gressing in civilization. There is a missionary church and school in the settlement, under the fostering care of the Protestant Episcopal church. About one hundred and fifty families, comprising about seven hundred and fifty persons, compose the church congregation, of whom about two hundred and fifty are communicants.

The Brothertown Indians had entirely laid aside their aboriginal character, to the extent even of having lost their vernacular, ard adopted the English language, and were in a fit situation to abandon their tribal relations and become citizens of the United States. Congress, therefore, by an act approved March 3, 1839, provided that the township of land granted for their use by the Menomonees, should be partitioned and divided among the different individuals composing the Brothertown tribe, and be held by them separately and severally in fee simple. And that thereafter each of them should be citizens of the United States, and their rights as a tribe or a nation should cease and determine. Since then they have been recognized as citizens: have been elected members of the Legislature, and to other offices under the Territorial and State governments, and have become homogeneous with the other inhabitants of the State.

CHAPTER XI.

THE LEAD MINES AND WINNEBAGO WAR.

The history of General SMITH is as complete in relation to the Indian disturbances in Wisconsin, as to the early explorations of the valley of the Mississippi, and this chapter is largely made up of extracts from that rare and valuable work.

Indian wars with their attendant horrors and savage atrocities have ever been concomitants of the primitive permanent settlement of every part of the American continent from those which followed the settlements at Jamestown and Plymouth to the latest conflicts with the savages of the Territories.

Indian traders in the Northwest were suffered to pursue their vocation for nearly two hundred years without mo

lestation, for the reason, doubtless, that the articles of traffic which they exchanged for furs and peltries contributed to he gratification of the tastes of the aborigines and to their uccess in hunting, fishing and trapping.

Besides the few missionaries who gave no offense to the Indians, and who were the apostles of the gospel of peace, there were no inhabitants who were not directly or remotely connected with the Indian trade, who for reasons already stated were suffered to pursue their vocation during this long period without interruption. Moreover, a large proportion of these traders were Frenchmen, many of whom had intermarried with the Indians of the various tribes, and their hybrid progeny exerted a powerful influence in creating a kindly feeling towards all French people.

But very different feelings pervaded the savage breast towards those who came to occupy the country for agricultural purposes; and, consequently, as they rightly believed, to impair its value for their nomadic use. And most especially were the Winnebago Indians jealous of, and determinedly opposed to, any intrusion upon or occupation of the country, which should threaten to interfere with their exclusive occupancy of the Lead Mine Region, the sole right to which east of the Mississippi, was claimed by that tribe.

Mr. JOHN SHAW has been already mentioned as having been engaged between 1815 and 1820, in running a trading boat between St. Louis and Prairie du Chien. In one of those trips he was anxious to visit the Lead Mines at Galena, with one of his trading boats, but was told by the Indians that the "white man must not see their Lead Mines;" but as he spoke French fluently, he was supposed to be a Frenchman, and was permitted to go up the Fever river with his boat, where he found at least twenty smelting places of which he has given the following description:

"A hole or cavity was dug in the face of a piece of sloping ground, about two feet in depth and as much in width at the top; this hole was made in the shape of a mill-hopper, and lined or faced with flat stones. At the bottom or point of the hopper, which was about 8 or 9 inches square other narrow stones were laid across grate-wise; a channel or eye was dug from the sloping side of the ground inwards to the bottom of the hopper. This channel was about a foot in width and in height, and was filled with dry wood and brush. The hopper being filled with the mineral and the wood ignited, the molten lead fell through the stones at the bottom of the hopper; and this was discharged through the eye, over the earth, in bowl-shaped masses called 'plats,' each of which weighed about seventy pounds.

The first occupation of the lead mines by white men was in 1822, when Col. JAMES JOHNSON, brother of the famous RICHARD M. JOHNSON, took possession with a small party of men, under the protection of several detachments of troops sent forward by order of the War Department. A very few persons, probably not more than twenty, spent the ensuing winter at Galena.

Col. MORGAN was then in command at Fort Crawford, and had charge of the troops, and some sort of treaty or agreement was probably made between him and Col. JOHNSON on the one part, and the Indians on the other, by which the occupancy by the whites was assented to; but whatever it was, it does not appear to have been ratified by, if ever submitted to, the Senate.

In 1823, some accessions were made to the population; and in August, by a census then taken, there were seventyfour persons, men, women and children, of whom a number were negroes. The total product of lead shipped that year was 425,000 pounds.*

There was a slight increase of immigration in 1824, and the mines at Hazel Green and New Diggings were discovered, and worked with great profit.

