Washington County, Minnesota - Chapter 14: Lonfl's Expedition, A. D. L817, in a Six-Oakkd Skiff, to Tiie Falls of Saint Anthony, 1881

Chapter 14: Lonfl's Expedition, A. D. L817, in a Six-Oakkd Skiff, to Tiie Falls of Saint Anthony

CiTvcr . GrinJi 'm. - R'suf. Sioux Interpreter. - Wepa»luw'» Villa,® end it* Vicinity - A Sactnl Dence - Indian Village Below Dajtun'i Bluff. - Career* C»ve. - Fountain Cave. - t'alla of St. Anthony Diacritic*!. - Site of a Fort.

Major Stephen II. Long, of the Engineer Corps of the United States Army, learning that there was little or no danger to be apprehended from the Indians, determined to ascend to the Falls of Saint Anthony, in a six-oared skiff presented to him by Governor Clark, of Saint Louis. His party consisted of a Mr. Hempstead, a native of New London, Connecticut, who had been living at Prairie du Chien, seven soldiers, and a halfbreed interpreter, named ltoque. A bark canoe accompanied them, containing Messrs. Gun and King, grandsons of the celebrated traveler, Jona¬ than Carver.

" When we stopped for breakfast, Mr. Hemp¬ stead and myself ascended a high peak to take a view of the country. It is known by tho name of the Kettle Hill, having obtained this appella¬ tion from the circumstance of its having numer¬ ous piles of stone on its top, most of them fragments of the rocky stratifications which constitute the principal part of the hill, but some of them small piles made by the Indians. These at a distance have some similitude of kettles arranged along upon the ridge and sides of the hill. From this, or almost any other eminence in its neighborhood, the beauty and grandeur of the prospect would bailie the skill of the most inge¬ nious pencil to depict, and that of the most ac¬ complished pen to describe. Hills marshaled into a variety of agreeable shapes, some of them towering into lofty peaks, while others present broad summits embellished with contours and slopes in the most pleasing manner; champaigns and waving valleys; forests, lawns, and parks alternating with each other; the humble Missis¬ sippi meandering far below, and occasionally losing itself in numberless islands, give variety and beauty to the picture, while rugged cliffsand stupendous precipices here and there present themselves as if to arid boldness and majesty to the scene. In the midst of this beautiful scenery is situated a village of tho Sioux Indians, on an extensive lawn called the Aux Aisle Prairie ; at which we lay by for a short time. On our arrival tho Indians hoisted two American flags, and we returned the compliment by discharging our blunderbuss and pistols. They then fired several guns ahead of us by way of a salute, after which we landed and were received with much friend¬ ship. The name of their chief is Wauppaushaw, or tho Leaf, commonly called by a name of the same import in French, La Feuille, or La Fye, as it is pronounced in English. He is considered one of the most honest and honorable of any of the Indians, and endeavors to inculcate into the minds of his people the sentiments and principles adopted by himself. IIo was not at homo at the time I called, and I had no opportunity of seeing him. The Indians, as I suppose, with the ex¬ pectation that I had something to communicate to them, assembled themselves at the place where I landed and seated themselves upon tho grass. I inquired if their chief was at home, and was answered in the negative. I then told them I should be very glad to see him, but as he was absent I would call on him again in a few days when I should return. I further told them that our father, the new President, wished to ob¬ tain some more information relative to his red children, and that I was on a tour to acquire any intelligence ho might stand in need of. With this they appeared well satisfied, and permitted Mr. Hempstead and myself to go through their village. While I was in the wigwam, one of the subordinate chiefs, whose name was Wazzecoota, or Shooter from the Pine Tree, volunteered to accompany me up the river. I accepted of his services, and he was ready to attend me on the tour in a very short time. When we hove in sight the Indians were engaged in a ceremony called the Bear Dance; a ceremony which they are in the habit of performing when any young man is desirous of bringing himself into particu¬ lar notice, and is considered a kind of initiation into the state of manhood. I went on to the ground where they had their performances, which were ended sooner than usual on account of our arrival. There was a kind of flag made of fawn skin dressed with the hair on, suspended on a pole. Upon the flesh side of it were drawn certain rude figures indicative of the dream which it is necessary the young man should have dreamed, before he can be considered a proper candidate for this kind of initiation ; with this a pipe was suspended by way of sacrifice. Two arrows were stuck up at the foot of the pole, and fragments of painted feathers, etc., were strewed about the ground near to it. These per¬ tained to the religious rites attending the cere¬ mony, which consists in bewailing and self-mor¬ tification, that the Good Spirit may be induced to pity them and succor their undertaking.

