USA > California > Lassen County > Fairfield's pioneer history of Lassen County, California to 1870 > Part 20
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The next morning ten men, William and John Dow, Tunison, Priest, Demming, Luther Spencer, Tutt, Frank Strong, Bangham, and Dr. Spalding, started for the scene of the murder. They had no snowshoes and the snow being so deep in places that they had to break a trail, they made slow progress and it was late, nearly sundown, when they reached the Demming cabin. When Jaek left home his brother was doing some washing. He had just made a pair of snowshoes and he said he was going down to the valley to practice on them as soon as he had finished his work. Evidently he had done this, and while he was gone the Indians came and took the two guns that were in the house. They went into the cabin, or behind it, and waited for him to come back, and when he was about twenty feet from the door
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they shot him with a load of buckshot. When it hit him he gave a convulsive spring and struck twelve or fifteen feet away from the snowshoes. The Indians dragged his body into the cabin and stripped it and threw it into a little cellar under the building. They then took everything that would be of any use to them, bedding, clothing, etc., and the two horses and went away. What Jack left beside the cabin door was gone, too, and this showed that the Indians were close enough to hear him yell and came back, but he was out of their reach when they got there. It was a close call for him, for if he had reached home a little sooner, they would have got him, too.
The first thing to do was to dispose of the dead man's body. All they could find to work with was a small piece of iron and a board. They managed to loosen up the ground in the cellar with the iron and then scoop it out with the board and in this way dug a shallow grave. They wrapped the body up in a blanket that one of the party happened to bring along and putting it into the grave, covered it up as best they could. Demming said it was all right for he intended to move his brother in the spring. William Dow wanted to go in pursuit of the Indians at once. He said they had taken so much plunder that they could not have gone very far, and if the white men would start right out after them, they could overtake them that night and then wait until daylight and take them in. But the rest of the party thought it was not advisable to do this. The weather was very cold, the snow was deep, and they were not prepared for such a trip. Besides this Demming was in no shape, physically or mentally, to go along, and it would not do to divide the party and leave some of them with him. So they started back right away and reached home about five o'clock Sunday morning.
Some of the early settlers say that a while before this murder was committed Jack Demming was at an Indian dance a few miles below Susanville. Among those present was a Pit river Indian who wore a high-crowned Mexican hat. Demming made a good deal of fun of the hat and finally jammed it down over the Indian's eyes and the crowd all laughed at his struggles to get the hat off. The Indian was very angry, but there were so many white men present that he did not dare to do anything then. Perhaps it was not known for certain, but the whites supposed that this Indian had something to do with the murder.
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Ben Neuhaus and others say that the Indians thought it was Jack Demming they were killing and were sorry that they killed his brother. It is also said that Jack Demming killed a good many Indians when there was no excuse for his doing it.
Of course the people of Honey Lake valley were greatly excited and angered by this murder, and believing that it was committed by the Pah-utes, demanded that Captain Weatherlow take his Honey Lake Rangers, which he says was a company of sixty men still in organization, and march against them at once.
The following petition was sent to Governor Roop :
"Susanville, Nevada Ter., Jan. 15, 1860.
"Dear Sir-We, the undersigned, would most respectfully urge the necessity of your Excellency's calling out the military forces under your command to follow and chastise the Indians upon our borders. We make this request to your Exeelleney from the fact that we have received information that we fully rely upon, to the effect that Mr. Demming has been murdered, and his house robbed, on or about the 13th instant, by Indians, within the borders of Nevada Territory. Your petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever pray, etc.
