Memory-1848, October 1

In October 1854, Bishop James O. Andrews passed through Fort Leavenworth on his way to the Fort Leavenworth Manual Labor School (the current Shawnee Indian Mission Historic Site) and visited other missions in the vicinity. Covering several chapters in his book, Miscellanies, the Bishop espoused his, and by extension the Methodist Church (South), views about the work of missionaries to convert and educate the Indians. This excerpt pertains specifically with his writings on the Shawnee Indian Mission.

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   Fort Leavenworth, beautifully situated on a commanding bluff, which overlooks the Missouri river. It has more the appearance of a handsome village, than a military position. It is, however, well adapted for defense against Indians, the only foe likely to be encountered in these regions; and even from this source there is but little danger to be apprehended now. It is principally important, as it serves as a depository for the property of the United States army, and as a point of departure for the troops destined to operate among the Indians of the far off Western mountains and plains, or those intended for service in Oregon or New Mexico. Hundreds of wagons were there when we passed, and a full complement of the poorest mules I have ever yet seen. These had just returned from service in the Mexican war. What disposition Uncle Sam will make of all these wretched cattle, is past my calculations….”

   …The most of the Prairie through which we were passing was thinly inhabited; for the last few miles of our afternoon ride, however, the appearance of matters considerably improved. A number of snug farms with comfortable looking houses, indicated an improved attention to the means of domestic comfort. Our guide being but imperfectly acquainted with the way, we took the wrong track, and found ourselves in a path almost impassable for carriages; indeed, I think it questionable whether ours was not the first carriage that had ever attempted to pass over it. However after considerable difficulty we reached the mission house about dark—weary, and cold and hungry; but a cordial welcome from brother and sister Thaler, a warm fire and a good supper, soon made us feel comfortable and at home. After supper we had to walk half a mile to the mission church, where we found a small company of Delawares assembled, to whom I endeavor to preach through an interpreter, on “Our Father which art in heaven.” It was my first attempt in this line, and of course it was rather an awkward business. I did my best, however, and fortunately for my hearers my interpreter was himself not only a very superior interpreter, but an excellent preacher; so that he was able, at least in part, to supply my lack of service to his countrymen.

   His name is James Ketchum, a half- breed; he has the reputation of being an intelligent man, an excellent preacher, and what is best of all, a very exemplary Christian. I could not understand anything that he said, but in gesture and manner he was certainly one of the most easy and graceful speakers I have ever listened to. In the morning I was visited by two of the Delaware sisters,—mother and daughter. The old lady, I think, was the first convert among the Delawares, and has been an exemplary and devoted Christian ever since; she seemed to be strong in faith and waiting patiently for her change to come. Her husband was a man of considerable note in his nation, but withal a most abandoned drunkard. When his wife became a Christian he persecuted her pretty sorely for a time, but at length it pleased God to open his eyes to the utter worthlessness of paganism. He sought the Lord with all his heart, and God granted him the blessing he sought, even a new heart. He abandoned heathenism and drunkenness together, and became at once a Christian and a sober man. This abandonment of the customs of his fathers gave great offence to his pagan countrymen, and they resolved on his destruction. About that time there was a great deal of sickness among the Indians, and a goodly numbered died. This, it was alleged, was his work; he was charged with having killed these people by means of some invisible agency connected with his new religion. A council was convened, and the venerable old chief was summoned to appear before them. They told him that he had been killing their people long enough, and that they could bear with him no longer; that his time had come, the hatchet was bright and sharp, and he must die. The old man stood before them calm and unmoved; not a feature of his countenance gave sign of uneasiness, for there was no fear in his heart. He looked up to heaven, knowing in whom he believed. “I am not afraid to die,” said he; “you can take my life if you choose but as to killing your people, I have no power to do it if I would, and if I had the power to do it, my religion forbids me. It teaches me to hate nobody, to do nobody any harm, but to love everybody, and do them all the good I can,” For some time his life seemed to tremble in the balance, but finally his enemies told him that they would try him a little longer, but that if certain leading men among them died they would instantly put him to death. Thus was he delivered from his enemies, and it pleased God not long after to remove his servant from farther trials. The venerable Anandagerman was translated to the paradise of God….

