God Gave Us This Country: Tekamthi and the First American Civil War

We know him as Tecumseh, the Shawnee chief who organized Indian tribes in the Northwest Ordinance territory for a united effort to halt white encroachment, a heroic figure respected by friend and foe. Gilbert ( Westering Man: The Life of Joseph Walker ) gives a vivid, detailed account of nearly five decades of conflict on the Western frontier, an appalling story of violence. Following the life of Tekamthi, the author attempts to separate fact from folklore; after Tekamthi's death at Tippecanoe, he became a folk hero in the Middle West. Gilbert chronicles the origins of the U.S. Army and its disastrous record against the Indians; he notes that despite defeats, the Americans continued to advance, while the Indians' were Pyrrhic victories, and concludes that Tekamthi's resistance movement probably delayed the western advance by less than a decade. History and military buffs will appreciate this authoritative account of this long and bloody conflict. (July)