Upon opening one large mound at Lake Lawn farm, eighteen skeletons were discovered by the Phillips Brothers. The heads, presumably those of men, are much larger than the heads of any race which inhabit America today. From directly over the eye sockets, the head slopes straight back and the nasal bones protrude far above the cheek bones. The jaw bones are long and pointed, bearing a minute resemblance to the head of a monkey. The teeth in front of the jaw are regular molars.
There was also found in the mounds the skeletons, presumably of women, which had smaller heads, but were similar in facial characteristics. The skeletons were embedded in charcoal and covered over with layers of baked clay to shed water from the sepulcher.
La Cross Tribune , November 4, 1912
FIND BONES IN INDIAN MOUND
Normal Professor and Students Excavate Historical Hills Near Stoddard
Fifty Skeletons Unearthed
Remains of Giant Aborigines Discovered; Weapons and Utensils are Buried
More than fifty skeletons of the ancient moundbuilders were unearthed Saturday from five mounds in the town of Stoddard by a party of normal students and professors who made a special trip to investigate them. Valuable relics were also uncovered which will be on exhibition at the normal museum.
The country around La Cross has long been known as the center of Indian activities in centuries long past and as evidence of this fact there are many mounds in this vicinity. About thirty years ago agents of the Smithsonian Institute of Washington D,C. Investigated several mounds in what is now the town of Stoddard. They unearthed much valuable material in the line of skeletons, arrow heads and spear heads from the first few of a chain of a dozen mounds and at the present time there is in Washington a Stoddard collection of Indian relics.
Since that time the Smithsonian officials have often considered opening more of the mounds but nothing more has been done. Spurred on by the generous offer of A. White, who owns the ground on which are located five large mounds to donate the contents to the normal school museum, the normal authorities recently took the matter up and several local citizens generously provided a fund for the expenses of an expedition to unearth the contents.
Dig into Ancient Graves
Professors A. H. Stanford and W. H. Thompson of the department of history and L. P. Denoyer of the geology department together with a company of thirteen students left on a Saturday morning with shovels to examine the ancient graves. Professor Austin and some of his students surveyed and made a contour map of the field determining the dimensions of the mounds and the lay of the surrounding country. The expedition was of a scientific character and the results of the investigation will appear in printed form.
A large mound in the center, probably the grave of an Indian chief, was adjoined by two smaller ones on each side. The latter were investigated first and the efforts of the diggers were rewarded at once by the unearthing of a skeleton about five feet down which measured six feet and a half in length. The skull was very large being eight inches in diameter from ear to ear. The teeth were well preserved but the other bones quickly fell to pieces. The first mound yielded eleven skeletons. The second contained only charcoal and burned bones indicating cremation.
Skeletons and Implements
The middle mound which was the largest required much effort to excavate. More than twenty skeletons were found besides the bowl a clay peace pipe, a copper arrow head, copper skinning knife, a sandstone spearhead and several flint arrowheads. The fourth eminence yielded over twenty-five skeletons, pieces of clay pottery and a bear's tooth. The last mound, after digging about six feet down, brought up a large spear point of quartz with a red coloring design on each side.
After the land had been levelled it was decided to dig a little deeper and it was then that two more skeletons were discovered, which apparently were buried at an earlier historical period than the first five. The skeletons were of a man and a woman facing each other, lying on their sides in an attitude of repose. Their hands were folded and their knees had been drawn up in a cramped position. Man was a Giant.
These two skeletons have not been removed. An effort will be made to take up the earth and leave them in their original position and move them to the state historical library. Charles E. Brown secretary of the state archaeological society hads been on the ground gathering details as soon as he learned of the discovery. The measurements show that the man was a “giant.” He was at least 6 feet 3 inches high and might have been six inches higher owing to the extreme difficulty in measuring the man in such a cramped and bent over position.
The End of the Allegewi Hopewell
There was a sign from the sun, the like of which had never been seen and reported before. The sun became dark and its darkness lasted for 18 months. Each day, it shone for about four hours, and still this light was only a feeble shadow. Everyone declared that the sun would never recover its full light again.”
John Ephesus, 535 A.D.
The year 535 marked great changes across the globe. In South America, Teotihuacan vanishes, the
Roman Empire falls, the Persian empire crumbles and in North America it is the end of the Adena
Hopewell Empire. 535 A.D. was a time of plague, famine and the beginning of the Dark Age in
Europe. Why? According to to David Keys in, Catastrophe: A Quest for the Origins of the Modern
World, 1999, these events were caused by the volcanic Indonesian island of Krakatoa exploding and
sending the world into what would be the equivalent of a "nuclear winter."
