UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY
Class Book Volume
F 11-20M
liiNOIS HiSTORJCM. SURVEY
.HE ;tM^
CEREMONIES
THE UNVEILING
BRONZE MEMORIAL GROUP
CHICAGO MASSACRE
OF 1812.
CHICAGO:
PRINTED FOR THE CHICAGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY. 1893.
BLAKELY & ROGERS CHICAGO.
CEREMONIES.
'topr ~^HE ceremonies at the unveiling of the Bronze »0 1 Memorial Group of the Chicago Massacre of 1812, were held near the "Massacre Tree," at the eastern end of Eighteenth Street, in the City of Chicago, on June 22nd, 1893, in pursuance of the following invitation, addressed by the Chicago His- torical Society to its members and friends, to the number of fifteen hundred or more : K
THE PRESIDENT AND EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE tx OF THE
CHICAGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY REQUEST THE HONOR
OF
ro YOUR ATTENDANCE AT THE UNVEILING OF CARL ROHL-SMITH'S BRONZE MEMORIAL GROUP OF THE CHICAGO MASSACRE
XT
0 OF I8l2, AND THE PRESENTATION OF THE
K
WORK TO THE SOCIETY K
=: BY
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£ GEORGE M. PULLMAN.
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4> THE CEREMONY WILL TAKE PLACE NEAR THE " MASSACRE TREE,"
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*- AT THE EASTERN END OF EIGHTEENTH STREET, AT FOUR O CLOCK ON ^ ^ THE AFTERNOON OF THURSDAY, JUNE 22d, 1893.
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At the hour and place appointed a large audience assembled. Among those present were Mr. and Mrs.
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George M. Pullman, Ex-President Benjamin Harrison and his daughter, Mrs. McKee ; Chief Justice Melville W. Fuller, Hon. Lambert Tree, Dr. N. S. Davis, Hon. Thomas W. Palmer, Hon. Robert T. Lincoln, Prince Isenberg, General and Mrs. Nelson A. Miles, Marshall Field, Mrs. H. O. Stone, Rev. Dr. Clinton Locke, Miss Kate Field, E. S. Willard, Mr. and Mrs. John M. Clark, Mrs. Wirt Dexter, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Caton, Mrs. Sanger, Miss Pullman, Norman Williams, W. G. Hibbard, Mr. and Mrs. Frank Carolan, Mr. and Mrs. W. W. Kimball, Mr. and Mrs. George L. Dunlap, Hon. Darius Heald, General Horace Porter, Mr. and Mrs. John W. Doane, O. S. A. Sprague, Franklin H. Head, H. N. Higinbotham, General John Corson Smith, E. L. Brewster, Judge and Mrs. Grosscup, Ex-Senator Lyman Trumbull, Mr. and Mrs. E. B. McCagg, E. W. Blatchford, A. B. Pullman, Mrs. Edmund Norton, Mrs. R. L. Henry, Miss Reuling, Mrs. Charles P. Kellogg, Miss Emma Kellogg, Mrs. L. M. Johnson, Mr. and Mrs. G. B. Marsh, Miss Clark, Miss Gretchen Isham, Miss Lucy Isham, Mrs. James A. Mulligan, Thomas Dent, Mr. and Mrs. W. K. Nixon, Mrs. Wilmerding, District- Attorney Milchrist, Miss Laura Williams, Mr. and Mrs. William E. Hale, Mr. and Mrs. Murry Nelson, Charles H. Mulliken, Gen. and Mrs. A. L. Chetlain, Mr. and Mrs. T. W. Wadsworth, James Wadsworth, John D. Adair, Paul Selby, Miss Nina Smith, William
D. Kerfoot, Mr. and Mrs. Samuel H. Kerfoot, Mr. and Mrs. T. W. Harvey, H. N. May, Mr. and Mrs. N. K. Fairbank, Col. and Mrs. John M. Loomis, John G. Shortall, C. Gunther, William G. Beale, A. F. Stevenson, H. B. Mason, Miss Kimball, A. T. Andreas, James W. Scott, John B. Drake, William W. Stewart, Augustus Jacobson, Mr. and Mrs. Henry W. King, Orson Smith, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Kirkland, J. Irving Pearce, Joseph E. Otis.
