed put. Relations between them deteriorated to the point where Slingerland moved out of the Marsh household and the two men avoided each other. Slingerland continued his mission work but stopped reporting what he was doing to Marsh (letter from Slingerland to Greene, 2/9/1847). As a result, Marsh couldn't possibly have appreciated the work Slingerland was doing from that point on.

Death of the Tribal Church: Summary of Tribal Church History, 1734 to 1844

Death of the Tribal Church:
The Stockbridge Mohicans and the ABCFM
I. Introduction
II. Today's post: Summary of Tribal Church History 1734-1844


As this crude map shows, what is now the state of Wisconsin was part of the Michigan Territory in 1830, the year that Cutting Marsh began his ministry to the Stockbridge Mohicans.


During Cutting Marsh's time as the missionary to the Stockbridge Indians, when people out east spoke of "Green Bay," they weren't referring to the modern city of Green Bay, but, rather, much of what we would now call eastern Wisconsin. The Stockbridges' first settlement was known as Statesburg and it was located within today's city of Kaukauna.






By the 1730's the once-mighty Mohican Indian nation was devastated by diseases, warfare, and other aspects of more than one-hundred years of white contact. Not only had their numbers decreased dramatically, but the Mohican hunting and gathering economy and their traditional religion were greatly weakened. In 1734 two Mohican chiefs were approached by two clergymen who represented the New England Company, a philanthropic mission society based in London. A Christian mission was proposed by the two ministers. This proposal was later debated in a local council and ultimately at a council of the Mohican nation. It was decided that the new religion "should be preached in one certain village and let every man and woman hear it and accept it if they think best" (Hendrick Aupaumut, "Extract From an Indian History," in Massachusetts Historical Collections, pages 99-102). A missionary and a schoolteacher were successful enough to attract Mohicans and other Indians and the town of Stockbridge, Massachusetts was incorporated in 1739.

Aspects of white contact continued to cause more suffering among the Stockbridge Mohicans in the decades after the mission town was established. Many of their best men died while fighting for the British (against the French) and for the young United States in the Revolutionary War (See Frazier's The Mohicans of Stockbridge for more about this period of time). There is not space here to describe all of the tribe's struggles and losses except to note that they were pushed west, to New York State by the 1780's, and by the mid-1820's most of them had settled along the Fox River in what is now Kaukauna, Wisconsin.

Despite their hard times over the years, tribal leaders prided themselves on being "civilized" Christian Indians. However, they had left their missionary back in New Stockbridge, New York. They addressed the issue of being without a missionary in an undated draft of a letter they intended to send to a mission society.

We hold meetings for divine worship regularly every Sabbath, conferences on fridays, concerts for prayer every first monday in each month. The meetings are conducted by the members of the church by prayers and reading a chapter with the notes and observations in Scott's Bible.

And we would also inform you that here is an extensive country where the people are absolutely without any means whereby they might attain to the knowledge of a true God, a great field indeed where much improvement is wanting in all respects [the Ho-Chunk or Winnebago Indians and the Menominees] are all in a spiritual sense sitting in the regions [of the] shadow of death. May God in his allwise providence dispose the hearts of the heralds of the cross to come into this distant country to sound the glad tidings of the gospel not only to us but may it also reach our Menominee and Winnebago brethren who have no knowledge of our blessed redeemer (found in the John C. Adams Papers at the Wisconsin State Historical Society, Madison).

While it is not clear exactly where that letter wound up, Rev. Jesse Miner who was serving the remnant of the tribe in New York State visited the Fox River settlement in 1827. A year later, Miner was instructed by the American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Missions (ABCFM) to move his ministry permanently. However, Miner died after serving the Stockbridge Mohicans on the Fox River for only several months.

Under the auspices of the ABCFM, Rev. Cutting Marsh began his ministry among the Stockbridge Mohicans in 1830. A few years later, Marsh moved along with the tribe to some good agricultural land on the east shore of Lake Winnebago. Their settlement there - as it was in Massachusetts - became known as "Stockbridge" in English and "Muhheconnuk" in their native language. While it appears that Marsh had something of a honeymoon period with the tribe, he was not as tolerant as some of his more successful predecessors had been. Marsh, of course, was also unfortunate to be serving the Stockbridges at a time when inter-tribal political tensions - largely resulting from federal Indian policy - were coming to a head.