"At the distance of two or three hundred yards from the flag, is an excavation which they call the bear's holo, prepared for the occasion. It is about two feet deep, and has two ditches, about one foot deep, leading across it at right an¬ gles. The young hero of the farce places himself in this hole, to bo hunted by the rest of the young men, all of whom on this occasion are dressed in their best attire and painted in their neatest style. , The hunters approach the hole in the direction of | one of the ditches, and discharge their guns, which were previously loaded for the purpose with blank cartridges, at the one who acts the part of the bear; whereupon ho leaps from his den, having a hoop in each hand, and a wooden lance ; the hoops serving as forefeet to aid him in characterizing his part, and his lance to defend him from his assailants. Thus accoutred he dances round the place, exhibiting various feats of activity, while the other Indians pursue him and endeavor to trap him as he attempts to re¬ turn to his den, to effect which he is privileged to use any violence he pleases with impunity against

" This part of the ceremony is performed three times, that the bear may escape from his den and return to it again through three of the ave¬ nues communicating with if;. On being hunted from the fourth or last avenue, the bear must make his escape through all hit. pursuers, if pos¬ sible, and flee to the woods, whei he i . t j remain through the day. This, however, is seldom or never accomplished, as all the young men exert themselves to the utmost in order to trap him. When caught, he must retiro to a lodge erected for his reception in the field, where he is to be se¬ cluded from all society through the day, except one of his particular friends whom he is allowed to take with him as an attendant. Here he smokes and performs various other rites which superstition has led the Indians to believe are sa-- cred. After this ceremon; is ended, the young Indian is considered qualified to act any part as an efficient member of their community. The Indian who has the good fortune to catch the bear and overcome him when endeavoring to make his escape to the woods, is considered a candidate for preferment, and is on the first suit¬ able occasion appointed the leader of a small war party, in order that he may further have an op¬ portunity to lest his prowess and perform more essential service in behalf of his nation. It is accordingly expected that he will kill some of their enemies and return with their scalps. I re¬ gretted very much that I had missed the oppor¬ tunity of witnessing this ceremony, which is never performed except when prompted by the particular dreams of one or other of the young men, who is never complimented twice in the same manner on account of his dreams."

On the sixteenth he approached the vicinity of where is now the capital of Minnesota, and writes : " Set sail at half past four this morning with a favorable breeze. Passed an Indian bury¬ ing ground on our left, the first that I have seen surrounded by a fence. In the centre a pole is erected, at the foot of which religious rites are performed at the burial of an Indian, by the particular friends and relatives of the deceased. Upon the pole a flag is suspended when any per¬ son of extraordinary merit, or one who is very l much beloved, is buried. In the enclosure were two scaffolds erected also, about six feet high and six feet square. Upon one of them were two coffins containing dead bodies. Passed a Sioux village on our right containing fourteen cabins. The name of the chief is the Petit Corheau, or Little Raven. The Indians were all absent on a hunting party up the River St. Croix, which is but a little distance across the country from the village. Of this we were very glad, as this baud are said to be the most notorious beggars of all the Sioux on the Mississippi. One of their cabins is furnished with loop holes, and is sit¬ uated so near the water that the opposite side of the river is within musket-shot range from the building. By this means the Petit Corbeau is enabled to exercise a command over the pass¬ age of the river and has in some instances com¬ pelled traders to land with their goods, and in¬ duced them, probably through fear of offending him, to bestow presents to a considerable amount, before he would suffer them to pass. The cabins are a kind of stockade buildings, and of a better appearance than any Indian dwellings I have before met with.

"Two miles above the village, on the same side of the river, is Carver's Cave, at which we stopped to breakfast. However interesting it may have been, it does not possess that character in a very high degree at present. W<: descend¬ ed it with lighted candles to its lower extremity. The entrance is very low and about eight feet broad, so that a man in order to enter it must be completely prostrate. The angle of descent within the cave is about 25 deg. The flooring is an inclined plane of quicksand, formed of the rock in which the cavern is formed. The dist¬ ance from its entrance to its inner extremity is twenty-four paces, and the width in the broadest part about nine, and its greatest height about seven feet. In shape it resembles a bakers's oven. The cavern was once probably much more ex¬ tensive. My interpreter informed me that, since his remembrance, the entrance was not less than ten feet high and its length far greater than at present. The rock in which it is formed is a very white sandstone, so friable that the frag¬ ments of it will almost crumble to sand when taken into the hand. A few yards below the mouth of the cavern is a very copious spring of fine water issuing from the bottom of the cliff.

" Five miles above this is the Fountain Cave, on the same side of the river, formed in the same kind of sandstone but of a more pure and fine quality. It is far more curious and interesting than the former! The entrance of the cave is a large winding hall about one hundred and fifty feet in length, fifteen feet in width, and from eight to sixteen feet in height, finely arched overhead, and nearly perpendicular. Next suc¬ ceeds a narrow passage and difficult of entrance, which opens into a most beautiful circular room, finely arched above, and about forty feet in di¬ ameter. The cavern then continues a meander¬ ing course, excluding occasionally into small rooms of a circular form. We penetrated about one hundred and fifty yards, till our candles began to fail us, when we returned. To beauti¬ fy and embellish the scene, a fine crystal stream flows through the cavern, and cheers the lone¬ some dark retreat with its enlivening murmurs. The temperature of the water in the cave was 46 deg., and that of the air 60 deg. Entering this cold retreat from an atmosphere of 89 deg., I thought it not prudent to remain in it long enough to take its several dimensions and me¬ ander its courses ; particularly as we had to wade in water to our knees in many places in order to penetrate as far as we went. The fountain sup¬ plies an abundance of water as fine as I ever drank. This cavern I was informed by my interpreter, has been discovered but a few years. That the Indians formerly living in its neighbor¬ hood knew nothing of it till within six years past. That it is not the same as that described by Carver is evident, not only from this circum¬ stance, but also from the circumstance that in¬ stead of a stagnant pool, and only one accessible room of a very different form, this cavern has a brook running through it, and at least four rooms in succession, one after the other. Car¬ ver's Cave is fast filling up with sand, so that no water is now found in it, whereas this, from the very nature of the place, must be enlarging, as the fountain will carry along with its current all the sand that falls into it from the roof and sides of the cavern."

