Speaker 1: M. Takoma was the most remarkable Native American leader in
Speaker 1: all of American history. He was a man that tried
Speaker 1: to unite the tribes to hold the Ohio Valley and
Speaker 1: the Midwest against American expansion. But his leadership was of
Speaker 1: such a great nature. His leadership was so grand that
Speaker 1: he was admired not only by Native American people, but
Speaker 1: by the Americans who have posed him, and he has
Speaker 1: emerged as a major folk hero throughout all of the
Speaker 1: United States. On this episode, we're neck deep in the
Speaker 1: murky waters of American identity. We're peering into the life
Speaker 1: of the Shawnee leader two Kumsa. I want to understand
Speaker 1: his social political context, the foundations of what built him
Speaker 1: while trying to understand the extraordinary leadership of this man
Speaker 1: whose name means a panther crossing the sky. He was
Speaker 1: a hunter, a warrior, and exceptional orator. He was a
Speaker 1: revolutionary leader, considered a genius, and though he was an
Speaker 1: enemy of the United States, his legacy was grafted into
Speaker 1: our national character. And I believe that he's an American hero.
Speaker 1: In this series, we're gonna hear from the current chief
Speaker 1: of the Shawnee Nation, Chief Ben Barnes and New York
Speaker 1: Times bestselling author Robert Morgan. We'll hear from Peter Cosens
Speaker 1: and acclaimed historian and author, and from Native American historian
Speaker 1: Dr Dave Edmonds. We got these guys stacked in here deep,
Speaker 1: and in all my work on this here Burgary's podcast.
Speaker 1: I don't think I've ever had to dig as deep
Speaker 1: into the American bone yard to get the goods. I
Speaker 1: really doubt that you're gonna want to miss this one.
Speaker 1: My name is Clay Nukelem, and this is the Bear
Speaker 1: Grease Podcast, where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search
Speaker 1: for insight and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the
Speaker 1: story of Americans who lived their lives close to the land,
Speaker 1: presented by f HF gear, American made purpose built hunting
Speaker 1: and fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged as
Speaker 1: the places we explore. The being within. Communing with past
Speaker 1: ages tells me that once nor lately there was no
Speaker 1: white man on this continent, that it then belonged to
Speaker 1: the Red Man. Children of the same parents placed on
Speaker 1: it by the great spirit that made them to keep it,
Speaker 1: to traverse it, to enjoy its productions, and to fill
Speaker 1: it with the same race, once a happy race, since
Speaker 1: made miserable by the white people, who are never contented,
Speaker 1: but always encroaching the way. And the only way to
Speaker 1: check and stop this evil is for all red men
Speaker 1: to unite in claiming a common and equal right in
Speaker 1: the land, as it was at first and should be yet,
Speaker 1: for it never was divided, but belongs to all for
Speaker 1: the use of each, For no part has a right
Speaker 1: to sell, even to each other, much less to strangers,
Speaker 1: those who want all and will not do with less.
Speaker 1: Two cups spoken to William Henry Harrison in eight ten,
Speaker 1: Two CUMPSA. I'd like you to take an inventory of
Speaker 1: everything you know about him. Did you know what tribe
Speaker 1: was from when he was alive? Have you heard of
Speaker 1: towns or businesses or people named after him? If you're
Speaker 1: an American, I'm certain you've heard his name. And if
Speaker 1: you're into how things came to be as they are
Speaker 1: on this continent, you'll want to know what he did
Speaker 1: and if things had just gone slightly different for him,
Speaker 1: these contiguous United States we know today would have an
Speaker 1: Indian nation occupying the likes of what is now Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan,
Speaker 1: and Wisconsin. Maybe even bigger. Two Comes to command of
Speaker 1: the largest Native American forces ever rallied against the United States,
Speaker 1: larger even than any of the Indian wars of the West.
Speaker 1: And interesting to me, Two comesa is considered by many
Speaker 1: to be one of the greatest orators in American history.
Speaker 1: That's right, all of American history. I'm in search of
Speaker 1: learning who this man was and what drove him to
Speaker 1: his death on the battlefield on a cool October day
Speaker 1: in eighteen thirteen. His passing scattered to the winds the
Speaker 1: unified Native American forces and marked the end of their
Speaker 1: most serious resistance east of the Mississippi, and soon after
Speaker 1: most of the weakened tribes moved west. Two Comes to
Speaker 1: his death was the end of an epoch of governance
Speaker 1: of the great Native American civilizations in the eastern one
Speaker 1: third of this continent. But much of his life doesn't
Speaker 1: make sense to me, and I need answers. Well, why
Speaker 1: don't you begin with the paradox of comps being for
Speaker 1: most of his life an enemy of the United States,
Speaker 1: but being one of the most celebrated people of that
Speaker 1: era by Americans, but on stamps the statues to him, Now,
Speaker 1: why would that be Why would he be so celebrated
Speaker 1: in the country he fought again? That was the voice
Speaker 1: of New York Times bestselling author Robert Morgan. He was
Speaker 1: also the author of The Boon Biography, which me and
Speaker 1: Steve Rinella love so much. I'm after the answer to
Speaker 1: his question, why did our young country love this man
Speaker 1: who would today be labeled a domestic terrorist. But let's
Speaker 1: get things straight from the beginning. We're all gonna have
Speaker 1: to gather up and put on our learning caps if
Speaker 1: we even want to pretend to understand what was actually
Speaker 1: going on with Twokumpsa. If you want to listen to
Speaker 1: some soft rock and scroll through TikTok, then this series
Speaker 1: probably isn't going to be your favorite. So first of all,
Speaker 1: you can't talk about two Kumsa without talking about his brother,
Speaker 1: Tim Squattawa, also known as the Prophet. These boys are
Speaker 1: inseparable and started a movement or a revolution that sought
Speaker 1: to stifle the expansion of the United States and unite
Speaker 1: the Indian tribes like never before into one Indian nation.
Speaker 1: A Pan Indian confederacy. Bam, that's it. That's the term.
Speaker 1: You gotta remember, Pan Indian Confederacy. It's everything in this story.
Speaker 1: But Two Comes his life was so much bigger than
Speaker 1: just being a military leader. He was called a genius
Speaker 1: by US President William Henry Harrison. We're now going to
Speaker 1: hear from Dr Dave Edmonds of the University of Texas
Speaker 1: at Dallas. He's a distinguished author with more accolades related
Speaker 1: to Native American history than we've got room to tell.
Speaker 1: He's going to help set the context for Two Comes
Speaker 1: to his life. I mean, first of all, Two Comes
Speaker 1: is a remarkable man. He's one of the few Native
Speaker 1: American leaders that his opponents at the time admired. You.
Speaker 1: You almost never find any kind of historical reference to
Speaker 1: Two Comes that's negative. And the more you read about him,
Speaker 1: he's it's it's some way that's sort of hard to
Speaker 1: do biography of him, because it's he kind of transcends
Speaker 1: history and folklore and this figure emerges out of there
Speaker 1: when when the movement first starts, he's not mentioned. Everything
Speaker 1: that's mentioned is this prophet, this prophet, this strange man.
Speaker 1: And so as time went on, I began to realize
Speaker 1: that the movement starts sort of as a as a
Speaker 1: religious movement, it becomes his brother. And but at this time.
Speaker 1: Things are very bad for tribal people in the Midwest.
Speaker 1: I mean, they're losing their lands. There have been a
Speaker 1: lot of diseases that have swept through. Some of them
Speaker 1: have been picked up and partying beginning to move them west.
Speaker 1: Things are just going very bad. It seems like the
Speaker 1: world is kind of collapsing around them. And the Shawnees
Speaker 1: believe that there are two forces in the world. There's
Speaker 1: the Master of Life, which is the major power in
Speaker 1: the universe. What you want out of life is harmony,
Speaker 1: to of the way the Master of Life wants you
Speaker 1: to live. But there's a bad force in it, to
Speaker 1: the Great the Great Serpent. And these forces fly back
Speaker 1: and forth. And many of them believe that by in
Speaker 1: the eighteen or eighteen hundreds that the Great Serpent was
Speaker 1: was gaining the upper ground. The Great Serpent was gaining
Speaker 1: the upper ground. When you look at what was happening
Speaker 1: to their civilization, it's hard to argue with their synopsis
Speaker 1: and the proceeding four hundred years. As much as eight
Speaker 1: of the Native American population was killed by disease brought
Speaker 1: over by Europeans, let alone the amount killed in warfare.