This is part of a continuing series.

Death of the Tribal Church: Introduction

As the Stockbridge Mohican's white missionary gets ready to leave them, the tribe is divided politically. Although a promising young member of the tribe has graduated from an eastern seminary, his political involvement alienates him from the missionary and others. To what extent is a unified tribal church possible amongst a politically divided tribe? Will a white mission society support Indians without the presence of a white missionary? This is what the present series of posts is about.


In my research on the conflict between Cutting Marsh and Jeremiah Slingerland, I was fortunate, not only to have a chance to look at microfilmed ABCFM records and other primary materials, but I also benefited from reading Roger Nichols' (pictured) thesis, Cutting Marsh: Missionary to the Stockbridges. At least some of the conclusions I've come to were first made by Roger Nichols back in 1959. Although Nichols is now a well-known historian, few people are aware that he ever studied the Stockbridge Mohicans. I'm grateful to be able to present material here which he addressed decades ago.

The young state of Wisconsin created this flag to reflect an economic future that didn't necessarily include Indians.

Death of the Tribal Church:

The Stockbridge Mohicans and the ABCFM

(American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions)

Introduction

The year is 1848. Over the past fifteen years, what had been the Stockbridge Reservation on the east shore of Lake Winnebago has gone form having no white people to having three whites for every Indian. The brand new state of Wisconsin plans to flex its muscles and have the Stockbridge Mohicans move west of the Mississippi River. in fact, for a number of years the federal government has already been trying to push the tribe west. Treaties and acts of Congress over the past ten years which were purported to be "for the relief of the Stockbridge Indians" have only brought about a complicated and confusing situation and fostered bitterly partisan tribal politics.

One hundred and seventy-seven Stockbridge Mohicans are now recognized as members of the Indian party. The federal government will negotiate a treaty with Indian party leaders which will compensate them for lands lost and provide them with a new reservation in what will become Minnesota. Meanwhile, members of the citizen party have taken allotments of land. They can stay in Wisconsin, but neither the federal government nor the leaders of the Indian party recognize them as part of the tribe politically.

Cutting Marsh, whose effectiveness as the missionary has been compromised by the political turmoil and - at least to some extent - by his own rigidity, decides that it is time for him and his family to leave Stockbridge, Wisconsin. His feelings for the tribe having soured, Rev. Marsh has been advising the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM), to withdraw their support for the mission. What will happen to the Stockbridge Mohicans church?

This is the first of a continuing series of posts.

The Chicks Family Goes Methodist

Although it appears that the unified church of the Stockbridge Mohicans reached its peak during the early 1830's, that same church began splitting into factions by the end of that decade. You may remember that the first permanent split came when the Hendrick and Konkapot faction came into conflict with the tribe's official political leaders as well as with Rev. Cutting Marsh. Eventually a deal was made which sent the Hendrick and Konkapot faction packing to what is now Kansas.

The next split came only a few years later. Again it happened amidst political turmoil, this time it was the Citizen or "Chicks" party against the Indian or "Quinney" party. Cutting Marsh appears to have tried to remain neutral in that conflict, but the situation proved too tricky for him.

In the spring and summer of 1844 Marsh censured John N. Chicks for "intemperance" (drinking alcohol) and even excommunicated other members of the Citizen party. John's father, Jacob Chicks, a deacon in the church, was insulted by what he felt was unfair treatment of his son. He left Marsh's church to join the Methodists at Brothertown. But the son, John N. Chicks, went farther. He asked Rev. Wesson G. Miller to hold a revival meeting in his father's barn.






Ethel A. Furman and Associates, were commissioned by the United Methodist Church to create this bronze statue. Clearly the circuit riders' importance is still recognized by the Methodist church today.







Miller was a young Methodist circuit rider who, as a middle-aged man in ill health, wrote a memoir, Thirty Years in the Itinerancy, which includes an account of what happened next. But first I need to explain that in those days Protestant missionaries had an understanding that they were not to compete with each other. Therefore, Miller understood that John N. Chicks was asking him to step onto Cutting Marsh's turf. Nevertheless, based on what Miller (page 25) was told about Cutting Marsh, he felt that the tribe could use another church.

