Sunday, May 17, 2009
The chief's daughter
Polistra is reading p. 291 of the WPA Guide to Oklahoma:
Right from Pawhuska on an unimproved dirt road is the CHIEF SAUCY CHIEF HOMESTEAD.
Nellie, the daughter of the chief, was the first Osage to be given Christian burial. She contracted pneumonia in 1885 at the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania and was sent home, where she died. Major Laban J. Miles, the Osage Agent at that time, persuaded her parents to conduct the Christian rites rather than their customary procedure of burying the dead in a sitting posture on the summit of a hill. However, the Indians kept their own mourning customs, the chief wearing only a white sheet, moccasins and breechclout for a three-and-a-half-month period, despite the snow-covered ground. In preparation for the three-day dance which was to end the mourning observance, the funeral party rode out solemnly to capture the scalp of a town merchant who had ingratiatingly decided to submit himself to a mock scalping; he allowed the Indians to cut off his forelock minus the traditional accompaniment of skin. Major Miles was accorded the honor of leading the group, much to the amazement of Pawhuska citizens who saw him riding into town holding the scalp-pole with the hair flying from its top. After Saucy Chief had been bathed and dressed in warm blankets, the dance began.
Nellie's death had been properly observed, and her spirit sent on its journey with the blessing of both the white and red man's ritual. ¶ 7:37 PM
Polistra is reading p. 291 of the WPA Guide to Oklahoma:
Right from Pawhuska on an unimproved dirt road is the CHIEF SAUCY CHIEF HOMESTEAD.
Nellie, the daughter of the chief, was the first Osage to be given Christian burial. She contracted pneumonia in 1885 at the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania and was sent home, where she died. Major Laban J. Miles, the Osage Agent at that time, persuaded her parents to conduct the Christian rites rather than their customary procedure of burying the dead in a sitting posture on the summit of a hill. However, the Indians kept their own mourning customs, the chief wearing only a white sheet, moccasins and breechclout for a three-and-a-half-month period, despite the snow-covered ground. In preparation for the three-day dance which was to end the mourning observance, the funeral party rode out solemnly to capture the scalp of a town merchant who had ingratiatingly decided to submit himself to a mock scalping; he allowed the Indians to cut off his forelock minus the traditional accompaniment of skin. Major Miles was accorded the honor of leading the group, much to the amazement of Pawhuska citizens who saw him riding into town holding the scalp-pole with the hair flying from its top. After Saucy Chief had been bathed and dressed in warm blankets, the dance began.
Nellie's death had been properly observed, and her spirit sent on its journey with the blessing of both the white and red man's ritual. ¶ 7:37 PM
