Page 192 - Confronting Race Women and Indians on the Frontier, 1815 - 1915

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explained an early T e xan, "are warlike and fight on horseback; they drill
themselves & horses on the prairie, their mode of fight is to fo rm a circle
round their enemy , & keep riding round & round like circus riders . . .
they then draw their arrows and commence attack; still keeping their
8
circular gallop."5 T o some men, Indians were at their worst when after
white women. T o them, women who fe ll into Indians "merciless
clutches" f a ced "an ordeal worse than death."59
The majority of white men spent even more energy worrying
about their stock. 60 Like white women, men realized that most
American Indians wanted to take animals rather than captives. Given
the crucial role that stock played in westering, men were neither gen­
erous nor understanding where animals were concerned. As Isaac Wistar
explained after Digger Indians had run off his party's mules, "most of
the men have gone after the mules in a desperate hope of recovering
them, f o r life itself here depends on the all-important help of that indis­
pensable but hated animal." He added that men fe lt terrorized when
Indians took their stock, becoming "savage" themselves. 6 1
Certainly, women recognized the need fo r defense measures, but
they mentioned it less often than men. Some women even joked about
precautions at the men's expense. As might be expected, women were
inquisitive about domestic matters, especially customs and morality, mar­
ital etiquette, child-raising practices, and crafts of American Indians. 62
As civilizers, white women had vested interests in these topics. Because
white women f a iled to understand Indian ways they most often
expressed shock, disapproval, and indignation. 6 3 Men, who were less
concerned than women with the domestic side oflife and keeping white
morality in fo rce, were nonchalant. They observed that Native
Americans practiced plural marriage and intermarried with French set­
tlers. Some men noted that Indians ate insects, were f o nd ofliquor, were
lazy, and were inveterate beggars. They were, however, terse in their
moral judgments of such practices. 6 4
Because many men were curious about the ways that American
Indians treated their dead, they wrote in detail about above-ground
burials. 6 5 One emigrant of the 1 8 60s commented that he f o und these
burying grounds "quite interesting," but he, like most other men,
extended them the greatest respect. 66 Only one man from the group