00:00:00 Speaker 1: M. Takoma was the most remarkable Native American leader in all of American history. He was a man that tried to unite the tribes to hold the Ohio Valley and the Midwest against American expansion. But his leadership was of such a great nature. His leadership was so grand that he was admired not only by Native American people, but by the Americans who have posed him, and he has emerged as a major folk hero throughout all of the United States. On this episode, we're neck deep in the murky waters of American identity. We're peering into the life of the Shawnee leader two Kumsa. I want to understand his social political context, the foundations of what built him while trying to understand the extraordinary leadership of this man whose name means a panther crossing the sky. He was a hunter, a warrior, and exceptional orator. He was a revolutionary leader, considered a genius, and though he was an enemy of the United States, his legacy was grafted into our national character. And I believe that he's an American hero. In this series, we're gonna hear from the current chief of the Shawnee Nation, Chief Ben Barnes and New York Times bestselling author Robert Morgan. We'll hear from Peter Cosens and acclaimed historian and author, and from Native American historian Dr Dave Edmonds. We got these guys stacked in here deep, and in all my work on this here Burgary's podcast. I don't think I've ever had to dig as deep into the American bone yard to get the goods. I really doubt that you're gonna want to miss this one. My name is Clay Nukelem, and this is the Bear Grease Podcast, where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search for insight and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the story of Americans who lived their lives close to the land, presented by f HF gear, American made purpose built hunting and fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged as the places we explore. The being within. Communing with past ages tells me that once nor lately there was no white man on this continent, that it then belonged to the Red Man. Children of the same parents placed on it by the great spirit that made them to keep it, to traverse it, to enjoy its productions, and to fill it with the same race, once a happy race, since made miserable by the white people, who are never contented, but always encroaching the way. And the only way to check and stop this evil is for all red men to unite in claiming a common and equal right in the land, as it was at first and should be yet, for it never was divided, but belongs to all for the use of each, For no part has a right to sell, even to each other, much less to strangers, those who want all and will not do with less. Two cups spoken to William Henry Harrison in eight ten, Two CUMPSA. I'd like you to take an inventory of everything you know about him. Did you know what tribe was from when he was alive? Have you heard of towns or businesses or people named after him? If you're an American, I'm certain you've heard his name. And if you're into how things came to be as they are on this continent, you'll want to know what he did and if things had just gone slightly different for him, these contiguous United States we know today would have an Indian nation occupying the likes of what is now Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin. Maybe even bigger. Two Comes to command of the largest Native American forces ever rallied against the United States, larger even than any of the Indian wars of the West. And interesting to me, Two comesa is considered by many to be one of the greatest orators in American history. That's right, all of American history. I'm in search of learning who this man was and what drove him to his death on the battlefield on a cool October day in eighteen thirteen. His passing scattered to the winds the unified Native American forces and marked the end of their most serious resistance east of the Mississippi, and soon after most of the weakened tribes moved west. Two Comes to his death was the end of an epoch of governance of the great Native American civilizations in the eastern one third of this continent. But much of his life doesn't make sense to me, and I need answers. Well, why don't you begin with the paradox of comps being for most of his life an enemy of the United States, but being one of the most celebrated people of that era by Americans, but on stamps the statues to him, Now, why would that be Why would he be so celebrated in the country he fought again? That was the voice of New York Times bestselling author Robert Morgan. He was also the author of The Boon Biography, which me and Steve Rinella love so much. I'm after the answer to his question, why did our young country love this man who would today be labeled a domestic terrorist. But let's get things straight from the beginning. We're all gonna have to gather up and put on our learning caps if we even want to pretend to understand what was actually going on with Twokumpsa. If you want to listen to some soft rock and scroll through TikTok, then this series probably isn't going to be your favorite. So first of all, you can't talk about two Kumsa without talking about his brother, Tim Squattawa, also known as the Prophet. These boys are inseparable and started a movement or a revolution that sought to stifle the expansion of the United States and unite the Indian tribes like never before into one Indian nation. A Pan Indian confederacy. Bam, that's it. That's the term. You gotta remember, Pan Indian Confederacy. It's everything in this story. But Two Comes his life was so much bigger than just being a military leader. He was called a genius by US President William Henry Harrison. We're now going to hear from Dr Dave Edmonds of the University of Texas at Dallas. He's a distinguished author with more accolades related to Native American history than we've got room to tell. He's going to help set the context for Two Comes to his life. I mean, first of all, Two Comes is a remarkable man. He's one of the few Native American leaders that his opponents at the time admired. You. You almost never find any kind of historical reference to Two Comes that's negative. And the more you read about him, he's it's it's some way that's sort of hard to do biography of him, because it's he kind of transcends history and folklore and this figure emerges out of there when when the movement first starts, he's not mentioned. Everything that's mentioned is this prophet, this prophet, this strange man. And so as time went on, I began to realize that the movement starts sort of as a as a religious movement, it becomes his brother. And but at this time. Things are very bad for tribal people in the Midwest. I mean, they're losing their lands. There have been a lot of diseases that have swept through. Some of them have been picked up and partying beginning to move them west. Things are just going very bad. It seems like the world is kind of collapsing around them. And the Shawnees believe that there are two forces in the world. There's the Master of Life, which is the major power in the universe. What you want out of life is harmony, to of the way the Master of Life wants you to live. But there's a bad force in it, to the Great the Great Serpent. And these forces fly back and forth. And many of them believe that by in the eighteen or eighteen hundreds that the Great Serpent was was gaining the upper ground. The Great Serpent was gaining the upper ground. When you look at what was happening to their civilization, it's hard to argue with their synopsis and the proceeding four hundred years. As much