According to Miller, the worship which he conducted in "Father Chicks" barn was highly successful. My impression is that Miller had a tendency to exaggerate, but nevertheless, the Citizen party's defection to the Methodists was a real split in the Stockbridge church.

The people from the two nations [Stockbridge and Brothertown] came in throngs. The barn was filled, and the groves around it, until my head grew dizzy in looking at the multitudes and thinking of what was to follow... The part borne by Father Chicks, as he was called, the head chief of the Stockbridge nation, also added not a little to the interest of the occasion... his heart was overflowing... Tall and erect in form, with a brow to rule an empire, he rose in the midst of the great assembly and came forward to the stand (page 27).

What followed was a remarkable speech or lay-sermon. Actually, I'll never know which is more remarkable, Jacob Chicks' speech or Miller's description of it:

'Me been a great sinner, as all my people know,' For the moment he could go no further. His noble form shook with emotion, and his manly face was flodded with tears. The whole audience wept with him, for his tears were sublimely eloquent. Recovering himself, he simply added, 'All me want now is to love him, Christ.' Then turning to his people, with a face as radiant as the sunlight, he began to address them in his own language (27-28).

As J.N. Davison pointed out in 1893, Jacob Chicks most likely spoke better English than Miller gives him credit for. Furthermore, Miller estimated Jacob Chicks to be about eighty years-old by then, but he was considerably younger. Nevertheless, saying the man was about eighty set up the next scene. Miller wrote that Chicks became "lithe and animated," and that his non-verbal communication was "enough to move the human soul to the depths of its being." And he goes on:

But to those were added the human voice divine with its matchless cadences, now kindling into a storm of invective, before which his audience shrank, like shriveled leaves in autumn, then sinking to sepulcral tones that seemed to challenge a communion with the dead; now wailing in anguish of sorrow utterly insupportable, and then rising in holy exultation, as one redeemed from sin and inspired with the triumphant shout of victory (page 28).

The High Point of Stockbridge Calvinism

Calvinism has long embodied many denominations. But, together, those denominations continue to share this common symbol.








A photo of the Rev. Cutting Marsh, Missionary to the Stockbridge Mohicans, 1830-1848. Although (as Roger Nichols noted) Marsh tended to be "stern and stubborn," he experienced a sort of honeymoon period with the tribe before political conflict compromised the whole situation.


By the time Rev. Cutting Marsh enters the scene, the Stockbridge Mohicans had been a Christian nation for nearly one hundred years. This, of course, does not mean that all members of the tribe were pious, or even baptized, but if you've read enough of my posts, you can at least understand why I say they were a Christian nation, not merely "Christianized" or "missionized."

While the Stockbridge mission as a whole was supported by the largely Congregational ABCFM, Marsh identified himself as a Presbyterian, and his salary was contributed by the Scottish Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge (SSPCK). Based on Marsh's ongoing reports to the ABCFM, and his annual reports to the Scottish mission society, I consider Marsh's first six years or so to represent the high point of Calvinism among the Stockbridge Mohicans.

Here are the benchmarks noted in Marsh's letter to the ABCFM of July 8, 1833:

• Out of a nation of roughly 250 people, Marsh reported that weekly church attendance ranged between 100 and 150 persons.
• Marsh stated that of those who attended his worship services, none of them "violate the Sabbath by attending to secular concerns or indulging in amusements of any kind" on Sundays.
• Marsh observed that the Stockbridge Mohicans were hospitable, kind, peaceful, not revengeful, ready to forgive and respectful, both to the aged and to "superiors;" [those traits, of course, are Indian values, but they are also Christian values].

And here's what Marsh wrote in his 1831 report to the SSPCK:

"...the sabbath here is generally observed, all kinds of labour are suspended & many of them observe it with great strictness. And when I arrived at the place of worship, which is not large, I found it filled with decently clad, and apparently devout worshippers. There is on the Sab. a very general attendance at meeting, & better order and more stillness I have seldom witnessed in assemblies of white people than uniformly prevail here. The singing is conducted wholly by themselves and they are very fond of it, have excellent natural voices & would excel provided they had suitable instruction in the art."

