Artist: Pauline Johnson of the Mohawk, 1861-1913

Education for women was becoming more accepted in the 19th century, but a woman who was a published poet and novelist was still rare.  Even rarer still were Native women who wrote for publication.  Pauline Johnson, 1861-1913 a mixed-race Mohawk woman of the Six Nations Reserve in Ontario, Canada, beat these odds.

A word on her ancestry, because there are a great many myths and misconceptions.  The Mohawk traditional home range was New York.  In the 18th century, Anglo-Irish Indian Agent Sir William Johnson was well-known to the Mohawk and lived with a Mohawk woman, Mary (Molly) Brant, the sister of Mohawk war chief Joseph Brant.  The Mohawk had, for the most part, accepted and adopted to English customs, converting to Anglicanism and farming.  As was often customary, when a Mohawk person was baptized, he or she often took the name of a prominent White person.  Thus, in 1758, when Pauline Johnson's great-grandfather was baptized, he took or was given the name Jacob Johnson.  Jacob is a Bible name and Johnson honored Sir William.  However, Jacob was not, as is commonly asserted, a biological son or nephew of Sir William.  Jacob would go on to marry a Mohawk woman.  Their son, John Smoke Johnson, was a veteran of the War of 1812 and later made a Pine Tree Chief.  He was not a hereditary sachem, but was chosen as a chief because of his abilities in war, as well as his ability to work with Whites.

John Smoke Johnson married a woman of the Wolf Clan who carried the authority to chose one of the hereditary sachems of the Mohawk Nation.  Their son, George, was thus a Wolf Clan Sachem.  Like his father, George had a flair for public speaking, diplomacy and languages.  He was a church translator and government interpreter.  He fell in love with Emily Howells, the sister-in-law of an Anglican missionary with whom he worked as a translator.  Emily's family opposed the match because George was Mohawk.  George's family opposed the match because Emily, being White, would carry no status within the tribe.  They felt that a sachem should marry a woman who could transmit her status and clan membership to her children.  George and Emily stuck to their guns and, in 1853, they were married.  By 1856, George built Chiefswood, a timber mansion house similar to what well-to-do White families would have lived in at the time.  The families eventually came around and accepted the marriage.

Emily Pauline Johnson was born at Chiefswood in 1861.  Her parents instilled in her respect for both the Anglo and Mohawk heritages.  Grandfather John Smoke was still alive and his stories fired young Pauline's imagination.  She would grow up understanding Mohawk but not speaking it well.  While other Native children were sent away to boarding schools, Emily insisted on teaching Pauline at home.  George had acquired a library and Pauline loved poetry, devouring Tennyson, Keats, Browning and Longfellow.  At the age of 14, Pauline went to Brantford Central Collegiate and graduated in 1877.  A well-to-do young woman of the time didn't work outside the home, so Pauline had plenty of opportunity to begin writing and acting in amateur theatricals.  She published her first work, "My Little Jean" in 1883.  Then, in 1884, her father died.  The family rented out Chiefswood and moved to a modest home in Brantford.  Pauline now had to make her acting and writing pay.

In 1885, she published "A Cry From an Indian Wife," basing it on an incident from the recent Riel Rebellion.  She would later travel to New York, and write a poem honoring Seneca leader Red Jacket.  Then, in 1886, she wrote a poem to commemorate the unveiling of the Joseph Brant Statue in Brantford.  By the 1890's, she was regularly publishing in periodicals in Canada.  She began giving readings of her poems, wearing Native dress to recite works dealing with Native history and legends, and also writing conventional poetry of the time.  This was an era of interest in all things Native, including the Wild West shows of the period, which were popular throughout North America and Europe.  Later in life, she moved to Vancouver, where some of her work dealt with the local Suquamish people.  She died in Vancouver of breast cancer in 1913.  She was cremated and her ashes buried near Siwash Rock in Stanley Park.  In 1922, a memorial cairn was erected at the site.