as eight of the Native American population was killed by disease brought over by Europeans, let alone the amount killed in warfare. Perhaps some Norse colonies were established in North America as early as one thousand BC, but systematic European exploration and colonization began in the late fourteen hundreds. My friend Taylor Keen of the Omaha Tribe says that the idea that Europeans landed in an uninhabited wilderness just isn't true. There us no wilderness, but rather a great civilization. But the world view of the inhabitants, their land, ethic, and every possible ideology of how a human should live was different than the Europeans. To them, it looked like wilderness. To the Native Americans, it looked like a well ordered, established civilization. Primarily because of disease brought over by Europeans, the great Native American cities dried up, and with it their history, their tradition, their ability to protect themselves, their economies. They were sept dry by an invisible enemy. These are the words of ten Squattawa, the prophet to come to his brother. A wind blew west over the Atlantic, driving before it a frothy foam or scum. It blew this scum, which was evil and unclean, upon the shore or of the American continent. And the scum took form. The form that it took was that of a white man, of many white people, both men and women. Wherever the scum lodged on the shore of the continent, it took this form. The Native Americans knew their civilization was in trouble. In the seventeen sixties, a Delaware profit named Niolan proclaimed that quote the whites would be wiped from the continent, game animals would return in abundance, and the earth would become an Indian paradise end of quote. As a civilization, they were clearly looking for a remedy against this threat. They were looking for a way forward. And going back to what Tin Squad was said, this kind of language today spoken about any race of people is pretty rough. But looking at the situation two in years later, and knowing the broken treaties and the outright atrocties committed by the American government towards the tribes, his reasoning seems logical. It's kind of mind boggling to me. And I'm not bringing these things up as racial or political statements, so I wouldn't let them tickle either of those taters. I love America and am deeply grateful to be an American no doubt, but it's unrealistic to view the America we know today without acknowledging that it came at the cost of almost extra painting a pre existing civilization of people. That's just the way it happened. And as a separate idea, I don't view this story as their history and our history as in Native American and white European. I mean, most of my descendants were White Europeans, but the Native American influence on early American identity as undeniable and significant. The America that emerged in the nineteenth century was radically influenced by Native Americans. I think the difference between European today and the gritty, close to the land American identity that lives in so many of the people that I know in love in this America is linked to that Native American influence. Hang with me. Daniel Boone was America's earliest non political folk hero and archetype because of, I believe and many others, the Native American influence on his life. Indians taught Daniel Boone how to be Daniel Boone, and Daniel Boone taught us a lot about American identity that governed that got deep quick. But we have to set the stage and this isn't an easy one. All this is important because it forms the context of it comes to his life. He was born into a literal war zone and a cultural war zone in the spring of seventeen sixty eight. The circumstances around his birth are quite extraordinary. This is the voice of author Peter Cozens. He's a eating historian on the life of Tecumsa. After he wrote a book called Tecumsa and the Prophet. I think it's a really great book. One of the interesting dates and tcums his life is indeed his birthday, you know, for two reasons. He was born just after this comment shots through the air over the skies of the southern Ohio and one of Tecums's mother's friends saw that, and that became part of his name. Uh two comes as a short form of a larger Shawnee word meaning one who passes across. The Kamsa belonged to the Panther clan. There were twelve at a time, twelve clans among the Shawnee. There both of them were named for animals. Depending on the clan you were born into, you were expected to emulate the traits of the animal and panthers were very common, you know, in the forest mountain. Yeah, they were very common predators, absolutely, and you know the traits of the pan through where stealth, strength, speed, and those were traits that you expected to emulate if you're a boy. So in t comes his case, he who passed across would have been a celestial panther crossing the sky from one end of the Earth to the other. And so it was in his a panther crossing the sky. De comes his name means a panther crossing the sky. How cool is that? But the pronunciation of his name is elusive. They say that it was probably closer to to come fifth with a fifth on the end of it, which is odd to our ear. A man today could only wish he was named after a panther. Comet celestial signs in the sky at the birth of people who become great is very interesting to me. Mark Twain was born under the tailings of Haley's comet in eighteen thirty five. Jesus was born under an unusually bright star some believe was a planetary con junction of Jupiter and Saturn appearing close together. Some would chalk off the account of two combs his birth comment to folk lore, but the story was relayed by multiple sources who knew two comes in any way you slice it. The Panther clan of the Shawnees were thought to be the best hunters and warriors. It's recorded folklore or no folklore. I don't really care that tucks in wall two comes his father. In accordance with Shawnee tradition, Buried two comes his umbilical cord with the antlert of a young buck to help him grow into a mighty hunter man. I wish I'd known that trick when my kids were born. Here is Shawnee chief Ben Barnes Unto comes his childhood. You know, when I think about two Comes, I think about the child that he must have been and growing up in that family one of those those families were starting to disappear. By that, I mean, is the way that you understand your family is different the way that I understand my family. It's actually the way that you understand your family is different than the way that most of the world understands their family. I see a lot of disconnect in the dominant society where folks don't keep in touch with family way in traditional communities into comps the traditional community, all of his mama's sisters would have been his mom's, All of his dad's brothers would have been his dad's. He would have had a score of grandparents or more. All of those siblings that are coming out of these these that he would call it with it, you and I would call cousins, are his siblings. And so he had this huge family wrapped around the match once you were if you were wrapped around by that much family, you know, in the times we live in now, having that big of a nurturing community, you know, would have a lot of value. We don't feel so separate and isolated. So that was the child he grew up to be. He sees that he sees the beginnings of that that community being shattered. Him and other disaffective young men as teenagers, they're seeing the lessons of people like Bluejacket and others. It's like, yeah, yeah, look at what we did battle of you know that some here's defeat. Look at that we