The plain story of American history

Front matter

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Preface

My purpose in writing this book is expressed in the title. I wish that it may be a plain story of the achievement of human beings in that part of the Western Hemisi)here which is now the United States of America. To relate the main facts clearly and broadly, rather than to describe many detailed occurrences, has been constantly in my mind. The story here presented may be taken as an introduction for a wider study of our history. It has been my aim to use simple but strong language, and to place the emphasis of the book on human actions. But much attention has been given to social history, and in two chapters the outlines of American government have been presented. I hope the book will prove neither hard nor easy for pupils. If it is received as a straightforward story, drawing forth the earnest efforts of capable pupils and making for the success of faithful teachers, it will be a source of pleasure for the author, repaying him for many days and nights of careful study of our national history. More especially, I wish that the book may serve, along with many other excellent works of similar scope, to give to the American youth a better appreciation of the glorious history of their native land, and to create in them a warmer purpose to serve their country and promote its progress.

With the hope of making the task of the teacher lighter, the chapters have been made short and an abundance of marginal headings has been introduced. On the basis of these headings complete outlines can be made by the pupils, which, when studied under the chapter headings, will give the pupil good topical grasp of the subject. The questions at the ends of the chapters are intended for viii PREFACE

the use of pupils in the preparation of their work. They are so arranged as to call forth efforts to define the facts in the text from more than one point of view. Although this practice may suggest partial repetition, it will, if persistently followed, make for accurate knowledge. One of the traits most generally lacking in advanced students of history is the ability to make careful and discriminatmg statements. No effort will be spared by the good teacher to remedy this deficiency. The full questioning on details, here offered so that the pupil may test himself while preparing his lesson, should aid in developing accuracy. The topics at the ends of chapters are suggestions for the teachers who wish to prepare lectures on supplementary subjects, or who wish to have students write short reports on topics not fully treated in so brief a text as this must necessarily be. The resourceful teacher will reject them as freely as he desires, or add to them from his knowledge.

JOHN SPENCER BASSETT.

Northampton, Massachusetts, July 12, 1915.

Contents

OHAPTEK

I. America before the Arrival of Columbus

II. The Arrival of Columbus

Chapter I America Before The Arrival Of Columbus

We must not think that the history of our country began with the arrival of men from Europe. Many hundreds of years earher than that time Indians Uved here in their own way. The early They knew nothing of Europe nor of the cities, states, Americans and fine manners of the great nations which made history on the eastern side of the Atlantic. To them America was the only world in existence and the Indian life the only life a people could possibly lead. They considered an Indian canoe the only possible kind of boat, an Indian house the only kind of house, and an Indian village the only kind of town. Before we read about America in the hands of the whites, we must know something of the Indians and see how they were in the habit of governing themselves. We must also see how they lived in their daily lives. So far as we can learn, they were the earliest Americans.

We do not know for certain where the Indians came from, but there is reason to suppose that they are of the same stock as the inhabitants of the northeastern corner of Asia. Both origin of the peoples have the same kind of coarse black hair, the Indians same copper-colored skin, and the same high cheek bones. To this day the natives cross the Bering Straits in their rude boats, and it is possible that our earliest inhabitants came from Asia in this way. It is also possible that the people of northeastern Asia arrived there from Alaska.

All the earliest Americans were probably Indians ; but great differences grew up among them because the various branches of the race dwelt far apart. Some of them inhabited warm countries and had to live very unlike people who dwelt in cold regions. The Eskimos are Indians, but they are forced to dress in furs. They cannot have farms or gardens and must live on fish and other wild animals of the frozen North. The people who lived in Mexico and Peru before the arrival of the whites were also of pure Indian blood, but they lived in a warm climate, where fruits and vegetables grew abundantly and were raised with little effort. The people found it easier to live by their gardens and fields than to hunt for their food ; and they thus grew into an agricultural people. In Mexico it was not advisable to move from one place to another, for in doing so it would be necessary to give up the fields. The people, therefore, came to build permanent houses out of adobe, which

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is a kind of sun-dried brick. These people became numerous, powerful, and prosperous. They also had time to improve their habits of life. They discovered how to make cloth, and they made pots for their household service. After a time they discovered the way to beautify pottery and cloth. This was their beginning of art. When the Spaniards conquered Mexico, they found cities, temples, and many people living in great comfort. But the Mexicans were Indians for all that, Indians in a high state of development.

