VII The Prince of Indian Preachers
Without disparagement to any of his brethren in the ministry, this title can be properly applied to the Rev. John Baptiste Renville, of Iyakaptapte, (Ascension) South Dakota, who recently passed on to join the shining ranks of the saved Sioux in glory.
Timid as a little child, yet bold as a lion, when aroused; shy of conversation in private, yet eloquent in the pulpit and in the council-chamber; yielding yet firm as a rock, when duty demanded it; a loving husband, a kind father, a loyal citizen, a faithful presbyter—a pungent preacher of the gospel, a soul-winner—a courteous, cultured Christian gentleman; such a man was this Indian son of a Sioux mother, herself the first fullblood Sioux convert to the Christian faith.
He was the youngest son of Joseph Renville, a mixed blood Sioux and French, who was a captain in the British army in the War of 1812 and the most famous Sioux Indian in his day. After the war, he became a trader and established his headquarters at Lac-qui-Parle, where he induced Dr. Thomas S. Williamson to locate his first mission station in 1835.
John Baptiste was one of the first Indian children baptized by Dr. Williamson and he enjoyed the benefits of the first school among the Sioux. He was rather delicate, which hindered his being sent east to school as much as he otherwise would have been. However, he spent several years in excellent white schools, and he acquired a fair knowledge of the elementary branches of the English language. The last year he spent at Knox College, Galesburgh, Illinois, where he wooed and won Miss Mary Butler, an educated Christian white woman, whom he married and who became his great helper in his educational and evangelistic work.
John B. Renville[1] John P. Williamson, D.D. Daniel Renville
John Eastman Charles R. Crawford
All Indian Ministers Except Dr. Williamson
[1] Died Dec. 19, 1904
The Rev. Thomas S. Williamson, M.D.,
Forty-five years a Missionary to the Sioux.
He was the first Sioux Indian to enter the ministry. In the spring of 1865, he was licensed to preach, by the presbytery of Dakota, at Mankato, Minnesota, and ordained in the following autumn. When he entered the ministry, the Sioux Indians were in a very unsettled state, and his labors were very much scattered; now with the Indian scouts on some campaign; again with a few families of Indians gathered about some military post, and anon with a little class of Indians, who were trying to settle down to civilized life.
In 1870, he became the pastor of Iyakaptapte, (Ascension) a little church in what subsequently became the Sisseton reservation. Both physically and in mental and spiritual qualities, he was best adapted to a settled pastorate. His quiet and unobtrusive character required long intercourse to be appreciated. However, in the pulpit, his earnestness and apt presentation of the truth ever commanded the attention even of strangers. Under his ministry, the church increased to one hundred and forty members. More than half a dozen of them became ministers and Ascension was generally the leading church in every good work among the Dakota Indians. No one among the Christian Sioux was more widely known and loved than Mr. Renville. In the councils of the church, though there were seventeen other ministers in the presbytery before his death, he was ever given the first place both for counsel and honor. He twice represented his presbytery in the general Assembly, and he was ever faithful in his attendance at Synod and Presbytery and active in the discharge of the duties devolving upon him.
Mary Butler, the white wife of his youth, died several years ago. Their daughter Ella, a fine Christian young lady passed away at twenty years of age. She was active in organizing Bands of Hope among the children of the tribe. She sleeps, with her parents on the brow of Iyakaptapte overlooking the church to which all their lives were devoted. Josephine, the Indian wife of his old age, survives him and remains in the white farm house on the prairie in which John Baptiste Renville spent so many years of his long, happy useful life. He died December 19, 1904, in the seventy-third year of his age.