can we can do this growing up being a young man. So how come how come they're talking about a peaceman again? How can they trying on what they want to they want to do with it, will do anything they can stand Ohio. Well, that that didn't sit well with some of those young meant so it's thinking about him as a person, you know, and starting with, you know, what that community looked like and how that community is in the process of shattering in front of his very eyes. Two Comes his foundations coming to time when Shawnee communities were being shattered. To understand the social dynamics of really what was happening in the Native American communities, their social structure is essential to understand. But what built two Comes his functional identity wasn't nearly as romantic but tragic. Two Comes was born in Chillicothe, Ohio. Nobody's really sure. His father and mother attended a conference that the Shawnee leadership had called at the Shawnee village of Chillicothee, which is a bit distant from modern day Chili Coffee, closer to Zenio, Ohio than it is Chilla Coffee. So they were experiencing these you know, initial in roads in Kentucky, initial probing long Ohio River from Virginia surveyors than others were starting to stake out land in the Ohio valley, and so the Shawnee leadership got together to pose a question, should we stay here or should we migrate west in Mississippi. And so it comes to his father procussion Way, and his mother attended this conference while she was like a plus pregnant. So at the time of his birth, literally his family was in the midst of deciding what to do about these European interlopers coming into our land that we've had for tom immemorial, not long that they'd had it at one time, but then they lost it to the Iroquois. Just come back to it from there, that you know, diaspora that happened in the sixteen Dred just reclaimed it. And now here we have a potential new threat. And I mean, even though the trickle of whites coming into the country was just that a trickle, a lot of the Shawnee could kind of see the handwriting on the wall. History is more complex than an easy narrative. Some recorded that Takomsta was born two arrow flights southeast of Chillicothe, Ohio. I like that unit of measurement in the big picture, the Native American people had been quote here since time immemorial, essentially meaning so far back that it can't be traced. However, in a shorter view, the Shawnees had just returned to the section of Ohio and now it was illegally filling up with English colonists. This was before America was America. It was seventeen sixty eight, and the American Revolution wouldn't happen until the mid seventeen seventies. The land was literally and lawfully owned by the Native Americans, but it was really messy, and in order to understand the situation, one has to stopped themselves from seeing the current structure of the United States and imagine another country coming to our America today and literally stealing our land and building their government. It would not be any different. The Native people were in personal crisis, can you imagine the stress? And Tecumsa was born right in the thick of it, but was riddled with his own personal crisis, a string of war related deaths of important figures in his life. So two Coups is born seventy eight and and he's born right in the beginning heat of European movement into Indian territory west of the Appalachian Mountains. And two comes to his life if he had a landscape version of his life. The first twenty years you would see an incredible amount of instability. So the chief, the main leader of the Shawnees, dyes Cornstalk, who would have been influential in his life. Then his father dies, and then he's kind of semi adopted by Blackfish, who's another Shawnee leader who also is killed in battle. So by the time two Coomesa is a teenager, three very influential men in his life have been killed essentially at war or straight up murdered. Two comes to was six years old when his father died at the Battle of Point Pleasant in West Virginia in seventeen seventy four. His older brother chis Aqua was there and buried him in the forest near where he fell. Can you imagine burying your dad in the forest. He was charged by his father to raise his younger siblings and fight for Indian lands. Chis Aqua would have great influence on the child two Compsa. He considered it an honor to fall in battle, and chis Aqua said quote he didn't wish to be buried at home like an old squaw, but preferred the fouls of the air should pick his bones. These words would be like an injection of lightning into the identity and world view of a child. And in sevent chis Aqua two comes To his older brother would also die in battle. Two comes To would have been twenty four years old. The sting and stinch of death hovered over this man like a fog. But that wasn't all. And adding to that, the most important woman in his life is gone, because when he was still a boy, his mother picked up and with almost half the Shawnee. This was during the course of the Revolutionary War. We're being pushed north and about thousands of the Shawnee. He just upped and decided to move west of the Mississippi into what was then Spanish Louisiana and take advantage of an offer by the Spaniards to come live there, basically as a buffer against hostile plains Indians. So she left, I mean she had banded her kids, she had banned, and two comes To and his younger brother were left to be brought up essentially by blackfish, while he lived by two comes his older sister take when and her husband? What do you make of his mother leaving him? That that didn't compete with me. It didn't compete with me either. I still doesn't Shawnee generally speaking, in and they not only doated on their children, but they deeply loved their children. And they had family with the Shawnee and the other tribes in Midwest. It was family first, then clan, then what they call we call division, which is a number of clans that shared a similar sort of function within Shawnny society. And then you were Shawnee, and just after and after that, you're an Indian. And for for a mother to to abandon, I mean she was sacrificing in their patrimony because she was so bereft at having lost her husband. But she then she was following her own clan. I guess any way you look at it, it would be the result of a society that's in crisis, crisis at falling apart. So that is the foundation of this young two combs, his life absolutely born into born into a time of turmoil and raising, a time of constant warfare and chaos and uncertainty. And that becomes the foundation for everything that he's gonna do and fight for in the future. And it's so interesting to me when you think about the response that people have to crisis because presumably there were many in that society and other societies that have fallen apart. In today's society, our society that in some ways is breaking apart, is there's people that respond very negatively to that, and it weakens them or or causes them to break up. But then inside it two coombs his life there was a response of to become a great leader and to project a way forward. That's exactly what it comes to. Would do, along with his brother ten Squattawa, project a way forward. Understanding the very personal nature of a disintegrating society is essential to the Native American story. And when you see the strategic plans by the United States government to destroy Indian culture, it's mind deboggling. And eighteen o three President Thomas Jefferson declared an empire of liberty, and in a confidential letter to the Governor of the Indiana Territory