Interesting Anderson History 1801-1806

Welcome to the thread Frybread!!!

Speaking of frybread....yum! It was a tasty treat when I was growing up!

Hmmmm. Given who you are I sure am glad I gave Kikthewenund a good review!!

Honestly, it is easy to see why he is still celebrated in the area and thought well of compared to other just as local chief's who really weren't nearly as good at their role as your ancestor was. I have read what I have been able to find about him and it is all positive.

The missionaries were most CLEARLY annoyed with him when they were trying to leave because he had indicated he could work out a better deal for then than Hockingpomska wanted. In the end though he thought it better to not contradict the other chief. They took their houses, a year old ox and three hogs, and a table made from wood obtained locally. I think Anderson understood the balance that needed to be maintained among his own people and that he reduced the amount that Hockingpomska was going to demand.  All in all the problem stemmed from a younger, very liquored up and violent generation of Delaware who were being stirred up by a trouble making Prophet who convinced them to not listen to the old chiefs. It made for an absolute brutal time when so many Indians died needlessly.

Is that a picture of Chief Anderson? It was honestly my initial thought and I did an image search and couldn't find a good one of him. I found one of a daughter but that was it.

Hey, while were at it, how are you a descendant? Is your family from the marriage of Chief Anderson's daughter to William Conner? Honestly, your family in this area is quite interesting in the way it so very heavily influened the area. Again, glad to have you as part of the thread!

Actually, I am going to change my picture guess. That photo is a later date than Chief Anderson would have been in looking that young. Are these his boys? I know he had 4 and the smallest little guy would have been a grandson?

Here's today's entries:

Nov 17th 1801 - You'll remember that Br. Luckenbach has been in Cincinnati.

Br. Luckenbach returned from Cincinnati safe and sound. We thanked the Saviour that all for which this journey had been undertaken (namely, to get some money from Mr. Zeigler in Cincinnati, for our necessary subsistence) had been successfully accomplished. He also brought with him the long desired letter from the dear Bretheren Van Vleck and Schaaf in Bethlehem. Though some of them were written in the month of May they nonetheless gave us great job, as we saw most clearly in these the love and interest of the dear brethren of the General Helper's Conference as well as of all our dear brethren. We only wish we had more opportunity to go to Cincinnati in order to correspond more frequently with them (but the trouble is that there is so liitle oppoptunity to send any message to that place) : although the traders from Woapicamikunk travel to Fort Hamilton, we do not learn of it for the most part, and when we do find out, we have no one who will take our letters that far without pay, because is more than 20 miles from here to Woapicamikunk. If we had a horse we could then make the most of every opportunity we learn of and take the letters to the traders ourselves, and also make frequent visitations among the Indians which would surely do a great deal of good. Without a horse one can not go anywhere, because no matter where one wants to go here, one has to cross creeks over which one can not pass very well without a horse.

Nov 17th 1805

At the usual time Br. Kluge preached on the text, Phil 3:17-20. Being kept from it by circumstances last evening, we enjoyed this evening the body and the blood of our Lord and Saviour in Holy Communion. Our hearts were comforted thereby, the Saviour being very near unto us, and granting us His peace.

That's it. Not much to work with today. Of one note of interest is that each time they held communion they noted the condition of their spirit. Peace is not always what is granted and comfort isn't always what is sought and recieved either. I may not type out the entire communion entries in the future because they all read very much like this one but I will include the end where it indicates the general frame of mind of the missionaries and what they felt as a result of the communion service.

 Otherwise, it is interesting to read the missionaries complaint about not having a horse and how it hindered their travels. Why they did not create a canoe in their camp I really can't answer since it would have made travel much easier. They are right about their travel though. They could have gone to Buckstown without too much difficulty from their camp and that would have been the extent of traveling ability without crossing a creek. Actually, the biggest problem wasn't so much small creeks as White River itself. Even to go to Anderson they would have had to cross White River since the village was on the south, or more aptly in that area, the west bank and the mission was on the north or east bank. There were two fording spots on White river one of which is still as obvious today as it was then. The Truman bridge is just south of the spot. There are several sand bars in the river there. With the water level the last couple of years you can almost cross and stay dry. The other fording spot is closer to the Irondale area. In later times a ferry existed near 8th street bridge. Crossing White River was a major pain for early settlers and the missionaries were certainly hampered by it as well. The 1801 entry does give a good indication of how very alone these people were from the other whites in the area.

