Page:History of the Ojibway Nation.djvu/477

Rh so much intermixed with childish details, and contained so many coincidences with the Mosaic doctrines, evidently derived from white men, that they do not deserve to be noted."

During the month of July, 1824, a Mr. Findlay with a Canadian named Barrette, and two others, were met at Lake Pepin by an Ojibway war party and killed.

In the spring, Kewaynokwut, a chief of Lac Vieux Desert, while very sick, made a vow, that if he recovered, he would lead a war party against the Sioux. After he gained strength, early in July with twenty-nine warriors he descended the Chippeway River to its mouth, where he arrived, early on a foggy morning, and found Findlay and his party still asleep. When it was discovered they were not Sioux, the Ojibways began to pillage, and first killed all but Findlay, who was near his canoe. He was at length pursued by an Indian named Little Thunder who shot him, and then waded in the water, cut off his head, and took the scalp.

The affair created great excitement, and on the 31st of August, John Holiday, a trader, came to Sault Ste. Marie bearing a small coffin painted black containing the scalp of the American killed at Lake Pepin, which had been sent down by the Ojibway chief at Keweenaw. Schoolcraft, then Indian agent, forwarded it to the Governor of Michigan, who was Superintendent of Indian Affairs in the Northwest, and on the 22d of June, 1825, the murderers were delivered up.

In view of the dissensions among the Indians of the Northwest, the United States government authorized Gov-