The Delaware Indians kept an account of their history in what is called the “Bark Record” also
known as the “Walam Olum.” This history was preserved on painted sticks, translated by Rafinesque
from the original symbols and the Algonquin words written along with them by an interpreter who
understood both. The movement to the south of the Delaware and the Algonquin people also coincides
with David Keys theories that there was a cataclysmic event that occurred in 535 A.D; effecting the
weather for years after the explosion of the island of Krakatao. The Walam Olum chronicles the
Algonquin Nations movements from the north (Canada) to the south into lands inhabited by the Adena
Hopewell. What event caused the whole Algonquin Nation to move south? The Walam Olum says, “It
freezes where they abode, it snows where they abode, it storms where they abode, it is cold where they
abode.” Did the explosion on the Isle of Krakatoa and the ensuing global cataclysm precipitate the
Algonquin nation's move to the south? Did those eighteen months without sunlight cripple the
Allegewi Hopewell empire to the point where they too moved south, abandoning the earthworks in the Ohio Valley, or where they defeated in battle by the the Algonquin tide that appeared in overwhelming
numbers from the north?
The Prehistoric Aborigines of Minnesota and Their Migrations, N. H. Winchell, 1908
It will be anticipated, from what has been said thus far, that the original mound-builder dynasty in
the Ohio Valley was destroyed by an incursion of hostile people belonging to the Algonquin stock. It
will burden of the rest of this paper to establish that great prehistoric event, and to show what effect it
had on Minnesota.
Dr. Cyrus Thomas is to be accredited with the most thorough investigation of the aboriginal
earthworks of the country. Under the direction of the Bureau of Ethnology he has established some
important generalizations and has traced out some of the movements of the tribes that were concerned
in the war which resulted in the expulsion of the original mound-builders from Ohio and the contiguous
regions. Suffice it to say here that he considers that the evidence shows a movement, at least an
extension, of the earliest mound-builders from the region of eastern Iowa, southeastern Minnesota, and<
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southwestern Wisconsin, across Illinois and Indiana into Ohio. He shows that these people were driven
out toward the east and southeast. He traces this retreat, which may have required several hundred
years for its completion, with the most patient and convincing research, and arrives at the conclusion
that when the whites came upon the scene the defeated and expelled people were known as Cherokee,
living in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee, and were still building mounds
But this line of persistent agression from the northwest to the southeast, resulting in the expulsion of
the Cherokee from the upper part of the Ohio Valley, was not the whole of the great war, though it is
part that has been established by evidence like that adduced by Dr. Thomas. It can hardly be
questioned that such an incursion would have had disastrous effect on the mound builders of the whole
Ohio Valley, and that they were driven out at the same time by the same hostile force.”
Cyrus Thomas based some of his findings from the accounts of John Heckwelder, a Moravian Missionary, living with the Delaware or Lenni-Lenape in Pennsylvania, who gave the first printed
account of the migrations and subsequent hostile incursion of the Delaware into the Allegewi Hopewell
homeland.
The History, Manners and Customs of Indian Nations Who Once Inhabited Pennsylvania and the Neighboring States, John Heckwelder 1822
Their object was the same with that of the Delaware’s; they were
proceeding on to the eastward, until they should find a country that
pleased them. The spies, whom the Lenape had sent forward for the
purpose of reconnoitering, had long before their arrival discovered that
the country east of the Mississippi was inhabited by a very powerful
nation, who had many large towns, built on the great rivers flowing through their land. These people
(as I was told) called themselves Talligewi. Colonel John Gibson however, a gentleman who has a
thorough knowledge of the Indians, and speaks several of their languages, is of opinion that they were
not called Tallegewi, but Allegewi, and it would seem that he is right, from the traces of their name
which still remain in the country, the Allegheny river and mountains having indubitably been named
after them. The Delaware still call the former Allegewi Sipu, the River of the Allegewi. We have
adopted, I know not for what reason, its Iroquois name, Ohio, which the French had literally translated
into La Belle Riviere, The Beautiful River. A branch of it, however, still retains the ancient name
Allegheny.
Many wonderful things are told of this famous people. They are said to have been remarkably tall
and stout, and there is a tradition that there were giants among them, people of a much larger size than
the tallest of the Lenape.”
The Allegewi name still survives in the Allegheny Mountains and River. Further, the Ohio River’s
ancient name was Allegewi Sipu or the river of the Allegewi. Allegewi mounds are found within the Ohio River drainage or on the Ohio River itself which supports this connection. The Delaware also say
that there were giants among the Allegewi.
A series of circular fortifications were constructed from Kosciusko County in north central Indiana
across the southern tier of Lake Erie and Ontario and east along the St Lawrence River. Many of these
forts have been attributed to the Iroquois, but there are also indications of an earlier Adena presence
who may have allied with the Iroquois in northern Ohio and east along the southern tier of the Great
Lakes. Were these Allegewi forces sent north to stem the tide of the Algonquin invasion?
There is evidence of Allegewi in apparent large numbers south of the Great lakes. Robert Converse
writes in The Archaeology of Ohio, 2003 : “Strangely, nearly all the large classic Flint Ridge Allegewi
spears have been recorded as isolated surface finds in northern Ohio. Although these typical cultural
objects-spears, cache blades, pendants and gorgets occur as burial accompaniments in the mounds of
the Allegewi homeland in southern Ohio and the Ohio River Valley, they are not commonly found as
surface artifacts there. At no place in the entire Allegewi area do they occur in the numbers seen in
northern Ohio.”
