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| Tecumseh, from life, artist unknown |
One hundred and ninety-eight years ago this week, during the
War of 1812, Tecumseh’s warriors and their British allies met defeat by
American forces under William Henry Harrison (future president) at the frontier
Battle of the Thames, north of Lake
Erie near present-day Chatham, Ontario.
During this battle, Tecumseh had taken over leadership of the
British, Canadian and Indian forces, the British commander being weak-willed
and unwilling to stand against Harrison’s Kentuckians,
who numbered more than twice those of Tecumseh. He situated the men in the best
defensive position he could find. Harrison’s
forces crashed into the British line, routing them entirely, but the Indians
under Tecumseh, engaged with the Americans, pushed back and forth, forcing the
fight into a swamp. Many men on both sides hear Tecumseh’s voice thunder over
the din, and saw him, as he exhorted his forces to hold, wounded over and over.
By twilight, he was gone. In the night, the Indians slipped away quietly,
taking the body of their great leader with them.
Tecumseh was born a Shawnee
in March of 1768 near present-day Dayton, OH.
His name was actually Tecumtha, meaning “panther lying in wait,” but whites
mispronounced it, interpreting this name to mean “shooting star.” Either
meaning applied to Tecumseh, a dynamic man who became the definitive leader of
his people.
Tecumseh’s father Puckeshinwa was a Shawnee
war chief born in Florida, and
his mother Methoataske was probably a Creek from eastern Alabama,
illustrating the Shawnee penchant
to roam. Shawnees migrated
incessantly in small groups, settling here among the Miamis,
there among the Chickasaw, then moving on, making it difficult for whites to see
them as a single nation. No doubt, this nomadic predilection, giving the Shawnee
a strong bond with dozens of tribes from the Gulf of Mexico
to the Great Lakes, figured largely in Tecumseh’s
ability to unite the many nations to defend their territories.
Such defense has a long history, dating to the first days of
European exploration and colonization. During the French and Indian War, native
tribes banded together with French allies in an effort to stop the migration of
English settlers into Indian territories.
Soon after, Joseph Brant, an Iroquois who had been educated
by white settlers, had a similar idea, to unite the native nations into a solid
political unit to protect native homelands against sale to and settlement by
white pioneers. He almost achieved his goal during the American Revolution when
he united the seven Iroquois tribes into a single nation and won several
concessions for recognition of the Iroquois as a nation by the new United
States on their traditional homeland within New
York State. But it
all turned to ash when most of his people sided with the British. The Iroquois
lost their political clout when the British lost the war.
“The long, confused wanderings, marked by numerous alliances
with other tribes and constant guerrilla warfare against advancing whites, had
made the Shawnees more conscious
than most natives of the similarity and urgency of the racial struggles being
waged against the settlers on many fronts.” (1)
Tecumseh, a product of this period of constant conflict,
continued this idea of unity among the native tribes and nations. He was a Shawnee,
but his vision encompassed all Native Americans.
"Where today are the Pequot?” Tecumseh asked in 1811. “Where
are the Narragansett, the Mochican, the Pocanet, and other powerful tribes of
our people? They have vanished before the avarice and oppression of the white
man ... Sleep not longer, O Choctaws and Chickasaws ... Will not the bones of
our dead be plowed up, and their graves turned into plowed fields?" (2)
Primarily because of broken treaties, he became dreaded for
his prowess in leading the Indians against white encroachment on Indian lands,
and news of his death in October, 1813, was cause for great exultation
throughout the frontier communities.
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| Benson John Lossing's depiction, 1868 |
As much as whites had feared this powerful Shawnee
war chief, many recognized his greatness as a leader. Gen. William Henry
Harrison, reporting to Washington
after the Battle of the Thames,
described Tecumseh as “one of those uncommon geniuses, which spring up
occasionally to produce revolutions and overturn the established order of
things. If it were not for the vicinity
of the United States,
he would perhaps be the founder of an Empire that would rival in glory that of Mexico
or Peru.” (3)
“He was a brilliant orator and warrior and a brave and
distinguished patriot of his people. He was learned and wise, and was noted,
even among his white enemies, for his integrity and humanity.” (4)
With the death of Tecumseh, that shining star, Native
Americans throughout the continent lost not only their greatest patriot, but
also all hope for a sovereign nation separate from the encroaching United
States.
SOURCES
1. The Patriot Chiefs:
A Chronicle of American Indian Leadership by Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., New
York: The Viking Press, 1961. p. 138
2. "Poetry and Oratory,"The
Portable North American Indian Reader by Frederick Turner III,
Penguin Book, 1973. pp. 246–247
3. The Patriot Chiefs:
A Chronicle of American Indian Leadership by Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., New
York: The Viking Press, 1961. p. 131
4. The Patriot Chiefs:
A Chronicle of American Indian Leadership by Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., New
York: The Viking Press, 1961. p. 132
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