Conspicuous among the guests were a number of old residents of Chicago, including Judge John D. Caton and S. B. Cobb (1833), Fernando Jones, Charles C. P. Holden and George M. Gray (1835), A. G. Burley, A. H. Burley and Charles E. Peck (1836), Robert Fergus, Peter L. Yoe, Eugene C. Long and John C. Long (1840).
The President of the Chicago Historical Society announced that the Society had received a letter from George M. Pullman, Esq., which read as follows:
CHICAGO, June iQth, 1893.
E. G. MASON, ESQ., PRESIDENT CHICAGO HISTORICAL
SOCIETY, CHICAGO, ILL.
Dear Sir: — The proximity to my home of the old cottonwood tree, which marks the spot in the vicinity of which occurred the massacre of the major portion of the garrison and residents at and near Fort Dear- born, on August 1 5th, 1812, suggested the thought of
contributing an addition to the many valuable relics belonging to your Society by the erection of an en- during monument, which should serve not only to perpetuate and honor the memory of the brave men and women and innocent children — the pioneer settlers who suffered here — but should also stimulate a desire among us and those who are to come after us to know more of the struggles and sacrifices of those who laid the foundation of the greatness of this City and State. I have been fortunate in securing the services of the eminent sculptor, Mr. Carl Rohl-Smith, who, after extended and careful research and investigation of the subject, has succeeded in producing a group of statuary and designs in basrelief which embody the prominent incidents and culminating scenes of the massacre. The monument is finished, and located just 100 feet due east from the " Massacre Tree," and I have now the pleasure of presenting it, with appropriate deed of gift, to your Society in trust for the City of Chicago and for posterity. With great respect,
Yours sincerely,
GEORGE M. PULLMAN.
At the conclusion of the reading of the letter the Memorial Group, which had been draped with our National flag, was unveiled by Miss Pullman and George M. Pullman, Junior. It was greeted by those
present with great enthusiasm, and with appropriate music by the Royal Hungarian Band.
Mr. Edward G. Mason, President of the Chicago Historical Society, then spoke as follows:
MR. MASON'S ADDRESS.
The Chicago Historical Society accepts this noble gift in trust for our city and for posterity with high appreciation of the generosity, the public spirit, and the regard for his- tory of the donor. It realizes that this monument so wisely planned and so superbly executed .is to be preserved not simply as a splendid ornament of our city but also as a most impressive record of its history. This group, repre- senting to the life the thrilling scene enacted perchance on the very spot on which it stands, barely eighty years ago, and its present surroundings, make most vivid the tre- mendous contrast between the Chicago of 1812 and the Chicago of 1893. It teaches thus the marvelous growth of our city, and it commemorates as well the trials and the sorrows of those who suffered here in the cause of civiliza- tion. The tragedy which it recalls, though it seemed to extinguish the infant settlement in blood, was in reality one which nerved men's arms and fired their hearts to the efforts which rescued this region from the invader and the barbarian The story which it tells is therefore of deeper significance than many that have to do with
"Battles, and the breath
"Of stormy war and violent death,"
and it is one which should never be forgotten.