Speaker 1: Perhaps some Norse colonies were established in North America as
Speaker 1: early as one thousand BC, but systematic European exploration and
Speaker 1: colonization began in the late fourteen hundreds. My friend Taylor
Speaker 1: Keen of the Omaha Tribe says that the idea that
Speaker 1: Europeans landed in an uninhabited wilderness just isn't true. There
Speaker 1: us no wilderness, but rather a great civilization. But the
Speaker 1: world view of the inhabitants, their land, ethic, and every
Speaker 1: possible ideology of how a human should live was different
Speaker 1: than the Europeans. To them, it looked like wilderness. To
Speaker 1: the Native Americans, it looked like a well ordered, established civilization.
Speaker 1: Primarily because of disease brought over by Europeans, the great
Speaker 1: Native American cities dried up, and with it their history,
Speaker 1: their tradition, their ability to protect themselves, their economies. They
Speaker 1: were sept dry by an invisible enemy. These are the
Speaker 1: words of ten Squattawa, the prophet to come to his brother.
Speaker 1: A wind blew west over the Atlantic, driving before it
Speaker 1: a frothy foam or scum. It blew this scum, which
Speaker 1: was evil and unclean, upon the shore or of the
Speaker 1: American continent. And the scum took form. The form that
Speaker 1: it took was that of a white man, of many
Speaker 1: white people, both men and women. Wherever the scum lodged
Speaker 1: on the shore of the continent, it took this form.
Speaker 1: The Native Americans knew their civilization was in trouble. In
Speaker 1: the seventeen sixties, a Delaware profit named Niolan proclaimed that
Speaker 1: quote the whites would be wiped from the continent, game
Speaker 1: animals would return in abundance, and the earth would become
Speaker 1: an Indian paradise end of quote. As a civilization, they
Speaker 1: were clearly looking for a remedy against this threat. They
Speaker 1: were looking for a way forward. And going back to
Speaker 1: what Tin Squad was said, this kind of language today
Speaker 1: spoken about any race of people is pretty rough. But
Speaker 1: looking at the situation two in years later, and knowing
Speaker 1: the broken treaties and the outright atrocties committed by the
Speaker 1: American government towards the tribes, his reasoning seems logical. It's
Speaker 1: kind of mind boggling to me. And I'm not bringing
Speaker 1: these things up as racial or political statements, so I
Speaker 1: wouldn't let them tickle either of those taters. I love
Speaker 1: America and am deeply grateful to be an American no doubt,
Speaker 1: but it's unrealistic to view the America we know today
Speaker 1: without acknowledging that it came at the cost of almost
Speaker 1: extra painting a pre existing civilization of people. That's just
Speaker 1: the way it happened. And as a separate idea, I
Speaker 1: don't view this story as their history and our history
Speaker 1: as in Native American and white European. I mean, most
Speaker 1: of my descendants were White Europeans, but the Native American
Speaker 1: influence on early American identity as undeniable and significant. The
Speaker 1: America that emerged in the nineteenth century was radically influenced
Speaker 1: by Native Americans. I think the difference between European today
Speaker 1: and the gritty, close to the land American identity that
Speaker 1: lives in so many of the people that I know
Speaker 1: in love in this America is linked to that Native
Speaker 1: American influence. Hang with me. Daniel Boone was America's earliest
Speaker 1: non political folk hero and archetype because of, I believe
Speaker 1: and many others, the Native American influence on his life.
Speaker 1: Indians taught Daniel Boone how to be Daniel Boone, and
Speaker 1: Daniel Boone taught us a lot about American identity that
Speaker 1: governed that got deep quick. But we have to set
Speaker 1: the stage and this isn't an easy one. All this
Speaker 1: is important because it forms the context of it comes
Speaker 1: to his life. He was born into a literal war
Speaker 1: zone and a cultural war zone in the spring of
Speaker 1: seventeen sixty eight. The circumstances around his birth are quite extraordinary.
Speaker 1: This is the voice of author Peter Cozens. He's a
Speaker 1: eating historian on the life of Tecumsa. After he wrote
Speaker 1: a book called Tecumsa and the Prophet. I think it's
Speaker 1: a really great book. One of the interesting dates and
Speaker 1: tcums his life is indeed his birthday, you know, for
Speaker 1: two reasons. He was born just after this comment shots
Speaker 1: through the air over the skies of the southern Ohio
Speaker 1: and one of Tecums's mother's friends saw that, and that
Speaker 1: became part of his name. Uh two comes as a
Speaker 1: short form of a larger Shawnee word meaning one who
Speaker 1: passes across. The Kamsa belonged to the Panther clan. There
Speaker 1: were twelve at a time, twelve clans among the Shawnee.
Speaker 1: There both of them were named for animals. Depending on
Speaker 1: the clan you were born into, you were expected to
Speaker 1: emulate the traits of the animal and panthers were very common,
Speaker 1: you know, in the forest mountain. Yeah, they were very
Speaker 1: common predators, absolutely, and you know the traits of the
Speaker 1: pan through where stealth, strength, speed, and those were traits
Speaker 1: that you expected to emulate if you're a boy. So
Speaker 1: in t comes his case, he who passed across would
Speaker 1: have been a celestial panther crossing the sky from one
Speaker 1: end of the Earth to the other. And so it
Speaker 1: was in his a panther crossing the sky. De comes
Speaker 1: his name means a panther crossing the sky. How cool
Speaker 1: is that? But the pronunciation of his name is elusive.
Speaker 1: They say that it was probably closer to to come
Speaker 1: fifth with a fifth on the end of it, which
Speaker 1: is odd to our ear. A man today could only
Speaker 1: wish he was named after a panther. Comet celestial signs
Speaker 1: in the sky at the birth of people who become
Speaker 1: great is very interesting to me. Mark Twain was born
Speaker 1: under the tailings of Haley's comet in eighteen thirty five.
Speaker 1: Jesus was born under an unusually bright star some believe
Speaker 1: was a planetary con junction of Jupiter and Saturn appearing
Speaker 1: close together. Some would chalk off the account of two
Speaker 1: combs his birth comment to folk lore, but the story
Speaker 1: was relayed by multiple sources who knew two comes in
Speaker 1: any way you slice it. The Panther clan of the
Speaker 1: Shawnees were thought to be the best hunters and warriors.
Speaker 1: It's recorded folklore or no folklore. I don't really care
Speaker 1: that tucks in wall two comes his father. In accordance
Speaker 1: with Shawnee tradition, Buried two comes his umbilical cord with
Speaker 1: the antlert of a young buck to help him grow
Speaker 1: into a mighty hunter man. I wish I'd known that
Speaker 1: trick when my kids were born. Here is Shawnee chief
Speaker 1: Ben Barnes Unto comes his childhood. You know, when I
Speaker 1: think about two Comes, I think about the child that
Speaker 1: he must have been and growing up in that family
Speaker 1: one of those those families were starting to disappear. By that,
Speaker 1: I mean, is the way that you understand your family
Speaker 1: is different the way that I understand my family. It's
Speaker 1: actually the way that you understand your family is different
Speaker 1: than the way that most of the world understands their family.
Speaker 1: I see a lot of disconnect in the dominant society
Speaker 1: where folks don't keep in touch with family way in
Speaker 1: traditional communities into comps the traditional community, all of his
Speaker 1: mama's sisters would have been his mom's, All of his
Speaker 1: dad's brothers would have been his dad's. He would have
Speaker 1: had a score of grandparents or more. All of those
Speaker 1: siblings that are coming out of these these that he
Speaker 1: would call it with it, you and I would call cousins,
Speaker 1: are his siblings. And so he had this huge family
Speaker 1: wrapped around the match once you were if you were
Speaker 1: wrapped around by that much family, you know, in the
Speaker 1: times we live in now, having that big of a
Speaker 1: nurturing community, you know, would have a lot of value.
Speaker 1: We don't feel so separate and isolated. So that was
Speaker 1: the child he grew up to be. He sees that
Speaker 1: he sees the beginnings of that that community being shattered.
Speaker 1: Him and other disaffective young men as teenagers, they're seeing
Speaker 1: the lessons of people like Bluejacket and others. It's like, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: look at what we did battle of you know that
Speaker 1: some here's defeat. Look at that we can we can
Speaker 1: do this growing up being a young man. So how
Speaker 1: come how come they're talking about a peaceman again? How
Speaker 1: can they trying on what they want to they want
Speaker 1: to do with it, will do anything they can stand Ohio. Well,
Speaker 1: that that didn't sit well with some of those young
Speaker 1: meant so it's thinking about him as a person, you know,
Speaker 1: and starting with, you know, what that community looked like
Speaker 1: and how that community is in the process of shattering
Speaker 1: in front of his very eyes. Two Comes his foundations
Speaker 1: coming to time when Shawnee communities were being shattered. To
Speaker 1: understand the social dynamics of really what was happening in
Speaker 1: the Native American communities, their social structure is essential to understand.
