AMBASSADOR Robert Holmes Tuttle

Speeches, Remarks & Events

22 November 2006
Remarks by Ambassador Robert H. Tuttle at the Southwark Cathedral service and dedication of the memorial to Sachem Mahomet Weyonomon by Her Majesty the Queen

Your Majesty, Your Royal Highness, My Lord Bishop, Dean, Chairman Two Dogs, Ambassador Brown, Ladies and Gentlemen,

Hello, everyone, and good morning!

Or, as they say in the language of my own Chickasaw ancestors:

Mishiho  okla  chukma  nitaki!

Your Majesty, by granting the audience denied by disease and death to Sachem Mahomet Weyonomon, Your Majesty brings to a conclusion a distant chapter in our transatlantic history. Given my roots in a tribe that was also brought to near extinction, I am particularly honored to share this day, and this occasion, with you, Chairman Two Dogs and Ambassador Brown.

Historically, the Chickasaw lived much farther to the east than our current home in Oklahoma, but we are distantly related to the Mohegan, as cousins in the Algonquian language.

So, in this season of Thanksgiving for Americans, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you, on behalf of all Americans, but particularly the Mohegan people, for your presence here today.

Through the good offices of this cathedral, we have honored Sachem Mahomet with this service, and leave this stone as reminder to generations to come of a time in which our peoples were not always at one. But more importantly, of this moment, as a symbol of our friendship and unity - across water and time.

It is a timely lesson in remembering, and of thanks, as well as a reminder of our identity and sense of self, going into the future.

Thank you, everyone, and good day. Or, to try my hand at the language of our guests:

Taput  ni  Wami  Skitopak  Wikun  Kisk.

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