ALLAN W. ECKERT ON TECUMSEH

Allan W. Eckert, A Sorrow in Our Heart: The Life of Tecumseh (New York: Bantam Books; 1992). American spellings retained.

‘When a white man kills an Indian in a fair fight it is called honorable, but when an Indian kills a white man in a fair fight it is called murder.

When a white army battles Indians and wins it is called a great victory, but if they lose it is called a massacre and bigger armies are raised.

If the Indian flees before the advance of such armies, when he tries to return he finds that white men are living where he lived.

If he tries to fight off such armies, he is killed and the land is taken anyway.

When an Indian is killed it is a great loss which leaves a gap in our people and a sorrow in our heart; when a white is killed, three or four others step up to take his place and there is no end to it.

The white man seeks to conquer nature, to bend it to his will and to use it wastefully until it is all gone and then he simply moves on, leaving the waste behind him and looking for new places to take. The whole white race is a monster who is always hungry and what he eats is land.’ – Chiksika, elder brother of Tecumseh, to Tecumseh, March 19, 1779.

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