History of the Ojibways - Chapter 4b (conclusion)

When I witnessed this curious family register in 1842, it was exhibited by Tug-waug-aun-ay to my father. The old chief kept it carefully buried in the ground, and seldom displayed it. On this occasion he only brought it to view at the entreaty of my mother, whose maternal uncle he was. Father, mother, and the old chief, have all since gone to the land of spirits, and I am the only one still living who witnessed, on that occasion, this sacred relic of former days.

On this plate of copper was marked eight deep indentations, denoting the number of his ancestors who had passed away since they first lighted their fire at Shaug-a-waum-ik-ong. They had all lived to a good old age.

By the rude figure of a man with a hat on its head, placed opposite one of these indentations, was denoted the period when the white race first made his appearance among them. This mark occurred in the third generation, leaving five generations, which had passed away since that important era in their history. Tug-waug-aun-ay was about sixty years of age at the time he showed this plate of copper, which he said had descended to him direct through a long line of ancestors. He died two years since, and his death has added the ninth indentation thereon; making, at this period, nine generations since the Ojibways first resided at La Pointe, and six generations since their first intercourse with the whites.

From the manner in which they estimate their generations, they may be counted as comprising a little over half the full term of years allotted to mankind, which will materially exceed the white man's generation. The Ojibways never count a generation as passed away till the oldest man in the family has died, and the writer assumes from these, and other facts obtained through observation and inquiry, forty years as the term of an Indian generation. It is necessary to state, however, for the benefit of those who may consider this as an over-estimate, that, since the introduction of intoxicating drinks and diseases of the whites, the former well-authenticated longevity of the Indians has been materially lessened.

According to this estimate, it is now three hundred and sixty years since the Ojibways first collected in one-armed central town on the Island of La Pointe, and two hundred and forty years since they were first discovered by the white race.

Seventy-seven years after, Jacques Cartier, representing the French nation, obtained his "first formal meeting with the Indians of the interior of Canada," and fifty-six years before Father Claude Allouez (as mentioned in Bancroft's History of America), first discovered the Ojibways congregated in the Bay of Shaug-a-waum-ik-ong, preparing to go on a war excursion against their enemies the Dakotas.

From this period the Ojibways are traditionally well possessed of the most important events which have happened to them as a tribe, and from nine generations back, I am prepared to give, as obtained from their most veracious, reliable, and oldest men, their history, which may be considered as authentic.

In this chapter we have noted the course of their migrations, which, in all likelihood, occupied nearly two centuries prior to their final occupation of the shores of Lake Superior.

These movements were made while they were living in their primitive state, when they possessed nothing but the bow and arrow, sharpened stones, and bones of animals wherewith to kill game and fight their enemies. During this period they were surrounded by inveterate foes, and war was their chief pastime; but so dreamy and confused are their accounts of the battles, which their ancestors fought, and the exploits they enacted, that the writer has refrained from dwelling on them with any particularity. One tradition, however, is deemed full worthy of notice, and while offering it as an historical fact, it will at the same time answer as a specimen of the mythological character of their tales, which reach as far back as this period.

During their residence in the East, the Ojibways have a distinct tradition of having annihilated a tribe whom they denominate Mun-dua. Their old men, whom I have questioned on this subject, do not all agree in the location nor details. Their disagreements, however, are not very material, and I will proceed to give, verbatim, the version of Kah-nin-dum-a-win-so, the old chief of Sandy Lake:
"There was at one time living on the shores of a great lake, a numerous and powerful tribe of people; they lived congregated in one single town, which was so large that a person standing on a hill which stood in its center, could not see the limits of it.

"This tribe, whose name was Mun-dua, were fierce and warlike; their hand was against every other tribe, and the captives whom they took in war were burned with fire as offerings to their spirits.

"All the surrounding tribes lived in great fear of them, till their Ojibway brothers called them to council, and sent the wampum and war club, to collect the warriors of all the tribes with whom they were related. A war party was thus raised, whose line of warriors reached, as they marched in single file, as far as the eye could see. They proceeded against the great town of their common enemy, to put out their fire forever. They surrounded and attacked them from all quarters where their town was not bounded by the lakeshore, and though overwhelming in their numbers, yet the Mun-dua had such confidence in their own force and prowess, that on the first day, they sent only their boys to repel the attack. The boys being defeated and driven back, on the second day the young men turned out to beat back their assailants. Still the Ojibways and their allies stood their ground and gradually drove them in, till on the eve of the second day, they found themselves in possession of half the great town. The Mun-duas now became awake to their danger, and on the third day, beginning to consider it a serious business, their old and tried warriors, 'mighty men of valor,' sang their war songs, and putting on their paints and ornaments of battle, they turned out to repel their invaders.

"The fight this day was hand to hand. There is nothing in their traditionary accounts, to equal the fierceness of the struggle described in this battle. The bravest men, probably, in America, had met--one party fighting for vengeance, glory, and renown; and the other for everything dear to man, home, family, for very existence itself!

"The Mun-dua were obliged at last to give way, and hotly pressed by their foes, women and children threw themselves into, and perished in the lake. At this juncture their aged chief, who had witnessed the unavailing defense of his people, and who saw the ground covered with the bodies of his greatest warriors, called with a loud voice on the 'Great Spirit' for help (for besides being chief of the Mun-duas, he was also a great medicine man and juggler.)

"Being a wicked people, the Great Spirit did not listen to the prayer of their chief for deliverance. The aged medicine man then called upon the spirits of the water and of the earth, who are the under spirits of the 'Great Spirit of Evil,' and immediately a dark and heavy fog arose from the bosom of the lake, and covered in folds of darkness the site of the vanquished town, and the scene of the bloody battle. The old chieftain by his voice gathered together the remnants of his slaughtered tribe, and under cover of the Evil Spirit's fog, they left their homes forever. The whole day and ensuing night they traveled to escape from their enemies, until a gale of wind, which the medicine men of the Ojibways had asked the Great Spirit to raise, drove away the fog; the surprise of the fleeing Munduas was extreme when they found themselves standing on a hill back of their deserted town, and in plain view of their enemies.

"'It is the will of the Great Spirit that we should perish,' exclaimed their old chief; but once more they dragged their wearied limbs in hopeless flight. They ran into an adjacent forest where they buried the women and children in the ground, leaving but a small aperture to enable them to breathe. The men then turned back, and once more they met their pursuing foes in a last mortal combat. They fought stoutly for a while, when again overpowered by numbers, they turned and fled, but in a different direction from the spot where they had secreted their families: but a few men escaped, who afterward returned, and disinterred the women and children. This small remnant of a once powerful tribe were the next year attacked by an Ojibway war-party, taken captive, and incorporated in this tribe. Individuals are pointed out to this day who are of Mun-dua descent, and who are members of the respected family whose totem is the Marten."

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