| FOOTNOTES 1Captain Belknap's account (Michigan History, Vol. 13, pp. 144-145) of the twins on the Thornapple is in many ways so accurate that we may speculate that the sisters, being regarded as virtually one person, may both originally have been married to Hazy Cloud. According to Indian custom, both would have been named Flying Cloud Woman. Kewiniquot (Returning Cloud) was actually a great Ottawa chief, the grandfather of Mme. La Framboise who preceded Robinson as a trader on the Grand River. Since Hazy Cloud was only the chief of a small band, he no doubt welcomed the opportunity to marry off his "sister" to Robinson. 2The fact of Miss-a-quot-o-quay's consumption may have prompted Mary E. Robinson's assertion (Michigan History, Vol. 6, p.280) that she divorced Rix and returned to her tribe after the prescribed 100 moons. That this did sometimes occur can be seen in the relationship between the trader Daniel Marsac of Lowell and his Indian wife. When the white families began arriving in the area, Marsac became ashamed of his squaw. Putting her aside, he returned to Detroit and married a French girl. His relationship with the Indians was destroyed however; and he soon turned to farming. 3It was probably Sippi-quay whom the diarist (Michigan History, Vol.43, p. 458) mistook for Robinson's wife. The numerous "half-breed" children were no doubt just members of Rix's extended and extensive Indian family. 4Interestingly enough the tale about Rix's second wife being the daughter of a Saginaw chief (Michigan History, Vol. 6, p. 282) is not entirely false. Sippi-quay's father, Hazy Cloud (Nah-tun-e-ge-zhic), was the son of Mix-i-ni-ni, a signer of the 1819 Saginaw Treaty. Following the land cession Mix-i-ni-ni joined his father-in-law, Noonday (No-no-qua-he-zhic) at Grand Rapids. 5 "Isabella County Enterprise," August 17, 1881, p.1 on microfilm, Clarke Historical Library, Central Michigan University. 6The Traverse Region, H. R. Page and Company, p.25. |