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LITR 4328 American
Renaissance Research Posts 2015 (research post assignment) Research Post 1 |
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Karin Cooper
3/10/15
What Happened to the Rest of the Mohicans?
When the class read The Last of
the Mohicans the idea of Uncas being the last pure Mohican intrigued me.
Part of the reason is because I am actually one-sixteenth Native American, and I
have never been told anything about that part of my heritage. This was enough to
get me thinking about what became of the rest of the Mohicans after the French
and Indian war. I am aware that The Last
of the Mohicans is a work of historical fiction, but it is enough to make me
interested in what really happened. I started my journey on the Mohegan Sun
Casino website to see where the research led me from there.
Native Americans, like many cultures have a strong background in oral
traditions. Many of the stories that are passed down from generation to
generation have never been written down. The Mohegan website which I reached
from clicking a history link from the Mohegan Sun Casino website, said that the
reason that many stories were oral was that it was more unifying for the tribe.
This website gave mention of the time period when the English settlers came to
America, but did not give any great details from the time period. I did learn
that the Mohegans had a whole slew of stories and myths that had been passed
down, that explained origins, much like the Greeks. According to the Mohegan
website there was a church founded in 1831 which greatly helped the Mohegans
avoid being moved west like many of the tribes around them were.
The Mohegan church actually played a large role in the Mohegan tribe.
The Last of the Mohicans was set in
1757 and written in 1826. There must have been some reason that the Mohegan
tribe was on the mind of the people during that time because in 1831 just fives
year after it Cooper's book was written there was a poem written in the Norwich
Courier about the Mohegan church which had been built that very year. The source
where these lines were printed also mentioned that the funds to build this
church were raised mostly by women.
There are not very many details known about what was going on in the tribe from
1757 to 1831. We do know that by somewhere around 1861 the Mohegan church was
the only piece of tribal property left (Campisi).
During the time period of the American Renaissance there was a large
focus for many people on religion. Possibly this is the reason that the Mohegan
church was built. According to
The Dictionary of American History
almost all of the land that was supposed to belong to the Mohegans was seized in
1861, and divided among tribal members the only land that remained tribal was
the plot the church was on. This source also stated that the Mohegans did not
attempt to get any of their land back until the second half of the twentieth
century. Because the church was the only tribal property, it was the center of
the tribe's activities for over a century.
The church was the base for the Mohegan tribe's activities, and women
were really the ones that kept the tribe organized and going throughout the
years (Business Insights). Women were the ones who raised the money for the
church in the first place. Women were the ones who organized and provided all
the documents needed to get the tribe's land back in the lawsuit with the
government that lasted two decades (Business Insights). Women were really the
life-breath of the tribe. Finally to top it off in 2010 a woman became chief of
the Mohegan tribe, which was only the second time in the tribe's history that a
woman held that position. Lynn Malerba was elected for life to be the chief of
the Mohegan tribe. She was a member of the tribe, leaving her position as
chairwoman of the Mohegan tribe council (Business Insights) when she was elected
chief. It is clear that women along with the Mohegan church kept the tribe a
cohesive unit over the years.
With the space that I had in this research post the question I asked way
over-reached its bounds. The Mohegan Indian tribe is still going strong today,
that I can say. Although there is not as much information available as I would
have liked about their history. I think that is probably because the Mohegan
tribe depended so much on oral tradition that many things about their history
were just never written down. This project would probably be more inclusive if
it were done with interviews, because of the strong oral traditions that are
passed down. I do think I answered a question I did not know I was asking which
would be this: What role did the women and the Mohegan church play in the
Mohegan tribe's history? That question I can answer. Women played a huge role in
the tribe's history and it is quite possibly because of them that the tribe is
going so strong today. The church provided a place for the tribe to center
itself even during the time that almost all of their land was not their own.
This is just one piece of the Mohegan tribes history and heritage, but it is a
big one and it does partially answer my big question at the beginning of my
research.
Works Cited
Casino-
mohegansun.com
Church-
http://www.mohegan.nsn.us/heritage/preservation-projects
Campisi, Jack. "Mohegan." Dictionary of American History. Ed. Stanley I. Kutler.
3rd ed. Vol. 5. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2003. 435. Gale Virtual
Reference Library. Web. 13 Mar. 2015.
"EDITORIAL: Hail Mohegan chief." Day [New London, CT] 7 Mar. 2010. Business
Insights: Global. Web. 13 Mar. 2015.
THE MOHEGAN CHURCH. (1831, Jan 15). The Religious Intelligencer ...Containing
the Principal Transactions of the various Bible and Missionary Societies, with
Particular
Accounts of Revivals of Religion (1816-1837), 15, 528. Retrieved from
http://search.proquest.com/docview/137621550?accountid=7108
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