The Indians living in what is now the United States were less rude than the Eskimos and less advanced than the Mexicans. Our Game was abundant in this region, where the climate

Indians ^as neither very hot nor very cold. Although the in-

habitants had small fields in which they raised corn and pumpkins, most of their food came from forest and stream. When the game became scarce in one place, they moved to another where it was more plentiful. Thus they had to abandon their houses after a few years of use and did not take the trouble to make them of

An Indian wigwam stone or brick. Wigwams covered with skins, bark, or grass gave sufficient shelter from the storms and could easily be rebuilt when the tribe changed its abode.

How long had the Indians lived in America when the whites first saw them? That is a question about which there is much Age of dispute. The Indians had no books and the stories

the Indian they told were too vague to throw any light on the ^^^^ subject. Learned men have thought that an answer

to the question may be found in the stone arrows, axes, and knives that are sometimes dug up at the bottoms of wells or other excavations. It is said that these things must have been made by hand, that they must have been dropped and covered up by sand and clay as it was brought forward by some river which once flowed over the site of the digging, and that it took a very long time to cover the implements and for the river then to dry up or change its course. Stone implements have been found near the Delawa'-e River many feet below the present surface of the earth. No one will say how long it has been since they were dropped at what must once have been the bottom of the river.

The boldest claim of this kind was made for the "Calaveras skull." In 1866 a skull was produced in California, which, it was TheCaia- claimed, had been found by workmen digging a mine veras skull shaft as much as 130 feet below the surface. If what was claimed was true, this human skull must have lain where found through more than 100,000 years ; for the region was volcanic, and above the spot in which it was said to have been found were layers of gravel on the top of thick layers of lava. The skull is now in a museum at Harvard University ; but there are many men who do not think it was found where the miners claim.

At Lansing, Kansas, in 1902, two skulls were found 20 feet below the surface near the banks of the Missouri River. It was The Lansing evident that the spot at which they were found was skulls once river bottom and is now exposed and dry because

the current has shifted. We do not know how long the Lansing skulls lay in the ground before discovery. It is supposed by some that the time was not more than one thousand years, and by others the period is estimated at thirty thousand j^ears. The skulls of Indians are unlike those of other races, and when we see that the Lansing skulls are very much Hke those of the present race of Indians, we conclude that Indians lived on the banks of the Missouri from one to thirty thousand years ago. Other evidence points to the same conclusion. This is about all we can say in answer to the question : How long has man lived in America ?

Some Indians buried their dead in mounds, either round or long and irregular in shape. When one of these mounds is opened we find skeletons and many implements. It was The mound thought that a dead Indian would need his bow, arrows, builders hatchets, and jars of food, as well as his beads and other ornaments, on his journey to the happy hunting grounds beyond the grave. The burial mounds in the Ohio valley are so large «that it was once thought that they were constructed by a race superior to the Indians. But when we dig into them we find they were burial places, like other mounds. The skeletons they contain are Indian skeletons. The old view that the mound builders were a separate race has been given up.

The Indians hved in small numbers scattered over large areas. They dwelt in this way because a numerous population in one place would destroy the game. They were in tribes. Linguistic or "nations," as they were sometimes called. A families tribe would wander forth in search of better game or in an attempt to shun some strong hostile Indians. Thus some tribes which once lived side by side became widely divided. The best way of telling which tribes are related to one another is to observe their language! For example, the Cheyennes who once lived in Wyoming and Colorado speak a language like that of the Algonquins in New England, and we conclude that the two tribes once lived together. A group of tribes speaking the same language is called a linguistic family.

Three great families occupied the eastern part of North America from Florida to Newfoundland. The first was the Algonquian

Family. It takes its name from the Algonquins, one of its tribes, who hved on the St. Lawrence River. Other tribes were the The great Mohegans on the Hudson ; the Pequots and Narraganfamiiies setts in New England ; the Delawares in Pennsylvania ; the Powhatans in Virginia ; the Pamlicos in North Carolina ; the Shawnees of Tennessee ; the Miamis, Illinois, Kickapoos, and Foxes in the region between the Ohio River and the Lakes ; and the Cheyennes and Arapahoes in the upper Missouri valley. All these tribes played important parts in opposing the attempts of the whites to settle the country. The Iroquoian Family was also very important. It contained the Iroqouis, or Five Nations, in New York ; the Hurons, on the shores of Lake Huron ; the Cherokees, in the southern Appalachian Mountains ; and the Tuscaroras, in eastern North Carolina. The third great family was the Muskhogean. It contained the Creeks, living in Georgia and Alabama ; the Chickasaws, living west of the Creeks ; the Choctaws on the lower Mississippi ; and the Seminoles in Florida. West of the Mississippi River were many families, some of them quite small. The greatest was the Siouan Family, living chiefly in the Dakotas. It contained the Sioux tribes, the Crows, Caws, Omahas, and Winnebagos. One tribe of this family, the Catawbas, lived far eastward in South Carolina. The student should remember the location of the leading Indian tribes. He should also remember that there were tribes that did not belong to either of these families.

