Large Skull Found in a Chippewa Indian's Burial Ground

Large Skull Found in a Chippewa Indian's Burial Ground

Several miles to the south of these works I was shown the spot where the last and decisive battle was fought between the Chippewas and Iroquois. This battlefield, which was on a point of land near Kee-wai-wona bay, was remarkable because it affords an instance of the great distances that were sometimes traversed by Indians when conducting their wars of extermination. The Iroquois whose territories and villages were upon the southern shores of Lakes Ontario and Erie, crossed into the Chippewa lands by the way of the channels leading to Sault Ste. Marie. Therefore, supposing that they followed the most direct line to the place where the battle was fought, they must have passed over a distance of not less than six hundred miles.

One of the burial mounds which had been opened, contained a large skull, a pipe made of dark slate and a stone hatchet. Upon the top of the mound was a pine tree that measured thirty inches in circumference. The scattered descendants of the Chippewa tribes dwell in the districts to the west of Lake Superior, but they occasionally wander into their original country. I met some of them near the shores of that great inland sea.