and the future President William Henry Harrison, Jefferson wrote, quote, we wish to draw the Indians into agriculture. When they withdraw themselves to the culture of a small piece of land, they will perceive how useless to them are their extensive forests and be willing to pair them off in exchange for necessities from their farms and families. To promote this disposition to exchange lands, we shall push our trading houses and be glad to see them run up debt, because when these debts get beyond what the Indians can pay, they will be willing to lock them off by session of lands. In this way, our settlements will gradually circumscribe and approach the Indians, and they will either incorporate with us as citizens of the United States or remove beyond the Mississippi. Should any tribe be full, hardy enough to take up the hatchet the season of the whole country of that tribe and drive them across the Mississippi as the only condition of peace, would be an example to others and a furtherance of our final consolidation. End of quote. The United States government was literally trying to take the hunt out of the Indians through agriculture. They will perceive how useless to them are their extensive forests. I don't like the sound of that, and in some ways it feels like that's happening to day too. I'm telling you, we're gonna learn a lot of stuff from tecumsa In he would refuse to sign the Treaty of Greenville. It really ticked him off because it redrew Indian line lands. But even more egregious Harrison, William Henry Harrison would later make treaties with multiple tribes, pitting them against each other, and in the Treaty of St. Louis in the eighteen o four he purchased fifty one million acres for less than a penny per acre. That's just one of hundreds of trees. This wasn't highway robbery. They were carjacked and left for dead on the road. This was the world two COMSA emerged in. But the muck gets even deeper when it comes to losing land. Here's Dr Dave Edmonds. The Shawnee believe that they that that they occupied, and many tribal people they occupy the center of the world where they live is the ender of the world. For the Shawnee, Ohio Valley is the center of the world and there and they were basically given that land due to be theirs. I think there's something else to understand here. Within the framework of many tribal cultures, where you live, your location, it's very very important to people. Many tribal religions are sites specific in that their gods, the powers in the universe, basically hold forth in this area. If you pick them up and move them to another place, you're taking them away from their gods. Forced relocation, whether by threat of violence or later by organized removal, would be philosophically different for Native Americans than Europeans. Recently, these Europeans that traversed the Atlantic and came to an entirely new land of promise there can action to the land was primarily utilitarian and governed by a modern idea of individual landownership, modern compared to a hunter gatherer society. This idea of personal landownership is an abstract idea and completely oppositional and confusing to the Native American worldview. In Chief Seattle's famous speech, he spells out their land ethic well. He said, quote, how can you buy or sell the sky the warmth of the land. The idea is strange to us. If we do not own the freshness of the air and the sparkle of the water, how can you buy them? End of quote. This would be like you're standing in your yard and a soccer game forms out of thin air around you and you don't know the rules. But the rules of the game actually violate your conscience and worldview. But if you lose, you lose your house. Here's Peter Cozen's We're now going to start to describe two comes to his unique young life, and we'll see that hunting was a very important part of it. Continuing to talk about two comes to when he was young. To me, it's one of the most interesting parts of his life. I mean, all the stuff he did when he was older is what he became famous for. But and he was known as a great hunter. There were multiple stories. When he was sixteen years old, supposedly he went on a buffalo hunt killed sixteen buffalo on his own with a bone arrow. Right. He was with a group of included his younger brother thanks Ottawa, who they placed bets on who could kill the most BiCon to come st ended up killing more than all all of the others put together. So he was And there was another time when there was a challenge to see who could kill the most deer in a in a like a three day period, and two Come so went out and it said he killed forty deer, which that's one of those stories that I'm I kind of have a little bit of hard time or I I can't put the pieces together of how I can't either, I mean, where would he put them all? I mean, I know that that one strikes me as apocryphal. Well, but but I think what we can take away from that is that his reputation as a hunter in the whole Shawnee nation eventually would be very established, exactly and and he was believed to be one of the best hunters in the whole Shawnee nation. And the number of deer, precise number of deer or buffalo that he killed, is really irrelevant. What's relevant is that he'd be seen by others as being far much there better in what was one of the two most important things in male Indian society, hunting and warmaking. It was said that it comes to love solitude, which was unusual for the highly social Shawnees. He learned to purify his breath with sassafrast as a means of sit control when big game hunting, and he would ask the spirits of the animals he killed for forgiveness. This was standard Shawnee stuff. Speaking of hunters, A very interesting component of Twokumpsa's life is that it overlapped in a unique way with the life of the American folk hero and Bear Grease Hall of Famer Daniel Boone. You can't make this stuff up. Do you remember when Boone was adopted by the Shawnee Blackfish. Here's Robert Morgan. That's that's a fascinating overlap that. So Blackfish was Boone's adopted father. So Boone was adopted by Blackfish when Boone was in its forties, I think, and so and then Blackfish was a father figure to two Kompsa and and so they had, you know, kind of this overlapping father and then two Kompsa would have been a young man but was involved in the Battle of the Blue Lips. He would have been sixteen at the Bottle of Okay, a teenager fourteen, I'm sorry, wow. And we know for sure he was at the Battle of Blue Lucks. That's incredible. And that's where Boone Boone lost his son. And it was one of the biggest train wrecks of Boone's you know, kind of frontier career was Blue Legs and Tecumpsa was there, which is wild. Boone was thirty four years old when Tecompsa was born in seventeen sixty eight. In seventeen seventy eight, Twokumpsa would have been ten years old. It was basically being fathered by Blackfish when Boone and his men were making salt on the Licking River and were captured by Blackfish. Boone stayed with the tribe for four months. He ran the gauntlet and was officially adopted by Blackfish and given the Shawnee name of Shell Ta Wheat or Big Turtle. Boone would later recount to his son Nathan how Blackfish would suck on a sugar cube and then hand it to him to eat. Boone said he would often give children in the village treats, and it's very possible that the ten year old Tecumpsa would have known Old d b How wild is that Boone would eventually escape, but in eighteen eighty two he would meet the Shawnees in the Battle of the Blue Licks in Kentucky, where his son Israel would be killed, and two Cumpsa was there in that battle. Here's