The Indian knew nothing about a linguistic family, and fierce wars were sometimes waged between tribes speaking the same Confed- language. To him it was sufficient to stand by the eracies members of his tribe. He knew nothing of exact

boundaries between tribes. Some small valley, peninsula, or the shores of a bay might mark the limits in which a tribe lived. We sometimes come across confederacies made up of several small tribes. They were usually formed through conquest and grew up because in one of the tribes was a powerful chief who could make men obey him. Such a chief was Powhatan, whose rule extended over most of the Virginia tribes when the whites arrived in that colony. He surrounded himself with a guard of fifty men who acted as a kind of police, protecting him from attack and seeing that the warriors obeyed his will.

A still greater confederacy was that of the Iroquois, in middle and western New York, composed of five tribes, or nations; the Mohawks, Oneidas, Senecas, Onondagas, and Iroquois Cayugas. After the Tuscaroras, of North Carolina, Confederacy were conquered by the whites in 1713, they removed to New York and became the sixth of the Iroquois nations. The confederacy had a great council in which each tribe had representatives. The council decided upon matters concerning all the tribes, such as war and peace ; and its decisions were treated with great respect. The Iroquois confederacy was more like modern government than anything else among the Indians.

Indians of the same kindred were said to belong to a com-'

mon clan, and there were several clans in each tribe. The clan

had the name of an animal by which it was known, as

The clan the "Wolf," or the "Bear" clans. When an animal

was thus taken as the name of a clan, it was called a totem. It is plain that the totem was supposed to have some power of protecting or helping the members of the clan ; and an Indian treated his totem with great respect. A man might be adopted in a clan ; and sometimes prisoners of war, who were about to be killed, were rescued and adopted. If an Indian was captured, he thought it great shame to show that he feared death ; and no other Indian was likely to claim him for adoption if he seemed afraid to die.

Most of the government of Indians was done within the clan, at the head of which was a man of great dignity, called a sachem. He was supposed to know all about the old customs of Sachem the clan. If a man or woman had violated these cus- and council toms, the sachem tried the case and decided what the penalty should be. When the sachem died all the men and women met in a council of the clan and elected his successor, and the votes of the women were equal in weight to those of the men.

There was also a war chief, a man selected by the council for his bravery and skill in war. The warriors were called braves, and they gloried in their deeds of valor. When they went on the warpath they painted their faces in red and black, and they wore Chiefs and feathers, the heads of animals, and other awe-inspirbraves j^g objects. They believed that by making them-

selves terrible to look at they would frighten their opponents from the field of battle. As each side knew that behind each hideous mask was only an Indian, it is likely that most of their care to decorate themselves was wasted.

The Indian law forbade a man to marry within his own clan, and a wife was never considered a member of her husband's clan. Marriage, I^ ^^e became a widow, she returned to her own people kinship, and her children went with her. They were not kin property ^^ ^ier husband's people, but only to their mother's kindred. One of the effects was that children did not inherit the property of their father ; for it must go to his own kindred, who were members of his o^\^^ clan, that is, to his mother's children. As the Indians had no such thing as private property in land this was not a very important matter. Land belonged to the tribe ; and about the only thing a man possessed was his hunting implements and his clothing. After the arrival of the whites, however, the Indians began to own private property, but it was a long time before they showed a desire to become landowners.

The Indians drew a distinct line between the work a man should do and that which a woman should do. Fighting against Work of the tribal enemies and hunting was the man's work. It men and was the work in which there was danger, and facing women danger boldly was a great virtue in the eyes of these

people. This work also demanded the power to endure hunger.

to march cautiously through the forest, and to be ready to die without flinching. The Indian women admired the courage of the men. They wiUingly worked the fields of corn and dressed the game their husbands killed. They lived happily in their own employment and did not think they were treated badly. White people are brought up to feel that farm labor should be done by men, and it seemed to the colonists that the Indians were very unfair to their women. We should be able to look at the matter from the Indian's point of view, ])ut this does not mean that we should adopt his customs.

