The Potawatomi Trail of Death

Emily and I were traveling through Marshal County, Indiana, when we stumbled across a sign:

We knew about the Trail of Death, having traveled across Indiana for two years researching our book, Hoosier Hysterical. Since Emily and I have Native American blood, we followed our curiosity and other signs ...

To the statue of Chief Menominee.

Here Beowulf (who was not allowed to pee on the property) investigates a plaque at the memorial site. While other Native Americans signed treaties and moved themselves west of the Mississippi River, Menominee gathered into his village a group of people who simply refused to go. In 1838 he and five other leaders were arrested, and the final 859 Potawatomi were forced to move to Kansas, a two month trip. It was the largest single forced removal of Natives from Indiana. In a march of about 660 miles, forty-two of them died, many of a typhoid epidemic; twenty-eight were children.

A Catholic priest who made the trip with them died on the way back, of exhaustion. Menominee himself passed away less than three years later, and is buried in Kansas.

The first monument to a Native American under state or federal legislation is this one, erected in 1909 by the State of Indiana. It's near the headwaters of the Yellow River, and not far from the location of his village.

So.

Emily and I both have Cherokee ancestors: Hers were forced onto the Trail of Tears, ending up in her case in Missouri; mine apparently hid out in the Appalachians, escaping government removal. There are markers and monuments commemorating events along the routes, and I'd encourage people to follow them sometime.

If there's one thing our road trips have taught us, it's that you come across the most unexpected things along the way.

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