PRIDE IN PARENTAGE
Tecumseh (1768-1813) was the chief of the American Shawnee Indians, who organized an Indian confederacy to resist white encroachments. General (later President) William Henry Harrison defeated him at Tippecanoe (1811). Tecumseh was killed in the battle of the Thames River (1813), fighting on the British side in the war of 1812. In 1810 Harrison, then governor of Indiana Territory, was negotiating with Tecumseh in order to prevent open hostilities. He ordered a chair to be brought for the Indian chief. The man who brought it said, “Your father, General Harrison, offers you a seat.” “My father!” Tecumseh exclaimed. “The sun is my father and the earth is my mother, and on her breast will I lie.” Ignoring the chair, he stretched out on the ground. Little Brown Book of Anecdotes, Clifton Fadiman, Ed., page 536.
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