Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1922-09-21


4[-G, that bears his name, used his argue
~ buses a band Of Indians from the
Iroquois COnfederacy and set them
running home to the Mohawk valley of New York.
This was in 1609 two years after the founding of
jamestown, eleven years before the landing of the
Pilgrims and eighty years before the beginning of
the armed clash between the French and English
for the possession of America.
1t is a far cry from 1909 to 1922; from New
York to Montana from IroquOis to Flatheads.
Just the same, it was Champlan who set the feet
of Marcus Whitman and Father Pierre-Jean De
Smet s. j., on the Oregon Trail two centuries
later. Marcus Whitman, Presbyterian missionary
patriot, statesman and martyr, saved Oregon and
the Pacific Northwest for the United States Fa-
ther De Smet greatest and most practical mission
pry who ever labored among the American In
dams, dotted the far Northwest with religious
and educational establishments, kept many
savage tribe from the warpath and served well
the government of his adopted land. The history
of the American Northwest cannot be told without
Whitman and De Smet-both of whom Champlan
started over the Oregon Trail to everlasting fame.
And here is the story in brief with it's fascinating
sequiturs-sequence of cause and effect:
The IrOquois Confederacy, because Of Cham
plains attack, undyng enmty to the
French. The Indians Of this unique cOnfederacy-
Mohawks Cayugas, OnOndagas Senecas, Onedas
and TuscarOras-by the time the French and Brit
ish came to grips in 1859, were dictatoral over
lords Of all the tribes from Hudson's bay to the
Cherokee frontier of the Caronas and from the
Connecticut to the Mississippi. Their geograph-
ical location and influence gave them the balance
of power. between the French and the British.
They big factor in the several wars which
finally resulted in the expulsion Of the French
after the capture of Quebec by Wolfe in 1859.
In the Revolution all the Iroquos kept on siding
with the British except the Oneidas and part of
the Tuscaroras. They laid waste the American
frontier. Sullivan led an American punitive eXpe-
dtion and destroyed their homes crops and
chards The outcome of the Revolution drove the
four hostile tribes to Canada.
In Canada many of the exed Iroquois were
ChristiNnzed by Jesuit missionaries, whose prin-
cipal work in America had been in New France
and the French possessions
In 1916 party of "a Iroquois left the Roman
Catholic mission of Caughnawaga, Canada, on the
st. Lawrence and struck out across the Mississippi
valley They ended up among the Flatheads of
the Bitter Root valley These Iroquois were led
by Ignatius La Mousse (Old Ignace), who achieved
dominating influence among the Flatheads,
taught them the rites Of the Roman Catholic re-
lgon and created a tribal desire for the presence
of BlacIrobes Uesuit missionaries) which resulted
in decision in 1880 to send a delegation to the
white mans country to ask for them.
Here II Is profitable to glance at the chronology
of this part of the West, which was just beginning
to get acquainted with the white man. St. Louis
wns founded in 1853. The Lewis and Clark expe-
ditlon 0S04-6) had passed through their country.
John Golfer had discovered the Yellowstone in
1907 only to have it ridculed as an impossbllity
and dubbed Golfers He'll" Astoria had been
established in 1872 Gen. William II. Ashley and his
associates of the Rocky Mountain Fur company,
with headquarters at st. Louis, had begun to use
| the Oregon Trail soon after 1922 their trips to