Schafer's Wisconsin Domesday Book, Part 2

"Stockbridge history, from the year 1843, tends more and more toward the ruin of that interesting tribe. In fact, so sharply did the citizenship conflict etch the character defects of the people[,] that their missionary pastor, Rev. Cutting Marsh, was at last brought to confess himself nearly hopeless in regard to them" (James Schafer in the Domesday Book, page 58).

In the previous post, I said that Joseph Schafer's account of the Stockbridge Mohicans (in The Domesday Book: The Winnebago-Horicon Basin) is not politically correct. But he didn't actually blame the "ruin" of that tribe on "Indian character." Instead, his position appears to be that the tribe's dealings with the federal government created or encouraged character defects.

I've said before that much effort was put into writing letters and making trips to Washington D.C. by the leaders of one party or another. As the years went by and the federal government first sided with one faction and then another, the bitterness of the "Citizen" vs. "Indian" conflict only intensified. And so Schafer (page 66) speaks of the Stockbridge Indians as "quarrelsome," and "litigious." I don't think he or anybody would blame tribal leaders for trying to right past wrongs, but the point has to be that the in-fighting was not healthy.

At least by the later part of the 1800's (if not sooner), Schafer's labels do seem to apply to a tribe that frustrated a number of federal agents. One such agent was William Parson, who felt

"the men are all either politicians or 'statesmen' and the almost sole occupation of the entire male portion of the tribe is politics. This is largely due to the many preceeding years of political wire-pulling which has cursed this people" (letter to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, 1/16/1888, printed in the Congressional testimony of 1892, page 31).

The Mission House at Stockbridge, Wisconsin

If you look at the picture of the church building from this post which I blogged on February 28th, 2009, you'll see that the artist of that drawing labeled his or her work as the "Stockbridge Indian Mission," the "First Congregational Church in Wisconsin," and finally asserted that it was "Built in 1829." I questioned that date when I first saw the drawing and now I can show you why I questioned it. The evidence is in this painting. Obviously the same building is pictured in both pieces of art. The dispute is over the date and location.

The painting you see above is from the front cover of The Stockbridge Story. I have already written a post about the book.

Take a look at the white man in the painting. Based on a photo I've seen, it is a good likeness of Rev. Cutting Marsh. Since Marsh ministered to the Stockbridge Mohicans both at Grand Kawkawlin/Statesburg, and at Stockbridge, his presence in the painting will not tell us the location of the building.

The artist of the painting above is LuLu [Doxtator] Mattson, the sister of the book's co-author, Elaine Doxtator Raddatz. Both are enrolled members of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians. Both LuLu Mattson and the artist of the drawing in my February, 28, 2009 post were using the same photo as a model. (I've seen that photo in the print version of the Wisconsin Historical Collections, but couldn't locate it on the web.)

Elaine Doxtator Raddatz and her sister LuLu Mattson are possibly the last of their kind: Stockbridge Indians born in Stockbridge, Wisconsin. The treaty of 1856 sent most of the tribe to the current reservation in Shawano County, but there were a handful of Indians who were acknowledged as legitimate landowners by the federal government and allowed to stay in Calumet County/the town of Stockbridge, known informally to Shawano County Indians as "down below."

Anyway, on the issue of which church building is pictured, I side with Elaine and LuLu (I've communicated with both of them, but not met either in person). I believe the painting above (and the drawing featured in my post of February 28, 2009) is of the mission house at Stockbridge, Wisconsin, and not Statesburg/Grand Kawkawlin. the evidence is found in the photo you see below.
This is a photo of that same building. Sometime after this building was last used as a church/school/courthouse, it was converted into a blacksmith shop. Look at the church in the painting and then imagine the same building with the front steeple-part knocked out. The blog format tends to shrink most graphics somewhat which may make it harder to see the similarities in the painting and the photo, but if you ask me, it clearly is the same building: The Stockbridge [Wisconsin] Mission House, built in 1834.

Read about the last sermon preached in the old building.

Some Wept Aloud

A Meeting of Reconciliation and
the Allegations of Robert Konkapot
If 1829 is the correct date, this would be the church building at Grand Kawkawlin, not the reservation on the shore of Lake Winnebago. However, the date given must be wrong. See this post to understand why I say that.
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Are you ready to get back to the chaotic things going on amongst the Stockbridge Mohicans in the Territory of Wisconsin?


