THE DAKOTAS OR SIOUX IN MINNESOTA AS THEY

WERE IN 1834.*

BY REV. SAMUEL WILLIAM POND.

PREFACE.

Perhaps the following work needs no preface, for it is what the title indicates and nothing more. It is written because in a short time none can tell what the Dakotas of Minnesota were when the first white mission for them began. This fragment of the History of Minnesota may be of more value at some future time than it is

now.

It may be thought strange that the writer, who was so many years a missionary among the Dakotas, has said nothing about the way in which they received or rejected Christianity; but he thought it better not to mention that subject at all than to treat it superficially, and justice could not be done here without too greatly extending this work. My main object has been to show what manner of people the Dakotas were as savages, while they still retained the customs of their ancestors.

This paper was partly read by Samuel W. Pond, Jr., of Minneapolis, at the monthly meeting of the Executive Council, March 12, 1906. It is printed from a manuscript book written mostly during the years 1865 to 1875 by Rev. Samuel W. Pond, giving his "Recollections of the Dakotas as they were in 1834." In that year he and his brother, Rev. Gideon H. Pond, began their missionary work for these people at Lake Calhoun, building a log house there, the first dwelling of white men on the site of Minneapolis. The lives and work of these brothers were narrated by Rev. Edward D. Neill, D. D., in one of his Macalester College Contributions (Second Series, 1892, No. 8, pp. 159-198), "A Memorial of the Brothers Pond, the First Resident Missionaries among the Dakotas"; and a more extended narration by Samuel W. Pond, Jr., entitled "Two Volunteer Missionaries among the Dakotas, or the Story of the Labors of Samuel W. and Gideon H. Pond," was published in 1893 as a volume of 278 pages, with portraits and other illustrations from photographs. The author of this paper was born in New Preston, Conn., April 10, 1808; and died in Shakopee, Minn., December 12, 1891. His brother Gideon was born also in New Preston, Conn., June 30, 1810; and died in Bloomington, Minn., January 20, 1878.

SUBDIVISIONS OF THE DAKOTAS IN MINNESOTA.

Nearly all that portion of the Dakota or Sioux nation that lived in Minnesota, as the limits of the state were afterward defined, had summer residences on the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers, except those who lived at lakes Big Stone and Traverse.

There was a small village at Lake Calhoun, one on Cannon river, and one at Two Woods, south of Lac qui Parle. With these exceptions, all the Dakota villages were near the two rivers and two lakes before mentioned. This statement applies to the summer villages of the Dakotas, as during the winter months camps were made wherever deer or furs were to be found.

These Indians belonged to different divisions of the great tribe of Dakotas, and were known by different names. There were five of these divisions, namely, the Medawakantonwan, Wahpetonwan, Sissetonwan, Ihanktonwan or Yankton, and Wahpekuta.

The villages of the Medawakantonwan were on the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers, extending from Winona to Shakopee. Most of the Indians living on the Minnesota above Shakopee were Wahpetonwan. At Big Stone lake there were both Wahpetonwan and Sissetonwan; and at Lake Traverse, Ihanktonwan, Sissetonwan, and Wahpetonwan. Part of the Wahpekuta lived on Cannon river, and part at Traverse des Sioux. There were frequent intermarriages between these subdivisions of the Dakotas, and they were more or less intermingled at all their villages.

Although the language, manners, and dress of the different divisions were not precisely alike, they were essentially one people. Nor were these people of Minnesota separate from the rest of the Dakota nation, but were closely connected with those living farther west. They considered themselves as forming part of a great people, which owned a vast region of country, extending from the upper Mississippi to the Rocky mountains.

They thought, and not without reason, that there was no other Indian nation so numerous or so powerful as the Dakota nation. Before their chiefs visited Washington, many of them believed that if the Dakotas should unite their forces and act in concert, they would prove more than a match for the whites. The trip to Washington greatly modified the opinions of the chiefs on many other points, besides that of the relative strength of the white and the native races.