In addition to the large amounts of Allegewi arrows and spearheads found in Northern Ohio and
along the southern tier of the Great Lakes, there are accounts of mass graves containing large skeletons.
Historical Collections of Ohio, 1849, Howe V. I., Pt, 1.,
Ashtabula County There were mounds situated in the eastern part of the village of Conneaut and an extensive burying ground near the Presbyterian Church, which appear to have had no connection with the burying places of the Indians. Among the human bones found in the mounds were some belonging to men of gigantic structure. Some of the skulls were of sufficient capacity to admit the head of an ordinary man, and jaw bones that might have been fitted over the face with equal facility; the other bones were proportionately large. The burying ground referred to contained about four acres, and with the exception of a slight angle in conformity with the natural contour of the ground was in the form of an oblong square. It appeared to have been accurately surveyed into lots running from north to south, and exhibited all the order and propriety of arrangement deemed necessary to constitute a Christian burial. On the first examination of the ground by the settlers they found it covered with the ordinary forest trees, with an opening near the center containing a single butternut. The graves were distinguished by slight depressions disposed in straight rows and were estimated to number from two to three thousand. On examination in 1800, they were found to contain human bones, invariably blackened by time, which on exposure to the air soon crumbled to dust. Traces of ancient cultivation observed by the first settlers on the lands of the vicinity, although covered with forest, exhibited signs of having once been thrown up into squares and terraces, and laid out into gardens.
History of Huron and Erie Counties, Ohio, 1879
Near these forts were mounds or hillocks, which were found to contain human bones, promiscuously
thrown together, as if a large number of bodies had been buried at one time. The skull bones, when
found entire, were shown to be larger upon average, than those of the present race, and all exhibited
marks that would indicate that life had been taken in deadly combat.
History of Erie County, Pennsylvania, Illustrated, 1884
An ancient graveyard was discovered in 1820, on the land known as the Drs. Carter and Dickinson
places in Erie, which created quite a sensation at the time. Dr. Albert Thayer dug up some of the
bones, and all indicated a race of beings of immense size.
History of Niagara County, New York, 1878
Town of Cambria A search enabled them to come to a pit, but a slight distance from the surface. The top of the pit was covered with slabs of the Medina Sandstone, and was twenty-four feet square by four and a half in depth, the planes agreeing with the four cardinal points. It was filled with human bones of both sexes and all ages. They dug down at one extremity, and found the same layers to extend to the bottom, which was the same dry loam, and from their calculations they deduced that at least four thousand souls had perished one great massacre. In one skull two flint arrowheads were found, and many had the appearance of having been fractured and cleft open by a sudden blow. They were piled in regular layers, but with no regard to size or sex. One hundred and fifty persons a day visited this spot the first season, and carried off the bones. They are now nearly all gone and the pit ploughed over. The remains of a wall were traced near the vault. Some of the
bones found in the latter were of unusual size. One of these was a thighbone that had been healed of an oblique fracture. One was the upper half of a skull so large that that of a common man would not fill it.
Pioneer Society of Michigan, 1876 (Ontario Canada) We frequently hear of the discovery of the skeletons of a gigantic race, and we are therefore the more puzzled to know to what race the mound builders belonged, for although we are called a new country, comparatively speaking, we may be the oldest.
A few years ago an article appeared in the Toronto Telegraph stating that in the township of Cayuga in the Grand River, on the farm of Daniel Fredenburg, five or six feet below the surface, were found two hundred skeletons nearly perfect, in a string of beads around the neck of each, stone pipes in the jaws of several of them, and many stone axes and skinners scattered around in the dirt. The skeletons were gigantic, some of them measuring nine feet, and few of them less than seven. Some of the thigh bones were six inches longer that any now known. The farm had been cultivated a century and was originally covered with a growth of pine. There was evidence from the crushed bones that a battled had been fought and these were some of the slain. Were these the remains of Indians or some other race? Who filled this ghastly pit?
Migrations of the Lenni Lenape or Delawares American Antiquarian, Vol., 19, 1897
“The relation, geographically, of the Iroquoian family to the Algonquins may, it is presumed, be
taken as an indication that the former preceded the latter in the possession of the eastern territory,
whether we adopt the one theory or the other, in reference to the general course of migration, Dr.
Daniel Wilson in his paper on "The Huron-Iroquois of Canada" (Royal Society of Canada, 1884) takes
the view in regard to the comparative ages of these two groups in this region. As a stream meeting an
obstruction it cannot overwhelm, divides and circles about it, so it would seem that the Algonquin tide,
finding the firmly planted Iroquois an obstruction it could not sweep away, flowed around them, filling
the unoccupied spaces. What was the general course of the Algonquin tide? As there are few, if any,
The Nephilim Chronicles: Fallen Angels in the Ohio Valley Page 42