In some of my recent posts, we've seen that there was factional conflict in the tiny Stockbridge nation. We don't know the whole story, but it had something to do with crime and punishment and whether or not to emigrate to what is now Kansas. Most likely, the pot was stirred by an unscrupulous federal Indian agent (and I regret to remind you that he was an ordained minister), John F. Schermerhorn.

Towards the end of 1836, Rev. Marsh tried to play the role of peacemaker, holding a meeting of reconciliation in which "all wept, many made confession publicly and some wept aloud"(Cutting Marsh's diary, in the Cutting Marsh Papers, Wisconsin Historical Society, November 13, 1836). Marsh did have something like a honeymoon period with the tribe, lasting a few years, but his position as a spiritual leader was compromised by 1836. He appears to have made his situation worse by siding with tribal leaders in political matters.

The official tribal leaders (known as the "Wiskonsin party) left us plenty of data to understand their position and it is spelled out in previous posts. On the other hand, I only have one document written by Robert Konkapot and none written by Thomas Hendricks. On January 16, 1838, Konkapot made a number of allegations against Cutting Marsh and the leaders of the Wiskonsin party in a letter to the president of the ABCFM.

According to Konkapot, "a commissioner" apparently Schermerhorn, entered into a business deal with "five or six men" who "divided the avails of the land amongst themselves." Konkapot also believed that Cutting Marsh was in on the deal. He felt that Marsh was refusing communion to certain Indians based on their refusal to pay taxes. Furthermore, Konkapot alleged that Rev. Marsh refused new converts for secular reasons:

"...one minister visited us last winter [and] by his instrumentality many sinners were awakened and resolved to serve the Lord long as they live, but none ever [were] admitted [to] the church unless they sign[ed] that new law...and they were told that they can not be Christians unless they come under that law."

The First Permanent Split in the Stockbridge Tribal Church

New York Indian Removal, Part XII:
The First Permanent Split in the Stockbridge Tribal Church

An understanding of this post depends upon my posts of Part X and Part XI of the New York Indian Removal series.

This illustration of the westward migration of the Delaware Indians acknowledges the Munsees in Canada, but doesn't recognize their stopoff at the Stockbridge Reservation in Wisconsin.
It is unfortunate that there is a lot more data available and known to historians from the point of view of the Quinneys and Rev. Cutting Marsh than there is from the point of view of Thomas Hendricks and Robert Konkapot. In the most politically correct terminology, they were the leaders of the "Emigrant party." Cutting Marsh, of course, called it the "Disaffected party," and I have also used that term, not as a slight to Hendricks, Konkapot, or others in the party, but because I suspect that one of the main reasons that they were so willing to leave good agricultural land for a drier climate to the west (present-day Kansas), is that they had had enough of the Quinney-led, missionary-backed tribal government.

As I have outlined before, various historians have offered various explanations for the origin of the factional conflict, but I think that my "Crime and Punishment" post [see the comment where I give due credit to Roger Nichols for my viewpoint] best explains how Hendricks and Konkapot emerged as leaders. They were also, of course, members of the tribe's other leading families and that may have something to do with their "disaffection."

In my last post you read that the Quinneys had accused Thomas Hendricks and Robert Konkapot of bringing roughly 200 Munsees to the Stockbridge Reservation in Wisconsin so they could cash in on the $500 offered in the 1836 Schermerhorn treaty. Instead, it is more likely that their main intention was to add numbers to their "disaffected" party.

Since there wasn't a lot of separation between church and state in the tribe from 1734 up until the 1830's, events in the tribal church are significant benchmarks in following the conflict. In a May 28th, 1838 letter to David Greene of the ABCFM, Cutting Marsh reported that he had suspended Thomas Hendricks from the tribal church and excommunicated Robert Konkapot for "slander, lying and dishonesty."

Marsh's next letter to the ABCFM (11/29/1838) marks the first permanent split in the tribal church of the Stockbridge Mohicans. (An earlier split was reconciled when Samson Occom died and members of his congregation re-joined John Sergeant[Jr.]'s congregation). Marsh had the nerve to tell his supporters that it seemed "as though the adversary [meaning Satan] had sent two Baptists to help them." Somehow Hendricks and Konkapot got in touch with two Baptist Indians who had ties with the tribe, brought them to the reservation and held their own worship services to rival those of Cutting Marsh and the tribe's regular leaders.

