Tecumseh/Proctor Pipe Ax by Glen McClain

Glen McClain Display at the 2012 CLA Show

below is one of these axes

Ceremonial pipe tomahawk (ca. 1790-1810) a gift from Colonel Henry Proctor. The eye is teardrop, the pipe bowl is tall and almost nozzle shaped. The overall height of the head has increased with both a taller bowl and a longer blade. The obverse side of the blade is engraved in script letters: 

To Chief Tecumseh

From Col. Proctor

MDCCCXII

Henry Proctor was commander of the British forces with whom Tecumseh’s Shawnees served during the War of 1812.

Wood, iron, lead

26” x 8.9”

This ax was probably presented to the Shawnee war chief at Fort Malden, in amherstburg, Ont. Late in the autumn of 1812. During that summer, when the War of 1812 officially started, Tecumseh led Native warriors against the Americans  on the Detroit frontier. In mid-august he joined with British forces, led by General Isaac Brock, to capture Detroit from General William Hull and an American army.

-R. David Edmunds (Cherokee), Anne and Chester Watson Chair in History, University of Texas Dallas School of Arts and Humanities

This essay is excerpted from Infinity of Nations: Art and History in the collection of the National Museum of the American Indians, edited by Cecil R. Ganteaume and published by Harper Collins in Association with the National Museum of the American Indian.

American Indian, Spring 2012 

(the above expert is from this magazine with Glen's display)

Photographed at the 2012 CLA Show by Jan Riser.