POETRY VERSUS FACT
FICTION AND HISTORY

The following letter was written by David Green in reference to the wide-spread article about his brother Joseph, which was covered here previously in “He Wasn’t the One”. Apparently a collection of poems by a Nebraska poet, which referenced this event, provoked an article in The Platte Journal attempting to correct the story. Here is David Green’s response to the inquiry, as printed in the paper.

Dayton, Ill., March 31^st, 1871
J. G. Higgins, Esq., Columbus, Neb –

Dear Sir: — Yours of the 7^th inst. asking for information was duly received, in which you give some extracts from a poem written by the Rev. Orsamus C. Dake, entitled the “Raw Hide,” which is found in a recent publication entitled “Nebraska Legends,” with the following preface:

“A certain man, of a small company moving up the great plain of the Platte, in a spirit of bravado, said he would shoot the first Indian he met; which he did, having shortly afterward found a Pawnee woman a little separated from her tribe. But a band of warriors, pursuing, demanded from his companions the surrender of that man, which being refused, the Pawnees made ready to slay the whole company of whites, whereupon the offender being given into their hands, they flayed him alive. From this circumstance the little stream, on whose banks it occurred takes the name of the ‘Raw Hide.’”

The Rev. Mr. Drake has given in the above, the substance of a report which in 1849 found its way into nearly every newspaper in the United States, and no doubt but he together with many others, in good faith and very innocently believes that such a tragedy did really take place as stated, but the whole story is a base and unmitigated falsehood from beginning to end, as there never was the least foundation for said report. The hoax was gotten up in Magnolia, Putnam county, Illinois, in a bar-room to gull a gaping crowd, without any thought of its going any further, but someone present took it to be true and communicated it to the editor of a paper published in Lacon, Marshall county, Illinois, from which it was, as stated, very extensively copied.

On receipt of yours I wrote to Hon. Wm. E. Parret now of Winona, Illinois, but at the time the hoax was gotten up he resided in Magnolia, Illinois, and in reply he says, “That two men by the name of D. P. Fyffe and David Law, of Magnolia, got up the hoax out of whole cloth. The said Mr. Fyffe of Magnolia, over his signature of the 27^th inst, says “It (referring to said hoax) originated here and was known to be a hoax.” I merely give you the above that you may know where said report originated.

My Father, two Brothers and some twenty or thirty others from this county were the company referred to, and my brother Joseph Green was the reported victim, who would have been the last man in the world to make any such threat, or be guilty of any such rash act.

The said company went out to California in the spring of 1839 – he Joseph Green returned in 1851 – went out to California again in 1852, returned in 1853, and died in this place in 1855, with the consumption. A more noble, kind-hearted and generous man never lived, and I hope you will use your best efforts to correct this infamous slander upon his fair name.

I am, very respectfully,
D. Green¹

1. The Platte [Nebraska] Journal, April 12, 1871, p2, col2.