BANCROFT LIBRARY o THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA C. ^ e^ -* C^JS CATLIN'S INDIAN CARTOONS. Synopsis of the Author's roaming s in gathering the paintings enumerated in his Catalogue. In the years 1830 and 1831 (42 years ago) I accompanied Governor Clark, of St. Louis, then Superintendent of Indian Affairs, to Treaties held with the Winnebagos and Menomo- nies, the Shawanos, and Sacs and Foxes; and in these inter views began the series of my Indian paintings. In 1831 I visited, with Governor Clark, the Konzas, and, returning to St. Louis, painted the portraits of "Black Hawk" and five of his warriors, prisoners of war at Jeffer son Barracks, at the close of the "Black Hawk War." In the spring of 1832 I ascended the Missouri, on the steamer "Yellow Stone," to Fort Union, mouth of Yellow Stone River, and descended the Missouri to St. Louis, in a canoe, \vith two men, a distance of 2,000 miles, steering it the whole way with my own paddle; and in that campaign visited and painted the Mandans, Crows, Blackfeet, K'nisten- eux, Assinneboins, Minatarrees, Riccarrees, Sioux, Puncahs, and low as. In the summer of 1833 I ascended the Platte to Fort Lar- amie, visiting the two principal villages of the Pawnees, and also the Omahas and Ottoes, and at the Fort saw a great number of Arapahos and Cheyennes, and rode to the shores of the Great Salt Lake, when the Mormons were yet build ing their Temple at Nauvoo, on the Mississippi, (38 years ago.) In the spring of 1834 I ascended the Mississippi to the Fall of St. Anthony, saw the Mississippi Sioux, the Ojibbe- ways, and Saukies, and descended the Mississippi to St. Louis 900 miles in a bark canoe, with one man, Corporal Allen, steering with my own paddle. In 1835 I made a second visit to the Fall of St. Anthony, steaming from Buffalo to Green Bay ascending the Fox, and descending the Wisconsin rivers, 600 miles, in a bark canoe, to Prairie du Chien, and thence by canoe, 450 miles, f to the Fall of St. Anthony. From the Fall of St. Anthony I ascended the St. Peter's to the "Pipe Stone Quarry," on the Coteau des Prairies, and descended the St. Peter's in a canoe with my English companion, Mr. Wood, 150 miles, to the Fall of St. Anthony, and from that, a second time, to St. Louis, in a bark canoe, 900 miles, steering with rny own pad dle. In the spring of 1836 I obtained permission from Gover nor Cass (then Secretary of War) to accompany the 1st Regi ment of Mounted Dragoons, under the command of Colonel Dodge, to the Camanchees and other southwestern tribes. We saw in the campaign of that summer all of the Caman chees, the Osages, the Pawnee Picts, the Kiowas, and Wicos, and at the Kiowa village a large number of Arapahos; and visiting the Pawnee Picts, an encampment of Jiccarilla Apaches and I^avahos; and at and near Fort Gibson, on the Arkansaw, the Cherokees, the Choctaws, and Creeks, then recently removed from Georgia and Alabama. From Fort Gibson, on my horse "Charley,'' without a road or a track, and alone, I rode to St. Louis, a distance of 550 miles, guided by my pocket compass, and swimming the rivers as I met them. In 1837 I went to the coast of Florida to see the Seminolees and Euchees; and in 1838 made a voyage from New York to Charleston, to paint Osceola and the other Seminolee chiefs, then prisoners of war. I afterwards made my Exhibition in New York, Philadel phia, Washington, and Boston, and then went to London and opened in the Egyptian Hall, paying rent, 500 per annum, for three years; then went to Paris with it, showed it in the "Salle Valentino," and afterwards, by command of Louis Philippe, in the "Salle des Seances," in the Louvre. The revolution turned me out "neck and heels," and, at great expense, I got my Collection out of Paris and to London, and opened in Place Waterloo, for two years. In 1852 I sailed to Havanah, to Venezuela, went to the Orinoko and Demerara; ascended the Essequibo, crossed the Tumucamache (or Crystal) Mountains, to the head-waters of 3 the