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189 ADDENDA181 Having received from some of our friends an account of their escape, after leaving Friendly Camp, we have concluded to append that, and also the articles we have written since our journal was concluded:182 Ta-pa-ta-tan-ka, or Great Fire, one of the Indians who was condemned and is now in prison at Davenport, Iowa, stated to some of his acquaintances that he went with the war party in order to aid the white people, who might be making their escape from the Indian raid.183 We are unable to judge whether this was his first intentions or not, any farther than his previous character in the community and orderly conduct in the church, would affirm. But of one thing we are confident: he would not have related his adventures with the party so fully in regard to saving Dr. Williamson, with his wife and sister, had it not been true. As we love to notice the dealings of Providence in sparing the lives of the Missionaries, we will narrate Great Fire’s story. The party saw the track of the Dr.’s cart on the grass, where it had apparently turned off on to the prairie. Among the party was a young Indian, after Little Crow’s own heart, who tried every persuasion to get the entire company to follow after the Dr., and murder them all. Great Fire told him they were all old people, and had no property of any value with them, and asked him what he wished to kill such good persons for, who had always treated the Indians well and never deceived them. The rascal came near turning up on Great Fire in his fury. At first the rest of the party were inclined to pursue the Missionaries, but Great Fire’s upright and manly interference prevailed, and thus was spared these three worthy Missionaries; and can a single Christian fail to see God’s hand in all this? The Rev. Dr. has, during the last winter, labored faithfully in the prison at Mankato, going through storms that even convinced the idolatrous Indians that there must be a reality in the white man’s religion, A Thrilling nArrATive of indiAn CApTiviTy 190 or such an aged man would not sacrifice the comforts of home to spend and be spent in teaching them to read and write, and talking to them about Jesus. It may be well to say a word to those who have not learned to read in early years; that it is possible for them to learn at any age, if they bend their minds and will to do it; for these poor degraded Indians have surprised many an educated and intelligent man, by their application and final success in learning to read and write intelligibly—some even at advanced ages. Here Great Fire and Chas-ca-da, or Robert Hopkins, have been used as instruments of great good—if we admit that Indians have souls—by their faithfulness in teaching their fellow prisoners. We may as well declare that the Anglo-Saxon race have no souls; for, trace this nation back a few centuries, and you find them just emerging from barbarism; and still farther back and not a glimmer of civilization existed. We might come down to our own times and look at the poorer class among the Southern rebeldom, or the recent barbarous acts of some in our own State. We have reference to the digging up of the graves of helpless infants and aged Indians, and scattering their bones to the wind.184 We are glad for the credit of the State that the proper authorities interfered and stopped such barbarous deeds. Hunt the Indians who are now and have troubled the frontier; shoot them if necessary; condemn them to prison or the gallows if justice demands it, but let the graves of the long-since dead lie in peace until God himself shall bring them to judgment. How true it is that God’s ways are not our ways, and His thoughts our thoughts. His ways of disseminating the Gospel are often not visible to mortals until long after. It is a fact well known in many places, though not it all, that New Ulm suffered deeply from the terrible massacre, and as we have before mentioned, may it not have been a visitation of Divine wrath, for burning the image of the Incarnate Son just the Sabbath before? The army stationed...

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