Munsee Removal and the Quinneys' Perspective

New York Indian Removal, Part XI:
Munsee Removal and the Quinneys' Perspective


This painting of Austin E. Quinney is owned by the Wisconsin State Historical Society. --->


To missionary Cutting Marsh, there was nothing wrong with the 1837 Tribal Constitution of the Stockbridge Mohicans (reprinted on pages 209-213 of James Oberly's
A Nation of Statesmen). So when members of the Hendricks and Konkapot faction - also known as the Disaffected party - opposed it, Marsh felt that they just weren't ready to adhere to the laws that "all civilized nations" had in common (letter from Marsh to Green, December 13, 1838 ABCFM Papers).

Marsh wasn't specific about what the Hendricks and Konkapot faction were doing to oppose the new constitution. However, after considering the Schermerhorn treaty of 1836 and a hand-written copy of an old letter I found in the John C. Adams Papers (at the Historical Society in Madison, WI) I have concluded that it had a lot to do with the Munsee Delawares.

The treaty the United States made with the Menominees in 1832 set aside two townships on the east shore of Lake Winnebago for the Stockbridge and Munsee Indians, but the vast majority of Munsees remained either in New York State or in southern [southeastern] Ontario, Canada. By the 1830's, present-day Wisconsin was a popular destination for white settlement and instead of removing New York Indians to Wisconsin, the federal government aimed to move them west of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers. As a result, the Schermerhorn treaty of 1836 contained a clause in which any chief who would "remove his Tribe or any party of not less than 100 persons [would receive] $500 for his services"(the treaty is reprinted in Oberly, pages 243-246).

As you may remember, the tribal leaders (aka leaders of the "Wiskonsin party") had seen the land west of the Missouri River and decided not to make the move. While John W. Quinney was lobbying Congress not to ratify the Schermerhorn treaty, Thomas Hendricks and Robert Konkapot were lobbying Congress to ratify it (see Oberly, 62).

A handwritten, undated letter, addressed only to "the Honorable Secretary of War," and signed by John W. Quinney and Austin E. Quinney, alleged that Thomas Hendricks and Robert Konkapot left their reservation and met up with roughly 200 Canadian Munsees near Detroit. According to the Quinneys, Hendricks and Konkapot persuaded the Munsees to "come round by the way of Green Bay, telling them that that was the easiest and they would be provided with everything necessary by the government in this route to the end of the journey." Furthermore, the Quinneys claimed that Hendricks and Konkapot induced the Munsees by telling them that there were Munsee lands near the Stockbridge settlement which had recently been sold and they could receive some of the proceeds of that sale if they showed up.


<------ Joel Poinsett, U.S. Secretary of War, 1837-1841. An amateur botanist, Poinsett imported a plant from the Aztecs that was named after him (the Poinsettia).


As the Quinneys tell it in their letter, nearly all the Munsees wanted to continue on their way to what is now Kansas, but they were "persuaded to remain until the [Schermerhorn] treaty was ratified." In other words, the Quinneys were alleging that Hendricks and Konkapot worked to keep the Munsees on the Stockbridge reservation in order to collect the $500 payoff promised in the treaty. They even pointed out that these were "Canadian" Munsees, not the New York Munsee Indians that the government was so eager to see gone.

Was it worth $500 for the two leaders of the "Disaffected party"? You'll see in my next post that Hendricks and Konkapot may have been motivated by more than that.

Crime and Punishment

The event that Deacon John Metoxen would later describe as what set the Stockbridge Mohicans down the wrong path (Marsh to Green, May 28, 1838 in the ABCFM Papers) occurred either on July 3rd or July 4th of 1836. A Brothertown Indian was brutally murdered by two intoxicated Stockbridges. Rev. Cutting Marsh, having audited some medical classes back east, was the closest thing to a doctor in the area and was called on the scene immediately. (I will spare you his graphic description of the murder itself, I only include it in Algonkian Church History because of the events that followed it.)

