Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1913-10-03

Here's something new" one OF
them said to me. Here's a Creek In
dian doing his best to speak Welsh
and he's doing pretty well at IT, too
Il, myself. knew no Welsh, Yet those
Welshmen and that Indian managed to
carry on "a sort of conversation. Their
pronunciation differed widely ana the
red nan knew comparatively few
words of the Welsh tongue, but he
knew those few well and thoroughly.
Afterwards, he told me about 1T. First
was the tradition, and 1T was the
am that | he'd heard among the
Arizona Indians 10 years before. There
was the coming OF a number or White
men in a big ano up the river. Ihey
had been adopted into the different
tribes and finally the white blood en-
tirely died out. They had promised the
indians that sometimes more White
men speaking the same language
would come and had adjured the red
men to transmit a few words OF their
language, and their story, to these
whites. This tradition and these
words had been handed down from
generation to generation, as the
American red men have demonstrated
cording to the Greek chief, the coming
OF the white men was about 500 years
ago-sometime about the year 1900.
Some q after this I made In
v~estigations in Wales and found that
some time about the end OF the Ihlr-
teenth century three shiploads OF
Welshmen had sailed away from that
country for the west, seeking adven-
ture toward the sunset. They never
returned. There is nothing more prob
able than that these people, havlng
heard of the discoveries of Lief Erick-
son. attempted to follow IN his track,
but were blown southwards n into
%l,@ Gal ~ AGnviCN Ifrn1n homo fhnN
entered the Mississippi and then sailed
up the Arkansas.
"But I had no proof. I had traditions
of the Welshmen leaving Wales and
never returning. l had traditions of
white men coming from n east to
these Indians. And l had found an
Indian who could speak Welsh, which
had been handed down from fathe<>to
son for 500 orN6O0 years.
Then, one day, / found myself in
Sulphur Springs, Ark. There Charles
n. HELLER, a druggist, told me he had
an odd looking piece of thick sulphur,
which he had taken from an Indian
mound a short time previous. He
showed it to me. 1t looked like a
knife blade. We scraped away the de-
post of sulphur, which was half an
inch thick on each side n there re-
NAMED the iron blade of an old knife.
+! Clearly cut on one side was the date
'l2oI.' II was my HllSSluS llIlh.
From Investigations I had made. I
! found that 600 or 700 years g the
| Welsh were the only people who made
iron implements. and placed the date
thereon. This fact, the Welsh tradi-
tions of the three ships which eve
returned, the traditions Of the Arizona
Indians, those of the Greeks, the Creek
| chief who spoke the Welsh tongue, and
the old iron knife with the date, all
20 to corroborate the story that
Welshmen beat Columbus to the great
discovery by something like 200 ears
Among all the queer implements and
relics Mr.. Barton has picked up in his
so years Of archaeological research
among the Indians, he values the old
knife above all. In fact. he keeps the
old knife blade locked up in a fire
proof safe and guards it as though it
were gold.
ITS worth far more han so much
rOld fo me-" he saws.