First, welcome to temakwe, another new member and Native American.

Hey, PatriotDan - this is all from a source book, right? And not your personal opinion? I've just skimmed the thread. You haven't pulled the wool over my eyes so to speak have you?

I encourage everyone to chime in on this thread.

Thanks!

patriotdan i will tell you later today about the photo.

It is indeed from a source book.

The Title is The Moravian Indian Mission on White River by Lawrence Henry Gipson and published by the Indiana Historical Bureau in 1938.

The Anderson Public Library has a couple of copies in the Indiana Room.

The entries that pair with the dates are straight form the book. If I skip some space and is obviously not the same style as the missionaries then that is my interjecting other bits of info and at times opinion. I try to make that clear but perhaps I am not. From now on, the Missionaries entries will appear in red and any other information will be in black. That will help keep the two seperate. As far as what I have said about the Indians and their lifestyle/habits - those views are all expressed by the missionaries at various times. I have never met them before so I can only take their word on it.

This may be a good time to point out that with any primary historical text there is bias. You have two very different cultures coming together here and we are reading one side of it. Alcoholism was devestating at the time. There are other texts, admittedly governmental in nature, that also back up many of the missionaries claims, specifically that while the white traders had been banned from selling alcohol to the Indians the Indians themselves often went to Fort Wayne and purchased it and took it back to sell to the villages. I am also not sure that the diary or I, for that fact, can do justice to the influence that Tecumseh and his brother The Prophet had on these people. We know very little of the chiefs of that time except through what the whites in the area wrote down and what we have from oral tradition of the Indians. They are both quite biased and don't always match up. The one chief we know the most about is Frybread's ancestor, Kikthawenund or Chief Anderson. His reputation was very good and he was the primary influence that kept the local Indian population out of war by convincing the people to not follow Tecumseh and The Prophet. For those of you not aware of how that all shook out, those two managed to form a conferderation of sorts and fight with the British in the war of 1812. They lost. It's hard to say though what the outcome could have been. Had Anderson not kept his people out of the war, would it have made a difference? Most likely not. The British still lost. In the end though for his maintaining his people's ability to stay out of the conflict it gave Gov. Harrison all he needed to send all Indians out of the territory. In exchange for being friendly to the US he got himself a reservation. Nice trade huh? There were other good Indians in the area too. Certainly many in the tribe were very nice people. It is NOT my intention to demonize Indians as that just isn't truthful. What did happen though was a brutal change in tribe leadership in many of the villages along White River during the time that the missionaries were here. A chief died of natural causes, at least one was murdered, by his own son at that, and a couple of others retained power as a figure head only. The young in the tribes took over. It should also be known though that this in itself was not something that was not driven by circumstances.
My knowledge on the Delaware tribe is not what it used to be so Frybread, please correct me if I say something wrong.

The Delawares migrated from....anyone.....anyone? Delaware, that's right! They were pushed out by white settlers. The migrated west in steps but finally reached a deal with the Miami's to settle along the White River. They are themselves a people surrounded by other Indian nations. Moreover those other nations realize the Delaware's position and refer to them as "The women". Not exactly the way strapping young men want to be known. Life was difficult for them and the chiefs were handling land over to Harrison left and right. It was a powder keg and Tecumseh and The Prophet was a whole lot of fire. Many of the chiefs were also getting a bit arbitrary it seems and a good bit greedy. I can't say for sure what was going through the younger Idians minds but I imagine it was not exactly an endearing situation with the chiefs.

