236 HISTORY OF OHIO. 



Their praise we neither need, nor desire to have. Those in 

 the east, who undertake to bestow it, upon us in the west, are 

 rather too bungling at the business, to please any one, in the 

 Valley of the Mississippi. 



But a few remarks upon the preceding battle, and this war, 

 for "free trade and sailors' rights," and we will gladly leave off 

 describing battles, campaigns and carnage. 



In ihis action Tecumseh, as we have said, was killed, which 

 circumstance has given rise to almost innumerable fictions — 

 why, we hardly can tell, but it is so. The writer's opportu- 

 nities for knowing the truth, is equal to any person's now liv- 

 ing. He was personally, very well acquainted with that cel- 

 ebrated warrior. He accompanied Tecumseh, Elsquataway, 

 Fourlegs and Caraymaunee, on their tour among the six na- 

 tions of New York, in 1809, and acted as their interpreter 

 among those Indians. In 1829, at Prairie Du Chien, the two 

 latter Indians, both then civil chiefs, of the Winnebagoes, 

 were with the writer, who was then acting as commissioner of 

 Indian affairs in the United States service. From the state- 

 ments of these constant companions of Tecumseh, during 

 nearly twenty years of his life, we proceed to state, that Te- 

 cumseh lay with his warriors at the commencement of the 

 battle i'n a forest of thick underbrush, on the left of the Amer- 

 ican army. That these Indians were at no period of the bat- 

 tle, out of their thick underbrush; that Nawcaw saw no officer 

 between them and the American army; that Tecumseh fell 

 the very first fire of the Kentucky dragoons, pierced by thirty 

 bullets, and was carried four or five miles into the thick woods, 

 and there buried by the warriors, who told the story of his 

 fate> This account was repeated to me three several times, 

 word for word, and neither of the relaters ever knew the fic- 

 tions to which Tecumseh's death has given rise. Some of 

 these fictions originated in the mischievous design of ridicul- 

 ing the person who is said to have killed this savage, and 

 who, bye the bye, killed no one that day, at least, either 

 red or white. We mean no personal reflection on any 

 one for not killing Tecumseh. We could easily write this 



