One Thousand White Women: The Journals of May Dodd

by Jim Fergus

  I have recently discovered that a few of the savages do possess an extremely limited command of the English language and even more of them appear to be decently proficient in a kind of bastardized French—which they first learned some years ago from the old-time French fur trappers and traders, and which has been passed down as a kind of patois, barely comprehensible to us but certainly more so than their native tongue. How I wish you could hear their accents, dear sister! The first time this abomination assaulted my ears I didn’t even recognize it as the French language —but at least it sounded vaguely familiar. Fortunately, there is one French girl among us, a very pretty dark-haired girl named Marie Blanche de Bretonne, who was touring America with her parents when they were tragically killed by thieves in our fair city of Chicago. Truly, no one is safe any longer in this world. While still in shock and mourning, the poor girl, alone in a strange city, stranded thousands of miles from home, signed up for this program. Like many of our little group, I’m afraid that she is having second thoughts about the matter … In any case it was through Marie Blanche that we first discovered the Cheyennes’ ability to speak French, if indeed we may call it that. Why, Hortense, truly it would be enough to make our childhood tutor, Madame Bouvier, turn over in her grave. You remember what a stickler she was for pronunciation? how she would rap our knuckles with her pointer when we got it wrong, and say “Zat eees eencarrect, mademoiselle” … But I digress, n’est-ce pas? I must stop recalling the past, which comes back to me so vividly when I write to you, as if this new life is but a dream and you, still living in the real world, are trying to pull me back … too late, alas, too late … would that it could be so …

  As you might imagine it is hardly an enviable position to find oneself in the home (the word “home” I’m afraid does not properly conjure our bizarre living arrangements) of another woman—in this case, two women—as the soon-to-be third bride of their husband. The older wife, Quiet One, has been far less accepting of me than young Feather on Head. Some nights I lie awake on my bed (such as it is) in mortal fear that she will cut my throat with a knife if I dare to fall asleep …

  The situation is awkward to say the least. Indeed the word “awkward” hardly describes it. Yes, well we are people from such different … backgrounds … God, I sound just like Mother when she would lecture us all those years ago about playing with the servant children … I begin to understand that this experience requires a new vocabulary altogether—trying to explain it to you would be like trying to describe the world of Shakespeare to the savages … the words don’t exist, language fails … John Bourke was right …

  Yes, well let me try again. We live in a tent—why mince words, a tent made of animal hides—three wives, a girl, an old crone, an infant child, a young orphan boy, who seems to have been adopted by the Chief’s family and who cares for the Chief’s considerable string of horses and sometimes helps the women with the chores, and this man Little Wolf, who is a great Chief of his people.

  It is quite a spacious tent, as tents go, I’ll say that for it. I have my own charming little corner space … if it is possible to have corners in a round tent … where I sleep upon a bed of pine boughs, animal hides, and trade blankets. The odors in our “home” are quite indescribable—a word that I find myself using often in my attempts at rendering these little scenes on paper. There are the odors of human bodies, of the earth beneath us, of the animal skins used as bedding, of the smoke from the fire … Added to these, if the wives have been cooking (which they seem perpetually in the process of doing, for the savages do not seem to observe the custom of breakfast, dinner, and supper at regular hours as we do, but rather eat whenever they are hungry so that there must always be food available) there is generally also an odor inside the tent of food being prepared. Sometimes the cooking scents are actually appetizing, at other times the stench rising from the pot is so perfectly revolting that I can hardly bear it, I feel that I shall be sick and must stumble outside and gasp fresh air and I know that I shall go hungry that day. As you know, Hortense, I have always been interested in the culinary arts as a recreational pastime, but I have not yet offered my services in the “kitchen” such as it is (another excellent example of the inadequacies of language) nor indeed have I been asked to help with meal preparation. However, if I am to live here among these people I fully intend to take a turn at the stove … the fire … Perhaps I will make my tentmates a lovely little French dish, say a delightful Coq au Vin … Harry’s favorite repast … though, of course, the first question that presents itself is where might I obtain a decent bottle of French burgundy wine? Or for that matter, any bottle of wine … Hah! … But now I allow myself to drift off again into thoughts of that old life, which can only make this new one so much more precarious and difficult, and … insupportable.

  Now then, dearest sister, on the brighter side. It has finally been determined that we are to be wed with the others in a group ceremony tomorrow evening. Reverend Hare, an enormous Episcopalian missionary who has accompanied us into the wilderness, will be performing the Christian services. Would that you were here to act as my bridesmaid! Ah, how I love to imagine the family all gathered together … staying in our … guest tent! Father thin-lipped and appalled, Mother alternately weeping and swooning in abject horror of the heathens. Why, we’d be administering smelling salts to her every quarter hour! God, what fun it would be! I, who have always had such a talent for shocking the family, have this time truly outdone myself, wouldn’t you agree?

