Black Hawk (Sauk Leader) - Early Life

Early Life

Black Hawk, or Black Sparrow Hawk (Sauk Makataimeshekiakiak, "be a large black hawk") was born in the village of Saukenuk on the Rock River, in present-day Rock Island, Illinois, in 1767. Black Hawk's father Pyesa was the tribal medicine man of the Sauk people. The Sauk people used the village in the summer for raising corn and as a burial site, while moving across the Mississippi for winter hunts and fur trapping.

Little is known about Black Hawk's youth. He was said to be a descendant of Nanamakee (Thunder), a Sauk chief who, according to tradition, met an early French explorer, possibly Samuel de Champlain. At age 15, Black Hawk accompanied his father Pyesa on a raid against the Osages, and won the approval of his father by killing and scalping his first enemy. The young Black Hawk then tried to establish himself as a war captain by leading other raids, but met with limited success until, at age 19, he led 200 men in a battle against the Osages, in which he personally killed five men and one woman. Soon after, he joined his father in a raid against Cherokees along the Meramec River in Missouri. After Pyesa died from wounds received in the battle, Black Hawk inherited the Sauk medicine bundle that had been carried by his father.

After an extended period of mourning for his father, Black Hawk resumed leading raiding parties over the next years, usually targeting the Osages. Black Hawk did not belong to a clan that provided the Sauks with civil leaders, or "chiefs". He instead achieved status through his exploits as a warrior, and by leading successful raiding parties. Men like Black Hawk are sometimes called "war chiefs", although historian Patrick Jung writes that "It is more accurate to call them 'war leaders' since the nature of their office and the power that it wielded was much different from that of a civil chief." The term "war captain" is preferred by some historians.