BasHNELL] NATIVE CEMETERIES AND FORMS OF BURIAL 41 



times. After the Battle of Tippecanoe, fought November 7, 1811, 

 the Indians who fell in that memorable encounter are said to have 

 been buried on the summit of a ridge, running north and south and 

 bounded on the west by the Middle Fork of Vermilion River and 

 on the east by a deep ravine, about 5^ miles west of the present Dan- 

 ville, Vermilion County, Illinois. This region was then occupied 

 by roving bands of different tribes, including members of the Shaw- 

 nee. In the early years of the last century, just after the settlement 

 of the village of Gosport, Owen County, Indiana, the Shawnee chief, 

 Big Fire, died, and his body was taken in a canoe 10 miles on the 

 West Fork of Wliite River, to a place where the party landed. A 

 stretcher was there made by interlacing bark between two long 

 poles. The body was then placed upon the stretcher and carried to 

 the grave by four men. AiTiving at the grave the body " was 

 painted, dressed in his best blanket and beaded mocassins, and 

 buried along with his ornaments and war weapons. The grave was 

 three feet deep, lined with rough boards and bark. Over it was 

 planted an oak post, five feet high, eight inches square, tapering to 

 a point, which was painted red. The monument was often visited 

 and long revered by the band. It has disappeared Avithin a few 

 years." (Collett, (1), p. 324.) Stretchers similar to the one just 

 mentioned were undoubtedly used quite extensively by the Indians 

 in conveying their dead or wounded comrades from place to place. 

 One, illustrated by Schoolcraft from a painting by P^astman, is now 

 reproduced in plate 11, a. " The mode of carrying the sick or wounded 

 is in a litter on two poles lashed together, and a blanket fastened on 

 to it." (Schoolcraft, (2), II, p. 180.) Probably barks, skins, or 

 mats were used in earlier times, later to be followed by the blankets 

 obtained from the traders. 



The Delaware village of Greentown stood on the left bank of the 

 Black Fork of the Mohican, in Ashland County, Ohio. The settle- 

 ment was abandoned in 1812, when the families removed and erected 

 a new village at Piqua, on the Great Miami. The site of old Green- 

 town was soon under cultivation by the whites. The area was 

 examined during the summer of 1876, at which time it was said 

 " the southern portion of the site is still in woods, and the depres- 

 sions that mark the graves are quite distinct. ... In some cases 

 the remains were inclosed in a stone cist; in others small, rounded 

 drift bowlders were placed in order around the skeletons. The long- 

 bones were mostly well preserved. No perfect skull was obtained, 

 nor were there any stone implements found in the graves. At the 

 foot of one a clam shell was found. The graves are from two and 

 one-half to three feet deep, and the remains repose horizontally." 

 (Case, (1), p. 598.) The apparent lack of European objects asso- 