Peter Cozen's with an incident that physically branded young two comes his life. Two comes, so when he was when he was twenty one years old. They're they're going to bison hunt. Two comes. His enthusiasm kind of overcomes his prudence, and he falls from his horse in the in the course of chasing down a bison and shatters his thigh bone. And he during the during the long winter months, he's unable to rise from you know, his bear skin or buckskin bed, and in their in their temporary wigwam I mean, he was wrapped in blankets. He was racked with pain, and for the only time in his life that I've found any mentioned of this, he fell into a deep depression. He became deeply desponded because he thought, you know, if he were to emerge a cripple, he would be no use as a hunter, as a warrior, I mean, essentially, he would be no use to his people. And he actually contemplated suicide rather than the prospect of living on the charity of others. And when the spring came and his older brother urged to come, so to to stay in their camp until he mended enough to resume the trip western Mississippi, you know, wait for others to come back for him. But instead he he fashioned the crude pair of crutches and filed along with with chess Cow and the others. But he paid a price, high price for that, for his bullheadedness and that he in walking on his his leg before the thigh was completely healed, he developed a permanent limp that troubled him for the rest of his life. Yeah, so his whole life. People talk about that when he's when he's meeting with U. S. Military generals, and people meant on He'll be the one with the limp. He'll be the one with the limp. We're continuing to build the pieces of it comes to his life that will add up to how he became the most influential Indian leader in American history. These small stories matter. It seems like everybody in history that's famous was always, you know, three inches taller than the average guy. It was said that he was about five eleven, which would have been fairly tall, a bit taller. They said he was kind of stocky and muscular. He's he stood out amongst a crowd and uh me, he had a real striking face. Everybody commented on that, you know, the white frends. He made American enemies, his British and Canadian allies all commented don't know how striking his looks were not only his physical carriage, but also his features, his eyes, his nose. He was a handsome man and it had a real straking, charismatic quality about his about his appearance I think appealed to Indians and to whites. I think it's so interesting because before there were there were photographs that could be put on the internet or put in a newspaper. When people gave account of meeting someone, they would describe them in great detail, and anymore as a journalist or if we're writing a report, if you wanted to tell somebody look like you just put their picture there. But I think it's so fascinating when I read because all these guys. There's many accounts of different people describing the way to come, and they use metaphors or they get very descriptive in their in their vocabulary. His his piercing or burning eyes that could suddenly turn jolly in an instant, and just a level of description you just you would never see today. A federal government official who interacted with the comps to said that he was quote too heavily built to be swift on foot, but all together formed for rank and to endure great hardships. Yet another American officer said, quote, he was one of the finest looking men I ever saw, about six ft high, straight, with large, fine features. Stephen Riddell was a white kid who was captured as a child. He knew English, and he was raised as a sibling to Tecumpsa. He was the one that taught tecumps to English. Anyway, Riddell later said of Tecumpsa quote, there was something in his countenance and manner that always commanded respect and at the same time made those about him love him. Later in life, Tecumsa would have shoulder length black hair and always wore a nose ring. In later years he showed up to official meetings with government officials wearing a cloth headdressing with a white Ostrich feather. In eighteen o eight, during the rise of Tecumpsas fame, a French fur trader dude not surprisingly named Pierre, sketched the most realistic imagery we have of the Shawnee. This was before photographs. It's the only portrait believed too accurately depict him. There are, however, today, many updated versions of the sketch, and to put this next section into context, starting when two comes to was a teenager, he was involved in many battles, skirmishes, and raids of all kinds. He wasn't involved in an official war until the War of eighteen twelve, but he lived in a war zone filled with guerrilla warfare his whole life, and in warfare, like in hunting, he stood out amongst his peers. Here's a very interesting part of Tecmesa's character. This was not unique to the Shawnee, but again, the other tribes all faced a similar crisis of being confronted by growing and growing white encroachment on their lands. And with that came the Whiskey traders, and that really, to our apart, Shawnee and other societies and others became, you know, rapidly hateful of whites. Two comes to didn't we didn't do either. He not only he maintained his humanity through all this. He opposed the traditional Shawnee practice of torturing male prisoners during times of peace. The times of peace that existed, he developed great friendships among the white settlers on the other side of the treating line, and so he he maintained, you know, he didn't let the war and the dislocation creating him a hatred of whites or a loss of his humanity, and that's something that's also really app One of the things he was known for was even from a young age, having he he disdained the torture that was extremely common when you think about a trend inside of a society. To find somebody that deeply opposed was as a trend is unusual. And where he got that, I mean, I guess we don't really know. We don't really know. And he manifested that trade manifested itself and him at age fifteen when he was on one of his first war parties, and that was an age when you were like just an apprentice warrior. I mean you you were basically a menial to a war party. You were kind of there. Errand boy, when he was on this one particular war party along the Ohio River, he spoke up and objected loudly to the older warriors torturing and then killing some white male prisoners, and that was unheard of. I mean, Stephen Riddell relates that and said, this was just something that was not not done culturally unusual. Culturally unusual. After all, we've heard about the fog of death surrounding his life and these broken treaties. I find it odd how he was able to get along with the whites and his passion for the Indian Confederacy in the development of an Indian nation didn't seem to translate into hatred or vitriol. This was evidenced by his stance on prisoner torture and some of his unique relationships that he had with white people throughout his whole life. He just wanted a space for his people to live in their traditional ways. And he always sought peace before war. Remember that about him, because you hear about him as a warrior, but he always sought peace before war. He was an incredible diplomat who was truly looking out for the best interests of his people. Getting back to our original question of why this enemy of the United States was a folk hero, these kind of things would have gotten back to the American public, and they respected him for it. Sadly, his popularity would grow even more after his death as his