Speaker 1: But what built two Comes his functional identity wasn't nearly
Speaker 1: as romantic but tragic. Two Comes was born in Chillicothe, Ohio.
Speaker 1: Nobody's really sure. His father and mother attended a conference
Speaker 1: that the Shawnee leadership had called at the Shawnee village
Speaker 1: of Chillicothee, which is a bit distant from modern day
Speaker 1: Chili Coffee, closer to Zenio, Ohio than it is Chilla Coffee.
Speaker 1: So they were experiencing these you know, initial in roads
Speaker 1: in Kentucky, initial probing long Ohio River from Virginia surveyors
Speaker 1: than others were starting to stake out land in the
Speaker 1: Ohio valley, and so the Shawnee leadership got together to
Speaker 1: pose a question, should we stay here or should we
Speaker 1: migrate west in Mississippi. And so it comes to his
Speaker 1: father procussion Way, and his mother attended this conference while
Speaker 1: she was like a plus pregnant. So at the time
Speaker 1: of his birth, literally his family was in the midst
Speaker 1: of deciding what to do about these European interlopers coming
Speaker 1: into our land that we've had for tom immemorial, not
Speaker 1: long that they'd had it at one time, but then
Speaker 1: they lost it to the Iroquois. Just come back to
Speaker 1: it from there, that you know, diaspora that happened in
Speaker 1: the sixteen Dred just reclaimed it. And now here we
Speaker 1: have a potential new threat. And I mean, even though
Speaker 1: the trickle of whites coming into the country was just
Speaker 1: that a trickle, a lot of the Shawnee could kind
Speaker 1: of see the handwriting on the wall. History is more
Speaker 1: complex than an easy narrative. Some recorded that Takomsta was
Speaker 1: born two arrow flights southeast of Chillicothe, Ohio. I like
Speaker 1: that unit of measurement in the big picture, the Native
Speaker 1: American people had been quote here since time immemorial, essentially
Speaker 1: meaning so far back that it can't be traced. However,
Speaker 1: in a shorter view, the Shawnees had just returned to
Speaker 1: the section of Ohio and now it was illegally filling
Speaker 1: up with English colonists. This was before America was America.
Speaker 1: It was seventeen sixty eight, and the American Revolution wouldn't
Speaker 1: happen until the mid seventeen seventies. The land was literally
Speaker 1: and lawfully owned by the Native Americans, but it was
Speaker 1: really messy, and in order to understand the situation, one
Speaker 1: has to stopped themselves from seeing the current structure of
Speaker 1: the United States and imagine another country coming to our
Speaker 1: America today and literally stealing our land and building their government.
Speaker 1: It would not be any different. The Native people were
Speaker 1: in personal crisis, can you imagine the stress? And Tecumsa
Speaker 1: was born right in the thick of it, but was
Speaker 1: riddled with his own personal crisis, a string of war
Speaker 1: related deaths of important figures in his life. So two
Speaker 1: Coups is born seventy eight and and he's born right
Speaker 1: in the beginning heat of European movement into Indian territory
Speaker 1: west of the Appalachian Mountains. And two comes to his
Speaker 1: life if he had a landscape version of his life.
Speaker 1: The first twenty years you would see an incredible amount
Speaker 1: of instability. So the chief, the main leader of the Shawnees,
Speaker 1: dyes Cornstalk, who would have been influential in his life.
Speaker 1: Then his father dies, and then he's kind of semi
Speaker 1: adopted by Blackfish, who's another Shawnee leader who also is
Speaker 1: killed in battle. So by the time two Coomesa is
Speaker 1: a teenager, three very influential men in his life have
Speaker 1: been killed essentially at war or straight up murdered. Two
Speaker 1: comes to was six years old when his father died
Speaker 1: at the Battle of Point Pleasant in West Virginia in
Speaker 1: seventeen seventy four. His older brother chis Aqua was there
Speaker 1: and buried him in the forest near where he fell.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine burying your dad in the forest. He
Speaker 1: was charged by his father to raise his younger siblings
Speaker 1: and fight for Indian lands. Chis Aqua would have great
Speaker 1: influence on the child two Compsa. He considered it an
Speaker 1: honor to fall in battle, and chis Aqua said quote
Speaker 1: he didn't wish to be buried at home like an
Speaker 1: old squaw, but preferred the fouls of the air should
Speaker 1: pick his bones. These words would be like an injection
Speaker 1: of lightning into the identity and world view of a child.
Speaker 1: And in sevent chis Aqua two comes To his older
Speaker 1: brother would also die in battle. Two comes To would
Speaker 1: have been twenty four years old. The sting and stinch
Speaker 1: of death hovered over this man like a fog. But
Speaker 1: that wasn't all. And adding to that, the most important
Speaker 1: woman in his life is gone, because when he was
Speaker 1: still a boy, his mother picked up and with almost
Speaker 1: half the Shawnee. This was during the course of the
Speaker 1: Revolutionary War. We're being pushed north and about thousands of
Speaker 1: the Shawnee. He just upped and decided to move west
Speaker 1: of the Mississippi into what was then Spanish Louisiana and
Speaker 1: take advantage of an offer by the Spaniards to come
Speaker 1: live there, basically as a buffer against hostile plains Indians.
Speaker 1: So she left, I mean she had banded her kids,
Speaker 1: she had banned, and two comes To and his younger
Speaker 1: brother were left to be brought up essentially by blackfish,
Speaker 1: while he lived by two comes his older sister take
Speaker 1: when and her husband? What do you make of his
Speaker 1: mother leaving him? That that didn't compete with me. It
Speaker 1: didn't compete with me either. I still doesn't Shawnee generally speaking,
Speaker 1: in and they not only doated on their children, but
Speaker 1: they deeply loved their children. And they had family with
Speaker 1: the Shawnee and the other tribes in Midwest. It was
Speaker 1: family first, then clan, then what they call we call division,
Speaker 1: which is a number of clans that shared a similar
Speaker 1: sort of function within Shawnny society. And then you were Shawnee,
Speaker 1: and just after and after that, you're an Indian. And
Speaker 1: for for a mother to to abandon, I mean she
Speaker 1: was sacrificing in their patrimony because she was so bereft
Speaker 1: at having lost her husband. But she then she was
Speaker 1: following her own clan. I guess any way you look
Speaker 1: at it, it would be the result of a society
Speaker 1: that's in crisis, crisis at falling apart. So that is
Speaker 1: the foundation of this young two combs, his life absolutely
Speaker 1: born into born into a time of turmoil and raising,
Speaker 1: a time of constant warfare and chaos and uncertainty. And
Speaker 1: that becomes the foundation for everything that he's gonna do
Speaker 1: and fight for in the future. And it's so interesting
Speaker 1: to me when you think about the response that people
Speaker 1: have to crisis because presumably there were many in that
Speaker 1: society and other societies that have fallen apart. In today's society,
Speaker 1: our society that in some ways is breaking apart, is
Speaker 1: there's people that respond very negatively to that, and it
Speaker 1: weakens them or or causes them to break up. But
Speaker 1: then inside it two coombs his life there was a
Speaker 1: response of to become a great leader and to project
Speaker 1: a way forward. That's exactly what it comes to. Would do,
Speaker 1: along with his brother ten Squattawa, project a way forward.
Speaker 1: Understanding the very personal nature of a disintegrating society is
Speaker 1: essential to the Native American story. And when you see
Speaker 1: the strategic plans by the United States government to destroy
Speaker 1: Indian culture, it's mind deboggling. And eighteen o three President
Speaker 1: Thomas Jefferson declared an empire of liberty, and in a
Speaker 1: confidential letter to the Governor of the Indiana Territory and
Speaker 1: the future President William Henry Harrison, Jefferson wrote, quote, we
Speaker 1: wish to draw the Indians into agriculture. When they withdraw
Speaker 1: themselves to the culture of a small piece of land,
Speaker 1: they will perceive how useless to them are their extensive
Speaker 1: forests and be willing to pair them off in exchange
Speaker 1: for necessities from their farms and families. To promote this
Speaker 1: disposition to exchange lands, we shall push our trading houses
Speaker 1: and be glad to see them run up debt, because
Speaker 1: when these debts get beyond what the Indians can pay,
Speaker 1: they will be willing to lock them off by session
Speaker 1: of lands. In this way, our settlements will gradually circumscribe
Speaker 1: and approach the Indians, and they will either incorporate with
Speaker 1: us as citizens of the United States or remove beyond
Speaker 1: the Mississippi. Should any tribe be full, hardy enough to
Speaker 1: take up the hatchet the season of the whole country
Speaker 1: of that tribe and drive them across the Mississippi as
Speaker 1: the only condition of peace, would be an example to
Speaker 1: others and a furtherance of our final consolidation. End of quote.