With its suggestions before us how readily we can picture to ourselves the events of that i$th day of August in the year of grace 1812. Hardly a week before there had come through the forest and across the prairie to the lonely Fort Dearborn an Indian runner, like a clansman with the fiery
8
cross, bearing the news of the battle and disaster. War with Great Britain had been declared in June, Mackinac had fallen into the hands of the enemy in July, and with these alarming tidings the red messenger brought an order from the commanding General at Detroit, contemplating the abandonment of this frontier post. Concerning the terms of his order authorities have differed. Capt. Heald, who received it, speaks of it as a peremptory command to evacu- ate the fort. Others with good means of knowledge say that the dispatch directed him to vacate the fort if practi- cable. But Gen. Hull, who sent the order, settles this question in a report to the War Department, which has recently come to light. Writing under date of July 29th, 1812, he says:
"I shall immediately send an express to Fort Dearborn with orders to evacuate that post and retreat to this place (Detroit) or Fort Wayne, provided it can be effected with a greater prospect of safety than to remain. Capt. Heald is a judicious officer and I shall confide much to his discretion."
The decision whether to go or stay rested therefore with Capt. Nathan Heald, and truly the responsibility was a heavy one. Signs of Indian hostility had not been wanting. But the evening before Black Partridge, a chief of the Pottawatomie tribe, long a friend of the whites, had entered the quarters of the commanding officer and handed to him the medal which the warrior wore in token of services to the American cause in the Indian campaigns of "Mad" Anthony Wayne. With dignity and with sadness the native orator said :
"Father, I come to deliver up to you the medal I wear. It was given me by the Americans, and I have long worn it in token of our mutual friendship. But our young men are resolved to imbue their hands in the blood of the whites. I cannot restrain them and I will not wear a token of peace while I am compelled to act as an enemy."
This striking incident has been fitly chosen as the subject of one of the reliefs on the pedestal of the monument. It
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typifies the relations between the hapless whites and their red neighbors at the moment and the causes which had changed friendship into hatred, and it sounds the note of coming doom.
On that dreary day one gleam of light fell across the path of the perplexed commander. Capt. William Wells arrived from Fort Wayne with a small party of friendly Miami Indians to share the fortunes of the imperiled garri- son. This gallant man, destined to be the chief hero and victim of the Chicago massacre, had had a most remarkable career. Of a good Kentucky family, he was stolen when a boy of 12 by the Miami Indians and adopted by their great chief, Me-che-kau-nah-qua, or Little Turtle, whose daughter became his wife. He fought on the side of the red men in their defeats of Gen. Harmar in 1790 and Gen. St. Clair in 1791. Discovered by his Kentucky kindred when he had reached years of manhood, he was persuaded to ally himself with his own race, and took formal leave of his Indian comrades, avowing henceforth his enmity to them. Joining Wayne's army, he was made Captain of a company of scouts, and was a most faithful and valuable officer. When peace came with the treaty of Greenville in 1795, he devoted him- self to obtaining an education, and succeeded so well that he was appointed Indian agent and served in that capacity at Chicago as early as 1803, and later at Fort Wayne, where he was also the government interpreter and a Justice of the Peace. Here he heard of the probable evacuation of the post at Chicago, and knowing the temper of the Indians, he gathered such force as he could and made a rapid march across the country to save or die with his friends at Fort Dearborn, among whom the wife of Capt. Heald was his own favorite niece, whose gentle influence had been most potent in winning him back from barbarism years before. It seemed almost as if he had resolved to atone for the period in which he had ignorautly antagonized his own people by a supreme effort in their behalf against the race which had so nearly made him a savage.
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He came too late to effect any change in Capt. Heald's plans. The abandonment was resolved upon, and the stores and ammunition were in part destroyed and in part divided among the Indians, who were soon to make so base a return for these gifts. At 9 o'clock on that fatal summer morning the march began from the little fort, which stood where Michigan avenue and River street now join, on a slight eminence around which the river wound to find its way to the lake near the present terminus of Madison street. The garrison bade farewell to the rude stockade and the log barracks and magazine and two corner block-houses which composed the first Fort Dearborn. When this only place of safety was left behind, the straggling line stretched out along the shore of the lake, Capt. Wells and a part of his Miamis in the van, half a company of regulars and a dozen militiamen, and the wagons with the women and children following, and the remainder of the Miamis bringing up the rear. You may see it all on the panel on the monument, which recalls from the past and makes very real this mournful march to death. The escort of Pottawatomies, which that treacherous tribe had glibly promised to Capt. Heald, kept abreast of the troops until they reached the sand hills intervening between the prairie and the lake, and here the Indians disappeared behind the ridge. The whites kept on near the water to a point a mile and a half from the fort and about where Fourteenth street now ends, when Wells in the advance was seen to turn and ride back, swing- ing his hat around his head in a circle, which meant in the sign language of the frontier: " We are surrounded by Indians."
