The Chippewa (now more commonly known as the Ojibwa) were one of the
most populous and widely distributed indigenous peoples of North
America. Indeed, some have estimated they were the largest and most
important tribe north of Mexico. By 1800 the Ojibwa were living in
Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota,
Illinois, Indiana and Ohio.
Edwin James first encountered the
Chippewa when he was serving as a physician in the United States Army
in various frontier outposts in the Great Lakes region. There he met
John Tanner, the son of a Kentucky pioneer family. Tanner had been
captured as a boy during an Ojibwa raid. But after living two years in
an Ojibwa village, he was given to a woman of the Ottawa tribe who
accepted him as a son. Because of his fluency in both English and
Chippewa, Tanner was recruited to work for the U.S. government as an
interpreter.
This copy is autographed on the inside front
cover: Propriete de Mr. Bonduel. This is the signature of Belgian
missionary Father Florimond Joseph Bonduel (1799-1861). Between 1830
and 1860, Bonduel founded missions and parishes in the Wisconsin,
Michigan and Minnesota territories. In the 1830’s he spent several
years working among the Menomini, a Chippewa speaking tribe in the
Wisconsin territory.
There is a connection between Bonduel and
one of the translators of this Chippewa Testament. John Tanner’s
daughter Martha, whose mother was of the Ottawa tribe, got to know
Bonduel when she was one of his parishioners at his mission on Mackinac
Island, Michigan. Later in a letter to Bonduel she expressed her great
admiration for the priest.
Notes by Rev. Lawrence B. Porter, Associate Professor, Dogmatic Theology
