John Tanner - A narrative of the captivity and adventures of John Tanner

On my way down, I was assisted by the North West Company. At Drummond’s Island I was disappointed of large presents given me when on my way to the Lake of the Woods, but which, as I did not then wish to take, were promised me on my return. The commanding officer who had shown me so much kindness, had been relieved by another of a very different character, one who seemed to find no satisfaction in doing any thing for any person connected with the Indians. This man refused to see me, or afford me any assistance. By the kindness, however, of Mr. Ermatinger of the Saut De St. Marie, I was enabled to reach Mackinac.

Col. Boyd, the Indian agent at that time at Mackinac, called me to him, and wished to hire me as a striker in his smith’s shop; but not liking the employment, I did not wish to remain. He gave me one hundred pounds of flour, the same quantity of pork, some whiskey, tobacco, etc. There were two vessels about to sail for Chikago, but neither of them would take me as a passenger, though I had money enough, and was willing to pay them. As I had no other alternative, I was compelled to purchase from the Indians a poor and old bark canoe, for which I gave sixty dollars, and I engaged three Frenchmen to accompany me, but Col. Boyd would not permit them to go. He gave me, however, a letter to Dr. Wolcott, who was now Indian agent at Chikago, and I started with only one man to assist me.

At the Ottawwaw settlement of Waw-gun-nuk-kiz-ze I stopped for a short time, and finding that my canoe was too frail and leaky to perform the voyage, I purchased another, a new one, for which I gave eighty dollars. Several of my acquaintances among the Ottawwaws determined to accompany me, and started accordingly, eight men in one canoe, and six in another, with some women. They went on with me until we arrived within one or two days’ journey of Chikago, when meeting other Indians with discouraging accounts of the state of the water in the Illinois, they left me and went back. My wife returned with them.

When I arrived at Chikago, I was sick of a fever, and my provisions being exhausted, I was in great distress. I went to Dr. Wolcott to present him the letter from Col. Boyd, the Indian agent at Mackinac, but he would not receive it, nor take any notice of me. He knew well who I was, as he had seen me when I passed Chikago before, and I could not tell why he refused me assistance. I had my tent set up at a little distance from his house, near a wild rice swamp, and for several days, though I was so much more unwell that I was scarce able to sit up five minutes at a time, I subsisted my children by shooting the black birds as they came and settled on the rice. When I was again able with the aid of two sticks to crawl to the house of Dr. Wolcott, I went to represent to him that my children were in danger of perishing of hunger, but he drove me harshly away. When I left his door, I shed some tears which it was not common for me to do, but I was rendered womanish by my sickness. Three or four times I fainted, and lay long by the road side on the way from his house to my tent. But my sufferings, and those of my children, were shortly afterwards relieved by a Frenchman, who had been to carry some boats across the Portage. His wife was an Ojibbeway woman, and commonly accompanied him when he went to take any boats across. Though his horses were now much worn out with the long journey from which he had returned, he agreed to take me and my canoe sixty miles, and if his horses could hold out, the whole one hundred and twenty, which was, at the present stage of water, the length of the Portage, for which I agreed to pay him agreeable to his demand, which I thought very moderate. He lent me, also, a young horse to ride as I was far too weak to think of walking, and he thought I could ride on horseback much more comfortably than in the cart with the canoe. Before we arrived at the end of the sixty miles, he was taken sick, and as there was now a little water in the river, I concluded to put my canoe in, and try to descend in it. His young horse, the night after I gave it up to him, was stolen by the Po-ta-wato-mies. He was seized with the bloody flux, but as he had a young man with him, I rendered him what assistance I could in starting, and let him go back. My Frenchman had deserted from me soon after I left Chikago, and I had now no person to assist me except an old Indian, called Gos-so-kwaw-waw, (the smoker.) We put the canoe in the water, but we could not get into it ourselves, only sometimes the children were put in, and we took them down, one walking at the bow, the other at the stern of the canoe. We had proceeded no more than three miles when I found that this method was likely to prove so laborious and slow that I thought best to engage a Po-ta-wato-mie, whom I met there, and who agreed for a blanket and a pair of leggins, to take my baggage and my children on his horses to the mouth of the An-num-mun-se Se-be, or Yellow Ochre River, a distance of sixty miles. The An-num-mun-ne comes from towards the Mississippi, and below it there is always, in the Illinois, water enough for canoes. I felt somewhat afraid to trust the Po-ta-wato-mie with my children, and the baggage, which contained some valuable property, but old Gos-so-kwaw-waw was of the opinion that he would prove honest. When he put the children on the horses, he said, “In three days I shall be at the mouth of the An-num-mun-ne River, and shall wait for you there.”

Without any further words, we parted, and the old Smoker and myself continued our laborious and difficult route along the bed of the Illinois. Most of the country on both sides the route from Chikago to the Yellow Ochre River, are prairie in which horses and carts can be driven without any difficulty. On our arrival at the place appointed, we found the Po-ta-wato-mie there, and all safe.

We now embarked every thing together in the canoe, and went down to Fort Clark which is on a narrow neck of land between two lakes, and is thence called by the Indians Ka-gah-gum-ming [*], (the isthmus.) Here I found some acquaintances, or rather those who claimed relationship in consequence of their having been in some measure connected with the family that I belonged to among the Indians. Here was a Taw-ga-we-nin-ne, a son of him that had been the husband of Net-no-kwa, and some of the relatives of one of my wives. One of these, an old woman, gave me a sack of Wiskobimmenuk, or that sort of corn which is plucked green, boiled, and then dried. Two or three miles beyond this, as I went on my way, I saw a man standing on the bank, who, as I came opposite to him, called out, “My friend, do you love venison?” When I told him I did, and had put my canoe in shore, he lifted a large and fat deer into it, saying, “Perhaps you will like to eat some of this, which I have just now killed.” He was going to turn away when I called him back, and though he refused any compensation for the deer, I gave him a little powder and shot, and some flints, for which he appeared very thankful.

About this time, when I was one day warm at work, I shot a crane and got into the water to take it up. Shortly after I felt somewhat unwell, but not reflecting on the cause of my illness, I went again into the water to get something I had shot, when immediately I fell down, and was unable to get up. My fever returned upon me with such violence that being in immediate expectation of death, I gave the Old Smoker directions to take my children to Governor Clark, who, I was confident, would assist them in reaching my relatives. But contrary to my expectation, I became gradually better, and after some days was able to go on my journey. We passed great numbers of Potawattomies, their lodges standing many together in almost every bend of the river. Some of them started out in their canoes occasionally, and accompanied me some distance on my way. One day a man came running from his lodge to the bank of the river, and asked me who I was. When I had told him, he inquired if my children could eat honey; and when I told him I believed they could, he sent two young men, each with a large wooden bowl full, which they brought wading into the water, and handed to me.