Helen Hunt Jackson campaigned for the rights of native Americans. She published A Century of Dishonor (1881), castigating United States policy, which led to Congress appointing her to a commission to study the issue and publishing her Report on the Condition and Needs of the Mission Indians of California (1883). She was not satisfied with the impact of these reports, so she wrote the novel, Ramona. “If I could write a story that would do for the Indian a thousandth part what Uncle Tom’s Cabin did for the Negro, I would be thankful the rest of my life.”
Ramona was the “daughter of an unnamed Indian woman and a Scotch seaman named Angus Phail.” Ultimately, Señora Moreno took charge of Ramona and her fortune, which Ramona was to receive upon marrying worthily. Ramona was raised in luxury alongside Felipe, Señora Moreno’s only child. She didn’t know her Indian parentage. Señora Moreno planned for her to marry a Mexican aristocrat. Instead, Ramona ran off with the Indian Alessandro Assis.
With Alessandro, Ramona is subject to all the atrocities that the Americans inflicted on the Indians, including having their land and homes stolen, and being starved and murdered. “According to Ramona, those who were victims of Manifest Destiny were not just human beings; they were paragons of industry, gentle creatures who were hardworking, law-abiding, and devout.”
Helen Hunt Jackson died shortly after Ramona was published (August 12, 1885). However, her work was not forgotten. On January 12, 1891, Congress passed “the Act for the Relief of the Mission Indians in the State of California. This bill not only established a fund for the aged and destitute, but called for the appointment of a three-man commission, which, covering the same ground that Jackson had, ultimately set aside approximately 136,000 acres on twenty-six reservations for 3,200 Mission Indians, reservations that still exist today.”
The heroes of Ramona were the Mission Indians,
the Mexicans, and the Franciscans, against the Americans. “The American law
is different.” “It’s a law of thieves!” cried Ramona. “Yes, and of murderers
too,” said Alessandro.” “They are a pack of thieves and liars, every one of
them!” cried Alessandro. The other heroes were Capitan, Felipe’s sheep dog;
Benito, Alessandro’s horse; and Baba, Ramona’s horse.
Helen Hunt Jackson was friends with Emily Dickinson.
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