58 F. V. Hayden on the Mandan Indians, with 



lages, which is doubtless the case. The observations thus far 

 made, point to the conclusion that all these stationary tribes rai- 

 grated in the same direction, from southeast to northwest along 

 this river, which may be inferred from the circumstance that no 

 remains of their villages are to be seen along any other stream 

 than the Missouri. 



Prior to the visit of Lewis and Clarke in the autumn of 1804, 

 we possessed very little information of a reliable character in re- 

 gard to the origin and early history of the Mandans. Col. D. D. 

 Mitchell, in a letter addressed to Mr. H. R. Schoolcraft, pnd pub- 

 lished in the Sd part of the " History of the Indian Tribes," re- 

 fers to an early writer by the name of Macintosh, who it seems 

 was connected with a French Trading Company as early as 1772. 

 From his own account he left Montreal in the summer of 1773, 

 crossing over the intervening country, reached the Mandan Vil- 

 lages on Christmas day. He says that at that time the Mandans 

 occupied nine large towns, situated very near each other, and 

 that at short notice they could muster 15,000 warriors. This is 

 doubtless a great exaggeration, but that they were a formidable 

 nation the ruins of numerous villages, along both sides of the 

 Missouri, bear ample testimony. 



The following extracts from the well-known work, "Travels 

 of Lewis and Clarke to the Source of the Missouri," show very 

 clearly the condition of the Mandans and other stationary tribes 

 in 1804. 



"The villages near which we are established are five in number, and 

 are the residence of three distinct nations ; the Mandans, the Ahnaba- 

 ways, and the Minnetarees. The history of the Mandans, as we received 

 it from our interpreters and from the chiefs themselves, and as it is attested « 



iinsteady movements and the tottering fortunes of the American nation;'. 

 Within the recollection of living witnesses, the Mandans were settlo«ni"ty 



miles below, and situated seven on the west and two on the east «i ;" ' ' 

 the Missouri. The two finding themselves wasting away before tb" -■' ■ 

 pox and the Sioux, united into one village, and moved up the r\\-- 

 site to the Ricaras. The same causes reduced the remaining sev- • 

 villages, till at length they emigrated in a body to the Kicar- 

 ■where they formed themselves into two villages, and joined tlid-- 

 countrymen who had gone before thera. In their new residein-.- - . 

 •were still insecure, and at length the three villages ascended the Mi-~' '-'■ 

 to their present position. The two who had emigrated together still ^e^' 

 tied in the two villages on the northwest side of the Missouri, while the 

 single village took a position on the southeast side. In this situalfon the^ 

 were found by those who visited them in 1796 ; since which the two vil- 

 lages have united into one. They are now in two villages, one on the 

 southeast of the Missouri, the other on the opposite side, and at the dis- 



forty or fifty lodges, built in the same way as those of the Ricaras ; the 