Trombutas, which I descended in a pirogue, to the Am azon, at Obidos, as described in "Life amongst the Indians," (Appleton,) and from that to Para, having seen Carribbees, Gooagives, Arowaks, Wayaways, Macouchies, Tarumas, and Zurumatis. From Para, (near 20 years ago,) I took steamer to the Barra, to Tabitinga, and Nauta; from l^auta I descended the Amazon to Obidos, 1,000 miles, in a cupola boat, as described in Appendix A of my catalogue, helping to row my own boat, and seeing 80 of the 100 tribes of Indians said to in habit the shores of that river. I afterwards ascended the Amazon again, and went on a gold-hunting expedition to the Acarai Mountain, described in "Last Rambles," (a juvenile book, Appleton.) Returning to the Amazon, I took an ascending steamer to Nauta, and ascended the Yucayali to the Connibos, 400 miles, and made a tour on horseback across the "Pampas del Sacramento ?> to the base of the eastern sierra of the Andes, making many sketches of the beautiful pampas and mountains; and seeing on the Yucayali and the Pampas, the Remos, Pacapacurus, the Connibos, the Chetibos, and Sepibos; descended the Yucayali in a pirogue to Nauta, crossed the mountains by the mail route to Lima, steamed to Panama, to St. Diego, and San Francisco, and took a sailing vessel to the mouth of the Columbia, to Nootka Sound, Queen Charlotte's Inlet and Island, to Liska, in the Alaeutian Islands, to Kamskatka, to Sitka, back to Queen Charlotte's, and to Victoria, seeing Indians Klahoquats, Hydas, Nayas, Chippewyans, Stone, Dogrib, Athapascas, Esquimaux, Alaeutians, and Koriaks, about Petropolovski, in Kamskatka. From Victoria I went to the Dalles, on the Columbia, to Walla Walla, and on horseback to the Salmon River Valley, crossed the Salmon River Mountains into the Snake River Valley, at Fort Hall, made a visit to the Great (or " Smoky") Falls of the Snake River, made many sketches, and returned to Walla Walla, to Portland, and thence by steamer to San Francisco and St. Diego; having seen Indians Paunch, (a band of Crows,) Walla Wallas, Snakes, and Flatheads, in many bands. From St. Diego, on horseback, crossing the Colorado of the "West at La Pas, and Rocky Mountains to St. Diego on the Rio Grande del Norte, and from that point, in a " dug out," steering with my own paddle, descended that river to "El Paso," and to Matamoras, 800 miles; seeing Indians Cochemtees, Mohaves, Yumas, Yumayas, and several bands of the Apachees. In 1855, from Matamoras I sailed for Sisal, in Yucatan, visited the ruins of TJxmal, painted Indians, Mayas; sailed from Sisal to Havre, went to Paris, and to Berlin, to see my old friend the Baron de Humboldt, then in his 87th year, who presented me to the king and queen at "Sans Souci," and gave me a letter of introduction to Baron Bonpland, in Santana, in Uruguay, to which place I was preparing to start in a few days. I took steamer at Havre, in the fall of that year, for Rio de Jeneiro and Buenos Ayres, from Buenos Ayres, by steamer, up the Paraguay to the mouth of the Parana, as cended the Parana on a trading boat 700 miles, and crossed the "Entre Rios" Mountains to Conception, on the head waters of the Uruguay, and descended that river, 700 miles in a pirogue, to the mouth of the Rio Negro, steering with my own paddle, and thence to Buenos Ayres; seeing In dians Chaymas, Chacos, Payaguas, Botocudos, and Tobos; and, in a ride to the Rio Salado and the "Grand Saline," saw the Aucas and Puelches. From Buenos Ayres, in 1856, by a sailing packet, I coasted the whole length of Patagonia, and passed through the Strait of Magellan; seeing Indians, an encampment of Patagons and Fuegians; sailed to Panama; by rail went to Chagres, and thence to Carracas, in Venezuela, a second time, and to Santa Martha and th*e lake and mountains of Maricaybo, to witness the effects of the cataclysm of the Antilles, where the Andes chain was broken, and of which some account (as well as of some of my last rambles of three years to see Rocks, not Indians,) will