The poor missionaries, for all their good inentions, are cash strapped by being the best stewards they can be, left with little transportation, their Indian converts are too old to be of real use in the very demanding labor that needed to be done, and very alone. On top of it some of the Indians they trust the most and promote the most are the ones who backstab them the hardest and are the poorest testaments to the faith that they were promoting. The missionaries record many Indians as saying they wanted change from their own people and they did not seeing it happen and so they watched carefully for change in the lives of the convert Indians but in the end they thought they were as bad as the heathen Indians if not worse. Couple that with the powerful changes going on in the Indian nations and you have a slam dunk disaster in the making.

Welcome Temakwe. Feel free to join in any time. This little mission and what was happening among your people is of great interest to me and went a very long way in forming this area.

Alright, on to today's entries. They are slim and altogether uneventful.

Nov 18th 1803-

In the evening we sang a Passion liturgy.

Nov 18th 1805-

We had a Thanksgiving liturgy.

That's it. Nothing more of interest. Tomorrow isnt any better so I am going to skip ahead a bit. My posting next week will be a bit spotty so we need to get a bit ahead.

On the 19th they sang a Thanksgiving liturgy and took communion, otherwise the entries for that date are empty.

Nov 20th-

The communicants were addressed in preparation for the coming Communion. Br. and Sr. Jacob's testimony was especially a joy to us. For example, Br. Jacob said: "I see and experience ever more that all else is as nothing when compared to that which I enjoy with the Saviour. If I am in cimmunion with Him, then I have enough of everything and I feel happy at heart, therefore I pray that He may ever keep me very close to Him and set me wholly free from all other things, so that I may spend my time alone with Him," etc. Some of our other Indian bretheren we have to to bear with a great deal of patience, which we must daily seek from the Saviour.

Nov 21st - We enjoyed the body and blood of our Saviour in teh Holy Communion to the quickening of our poor hearts. Five of the Indian Christians partook. The Saviour was very near to us.

I want to stop and talk about Br. Jacob a bit. I like him a lot. He is one of the real good guys and he struggles. The diary paints Jacob and Joshua as very real people that many can identify with. It is very interesting what Jacob said in the 20th entry because it proves to be a tall order thoughout the next 5 years. It is a personal struggle for him to be able to stave off the bad influences of his friends while maintaining the lifestyle he really wants to maintain. Sometimes there are big successes. Sometimes there are big mistakes. Through it all though Jacob is a real person who is caught in a struggle between many aspects of the white missionaries ways and those of the white religion and his roots with the tribe and their tradition and religion. It is a fine tightrope that he walks. In the end he remains true to his convictions and succeeds in what he has outlined above.

Nov21st 1802

The warm weather lasted until today, when we had a long spell of rain, after which it bagan to freeze during the night of the 23rd.

On the 15th the Indians noted that it was unseasonably warm.

Things get intereting in 1803.

Nov 20th 1803 -

In the mornignn we had a Thanksgiving liturgy, after which Br. Luckenbach preached on I Peter 1:22. In the evening Br. Kluge led the meeting.

Nov 21st, 1803-

A number of Indian women came here from Woapicamikunk for a visit. They told us that John Thomas and his family who wanted to return to Goshen, (more of this may be found under date of the 17th)had changed their minds; that they had listened to the advice of the chiefs and that , at least for the time being, they had given up their journey. They had gone to the chase for the winter. This was very unpleasant news for us, beacuse they will thereby lose themselves entirely among the heathen, as we have been afraid for a long time.

A couple of things, first, the chase was what the Idians called the winter of hunting. If the missionaries said that the Indians went hunting then it can generally be assumed they travelled no more than 10 miles to do so. If they go on the chase it appears that they have gone much further away. A time of two it is mentioned that no one at all is in a village or two when the chase is occuring.

