ChiefOkemos

Brave In Battle, Wise In Council, Honorable In Peace

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1770 Accounts of Okemos' date of birth range from 1739 to 1775.
 
 
1791 November 4. Okemos led his warriors to defeat General Arthur St. Clair on the Miami River in northern Ohio, near the shores of Lake Erie. This greatly concerned President George Washington..
 
1794 August 20. Major General "Mad" Anthony Wayne defeated Okemos and his men at the Battle of Fallen Timbers, or Battle of Maumee River in northern Ohio.
 

 

1800 Okemos and the Ottawas, along with the Pottawatomie, defeated the Shawnees near Three Rivers, Michigan.  Later that year, Okemos' tribe helped repulse the Chippewas, who were trying to invade Michigan from Wisconsin and the northwest.
 

 

1811 The Battle of Tippecanoe, in Tippecanoe County, Indiana, took place November 7, 1811.  A brother of Tecumseh called "The Prophet" led the Native Americans to defeat by Major General William Henry Harrison.  The battle took place on the Wabash River north of Lafayette, Indiana.  Okemos and his men escaped.  He joined the British forces and fought in the war of 1812 with a colonel's commission.
 

 

1813 The Battle of Sandusky was fought in January, 1813.  It was fought on the Seneca Plains in northeast Ohio.  The Native Americans waited near a road cut for passage of the American Army and supply wagons.  American troops approached and the Native Americans attacked.  More American troops appeared and the Native Americans were defeated.  Three days later, Native American women found three survivors, which included Okemos.  They nursed the survivors for months.  Okemos had wounds on his forehead and a gash on his back that never healed.  For this, the Native Americans surmised that he must have been favored by the Great Spirit and named him Chief out of respect.  Later that same year came the siege of Ft. Miegs in northern Ohio.  Two biographers, Albert Cowles and Rufus Hosmer, recount putting three fingers in a hole in Okemos skull.  The injury was sustained at Fort Miegs.

The Battle of the Thames was Okemos' last battle.  It took place October 5, 1813.  Major General W. H. Harrison defeated General Proctor and the Native American allies.  Chief Tecumseh was killed, Chief Okemos injured.  The battle took place in Ontario, Canada, on the Thames River, 30 miles north of Chatham.
 

 

1814 Okemos presented himself to Colonel Godfrey at Fort Wayne, Detroit, in the spring of 1814 and said simply that he would fight no more.  Through Lewis Cass, governor of the Michigan Territory, a peace pact was affected.  It was never broken.
 

 

1830 smallpox and cholera wiped out most of Okemos' tribe.
 

 

1840 roaming old hunting and camping grounds.
 

 

1858 According to an article in the Portland Observer of 1873, Okemos died in December 1858.  One account says that a small band of Indians came into DeWitt, drawing with them a sled upon which was Okemos? remains.  They filled a pouch with tobacco, a horn with powder, and a bag with bullets.  They placed the remains in a coffin, which was unusual for Native Americans, and continued their journey to the Indian village of Shimnecon