be seen in my little book, "Lifted and Subsided Rocks of America." GEO. CATLIK I^ettef of f^of. Seqfy, OF THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTE. WASHINGTON, D. C., Dec. 13, 1873. To the Chairman of the Library Committee of Congress: ******! would respectfully urge the importance of purchasing these valuable records of the previous inhabitants of North America, which, if not secured at this time, will be dissipated and lost to the world. They will grow in importance with advanc ing years, and when the race of which they are the representations shall have entirely disappeared their value will be inestimable. No scientific subject of the present day is exciting more interest than that of the past history of the world, as it is now being recon structed, as it were, from the materials hitherto almost neglected of the remains of ancient times, which are now being collected and presented for scientific study by every enlightened government of Europe. It is proved by cumulative arguments the most irresistible that the ancestors of the most civilized races of the present day were at one time savages, of whom the manners and customs can only be understood by a comparative study of the lives of savages now existing in different parts of the world. Comparative ethnology forms the basis of pre-historic science. Unfortunately the data of this science exhibits many gaps to be filled up, and our Government would be justly censured by the intelligence of the world were it to permit the valuable documents, as they may be called, of a disap pearing race to be suffered to be lost by the failure to grant the small appropriation necessary to procure them. JOSEPH HENRY, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institute. Cktlrn'$ Ii^dilii] Collection. .4^ UNIQUE MUSEUM Fiilly representing the Manners, Customs, Sports, Religious Ceremonies, Costumes, and Individuality of the Tribes of CONSISTING OF Three Hundred and Fifty Portraits Of distinguished Men and Women of the different Tribes, such as SACS, IvAXSiW. OKAUKS, COMANC1IFA, I'AWMEE-PICTW, MOUX, CHOC- TAWS. M2SSOURIES, ]IAN1>AXK, KI,4CItFKET, AS-SIX-XE- ISOIXS, 1>KI.AWAKt:S, CHE HOICK I S, C'llOWS, *o. Of which the Portraits of OSCEOLA, KEOKUK, BLACK HAWK and his Sons, IOWAY, BED JACKET, KING PHILIP, and JOHN ROSS, Are all prominent in American History. Two Hundred and Fifty otliei* Pictures, Descriptive of Indian Countries, their Villages, Games, and Customs, containing in all above :j,OOO All of which were painted on the spot forty years ago, when the Indian modes and customs were much more primitive than at the present time. The views of mountains, rivers, prairies, and waterfalls, painted at the same time, give points of American scenery long ago effaced by the ad vance of civilization. Among these pictures are FOUR VALUABLE AND HIGHLY-FINISHED PAINTINGS, Representing the singular Religious Ceremonies of the ~NL j-&r m?x TRIBE, (Now extinct.} A very valuable collection of Lances, Calumets, Pipes, Tomahawks, Scalping .Knives, Bows, Quivers, Shields, Necklaces, War-Clubs, Whistles, Saddles, Cradles, Masks, &c. Skulls from different Tribes, particularly several from the Flat-head Tribes, showing the character of this unaccountable custom, and Flat- head cradles illustrating the process. In addition to the above is the CARTOON COLLECTION, Containing 600 paintings of North and South American Indians, recently on exhibition at the Smithsonian Institute. INDIAN PORTRAITS. Certificates. I hereby certify that the persons whose signatures are affixed to the certificate used below by Mr. Catlin are officers in the service of the United States, as herein set forth ; and that their opinions of the accu racy of the likenesses, and correctness of the views, &c., exhibited by him in his "Indian Gallery," are entitled full credit. J. H. POINSETT, Secretary of War, WasJiington. With regard to the gentlemen whose names are affixed to certificates below, I am fully warranted in saying that no individuals