Unaffected by the Gospel: Osage Resistance to the Christian Invasion, 1673-1906: A Cultural Victory

8. Resisting the Catholics

i Resisting the Catholics Whether the labors and expenses undertaken by the Mission for the civilization of the Osages, have been of real utility to the Indian, I do not now intend to discuss. We know this much from the perusal of history; that to bring aborigines from their barbarism to a state of civilization , and then to make of them good Christians, has always been the work of centuries, not of a few years. —Father Paul Mary Ponziglione, “Origin of the Osage Mission” 1 The object of the establishment of this Mission of St. Francis of Jerome being the instruction of the Osage Indians in all that concerns religion and civilization. So from the very first day we came here we tried all the means in our power to succeed in this work, and though we must acknowledge that we did not do much, yet thank God we have not been idle. —Father Paul Mary Ponziglione, Western Missions Journals No. 2 2 So these two Indian Missions [St.Mary’s and St.Francis] have proved after all that they were not useless. And though the good done in the conversion of Indians,especially the Osages has not been much, yet this is also certain that if his State of Kansas to day [sic] numbers over 30,000 Catholics it is in great part due to the work of these two Missions. —Father Paul Mary Ponziglione, Western Missions Journals No. 2 3 149 The Jesuits established themselves in the small métis trading community along Flat Rock Creek, just two miles from where it joined the Neosho. The mission was set amid métis traders’ homes, and alongside the Osage agency and the trading post of the American Fur Company. The métis community was made up of French-Osage families who shared a language and a common culture with the European Jesuits, so that the French-speaking Jesuits were able to go into the homes of the métis trading families and speak directly to the people. All of the early Flemish Jesuits spoke French and thus could communicate without the problems encountered by the Protestants, who were only able to speak English. The métis traders, while not fervent Roman Catholics, did seek some spiritual blessings from the Jesuits. They sought religious sanction for their unions with Osage women and baptism for their mixedblood children. Father Ponziglione wrote that the members of the community “belong to that class of French who though can treat the Priest very nicely,and profess to be nothing else but Catholics,yet they do not care of practicing their religion.” 4 In addition to the métis trading families congregated about the trading posts, there were other mixed-blood Osage families living nearby. Some were remnants of the Hopefield and Boudinot farming communities who had managed to remain distinct from the band villages ,and they were joined by the mixed-bloods from the old Harmony Mission site who had been driven from Missouri by white settlers in the late 1830s. Together they settled in small family groups along the Neosho River. Father Ponziglione, who arrived at the mission in 1851, described the region: “When the mission began none but the Osage Indians lived in this Country they numbered a little over 7000 all pagan with the exception of Some 500 Halfbreeds most all baptized in the Cath. Church but knowing nothing of our holy Religion.” 5 TheBigandLittleOsagetownswerenotfarfromthemission.About twenty-five miles north of the mission on the west bank of the Neosho were four villages of the Little Osage. Just south of the Little Osage towns were the first of five Big Osage villages extending along the Neosho north and south of the mission.Pawhuska’s town was just a few miles due west of Flat Rock Creek.There was another Osage town thirty miles south of the mission just outside the Osage reservation, located on Cherokee lands. The former southern Osage bands of Claremore 150 ❙ Chapter Eight and Black Dog,who had reluctantly left the lowerVerdigris in 1839,were living in seven separate towns along the Verdigris just inside the Osage reservation, about forty miles southeast of the mission. When the Jesuits arrived, their buildings, although under construction for over a year, were still not complete, so they were forced to stay with the traders while they completed the school.While Father Schoenmakers and the three brothers worked on the...