As soon as he came within hearing he shouted: "We are surrounded; march up on the sand ridges." And all at once, in the graphic language of Mrs. Heald, they saw " the Indians' heads sticking up and down again, here and there, like turtles out of the water."
Instantly a volley was showered down from the sand hills, the troops were brought into line, and charged up the
II
bank, one man, a veteran of seventy years, falling as they ascended. Wells shouted to Heald, "Charge them!" and then led on and broke the line of the Indians, who scattered right and left. Another charge was made, in which Wells did deadly execution upon the perfidious barbarians, load- ing and firing two pistols and a gun in rapid succession. But the Pottawatomies, beaten in front, closed in on the flanks. The cowardly Miamis rendered no assistance, and in fifteen minutes' time the savages had possession of the baggage train and were slaying the women and children. Heald and the remnant of his command were isolated on a mound in the prairie. He had lost all his officers and half his men, was himself sorely wounded, and there was no choice but to surrender.
Such, in merest outline, was the battle, and one of its saddest incidents was the death of Capt. Wells. As he rode back from the fray, desperately wounded, he met his niece and bade her farewell, saying: " Tell my wife, if you live to see her — but I think it doubtful if a single one escapes — tell her I died at my post, doing the best I could. There are seven red devils over there that I have killed." As he spoke his horse fell, pinning him to the ground. A group of Indians approached; he took deliberate aim and fired, killing one of them. As the others drew near, with a last effort he proudly lifted his head, saying: " Shoot away," and the fatal shot was fired.
So died Chicago's hero, whose tragic fate and the hot fight in which he fell are aptly selected as the subjects of the other basreliefs of this monument. The bronze group which crowns it is an epitome of the whole struggle, reveal- ing its desperate character, the kind of foemen whom our soldiers had to meet, and their mode of warfare, their mer- ciless treatment of women and children, and setting forth the one touch of romance in the grim record of the Chicago massacre. It illustrates the moment when the young wife of Lieut. Helm, second in command of the fort, was
12
attacked by an Indian lad, who struck her on the shoulder with a tomahawk. To prevent him from using his weapons she seized him around the neck and strove to get possession of the scalping-knife which hung in a scabbard over his breast. In the midst of the struggle she was dragged from the grasp of her assailant by an older Indian. He bore her to the lake and plunged her into the waves; but she quickly perceived that his object was not to drown her, as he held her head above water. Gazing intently at him she soon recognized, in spite of the paint with which he was dis- guised, the whilom friend of the whites, Black Partridge, who saved her from further harm and restored her to her friends. For this good deed, and others, too, this noble chief should be held in kindly remembrance.
It is difficult to realize that such scenes could have taken place where we meet to-day; but history and tradition alike bear witness that we are assembled near the center of that bloody battlefield. From the place on the lake shore a few blocks to the north, where Wells' signal halted the column over the parallel sand ridges stretching southwesterly along the prairie and through the bushy ravines between, the run- ning fight continued probably as far as the present inter- section of Twenty-first street and Indiana avenue, where one of our soldiers was slain and scalped, and still lies buried. Just over on Michigan avenue must have been the little eminence on the prairie on which Heald made his last rally, and right before us the skulking savages, who had given way at the advance of our men, gathered in their rear around the few wagons which had vainly sought to keep under the cover of our line.