Speaker 1: The United States government was literally trying to take the
Speaker 1: hunt out of the Indians through agriculture. They will perceive
Speaker 1: how useless to them are their extensive forests. I don't
Speaker 1: like the sound of that, and in some ways it
Speaker 1: feels like that's happening to day too. I'm telling you,
Speaker 1: we're gonna learn a lot of stuff from tecumsa In
Speaker 1: he would refuse to sign the Treaty of Greenville. It
Speaker 1: really ticked him off because it redrew Indian line lands.
Speaker 1: But even more egregious Harrison, William Henry Harrison would later
Speaker 1: make treaties with multiple tribes, pitting them against each other,
Speaker 1: and in the Treaty of St. Louis in the eighteen
Speaker 1: o four he purchased fifty one million acres for less
Speaker 1: than a penny per acre. That's just one of hundreds
Speaker 1: of trees. This wasn't highway robbery. They were carjacked and
Speaker 1: left for dead on the road. This was the world
Speaker 1: two COMSA emerged in. But the muck gets even deeper
Speaker 1: when it comes to losing land. Here's Dr Dave Edmonds.
Speaker 1: The Shawnee believe that they that that they occupied, and
Speaker 1: many tribal people they occupy the center of the world
Speaker 1: where they live is the ender of the world. For
Speaker 1: the Shawnee, Ohio Valley is the center of the world
Speaker 1: and there and they were basically given that land due
Speaker 1: to be theirs. I think there's something else to understand here.
Speaker 1: Within the framework of many tribal cultures, where you live,
Speaker 1: your location, it's very very important to people. Many tribal
Speaker 1: religions are sites specific in that their gods, the powers
Speaker 1: in the universe, basically hold forth in this area. If
Speaker 1: you pick them up and move them to another place,
Speaker 1: you're taking them away from their gods. Forced relocation, whether
Speaker 1: by threat of violence or later by organized removal, would
Speaker 1: be philosophically different for Native Americans than Europeans. Recently, these
Speaker 1: Europeans that traversed the Atlantic and came to an entirely
Speaker 1: new land of promise there can action to the land
Speaker 1: was primarily utilitarian and governed by a modern idea of
Speaker 1: individual landownership, modern compared to a hunter gatherer society. This
Speaker 1: idea of personal landownership is an abstract idea and completely
Speaker 1: oppositional and confusing to the Native American worldview. In Chief
Speaker 1: Seattle's famous speech, he spells out their land ethic well.
Speaker 1: He said, quote, how can you buy or sell the
Speaker 1: sky the warmth of the land. The idea is strange
Speaker 1: to us. If we do not own the freshness of
Speaker 1: the air and the sparkle of the water, how can
Speaker 1: you buy them? End of quote. This would be like
Speaker 1: you're standing in your yard and a soccer game forms
Speaker 1: out of thin air around you and you don't know
Speaker 1: the rules. But the rules of the game actually violate
Speaker 1: your conscience and worldview. But if you lose, you lose
Speaker 1: your house. Here's Peter Cozen's We're now going to start
Speaker 1: to describe two comes to his unique young life, and
Speaker 1: we'll see that hunting was a very important part of it.
Speaker 1: Continuing to talk about two comes to when he was young.
Speaker 1: To me, it's one of the most interesting parts of
Speaker 1: his life. I mean, all the stuff he did when
Speaker 1: he was older is what he became famous for. But
Speaker 1: and he was known as a great hunter. There were
Speaker 1: multiple stories. When he was sixteen years old, supposedly he
Speaker 1: went on a buffalo hunt killed sixteen buffalo on his
Speaker 1: own with a bone arrow. Right. He was with a
Speaker 1: group of included his younger brother thanks Ottawa, who they
Speaker 1: placed bets on who could kill the most BiCon to
Speaker 1: come st ended up killing more than all all of
Speaker 1: the others put together. So he was And there was
Speaker 1: another time when there was a challenge to see who
Speaker 1: could kill the most deer in a in a like
Speaker 1: a three day period, and two Come so went out
Speaker 1: and it said he killed forty deer, which that's one
Speaker 1: of those stories that I'm I kind of have a
Speaker 1: little bit of hard time or I I can't put
Speaker 1: the pieces together of how I can't either, I mean,
Speaker 1: where would he put them all? I mean, I know
Speaker 1: that that one strikes me as apocryphal. Well, but but
Speaker 1: I think what we can take away from that is
Speaker 1: that his reputation as a hunter in the whole Shawnee
Speaker 1: nation eventually would be very established, exactly and and he
Speaker 1: was believed to be one of the best hunters in
Speaker 1: the whole Shawnee nation. And the number of deer, precise
Speaker 1: number of deer or buffalo that he killed, is really irrelevant.
Speaker 1: What's relevant is that he'd be seen by others as
Speaker 1: being far much there better in what was one of
Speaker 1: the two most important things in male Indian society, hunting
Speaker 1: and warmaking. It was said that it comes to love solitude,
Speaker 1: which was unusual for the highly social Shawnees. He learned
Speaker 1: to purify his breath with sassafrast as a means of
Speaker 1: sit control when big game hunting, and he would ask
Speaker 1: the spirits of the animals he killed for forgiveness. This
Speaker 1: was standard Shawnee stuff. Speaking of hunters, A very interesting
Speaker 1: component of Twokumpsa's life is that it overlapped in a
Speaker 1: unique way with the life of the American folk hero
Speaker 1: and Bear Grease Hall of Famer Daniel Boone. You can't
Speaker 1: make this stuff up. Do you remember when Boone was
Speaker 1: adopted by the Shawnee Blackfish. Here's Robert Morgan. That's that's
Speaker 1: a fascinating overlap that. So Blackfish was Boone's adopted father.
Speaker 1: So Boone was adopted by Blackfish when Boone was in
Speaker 1: its forties, I think, and so and then Blackfish was
Speaker 1: a father figure to two Kompsa and and so they had,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of this overlapping father and then two
Speaker 1: Kompsa would have been a young man but was involved
Speaker 1: in the Battle of the Blue Lips. He would have
Speaker 1: been sixteen at the Bottle of Okay, a teenager fourteen,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, wow. And we know for sure he was
Speaker 1: at the Battle of Blue Lucks. That's incredible. And that's
Speaker 1: where Boone Boone lost his son. And it was one
Speaker 1: of the biggest train wrecks of Boone's you know, kind
Speaker 1: of frontier career was Blue Legs and Tecumpsa was there,
Speaker 1: which is wild. Boone was thirty four years old when
Speaker 1: Tecompsa was born in seventeen sixty eight. In seventeen seventy eight,
Speaker 1: Twokumpsa would have been ten years old. It was basically
Speaker 1: being fathered by Blackfish when Boone and his men were
Speaker 1: making salt on the Licking River and were captured by Blackfish.
Speaker 1: Boone stayed with the tribe for four months. He ran
Speaker 1: the gauntlet and was officially adopted by Blackfish and given
Speaker 1: the Shawnee name of Shell Ta Wheat or Big Turtle.
Speaker 1: Boone would later recount to his son Nathan how Blackfish
Speaker 1: would suck on a sugar cube and then hand it
Speaker 1: to him to eat. Boone said he would often give
Speaker 1: children in the village treats, and it's very possible that
Speaker 1: the ten year old Tecumpsa would have known Old d
Speaker 1: b How wild is that Boone would eventually escape, but
Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty two he would meet the Shawnees in
Speaker 1: the Battle of the Blue Licks in Kentucky, where his
Speaker 1: son Israel would be killed, and two Cumpsa was there
Speaker 1: in that battle. Here's Peter Cozen's with an incident that
Speaker 1: physically branded young two comes his life. Two comes, so
Speaker 1: when he was when he was twenty one years old.
