Steven Spielbergâ??s Lincoln takes history seriously. While some of the details may be contrived â?? there is no record of black Union Army soldiers being assigned to greet the Confederate commissioners en route to negotiate a peace treaty â?? the film for the most part follows fact scrupulously. Much of the dialogue is based on contemporary letters and journalistic accounts.
Spielbergâ??s obsession with historical accuracy extends even to background.
In two scenes featuring General Grant, viewers will notice standing behind him the silent, striking presence of an American Indian in the uniform of a Union Army officer.
He is not there for setting. The man depicted is Ely Parker, a lawyer, engineer, life-long friend of Grant, and full-blooded Seneca, whose life story would justify a movie of its own.
It deserves telling.
Ely Parker was born in 1828 at IndianFalls on the Tonawanda Indian Reservation, near Akron, New York. His father, Seneca Chief William Parker was a veteran of the War of 1812. In his long and eventful life, Parker himself would rise to the rank of Chief, and to wear the Red Jacket medal, originally awarded by President George Washington to Chief Red Jacket after their peace negotiations, and inherited by Jimmy Johnson, Parkerâ??s grandfather.
Parker was educated on the Reservation, then taken up to Canada where he was taught to hunt and fish.
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