A. D. McDonald, William Brayton, E. Aubrey, E. A. Rower, W. M. C. Cain, William Dow, N. Purdy, F. Drake, Chas. King- man, Wm. Hamilton, D. Chandler, G. W. Fry, E. Brannan, Wm. Hill, J. E. Shearer, Geo. W. Shearer, Jas. Belcher, E. R. Nichols, Cyrus Smith, I. N. Boswiek, S. S. Smith, W. C. Taylor, J. M. Painter, C. Brown, Fred Morrison, G. W. Mitchell, John D. Robinson, S. H. Painter, Milton Craig, A. A. Holcomb, Wm. Hobby, A. D. Beecher, Dr. Jas. W. Stettinias, Dr. H. S. Borrette, B. E. Shumway, L. Vary, Joshua H. Lewis, Wm. Arullary, Thomas Bare, Z. C. Dow, Thos. Sheffield, E. G. Bangham, Henry Hateh, F. H. Moshier, U. J. Tutt, G. W. Lathrop, O. Streshly, J. Borrette, Dan Murray, J. H. Hollingsworth, E. L. Varney, Jas. A. A. Ohen (or Cohen), A. L. Tunison, Jas. Huntington, M. S. Thompson, Clark Doty, Alex. McLoud, Wm. D. Snyder, S. D. Patten, A. W. Worm, John Altman, A. B. Jenison, L. D. Sanborn, J. S. Haggett, W. Taylor, C. A. Fitch, F. Long, Mark W. Haviland, John Morrow, H. Kingman, J. E. Ellison, M. C. Thaderson (or Shaderson), J. W. Shearer, J. L. O'Donnell, J. W. Doyle, H. E. Arnold, L. J. Spencer, B. B. Gray, B. B.
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Painter, P. W. Shearer, James McFadden, J. H. Anderson, A. Ramsey, J. E. Parker, John Taylor, T. Campbell, F. A. Sloss, S. Conkey, C. Hall, Antonio Storff, C. T. Emerson."
Captain Weatherlow says: "I told them that the Pah-utes had always been friendly and as there existed a treaty between Winnemucca and ourselves which thus far had not been broken it was better to go and see Winnemucca and ascertain the truth of the matter. I believed it might have been the Pit river Indians whose country lay to the north of Honey Lake and who frequently made hunting excursions as far south as Willow creek. A meeting of the citizens was then held and its was agreed that I should send a Lieutenant of my company (Tutt) with fifteen men to trace the murderers and ascertain if it was the Pah-ute or Pit river Indians. I did so. The party was out four days, tracked the Indians through snow, recovered the horses, and came back and reported that it was the Pah-utes who were known as the Smoke Creek band which had drawn away in a measure from Winnemucca's control and recognized a chief known as Smoke Creek Sam as their leader."
This is the story of that trip after the Indians as Dow, Tutt, and Strong told it. Just as soon as they could get ready, in a day or two, Tutt, William Dow, Priest, Demming, Strong, Lute Speneer, and another man started out after the Indians. They found that the night before they killed Demming the Indians camped at the old Rice cabin about a mile north of the place where the murder was committed. (This must have been the cabin built by Johnson and Todd in the fall of 1859.) The night after the murder they camped at the head of a canyon only a few miles northeast of there, and if the white men had followed them as Dow wished, probably they would have killed all of them. The Never Sweats were on foot and it was slow work travelling through the snow. The first night they stayed at the Rice cabin and the second one on the side of the mountain southeast of Horse lake. The next day they found the Indians camped at Snow Storm creek. Long before the whites reached their campoodie the Indians saw them and got into a big rock pile near by. There they had a good natural fort and they had the two Demming guns, or perhaps more, and some ammunition, and the white men were out on the flat without any shelter. When they got within shooting distance the Indians stood up
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on the rocks and made insulting gestures and dared them to come on, and when a man came close enough they took a shot at him. The Honey Lakers stayed there several hours working every plan they could think of to get at them, and Spencer showed a great deal of bravery and took some desperate chances trying to kill an Indian. Finally they came to the conclusion that the Indians had the best of it and there was no use of staying any longer. One of the men said that he and Spencer crawled toward the rock pile and got pretty close to it. Before long he happened to look baek and saw that the others were going away. He called to Spencer and told him about it and then jumped to his feet and ran faster than he ever did before in his life. When he got out of range he stopped and looked back. Spencer was so angry because the rest of them quit that he deliberately got on his feet, threw his gun over his shoulder, and strolled away with his nose in the air as carelessly as though there was not an Indian within a hundred miles of him.