When the whites make war they fight for some special object. Sometimes it is for territory, and sometimes for tribute. At the

end of the war they make a treaty. But the Indians „ , .

JVLflkitis w3.r usually fought because they felt themselves the hereditary foes of their enemies. They did not make treaties after fighting one another. The defeated side only waited until it recovered from the blow it had received, which might be several' years, and then fell suddenly on its former conqueror, trying to wipe out the disgrace of the old defeat. When the warriors were ready to go on the warpath they assembled for a war dance, and then they set out in war paint. Each man carried a leather pouch of roasted corn meal, called rockahominy, tied around his waist. When they arrived in the enemy's country, they could not cook food lest the smoke of their fires show they were coming. Then the rockahominy was used. A spoonful in the palm of the hand moistened with water would restore the strength of a famishing man for several hours. The Indian was trained to endure extreme hunger. When a war party had struck their blow at an enemy they returned to their own country. It might be several years before the other side was able to try to take its revenge, but they were sure to make the attempt. A great many Indians were killed in these unending wars, and the result was that the population did not increase. Another thing that kept down the number of the Indians was smallpox. They did not know how

This picture was designed to show Champlain's attack on the Iroquois fort Inside the fort are the long houses of these Indians.

to treat the disease, and when it broke out in a village it destroyed many people.

Most of the life of the Indians was spent out of doors. They used a house as a sleeping place and for protection against rain and cold. The building was either round or long. The round house was brought to a point at the top and covered with bark, skins, or grass. At the tip of the roof was a hole through which came the smoke that arose from the hearth just beneath it. Inside were several rooms which got narrower around the hearth, like the points in the slices of a pie. Each room could thus have the benefit of the fire. The long houses

Houses also were divided into rooms, and between the rooms were fire pits with holes above them. The smoke was supposed to go out of the roofs, but it usually went all through the house before it escaped. It proved very trying to the whites who had to visit the Indians, but the savages were used to the smoke and did not suffer.

The great ships of the first white men who came to America, the guns that roared out death to men at a distance, and steel axes that would cut more in an hour than a stone ax Indians and would cut in a week, — all these possessions of the stran- the whites gers seemed to the natives to show that the white men were aided by powerful gods. They had great respect for the strangers, presented them with food, and wished to have them for friends. After a while they saw that the whites were only men. They stole the wonderful hatchets and guns and the whites punished them sternly. Wherever the two races came together they were soon at war. The whites captured the Indians and took them away as slaves. If the natives saw a white man's ship in a harbor or river's mouth, they lay in wait to seize and murder any of the crew who came ashore. This happened when ships came to explore the country or to trade for furs. After a long time the whites began to arrive as settlers, clearing the forests, building houses, and planting fields.

The Indian became alarmed, lest his lands be taken away and the game be destroyed. Now came fiercer wars than before. But the Indian was no match for the white man. The Indians Walled towns, strong forts, cannon, and muskets were driven westtoo much for him. He was driven back from the ^ coast, across the mountains, and then across the great plains in the middle of the continent, until at last he ceased to fight and settled down to a quiet life in the Far West. The government of the United States has spent much money in the past fifty years to educate him and to induce him to adopt the habits of white men. In spite of this generous treatment the Indians as a race progress slowly.

I. What was the probable origin of the American Indians? How did differences grow up between the branches of the Indian race? Give the important characteristics of the Eskimos, the Mexicans, and the Indians of the United States.

II. About how long have the Indians hved in America? How do we get evidence on this point from stone implements ? What was claimed for the Calaveras skull? What do the Lansing skulls indicate? How did the Indians bury their dead ? Explain the great mounds in Ohio.

III. Explain the Unguistic family. How does language show the kinship of tribes? Describe the location of the Algonquian, Iroquoian, Muskhogean, and Siouan families.

IV. What was an Indian confederacy? Describe the confederacy of the Iroquois. Describe the clan, the totem. What did adoption signify? What was the position of a sachem ? Describe the tribal council. Explain the position of the chief. What was a brave?

V. Explain the nature of Indian kinship. What was the Indian's idea of private property? How was the work divided between men and women ? How did the Indians conduct their military campaigns ? What kept the Indian population from increasing? Describe the Indian house.

