Red Jacket - A noted orator and chief of the Wolf Clan of the Seneca indians, born about 1756 in Seneca County, New York.  His Indian name was Sagoyewatha, which meant "He Who Causes Them to Be Awake."

He obtained the name Red Jacket during the Revolutionary War when a British officer, attracted by the chief's ability and brilliance gave him a red jacket, which in time became characteristic of him.

Cornplanter, the great Iroquois chief, once termed Red Jacket a coward to his face, and urged his wife to leave him.

Although Red jacket made peace with the Americans after the Revolution, he consistently opposed the white man's way as being neither good nor proper for the Indian.  In 1792 when he visited Philadelphia, he was presented by George Washington with a medal bearing the President's own likeness.  This medal is now in the Buffalo Historical Society.

Before the War of 1812, the Canadians tried to persuade Red jacket to join the Algonkins and help the British gain territory of the Ohio Valley, but he refused.  When war actually started Red jacket fought on the American side.

Red Jacket died January 20, 1830, and his final resting place is Forest lawn Cemetery in Buffalo where a monument was unveiled to the great chief on June 22, 1891.
 
 

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[ Brant ][ Burial ][ Cornplanter ][ Iroquois ][ Orators ][ Eli Parker ][ Tarhe ]