The Curse of Tekumseh: How an Indian Chief Reckoned with the Presidents of America

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

There are many curses known in world history - some of them come true, others do not. But there is one thing that has not allowed itself to be forgotten for more than one hundred and fifty years, because it concerns the presidents of America and is performed with enviable accuracy. One may not believe in the mysticism of Indian magic, but it is difficult to argue with the facts: in accordance with the curse pronounced by the Indian chief of the Shawnee tribe in 1813, seven US presidents were killed or died before the end of their term of office, and two subsequent ones were attacked.

The Shawnee were a large tribe. They lived in the territories of the modern American states of Kentucky, Ohio, Maryland, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. The expansion of white settlers drove the Indians from their native lands to the more southern and arid ones, today the remains of a huge genus number only a few thousand Shawnee. Tekumse was one of the last leaders who ruled over a huge and warlike people. From the age of 14, he participated in wars and earned the fame of a fearless fighter. He owns the famous words:

Tekumse witnessed more and more lands taken from his people by deception and force. The leader tried to take the only step that could change the situation - to unite the scattered Indian tribes into one union, and he almost succeeded. The Indian Union really existed for some time, but the tribes not accustomed to discipline, of course, could not withstand the military might of the white settlers. On October 5, 1813 Tekumse was killed in action. A legend has survived that before his death, the fearless leader, for violation of the contract with his people by the whites, uttered a curse. The Indian predicted that every American president elected per year, divisible by 20 without a remainder, will die or be killed before the end of the presidential term.

The main offender Tekumse was the first to be cursed. William Henry Garrison - the same president who, while still governor, took away from the Indians about 12,000 square kilometers of land. He was elected in 1840 and died a month after his inauguration. In the future, the curse of the Indian leader came true with amazing accuracy. Over the next hundred-odd years, all presidents elected in a year divisible by 20 did die or perish in office.

Abraham Lincoln (elected 1860) survived the first term safely, but after re-election in 1864 he was killed. The bloody Civil War has just ended, and one of the supporters of the defeated southerners shot the president in the head in the theater during a performance. James Garfield (elected in 1880) was president for only six months. At a train station in Washington, he was shot by a mentally unstable man who had a personal resentment against Garfid - he did not appoint him ambassador. By the way, modern researchers are inclined to think that in fact the wound received by the president was not so dangerous, but the case was completed by inept doctors. Alexander Bell himself tried to find a bullet in the body of a living president using his electric metal detector, but he failed and Garfield soon died.

William McKinley (re-elected 1900) … Less than a year after his re-election, he was wounded by an American anarchist who believed that the president was evil incarnate. McKinley died a week later, and newspapers compared his death to both Garfield and Lincoln. The curse of the Tekumseh has become quite tangible for the Americans.

Warren Harding (elected 1920) - the twenty-ninth President of the United States managed to sit in a high chair longer - about two years. After that, he died, presumably from a massive heart attack, although the version about poisoning was very much discussed. Suspicions fell even on his wife, since Harding was a famous bohemian and bohemian entertainer.

Franklin Roosevelt (elected 1932, re-elected 1936, 1940 and 1944) … This outstanding president is remembered for the fact that he was elected for more than two terms, but he was in vain to tempt fate. Of course, this man had a very difficult time - the world economic crisis and the Second World War. He died when he returned from the famous Yalta conference on April 12, 1945. The cause was a cerebral hemorrhage.

John F. Kennedy (elected 1960) … The mysterious murder that shook the whole world can be considered a loud end to the fatal curse (it was the seventh and last in this tragic series). On November 22, 1963, in the city of Dallas, while the presidential cortege was following the streets, the 35th President of the United States was wounded and died half an hour later on the operating table.

In the future, the curse of Tekumse seemed to loosen its tight grip a little. The next president falling under it is Ronald Reagan (elected 1980), - was also wounded during an assassination attempt in 1981, but survived thanks to modern medicine. However, in the 19th century, such a wound would have been considered fatal (the president had a lung hurt). George W. Bush (elected 2000) also survived an assassination attempt in Georgia, but the grenade thrown on the podium did not explode, so it is possible that after the seventh generation and the change of the millennium, Indian magic stopped taking the lives of American presidents.

Most often, evil fate overtakes one surname: 5 famous families, whose history makes you believe in the ancestral curse