They went back to the Indian eamp and got the things they had taken from Demming. Among them were the books, the axes, Demming's fiddle, and the two horses. They had food enough for only one day more, it looked as though a big storm was coming on, and so they started for home as soon as they could get ready. A little after dark they reached the plateau east of Pete's valley, and as it was very cold and the wind was blowing fiercely, they found a big juniper tree and camped in its shelter that night. The next day they came into the valley.
The reader must remember that this, and probably all the winter expeditions in pursuit of Indians, was made by men on foot. Frequently the weather was bitterly cold and sometimes the snow was deep. They had to get along with few blankets and food of the simplest kind and they were in luck if they had enough of that. Of course they had no tents and their only shelter from the winter storms was what they could get from brush and roeks and from the trees, if they were fortunate enough to be where there were any. They wore leather boots without any overshoes and frostbitten feet must have been a common thing. Subduing the wilderness may sound romantic on paper, but in reality there was very little romance about it, especially that part of it which related to the chasing of Indians in the winter.
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Lieutenant Tutt made his report on the 24th of January. Captain Weatherlow says: "Another meeting of the citizens was held and they again demanded that I should take my company and march out against the Pah-utahs. I told them that at that time there were 3000 head of stock at Pyramid lake protected by only a few herders, there were settlers located in small valleys remote from each other and distant from the settlement at Honey lake, and that small parties of prospectors were scattered through the mountains in every direction all of whom would be hopelessly exposed and murdered if I made an attack upon the Indians at that time. It was then agreed that I should go and have an interview with Winnemucca, inform him of the murder and demand redress."
On the 28th Governor Roop appointed Captain William Weatherlow and Thomas J. Harvey commissioners to visit Winne- mucca. They performed their duty and on their return made the following report which, with the correspondence also given, is taken from T. and W's. History of Nevada.
"Susanville, February 11, A. D. 1860.
"Your Excellency : We, the undersigned, your commission- ers, appointed Jan. 28, A. D. 1860, to proceed to the camp of the Pah-ute tribe of Indians, respectfully report that we proceeded across the country from this place in the direction of Pyramid lake; that on the third day of our travel we were met by a band of about (30) thirty Pah-Ute Indians, well mounted, who, with a war-whoop surrounded us and prevented us from proceeding to the main camp. We were detained over night by the same party of Indians, under a strict guard, the said Indians utterly refusing to give us any information as to the whereabouts of their chiefs. On the following morning we were released from imprisonment and ordered to return to Honey Lake valley. We travelled two or three miles in the direction of Honey Lake valley, and there being a dense fog, we came to the determination to travel across the country to the crossing of the Truckee river, and follow down said river to Pyramid lake. Arriving at Pyramid lake we found an encampment of the Pah-Utes, but from the contradictory reports of the said Indians, we were unable to ascertain where either of the chiefs could be found. We then travelled down the lake about ten miles, and found another encampment, which proved to be the camp of Winne-
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mucca, the war chief of the Pah-Utes. We represented to the chief that we were sent to them by the whites, to ask of the chief the delivery of the murderer or the murderers of Mr. D. E. Demming, in accordance with a treaty made and entered into between the Pah-Utes and the citizens of Honey Lake valley, at the same time inviting the chief to return with us and settle our difficulties amicably.
The chief acknowledged that according to the said treaty, we were warranted in making the demand, but after making many excuses, he refused to interpose his authority in preventing depredations upon the whites on the part of his followers. We then asked him to appoint some future time to visit us. He said that he would not come at all, and that the citizens of Honey Lake valley must pay him $16000 for Honey Lake valley. We have ascertained that he is at this time levying blackmail by demanding from one to two beeves a week from the herders of stock, there being two or three thousand head of stock in his immediate vicinity, herded by so few that they dare not refuse his demand. We find also that the owners of said stock can not drive them to the settlements from the great depth of snow between Pyramid lake and Honey lake, Washoe and Carson valleys. We believe that the Pah-Utes are determined to rob and murder as many of our citizens as they can, more especially our citizens upon the borders. Finding it impossible to bring the Indians to any terms of peace, notwithstanding the advan- tages offered them, we determined to return as speedily as possible and make this our report to your Excellency.
