Frances Slocum (March 4, 1773 – March 9, 1847) (Ma-con-na-quah, "Young Bear" or "Little Bear") was an adopted member of the Miami people. Slocum was born into a Quaker family that migrated from Warwick, Rhode Island, in 1777 to the Wyoming Valley in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. On November 2, 1778, when Slocum was five years old, she was captured by three Delaware warriors at the Slocum family farm in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Slocum was raised among the Delaware in what is now Ohio and Indiana. With her marriage to Shepoconah (Deaf Man), who later became a Miami chief, Slocum joined the Miami and took the name Maconaquah. She settled with her Miami family at Deaf Man's village along the Mississinewa River near Peru, Indiana.
In 1835 Slocum revealed to a visitor that she was a white woman who had been kidnapped as a child, and two years later, in September 1837, three of Slocum's siblings came to see her. They confirmed that she was their sister, but Slocum chose to stay with her Miami family in Indiana. Slocum fully assimilated into the Native American culture and was accepted as one of its members. On March 3, 1845, the United States Congress passed the joint resolution that exempted Slocum and twenty-one of her Miami relatives from removal to Kansas Territory. Her Miami relations in Indiana were among the 148 individuals who formed the nucleus of the present-day Miami Nation of Indiana. She is buried at Slocum Cemetery in Wabash County, Indiana. Tributes named in her honor include Indiana's Frances Slocum Trail; the Frances Slocum State Recreation Area on the banks of the Mississinewa Lake near Peru, Indiana; Maconaquah High School in Indiana; Frances Slocum Elementary School in Marion, Indiana; Frances Slocum Elementary School, Fort Wayne Indiana; and Frances Slocum State Park in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania and Mocanaqua, Pennsylvania.
Early life
Frances Slocum was one of ten children born to Jonathan and Ruth (Tripp) Slocum. The exact date of Frances's birth is uncertain, but it is believed to have been March 4, 1773. The Slocum family, who were Quakers and pacifists, emigrated from Warwick, Rhode Island, to the Wyoming Valley in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, in 1777.
Soon after their arrival, violence erupted in eastern Pennsylvania's Susquehanna River valley. Although the Slocum family remained in the settlement, many others fled during the Battle of Wyoming in July 1778,Meginness, p. 9. when British forces and Seneca warriors destroyed Forty Fort near Wilkes-Barre, killing more than three hundred American settlers. The Slocum family survived the battle, and felt their Quaker beliefs and friendly relations with the natives would protect them.Rafert,The Miami Indians of Indiana, p. 43.Meginness, p. 12. However, on November 2, 1778, while Jonathan was away, three Delaware warriors attacked the Slocum family farm near Wilkes-Barre. Ruth and all but two of her children escaped into the nearby woods, but the Delaware captured five-year-old Frances, her disabled brother, Ebenezer, and Wareham Kingsley, a young boy whose family was living with the Slocums. Ebenezer was released at the farm, but Frances and the Kingsley boy were taken captive.Meginness, pp. 13–14 and 18.Kingsley later returned from capture. See Meginness, p. 65. Slocum never saw her parents again. Natives killed her father and grandfather on December 16, 1778. Slocum's mother, who died on May 6, 1807, never gave up hope that her daughter would be found.
The Delaware gave Slocum to a childless Delaware chief and his wife. They named her Weletasash, after their youngest daughter who had died, and raised her as their own.Madison and Sandweiss, p. 20.Meginness, p. 66. Not much is known about Slocum's early life among the Delaware. She later recalled that they migrated west through Niagara Falls and Detroit, before settling near Kekionga (the site of present-day Fort Wayne, Indiana).
Marriage and family Slocum was briefly married to a Delaware sometime around 1791 or 1792. The tradition among the Miami is that he did not treat her well, and due to domestic violence, she returned to her Delaware parents. Her first husband is said to have migrated west with the Delaware tribe.Meginness, p. 78.
Slocum's second marriage, sometime after 1794, was to Shepoconah, known as Deaf Man to the white men because of his deafness.Meginness, p. 67. Shepoconah was a Miami warrior who later became a Miami chief. She first encountered him while traveling through the forest, finding him badly-wounded. With the assistance of her Delaware parents, she brought him to their village, where he stayed at their home and regained his health.Meginness, p. 79. Frances eventually married him. The couple had four children: two sons, who died at a young age, and two daughters, Kekenakushwa (Cut Finger)Alternate spellings: Kekesequa, Kick-ke-ne-che-qua, and Ke-ke-na-kush-wa. See James, p. 298 and Meginness, p. 110 and 126. and Ozahshinquah (Yellow Leaf),Alternate spellings: O-zah-wah-shin-qua, O-zah-shin-quah, We-saw-she-no-qua, and O-saw-she-quah. See Meginness, p. 71, 110, and 126, and Sleeper-Smith, Indian Women and French Men, p. 124. who both survived to adulthood. When Frances joined the Miami she took the name Maconaquah (Little Bear).