Chapter 20

   We left the Delaware mission house on Thursday morning, and a ride of four miles brought us to the Caw or Kansas river, which, at this place, is the dividing line between the Delawares and the Shawnees. The ferry is owned jointly by the two nations. We had passed some very fine country in the Delaware nation, and the soil of the Kansas bottom is rich. After passing out of the bottom we encountered some rather lofty hills, and entered on a beautiful prairie country. We passed the Quaker establishment, a very neat and prosperous looking farm. It is said they get on well with their educational and farming operations, but it is believed they have succeeded, to a very limited extent, in the establishment of their peculiar religious usages. Passing on some distance farther in the midst of one of the most lovely farming countries I have seen, we passed near the church and the campground of the Shawnee Mission; and five or six miles further brought us about noon to the Fort Leavenworth Manual Labor school, where we were kindly received by our old friend, Rev. Thomas Johnson, the superintendent of the establishment. As this is the most important point connected with our work in this region, it will be proper to bestow upon it a somewhat extended notice.

   We had established a mission among the Shawnees, and had been laboring among them for some time with an encouraging measure of success, when the United States Government proposed to establish an institution on the manual labor plan, designed for the education of the children of a considerable number of the surrounding tribes, in which the children were to be instructed in the elementary branches of an English education, in addition to which the boys were to be instructed in various mechanic arts and farming, and the girls to be taught the several branches of house-wifery, such as spinning, weaving, cutting, and making garments, and so on. This institution they proposed to place under the care of the Church, on certain conditions, and a handsome appropriation was to be made annually for its support from funds in the hands of the Government belonging to the various Indian tribes in the vicinity. The institution is conveniently located in the midst of a fertile and beautiful prairie. It has an abundant supply of excellent water from ever-running springs, and it is said the place has proved to be exceedingly healthy. There are three large and convenient brick buildings; One for the superintendent’s family, and a steward’s hall for the boys, affording also lodging-rooms for the hands employed about the farm. Some fifty yards distant is another brick building, occupied as a school room for the boys. Including also a chapel and a number of lodging rooms. On the other side of the street and at a considerable distance from the two former, is another large brick building designed for the girls; besides these, there is an ample supply of the necessary outbuildings, giving to the whole establishment the air of a clever, thriving village. There are a wagon-maker’s shop, a black-smith’s shop, a steam, saw, and grist mill, which formerly supplied the Indians from all the surrounding country with flour; but as there are other mills springing up in the neighborhood, we have judged it best to curtail the expenses of this department, by reducing the operations of the mill to some two or three days in a week. The farm is one of the most extensive, and well managed that I have ever seen, amounting to some five or six hundred acres. The stock is of the finest description, and the whole establishment under the discreet management of our friend Johnson, promises to be all its friends could reasonably expect. On Friday we rode over the farm, and on Saturday morning, while walking about the establishment, I saw a company of men singularly equipped, passing just below the mill. We understood they were a part of Col. Fremont’s company; and, as I had a great curiosity to see how such a company, entering on such a tour, would be a accoutred; and as I had, moreover, quite as strong desire to see the distinguished leader, for whose intelligence and enterprise, and general character, I had been inspired with a very high respect by his previous exploring tours, brother Johnson and myself saddled our horses and started in pursuit; But we were too late. The cavalcade was too far ahead for us to overtake them without a pretty long chase; so we were reluctantly compelled to abandon our object.

   Just as we were reconciling ourselves to our disappointment, we espied on the prairie at some half a mile’s distance, a company of men and dogs in full chase. “A wolf chase,” said my friend, “let us join them;” and immediately he was in full gallop, and what could I do but follow him? My friend swept over the prairie as though he were accustomed to it, but I could not divest myself of a certain sense of uneasiness as to the fate of my neck among the holes and salamander hills which abound in the prairie; so I slackened my pace. I could not help feeling that there was something ludicrous in our appearance. We were, neither of us, very small men; brother J. weighs about two hundred and thirty pounds, and his companion something short of two hundred; neither of us in very fine plight for playing the active; and, perhaps, some of your grave readers may question whether it was quite canonical for a bishop and a priest to engage so heartily in the amusement of hunting. Now, I am not going to enter into any sober argument on the subject. I don’t think my friend felt any qualms about it, as the wolf was a common enemy, and had, no doubt, had many a meal of nice fat pig, at the expense of the mission farm; and for myself I had long wished to examine a prairie wolf. We were not in at the death, but we were on the spot time enough to see the object of our pursuit. The prairie wolf is in its form and appearance not unlike the fox, only it is larger, and the color I think darker. They were very numerous in the prairies, and very destructive to pigs and lambs, so that there was no good understanding between them and the farmers. At night they may be heard single or in companies, and their howl is very much like that of the common wolf.

