Bayaaswaa (recorded variously in English as Biauswah, Bajasswa, Byianswa or Biaswah) was the principal Chief of the Sandy Lake Ojibwa, whose village was located at either terminus of the Savanna Portage (Sandy Lake & opposite the mouth of the East Savanna River) in Minnesota.
According to William Whipple Warren, based on oral history regarding Bayaaswaa, as a child Bayaaswaa was captured by the Fox and his father Bayaaswaa (I) traded his life for his son's. Bayaaswaa and few other survivors went to Fond du Lac, and the Fond du Lac Band drove the Fox out of northern Wisconsin.
The oral history, Warren continues, recalled a major battle with the Dakota at the mouth of the Crow Wing River. Sixty Ojibwa led by Bayaaswaa engaged three hundred Dakota who they said had destroyed their village at Sandy Lake. Supposedly, the battle lasted for three days. The Ojibwa established their village at Sandy Lake, establishing the Sandy Lake Band, and then ventured to Red Lake and Pembina. [1] Other oral history accounts, however, suggest the Cree aided the Ojibwa against the Dakota. According to Richard Alan Nelson, Bayaaswaa was a jiisakiiwinini (Shaking-tent Seer) and lived to the age of 109.
Bayaaswaa's son Gaa-dawaabide ("Broken Tooth") later became Chief of the Sandy Lake Band. [2]
Biauswah Lake in Itasca County, Minnesota, is named after him, as is the Biauswah Bridge, a bridge for the Minnesota State Highway 23 over the Saint Louis River out of the Fond du Lac neighbourhood of Duluth, Minnesota.
The Ojibwe are an Anishinaabe people whose homeland covers much of the Great Lakes region and the northern plains, extending into the subarctic and throughout the northeastern woodlands. Ojibweg, being Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands and of the subarctic, are known by several names, including Ojibway or Chippewa. As a large ethnic group, several distinct nations also understand themselves to be Ojibwe as well, including the Saulteaux, Nipissings, and Oji-Cree.
Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa are a historical Ojibwa tribe located in the upper Mississippi River basin, on and around Big Sandy Lake in what today is in Aitkin County, Minnesota. Though politically folded into the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, thus no longer independently federally recognized, for decades, Sandy Lake Band members have been leading efforts to restore their independent Federal recognition.
The Fond du Lac Indian Reservation is an Indian reservation in northern Minnesota near Cloquet in Carlton and Saint Louis counties. Off-reservation holdings are located across the state in Douglas County, in the northwest corner of Wisconsin. The total land area of these tribal lands is 154.49 square miles (400.1 km2). It is the land-base for the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. Before the establishment of this reservation, the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa were located at the head of Lake Superior, closer to the mouth of the Saint Louis River, where Duluth has developed.
The Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, also known as the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians, is a federally recognized American Indian tribe in east-central Minnesota. The Band has 4,302 members as of 2012. Its homeland is the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation, consisting of District I, District II, District IIa, and District III.
The St. Croix Chippewa Indians are a historical Band of Ojibwe located along the St. Croix River, which forms the boundary between the U.S. states of Wisconsin and Minnesota. The majority of the St. Croix Band are divided into two groups: the federally recognized St. Croix Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin, and the St. Croix Chippewa Indians of Minnesota, who are one of four constituent members forming the federally recognized Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe. The latter is one of six bands in the federally recognized Minnesota Chippewa Tribe.
The Lac Courte Oreilles Tribe is one of six federally recognized bands of Ojibwe people located in present-day Wisconsin. It had 7,275 enrolled members as of 2010. The band is based at the Lac Courte Oreilles Indian Reservation in northwestern Wisconsin, which surrounds Lac Courte Oreilles. The main reservation's land is in west-central Sawyer County, but two small plots of off-reservation trust land are located in Rusk, Burnett, and Washburn counties. The reservation was established in 1854 by the second Treaty of La Pointe.
The Mille Lacs Indians, also known as the Mille Lacs and Snake River Band of Chippewa, are a Band of Indians formed from the unification of the Mille Lacs Band of Mississippi Chippewa (Ojibwe) with the Mille Lacs Band of Mdewakanton Sioux (Dakota). Today, their successor apparent Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe consider themselves as being Ojibwe, but many on their main reservation have the ma'iingan (wolf) as their chief doodem (clan), which is an indicator of Dakota origins.
Mississippi River Band of Chippewa Indians or simply the Mississippi Chippewa, are a historical Ojibwa Band inhabiting the headwaters of the Mississippi River and its tributaries in present-day Minnesota.
The Snake River is a 104-mile-long (167 km) tributary of the St. Croix River in east-central Minnesota in the United States. It is one of three streams in Minnesota with this name. Its name is a translation from the Ojibwa Ginebigo-ziibi, after the Dakota peoples who made their homes along this river. Kanabec County's name is derived from the Ojibwe word for this river.