Sometime after the War of 1812 the Miami tribe, which included Shepoconah and Maconaquah (Slocum), moved to the Mississinewa River valley in north central Indiana. Little more is known about Slocum's life among the natives. Most of the available information focuses on her later years after she was reunited with her white relatives near Peru, Indiana, in 1837.Susan Sleeper-Smith, "Resistance to Removal: The 'White Indian,' Frances Slocum," in Enduring Nations: Native Americans in the Midwest, ed. R. David Edmunds (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2008), 113.
Later years
Discovery Since her capture Slocum's white relatives continued to search for her without success. They did not see her for fifty-nine years.Meginness, pp. 22–30. In 1835 Colonel George Ewing, an Indian trader who did business with the Miami and spoke their language fluently, stopped for the night at a log cabin in a small Indiana settlement known as Deaf Man's village along the Mississinewa River, near Peru, Indiana. During his stay he spoke with an elderly Miami woman who revealed that she was by birth a white woman and explained how she had been kidnapped as a child. She spoke no English, but remembered her white family's name was Slocum and they had been Quakers who lived along the Susquehanna River.Madison and Sandweiss, p. 18.
Ewing believed that Slocum wanted to reveal her identity, a secret she had kept for more than fifty years, because she was in poor health and thought she might die soon.Meginnes, pp. 38–41. Although some have suggested that Slocum feared she would be forcibly removed from the Miami if her past was known, others have argued it is more likely that she decided to reveal her white identity to save her Miami village from forced removal to the Kansas Territory.Sleeper-Smith, Indian Women and French Men, p. 135–36. Or, she simply may have wanted to remain with her daughters in Indiana during her final years.Rafert, The Miami Indians of Indiana, p. 107–8.
When Ewing met Slocum she was a widow living with her extended family at Deaf Man's village. The small enclave consisted of a double log cabin with two or three cabins attached to it, a corn crib, a stable, and outbuildings for livestock. Living with her were her two daughters, Ozahshinquah (Yellow Leaf), a young widow, and Kekenakushwa (Cut Finger), Slocum's elder daughter; Kekenakushwa's husband, Tanquakeh,Alternate spelling: Te-quoc-yaw. See Meginness, p. 126. a métis named Jean Baptiste Brouillette; three grandchildren; and an elderly relative.
Deaf Man's village was a cross-cultural meeting place and Slocum's diverse family was not unique. An African-American laborer who had assimilated and married into the Miami tribe lived in a nearby cabin.Rafert, The Miami Indians of Indiana, pp. 104–7. Although the village was a mix of European and Indian culture because of the influential fur trade, Slocum was thoroughly assimilated into the Miami culture and was a member of the Miami tribe. The inhabitants of the village, including Slocum, did not speak English and were not Christian. They practiced pluralism, and continued traditions and ceremonies that remained unchanged from the previous century.
Reunion with white relatives After Ewing found Slocum he tried to locate her white relatives. In 1835 he sent a letter to the postmaster at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, asking if the Slocum family had a relative that was captured by natives about the time of the American Revolutionary War, but the letter was misplaced. It was discovered two years later and a notice was published in an extra edition of the Lancaster Intelligencer, where it caught the attention of a minister in the Wyoming Valley. He was aware of the Slocum family's search for their sister, and forwarded the newspaper notice to her brother, Joseph Slocum.Cottman, Sketch of Frances Slocum, pp. 120–21.Meginness, pp. 42–43. Ewing received word from Joseph, and in September 1837 two of Slocum's brothers, Isaac and Joseph, and her older sister, Mary Slocum Towne, journeyed with interpreters to Deaf Man's village in the Mississinewa River valley to find out if she was their lost sister.Meginness, pp. 43–49. By that time Slocum was an elderly widow who had lived among the natives for nearly 60 years.Rafert, The Miami Indians of Indiana, p. 103. Frances, her two daughters, and a son-in-law also visited the Slocums while they were staying in Peru.Cottman, p. 121.
Slocum's siblings were thrilled to see their sister, but they were shocked by her transformation. She spoke no English and did not remember her Christian name was Frances.Cooke, Winter, Ramadhyani, Feest, and Edmunds, p. 114. Slocum communicated through an interpreter and only responded to direct questions. Some researchers have suggested that this could be a cultural trait the white visitors did not understand, or Slocum may have been afraid she would be forced to leave her Miami family and go live with the Slocums. During their visits the Slocum family confirmed that she was their lost sister from the information she provided, and especially after recognizing the disfigured forefinger on her left hand, which was the result of a childhood accident prior to her capture.Meginness, p. 47. The Slocum siblings tried to convince her to return with them to Pennsylvania, but she refused to leave her native family. Slocum explained that she preferred to remain with the Miami, and if she returned to her birthplace she would be "like a fish out of water." In September 1839 Joseph Slocum and two of his daughters, Hannah and Harriet, paid another visit to Deaf Man's Village. Slocum still refused to leave her Miami family, but she did agree to the Slocum family's request to have her portrait painted.
Avoiding removal to Indian territory Treaties signed with the Miami in 1838 and 1840 forced Slocum's Miami community to consider removal from Indiana to Kansas Territory. In these treaties the Miami ceded all but a small portion of their remaining tribal lands in Indiana to the federal government, and in 1840 they also agreed to move west of the Mississippi River within five years. and