SCALPING IN AMERICA. 433 



The " scalping knife," or " scalp knife," had ordinarily the shape 

 of a single-edged butcher knife, but occasionally it was two-edged, 

 like a dirk. The traders usually sold the knife alone, the Indians 

 making the scabbard according to their own liking. The instrument 

 was carried in the belt or on a cord passing about the neck. The 

 prices paid for these knives differed widely. Thus, in 1665 certain 

 Canadian Indians received 8 knives for 1 beaver skin, while in the 

 beginning of the nineteenth century, during the height of the power 

 of the fur companies, $7.50 was paid in their territory for a knife 

 Avhich in England was worth 3| pence. At about the same period 

 farther south, in the United States, a knife cost $1. Catlin tells us 

 that in 1832 a Sheffield knife, worth perhaps 6 pence, was valued at 

 the price of a horse. 



While firearms and steel knives gave a strong impetus to scalping 

 in North America, the acme of the custom was reached after the 

 institution by whites of scalp premiums, accompanied by the employ- 

 ment of the natives by the whites for scalp gathering, and scalping 

 by the whites themselves. 



The first to offer premiums for the heads of their native enemies 

 w^ere, in 1637, the Puritans of Xew England. They asked for the 

 heads, scalping being as yet unknown in that part of the countr3\ 

 As a result, heads of the Pequods were brought in by the colonists 

 and allied Indians in large numbers. 



Thirty-eight years after the Pequod war, began that against King 

 Philip, and head premiums were again established. At this period 

 the custom of scalping had already extended into New England, and 

 most of the trophies obtained must have been scalps. 



On the 15th of July, 1675, the Connecticut colonists nuide with one 

 of the Narragansett chiefs a treaty in Avhich they promised for the 

 person of one of the feared Wampanog chiefs 40 cloth coats, or 20 

 for his head alone, and for each one of his subjects 2 coats if living 

 or 1 if dead. To their oavu troops tliey paid 30 shillings for each 

 head. To the '' heroine," Hannah Dustin, who with her own hands is 

 said to have taken and brought in the scalps of 2 Indian men, 2 

 women, and 6 children, the colony paid £50, besides which she re- 

 ceived man}^ expressions of thanks and numerous gifts, including a 

 substantial one from Governor Nicholson. 



In 1680 scalp prizes were offered b}- the colonists of South Caro- 

 lina; in 1689 they offered the high sum of £8 for each scalp of an 

 Indian warrior. About this time we hear for the first time of scalp 

 premiums offered by the French. In 1688 the French Canadians 

 paid for every scalp of their enemies, whether white or Indian, 10 

 beaver skins, which was also a high price, equivalent in Montreal to 

 the price of a gun with 4 pounds of powder and 40 pounds of lead. 



SM 1906 28 