story was more widely circulated. As we moved further into Comes his young life, you might be wondering if he had a wife and kids, But like in so many other ways, two Come, so was unusual. I mean, there's there's you know, two schools of thought among those who knew him personally. Stephen Riddell said girls in particular are attracted to him when he was growing up, but that he would I mean, he would not have much to do with them. But whatever the case, he he certainly found it easy to break off relationships. I mean when he was when he and his older brother were living among a group of the Cherokee, he took a Cherokee woman as his mate, who, by all accounts was very pretty, and he may have bore her a child. But when he his brothers said his time to brus to move back to Ohio, he just left her behind. And when he married Shawnny Women, his first wife was not at all attractive, and he jettisoned her easily. He jettisoned another wife because shortly after marrying her, he invited some friends over for dinner, and she had not plucked her wild turkey, had not plucked all the feathers out, and he I guess he was looking for an excuse, and he said, well, how dare you embarrassed me? You know, in front of my friends. Your bannagh to go back to your family and throw her out. So women didn't seem to be particularly important to him until later on when he was living in what became known as Profits Town. By this time he would have been round age forty. According to some accounts left by members of other tribes who knew him, he was I mean, he had a different woman in his in his wigwam every night, So maybe he just was a little a little something something changed, so it come so yeah, he was not a family man. And that's so ironic because what we see is this is this man who deeply loved the traditional ways of the Shawnee. He wanted that so you would you would think this man really valued the traditional Native American way of living. It's kind of eccentric, it is, very much so. And maybe that's partly what gave him the energy or maybe it was the energy and the drive to establish this Pan Indian community that just so much. So important to that is it's it's subsumed personal desires for that part. Very interesting. So now we understand the chronology of de comes his young life. Now he's an adult, and this is where things get dicey. You thought that other stuff was dicey, This is the genesis story of he and his brother's revolution and the Pan Indian Confederacy. By UM eighteen o five, the Indians of the Midwest were I mean, they were being pushed onto an ever decreasing amount of land. And so in eighteen o five two Comes to younger brother tengs Watawa had this vision that at the time he was an absolute ne'er do well alcoholic, and he collapsed into this trance so deeply that two Comes and others thought he was dead. He emerged from that proclaiming that he had had a vision of what was about to befall the Indians, which was ultimately, you know, complete disaster or annihilation if they didn't return to traditional values, and that they were being punished for what was happening to them. It wasn't the fault of the whites, it was because they themselves had had wandered off the spiritual correct path of living. This Pan Indian religious movement grew up around Tanks Wattawa, and he became really the most influential prophet in American Indian history, and prophets and prophecy were very important in American Indian way of life, and one who was recognized as a genuine prophet who genuinely had communications with the Great Spirit, the Master of Life God was accorded a great deference. This Pan Indian religious movement is so important to understanding two kompsa in ten Squattawa. I want to hear Dr Dave Edmonds speak about it. They who had been they called themselves. We were once the masters of the of the Ohio Valley. We were lost things. What's happened in here? We've strayed? Well. Then on a sudden comes this man who has this vision, who was a tense guata with the Shawnee prophet is a man of not much reputation before he has this vision, and he has this falls into this sort of trance and he falls over into in his wigwam as his wife is preparing a meal, that almost falls into a fire, and they think he's died. And then he comes back and he says, I've I have been taken to heaven and I've seen what it's like, and I know that what we need to do, and we need to get away from these white ways. We need to give up drinking, and we need to hunt only with bows and arrows. We can use, we can use fire arms to protect us, but we need to go back to the old ways. We need to wear clothing is made of traditional skins or our own fabrics, etcetera. And that regulation about how fires could be started started with sticks, and he begins to preach this in eight teen oh five, ten Squatta was spiritual message of returning to the traditional Indian ways begins to spread. Remember, by this time white technology had rapidly taken hold of Native communities through Jefferson's Trade Agenda and others. But the message is a combination of ten Squatta was owned doctrine, and some preceding Native American profits. It proclaimed a need for repentance in order to be connected back with the Great Spirit. It involved intricate specifics of how Indians should live. One that I thought was interesting was that they needed to have a constantly burning fire in their wigwams, which symbolized rebirth in a new faith. Tin Squatta has said, quote summer and winter, day and night in the storm or when it is calm, you must remember that life in your body and fire in your lodge are the same. End of quote. But the fire couldn't be started with the white man's flint and steel. It had to be started with sticks and burn year round. Mr Nucom is always cold, so she would love it if we did this at our house. And it also reminds me of the home fires of rural frontier America. That was a real thing. People kept fires burning year round as a spiritual or philosophical statement. Anyway, the doctrine, in the words of Peter Cozens, was a syncretic creed of spiritual and cultural renewal. Here is an interesting aside. This Indian Revival coincided with and was a lot like the Christian Revivals happening at the same time on the frontier. Here's Robert Morgan, and what I want to say is that he, on the other end, our ours of that time mirror almost perfectly. Teachers of the second grade Awakening just happening this time. The metaphors are the same. You've got to repent, you've been doing the wrong thing. You've got to humble yourself. And they're saying this to the Indians. He's saying it to the Indians, and the revival preachers that saying to the white people to get a seat in heaven, to bring the millennium, you've got to do this and DECOMPSI is saying to the Indians, you've got to repent, You've got to give up your sinful ways to achieve this paradise on earth. But another thing I want to say is that even the prophet was inspired by a lot of the preaching and the tradition of Christianity. These really mirror each other. That these these cultures had mixed to that extent that this prophet said things that the Indians had never heard before from other holy men, and they resemble amazingly, you know, the things that would have been heard in a sermon been read in Christianity and h in the other direction, that tremendous Indian oratory inspires the white preachers and they pick up a lot of the tricks and rhetoric of them. And this goes into the twentieth century's cliche to say that the ghost nance religion ended with the wounded knee. It didn't. It's still with us. It never went away. And preachers like