Charles Blue Jacket (1817 – October 29, 1897) was a

Shawnee The Shawnee ( ) are a Native American people of the Northeastern Woodlands. Their language, Shawnee, is an Algonquian language. Their precontact homeland was likely centered in southern Ohio. In the 17th century, they dispersed through Ohi ...

chief in Kansas, as well as a

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...

minister. He was the grandson of the Shawnee Chief

Blue Jacket Blue Jacket, or Weyapiersenwah (c. 1743 – 1810), was a war chief of the Shawnee people, known for his militant defense of Shawnee lands in the Ohio Country. Perhaps the preeminent American Indian leader in the Northwest Indian War, ...

by his son George Blue Jacket. Charles' mother is unknown, but is believed to have been a Shawnee. His maternal grandmother was the daughter of a Shawnee woman and

Jacques Baby Jacques Bâby, dit Dupéron (1731 – August 1789) was a French Canadian fur trader who later became an employee of the British Indian Department. He worked in the Detroit area, where he acquired large amounts of land on both sides of the Detroit ...

. The younger Blue Jacket was born along the south banks of the

Huron River The Huron River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map , accessed November 7, 2011 river in southeast Michigan, southeastern Michigan, rising out of the Huron Swamp in Springfie ...

in Michigan in what is today

Monroe County, Michigan Monroe County is a County (United States), county in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 Census, the population was 154,809. The largest city and county seat is Monroe, Michigan, Monroe. The county was establi ...

. However, a very short time after Blue Jacket's birth, the family moved to

Piqua, Ohio Piqua ( ) is a city in Miami County, Ohio, United States, along the Great Miami River. The population was 20,354 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Located north of Dayton, Ohio, Dayton, it is part of the Greater Dayton, Dayton metro ...

. Blue Jacket was educated at the Quaker School in Piqua and mission schools in Kansas. The Blue Jacket family moved to Kansas in 1833. He served as an interpreter for the United States governor and was a farmer and businessman in what is today

Kansas City, Kansas Kansas City (commonly known as KCK) is the third-most populous city in the U.S. state of Kansas and the county seat of Wyandotte County. It is an inner suburb of the older and more populous Kansas City, Missouri, after which it is named. As ...

and its vicinity. He raised large numbers of hogs and cattle.John P. Bowes. ''Exiles and Pioneers: Eastern Indians in the Trans-Mississippi West''. (Cambridge University Press, 2007) p. 230 Also, in 1855, Blue Jacket and two of his brothers opened a ferry on the

Wakarusa River The Wakarusa River is a tributary of the Kansas River, approximately long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed March 30, 2011 in eastern Kansas in the United States. It drain ...

at Lawrence, Kansas, called Blue Jacket's Crossing. He served as chief of the Shawnee tribe from 1861–1864. Two of his sons served in the Union Army during the American Civil War, and one of his daughters-in-law killed one of the raiders under

William Quantrill William Clarke Quantrill (July 31, 1837 – June 6, 1865) was a Confederate States of America, Confederate guerrilla leader during the American Civil War. Quantrill experienced a turbulent childhood, became a schoolteacher, and joined a group ...

who had invaded her home. In 1869, Blue Jacket moved to Oklahoma with most of the other Shawnees.

Bluejacket, Oklahoma Bluejacket is a town in eastern Craig County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 339 at the 2010 census, an increase of 23.7 percent over the figure of 274 recorded in 2000. History Bluejacket was founded as a station designated by th ...

, received its name because he settled nearby, and he served as the town's post master and as the minister of the town's Methodist Church.

References

Sources

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another short article on Blue Jacket
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bluejacket, Charles People from Monroe County, Michigan People from Piqua, Ohio People from Kansas City, Kansas Methodist ministers 1817 births 1897 deaths 19th-century Shawnee people Shawnee leaders