‘Crow Mary’ tells about the courage to speak truth and remain loyal to your heritage

The book, "Crow Mary" by Kathleen Grissom.

Goes First listens to her grandfather, the Crow Chief Red Fox, tell stories of braves returning with scalps from their enemies, the Sioux. She then cries and tells her story; watching her grandmother crumble to the ground, her chest turning red from a shattering gun blast. 

“I didn’t go see. I ran away” she said. Her grandfather reminded her, “No one is without fear. There will be times in your life when you will be very afraid, but the brave take action in spite of that fear.” 

She wonders, “Will I ever be that brave?” 

“You already are,” Red Fox Says, “It is the brave who tell the truth.”

This month’s featured review

Kathleen Grissom’s biographical fiction book “Crow Mary” is a look inside the life of Goes First. Her story begins in 1863 as a young girl and continues to 1892 into her adulthood. Grissom is a New York Times bestselling author of “The Kitchen House” and “Glory Over Everything.” For “Crow Mary,” Grissom blended with ease historical facts with fiction to tell the tale of this fascinating woman from the Crow Tribe in southcentral Montana. 

Goes First, who became known as “Crow Mary” after she marries a white trapper, lives by truth. Truth to her family, her heritage and culture, truth to her love and herself. The reason behind her new name, Crow Mary, according to the preacher who performed her marriage, was that a lot of Crow women who married white men came to be known as “Marys’” because of the English name convenience. 

Goes First accepted Mary but wanted her name to be set apart from other Marys; and so Crow Mary was adopted to manifest her independence.

Family is everything to Crow Mary. She trusts that the Crow ways will fortify her children to survive in two different worlds; hers and the “yellow eyes.”

Even though her husband provides a house for her, she takes her children to her tipi lodge frequently to help them remember the Crow customs and skills. She lovingly teaches her daughter to bead.

Mary did not know her husband when they first married but she grew to love him and supported him throughout their marriage even when he was disloyal. Being true to herself made her great-grandmother in the forward of the book state, “That she faced this world with such bravery makes me proud to think I carry her blood.”

She has to make decisions based on her wit and wisdom. Her actions taken after the Cypress Hills Massacre of 1873 showcase her courage and fortitude. After spending the winter trapping season in Canada, Mary and her husband Abe Farwell prepare to return to Montana. A tragedy occurs when some drunken “wolfers” attack a Nakoda camp near Farwell’s trading post resulting in the massacre of elders, warriors, women and children. Five Nakoda women are taken captive and brutalized. Mary saw these women taken and vows to rescue them by herself when her husband refuses to help.

Exercising her stubborn resolution, she single-handedly secures their release aided by the threat of using two handguns in her possession. This scene in the book is a catalyst to other events through decades of time.

This is a story of untold hardships, conflict and love. The underpinning theme of honoring nature throughout the novel brings fresh insights into Mary’s identity. 

The narrative is insightful and packed with history of the Crow Nation. From Mary’s beginning, listening to her grandfather’s stories, to the end as her great-grandmother listens to Mary’s stories, we can all learn and marvel at the way stories help us understand ourselves and the world.

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