Not long after the crime was committed, the father of one of the murderers approached missionary Cutting Marsh and brought up the story of the adulterous woman from the Gospel of John, in which Jesus declared: "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her"(King James Version). The man's point, of course, was that the tribe should also forgive the two murderers. But Marsh, a strict, stern Presbyterian (see post about Roger Nichols thesis) was unmoved by the Biblical proof.

James Oberly's research shows that the Brothertown and Stockbridge Indians went to white authorities but none of them felt it their responsibility to try the two accused Stockbridges. Instead the tribal governments attended to the issue.

The two nations met in Council.... The councils were characterized by a spirit of harmony, coolness, and deliberation which reflected the highest honor upon them.... [the accused] were there declared guilty by every voter, which were about forty, except two and in the same manner declared worthy of death by a very large majority and sentenced to be executed upon the gallows... (Cutting Marsh in a letter to David Green, 8/18/1836 in the ABCFM Papers).

Here's something that illustrates the lack of separation between church and state at Stockbridge, Wisconsin: Marsh also reported to the ABCFM that the two assailants were brought into his church in chains and shackles to hear him preach a sermon on "crime and punishment."

Both Rev. Marsh and Chauncey Hall (the schoolteacher to the Stockbridge Mohicans), wrote to the ABCFM saying they were disappointed that the white man who sold whiskey to the murderers was not brought to justice as an accomplice in the crime. According to Hall, at least one of the murderers "would never have raised his hand to shed his brother's blood had not a white man furnished [them with] whiskey" (letter to Green, 9/8/1836, ABCFM Papers).

The murder would have lasting political ramifications for the Stockbridge Mohicans as Robert Konkapot and Thomas Hendricks emerged as leaders of a faction that rallied to get both prisoners released. The regular tribal officials, of course, wouldn't hear of it.

Somehow both prisoners escaped.

Marsh's Opinion of Sergeant's Ministry

Right: A modern road map of east-central Wisconsin. The Stockbridge Mohicans lived at modern-day Kaukauna (known then as Statesburg or Grand Kawkawlin) in the 1820's and at Stockbridge in the 1830's and 1840's. Note that Brothertown is south of Stockbridge.



In my February 8 post, I shared with you a long quote from a letter by John Sergeant [Jr.] in which he promoted the preservation of Native languages. Sergeant felt that bi-lingual literacy and the use of "white" agricultural technology was best for the Indians' welfare. He doesn't come across as a stubborn or pushy type, his belief that Indians would choose the appropriate level of "civilization" was based on his own experience, almost his entire life was lived among the Stockbridge Indians.

Things were different with Rev. Cutting Marsh. His life experience was different and his thinking was different. His efforts to push "civilization" amongst Indians who had already adopted as many white ways as they wanted, caused him some frustration. He discussed this issue with John Metoxen and later shared the conversation with the ABCFM in a letter to David Greene (10/19/1842).

...He [Metoxen] furthermore said that 'Mr. Sergeant was with them 50 years and never got discouraged in all of that time.' ....from all I have learnt of the result of his labors and of all the instruction in schools during that half century, no advances whatever were made in the Nation in knowledge and civilization, all remained precisely in status quo. But I put this question to the old man. If, the Lord when he gives the gospel to a people and expects and requires improvement, is it wrong for his servants [missionaries] to expect the same?

....Metoxen has often made [the] foolish expression that 'speaking the English language is what has made so many of the Brothertown people infidels.' Some, I know not how many, have never been pleased with me because I have not learnt their language so as to speak it. But this I have done from principle. This was one thing on account of which they liked Mr. Sergeant so well.

Sac and Fox Mission Trip, Part IV

Previous posts in this series:
Part I //Part II //Part III

How did the expedition to the Sac and Fox Indians end?

The four Stockbridge Mohicans that had traveled with Rev. Cutting Marsh decicided that they wanted to meet with a "pagan" Sac and Fox chief who was known as "The Stabber" to speakers of English (pictured right). Meanwhile, Marsh took the opportunity to meet with another minister and eventually took a steamboat up the Mississippi, trailing his parishoners by a few days.

