While we know our northern friends may not feel it, in the South, Spring is
here. So we thought we'd share a few of our gardening sites appropriate
for this time of the year. Along with gardening, there's grilling, and getting
ready to diet so that you can fit back into that bathing suit this summer!
Fox (trans. in plural of wagosh, 'red fox,' the
name of a clan).
An Algonquian tribe, so named, according to Fox
tradition recorded by Dr William Jones, because once while some Wagohugi,
members of the Fox clan, were hunting, they met the French, who asked who
they were; the Indians gave the name of their clan, and ever since the
whole tribe has been known by the name of the Fox clan. Their own name for
themselves, according to the same authority, is Měshkwa`kihŭg',
'red-earth people,' because of the kind of earth from which they are
supposed to have been created. They were known to the
Chippewa and other
Algonquian tribes as Utŭgamig, 'people
of the other shore'.
When they first became known to the whites, the Foxes
lived in the vicinity of Lake Winnebago or along Fox river, Wis. Verwyst
(Missionary Labors, 178, 1886) says they were on Wolf river when Allouez
visited them in 1670. As the tribe was intimately related to the Sauk, and
the two were probably branches of one original stem, it is probable that
the early migrations of the former corresponded somewhat closely with
those of the latter. The Sauk came to Wisconsin through the lower Michigan
peninsula, their traditional home having been north of the lakes, and were
comparatively newcomers in Wisconsin when they first became known to the
French. One of their important villages was for some time on Fox river.
The conclusion of Warren (Hist. Ojibways, 95, 1885) that the Foxes early
occupied the country along the south shore of Lake Superior and that the
incoming Chippewa drove them out, has the general support of Fox
tradition. Nevertheless there is no satisfactory historical evidence that
the Foxes ever resided farther north than Fox river in Wisconsin, and in
none of their treaties with the United States have they claimed land north
of Sauk county. This restless and warlike people was the only Algonquian
tribe against whom the French waged war. In addition to their disposition
to be constantly at strife with their neighbors, they had conceived a
hatred of the French because of the aid which the latter gave the Chippewa
and others by furnishing firearms, and because they gathered the various
tribes for the purpose of destroying the Foxes. The proposal to
exterminate them was seriously considered in the French councils, and
their destruction would earlier have been attempted but for the pleas
interposed by Nicolas Perrot. Their character is briefly described by
Charlevoix (Shea trans., v, 305, 1881) when he says they "infested with
their robberies and filled with murders not only the neighborhood of the
Bay [Green Bay], their natural territory, but almost all the routes
communicating with the remote colonial posts, as well as those leading
from Canada to Louisiana. Except the Sioux, who often joined them, and the
Iroquois, with whom they had formed an alliance, all the nations in
alliance with us suffered greatly from these hostilities.
It was this tribe that in 1712 planned the attack on
the fort at Detroit, and but for the timely arrival of friendly Indians
and the bravery of the French commandant, Buisson, would undoubtedly have
destroyed it. They were almost constantly at war with the Illinois tribes
south of them, and finally succeeded, in conjunction with the Sauk, in
driving them from a large part of their country, of which they took
possession.
From their earliest known history they were almost
constantly at war with the Chippewa dwelling north of them, but usually
without decided success, though often aided by the Sioux. It was by the
Chippewa, together with the Potawatomi, Menominee, and the French, that
their power was finally broken.
About 1746, and perhaps for some few years previous,
the Foxes lived at the Little Butte des Morts on the west bank of Fox
river, about 37 miles above Green Bay. They made it a point, when ever a
trader's boat approached, to place a torch upon the bank as a signal for
the traders to come ashore and pay the customary tribute, which they
exacted from all. To refuse was to incur their displeasure, and robbery
would be the mildest penalty inflicted. Incensed at this exaction, Morand,
a leading trader, raised a volunteer force of French and Indians, and
after inflicting severe punishment on the Foxes in two engagements drove
them down Wisconsin river. They settled on the north bank about 20 miles
from the mouth.
About 1780, in alliance with the Sioux, they attacked
the Chippewa at St Croix falls, where the Foxes were almost annihilated.
The remnant incorporated with the Sauk, and although long officially
regarded as one, the two tribes have preserved their identity.
According to Dr William Jones (inf'n, 1906) the culture
of the Foxes is that of the tribes of the eastern woodlands with some
intrusive streaks front the plains. They were acquainted with wild rice,
and raised corn, beans, squashes, and tobacco. They lived in villages in
summer, the bark house being the type of the warm-weather dwelling; in
winter they scattered and dwelt in oval flagreed lodges.
The belief in a cosmic substance called mŭnǐtowǐwi,
or unit mŭnǐtowǐwǐni,
is an essential element in their philosophy. Objects, animate or
inanimate, imbued with this substance become the recipients of marked
adoration. The Foxes practice many ceremonies, the principal one being the
feast festival of the gentes. There is probably no other Algonquian
community within the limits of the United States, unless it be that of the
Mexican band of Kickapoo in Oklahoma, where a more primitive state of
society exists.
Besides being warlike, the Foxes were described by
neighboring tribes as stingy, avaricious, thieving, passionate, and
quarrelsome; their bravery, however, was proverbial. Like most of the
tribes of the region of the great lakes they were polygamists. They were
familiar with both dug-out and birch-bark canoes. Spears and clubs were
among their weapons of war. Schoolcraft states that a band of warriors
seen by him wore headdresses consisting of red-dyed horsehair tied in such
manner to the scalplock as to present the shape of the decoration of a
Roman helmet. The rest of the head was completely shaved and painted. They
wore breech-cloths, moccasins, and leggings, and the upper part of their
bodies was painted; often the print of a hand in white clay was marked on
the hack or shoulder. They bore flags of feathers. Their "coat of arms" is
described by Lahontan in heraldic terms: "A meadow sinople, crossed by a
winding pale, with two foxes' gules at the two extremities of the river,
in chief and other words, as his figure oblique mark representing a
stream, with a fox at each end on opposite sides. He esplains this
"coat of arms" as the mark or symbol which, after a victory or successful
raid, they painted on trees. (See Owen, Folk-lore of the
Musquakie Inds., 1904)
Guignes estimated them in 1728 at 200 warriors,
but most of the estimates before the last half century give them from
1,500 to 2,000 souls. Lewis and Clark estimated them at 300
warriors, or 1,200 souls, in 1805. Since about 1850 the two tribes
have been enumerated together. The 345 "Sauk and Fox of Mississippi"
still (1905) in Iowa are said to be all Foxes. There are also 83
"Sauk and Fox of Missouri" under the Kickapoo school in Kansas. See
Sauk.
