Tecumseh

The American Indian Tecumseh (ca. 1768-1813), Shawnee chief, originated and led an Indian confederation against the encroaching white settlers in the old Northwest Territory. He was an ally of the British during the War of 1812.

According to tribal tradition, Tecumseh or Tecumtha, was born about March 1768 near what is now Springfield, Ohio. His father, Pucksinwa, was killed at the Battle of Point Pleasant in 1774, yet Tecumseh grew to manhood a distinguished warrior even without a father to guide him. He also grew to manhood angry at the encroaching whites who were forcing his tribe farther and farther west. A chief by 1808, he led the Shawnee to a site on the Wabash River near the mouth of the Tippecanoe, where they settled with permission from the Potawatomi and Kickapoo Indians.

Angry at the land hunger of the whites, Tecumseh was gradually coming to believe that no sale of land to the whites was valid unless all Indian tribes assembled and assented to such a sale. He said that the land did not belong to any one tribe, that it belonged to them all in common, and that the U.S. government had recognized this principle in 1795 at the Treaty of Greenville, when all tribes had assembled to make the agreement, after which the government had guaranteed title to all unceded land to the tribes in common. Governor William Henry Harrison of Indiana and other officials objected to this argument, realizing that such an arrangement was impractical from the government's point of view.

Tecumseh also knew that in unity there was strength, and he began to try to confederate all tribes from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico to oppose the whites. He was aided by his brother (perhaps a twin), Tenskwatawa, who was known as the Prophet. The Prophet preached with evangelical and revivalistic fervor that the Indians must return to the pure ways of their ancestors.

Tecumseh had some success in his drive to confederate the Indians. When the tribes visited his village, known as Prophet's Town, Tecumseh exhorted them not to drink alcoholic beverages, to develop their agricultural skills, and to accept nothing from whites on credit. He hoped to be left alone by the whites just long enough to consolidate his program and unify his people.

In this movement Tecumseh was aided by the British in Canada, who wanted allies against the Americans. He obtained arms, ammunition, and clothing from them. As he traveled and exhorted, he said, "Our fathers, from their tombs, reproach us as slaves and cowards." American observers noted that he was tall, straight, and lean—and a great orator. With British advice, he foretold the appearance of a comet in the heavens. When it appeared, as he had forecast, in 1812, the Creek Indians were so impressed that they arose against the whites—with disastrous results for their tribe.

In August 1810 Tecumseh met Governor Harrison at Vincennes for a conference, but he demanded the return of Indian lands so violently that the conference came to naught. The next year, at another conference, Tecumseh, overawed by militia, declared his peaceful intentions.

In 1811 Tecumseh journeyed southward to solicit more members for his confederation, warning his brother not to be drawn into battle unprepared. That summer was dry, crops were ruined, game became scarce, and the Prophet was led into a battle at Tippecanoe on Nov. 7, 1811. He was defeated, and this disaster caused many braves to desert Tecumseh. His confederation began to fall apart.

When the War of 1812 began, Tecumseh led his followers into the British camp, where he received the rank of brigadier general. He aided Sir Isaac Brock in the capture of Detroit; however, he also saved the lives of American soldiers about to be massacred there. In fact, his white enemies on the frontier always commented on his mercy and humanity, nothing that he would not torture prisoners and that his word was good.

Tecumseh and his followers fought with the British at Brownstown, Ft. Meigs, and Ft. Stephenson. His aid is often cited as the reason that the Americans failed to take Canada during this war. Yet when the British chose to retreat, following Adm. Oliver Hazard Perry's victories on Lake Erie, Tecumseh chose to cover the retreat. At the Battle of the Thames on Oct. 5, 1813, he was killed, leaving a lasting dispute as to who actually killed him.

Further Reading

Older books about Tecumseh and his movement that are of value include Benjamin Drake, Life of Tecumseh (1841; repr. 1969); Edward Eggleston, Tecumseh and the Shawnee Prophet (1878); and John M. Oskison, Tecumseh and His Times (1938). Recent works are Glenn Tucker, Tecumseh: Vision of Glory (1956); David C. Cooke, Tecumseh: Destiny's Warrior (1959); and a collection of documents by Carl F. Klinck, Tecumseh: Fact and Fiction in Early Records (1961). □

Tecumseh (1768–1813), Native American leader.Born to a Creek mother and Shawnee father at Old Piqua, a Shawnee village on the Mad River in Ohio, Tecumseh was raised by an older sister and grew to manhood during the border warfare of the Revolutionary Era. He served as a scout for the war party that defeated Arthur St. Clair's army in 1791, and in 1794 he fought at both Fort Recovery and Fallen Timbers. He refused, however, to sign the Treaty of Greenville (1795), which ceded most Indian lands in Ohio to the United States.

