North American Indians in the 1800s

"Text and 121 hand colored lithographs from: The history of the Indian tribes of North America, with biographical sketches and anecdotes of the principal chiefs. Embellished with one hundred and twenty portraits, from the Indian gallery in the Department of war, at Washington. By Thomas L. McKenney and James Hall. Philadelphia, E. C. Biddle, 1836-1844."

Keukuk was chief of the Sauks and Musquakees (Sacs & Foxes) - 2 tribes that lived together at Rock River, near the junction of the Mississippi, in Illinois. They followed a custom whereby each new male child was painted with a white or black mark and in alternating, divided the male population in half. It established a sense of rivalry in playing ball games or in examining which division brought home more scalps.

This portrait of Ne-Sou-A-Quoit or Bear in the Fork of a Tree, a Fox Indian, was made in 1837 in the city of Washington. He had 7 wives, was known for his generosity and the author found it notable that Ne-Sou-A-Quoit abstained from both alcohol and pipe smoking.

From the University of Washington Libraries Digital Collection comes the McKenney and Hall Indian Tribes of North America exhibition.

There are 9 thumb plate pages: page i, page ii, page iii, page iv, page v, page vi, page vii, page viii, page ix. Click on any individual image on each page for a larger version - text scan links relating to each image are then in the left margin.

There is also a map of the Localities of all the Indian Tribes of North Ameria in 1833.