CRANIA AMERICANA.
PLATE XXX.
MIAMI.
I received this skull from Dr. J. W. Davis, of Thorntown, Indiana, who
politely favored me with the following memorandum of the history of the
individual.
“The man to whom this cranium belonged was a Miami chief of the Eel
river village. This fraction of the tribe was established on Augar river, a tributary
of the Wabash, where they held a beautiful section of country known as the
‘ Thorntown Reserve.’ They acknowledged the authority of two individuals as
their chiefs, one of whom had received from the whites the name of Captain Jim.
This man had acquired a great ascendancy over his people by his bravery, his
success in the chase, and his uncompromising hostility to the white faces. By his
cunning and eloquence he several times defeated the project of his colleague and
rival, who was as anxious to sell the reservation as the whites were to purchase i t
In the year 1830 a general council was called once more to deliberate on the
propriety of selling their land. The Captain again opposed the sale, and in a
long and forcible speech depicted the beauty and fertility of the country they
then held, and’the folly of parting with it for any consideration. No sooner had
he ceased, than his rival denounced him as the enemy of his tribe, and wishing its
destruction. The Captain then sprang upon his feet, retorted the charges, and
called his colleague a white m an's dog, upon which the latter seized a knife in
each hand, and rushed furiously upon his opponent, who, with a single weapon of
the same kind, willingly joined in combat. The tragedy was short and bloody.
Each belligerent received the stab of his adversary, and both fell dead on the spot.
They were buried side by side, with a pole bearing a flag placed between them.