Why the Red River is Red

 (RED LAKE OJIBWE LEGEND)

In regard as to how the Red River received its name, Rev. E. G. Wright of Oberlin, who came to Red Lake in 1843, and was a missionary for forty years among the Chippewa Indians of northern Wisconsin and Minnesota, states that the Indians informed him that under the water was another world, and that long ago there was a desperate battle there and a great many of the people and animals were killed, their blood causing the water to turn red.  Others of the Indians on the Red River banks attributed its name to the bloody battles fought between the Sioux and Chippewas in canoes on the river, the blood of the slain coloring the water.
From Collections of the State Historical Society of North Dakota (1906)