Note 24 — Chapter XVIII

The name of Tamenund is doubtless familiar to all Americans who have taken the slightest interest in the history of the Indian tribes, as well as to that more numerous class who have read the graphic and picturesque descriptions penned by the great American novelist: nevertheless, it may be necessary, for the information of some European readers, to state that Tamenund was an ancient Lenapé chief, whose traditionary fame is so great in the tribe, that they have from time to time given his name to chiefs, and even to white men whom they desired especially to honour. At the time of the revolutionary war, so numerous were the traditions and legends respecting this hero, that he was in some quarters established as the patron saint of America, under the name of St. Tammany; and hence arose the Tammany societies and Tammany buildings in various parts of the Union.—See Heckewalder’s Historical Account of the Indian Nations, chap. xl., and The Last of the Mohicans, vol. iii. p. 152, &c.