have had bet ter opportunity of acquiring a knowledge of the persons, habits, cos tumes, and sports of the Indian tribes, or possess stronger claims upon the public confidence in the statements they make respecting the cor rectness of. delineation, &c., of Mr. Catlin's "Indian Gallery;" and I may add my own testimony with regard to many of those Indians whom I have seen, and whose likenesses are in the collection and sketched with fidelity and correctness. C. A. HARRIS, Commissioner of Indian Affairs. Washington. I have seen Mi*. Catlin's collection of portraits of Indians, many of which were familiar to me, and painted in my presence ; and as far as they have included Indians of my acquaintance, the likenesses are easily recognized, bearing the most striking resemblance to the originals, as well as faithful representations of their costumes. W. CLARK, Superintendent of Indian Affairs. St. Loui*. I have examined Mr. Catlin's collection of the Upper Missouri In dians to the Kocky Mountains, all of which I am acquainted with, and indeed most of them were painted when I was present, and I do not hes itate to pronounce them correct likenesses, and readily to be recognized. And I consider the costumes, as painted by him, to be the only correct representations I have ever seen. JOHN F. A SANFORD, U. 8. S. Indian Agent for Mandans, Rickarees, Minitarees, Crows, Kniste- neaux. Assinneboinx, Blackfeet, r>. Having spent sixteen years in the continual acquaintance with the Indians of the several tribes of the Missouri, represented in Mr. Catlin's Gallery of Indian Paintings, I was enabled to judge of the correctness of the likeness, and instantly recognized every one of them when I looked them over from the striking resemblance they bore to the originals ; so also of the landscapes on the Missouri. HONOEE PlCOTTE. The portraits in the possession of Mr. Catlin, of Pawnees, Picts r Kio- was, Comanches, Weecos, and Osages, were painted by him from life, when on a tour to their country with the United States dragoons. The likenesses are good, very easily to be recognized, and the costumes faith fully represented. Henry Dodge, Colonel of Dragoons ; R. H. Mason, Major of Dra goons ; D. Hunter, Captain of Dragoons ; D. Perkins, Captain of Dra goons ; M. Duncan, Captain of Dragoons ; T. B. Wheelock, Lieutenant of Dragoons. We have seen Mr. Catlin's portraits of Indians east of the Rocky Mountains, many of which are familiar to us. The likenesses are easily recognized, bearing a strong resemblance to the originals, as well as faithful representations of their costumes. J. DOUGHERTY, Indian Agent. J. GANTT. NOVEMBER 27, 1837. We hereby certify -that the portraits of the Grand Pawnees, Republi can Pawnees, Pawnee Loups, Tappage Pawnees, Otoes, Omahas, and Missouries, which are in Mr. Catlin's Indian Gallery, were painted from life by Mr. Catlin, and that the individuals sat to him in the costumes precisely in which they are painted. J. DOUGHERTY, 1. A. for Pawnees, Omafias, and Otoex. J. GANTT. NEW YORK, 1837. I have seen Mr. Catlin's collection of Indian portraits, many of which were familiar to me, and painted in my presence at their own villages. I have spent the greater part of my life amongst the tribes and individ uals he has represented, and I do not hesitate to pronounce them cor rect likenesses, and easily recognized ; also his sketches of their manners and customs, I think, are excellent ; and the landscape views on the Mis souri and Mississippi are correct representations. K. McKENZIE, Of the Am. Fur. Co. , mouth of Yellowstone. We hereby certify that the portraits of the Seminoles and Euchees, named in this catalogue, were painted by George Catlin, from the life> at Fort Moultrie ; that the Indians sat or stood in the costumes pre cisely in which they are painted, and that the likenesses are remarkably good. P. MORRISON, Gapt. th Inft. J. S. HATHAWAY, 2d Lieut. 1st Art. H. WHARTON, 2d Lieut. Qth Inft. F. WEEDON, Assistant Surgeon* FOET. MOULTRIE, Jan. 28, 1838.