If this gaunt old cottonwood, long known as the "Mas- sacre Tree," could speak, what a tale of horror it would tell. For tradition, strong as Holy Writ, affirms that between this tree and its neighbor, the roots of which still remain beneath the pavement, the baggage wagon containing twelve children of the white families of the fort, halted and one young sav-
13
age climbing into it, tomahawked the entire group. A little while and this sole witness of that deed of woe must pass away. But the duty of preserving the name and the locality of the Chicago massacre, which has been its charge for so many years, is now transferred to this stately monument, which will faithfully perform it long after the fall of the "Massacre Tree."
Capt. Heald's whole party, not including the Miami detachment, when they marched out of Fort Dearborn com- prised fifty-four regulars, twelve militiamen, nine women and eighteen children — ninety-three white persons in all. Of these twenty-six regulars and the twelve militiamen were slain in action, two women and twelve children were mur- dered on the field, and five regulars were barbarously put to death, after the surrender. There remained then but thirty- six of the whole party of ninety-three, and of the sixty-six fighting men who met their red foemen here that day only twenty-three survived. These, with seven women and six children, were prisoners in the hands of the savages. We know of the romantic escape, by the aid of friendly Indians, of Capt. and Mrs. Heald and Lieut, and Mrs. Helm; and three of the soldiers, one of whom was Orderly Sergeant William Griffith, in less than two months after the massacre found their way to Michigan, bringing the sad news from Fort Dearborn. Hull's surrender had placed Detroit in the hands of the enemy; but the Territorial Chief Justice, Wood- ward, the highest United States authority there, in a ringing letter to the British Commandant, Col. Proctor, under date of Oct. 8, 1812, demanded in the name of humanity that instant means should be taken for the preservation of these unhappy captives by sending special messengers among the Indians to collect the prisoners and bring them to the near- est army post, and that orders to cooperate should be issued to the British officers on the lakes. Col. Proctor one month before had been informed by his own people of the bloody work at Chicago, and had reported the same to his superior
officer, Maj. Gen. Brock, but had contented himself with remarking that he had no knowledge of any attack having been intended by the Indians on Chicago, nor could they indeed be said to be within the influence of the British.
Now, spurred to action by Judge Woodward's clear and forcible presentation of the case, Proctor promised to use the most effective means in his power for the speedy release from slavery of these unfortunate individuals. He com- mitted the matter to Robert Dickson, British agent to the Indians of the Western Nations, who proceeded about it leisurely enough. March, 16, 1813, he wrote from St. Joseph's Lake, Mich., that there remained of the ill-fated garrison of Chicago, captives among the Indians, seventeen soldiers, four women, and some children, and that he had taken the necessary steps for their redemption and had the fullest confidence that he should succeed in getting the whole. Six days later he came to Chicago and inspected the ruined fort, where, as he says, there remained only two pieces of brass ordnance, three-pounders — one in the river, with wheels, and the other dismounted — a powder magazine, well preserved, and a few houses on the outside of the fort, in good condition. This desolation apparently was not relieved by the presence of a single inhabitant. Such was the appearance of Chicago in the spring following the massacre. Of these seventeen soldiers, the nine who survived their long imprisonment were ransomed by a French trader and sent to Quebec, and ultimately reached Plattsburg, N. Y., in the summer of 1814. Of the women two were rescued from slavery, one by the kindness of Black Partridge; and the others doubtless perished in captivity. Of the children we only hear again of one. In a letter written to Maj. Gen. Proctor by Capt. Bullock, the British commander at Mack- inac, Sept. 25, 1813, he says: "There is also here a boy (Peter Bell) 5 or 6 years of age, whose father and mother were killed at Chicago. The boy was purchased from the Indians by a trader and brought here last July by direction
15
of Mr. Dickson." Of the six little people who fell into the hands of the Indians this one small waif alone seems to have floated to the shore of freedom.