The Battle of Kathio, or Battle of Izatys, was an oral tradition of the Chippewa reporting a battle fought in 1750 between Chippewas and the Sioux at the village of Kathio, or Izatys, on the Rum River next to Mille Lacs Lake.
Chief Buffalo was a major Ojibwa leader, born at La Pointe in Lake Superior's Apostle Islands, in what is now northern Wisconsin, USA.
The Sandy Lake Tragedy was the culmination in 1850 of a series of events centered in Big Sandy Lake, Minnesota that resulted in the deaths of several hundred Lake Superior Chippewa. Officials of the Zachary Taylor Administration and Minnesota Territory sought to relocate several bands of the tribe to areas west of the Mississippi River. By changing the location for fall annuity payments, the officials intended the Chippewa to stay at the new site for the winter, hoping to lower their resistance to relocation. Due to delayed and inadequate payments of annuities and lack of promised supplies, about 400 Ojibwe, mostly men and 12% of the tribe, died of disease, starvation and cold. The outrage increased Ojibwe resistance to removal. The bands effectively gained widespread public support to achieve permanent reservations in their traditional territories.
The Lake Superior Chippewa are a large number of Ojibwe (Anishinaabe) bands living around Lake Superior; this territory is considered part of northern Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota in the United States. They migrated into the area by the seventeenth century, encroaching on the Eastern Dakota people who had historically occupied the area. The Ojibwe defeated the Eastern Dakota, who migrated west into the Great Plains after the final battle in 1745. While they share a common culture including the Anishinaabe language, this highly decentralized group of Ojibwe includes at least twelve independent bands in the region.
The Tragedy of the Siskiwit was an event that took place in the pre-contact history of the Ojibwe and Meskwaki (Fox) Indian nations in present-day Wisconsin. As part of an ongoing series of conflicts between the two nations, a chief's son was kidnapped, and both groups had their camps destroyed.
Lake Lena is an unincorporated community and Native American village in Ogema Township, Pine County, Minnesota, United States, located along the Lower Tamarack River. It currently is the administrative center for the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation, District III.
Treaty of St. Peters may be one of two treaties conducted between the United States and Native American peoples, conducted at the confluence of the Minnesota River with the Mississippi River, in what today is Mendota, Minnesota.
Sandy Lake is an unincorporated community Native American village located in Turner Township, Aitkin County, Minnesota, United States. Its name in the Ojibwe language is Gaa-mitaawangaagamaag, meaning "Place of the Sandy-shored Lake". The village is administrative center for the Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa, though the administration of the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation, District II, is located in the nearby East Lake.
Bayaaswaa was an Ojibwa Chief of a village on the south shore of Lake Superior, located about 40 miles west of La Pointe, Wisconsin, in the late 17th century. According to William Whipple Warren, based on oral history regarding Bayaaswaa, he was known for his prowess and wise counsel. Warren continues that when Bayaaswaa returned from a day's hunting, he found his villagers massacred by the Fox. Upon tracking the Fox, he found they had two captives: an old man that was tortured to death and a boy that was just about ready to be tortured. Warren then states:
As Biauswah looked upon the scene from his hiding-place he recognized in the lad his own son. His heart was filled with strong affection for the youth, and knowing how helpless he was to rescue him single-handed, he stepped forth from his place of safety as the Indians were about to light the faggots. Much to the amazement of his enemies he bravely strode among them, until he stood near the lad, and then addressing them, said, "My little son, whom you are about to burn with fire, has seen but a few winters; his tender feet have never trodden the warpath, he has never injured you. But the hairs of my head are white with many winters, and over the graves of my relatives I have hung many scalps, which I have taken from the heads of the Foxes. My death is worth something to you. Let me, therefore, take the place of my child, that he may return to his people". His enemies listened in astonishment, and having long desired his death, accepted his proposal. They allowed the young lad to return to his people, and the father was burned in his stead. A terrible revenge was meted out to the Foxes when the lad told his sad tale, for a large war party fell upon the Foxes, destroying so many of them that the remainder left the district and made their home in Wisconsin.
William Alexander Aitken, also known as William Alexander Aitkin, was a fur trader with the Ojibwe in the Upper Mississippi region. He was at first affiliated with the American Fur Company, founded by John Jacob Astor, but after 1838 he set up as an independent trader, based in St. Louis, Missouri.
Zhaagobe (c.1794), also known as Jack-O-Pa or Shagobai, was a St. Croix Ojibwe chief of the Snake River band. He signed several Chippewa treaties with the United States, including the 1825 Treaty of Prairie du Chien, the 1826 Treaty of Fond du Lac, the 1837 Treaty of St. Peters, and the 1842 Treaty of La Pointe. In 1836, geographer Joseph Nicollet had an Ojibwe guide he called Chagobay, but historians are uncertain as to whether they were the same person.