Chief Black Hawk Of The Sac Tribe example essay topic

Contrary to popular beliefs, America was not discovered in 1492 by Christopher Columbus, nor was it discovered by the pilgrims in 1620. It was actually discovered millenniums before either of those voyages. The first native Americans are believed to have crossed the Bearing Strait somewhere around 40,000 B.C. They were a proud people who were well in touch with their natural surroundings, never hunting for sport or leaving anything of there prey to waste. The Subarctic was a region that horizontally spanned across the entire continent of North America and vertically covered a large portion of what is today known as Canada. In the Subarctic, life revolved around getting food. Tribes such as the Beavers, Kaska's, Hans, and Tanana's were nomadic hunters, fishers, and forgers who got around on foot.

The Subarctic cultures generally used wood, bone, horn, and antlers as utensils more frequently than stone. For ropes and cloth the used raw hide and root fiber. They mainly hunted moose, caribou, oxen, bear, and elk. The Eastern Woodland region spanned across the current day Eastern U.S. and Canada. The region contained a moderate climate and had great amounts of rainfall. Some of the tribes that inhabited the habitat were the Iroquois, E ries, Hurons, and Shawnees.

A number of the tribes there were Algonkian speaking the people. Most of the tribes operated in the same way. There was a class system, strikingly similar to some thing that you would see in Europe, that consisted of a chief, his family, nobility and commoners. Quite unlike the nomads of the Subarctic, the inhabitants of the Eastern Woodlands were Deer hunters and farmers. These tribes were very hostile and entered into many conflicts over things such as territorial rights, male coming of age rituals, or retaliation to a prior attack. The Great Basin was a vast span of arid desert that lay between the ridges of the Rockies and the Sierra Mountain ranges.

The winters were hot and the summers were frigidly cold. Tribes of this area were the Shoshones, the Utes, the Flatheads, and Was hos. Due to the fact that there were few animals in the area, the tribes that inhabited it were forced to survive by the means of nuts and seeds that they wandered around searching for and collecting. They ate the sweet nuts of the pinon tree and seeds of the pigweed and p rimose plants. They had to stay on the move, constantly searching for food because of its scarcity.

On average each family had at least three camps per year. Quite unlike the dry desert terrain of the Great Basin, the Plateau, located in northwestern U.S. and in southwest Canada, was riddled with mountains covered in lush evergreen forests. This area was in habited by the Shuswap's, Thompsons, Yakima's, and the Nez Per ces. A lifestyle similar to people of the Great Basin was present on the Plateau, but it was enhanced by annual runs of salmon up the Columbia River, other rivers and tributaries.

The Plateau natives also had to move a lot; they traveled on foot while dogs pulled their goods. Where there were lakes, they found other fish, ducks and mud hens. In the meadows, they pulled up camas, edible bulbs, and other nutrient-rich roots. They dried salmon and camas for winter consumption. People lived in villages made of partly sunken circular dwellings in the cold months and camped in grass mat houses in the warm months. Market villages existed where travelers from the Plains and the Pacific Coast congregated, purchased dried food and bartered for other items.

In 1832, Chief Black Hawk of the Sac tribe decided to revolt against the relocation treaty. On the way to gaining support for his cause, the chief was enraged by the brutal murder of one of his men. That night he staged an attack on the whites in the area. After that attack, they were heavily pursued by the American troops. In the final battle, Black Hawk tried to surrender, but the American troops still brutally murdered practically the entire tribe..