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Post by Robert Braun on Aug 2, 2002 14:32:50 GMT -5
Not sure where the initial thread went, so I'll start it again...
We know that intial determinations that the leader of the war party was "Little Preist," (a Winnebago, not Kickapoo) were incorrect.
Allan W. Eckert, in his sort-of historic narrative Twighlight of Empire p. 443 identified the 50 year old gray haired warrior that led the Kickapoo war party on its rampage June 14-16, 1832 as "Koonay."
Is there any evidence that cooberates this identification? Or did Eckert make it up?
r.
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Cliff Krainik
Member
MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS LIFTED THE TOPKNOTS OF THE LONG KNIVES
Posts: 233
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Post by Cliff Krainik on Aug 2, 2002 16:42:59 GMT -5
Why not ASK Allan. I'm sure he would appreciate your
"sort-of historic narrative" appraisal of his work.
Cliff
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Cliff Krainik
Member
MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS LIFTED THE TOPKNOTS OF THE LONG KNIVES
Posts: 233
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Post by Cliff Krainik on Aug 2, 2002 16:49:48 GMT -5
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Post by Robert Braun on Aug 3, 2002 21:29:06 GMT -5
Good idea, Cliff... I think I will ask him. I posed the qestion in the hopes that the more learned participants on this board might have a solution or comment. As for Mr. Ekert... well, he might make me eat my words. But for me right now, it's tough to know where his periodic contrived dialog for his historical figures ends, and the documented historical record begins. In my opinion, making things up (like dialog) and not informing your readership that you've done so for entertainment or dramatic effect makes such work "sort of" history. I'm sure we agree that a few of his assertions, like William Aubrey dying of cardiac arrest, stretch the limits of credulity.  |
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Post by Robert Braun on Aug 5, 2002 12:41:32 GMT -5
Message sent to Mr. Eckert this afternoon, with a copy to this discussion board's administrator. We will patiently await a reply! Bob. |
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Post by Robert Braun on Aug 5, 2002 13:59:55 GMT -5
Well! That was fast!  Mr. Eckert's cordial reply is as follows: Dear Mr. Braun,
Thank you for your e-mail, although I doubt that I will be able to help very much in your request to locate the source that identifies Koonay as the leader of a war party in 1832. That research was done some fifteen years ago and involved only one small matter among hundreds of sources involving thousands of bits of historical minutia -- material which, after all these years, I no longer have on file. TWILIGHT OF EMPIRE was the final volume in my six-volume series entitled The Winning of America and shortly after completing that work I donated my entire historical library to the Ohio Historical Society and all my papers, notes, maps, journals, correspondence, file cards and related data to the Filson Club of Louisville, Kentucky. I have no sources remaining to check through in an effort to help answer your question.
From memory I can make an educated guess that the original source regarding Koonay's identity was most probably the Draper Papers -- 480 volumes of largely handwritten material housed in the archives of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin at Madison -- but in which specific volume of that collection it might have appeared, I cannot be certain. I long ago disposed of all my reels of the microfilmed Draper Papers and no longer have access to that source, but there is a reasonable likelihood that the information was gleaned from that portion of the Draper Papers that is know as The Frontier Wars Papers.
While the Draper Papers have always been a remarkable and valuable set of documents involving the frontier period they are, unfortunately, wholly without index and therefore the only way to locate specific information is to go through the volumes page by page, as I did when researching TWILIGHT OF EMPIRE and other volumes in The Winning of America series. I'm afraid that doesn't help you very much, but it's the best I can do under the circumstances.
I wish you good luck in your further research.
Sincerely yours,
Allan W. Eckert |
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