Either the men weren't able to get an interpreter, or the one they had proved inadequate, but Marsh reported that his parishoners communicated little in roughly five days with The Stabber. In his annual report to the Society in Scotland for Promoting Christian Knowledge (SSPCK), Marsh admitted that the trip didn't succeed in advancing the spread of Christianity. On the other hand, he noted that the "deportment of the whole Stockbridge delegation during the whole tour was such as to do honor to themselves and the cause of missions." Stopping at the white mining town of Galena (now part of Illinois) on his way back, Marsh was told by the townspeople that his parishoners had been there too and had "sang hymns all Sabbath day." Marsh remarked that it seemed "not only new but strange to those who make no distinction betwixt one day or another when traveling."

Source:
Marsh's 1834 Report to the SSPCK printed in the Wisconsin Historical Collections, vol. XV, p. 113 and 115.

Sac & Fox Mission Trip, Part III

I've been reading Cutting Marsh's journal of the Sac and Fox Expedition. As you can see above, his hand-writing isn't the easiest to make out, but the journal is a worth-while read for anybody who is interested in what it was like to travel the Midwest in the 1830's. One disappointment is that, so far, Marsh has said very little about his traveling companions, four Stockbridge Mohicans, all devout Christians. On the positive side, Marsh relates a remarkable trip. Along the Mississippi River, and into what is now Iowa, Marsh runs into "Winnebagoes" (we now call them Ho-Chunk Indians), observes young Sioux men dancing, and meets quite a few whites. He describes most of the whites as being either "professors of Methodism" or "Universalists," and laments that the Indians are "in darkness" (meaning that they weren't Christians).

It seems there are between two to four men named Davenport that Marsh comes in contact with during the trip. In Part II of this series of posts, I told you about a trader named George Davenport. It seems that in Marsh's entries of June 28-29, 1834 he is dealing with a different Davenport, this one being a United States Indian Agent. Although Marsh said he found Agent Davenport to be "quite an agreeable man," he was the one to tell Marsh that Sac and Fox Chief Keokuck (see photo) had already declined the offer to have a mission school for his people. Davenport told Marsh that Keokuck "said the Great Spirit had given them mouths to speak with and they did not wish to learn to talk on paper."

Like the good Calvinist that he was, Marsh remarked in his journal, "perhaps it is on account of the pride in my heart that God seems to thwart my designs."

Sac & Fox Mission Trip, Part II

Use this link to read Part I of this series of posts.



Maps in this post are from Roger Nichols' thesis, Cutting Marsh: Missionary to the Stockbridges, 1830-1848.


In 1834, John Metoxen, John N. Chicks, two other Stockbridge Mohicans, and Rev. Cutting Marsh traveled by birchbark canoe up the Fox River, and then portaged to the Wisconsin and paddled down to the Mississippi. From there they continued south, spending time in what is now Iowa.

This was their mission trip to the Sac and Fox Indians. Unlike the Stockbridges, the Sac and Fox didn't speak an Algonquin language. From the Stockbridges' point of view, it was also significant that the Sac and Fox weren't "civilized" Indians.

When the delegation arrived in what would become the city of Davenport the next year, Cutting Marsh had a long talk with one of the city's founders, George Davenport, a trader. Marsh, of course, was trying to talk Davenport into getting a Calvinist mission established there. Davenport was noncommittal. He told Marsh that the Sac and Fox were "happy...in their present state."

Meanwhile, John Metoxen was fortunate to speak with Chief Blackhawk through a good interpreter. Unfortunately, we only have a second-hand account of the conversation written down by Cutting Marsh. However, the conversation must have started out well with Blackhawk telling Metoxen how he appreciated the level of sobriety he'd seen among the Stockbridge Mohicans during his visit to Statesburg a year earlier. This was probably the opening that Metoxen wanted. Marsh's reconstruction of the discussion from there is not quite believable, but it is all we have:

Blackhawk: "Now what do you think is best about receiving missionaries &c?"
Metoxen: "By all means, receive them...for they will do you good."
Blackhawk: But the trader, Mr. D, told me not to have anything to do with them..."

As contrived as that dialog seems, it likely reflects the larger truth that George Davenport's livelihood as a trader would have been threatened by a mission that would teach the local Indians to become "civilized farmers."

Sources:
*Letter from Marsh of Sept. 5th 1834 letter in the ABCFM Papers.
*Marsh's 1834 Report to the Society in Scotland for Promoting Christian Knowledge (SSPCK).

This series will continue.