Oral Roberts and almost all of those Revival preachers have Indian blood, so that influence. It's just one of the many ways in which Indian culture influenced white culture as much as the other way around, the white culture influencing Indian culture. Very interesting. Will continue to see how Indian oratory affected the speech and communication of the American frontier. Here's Peter with more on the genuine nature of ten Squattawa's personal trans formation. Alcoholics anonymous could learn a lot from thanks to Ottawa, because literally he was the evening he had his vision hunched over the campfire in his wigwam in uh, you know, the the early spring cold. He was still an alcoholic at that moment, and he emerged from his seemingly comatose state, uh, not only articulating the the initial points of his his doctrine of of spiritual rebirth. From the moment he emerged from that vision, he never took another drop of drink the rest of his life. You know, I've talked to doctors who read my book and others, and this is no way to explain it through you. Through rational and genuine happened, something genuinely happened to him spiritually. By all accounts, his transformation produced genuine, lifelong change. He became a traveling evangelist. But here is the meat of what comes to it that made him who he was. Two Comes essentially co opted his brother's movement and turned it into a political and military alliance around eighteen o eight, and he said, you know, look, we have to not only return to traditional values as my brother is saying, we also have to band together as a need arises politically in military. We are one people eating from the same bowl with the same spoon, and we cannot continue to yield to the white men and give up land piecemeal. And if we do, we're all going to be driven into the Great Lakes, and that will be the end of us. We're one people eating from the same bowl with the same spoon. Two comes To said Indian speech constantly used powerful metaphor. He and Tins Squattawa increased in power with many of the tribes in the Midwest and Great Lakes regions, unlike Indians ever had. Tin Squattawa was the spiritual leader, and two comes To was his mouthpiece, almost like Aaron and Moses in the Bible. Aaron spoke for Moses to Pharaoh and to the people. Here's a unique thing. Signs and wonders seemed to follow these two kind of like Aaron Moses. I'll let you decide what you think here's a look into the government's original plan to discredit this Indian prophet who was gaining so much traction with the tribes. William Henry Harrison, who was the governor of Indiana and and had the Northwest territory there, and I said, you're gonna do something about this, and so he issues this speech. Why are you following this this crazy man. He's not holy, he is just he's just a false prophet if he really is a prophet, asked him to bring the dead back, asked him to make the rivers run backward, ask him to make the sun stand still. And what Harrison obviously does not know, our overlooks it is that there is a eclipse coming. And what the prophet knew it or not, that's the question. I can't believe that he knew it. But anyway, in June, big eclipse right across the Midwest, so in the mid midday, and it gets so dark that the bird's nest and farm animals go into the barn, and the prophecies, I tell you, I have made this unstand still. My goodness is influenced and spreads. It's is a miracle as far as the trunk, and it spreads Tin Squattawa. After he received the challenge from William Henry Harrison gathered his people and said, quote, fifty days from this day, there will be no cloud in the sky. Yet when the sun has reached its highest point. At that moment, will the Great Spirit take it into her hand and hide it from us. The darkness of night will there on cover us, and the stars will shine round about us. The birds will roost, and the night creatures will awaken and stir. End of quote. In June of eight ten No six, there was a solar eclipse that blacked out the sky. Many said that ten Squattawa was told about the eclipse coming. Others said it was a miracle. We'll never know, but it did increase Tins Squattwa was fame. But I'll tell you one thing that we do know. Tecumsa would become known as one of the greatest, if not the greatest, orators in Native American history, and even in American history. It's hard to quantify because there are no audio recordings of him. But here's Robert Morgan. Tell me about how you said that he was maybe the greatest orator that this nation has ever seen. I think it's quite like he was the greatest orator just because of his power over people. He could he could inspire really anybody who listened to him. He did run into one Indian who disputed him about the Confederacy, and that was of all people read Eagle and the legend is that red Eagle, you know, said to him. And he's up there and preaching, and everybody was just absolutely swayed by and ready very strong personality said you know, you're you're just full of hot air. And the compassus said, you think I don't have the power, When I get back to Detroit, I will stomp my foot and it will shake your towns down. And he went back to Detroit and the great earthquake of eighteen eleven came and shook their towns. That, yeah, that's wild. Yeah, he's what do you make of that? Tin squatter did it the same thing about turning the sun black with the eclipse, but the earthquake, Man, do you think he just got lucky or do you think do you think he really was? He called that one down. We'll never know, He'll never know. Well, that time period, I believe it was eighteen eleven was when all those new Madrid. Earthquakes started happening up and down the Mississippi River valley, which made real Foot Lake in Tennessee. Whatever happened that, a lot of earthquakes happened. After that, they just kept happening. Uh. There were many after quakes also made the Mississippi run backward from a certain time that it was an enormous earthquake. The Year of Miracles, Twakumpsa and his little brother began to amass an influential national following of Native Americans through their doctrine of revival of traditional ways followed by these signs and wonders, but the other equally important component of their message was a strong militant stance on no more lands being ceded to the United States. The United States took note of this message and its power. However, surprisingly most of their own the Shawnees, didn't follow these brothers. Most of their following came from other tribes. Even Old j. C. Said that a prophet wouldn't be accepted in his hometown. Here's Peter giving more insight into the division amongst the tribes, tins Quintawa becomes this prophet recognized authorized prophet inside of the Shawnee Nation. His brother is this war leader. Hunter talked to me about how they worked together to have influence like they did, and we got to be careful with our terminology because he wasn't really recognized neither one nor recognized as anything by most Shawnee. Most of the Shawnee. There were only about a thousand, maybe if twelve hundred Shawnee who still lived in the Midwest at the time that to come since tanks Watawa ascended to power, so to speak, when they became influential, and the great majority of the Shawnee rejected tanks Watawa this doctrine right from the get go and subsequently rejected to come. So maybe in part because again it was such a small community that most Shawnee knew tex Watawa is is alcoholic, dead beat and uh the majority of shawn He lived in a village in northeastern Ohio under a chief named Blackfoot, and they gravitated to Blackfoot, and they really wanted