Seth and Mary Eastman

I'm glad you're finding this material interesting! I've also realised that, in the 1840s, when the Pond brothers were in the midst of their missionary work, the commander of Fort Snelling was Seth Eastman, who became well known for his paintings and drawings of Native Americans, particularly of the Dakota. And his wife, Mary Eastman, lived in the fort too and learned the Dakota language. In 1849 she published a book with the title, Dahcotah; or, Life and Legends of the Sioux Around Fort Snelling, her husband providing the illustrations. (An electronic edition is available here.) Mary's voice seems very much to dominate the book but she does sometimes quote Dakota speakers, so that, in a sense, the book resembles the missionaries' linguistic texts in constituting an archive of lost voices. The Mississippi River is often the setting of the events she describes.

One of the illustrations from Mary Eastman's book.