Page:History of Goodhue County, Minnesota.djvu/611

 CHAPTER XXIX. RED WING AS A HAMLET. Origin of the Village — First Settlement — Rev. Hancock's Arrival — The Early Settlers — Claim Hunters — Incidents of Village Life — Great Events of Those Days — Burning the Indian Tepees — First Farming — First Stores — First Churches — Pioneer Politics — Principal Events from 1852 to 1859 — Busi- ness Directory Published in 1869 — Poem by Julia B. Nelson. The origin of Red Wing as a village is shrouded in obscurity. It is certain that as early as 1806 Lieutenant Z. Pike found here a village, with a Red Wing as chief. Of this chief little is known, and the fact probably is that Red Wing (or Hhoo-pa-hoo-doo-ta, the Wing of Scarlet) was a title applied to successive chiefs of the tribe. The Indian name for their village was Hem-menne- cha, meaning the place of hill, wood and water, surely an appro- priate location for the winter quarters of a large. band of Indians. The sign of the tribe was a staff, from Avhich were pendant many bright colored feathers, with a wing dyed in blood at the top. This staff was borne in battle by the chief. The modern history of the village begins ill 1837, when there arrived here two Swiss missionaries, sent out by the Evangelical Society of Lausanne, Switzerland.. To these devout souls, Samuel Denton and Daniel Gavin, sufficient credit has never been given. They were the ones who really planted the standard of civiliza- tion here, and infused their personality among the Indians, so that those who came after had only to move into their houses and take up the broken threads of their work. For many years these missionaries labored faithfully and well, building two sub- stantial log houses and teaching the Indians the tenets of reli- gion and the customs of civilization. In 1846, owing to ill health, their effort was abandoned. In the fall of 1848, Rev. John Aiton, sent out by the American Board of Christian Missions, arrived in the village, took up his residence in the mission houses built by Denton and Gavin, and continued their work. These houses stood near what is now Bush street, about one-third of the dis- tance from Third to Main street. In June, 1849, came Rev. J. 529