  As I understand it this mass wedding is an unprecedented event and one that does not fit neatly into any of the established ceremonies of the Cheyennes. For the savages, the giving of horses, a feast, and a dance are all that is required to seal the marriage union, it being a simple agreement between the two parties—much as Harry and I took up our life together. Being neither of a particularly religious bent myself, nor, as you know, much interested in the institution of marriage, I find this arrangement to be quite adequate.

  However, the addition of Christian nuptials into the upcoming ceremony has got things all complicated both among our women and among the Indians. The savages are unable to reach consensus on even the smallest matters without hours of incredibly laborious deliberation. Now after much “powwowing” and smoking of pipes with Reverend Hare (in this one regard it strikes me that men of all races are similar), the parties seem finally to have come to terms.

  In this same way, the savages are absolute sticklers for protocol—some of their customs so peculiar as to simply defy description. Hardly a day goes by that I don’t violate some bizarre cultural tabu or other. For instance, it appears that when seated in the lodge the well-brought-up Indian maiden is expected to sit with her feet pointing to the right—except in the case of one particular band to which some of our women have gone and which is encamped slightly separated from the main camp and in which the women are noted for sitting with their feet pointing to the left. Yes, well, I have absolutely no idea how or why these preposterous customs became established in the first place, but the savages take them with the utmost seriousness. My Captain Bourke says that these are due to their innately superstitious nature. On my very first day here, I immediately cast my feet in the wrong direction and there suddenly issued from the women in our tent all manner of disapproving clucking and general distress. The old crone went so far as to wave her stick at me, jabbering like a mad hen. Of course I pay no attention to the position of my feet and shall continue to sit in the lodge with them pointing in whatever direction I damn well choose—regardless of the deep anxiety this appears to cause my tentmates. So you see, Hortense, just as in my “old” life, I am already a fly in the ointment of savage society, already rocking the conventional boat, already considered to be something of a scandal … which has always seemed to be my mission in whatever culture I live, does it not?

  Ah, but here was a lovely surprise: My fellow wives have sewn for me the most beautiful wedding gown upon which I have ever gazed. It is made of
antelope hide—the softest skin imaginable—sewn with sinew thread and intricately embroidered with beads and porcupine quills, and dyed with the essence of roots in exquisite colors and designs. I was completely flabbergasted—and very much touched—when they presented it to me, for it must clearly represent hundreds of hours of the most intensive labor imaginable and would seem to indicate that they have accepted me into their family—and in very gracious fashion, indeed. It is, I understand, common practice for the bride’s family to make for her an elaborate wedding dress, but as we are all without our families here, other women of the tribe have taken it upon themselves to dress us properly for the occasion. In fact, all of our other women have also been presented with wedding dresses—in most cases made for them by the sisters and mothers of their intended. I may surely be prejudiced in the matter, but of those dresses I’ve seen so far, mine is by far the most beautiful, certainly the most elaborately decorated. Perhaps because I am to marry the great Chief, special attention was taken in its creation … Even the sullen and unfriendly Quiet One participated in the making of this gown—which is not to suggest that she is warming in any way to my presence.

  As you might well imagine, I and most of the other ladies have balked at giving up our own clothing in favor of the savage attire. The clothes and meager personal possessions which we have brought with us into this wilderness represent our last connection to the civilized world, so we are naturally reluctant to part with them—for fear that once we don savage garb, we become perforce savages—not just the brides of savages, but savages ourselves. This is, you understand, an important distinction … Some in our group are so intent on keeping up their attire and toilet, no matter how inappropriate these may be, that they can sometimes be seen promenading through the camp—little gaggles of our ladies strolling and chatting and twirling their parasols as if on a garden tour, trying desperately to appear oblivious to our present circumstances. I think that they are quite mad—indeed, some of them really are mad—but while I personally have decided to give up such attempts to forge civilization out of wilderness, I must admit that I have not quite yet resigned myself to dressing exclusively in animal skins.

  Fortunately, the Cheyennes are traders, as well as hunters, and some of their attire is not so terribly different from our own. They have available, for instance, cloth and blankets and buttons, and other articles from our world. Indeed, some of the men dress quite ludicrously in bits and pieces of white man’s clothing, wearing altered U.S. Army uniforms, and hats—all misshapen and with the tops cut out and eagle feathers protruding from them. This gives the Indians who affect this attire the appearance of children playing dress up; they look more like carnival clowns than soldiers—their outfits bizarre hybrids of the two cultures …

  I’m pleased to report that my own intended dresses very modestly in traditional Indian garb. The only white man article which he affects is a large silver peace medal around his neck, a gift from President Grant himself.

  But I seem to be rambling again … where was I? Ah, yes, with the exception of Miss White and some of her more strident followers we are to be married in traditional Cheyenne wedding gowns. We are to be dressed prior to the feast by our Cheyenne “mothers” and “sisters,” literally stripped of our civilized clothing and dressed as savages—this is difficult to describe to you Hortense and, I’m certain even more difficult for you to understand, but the prospect is somehow both … terrifying and exhilarating.

  Without intending to keep you in undue suspense, I shall continue this correspondence after I am officially a bride … right now there is much to do.

