of the country tendered his submission; but soon after, while the Spaniards were crossing a river, they were attacked by the savages with a cloud of arrows. De Soto repulsed the enemy, and in keeping with his policy, refrained from revenging himself." (Frost pp. 16)Before his death in 1862, Henry David Thoreau, believing the Indian to be wholly misunderstood by whites, wrote: "It frequently happens that the historian, though he professes more humanity than the trapper, . . . [who] shoots one as a wild beast, really exhibits and practices a similar inhumanity to him, wielding a pen instead of a rifle." (Jacobs pp. 29) Thoreau continues saying that history, recorded by one who believes his race superior to others, is no history at all. Thoreau wrote to many different people, but as was and is still common practice, he was ignored. Evidence for this argument is provided by the fact that when an Indian-lover was unknowingly appointed to a command, he was quickly removed. The reader is invited to read of such cases involving Edward Wyncoop, Ely Parker, Lieutenant William B. Pease, Lieutenant James Connor, Captain Silas Soule, and Lieutenant Joseph Cramer, among others. Returning now to our timeline progression, we are approaching the mid-1500s. Under Hernando Cortes, the American Indians suffered greatly. The slave trade of natives was being highly and cruelly exploited. Cortes, arriving on islands "entirely shorn of their inhabitants,"e; continued the Holocaust by importing slaves. Entire peoples were divided, regardless of family ties, and were appropriated to a Spanish lord. The natives were shipped to unfamiliar lands and made to work in mines. As Las Casas puts it: "the mountains looked like anthills." The natives were given no food and worked to the death, supplying gold and material wealth for the Spanish lords. The natives were treated as non-humans, their masters being described by other Christians as ministers of Hell. When native...