The Pottawatomies, after the battle and the burning of the fort, divided their booty and prisoners and scattered, some to their villages, some to join their brethren in the siege of Fort Wayne. Here they were foiled by the timely arrival of William Henry Harrison, then Governor of the Indiana Territory, with a force of Kentucky and Ohio troops, and condign punishment was inflicted upon a part at least of the Chicago murderers. A detachment which Gen. Harrison assigned to this work was commanded by Col. Samuel Wells, who must have remembered his brother's death when he destroyed the village of Five Medals, a lead- ing Pottawatomie chief. To one of the ruthless demons who slew women and children under the branches of this tree, such an appropriate vengeance came that it seems fitting to tell the story here. He was older than most of the band, a participant in many battles, and a deadly enemy of the whites. His scanty hair was drawn tightly upward and tied with a string, making a tuft on top of his head, and from this peculiarity he was known as Chief Shavehead. Years after the Chicago massacre he was a hunter in Western Michigan and when in liquor was fond of boasting of his achievements on the warpath. On one of these occasions in the streets of a little village he told the fearful tale of his doings on this field with all its horrors; but among his hearers there chanced to be a soldier of the garrison of Fort Dearborn, one of the few survivors of that fatal day. As he listened he saw that frightful scene again, and was maddened by its re- call. At sundown the old brave left the settlement, and silently on his trail the soldier came, "with his gun," says the account, " resting in the hollow of his left arm and the right hand clasped around the lock, with forefinger carelessly toy- ing with the trigger." The red man and the white passed into the shade of the forest; the soldier returned alone; Chief Shavehead was never seen again. He had paid the
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penalty of his crime to one who could, with some fitness, exact it. Such was the fate of a chief actor in the dark scene enacted here.
Many others of the Pottawatomie tribe joined the British forces in the field, and at the battle of the Thames, Oct. 5, 1813, they were confronted again by Harrison and his rifle- men, who then avenged the slaughter at Chicago upon some of its perpetrators. Victor and victim alike have passed away. The story of their struggle remains, and this master- piece will be an object-lesson teaching it to after generations. Mr. Pullman's liberal and thoughtful action is a needed recognition of the importance and interest of our early history, an inspiration to its study, and an example which may well be followed. The event which this monument commemorates, its principal incidents, and the after fortunes of those concerned in it, have been briefly sketched and much has necessarily been left unsaid. But we should not omit a grateful recognition of the services of the able civilian soldier, William Henry Harrison, who stayed the tide of barbarism which flowed from the Chicago massacre, and humbled the tribe which was responsible, for that lurid tragedy. The name of Harrison is intimately and honorably associated with the early days in the Northwest, with the war of 1812, and with the highest office in the gift of the American people half a century ago. It is likewise inti- mately and honorably associated with the later days of the Northwest, with the great Civil War, and again with the highest office in the gift of the American people in our own times. It is fitting that the distinguished descendant of William Henry Harrison should be here to-day. It is a high honor that the eminent ex-President of the United States should grace this occasion with his presence, which makes these exercises complete. I have the great pleasure of introducing to you ex-President Benjamin Harrison.
EX-PRESIDENT HARRISON'S ADDRESS.
Chicago is exalted to-day, lifted up to a pinnacle that brings upon her the vision of the world. The nations, great and small, all races and tongues, have sent hither their official representatives with the choicest product of their art and of their handicraft. She has builded for the reception of the Nation's guests and for the display of their treasures palaces which in extent, in adaptation, and in classic grace and beauty far excel the best efforts of the cities that have before opened their gates to receive the representatives of the world.
Doubts, difficulties, jealousies, and petty criticisms have been swept away and the clear sunlight of a magnificent success shines upon the great enterprise. All other States and cities of this proud, united, and happy land share with you in the joy of this success, for it is an American success.