  21 May 1875

  Good God, Hortense, so much to tell you, I am only now, two days later awakening from the experience … I am still not myself, fear that I shall never again be the same. I have been drugged, my senses assaulted, my very being stripped to its primitive core … its savage heart … where to begin … ?

  The music … still beats in my mind, throbs through my body … dancers whirling in the firelight … coyotes on the hilltops and ridges, taking up the song beneath the moon …

  22 May 1875

  Forgive me, dear sister, but I fell back into a deep slumber after my last incoherent ramblings … I must have slept the full day and night round and I woke feeling better, stronger, a child grows inside of me … is it possible? Or have I only dreamed this, too …

  Yes, the scene of our wedding night is even more vividly etched now in my mind … let me describe it to you:

  The moon was full in the sky; it rose early before the sun had set and did not set again until after the sun rose; the moon spent the entire night crossing the sky, illuminating the dancers in an unearthly glow, casting their shadows across the plains as if the earth itself danced … all who danced lit by moonlight.

  We spent nearly the full day of the wedding in our lodges being dressed by the women, ornaments and totems hung from our clothing and from our hair, our faces painted with bizarre designs so that we would hardly recognize one another later under the pure white moon … perhaps this was just as well, perhaps our painted faces were meant as disguises, allowing each of us, savage and civilized alike, to act out these pagan rites in anonymity. It is true that several days later—or so I feel it to be for I have lost all track of time—we “civilized” women are hardly able to look one another in the eye for the madness that overcame us.

  The men had recently returned from a successful buffalo hunt—stupidly, it had never occurred to me that the Cheyennes had been waiting for that good fortune to befall them before scheduling the wedding feast, because of course, without the bounty of the hunt, it would be a poor feast, indeed. Clearly, I have as much to learn about the ways of subsistence living as they do about those of civilization.

  As it was, individual feasts were held in virtually every lodge in the camp, a kind of large, communal, movable feast. There was a vast amount of food, much of it surprisingly palatable. The first wife, Quiet One, is renowned in the camp for her talents as a cook and outdid herself on this occasion. She roasted the tender ribs and liver of the buffalo over coals, and boiled the tongue, and from another pot served a stew of meat and the wild turnips referred to by their French name, pommes blanches. There were other roots and various spring greens with which I am not familiar by name, but all quite interesting to the taste. We “brides” were not allowed to lift a finger—to the point that even our food was cut up for us in small morsels and hand-fed to us by our Indian attendants, as if they were trying to conserve our strength … now I understand why.

  There was one particular dish that I must tell you about, a dish that most of our women, myself included, were unable to tolerate. Too horrible! Too despicable! Boiled dog! Yes, yes, choked pup! It is considered a great delicacy, saved for just such a special occasion as our wedding. My friend Feather on Head who served the older one as a kind of sous chef, performed the gruesome task of wringing the little puppy’s neck just prior to cooking —which she did with her bare hands as casually as if she was wringing out a dishcloth. My God! When I tried to intervene, to rescue the poor little thing from her death grip, she merely laughed and pulled away and continued her stranglehold until the flailing puppy was limp and lifeless. It was then scalded in boiling water, scraped of hair, gutted, and roasted over the fire, and all present made such a fuss about its culinary qualities with much satisfied oohing and ahhing and general lip-smacking. I could not bring myself to taste the dog meat—even its odor while cooking sickened me.

  Our tipi was crowded with twelve people exactly, the majority of them clearly chosen because they were poor. You would know little about this, Hortense, because you have led such a sheltered and privileged life, but there is a universality to poverty that transcends culture; just as in our own society, there are among the savages both rich and poor—those who are successful hunters and providers who live in well-appointed lodges with many hides and robes and have a good string of horses, and those who have little and depend on the large
sse of their neighbors. And never have I seen a more generous, selfless people than these. I believe that those unfortunates who came to our lodge that night—there, you see, already I begin to take a proprietary interest in my living quarters!—were the families of men who had been killed in battle, or possibly the families of some of those poor wretches whom we had encountered at the forts—the drunks and beggars who had deserted their wives and children … one can’t help but wonder what we are doing to these people that their lives and livelihoods unravel so with our presence—“spoiled” by contact with us, as the Captain put it …

  It seems to be a primary duty of my husband … how strange to say … my husband Little Wolf … as head Chief to look after the poor of his people. Several women brought children of various ages with them to the feast; they sat quietly in the back of the lodge, silently accepting the food their mothers passed them.

  After all had eaten, the younger children, sated, fell asleep on the robes, the men passed a pipe and told stories, which of course, I could not understand, but to which the older children listened raptly. Possibly it was the effect of the food, or the warmth inside the lodge, or simply the soft murmuring of the men’s voices—I confess that I am beginning to find the language less objectionable; it possesses a certain rhythm and cadence that though primitive is no longer so displeasing to the ear—I began to fall into a kind of trance, a state that was like sleep, but I was not asleep, just floating as if in a dream, as if drugged.