   As I had an appointment to preach on the Sabbath at the Wyandot mission church, distant some eight or nine miles, I left after dinner in company with brother Hurlburt….

   …And now that we are just on the point of leaving this part of our great mission field, it may not be out of place to make a few more general remarks and reference to the Indians in the this region and our work among them. We have said already that the Fort Leavenworth School was established with a view to benefit the children of a considerable number of tribes who occupied this portion of country, and I think they have had in the institution at different times children from some ten or twelve different tribes—Wyandotts, Shawnees, Delawares, Kickapoos, Peorias, Pottawotomies, and several others; since the establishment of the school, however, other schools have sprung up in various places, so that the number of pupils is not as great as in its earlier history. There is still, however, a respectable number in attendance, amounting, I think, to about one hundred. Most of the tribes in this region are small, and decidedly on the decrease; some of them, I fear, destined to an early extinction.

   This may be attributed to several causes: such of them as still depend upon the chase for support, and pursue the wandering life of hunters, find this source of supply too precarious to afford them half the necessary sustenance; and their contiguity to the white settlements gives them the coveted supply of whisky; and for this the wild Indian will generally barter everything he has on earth. The dram-seller usually pockets all the profits of the Indians hunting, and then the poor child of the forest, half starved and almost naked, must either beg or steal. Failing to succeed sufficiently in the former, he is pretty sure to resort to the latter, and failing in every means to obtain the necessary supplies, without comfortable shelter and food when well, and devoid of proper attendance when sick, the children made a premature grave, and the adults, a large portion of them under the combined influence of hunger, nakedness, and intemperance, perish long before they reach a green old age; so that their numbers are annually decreasing. There is a cause at work, two, very adverse to the prosperity of most of the tribes, which I had not seriously thought of till my recent visit to this country brought it to my notice. In almost every instance these small tribes have too much waste land. I am fully persuaded that it is a great misfortune to any body of Indians, to have much more country than is sufficient to give to each family a good farm, making reasonable allowance for the probable increase of the tribe. The Indians, like their white neighbors, are very fond of moving about; but unlike the white man, the Indian has rarely sufficient enterprise to turn his move to a profitable account, and frequently the cause of the gospel is injured, when a few Christian families remove from the neighborhood of their pious brethren and their pastor, and, in search of some supposed advantage of good land, or more abundant game, settle themselves far from the means of grace, and in the midst of pagans. The result has but too often been what very generally follows when civilized men placed themselves in similar circumstances. If we would civilize and convert the Indians, it seems to me to be indispensable that they should be so circumstanced as to shut them up to the necessity of personal effort. Each one must have a home of his own, and proper efforts must be made to awaken in his mind and heart, those principles and affections which will prompt to vigorous effort to render that home comfortable and pleasant.

   A great deal has been said, and written, and sung, about the primitive excellence of the Indian, and his entire freedom from all desire of those luxuries which are supposed to have deteriorated the character of civilized man; and one would suppose, from the utterance of a certain class of writers, that they would regard the world’s retrogression to a state of primitive savageism, as the grand advent of its millennium. But we confess to the influence of no such sentimentalism. In our view, to adopt the language of one whose position enabled him to understand well their character, and than whom the red man has not a more devoted friend in these lands, “I declare that I know nothing in the character of the savage man which we ought to wish retained.” We must create in him a sense of want before we can properly elevate him. To accomplish this, nothing is so effectual as to surround him with the living examples of practical industry, and the benefits and comforts it bestows on its votaries. Hence the policy of isolating them from immediate neighborhood and intercourse with people whose superior intelligence, industry, and comfort, might exert a powerful influence over them, is, to my mind, exceedingly doubtful; but of this, more hereafter. In any plan for improving the condition of the Indians, the concurrence and assistance of the government agents will be found indispensable. Hence the importance of appointing suitable men to that highly responsible office. An Indian agent should certainly be a man of sound principle, of sterling integrity, of sound morals, at least; nay, he ought to be one who fears God and who discharges the duties of his office, not simply for its emoluments, but who is a genuine philanthropist, and labors most earnestly for the improvement and happiness of the interesting and helpless charge committed to his care. It sometimes happens, however, but little heed is given to these high moral qualifications, and men are appointed to these agencies as a reward for their active political partisanship. We do not design in these remarks any reflection upon the agents now in office; the superintendent of the western agencies, Major Harvey, is a Christian gentleman, and a faithful officer, who, we believe, seeks by all practical means, the happiness of the Indians, and we heard an excellent report of Major Cummins. Indeed, we take great pleasure in saying that the government is doing what they deem the best for the happiness of the red man; and we trust the change in the administration will make no change in the head of the Indian department; and if our wishes upon this subject our realized, we shall begin to have faith in the promises made by presidential candidates before their election.

