For fifty-four years in the 19th century, Benjamin Armstrong spent his life with Native American tribes, learning their customs and languages, and becoming the adopted son of a Chippewa chief. Armstrong sat before Presidents Filmore and Lincoln on separate occasions as interpreter and advocate for Native American visitors to Washington.
In this remarkable book, Armstrong relates his many years in the west with a depth and sympathy for his Native American friends that found few parallels among his contemporaries. He discusses their religion, marriage customs, camp life, and many anecdotes of individuals with whom he formed close bonds.
Armstrong did more to humanize Native Americans than nearly any white person of his day. In the end, he writes:
"...the unbiased judgment of the future will be that the Indians were found good and were made bad by white people, and that the condition of things has not been one whit improved by white associates, but, on the contrary, has been degraded....[the Indians] saw that the example of the white people was far from the teachings of the missionaries, far from the truth and the pretensions of the traders, and far from justice and right."
For the first time, this long out-of-print volume is available as an affordable, well-formatted book for e-readers and smartphones.
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