Speaker 1: They're they're going to bison hunt. Two comes. His enthusiasm
Speaker 1: kind of overcomes his prudence, and he falls from his
Speaker 1: horse in the in the course of chasing down a
Speaker 1: bison and shatters his thigh bone. And he during the
Speaker 1: during the long winter months, he's unable to rise from
Speaker 1: you know, his bear skin or buckskin bed, and in
Speaker 1: their in their temporary wigwam I mean, he was wrapped
Speaker 1: in blankets. He was racked with pain, and for the
Speaker 1: only time in his life that I've found any mentioned
Speaker 1: of this, he fell into a deep depression. He became
Speaker 1: deeply desponded because he thought, you know, if he were
Speaker 1: to emerge a cripple, he would be no use as
Speaker 1: a hunter, as a warrior, I mean, essentially, he would
Speaker 1: be no use to his people. And he actually contemplated
Speaker 1: suicide rather than the prospect of living on the charity
Speaker 1: of others. And when the spring came and his older
Speaker 1: brother urged to come, so to to stay in their
Speaker 1: camp until he mended enough to resume the trip western Mississippi,
Speaker 1: you know, wait for others to come back for him.
Speaker 1: But instead he he fashioned the crude pair of crutches
Speaker 1: and filed along with with chess Cow and the others.
Speaker 1: But he paid a price, high price for that, for
Speaker 1: his bullheadedness and that he in walking on his his
Speaker 1: leg before the thigh was completely healed, he developed a
Speaker 1: permanent limp that troubled him for the rest of his life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so his whole life. People talk about that when he's
Speaker 1: when he's meeting with U. S. Military generals, and people
Speaker 1: meant on He'll be the one with the limp. He'll
Speaker 1: be the one with the limp. We're continuing to build
Speaker 1: the pieces of it comes to his life that will
Speaker 1: add up to how he became the most influential Indian
Speaker 1: leader in American history. These small stories matter. It seems
Speaker 1: like everybody in history that's famous was always, you know,
Speaker 1: three inches taller than the average guy. It was said
Speaker 1: that he was about five eleven, which would have been
Speaker 1: fairly tall, a bit taller. They said he was kind
Speaker 1: of stocky and muscular. He's he stood out amongst a
Speaker 1: crowd and uh me, he had a real striking face.
Speaker 1: Everybody commented on that, you know, the white frends. He
Speaker 1: made American enemies, his British and Canadian allies all commented
Speaker 1: don't know how striking his looks were not only his
Speaker 1: physical carriage, but also his features, his eyes, his nose.
Speaker 1: He was a handsome man and it had a real straking,
Speaker 1: charismatic quality about his about his appearance I think appealed
Speaker 1: to Indians and to whites. I think it's so interesting
Speaker 1: because before there were there were photographs that could be
Speaker 1: put on the internet or put in a newspaper. When
Speaker 1: people gave account of meeting someone, they would describe them
Speaker 1: in great detail, and anymore as a journalist or if
Speaker 1: we're writing a report, if you wanted to tell somebody
Speaker 1: look like you just put their picture there. But I
Speaker 1: think it's so fascinating when I read because all these guys.
Speaker 1: There's many accounts of different people describing the way to come,
Speaker 1: and they use metaphors or they get very descriptive in
Speaker 1: their in their vocabulary. His his piercing or burning eyes
Speaker 1: that could suddenly turn jolly in an instant, and just
Speaker 1: a level of description you just you would never see today.
Speaker 1: A federal government official who interacted with the comps to
Speaker 1: said that he was quote too heavily built to be
Speaker 1: swift on foot, but all together formed for rank and
Speaker 1: to endure great hardships. Yet another American officer said, quote,
Speaker 1: he was one of the finest looking men I ever saw,
Speaker 1: about six ft high, straight, with large, fine features. Stephen
Speaker 1: Riddell was a white kid who was captured as a child.
Speaker 1: He knew English, and he was raised as a sibling
Speaker 1: to Tecumpsa. He was the one that taught tecumps to English. Anyway,
Speaker 1: Riddell later said of Tecumpsa quote, there was something in
Speaker 1: his countenance and manner that always commanded respect and at
Speaker 1: the same time made those about him love him. Later
Speaker 1: in life, Tecumsa would have shoulder length black hair and
Speaker 1: always wore a nose ring. In later years he showed
Speaker 1: up to official meetings with government officials wearing a cloth
Speaker 1: headdressing with a white Ostrich feather. In eighteen o eight,
Speaker 1: during the rise of Tecumpsas fame, a French fur trader
Speaker 1: dude not surprisingly named Pierre, sketched the most realistic imagery
Speaker 1: we have of the Shawnee. This was before photographs. It's
Speaker 1: the only portrait believed too accurately depict him. There are, however, today,
Speaker 1: many updated versions of the sketch, and to put this
Speaker 1: next section into context, starting when two comes to was
Speaker 1: a teenager, he was involved in many battles, skirmishes, and
Speaker 1: raids of all kinds. He wasn't involved in an official
Speaker 1: war until the War of eighteen twelve, but he lived
Speaker 1: in a war zone filled with guerrilla warfare his whole life,
Speaker 1: and in warfare, like in hunting, he stood out amongst
Speaker 1: his peers. Here's a very interesting part of Tecmesa's character.
Speaker 1: This was not unique to the Shawnee, but again, the
Speaker 1: other tribes all faced a similar crisis of being confronted
Speaker 1: by growing and growing white encroachment on their lands. And
Speaker 1: with that came the Whiskey traders, and that really, to
Speaker 1: our apart, Shawnee and other societies and others became, you know,
Speaker 1: rapidly hateful of whites. Two comes to didn't we didn't
Speaker 1: do either. He not only he maintained his humanity through
Speaker 1: all this. He opposed the traditional Shawnee practice of torturing
Speaker 1: male prisoners during times of peace. The times of peace
Speaker 1: that existed, he developed great friendships among the white settlers
Speaker 1: on the other side of the treating line, and so
Speaker 1: he he maintained, you know, he didn't let the war
Speaker 1: and the dislocation creating him a hatred of whites or
Speaker 1: a loss of his humanity, and that's something that's also
Speaker 1: really app One of the things he was known for
Speaker 1: was even from a young age, having he he disdained
Speaker 1: the torture that was extremely common when you think about
Speaker 1: a trend inside of a society. To find somebody that
Speaker 1: deeply opposed was as a trend is unusual. And where
Speaker 1: he got that, I mean, I guess we don't really know.
Speaker 1: We don't really know. And he manifested that trade manifested
Speaker 1: itself and him at age fifteen when he was on
Speaker 1: one of his first war parties, and that was an
Speaker 1: age when you were like just an apprentice warrior. I
Speaker 1: mean you you were basically a menial to a war party.
Speaker 1: You were kind of there. Errand boy, when he was
Speaker 1: on this one particular war party along the Ohio River,
Speaker 1: he spoke up and objected loudly to the older warriors
Speaker 1: torturing and then killing some white male prisoners, and that
Speaker 1: was unheard of. I mean, Stephen Riddell relates that and said,
Speaker 1: this was just something that was not not done culturally unusual.
Speaker 1: Culturally unusual. After all, we've heard about the fog of
Speaker 1: death surrounding his life and these broken treaties. I find
Speaker 1: it odd how he was able to get along with
Speaker 1: the whites and his passion for the Indian Confederacy in
Speaker 1: the development of an Indian nation didn't seem to translate
Speaker 1: into hatred or vitriol. This was evidenced by his stance
Speaker 1: on prisoner torture and some of his unique relationships that
Speaker 1: he had with white people throughout his whole life. He
Speaker 1: just wanted a space for his people to live in
Speaker 1: their traditional ways. And he always sought peace before war.
Speaker 1: Remember that about him, because you hear about him as
Speaker 1: a warrior, but he always sought peace before war. He
Speaker 1: was an incredible diplomat who was truly looking out for
Speaker 1: the best interests of his people. Getting back to our
Speaker 1: original question of why this enemy of the United States
Speaker 1: was a folk hero, these kind of things would have
Speaker 1: gotten back to the American public, and they respected him
Speaker 1: for it. Sadly, his popularity would grow even more after
Speaker 1: his death as his story was more widely circulated. As
Speaker 1: we moved further into Comes his young life, you might
Speaker 1: be wondering if he had a wife and kids, But
Speaker 1: like in so many other ways, two Come, so was unusual.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's there's you know, two schools of thought
Speaker 1: among those who knew him personally. Stephen Riddell said girls
Speaker 1: in particular are attracted to him when he was growing up,
Speaker 1: but that he would I mean, he would not have
Speaker 1: much to do with them. But whatever the case, he
Speaker 1: he certainly found it easy to break off relationships. I
Speaker 1: mean when he was when he and his older brother
Speaker 1: were living among a group of the Cherokee, he took
Speaker 1: a Cherokee woman as his mate, who, by all accounts
Speaker 1: was very pretty, and he may have bore her a child.