The reader will bear in mind that the Dakotas or Sioux of Minnesota formed but a small fraction of the nation to which they belonged, and were not distinct from the rest of their people, but are described separately because they occupied that portion of the territory of the Dakotas which is comprised within the boundaries of Minnesota and were better known to the writer than their kindred living farther west.

The Medawakantonwan were divided into eight bands. The lower band was called Kiuksa and was located below Lake Pepin where Winona now stands. The Kaposia band was at the village of Kaposia, a few miles south of the site of St. Paul. A village on the Minnesota river, two or three miles above its mouth, was called Black Dog's village; and a village named Pinisha was located on the Minnesota near the mouth of Nine Mile creek. Reyata Otonwa was at Lake Calhoun; Tewapa, at Eagle creek; and Tintatonwan at Shakopee, this last being the largest village of the Medawakantonwan.

The Wahpetonwan had villages at Carver, St. Lawrence, Belle Plaine, Traverse des Sioux, Swan Lake, and Lac qui Parle. They were also with the Sissetonwan at Big Stone lake, and with the Sissetonwan and Ihanktonwan at Lake Traverse. Most of the Sissetonwan had their villages in the vicinity of lakes Big Stone and Traverse. The home of the Ihanktonwan was at Lake Traverse, where some of them lived on islands, as the Wahpetonwan did at Big Stone lake. There was a small, restless band of Sissetonwan who lived south of Lac qui Parle.

The number of the Medawakantonwan was a little less than two thousand. The Wahpetonwan were so mixed with the Sissetonwan and Ihanktonwan that it was impossible to ascertain their exact numbers. These two divisions of the Wahpetonwan and Sissetonwan, according to a government census taken about the y year 1862, numbered about four thousand; but in taking the census of the Medawakantonwan the number was greatly exaggerated, and it may have been the same with these two upper divisions.

If we estimate the Wahpetonwan and the Sissetonwan at four thousand in the year 1834, at the time to which the present work relates, we have about seven thousand as the number of the Dakotas then living within the area of Minnesota and in the part of South

Dakota closely adjoining lakes Big Stone and Traverse; for there were two thousand of the Medawakantonwan and Wahpekuta, and perhaps a thousand of the Ihanktonwan. Seven thousand may seem like a small number to occupy so large a territory, but probably not many more could have obtained a living from it by hunting.

THE CHIEFS.

Wapasha was the chief of the Kiuksa; Wakuta, of Red Wing; and Wakinyantanka of Kaposia. The chief of the Black Dog band was Wamditanka; of the Lake Calhoun band, Marpiya-wichashta; Good Road, of Pinisha; and Shapaydan (Shakpay), of Shakopee.

Mazomani was the chief of the Wahpetonwan at Carver and St. Lawrence. This little band at Carver requires a passing notice, because it led in the cowardly attack on the Ojibways at Fort Snelling in 1827. In later years they murdered a woman in cold blood near Louisville, Scott county, in 1858; and, after committing many other outrages, they inaugurated the massacre of 1862, two of them. Hdinapi and Wamdupidan, being the first to imbrue their hands in the blood of the whites. These two men, however, had married into the Shakopee band and were numbered with the Medawakantonwan.

Ishtahkba (Sleepy Eyes) was the only acknowledged chief of the Wahpetonwan between St. Lawrence and Lac qui Parle; but Wakanhdioranki was the head man at Belle Plaine, and Tankamani at Traverse des Sioux.

At Lac qui Parle, Inyangmani and Nompakinyan were chiefs. At Big Stone lake, Inkpa was chief of the Wahpetonwan, and Wakinyanduta of the Sissetonwan. Matotopa was chief at Lake Traverse. The Tizaptani had Itewakinyanna (Thunder Face) for chief. He was called by the whites Diable Boiteux, a descriptive French name, suggested by his limping gait and fiendish disposition.

When not kept together by the fear of an enemy, there was a tendency in the larger bands to separate and form smaller ones; and some of the smaller bands were composed of fugitives from the larger ones. Thus Ruyapa, having murdered a woman at Shakopee, and fearing to remain there, removed to Eagle Creek, where, gathering his relatives and others about him, he finally became a chief. The township of Eagle Creek, in Scott county, de