But we are not at the White City to-day. Here, at this quiet corner by the lakeside, we come to be instructed by recalling an incident of the year 1812. These exercises are not out of time. They are not inharmonious. The starting post as well as the finish must be taken account of in the race. We get a better view of the oak if we hold the acorn in our hands while we look at the buttressed trunk, the towering crown, and the spreading branches of the magnif- icent tree. The first rude structure that moved by steam upon the tramway sets off the cp-miles-an-hour locomotive more than its paint and brasses. So the picture Mr. Mason has given us of Chicago in 1812 makes the city of 1893 more wonderful, more a thing of magic, than the White City.
But there is something better than the mere sense of growth to be had out of this brief visit to Fort Dearborn, to the Kinzie house and to the sand dunes that drank the
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blood of brave men and women and of innocent children. It is morally wholesome for a man or a community that has been highly exalted to consider the beginning. The soldier whose banner has triumphed on every field where it has been unfurled does well to look at the cradle in which he was rocked and the homely surroundings of his childhood, for they recall the services and the sacrifices of that gen- eration, and of the humble father and mother whose un- selfish and unobserved heroism made his greater career pos- sible. Doing this he will carry away some abatement of his pride and a higher sense of obligation.
I am glad that we are beginning to build monuments. Bunker Hill was, not long ago, lonesome, but now every city and nearly all counties have built in commemoration of the heroes and of the cause. The Sculptor has found the universal language. He speaks to the schooled and to the unschooled. The history of the conquest of the West is full of incidents calculated to kindle the historian and to stir the imagination of the novelist, the painter and the sculptor. The pioneer was as fine as he was unique in character. Free and unconventionally brave and self-reliant, as responsive to the cry of distress as a knight-errant, he pushed the skirmish line of civilization from the Alleghanies to the Rockies. All honor to him! He labored and forever entered into his rest. We possess the lands he won from the savagery of Nature and of the natives. Have we as strong a hold upon the sturdy virtues which his life illus- trated?
Every community should properly mark the scene of such historical event as we now commemorate. The future is full of imperious demands, but the historian serves the future as effectively as the projector. We shall value our possession of lands and free institutions more highly if we learn that they were bought not with corruptible things, as
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silver and gold, but with precious blood, the blood of the brave and of the innocent. We shall, after this lesson, be more willing to preserve by blood, if need be, that which was bought by blood.
This event which this monument commemorates was not a great military achievement. In the light of history the evacuation was a fatal mistake, but it was the occasion for bringing into prominence, it gave a field of display, for some of those traits of heroism, of courage in men and women, which so marked the whole course of our pioneer experience.
I am glad that the generosity of your fellow-citizen ( Mr. Pullman) has marked this spot. There is a teaching and an inspiring force in every such structure. Our land is not old. We cannot show to these visiting foreigners any ruins or any ivied castles. There is the mark of the chisel yet upon all our structures. And yet no century of the history of any nation's life can be found fuller of heroic adventure, of unselfish devotion to duty, of high enterprise, and of success in the establishment of great institutions than this century of our young existence.
It is, I am sure, a pleasant thing for you who are here to turn back and away for a moment from these hurrying scenes that are about you and to look with contemplative eye upon these incidents in the early history of Chicago, which, if they teach any lesson, teach this: that the prosperity of commun- ities, the safety and honor of states, must be bedded upon a virtuous, self-respecting, law-abiding and God-fearing people.
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THE MEMORIAL GROUP.
At the conclusion of the address of Ex-President Harrison, the audience gathered around the Memorial Group to carefully inspect this beautiful work of art.
The group represents the rescue of Mrs. Helm by Black Partridge, and, in accordance with Mr. Pullman's suggestion, the moment chosen is when Mrs. Helm, attacked by an Indian, who intends to brain her with his tomahawk, tries to grasp the scalping knife from his scabbard. Black Partridge, seeing her danger, rushes to her aid, and claiming her as his prisoner, prevents the perilous blow. The figure lying on the plinth is the surgeon of Fort Dearborn, Dr. Van Voorhis who had the well known conversation with Mrs. Helm which was interrupted by the Indians' assault. He was killed by another Indian at the same moment Black Partridge saved the life of Mrs. Helm. The baby is one of the twelve children toma- hawked by the Indian the same day.
