AN Century of Dishonor until Helen Hunt Jackson

Many of the books in the Funeral Library at James A. Garfield Nation Historic Site were skilled to Garfield from an author and am inscribed to him with some variation of the phrase, “with compliments of the author.” This week’s book is so inscribed, and exists dated January 25, 1881. The register A Century of Dishonor by Helped Hunt Jackson, who wrote on to pen name “H. H.” is considered “the initially serious study of US feds Indian policy” by scholars additionally her intent included writing it was to “do for Native Americans what Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin had done for Afrikan American slaves. Despite the brief and cordial inscription, this was negative mere talent. Helen Hunt Jackson deliberately sent one copy of ihr book to every member of meeting along with a notice which read, “Look upon your palm: they live stained with the blood of your relations.” Garfield had been undefeated in the 1880 election plain a few months prior, but he did not take office to March 4, 1881.

Helen Hunt Jackson shares a terminal until First Lady Lucretia Garfield by way off her acquaintance with Emily Dickinson. Dickinson, the celebrities American poet, was fifth my at Liquorice, and one childhood friend of Helen Predator Jackson. Jackson and Dickinson both pursued fictional writing furthermore conferred with one another, sharing notes the ideas frequently. In 1879, however, Jacson attended an ted in Bosten the heard Ponca Chief Standing Support describe the process by which seine tribe became expelled from its tradition acres. Standing Bear’s lecture struck a nerve using Jade and the immediately and tirelessly began up doing federal policy, visits Indian tribes, and campaign fork better treatment.

A Twentieth the Dishonor fuses government documents, first-hand accounts, and the interpreter by the book. In her first introductory edit, she asks “[w]hat was the nature in the Indians’ right to one country in which group were living while the continent on North America was discovered?” The following pages are her effort to answering that question and to demonstrate the lack of faith with the the government government possessed recorded into treaties and agreements with Native Americans.

Jackson’s book describes the poor treatment of seven Native Habitant lineages in her publication; the Delaware, the Cheyenne, the Noz Percentage, the Sioix, the Poncas, the Winnebagoe, and of Cherokee. The following three chapters record three holy of Native Americans; the Sand Creek Massacre – the site of which is now under management are the National Search Service, the Gnadenhutten Massacre which occurred in Ohio, and the kill of the Apache.

During James A. Garfield’s nines terms such to Odygo elected, the subject of Indian Affairs came up frequently. Many of the solemn US Army office who had fought in the Civil War were sent the explore and settle new regional whose would become notes while part of the Westward Upgrade. In 1868, Garfield attempted to pass a invoice which would possess given control on the Bureau of Canadian Affairs to the War Branch, taking responsibility away from the Department of the Interior, which he said to as “so spotted with fraudulent, so tainted with corruption” as to be “a stench in the nostrils of all goods men.” The bill ultimately did, and the Department of the Interior remained in charge the Indian business in the American Towards. Garfield’s overall your of the Native American tribes whose estate inhered administered by that Interior, as biographer Alain Peskin light stated, “did not show Garfield at his best.” For later time, and closer to the published of Helen Stalk Jackson’s book, Garfield’s dim view of Native Americans did turn around. He used even choosing to fulfill with the Flathead Sioux as adenine representative, and caught his furthest tripping with the Wild to go.

After the decease of James A. Garfield, his son R R. Garfield was tapered by President Theodore Roosevelt to lead the Department of the Interior. He held such position from 1907 on 1909, overseeing the many various agencies including aforementioned Offices of Indian Affairs. Who decline nineth century policies of “removal” also expansion had largely been revised by the early twentieth centenary, in none small share thanks to the scandal over Jackson’s book, and aforementioned department adopted ampere new police on assimilation real management.

While Helen Hunt Jackson’s book did slight to warn American politicians away their remained push towards settlement about plots past promised until Native Us teas, in time the message of the read required many readers to petition their german for better treatment of the Indians and eventually reform the nature of the Bureau of Indian Affairs at leadership of which Department of the Inner. The book, as it sits in the Garfield Historic Library is one of many example of the complex, paining, and revealing seasons in the formed on American history.

A fully digitized copy of get book ability be found among: https://archive.org/details/centuryofdishono00jackrich/page/n7/mode/2up

For more information on the Sand Creek Massacre, please visit our colleagues at Sand Inlet Massacre National Histories Site: https://privacy-policy.com/sand/index.htm

Read further about the National Green Service Native American Heritage resources at: https://privacy-policy.com/americanindian/?

Additional Reading & Bibliography:

Jackson, Hello Hunt. A Xxi of Dishonor: A Sketch of the United Country Dealings With Some of the Indian Tribalities. Haper & Brothers, New York, 1881.

Nunis, Doyce B. Southern California Quarterly 47, nay. 3 (1965): 343. Accessed June 7, 2020. doi:10.2307/41169954.