Militant God Botherers

[Doug1029]

Geronimo would kill anyone and their kids, then years latter his enemies shouted his name as a battle cry. I still never quite understood it. My father was part apache and he was born in 1929. He used to tell me stories that his grandfather told him of how the rest of the apache hatted him because the trouble he brought down on everyone else. I don't think Geronimo was a good guy even then in his own culture, but him and his iriquoys were probably the greatest gorilla warriors in all of history.

Geronimo, Iroquois? In the same place at the same time? That's not how I remember American history. But maybe these were descendants of the Six Nations? Could you elaborate?

Doug

[Frank Merton]

Fighting a hopeless cause and through their brutality enabling those who wanted to to justify suppressing the Native American and shoving them off their land.

Where do we see the same stupid tactics being employed today?

[Doug1029]

Fighting a hopeless cause and through their brutality enabling those who wanted to to justify suppressing the Native American and shoving them off their land.

Where do we see the same stupid tactics being employed today?

Life on the frontier was unbelievably brutal. An atrocity on one side justified atrocities on the other. At the Moravian Massacre a band of Indians who had accepted Christianity and settled down to a peaceful life as farmers were murdered by members of the Pennsylvania Militia. 93 people were herded into the communal log houses and held overnight. In the morning they were lined up outside where they were struck in the back of the head with a club, then scalped. The murders so offended the US Congress that they granted 12,000 acres in the US Military District to the survivors. These were the first three Federal Indian Reservations - Gnadenhuten, Schoenbrunn and Salem - near New Philadelphia, Ohio. The old survey grid still serves as property lines.

I have been studying the history of the Public Land Survey System. With only wo exceptions that I know of, the government bought the land or acquired it as spoils of the French and Indian War before surveying could start. This is what the treaties are about. There were a group of chiefs called the Treaty Chiefs who sold off Indian land in return for goods. This made them very popular with other members of their tribes and cemented their positions as chiefs. But there were others who saw what was happening and refused to accept the treaty goods, electing to fight instead. Most land was actually purchased before it was surveyed and settled.

The tribes who lost their land in the French and Indian War had sided with the French. At the treaty the French ceded lands west of the Appalachians to the British govt. Thus the government of Great Britain became the lawful owner of these lands. How the land had been acquired by the French was of no consequence. After the American Revolution Great Britain ceded its lands to the colonies. That left some tribes who had not ceded their land. Treaties to purchase the land were signed with these tribes.

The two exceptions were the Ghost Line in Illinois and the State of Oklahoma. When Congress ordered the surveying of the Fourth Principle Meridian they did not know where the confluence of the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers was. Turned out the Illinois made a loop to the west then turned back east, then turned west again before joining the Mississippi. When the meridian was run north from the confluence of the two rivers, it crossed into Indian land. The line was run (literally at a run because the penalty was scalping) 72 miles until it crossed back to the east side of the Illinois. They didn't even mark the section corners - all they did was chain it. After the Indian title was extinguished on the west side of the river, the surveyors came back and re-surveyed it.

Except for rights-of-way, like roads and powerlines, the entire state of Oklahoma still belongs to the Cherokees. The original intent was to make Oklahoma into the Indian Nations and settle all renegade tribes there. As no white settlement would take place, purchase of the land was not needed. Eventually this idea was simply forgotten and a series of reservations replaced the Indian Nations. Reservation land was sold off to individual Indians as long as there were any to buy it, with proceeds going to the tribes (The Okmulgee Wildlife Refuge where I am now conducting a tree ring study was an Indian Allotment; one can still see the plow furrows in the old fields.). This meant that some other tribes got Cherokee money. When they ran out of Indians, they sold the rest to whites. The reservations still exist as units of government, midway between state and county. The problem is that there is no treaty ceding Oklahoma to the Federal government - the state is Indian land.

Somewhat related is the fact that Mexico never ceded the land grants to the US. The old land grants, mostly in New Mexico and Arizona, technically are still part of Mexico.

Doug

[White Crane Feather]

Geronimo, Iroquois? In the same place at the same time? That's not how I remember American history. But maybe these were descendants of the Six Nations? Could you elaborate?

Doug

Sorry I ment Chiricahua. Memory fart there to many names. I think his wife was Chiricahua apache and after she was killed, he drew much of his support from that group of apache.

Edited October 3, 2014 by White Crane Feather

[Doug1029]

Sorry I ment Chiricahua. Memory fart there to many names. I think his wife was Chiricahua apache and after she was killed, he drew much of his support from that group of apache.

Thanks. Have you ever read the Navajo stories of those who escaped from the Navajo Trail death march? I used to live right on the Navajo Trail ("Where the narrow-gauge rail meets the Navajo Trail"), so developed an interest in it. Anyway, a band of Navajos escaped the cavalry by swimming across the Colorado River; those that couldn't swim were captured. All Navajo children are now taught to swim. In another incident a band of Navajos camped near the river were approached by cavalry who didn't know they were there. The Navajos climbed a nearby bluff and hid. The cavalry made a camp right where they had camped and remained there for several days while the hidden Navajos ran out of water. To get water they lowered containers on ropes to the river while the soldiers were facing the other way.

This would make a great movie - but Hollywood would rather treat us to Transformers than dramatize history.

Doug