Speaker 1: But when he his brothers said his time to brus
Speaker 1: to move back to Ohio, he just left her behind.
Speaker 1: And when he married Shawnny Women, his first wife was
Speaker 1: not at all attractive, and he jettisoned her easily. He
Speaker 1: jettisoned another wife because shortly after marrying her, he invited
Speaker 1: some friends over for dinner, and she had not plucked
Speaker 1: her wild turkey, had not plucked all the feathers out,
Speaker 1: and he I guess he was looking for an excuse,
Speaker 1: and he said, well, how dare you embarrassed me? You know,
Speaker 1: in front of my friends. Your bannagh to go back
Speaker 1: to your family and throw her out. So women didn't
Speaker 1: seem to be particularly important to him until later on
Speaker 1: when he was living in what became known as Profits Town.
Speaker 1: By this time he would have been round age forty.
Speaker 1: According to some accounts left by members of other tribes
Speaker 1: who knew him, he was I mean, he had a
Speaker 1: different woman in his in his wigwam every night, So
Speaker 1: maybe he just was a little a little something something changed,
Speaker 1: so it come so yeah, he was not a family man.
Speaker 1: And that's so ironic because what we see is this
Speaker 1: is this man who deeply loved the traditional ways of
Speaker 1: the Shawnee. He wanted that so you would you would
Speaker 1: think this man really valued the traditional Native American way
Speaker 1: of living. It's kind of eccentric, it is, very much so.
Speaker 1: And maybe that's partly what gave him the energy or
Speaker 1: maybe it was the energy and the drive to establish
Speaker 1: this Pan Indian community that just so much. So important
Speaker 1: to that is it's it's subsumed personal desires for that part.
Speaker 1: Very interesting. So now we understand the chronology of de
Speaker 1: comes his young life. Now he's an adult, and this
Speaker 1: is where things get dicey. You thought that other stuff
Speaker 1: was dicey, This is the genesis story of he and
Speaker 1: his brother's revolution and the Pan Indian Confederacy. By UM
Speaker 1: eighteen o five, the Indians of the Midwest were I mean,
Speaker 1: they were being pushed onto an ever decreasing amount of land.
Speaker 1: And so in eighteen o five two Comes to younger
Speaker 1: brother tengs Watawa had this vision that at the time
Speaker 1: he was an absolute ne'er do well alcoholic, and he
Speaker 1: collapsed into this trance so deeply that two Comes and
Speaker 1: others thought he was dead. He emerged from that proclaiming
Speaker 1: that he had had a vision of what was about
Speaker 1: to befall the Indians, which was ultimately, you know, complete
Speaker 1: disaster or annihilation if they didn't return to traditional values,
Speaker 1: and that they were being punished for what was happening
Speaker 1: to them. It wasn't the fault of the whites, it
Speaker 1: was because they themselves had had wandered off the spiritual
Speaker 1: correct path of living. This Pan Indian religious movement grew
Speaker 1: up around Tanks Wattawa, and he became really the most
Speaker 1: influential prophet in American Indian history, and prophets and prophecy
Speaker 1: were very important in American Indian way of life, and
Speaker 1: one who was recognized as a genuine prophet who genuinely
Speaker 1: had communications with the Great Spirit, the Master of Life
Speaker 1: God was accorded a great deference. This Pan Indian religious
Speaker 1: movement is so important to understanding two kompsa in ten Squattawa.
Speaker 1: I want to hear Dr Dave Edmonds speak about it.
Speaker 1: They who had been they called themselves. We were once
Speaker 1: the masters of the of the Ohio Valley. We were
Speaker 1: lost things. What's happened in here? We've strayed? Well. Then
Speaker 1: on a sudden comes this man who has this vision,
Speaker 1: who was a tense guata with the Shawnee prophet is
Speaker 1: a man of not much reputation before he has this vision,
Speaker 1: and he has this falls into this sort of trance
Speaker 1: and he falls over into in his wigwam as his
Speaker 1: wife is preparing a meal, that almost falls into a fire,
Speaker 1: and they think he's died. And then he comes back
Speaker 1: and he says, I've I have been taken to heaven
Speaker 1: and I've seen what it's like, and I know that
Speaker 1: what we need to do, and we need to get
Speaker 1: away from these white ways. We need to give up drinking,
Speaker 1: and we need to hunt only with bows and arrows.
Speaker 1: We can use, we can use fire arms to protect us,
Speaker 1: but we need to go back to the old ways.
Speaker 1: We need to wear clothing is made of traditional skins
Speaker 1: or our own fabrics, etcetera. And that regulation about how
Speaker 1: fires could be started started with sticks, and he begins
Speaker 1: to preach this in eight teen oh five, ten Squatta
Speaker 1: was spiritual message of returning to the traditional Indian ways
Speaker 1: begins to spread. Remember, by this time white technology had
Speaker 1: rapidly taken hold of Native communities through Jefferson's Trade Agenda
Speaker 1: and others. But the message is a combination of ten
Speaker 1: Squatta was owned doctrine, and some preceding Native American profits.
Speaker 1: It proclaimed a need for repentance in order to be
Speaker 1: connected back with the Great Spirit. It involved intricate specifics
Speaker 1: of how Indians should live. One that I thought was
Speaker 1: interesting was that they needed to have a constantly burning
Speaker 1: fire in their wigwams, which symbolized rebirth in a new faith.
Speaker 1: Tin Squatta has said, quote summer and winter, day and
Speaker 1: night in the storm or when it is calm, you
Speaker 1: must remember that life in your body and fire in
Speaker 1: your lodge are the same. End of quote. But the
Speaker 1: fire couldn't be started with the white man's flint and steel.
Speaker 1: It had to be started with sticks and burn year round.
Speaker 1: Mr Nucom is always cold, so she would love it
Speaker 1: if we did this at our house. And it also
Speaker 1: reminds me of the home fires of rural frontier America.
Speaker 1: That was a real thing. People kept fires burning year
Speaker 1: round as a spiritual or philosophical statement. Anyway, the doctrine,
Speaker 1: in the words of Peter Cozens, was a syncretic creed
Speaker 1: of spiritual and cultural renewal. Here is an interesting aside.
Speaker 1: This Indian Revival coincided with and was a lot like
Speaker 1: the Christian Revivals happening at the same time on the frontier.
Speaker 1: Here's Robert Morgan, and what I want to say is
Speaker 1: that he, on the other end, our ours of that
Speaker 1: time mirror almost perfectly. Teachers of the second grade Awakening
Speaker 1: just happening this time. The metaphors are the same. You've
Speaker 1: got to repent, you've been doing the wrong thing. You've
Speaker 1: got to humble yourself. And they're saying this to the Indians.
Speaker 1: He's saying it to the Indians, and the revival preachers
Speaker 1: that saying to the white people to get a seat
Speaker 1: in heaven, to bring the millennium, you've got to do
Speaker 1: this and DECOMPSI is saying to the Indians, you've got
Speaker 1: to repent, You've got to give up your sinful ways
Speaker 1: to achieve this paradise on earth. But another thing I
Speaker 1: want to say is that even the prophet was inspired
Speaker 1: by a lot of the preaching and the tradition of Christianity.
Speaker 1: These really mirror each other. That these these cultures had
Speaker 1: mixed to that extent that this prophet said things that
Speaker 1: the Indians had never heard before from other holy men,
Speaker 1: and they resemble amazingly, you know, the things that would
Speaker 1: have been heard in a sermon been read in Christianity
Speaker 1: and h in the other direction, that tremendous Indian oratory
Speaker 1: inspires the white preachers and they pick up a lot
Speaker 1: of the tricks and rhetoric of them. And this goes
Speaker 1: into the twentieth century's cliche to say that the ghost
Speaker 1: nance religion ended with the wounded knee. It didn't. It's
Speaker 1: still with us. It never went away. And preachers like
Speaker 1: Oral Roberts and almost all of those Revival preachers have
Speaker 1: Indian blood, so that influence. It's just one of the
Speaker 1: many ways in which Indian culture influenced white culture as
Speaker 1: much as the other way around, the white culture influencing
Speaker 1: Indian culture. Very interesting. Will continue to see how Indian
Speaker 1: oratory affected the speech and communication of the American frontier.