On the night of the sixteenth, he arrived at the Falls of Saint Anthony and encamped on the east shore just below the cataract. lie writes in his journal :

Description Of Falls Of Saint Anthony

"The place where we encamped last night need¬ ed no embellishment to render it romantic in the highest degree. The banks on both sides of the river are about one hundred feet high, decorated with trees and shrubbery of various kinds. The ]x>st oak, hickory, walnut, linden, sugar tree, white birch, and the American box ; also various evergreens, such as the. pine, cedar, juniper, etc., added their embellishments to the scene. Amongst the shrubery were the prickly ash, plum, and cherry tree, the gooseberry, the black and red raspberry, the chokeberry, grape vine, etc. There were also various kinds of herbage and dowers, among which were the wild parsley, rue, spikenard, etc., red and white roses, morning glory and various other handsome llowers. A few yards below us was a beautiful cascade of dne spring water, pouring down from a project¬ ing precipice about one hundred feet bight. On our left was the Mississippi hurrying through its channel with great velocity, and about three quarters of a mile above us, in plain view, was the majestic cataract of the Falls of St. Anthony. The murmuring of the ca.sc.ade, the roaring of the river, and the thunder of the cataract, all contrib¬ uted to render the scene the most inlerestingnnd magnidcient of any I ever before witnessed."

"The perpendicular fall of the water at the cataract, was stilled by Pike in his journal, ns six¬ teen and a half feet, which I found to be true by actual measurement. To this height, however, four or five feet may be added for the rapid des¬ cent which immediately succeeds to the jierpcndicular fall within a few yards below. Immedi¬ ately at the cataract the river is divided into two parts by an island which extends considerably above and below the cataract, and is about five hundred yards long. The channel on the right side of the Island is about three times the width of that on the left. The qnanity of water passins through them is not, however, in the same proportion, as about one-third part of the whole passes through the left channel. In the broadest channel, just below the cataract, is a small island .also, about fifty yards in length and thirty in breadth. IJoth of these islands contain the same kind of rocky formation as the banks of the river, and are nearly as high, llesides these, there are immediately at the foot of the cataract, two islands of very inconsiderable size, situated in the right channel also. The rapids commence several hundred yards above the cataract and continue about eight miles below. The fall of the water, beginning at the head of the rapids, and extending two hundred and sixty rods down the river to whero tho portage road commences, below the cataract is, according to Pike, fiftyeight feet. If this estimate be correct the whole fall from the head to the foot of the rapids, is not probably much less than one hundred feet. , Hut as 1 had no instrument sufficiently accurate to level, where the view must necessarily lie pretty extensive, I took no pains to ascertain the extent of the fall. The mode I adopted to ascertain the height of a cataract, was to suspend a line and plummet from the table rock on the south side of the river, which at the same time had very little water passing over it as the river was unusually low. The rocky formations at this place were arranged in the following order, from the surface downward. A coarse kind of lime¬ stone in thin strata containing considerable silex; a kind of soft friable stone of a greenish color and slaty fracture, probably containing lime, aluminum and silex ; a very beautiful satratification of shell limestone, in thin plates, extremely regular in its formation and containing a vast number of shells, all apparently of the same kind. This formation constitutes the Table Rock of the cataract. The next in order is a white or yellowish sandstone, so easily crumbled that it deserves the name of a sandbank rather than that of a rock. It is of various depths, from ten to fifty or seventy-five feet, and is of the same char¬ acter with that found at the caves before described. The next in order is a soft friable sand¬ stone, of a greenish color, similar to that resting upon the shell limestone. These stratifications occupied the whole space from the low water mark nearly to the top of the blufTs. On the east, or rather north side of the river, at the Falls, are high grounds, at the distance of half a mile from the river, considerably more elevated than the bluffs, and of a hilly aspect.

Speaking of the bluff at the conlluence o. Jie Mississippi and Minnesota, he writes: "A military work of considerable magnitude might be con¬ structed on the point, and might be rendered sufficiently secure by occupying the commanding height in the rear in a suitable manner, as the the two livera. lint without the commanding of the numerous ridges and ravines situated imwoxk in the rear, would be liable to be greatly mediately in its rear."