Chapter 21

   … But, perhaps, some are ready to ask what good effect has been produced among the Indians by the large establishment of which I have been speaking. Our success has not, by any means, equalled our wishes, nor has it, perhaps, been as great as some of the most sanguine friends of the enterprise had expected; yet it has, perhaps, been fully equal to what sober, reflecting men, who understand the character of the Indians, and the nature of the obstacles to be overcome, had anticipated. To educate an Indian, to train him to habits of industry, and to engraft upon his wild olive tree the shoots of Christianity and civilization, is no easy task, nor is it the work of a few days or months. It is a work of labor and of patient, pains-taking perseverance. It is emphatically a work of faith and a labor of love. The seed must be sown, and the laborer must be content to work on, and wait patiently for the early and the later rain. Great good has, doubtless, resulted from the operation of the Manual Labor School. A large number of youth have received here the elements of learning, and have obtained, besides, the knowledge of farming, and of the mechanic arts, which, in many instances, they have turned to good account when they have gone back to their respective tribes. A considerable number of the girls, too, have been taught the various branches of housewifery, and have turned their knowledge to good advantage in their own families, quite to the benefit of their husbands and children.

   Now these influences are to tell, silently it may be, but still efficiently, upon the generation to whom the destiny of the tribes to which they belong must be committed. The traveler, as he passes along through the Shawnee nation, particularly, cannot fail to witness with pleasure some of the evidence of improvement and prosperity. He will see scores of snug looking farms, with comfortable houses; and on most of them I noticed as I passed, a good ox-wagon and team. These, they not only use themselves, but they do a great deal of hauling for the merchants of the border towns, and especially for the traders. Brother Johnson informed me that the Indians had done more than a thousand dollars worth of hauling for one team in the course of the year. Brother Ward, the wagon-maker, told me that when he first took charge of the shop, some three or four years before, it was impossible to get a Shawnee into the shop. They would come to the door and peep in; but now, said he, nothing is more common than for them to come in and give particular directions about making their wagons, describing minutely how they wish the work done, even to the size of the boxes. Another thing I learned, which is to my mind a very strong indication of improvement. It is said that the Shawnees treat their women with a great deal more consideration than formally. They began to regard them as designed for their companions and equals, rather than their slaves and burden bearers. The apellation of wife is superseding the old savage one of squaw. If this report be correct, it is certainly one of the strongest proofs of the advancing spread of proper principles. But above all the other fruits of our establishment, scores of the children have been converted to God, many of whom still remain steadfast pillars of the church of God, and have gone forth to different tribes, carrying the leaven of truth with them.

   Upon the whole, it is our deliberate judgment, that if the system of education upon the manual labor plan to start succeed in connection with the preaching of the gospel, in enlightening and converting the Indians, there is no hope for them. There are numerous tribes on the upper Missouri, to whom no missionary has yet been sent, and who are thoroughly imbruted pagans. Indeed if the report of the traders can be relied on, some of them are not only pagans but cannibals. Brother Johnson informed me, that one of the traders told him in the course of the last year, that the Sioux Indians had broken in upon a village of the Omahaws and carried off a number of children, whom they subsequently killed and ate; and that the Omahaw were anxious to get some of their children into the school, to place them beyond the reach of their enemies.

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[Rev. James O. Andrew, Miscellanies, 1855, 146-172.] Read the book.