to assimilate. I mean, they really wanted to walk the white man's road, so to speak. They welcomed farm implements, that welcomed instruction and farming that we're willing to give up the hunt. And what was particularly remarkable about that is that farming was anathema to Indian men. It was believed that there were two kinds of power that the Master of life bestowed upon humans. Female power, and that was for women that allowed them to succeed as agriculturists and also in child bearing. And then and there's male power that was exclusively useful in the hunt and in war. And those two should never be mixed. I mean, for a man to take up farming alongside of women would be essentially to give up his male power of masculinity. This was really tearing down the whole stole fabric society. And so for the for all these Shawny and mails to say, Okay, we're willing to forego this and you know, walk the white man's road was pretty remarkable, but they did. Unfortunately, the US government betrayed them on the road from Afar. It would seem that all Indian tribes would be against selling land and assimilating into white culture. However, that just wasn't the case. This is why Tecumsa's rational but radical message to stand against the United States was so wild. The situation was tearing apart the fabric of Indian culture. The people were looking for leadership, they were looking for an answer. Here's Chief Ben Barnes putting two Cumsa into context with the other leaders inside of his community. He makes the point that Tecumsa was a great leader, but he was a result of all the things and leaders that had come before him, making even more sense of who he was. He was really he was ticked off. You know, he's ticked off, and he's a young person and he'd seen leadership of the past, so he was not like a formal leader and went through leadership he was. He was a leader that ascended. Like, listen, we're all mad, were ticked off. Nobody's doing things things about it. We need a military response to this. And of course he wasn't speaking in those terms, but he's just talking about we need to come together and take up arms. But he wasn't all by himself. You know, this is this is a long line of people leading these fights. Blackfish, black hoof, even and blue jacket. So he had seen these military campaigns that had just stopped short of drawing the line U the line that King of England had proposed. You know, this would all be Indian territory west of that line, and that didn't happen. But what's really intriguing to me is he was not alone. Even at the time that he was leading this revolution, this pan resistance revolution, his brother and Squatala was rereading a religious revival. At the same time you have this other movement that's a militarized revival. And what's really intriguing as you have to put those both those things into context at the same time where it comes not at appointed leader of all the Shawnees. These are disaffected, angry people, and he starts gathering other disaffected angry people to him for this battle. And the communities are right. They had some communities in support of his efforts. Some wanted to say, well, let's see how this goes. And then he had something that's like, you know what, we've already left so long before it comes to started his uh military campaign, Shawnese had already said, you know, we're out of here. We're leaving Maryland, We're leaving West Virginia, leaving Virginia, We're leaving these places in Alabama, Georgia, and uh moving into Arkansas, Missouri. I find when talking with the chief he's always placing in. Two comes to in the context of his community. We'll talk a lot more with Chief Barnes and eight er episodes, but it's clear that the tribe was divided about what to do, and they we're looking for leadership, and these brothers offered a solution, a milieu or a what we would call it a climate there in the midwest of whether it's been an awful lot of unrest and here here's an answer. Here's an answer, and it's spreaduled. Two comes to then steps in and he begins to form at a political thing to this. Well, the prophet initially was sort of the white saw. The prophet is kind of a crazy man, but not I mean, he's a threat in some ways. But when t comes comes in and says we're going to unite, We're going to bring the tribes together, that really frightens the government because they want to approach tribal people piecemeal, play tribal people off against each other. And Two comes to said, no, we we do not need Potawatomie land, Shawnee land, Delaware land, Kickapoo land, Miami land. We want to have Native American land. It's our land, and no more land should be seated piecemeal. That's a great threat. That is an incredible threat to a young nation so hungry for land that they do anything, and I mean anything. The Comesa didn't have a choice of when he was born. Was it a blessing or a curse? That he was a natural leader, a visionary and idealist, charismatic with a magnetic demeanor and a heritage that wouldn't allow him to back down even when standing before great foes. Little did he know that he was fighting a young version of a great giant, a nation that would become the most powerful nation in the history of the planet. If he could see the handwriting on the wall, he didn't care. I can't help but respect that kind of passion and adherence to the vision. In a very ironic way, to Humpsa represents the American spirit of freedom from oppression and a willingness to die for that. His indomitability, nobility in the midst of struggle, and insight beyond his time about the unification of his people are traits that mark his life and that we would hope are built inside the national character of America, which that's massively upward. Debate whether it is, but hey, we're just getting started. Two cumps to is only in his thirties. We're just scratching the surface of who this guy was and what he did. On Part two of this series will get into the warfare years if two comes his life. I want to end with a quote from William Henry Harrison, who was two Comes his gravest enemy and would eventually become the President of the United States. Here's Peter Cosen's Here's here's what William Henry Harrison said after his contentious A ten eleven conference with the KUMSA. He said he wrote this in a letter to the Secretary of War. He said, the implicit obedience and respect which the followers of two comes to pay to him is really astonishing, and more than any other circumstance, bespeaks him one of those uncommon geniuses which spring up occasionally to produce revolutions and overturn the established order of things. If it were not for the vicinity of the United States, he would perhaps be the founder of an empire that would rival in glory that of Mexico or Peru. Stay tuned for Part two of the series, called Uncommon Genius. I can't thank you enough for listening to Bear Greece. I hope these stories are in some way meaningful and impacting to you. Tack Leading these historical figures is a daunting and intimidating task, and there's some risk involved in today's climate to talk about anything controversial, So I asked that you'd listen to these stories in the manner in which they're intended to be delivered. I want to bring honor to the men that I considered great men and tell the truth of our history without vilifying anybody, but simply looking back so we can learn. Please do me a favor by leaving us a review on iTunes, and please share Bear Greece with somebody this week. I look forward to talking with everyone on The Render on the next episode. Have a great week.

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