In 1805–1806, Tecumseh's younger brother, Tenskwatawa, or the Shawnee Prophet, experienced a series of visions and predicted a solar eclipse. The Prophet then emerged as a holy man who led a multi‐tribal religious revitalization movement that spread to tribes throughout the Great Lakes region. In 1808, Tecumseh and the Prophet established Prophetstown, a village near the juncture of the Wabash and Tippecanoe Rivers in Indiana, and Tecumseh traveled to the midwestern tribes, transforming his brother's religious movement into a political confederacy. During 1811, Tecumseh visited the Creeks, Choctaws, and Chickasaws, but in November, while Tecumseh was in the South, William Henry Harrison and an American army attacked and destroyed Prophetstown, after defeating the Prophet at the Battle of Tippecanoe.

Early in 1812, Tecumseh returned to Indiana and began to rebuild his confederacy. He journeyed to Canada, where he sought British assistance. When the War of 1812 erupted, Tecumseh and his allies aided the British in the capture of Detroit and in the unsuccessful campaigns against Fort Meigs and Fort Stephenson, in northern Ohio. In 1813, when American forces invaded Canada, Tecumseh urged the British to stand and fight, but he was killed on 5 October at the Battle of the Thames, when the British army fled from the Americans.

Tecumseh was highly respected during his lifetime; both the British and the Americans admired his bravery and leadership ability. After his death he emerged as an American folk hero, his exploits embellished by myth and legend. Modern Native Americans remember him as a great leader dedicated to his people and to the defense of their homeland.
See also Early Republic, Era of the; Expansionism; Indian History and Culture: From 1800 to 1900; Indian Wars.

Bibliography

R. David Edmunds , Tecumseh and the Quest for Indian Leadership, 1984.
Gregory Evans Dowd , A Spirited Resistance: The North American Indian Struggle for Unity, 1745–1815, 1992.

R. David Edmunds

Tecumseh (c. 1768–1813), Shawnee chief and leader of an Indian confederation.Born when the Shawnee Indians were fighting to defend their Kentucky and Ohio lands, Tecumseh lost his father at the Battle of Point Pleasant (1774), a brother in the American Revolutionary War, and another in the wars that followed. He fought against Josiah Harmar (1790), Arthur St. Clair (1791), and Anthony Wayne (1794). He refused to sign the Treaty of Greenville (1795), which ceded most of Ohio to the United States, and in the next decade emerged as the leading opponent of American expansion.

In 1805, following a vision, Tecumseh's brother, Tenskwatawa, began to preach a return to traditional ways and rejection of white influences. Tecumseh broadened and directed the religious movement into a multitribal confederation opposed to further land cessions. A gifted orator, he carried his message of Indian unity from Canada to Florida.

In 1811, while Tecumseh was spreading his message in the South, William Henry Harrison, governor of Indiana Territory, attacked and burned Tenskwatawa's village at Tippecanoe, costing the Indian confederation much unity and momentum.

In the War of 1812, Tecumseh allied with the British and assisted Gen. Isaac Brock in capturing Detroit. After Brock's death, however, the British‐Indian alliance began to falter. Tecumseh despised the caution of the new commander, Col. Henry Proctor, but accompanied the British army on its retreat to Canada after the Americans won control of Lake Erie. He was killed during the Battle of the Thames in October 1813.

Tecumseh was not the first Indian to preach united resistance on the part of the tribes, but he was the most effective, forging a confederation of unprecedented range. Intratribal divisions—as many opposed as supported him among the Shawnees and other Indian nations—undermined his efforts to resist U.S. power. His death killed hopes for a united Indian state and ended major Indian resistance north of the Ohio River.
[See also Native American Wars.]

