TECUMSEH AND THE SHAWNEE CONFEDERATION

This latest entry in the Library of American Indian History series chronicles the life of the courageous Shawnee leader, Tecumseh, a gifted, charismatic, and ``brilliant, spellbinding orator'' who attempted to unite the Native Americans into an intertribal confederacy and an independent nation against newcomers. Stefoff (Finding the Lost Cities, 1997, etc.) recounts with sympathy and empathy, how Tecumseh ``was determined to keep white settlers out of the Indian lands north of the Ohio River.'' Tecumseh's impressive, historic encounter with William Henry Harrison, the governor of the Indiana Territory, showed that he was not someone to be easily manipulated as were other native people who sold lands they did not own for trinkets and alcohol. One of the lessons of this compassionate biography is that essential differences regarding land-owning made it impossible for Native Americans and non-natives to understand one another. Tecumseh attempted ``to establish a principle that the lands should be considered common property and none sold without the consent of all.'' Despite Tecumseh's brilliant communication and negotiation skills, he was unsuccessful ultimately as a warrior and a leader and was mortally wounded during the Battle of the Thames in 1813. In Stefoff's work, his legend of integrity and courage, as well has his ``remarkable brilliance, dignity, and honor,'' lives on. (b&w photographs, maps, index, not seen, chronology, further reading, notes) (Biography. 11-13)