INDIANS OF NORTH AMERICA, MISSIONS TO THE.
Roman Catholic Missions Presbyterians (§ 6).
(§ 1). Congregationalists (§ 7).
In New England (§ 2). Baptists (§ 8).
The Quakers (§3). Methodists (§9).
The Church of England and Lutherans and (§ 10).
Protestant Episcopal The National Indian Asso- Church (§ 4). ciation (§ 11).
Moravians (§ 5).
Christian missions among North American Indians began in Spanish territory before the earlysettlement farther north. Probably i. Roman the earliest in what is now the United Catholic States were missions in the Southwest Missions, conducted by Spanish Franciscans, Fathers Juan de Padilla, Juan de la Cruz, and Descalona, who began work among the Quivira (Wichita), the Pecos, and the Tigua in 1542 or 1543. Two years later another Spanish Franciscan, Francisco Andres de Olmos, began to mission the tribes in the Texas wilderness. In 1565 St. Augustine was founded in Florida, where the work of Christianizing the natives was begun by the Jesuits and continued by the Franciscans. Within twenty years several mission stations were established along the coast from St. Augustine to St. Helena, in South Carolina. In 1633 English Jesuits began work among the Conoy and Patuxent tribes of Maryland and some of the Virginia tribes. By 1642 the Jesuits had established work in the North, founding what was known as the New York Mission among the Mohawks. This was soon followed by successful work among the Oneidas, the Cayugas, and the Senecas. About 1660 Jesuit missionaries began work among the tribes in Michigan, founding a mission on Keweenaw Bay, and work among the tribes of the upper lake region soon followed. By 1685 some of the New England tribes were reached and Jesuit missions established among the Penobscots and thePassamaquoddies, and about ten years later the Abenaki mission on the Kennebec was
RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
India
Indians of North America
started. The most noted, perhaps, were the Franciscan missions of California, the story of which is part of the history of the Pacific coast. The year 1769 saw the first of such missions established at San Diego, and by 1828 a chain of prosperous missions extended northward to San Francisco Bay. In 1833 these missions were disbanded by the revolutionary government of Mexico. Since that date the Roman Catholic Church has vigorously prosecuted its work among the various Indian tribes in the country, and in 1908, according to the Official Catholic Directory, claimed to have 95 Indian churches, 67 priests, and 48,194 adherents. The work of Roger Williams (q.v.), begun in 1636, may be considered the first Protestant mission work for American Indians, with the excep- 2. In New tion that a clergyman of the Church of England. England is said to have baptized an Indian convert in 1587 The story of Williams' work among the Pequots and Narragansetts is closely interwoven with the early colonial history of Massachusetts and Rhode Island. Williams speedily acquired the language of the tribes among whom he labored, published a " key " to it, and soon carried the Gospel to large numbers of Indians about Providence. His work, however, seems to have been of purely personal initiative, and on his death in 1683 was not continued by any organization. It was greatly reinforced and extended by the labors of the Congregational missionaries, Experience Mayhew and John Eliot (qq.v.), who entered the same field in 1646. Eliot applied to the General Court of Massachusetts and obtained a grant of land on which the Indians might build a town where they could live together, cultivate the arts of civilized life, and enjoy the benefits of religious instruction. In less than twenty-five years there were fourteen such settlements, to all of which Eliot extended his labors, and in 1660 the Indians at Natick were formed into a church. During these years he got together twenty-four regular congregations in Massachusetts and had gathered about him and trained more than twenty native preachers from various tribes, besides translating both the Old and New Testament into one of the Indian tongues — the first Bible to be given to the Red Man. This period of wonderful advance was succeeded by King Philip's War; Eliot's " praying Indians " were scattered, and the twentyfour congregations were reduced to four. A time of great hardship for the Indians followed when the General Court collected the remnant and removed them to the islands in the bay. Following the labors of Eliot, Congregational work was carried on among the Nauset Indians of Cape Cod and other tribes in eastern Massachusetts. About 1651 a mission was begun among the Quinnipiacs in Connecticut, and during the next century the Congregational Church carried on a most successful work among many of the tribal remnants of New England. In 1643-48 a Lutheran minister, John Campanius Holm, chaplain of a Swedish colony in Delaware, did some mission work among the neighboring Indians.
Mn 1682 William Penn made his celebrated treaty h the Indians under the elm at Shackamaxon, V.— 31
on the banks of the Delaware River, presaging mutual "good faith and good will, openness, brotherhood, and love." As early as 1791
3. The the noted Seneca chief, Cornplanter, Quakers, sent greetings to the Philadelphia
yearly meeting, saying "we wish our children to be taught the same principles by which your fathers were guided, and such other things as you teach your children, especially the love of peace." Two years later the Delawares told certain Friends who visited them that they wished to be of their religion, and asked for teachers. In 1796 the yearly meeting began regular work among the Iroquois in New York, and established three workers among the Oneidas and the Tuscaroras. In 1798 they began a mission to the Senecas, and, later, at Cattaraugus and Tunesassah, with good results. In 1807 the New York meeting started schools among the Stockbridge and Brotherton tribes. During the past century, through the work undertaken by various yearly meetings, and later through the Associated Executive Committee, a delegate body representing ultimately all the yearly meetings, mission stations have been established among many tribes, and the record is one of loyal faithfulness, on the part of Friend and Indian alike, to the compact of brotherly love entered into on the banks of the Delaware River two hundred and twenty-five years ago. The Indian work of the Friends for the past few years has been largely confined to ten mission stations among the Modoc, Seneca, Wyandotte, Ottawa, Otoe, Iowa, Kickapoo, and Shawnee tribes in Oklahoma and Indian Territory.
With the possible exception of the baptism of an
Indian convert mentioned above, the efforts of the
Anglican Church to evangelize the
4. The Indians began in 1702, when the So- Church of ciety for the Propagation of the Gospel
England sent to America a missionary to the and Prot- Six Nations in the Mohawk valley, estant Six years later four Iroquois sachems Episcopal crossed the Atlantic and presented an Church, address to Queen Anne with belts of wampum as a token of the sincerity of the Six Nations. In that address occurs the following: " Since we were in covenant with our great Queen's children we have had some knowledge of the Savior of the world. If our great Queen would send us instructors they should find a hearty welcome." This address was referred to the Society, and it was at once resolved to send missionaries, to provide translations in Mohawk, and to endeavor to stop the introduction of intoxicating liquors among the Indians — this being the earnest request of the sachems themselves. The work met with varying success. At one time there appears " a regular sober congregation of five hundred Christians among the Mohawks, of whom fifty were devout communicants of the Episcopal Church." During the Revolution the Mohawks and some others of the tribes belonging to the " Long House " (a federation of tribes) abandoned their possessions under a sense of loyalty to the crown, and finally took shelter in Canada. Those who remained were without religious influences for several years until, in 1811, Bishop Hobart of New York gave atten-
Indians of North America