'Living history'

Red leaves descended from the branches of giant trees, landing in beds of grass. Stretching across the field, the sea of red appeared to mimic a battlefield stained by the blood of American soldiers.

As the leaves fall, they pass the silhouette of a large, tall monument commemorating the American soldiers lost that night. Veterans from American Legion Post 11, at the monument’s base, raise their rifles in the air and fire three shots in remembrance of the soldiers’ lost in the Battle of Tippecanoe.

On Saturday, the Tippecanoe County Historical Association, in partnership with the Legion Post, hosted a day of remembrance for the battle at the Tippecanoe Battlefield Museum and History Store.

The remembrance included history reenactors from the battle, a 21-gun salute from the American Legion Post 11 and a wreath laying ceremony.

John Wickett, 50, and his son Nolan, 18, were two of the reenactors at the event.
“I’ve been involved in living history since I was younger than my son and my son started participating with me when he was about nine,” said Wickett.

The two were dressed head-to-toe in a military uniform that soldiers during the battle would have worn. In their hands, they carried muskets that could fire ammunition, as John later demonstrated to a small crowd.

Every detail of their outfits had a purpose and took months to complete, they said.
“I put in a lot of late nights leading up to the (battle’s) bicentennial,” John said. “I was working on it for, I would say, most of 2011.”

The Battle of Tippecanoe took place on the morning of Nov. 7, 1811 said Trey Gorden, the Tippecanoe Battle Museum Manager from the TCHA. General William Henry Harrison and his troops were attacked in the night by Native Americans, called “Prophetsmen” by the reenactors, from the nearby town of Prophetstown.

Gordon said the attack took place at 4 a.m. and ended at sunrise with the retreat of the Prophetsmen from their camp.

According to Britannica, 62 American soldiers were killed and 126 were injured. 150 Native Americans were killed or injured.

Following the battle, the American soldiers went to Prophetstown to find it abandoned, John said. They took what food supplies remained and burned Prophetstown to the ground.

An 85-foot monument was erected at the location of the campsite where the battle took place in 1908. On the monument, it holds the names of the American soldiers who were killed in the battle. Several gravestones sit on the field that was the battleground 212 years ago. Those gravestones also belong to American soldiers.

A metal placard also rests on a boulder near the front of the museum, describing what the aftermath of the Battle of Tippecanoe yielded for Native Americans within the region.

“The 1811 Battle of Tippecanoe on this site was decisive, leading to the loss of their homelands and the removal of Indians from Indiana,” the 1996 placard reads. “At gunpoint, about 850 Potawatomi passed this location on Sep. 12, 1838 on a 660-mile trek known as the ‘trail of death’ because so many, mostly children, died along the way.”

But besides the placard, there is no significant memorial to the Native Americans lost in the battle near the memorial.

Even though much of the memorial focused on remembering the American soldiers who fought in the battle, Gorden said that this remembrance was for all who fought in the battle.

“Today, we remember the men and boys for the Battle of Tippecanoe.”