Speaker 1: Here's Peter with more on the genuine nature of ten
Speaker 1: Squattawa's personal trans formation. Alcoholics anonymous could learn a lot
Speaker 1: from thanks to Ottawa, because literally he was the evening
Speaker 1: he had his vision hunched over the campfire in his
Speaker 1: wigwam in uh, you know, the the early spring cold.
Speaker 1: He was still an alcoholic at that moment, and he
Speaker 1: emerged from his seemingly comatose state, uh, not only articulating
Speaker 1: the the initial points of his his doctrine of of
Speaker 1: spiritual rebirth. From the moment he emerged from that vision,
Speaker 1: he never took another drop of drink the rest of
Speaker 1: his life. You know, I've talked to doctors who read
Speaker 1: my book and others, and this is no way to
Speaker 1: explain it through you. Through rational and genuine happened, something
Speaker 1: genuinely happened to him spiritually. By all accounts, his transformation
Speaker 1: produced genuine, lifelong change. He became a traveling evangelist. But
Speaker 1: here is the meat of what comes to it that
Speaker 1: made him who he was. Two Comes essentially co opted
Speaker 1: his brother's movement and turned it into a political and
Speaker 1: military alliance around eighteen o eight, and he said, you know, look,
Speaker 1: we have to not only return to traditional values as
Speaker 1: my brother is saying, we also have to band together
Speaker 1: as a need arises politically in military. We are one
Speaker 1: people eating from the same bowl with the same spoon,
Speaker 1: and we cannot continue to yield to the white men
Speaker 1: and give up land piecemeal. And if we do, we're
Speaker 1: all going to be driven into the Great Lakes, and
Speaker 1: that will be the end of us. We're one people
Speaker 1: eating from the same bowl with the same spoon. Two
Speaker 1: comes To said Indian speech constantly used powerful metaphor. He
Speaker 1: and Tins Squattawa increased in power with many of the
Speaker 1: tribes in the Midwest and Great Lakes regions, unlike Indians
Speaker 1: ever had. Tin Squattawa was the spiritual leader, and two
Speaker 1: comes To was his mouthpiece, almost like Aaron and Moses
Speaker 1: in the Bible. Aaron spoke for Moses to Pharaoh and
Speaker 1: to the people. Here's a unique thing. Signs and wonders
Speaker 1: seemed to follow these two kind of like Aaron Moses.
Speaker 1: I'll let you decide what you think here's a look
Speaker 1: into the government's original plan to discredit this Indian prophet
Speaker 1: who was gaining so much traction with the tribes. William
Speaker 1: Henry Harrison, who was the governor of Indiana and and
Speaker 1: had the Northwest territory there, and I said, you're gonna
Speaker 1: do something about this, and so he issues this speech.
Speaker 1: Why are you following this this crazy man. He's not holy,
Speaker 1: he is just he's just a false prophet if he
Speaker 1: really is a prophet, asked him to bring the dead back,
Speaker 1: asked him to make the rivers run backward, ask him
Speaker 1: to make the sun stand still. And what Harrison obviously
Speaker 1: does not know, our overlooks it is that there is
Speaker 1: a eclipse coming. And what the prophet knew it or not,
Speaker 1: that's the question. I can't believe that he knew it.
Speaker 1: But anyway, in June, big eclipse right across the Midwest,
Speaker 1: so in the mid midday, and it gets so dark
Speaker 1: that the bird's nest and farm animals go into the barn,
Speaker 1: and the prophecies, I tell you, I have made this
Speaker 1: unstand still. My goodness is influenced and spreads. It's is
Speaker 1: a miracle as far as the trunk, and it spreads
Speaker 1: Tin Squattawa. After he received the challenge from William Henry
Speaker 1: Harrison gathered his people and said, quote, fifty days from
Speaker 1: this day, there will be no cloud in the sky.
Speaker 1: Yet when the sun has reached its highest point. At
Speaker 1: that moment, will the Great Spirit take it into her
Speaker 1: hand and hide it from us. The darkness of night
Speaker 1: will there on cover us, and the stars will shine
Speaker 1: round about us. The birds will roost, and the night
Speaker 1: creatures will awaken and stir. End of quote. In June
Speaker 1: of eight ten No six, there was a solar eclipse
Speaker 1: that blacked out the sky. Many said that ten Squattawa
Speaker 1: was told about the eclipse coming. Others said it was
Speaker 1: a miracle. We'll never know, but it did increase Tins
Speaker 1: Squattwa was fame. But I'll tell you one thing that
Speaker 1: we do know. Tecumsa would become known as one of
Speaker 1: the greatest, if not the greatest, orators in Native American history,
Speaker 1: and even in American history. It's hard to quantify because
Speaker 1: there are no audio recordings of him. But here's Robert Morgan.
Speaker 1: Tell me about how you said that he was maybe
Speaker 1: the greatest orator that this nation has ever seen. I
Speaker 1: think it's quite like he was the greatest orator just
Speaker 1: because of his power over people. He could he could
Speaker 1: inspire really anybody who listened to him. He did run
Speaker 1: into one Indian who disputed him about the Confederacy, and
Speaker 1: that was of all people read Eagle and the legend
Speaker 1: is that red Eagle, you know, said to him. And
Speaker 1: he's up there and preaching, and everybody was just absolutely
Speaker 1: swayed by and ready very strong personality said you know,
Speaker 1: you're you're just full of hot air. And the compassus said,
Speaker 1: you think I don't have the power, When I get
Speaker 1: back to Detroit, I will stomp my foot and it
Speaker 1: will shake your towns down. And he went back to
Speaker 1: Detroit and the great earthquake of eighteen eleven came and
Speaker 1: shook their towns. That, yeah, that's wild. Yeah, he's what
Speaker 1: do you make of that? Tin squatter did it the
Speaker 1: same thing about turning the sun black with the eclipse,
Speaker 1: but the earthquake, Man, do you think he just got
Speaker 1: lucky or do you think do you think he really was?
Speaker 1: He called that one down. We'll never know, He'll never know. Well,
Speaker 1: that time period, I believe it was eighteen eleven was
Speaker 1: when all those new Madrid. Earthquakes started happening up and
Speaker 1: down the Mississippi River valley, which made real Foot Lake
Speaker 1: in Tennessee. Whatever happened that, a lot of earthquakes happened.
Speaker 1: After that, they just kept happening. Uh. There were many
Speaker 1: after quakes also made the Mississippi run backward from a
Speaker 1: certain time that it was an enormous earthquake. The Year
Speaker 1: of Miracles, Twakumpsa and his little brother began to amass
Speaker 1: an influential national following of Native Americans through their doctrine
Speaker 1: of revival of traditional ways followed by these signs and wonders,
Speaker 1: but the other equally important component of their message was
Speaker 1: a strong militant stance on no more lands being ceded
Speaker 1: to the United States. The United States took note of
Speaker 1: this message and its power. However, surprisingly most of their
Speaker 1: own the Shawnees, didn't follow these brothers. Most of their
Speaker 1: following came from other tribes. Even Old j. C. Said
Speaker 1: that a prophet wouldn't be accepted in his hometown. Here's
Speaker 1: Peter giving more insight into the division amongst the tribes,
Speaker 1: tins Quintawa becomes this prophet recognized authorized prophet inside of
Speaker 1: the Shawnee Nation. His brother is this war leader. Hunter
Speaker 1: talked to me about how they worked together to have
Speaker 1: influence like they did, and we got to be careful
Speaker 1: with our terminology because he wasn't really recognized neither one
Speaker 1: nor recognized as anything by most Shawnee. Most of the Shawnee.
Speaker 1: There were only about a thousand, maybe if twelve hundred
Speaker 1: Shawnee who still lived in the Midwest at the time
Speaker 1: that to come since tanks Watawa ascended to power, so
Speaker 1: to speak, when they became influential, and the great majority
Speaker 1: of the Shawnee rejected tanks Watawa this doctrine right from
Speaker 1: the get go and subsequently rejected to come. So maybe
Speaker 1: in part because again it was such a small community
Speaker 1: that most Shawnee knew tex Watawa is is alcoholic, dead
Speaker 1: beat and uh the majority of shawn He lived in
Speaker 1: a village in northeastern Ohio under a chief named Blackfoot,
Speaker 1: and they gravitated to Blackfoot, and they really wanted to assimilate.