VI. How did the Indians first treat the whites? What caused them to change their attitude? Show how the Indian was driven westward.

Theories of the Origin of the Indians ; Controversy over the Calaveras Skull; The Serpent Mound of Ohio; A Pueblo; The Power of the Iroquois ; The Indian's Religion.

Chapter II The Arrival Of Columbus

In the days of the Roman empire the Mediterranean Sea, as the name indicates, was considered the middle of the world. To the people living in Italy northern Europe seemed as Early wild as northern Canada now seems to the people of notions the United States. The Italians thought the earth a flat plain surrounded by seas in which dwelt monsters who would destroy whatever ship came in their reach. When a vessel ventured out of the Straits of Gibraltar it kept close to the shore and felt itself lucky if it reached Britain and returned safely. It did not dare go* far south of the straits ; for it was supposed that the great heat there would draw the bolts from the ship and allow it to fall into pieces under the crew. The mariners had no compass by which to steer when sun and stars were not visible and they had no instruments to reckon latitude and longitude. It is not surprising that the sailors were very timid and superstitious.

As time passed and civilization and commerce spread through northern Europe, men came and went more freely from the Mediterranean to the English Channel, the Baltic Sea, and Iceland and Norway and Sweden. The Norsemen, who lived for Greenland the most part in Norway, were a bold people and in the ninth century were showing the effects of their contact with the civilized south. They built long boats which they sailed very skillfully and began to visit many distant lands. Some of them turned northward along the coast of Scotland, and in 874 they planted a colony in Iceland. Shortly afterwards one of their ships was blown beyond Iceland to the west and returned with the story of a great country it had discovered. The adventure was long remembered, and in 983 Eric the Red, an Iceland chief, sailed west and discovered Greenland, where he founded a colony in which his family became very important.

About 1000 his son, Leif Ericsson, with a company of hardy Norsemen sailed still farther west looking for a coimtry about Leif Erics- which vague reports had reached him. He came after son a time to a great continent and sailed southward along

its rocky shores for many days. He called the country Vinland, because he found wild grapes there ; and he tried to plant a colony.

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Where the Norsemen sailed

perhaps on the New England coast. Seven voyages were made to Vinland, but after a while the people of Greenland lost interest in it, and the colony was abandoned. The discovery of Vinland is described in the Norse Sagas, a collection of Scandinavian stories. There were at that time no printed books ; and it is not thought that Columbus ever heard of Leif Ericsson or his discovery. From Leif to Columbus was nearly five hundred years, which is more than from Columbus to our day.

In the Middle Ages the people knew that an ocean lay west of Medieval Europe and a great sea south of it ; and they had geography heard from travelers that water was on the east and south of Asia. But this theory did not answer the question,

'' What about Africa? " There it was south of the Mediterranean, a burning desert in the interior, and no one was wilhng to explore it. The impression prevailed that it grew hotter and hotter as one went southward. The only proper way to treat such assertions as these was to go and see if they were true.

In the fifteenth century European mariners began to use a compass to steer by and an astrolabe to tell where they were on the ocean when out of sight of land. These two little in- Thenavigastruments made them much bolder in sailing the seas, tors A new race of navigators grew up. They were men who studied geography, made maps of newly discovered regions, and made voyages to learn still more than was known. To-day we know so much about the surface of the earth that there is little for navigators to explore. It was not so in the fifteenth century. The navigators were bold and learned, and we owe them much for their patient discoveries.

The most famous of these men was Prince Henry, the Navigator, brother of the king of Portugal. He established a school in which the latest discoveries were taught to hardy sea- West coast men, a trained band of courageous explorers. Their of Africa main purpose was to pass around the continent of Africa and reach the East Indies, where the valuable spices grew. Ship after ship went out, and each sailed a little farther southward. When the equator was crossed safely and the captain found he could return to Portugal there was great joy. After that the explorers went more boldly into the unknown African waters. When they turned Cape Palmas and found that the shore ran east and west they thought the continent was at last passed and they were on the road to the eastern coast of Africa. But they were on the Guinea coast, and when the land began to run southward again for many miles they were discouraged and turned back. Others came, and in 1487 their perseverance was rewarded when Bartholomew Diaz passed the Cape of Good Hope and found that he was sailing nearly northward. He would have gone on to India, but his crew refused to proceed, and he had to return. The sailors feared that they would go so far the}^ would never see their homes again.