Page 303 - La Société canadienne d'histoire de l'Église catholique - Rapport 1961

-REP. CUTTING MARSH ON TIIE STOCKBRIDGES.
-
WAUPACA, Waupaca County, March 25th, 1857.

'To the Hon. LYMAN C. DRAPER,
Cor. h'ec. HiritoricaZ Society, Wis.:
DEAR SIR:-I have received a communication from a young
man belonging to the Stockbridge Indians, containing some
account of two of their most distinguished men. One now
survives, JOIIN METOXEN, but the other, J. W. QUINNEY, is
dead. I think he died in 1855. I send you also the AWany
.Free-Holder, of July 12,1854, which contains a speech of JOHN
W. QUINNEY, and which, I presume, was the last public
speech he ever made. Unlike most speeches of the kind made
by white men and put into the Indians' mouths, I believe that
you may rely upon this as being QUINNEY'S alone. I know
that it is his style, he was capable of making such a speech,
and no one in the nation was equally well acquainted with their
traditions as he was.
LEVI KONKAPOT, the writer of the communication I send, is
a Stockbridge Indian, and has received a very good English
education, and possesses, naturally, a pretty strong mind.
From years acquaintance with both METOXEN and QUINNEY, I
believe that KOXKAPOT does not hold those men he has so
graphisally described, in too high estimation. QUINNEY was
unquestionably a man of superior talents, and had a very good
oommon education; and provided he could have had the oppor-
tunity, he would have made a statesman of the highest order.
His desoription of METOXEN is also true, and I regret that I
have not the means at hand of giving a more full account sf his
early history. XONKAIJOT ha8 furnished me with only a part
of the information I desired, and if he furnishes more, I shall