Speaker 1: I mean, they really wanted to walk the white man's road,
Speaker 1: so to speak. They welcomed farm implements, that welcomed instruction
Speaker 1: and farming that we're willing to give up the hunt.
Speaker 1: And what was particularly remarkable about that is that farming
Speaker 1: was anathema to Indian men. It was believed that there
Speaker 1: were two kinds of power that the Master of life
Speaker 1: bestowed upon humans. Female power, and that was for women
Speaker 1: that allowed them to succeed as agriculturists and also in
Speaker 1: child bearing. And then and there's male power that was
Speaker 1: exclusively useful in the hunt and in war. And those
Speaker 1: two should never be mixed. I mean, for a man
Speaker 1: to take up farming alongside of women would be essentially
Speaker 1: to give up his male power of masculinity. This was
Speaker 1: really tearing down the whole stole fabric society. And so
Speaker 1: for the for all these Shawny and mails to say, Okay,
Speaker 1: we're willing to forego this and you know, walk the
Speaker 1: white man's road was pretty remarkable, but they did. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: the US government betrayed them on the road from Afar.
Speaker 1: It would seem that all Indian tribes would be against
Speaker 1: selling land and assimilating into white culture. However, that just
Speaker 1: wasn't the case. This is why Tecumsa's rational but radical
Speaker 1: message to stand against the United States was so wild.
Speaker 1: The situation was tearing apart the fabric of Indian culture.
Speaker 1: The people were looking for leadership, they were looking for
Speaker 1: an answer. Here's Chief Ben Barnes putting two Cumsa into
Speaker 1: context with the other leaders inside of his community. He
Speaker 1: makes the point that Tecumsa was a great leader, but
Speaker 1: he was a result of all the things and leaders
Speaker 1: that had come before him, making even more sense of
Speaker 1: who he was. He was really he was ticked off.
Speaker 1: You know, he's ticked off, and he's a young person
Speaker 1: and he'd seen leadership of the past, so he was
Speaker 1: not like a formal leader and went through leadership he was.
Speaker 1: He was a leader that ascended. Like, listen, we're all mad,
Speaker 1: were ticked off. Nobody's doing things things about it. We
Speaker 1: need a military response to this. And of course he
Speaker 1: wasn't speaking in those terms, but he's just talking about
Speaker 1: we need to come together and take up arms. But
Speaker 1: he wasn't all by himself. You know, this is this
Speaker 1: is a long line of people leading these fights. Blackfish,
Speaker 1: black hoof, even and blue jacket. So he had seen
Speaker 1: these military campaigns that had just stopped short of drawing
Speaker 1: the line U the line that King of England had proposed.
Speaker 1: You know, this would all be Indian territory west of
Speaker 1: that line, and that didn't happen. But what's really intriguing
Speaker 1: to me is he was not alone. Even at the
Speaker 1: time that he was leading this revolution, this pan resistance revolution,
Speaker 1: his brother and Squatala was rereading a religious revival. At
Speaker 1: the same time you have this other movement that's a
Speaker 1: militarized revival. And what's really intriguing as you have to
Speaker 1: put those both those things into context at the same
Speaker 1: time where it comes not at appointed leader of all
Speaker 1: the Shawnees. These are disaffected, angry people, and he starts
Speaker 1: gathering other disaffected angry people to him for this battle.
Speaker 1: And the communities are right. They had some communities in
Speaker 1: support of his efforts. Some wanted to say, well, let's
Speaker 1: see how this goes. And then he had something that's like,
Speaker 1: you know what, we've already left so long before it
Speaker 1: comes to started his uh military campaign, Shawnese had already said,
Speaker 1: you know, we're out of here. We're leaving Maryland, We're
Speaker 1: leaving West Virginia, leaving Virginia, We're leaving these places in Alabama, Georgia,
Speaker 1: and uh moving into Arkansas, Missouri. I find when talking
Speaker 1: with the chief he's always placing in. Two comes to
Speaker 1: in the context of his community. We'll talk a lot
Speaker 1: more with Chief Barnes and eight er episodes, but it's
Speaker 1: clear that the tribe was divided about what to do,
Speaker 1: and they we're looking for leadership, and these brothers offered
Speaker 1: a solution, a milieu or a what we would call
Speaker 1: it a climate there in the midwest of whether it's
Speaker 1: been an awful lot of unrest and here here's an answer.
Speaker 1: Here's an answer, and it's spreaduled. Two comes to then
Speaker 1: steps in and he begins to form at a political
Speaker 1: thing to this. Well, the prophet initially was sort of
Speaker 1: the white saw. The prophet is kind of a crazy man,
Speaker 1: but not I mean, he's a threat in some ways.
Speaker 1: But when t comes comes in and says we're going
Speaker 1: to unite, We're going to bring the tribes together, that
Speaker 1: really frightens the government because they want to approach tribal
Speaker 1: people piecemeal, play tribal people off against each other. And
Speaker 1: Two comes to said, no, we we do not need
Speaker 1: Potawatomie land, Shawnee land, Delaware land, Kickapoo land, Miami land.
Speaker 1: We want to have Native American land. It's our land,
Speaker 1: and no more land should be seated piecemeal. That's a
Speaker 1: great threat. That is an incredible threat to a young
Speaker 1: nation so hungry for land that they do anything, and
Speaker 1: I mean anything. The Comesa didn't have a choice of
Speaker 1: when he was born. Was it a blessing or a curse?
Speaker 1: That he was a natural leader, a visionary and idealist,
Speaker 1: charismatic with a magnetic demeanor and a heritage that wouldn't
Speaker 1: allow him to back down even when standing before great foes.
Speaker 1: Little did he know that he was fighting a young
Speaker 1: version of a great giant, a nation that would become
Speaker 1: the most powerful nation in the history of the planet.
Speaker 1: If he could see the handwriting on the wall, he
Speaker 1: didn't care. I can't help but respect that kind of
Speaker 1: passion and adherence to the vision. In a very ironic way,
Speaker 1: to Humpsa represents the American spirit of freedom from oppression
Speaker 1: and a willingness to die for that. His indomitability, nobility
Speaker 1: in the midst of struggle, and insight beyond his time
Speaker 1: about the unification of his people are traits that mark
Speaker 1: his life and that we would hope are built inside
Speaker 1: the national character of America, which that's massively upward. Debate
Speaker 1: whether it is, but hey, we're just getting started. Two
Speaker 1: cumps to is only in his thirties. We're just scratching
Speaker 1: the surface of who this guy was and what he did.
Speaker 1: On Part two of this series will get into the
Speaker 1: warfare years if two comes his life. I want to
Speaker 1: end with a quote from William Henry Harrison, who was
Speaker 1: two Comes his gravest enemy and would eventually become the
Speaker 1: President of the United States. Here's Peter Cosen's Here's here's
Speaker 1: what William Henry Harrison said after his contentious A ten
Speaker 1: eleven conference with the KUMSA. He said he wrote this
Speaker 1: in a letter to the Secretary of War. He said,
Speaker 1: the implicit obedience and respect which the followers of two
Speaker 1: comes to pay to him is really astonishing, and more
Speaker 1: than any other circumstance, bespeaks him one of those uncommon
Speaker 1: geniuses which spring up occasionally to produce revolutions and overturn
Speaker 1: the established order of things. If it were not for
Speaker 1: the vicinity of the United States, he would perhaps be
Speaker 1: the founder of an empire that would rival in glory
Speaker 1: that of Mexico or Peru. Stay tuned for Part two
Speaker 1: of the series, called Uncommon Genius. I can't thank you
Speaker 1: enough for listening to Bear Greece. I hope these stories
Speaker 1: are in some way meaningful and impacting to you. Tack
Speaker 1: Leading these historical figures is a daunting and intimidating task,
Speaker 1: and there's some risk involved in today's climate to talk
Speaker 1: about anything controversial, So I asked that you'd listen to
Speaker 1: these stories in the manner in which they're intended to
Speaker 1: be delivered. I want to bring honor to the men
Speaker 1: that I considered great men and tell the truth of
Speaker 1: our history without vilifying anybody, but simply looking back so
Speaker 1: we can learn. Please do me a favor by leaving
Speaker 1: us a review on iTunes, and please share Bear Greece
Speaker 1: with somebody this week. I look forward to talking with
Speaker 1: everyone on The Render on the next episode. Have a
Speaker 1: great week.