Two officers of the ordinance department-Maj. ANDERSON and Lieut. BURDINE-were sent out to protect the interests of the government; and subsequently Lieut. MARTIN THOMAS was appointed superintendent of the mines.

The fame of the Upper Mississippi lead mines, and their fabulous value and richness, had been spread far and wide throughout the Mississippi Valley; and by the year 1825, the desire for gain and love of adventure and spirit of migration had taken possession of its inhabitants, especially in Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky and Tennessee, so that the determination to occupy and utilize these mines of wealth

"About one-twentieth are females, and one hundred are free blacks."

could no longer be restrained by any pretensions of the red man to the exclusive right of their possession.

The time had now come when this beautiful country was to be occupied by a hardy, resolute, adventurous and persevering population.. The laws which, as a rule, generally confine the migration of the human race to isothermal zones and similarity of climate, were to be set at defiance, and the emigrant from the mild climate of Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri and southern Illinois was to exchange the balmy and genial atmosphere to which he had been accustomed, for one in which during nearly half the year all nature is bound with icy chains and covered with its robe of snow. But no matter! The migratory spirit stimulated by the greed for suddenly acquired wealth, and the irrepressible love of adventure, had taken possession of the pioneer immigrants to the lead mines, and the years of 1825 and 1826 witnessed a rush of emigration which had never before had its parallel, and the like of which has never since been seen, unless in the migration to California some twenty or more years subsequently.

These pioneers came in search of lead, and nearly all with the expectation of soon getting rich and returning to the homes they left behind them. Many came in the spring and returned upon the approach of winter, thus exhibiting so close a resemblance to some of the piscatory tribe that they received the designation of "suckers," and the results of their temporary and unsystematic labor were known as "sucker holes."

Others, however some attracted by success and some compelled by the necessities resulting from ill luck-remained, and soon became permanently attached to the country, which they had visited at first only as an adventurous experiment.

Galena was the objective point of all the earliest immigrants, as it was the first point at which their mining and smelting operations were begun. But the mines in the immediate vicinity of Galena were not adequate to meeting the wants and expectations of the thousands of adventurers who were flocking to it, and they sought new fields of discovery, and many with such success that it soon became evident that the extent of the lead district was far greater than their first impressions had led them to suppose. Mines were soon opened at Hardscrabble, Council Hill, Vinegar

Hill, East Fork, New Diggings, Buncome, Natches, Gratiot's Grove, Shullsburg, Stump Grove, Wiota, Sinsinniwa, Menomonie, Big Patch, Platteville, Snake Hollow, Beetown, Rattle Snake, Crow Branch, Strawberry, Mineral Point, Dodgeville, Blue Mound, Sugar River and at many other points.

Such was the march of progress in the development of these newly discovered lead mines, that during the first three years of their occupancy, and before the Indian title was extinguished, the lead product exceeded fifteen million pounds, and this, notwithstanding the continued disturbance of the settlers by Indian hostilities, against which they were wholly dependent upon themselves for protection, until, by their own well directed efforts, governmental protection was no longer necessary.

During these first three years of the settlement of the lead mines, the pioneer occupants of the hunting grounds of the Winnebagoes lived in constant apprehension of the resentment of this numerous and savage tribe, who regarded such occupancy as an unwarranted invasion of their country, for which they appeared determined to be revenged.

In the summer of 1825 a grand council, or treaty, was held at Prairie du Chien, with the different tribes of Indians. Gov. CASS, of Michigan, and Gen. CLARK, of Missouri, superintendents of Indian affairs for their respective regions, were commissioners on the part of the United States. The Indian tribes represented were the Sioux, Sauks and Foxes, Chippewas, Winnebagoes, Menomonees, Iowas, and a portion of the Ottawa, Chippewa, and Potawatomie tribes living upon the Illinois. The object of this treaty was to make a general and lasting peace between these tribes, and also to settle the boundaries between them respectively. Gov. CASS, when asked what good he thought would result from it, shrugged his shoulders and smiling, said: "They would have it so at Washington." A treaty of perpetual peace was made, and the boundaries settled between the different tribes, which resulted in keeping the Indians at peace-until they were ready again to go upon the war-path.

In October, 1826, by a positive order from Washington, the troops were removed from Fort Crawford, up the river to Fort Snelling, and Fort Crawford was abandoned, the commandant taking with him two Winnebago Indians who had been confined in the guard-house for some supposed of