Existing comment:
Red Jacket (Sagoyewatha), c 1758-1830
Renowned Seneca chief Sagoyewatha, who fought along with other Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) for the British during the American Revolution, received the name "Red Jacket" from the scarlet coats he habitually wore. In his dealings with the new American republic, he excelled as an orator and negotiator, always resisting any encroachment upon ancestral lands or Native customs and beliefs. In March 1792, Sagoyewatha led a delegation of Haudenosaunee to meet with George Washington in Philadelphia. Sagoyewatha supported the Americans during the War of 1812, but after participating in several battles, he proposed that Native Americans fighting on both sides withdraw from the war.
Especially proud of the large peace medal that President Washington presented to him, Sagoyewatha was rarely seen without it, and it appears in the image that Charles Bird King painted in Washington in 1828.
Albert Newsam, after Henry Inman, after Charles Bird King, 1834 |