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Centennial of the Wyandot Mission: 1816-1916Professor R. T. Stevenson, 1).D., Ohio Wesleyan UniversityWhen Dr. Samuel Johnson, in the eighteenth century, made his visit to the Western Islands of Scotland nothingimpressed him more than the ruins of Iona. His famous* statement of the blessings which the savage clans of Caledonia got from religion comes at call of the student of his-“The man is little to be envied whose patriotismwotuU not gain force from the plain of Marathon, or whosepiety would not grow warmer among the ruins of Iona.”In some such spirit the traveler who knows what Methodism owes to the labors of John Stewart among the Wyandot Indians at what is now known as Upper Sandusky, Ohio, and the consequences for world-evangelism on the part of the church under whose benedictions he was converted and authorized to go upon his mission among the savages of Northwest Ohio, muses among the hillocks of the old grave-7*yard in which stands the “Mission Church” of the inland town between the lake and the river.Upper Sandusky lies fortyy miles northwest of Delaware on the Hocking Valley Raikfiad. The whole section has been set apart in a sort of double memory, horrid and holy as well, by deeds of cruel atrocity and devotion of humane and tenderest kind. Seven miles to the northwest of the town is a monument to the memory of Colonel Crawford, who died at the stake, after undergoing unspeakable tortures at the hands of Indians, June 11, 1782. One has to go far to find so fiendish a stor^of inhuman wrath.During the war of 1812, while the Detroit Wyandots supported the British against the frontier Americans, the Sandusky Wyandots rallied to the side of the latter. According to the account of the heroic Harrison, General of the front-tiersmen: “With all but the Wyandots, flight in battle when meeting with unexpected resistance or obstacles brought with it no disgrace. . . . With the Wyandots it was otherwise.” When one Captain Wells was told by General Wayne in 1793 to bring in a prisoner from Sandusky, he replied that he “could bring in a prisoner, but not from Sandusky, because there were none but Wyandots at San-- dusky, and they would not be taken alive.” The historian, John Fiske, wrote that the fiercest of all the fighters among the warring tribes were the Wyandots. These were the woodsmen, who died but never surrendered. From the lads who learned to shoot with their small bows, to the veteran braves who gathered in with glee the scalps of their foes, they lacked nothing of the spirit which won them the word of the historian.Yet, as one enters the tiny graveyard encircling the old Mission Church, and reads upon the tombstones the names of Summundewat, Grey Eyes, and Mononeue, he has all the proof desired by the Christiaft Apologist of the mighty power of the Gospel of the Son of God. For here lie the red men whose only surrender had formerly been to death, while now they yielded to ONE whose appealing symbol invoked self-surrender and worked the miracle of the ages,— the transformation of the heart of stone into one of flesh.The Cross accepts strange challenges and runs some fearful risks, and to the surprise of unbelief chants incredible triumphs. For instance, the Wyandots were the leading tribe of the red men in the Northwest. They held the Grand Calumet which united ail the tribes of that section, and kindled the central council fires of the assembled tribes in their Confederacy. Their villages dotted the banks of the Sandusky River, and clustered about the present city of Detroit. Their leading settlement was at Upper Sandusky. The Revolutionary War was drawing to a close when Crawford suffered his dreadful defeat. Dante's Inferno, as pictured by Dore, has no more horrors than those under which the white chief expired under the bitter taunts of savages, and whose last lines show only a pile of ashes, the burnt ends of hickory poles and a riot of drunken warriors.Thirty-four years later on, in 1816, the region is enteredby a mulatto named John Stewart, bearing those tremendous levers of progress—a Bible and a Hymnbook. He was innocent of hostile purpose as he entered the Indian village. He knew one science, for he was acquainted with Jesus Christ. He had one art, for he was the possessor of a singing voice of rare sweetness and power. He had for audience at his first meeting two old Indians, Big Tree and Mary.It is not the aim of this article to recite in full the story of the short labor-life of Stewart, for it soon ran its course in the noblest evangelism, marked by self-support, devotion, good judgment, and resistless zeal. He had been converted at Marietta, had received his recommendation from the father of Dr. L. D. McCabe, who was for a long time in the Faculty of the Ohio Wesleyan University, and had then bent his steps to the northwest section of the State for the purpose of converting the Wyandots. Stewart's work developed with the passing months. After two years of evangelism he was compelled to ask for help from the old Ohio Conference, which met that year in Urbana. J. B. Finley was appointed missionary and Stewart his assistant.The work must have had peculiar attractions for the leaders of the time. For within four years from the coming of Stewart we find the name of the Rev. Charles Elliott, afterwards the eminent editor and author, in charge of the mission for a year. His wife was the assistant of a remarkable person, who had offered herself as teacher when Mr. Finley had first assumed charge. This lady, Miss Harriet Stubbs, was the first woman missionary of the Methodist Episcopal Church to the heathen. One of her little charges was the daughter of Chief Grey Eyes, and she was living, a quarter of a century ago, a few miles from Upper Sandusky. Up to her old age the old Indian woman, known as “Mother Solomon,” the widow of one who had been dead many years, remembered the hymns taught her by Miss Stubbs. Dr. Elliott speaks of the beautiful work of Miss Stubbs, though he does not give her name.Stewart died December 17, 1823, aged thirty-seven years, and was buried in his own garden; then, when about to move to the West under the plans of the government, the Wyandots reverently removed the body to the graveyard of the Mission Church. This took place in 1843.The year 1916 will offer to the people of Ohio called Methodists several opportunities for celebrating past events and dead heroes. Already plans are making for recalling the life and labors of Bishop Asbury, whose death occurred in 1816. A symbolic equestrian statue of the great itinerant evangelist is suggested for some spot in the Capitol of the Nation. It would be a fitting memorial indeed.4 The General Conference of 1912 voted to celebrate in fitting manner the Centenary of John Stewart and the foundation work he laid out, of which the world-round service df the vast Foreign Missionary Society has grown. At their sessions in the early fall of this year, the West Ohip Con-'ference, the Ohio Conference, and the North-East Objto Conference in order voted to co-operate in such an effort to lift to finer fame the memory of the founder of the Wyandot Mission. In this the Woman's Home Missionary Society will take part.This article is set before the readers of the Western that they may be led to look forward to what we hope will prove to be a splendid and stirring memojial during the coming year. Committees have been ordered under the leadership of Bishop Anderson. The call will soon be made for their assembling and discussion and conclusion of plans. «-Fifty thousand subscribers by April 1, 1916, is the slogan of the publishers of the Western. Pastors throughout the territory are being urged to take up the work at once and push it until at least one subscriber in every twelve of the membership is obtained.
Newspaper Details
Western Christian Advocate
Cincinnati, Ohio, US
Wed, Jan 12, 1916
Page 6
Full Page
Clipped by
Average U.
NA, 21 Jul 2024
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