The four basreliefs on the pedestal tell some of the important incidents of the tragedy. The panel facing South-east represents Black Partridge return- ing to Captain Heald, Commander of Fort Dearborn, the medal presented to him by the government. This took place in the Court of the Fort on the evening before the evacuation. The figure on Captain Heald' s
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right side is Captain Wells sent to the assistance of the Fort with a small band of friendly Miami Indians. In the background, the garrison and women making preparations for the departure on the following morning.
The panel facing South-west, shows the march from the Fort along the shore of Lake Michigan, Captain Wells and his Miamis leading the train, then Captain Heald with the garrison, wagons containing women and children, Mrs. Heald and Mrs. Helm on horseback, and a party of Indians following the train; Fort Dearborn is visible in the background to the right.
The North-east panel represents the attack of the combined Indian Tribes on the garrison.
The death of Captain Wells is shown on the North- west panel. His horse shot under him and himself mortally wounded, he asks Mrs. Heald, who passed him on her flight, to take a message to his wife. She sees an Indian aiming at him, and he seeing her terror, coolly turns his breast toward the Indian and shouts: "Shoot away!" In the background Fort Dearborn and Lake Michigan.
An artistic conception of this historical event could not go to any of the known styles of plastic art for an adequate expression; it would have to sacrifice something of its character.
A massacre, perpetrated by savages, demands for
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full expression the portrayal of the highest degree of violence, and the equipoise and dignity which are the fundamental elements of all plastic art.
This problem the artist has tried to solve by giving to the outline of the whole group, when seen at a dis- tance at which the individual motives of action and the details of treatment are still indistinct, that careful balance between part and part, that architectural symmetry which is the severe demand of all classical plastic art; while within this firm framework he has let loose that intense play of manifold forces, which is the only true messenger between reality and the human imagination, and which, therefore, neither art nor history dares to give up.
The panels have been treated so as to allow of full realism in the representation both of human beings and landscape, and the very low relief in which they are executed contributes to give the main group a more dominant, more forcible position.
The artist's work fully justifies the encomium of a competent art critic, who says: "It is one of the great- est pieces of realistic sculpture that has ever been given to plastic art in this or any other part of the world. It is the first time that the real American Indian*— in feature, form, costume and methods of warfare — has ever been given to the world in bronze; and so far as my information goes, it is the only time that living models have been used for that purpose.
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Anyone familiar with plastic art, and who has seen the Indian and studied his history, cannot fail to see that the artist has been remarkably successful in reproduc- ing the original faithfully, that he has indeed given us a really great work of permanent artistic and historic value."
The group and basreliefs are bronze, cast by the Henry-Bonnard Bronze Co. of New York. Height of group 9 feet; dimensions of plinth, 7 feet 10 inches by 4 feet 7 inches; size of basreliefs, 7 feet 2 inches by 2 feet 5 inches, and 3 feet 1 1 inches by 2 feet 5 inches.
The pedestal is dark polished Quincy granite, executed by the Hallowell Granite Co. of Chicago. Height, 10 feet; base, 13 feet by 9 feet 9 inches.
In a cavity in the pedestal, directly under the central figure, was placed a copper box containing the following:
Chicago City Directory, 1893 ; official directory World's Fair; standard guide of Chicago; Great Fire pictures; portraits, engravings, etc.; Story of Chicago, Kirkland; Story of Massacre, Kirkland; Judge Caton's narrative concerning the Massacre Tree ; Holden's sketch concerning battlefield; cylinder of phono- graphic speech; letter of donation; daily newspapers of Chicago.
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