Bibliography

R. David Edmunds , Tecumseh and the Quest for Indian Leadership, 1984.
John Sugden , Tecumseh, A Life, 1998.

Colin G. Calloway

Tecumseh , 1768?–1813, chief of the Shawnee , b. probably in Clark co., Ohio. Among his people he became distinguished for his prowess in battle, but he opposed the practice of torturing prisoners. When the United States refused to recognize his principle that all Native American land was the common possession of all the Native Americans and that land could not rightly be ceded by, or purchased from, an individual tribe, Tecumseh set out to bind together the Native Americans of the Old Northwest, the South, and the eastern Mississippi valley. His plan failed with the defeat of his brother, the Shawnee Prophet , at Tippecanoe (1811). Though Tippecanoe was, properly speaking, a drawn battle, it marked the collapse of the Native American military movement. In the War of 1812, Tecumseh allied himself with the British and was made a brigadier general. He led a large force of Native Americans in the siege of Fort Meigs, covered Gen. Henry Procter's retreat after the American victory on Lake Erie, and lost his life in the battle of the Thames (see Thames, battle of the ), in which Gen. William Henry Harrison overwhelmed Procter and his Native American allies. Tecumseh had great ability as an organizer and a leader and is considered one of the outstanding Native Americans in American history.

Bibliography: See biographies by B. Drake (1841, repr. 1969), J. M. Oskison (1938), G. Tucker (1956, repr. 1973), A. W. Eckert (1992), and J. Sugden (1998); C. F. Klinck, Tecumseh: Fact and Fiction in Early Records (1961); A. W. Eckert, The Frontiersmen (1967).

Tecumseh (1768–1813) Shawnee chief and military leader. Probably born at Piqua on the Mad River in Ohio in March 1768, Tecumseh grew up during the long conflict between the Indian tribes and white settlers advancing into the Old Northwest after 1774. He took part in many raids against the settlers in Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee as well as in the battle against U.S. troops led by Gen. ”Mad Anthony” Wayne at Fallen Timbers (August 20, 1794). Together with his brother, the medicine man Tenskwatawa (”The Prophet”), Tecumseh led the Shawnee and other northwest tribes in resisting white expansion into their territory after Fallen Timbers. He quarreled with Indiana governor William Henry Harrison over the sale of Indian land to white settlers (1809–1811) and traveled south in 1811 to persuade the southeastern tribes to join his confederacy. While he was away Harrison attacked and gained a victory over the Indians at Tippecanoe (November 7, 1811). Tecumseh returned to the Northwest in 1812 and allied himself with the British in the War of 1812, raiding American forces and settlements along the Detroit River. He was killed in battle against U.S. troops led by Harrison at the Battle of the Thames in Canada (October 5, 1813).

Tecumseh (1768?–1813), Shawnee Indian chief, who established a confederacy of tribes, and was led into a war (1811) with the U.S. when the government refused to recognize his principle that all Indian lands were a common possession that could not be ceded by or purchased from individual tribes. During his absence, Tensk‐watawa (1768?–1834?), the “ Shawnee Proph‐et,” who is considered to have been Tecumseh's twin brother, was maneuvered by W.H. Harrison into the disastrous battle of Tippecanoe⧫ (1811), and the war came to an end. During the War of 1812, Tecumseh was made a brigadier general by the British, and was killed in battle. In 1836 Dr. William Emmons published “a national drama” called Tecumseh, a subject he had previously employed in his epic The Fredoniad; or Independence Preserved (4 vols., 1827), a poetic history of the War of 1812. The Indian chief also figures in James Strange French's Elkswatawa; or, The Prophet of the West (1836), Edward S. Ellis's The Forest Spy (1861), and other melodramatic novels, as well as being the subject of a romantic biography (1841) by Benjamin Drake.

Tecumseh (c.1768–1813) Native American Shawnee chief in the Ohio Valley. Tecumseh emerged as the most formidable opponent of the White westward expansion, believing that Native American land was a common inheritance, which could not be ceded piecemeal by individual tribes. Together with his half-brother, the Prophet Tenskwatawa, he formed a confederacy of tribes to negotiate a peaceful settlement with the settlers. This confederacy was defeated at the Battle of TIPPECANOE in 1811 and Tecumseh then sided with the British in the WAR OF 1812, but was killed at the Battle of the THAMES in 1813. This marked the end of Native American resistance in the Ohio Valley. Tenskwatawa retired to Canada with a British pension, but returned in 1826 and accompanied the Shawnee when they were moved, first to Missouri, and then to Kansas, where he died (c.1837).

Tecumseh (1768–1813) Native American leader. A Shawnee chief, he worked with his brother, known as ‘the Prophet’, to unite the Native Americans of the West and resist white expansion. After the Prophet's defeat, Tecumseh joined the British in the War of 1812. He led 2000 warriors in several battles and died fighting in Upper Canada.

Tecumseh, Canada, USA Named after Tecumseh (1768–1813), a Shawnee chief who, although he fought against white rule, joined the British in the war of 1812 and helped in the capture of Detroit.