Second, the Thomas family not going back to Goshen is a very bad occurance. It will have extremely dramatic effects by 1806. While the wife and children are amicable still to the mission, John is harboring a nasty grudge that he is going to get more and more vocal about and it is going to cause a lot of trouble and at least one death. It would be very easy to write him off as a complete bad apple but I don't think that was the truth of the situation. Just like Jacob, John is walking a line between cultures and while Jacob ultimately ends up retaining his convictions, John is drawn off by the increasing culture of fear that The Prophet is bringing. The Prophet is already at work in the surrounding areas and is having an affect locally even though it isn't that prominant yet. John will be a casualty of that influence.

Nov 21st 1804-

Old Br. Jacob came to Br. Kluge and said that Chief Pakantschihilas had entrusted him with the following message to us, "Brothers, do not remember any longer that I dobade my grandchildren to attend your school and to hear the great Word. When I forbade them I may have been drunk and I am sorry that I said anything. I think otherwise now. M whole desire now is that my grandchildren and any others who so desire may attend your school and learn to read and to write. Perhaps I may live long enough to see the time when my grandchildren can write. In that event how happy I shall be."

We sent him a message saying that his words were very pleasant to us; that we were willing to forget what he had said and would gladly strive to teach his grandchildren and others who desired it; especially did we desire that he himself might get a desire for the Word of God and open his heart to God, so that he might realize how necessary it was that he and all Indians should be converted to God and learn to know Him who from love became man and for our sins had suffered and died, to deliver us out of the power of Satan and to reconcile us to God; that anyone who had the grace to realize this fully would then enjoy the great mercy of believing on God and belonging to Himl and he and all Indians would then thank God with all their heart that He had sent His Word among them in order to learn the way of salvation from it.

The missionaries never missed a chance to preach. Sometimes I wonder if that wasn't to their detriment as I think they appeared a bit over the top to the Indians.

Nov 20th 1805-

we visited our old sick Br. Jacob, as we usually do every day. We found in in a very encouraging state of heart. among other things he said, "I am now entirely surrendered to the will of the Saviour. Physically I am very weak. I feel myself very poor indeed. I can do no more than pray to the dear Saviour to have mercy on me and help me as long as I have to be in this world." We comforted hom in a loving manner and urged him to keep very close to the Saviour, and to remind himself often how much the dear Saviour had suffere to redeem us. We are very sorry that this old brouther is outwardly so forsaken and that he has no proper care in these days of his sickness. Since the daughter of his departed wife left him and went to her friends, he lies all alone in his house. Naturally we do all that we can for him, but this does not give him the comfort he would have if he could be taken care of by one of his own people, as he frequently tells us. But we cannot help him out in this respect. We have only a few old Indian sisters who belong to us and they have enough to do with themselves. The other inhabitants of the village are like all other heathen and do not bother about him at all, for they do not care how the believers fare. In fact, the Idians here have very little sympathy for their sick friends.

Nov 21st 1805-

Old Br. Jacob's daughter, a heathen, visited him and promised to move to him with her husband and children so as to take better care of him. The old brother was very happy over this. -The evening meetings were held this week after the usual manner. Several of them were attended by heathen strangers.

This entry is pretty interesting because it is a good window into the missionaries frustration. By this time the Indians are becoming hostile to the mission being there. There are still many who stop and are cordial but there has been a fundamental shift in the Indian perception of the place and those who live there. It will be a few more month before things explode but the fuse is lit on this powder keg.

The missionaries are highly frustrated by the lack of help they are receiving in caring for Br. Jacob from his own people. It is a sum of all the frustration that they have felt over the four years because they have received little assistance of any kind from the Indians which is totally against what they expected to find in the area. The entry for the 21st shows that the 20th entry was not very accurate and were words spoken from as much anger as factuality. In 1805 Brother Jacob is heading for death which comes in mid December but it will be some of the most encouraging times the missionaries had with him.

The font coloring makes it a lot easier to separate you PatDan, from the book. Thanks for that. ;)

No problem!

If it appears in red then it is the exact entry from the diary. Everything in black is paraphrasing, giving background information, interesting thoughts or opinion.