William Weatherlow, T. J. Harvey."
Probably it was on this trip that the lives of these two men were saved by a young Indian called Pike who had been raised by Harvey. As the story is told they had been captured by the Indians and Pike talked them into letting Harvey go. Harvey told Pike that Weatherlow was a good man and asked him if he didn't remember that whenever they two visited him he, Pike, was given a bed and food and treated as well as any one. Harvey refused to go away and leave Weatherlow. The Indians held another council and finally gave the two men their property and told them to go.
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In his statement Captain Weatherlow says: "Who had in- structed the chief to demand that particular sum ($16000) or indeed any sum of money from the settlers of Honey Lake, I can not imagine, but certain it is that up to that time Winne- mucca was always willing that the whites should occupy the valley and gave them land freely, his one desire in return seemed to be to have a house and learn to till the soil and live like a white man.
"On our return to Honey Lake I stopped at the camps of the herders at Pyramid lake and informed them of the approach- ing danger and advised them to remove their stock as soon as possible. They said the snow was so deep they could not go away and they might as well remain and take the chances of losing their cattle by the Indians as to attempt to drive them through the snow. But they begged me that the Honey Lake people should make no demonstration against the Indians until they could remove. I promised to protect them all I could."
The next day after the commissioners made their report Governor Roop asked assistance from the General commanding the Pacific department and thoroughly explained affairs in this part of the country. His letter to General Clark was as follows : "General Clark, U. S. A.,
Commander of the Pacific Department.
"Sir: We are about to be plunged into a bloody and pro- tracted war with the Pah-Ute Indians. Within the last nine months there have been seven of our citizens murdered by the Indians. Up to the last murder we were unable to fasten these depredations on any particular tribe, but always believed it was the Pah-Utes, yet did not wish to blame them until we were sure of the facts. On the 13th day of last month Mr. Dexter E. Demming was most brutally murdered at his own house, plun- dered of everything and his horses driven off. As soon as I was informed of the fact I at once sent out fifteen men after the murderers (there being snow on the ground they could be easily traced) with orders to follow on their tracks until they would find what tribe they belonged to, and if they were proved to be Pah-Utes not to give them battle, but to return and report, as we had some two years ago made a treaty with the Pah-Utes, one of the stipulations being that if any of their tribe committed any murders or depredations on any of the whites we were first
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to go to the chiefs and that they would deliver up the murderers or make redress, and that we were to do the same thing on our part with them. On the third day out they came onto the Indians and found them to be Pah-Utes, to which I call your attention to the paper marked A. Immediately on receiving this report, and agreeable to the said treaty, I sent Capt. William Weatherlow and Thomas J. Harvey as commissioners, to proceed to the Pah-Utes headquarters and there inform the chief of this murder and demand redress. Here allow me to call your atten- tion to the paper marked B. It is now a pretty well established fact that the Pah-Utes killed these eight men, one of them being Mr. Peter Lassen. How soon others must follow is not known for war is now inevitable. We have but few good arms and but little ammunition.
"Therefore, I would most respectfully call upon you for a company of dragoons to come to our aid at once, as it may save a ruinous war to show them that we have other help besides our own citizens, they knowing our weakness. And if it is not in your power at present to dispatch a company of men here, I do most respectfully demand of you arms and ammunition, with a fieldpiece to drive them out of their forts. A four or six pounder is indispensable in fighting the Pah-Utes. We have no Indian Agent to call on, so it is to you that we look for assistance.
"I remain your humble servant,
"Isaac Roop,
"Governor of Nevada Territory. "Susanville, February 12, 1860.
"P. S. Sir :- If you should forward to us arms, ammunition, etc., I hereby appoint Col. J. H. Lewis to receive and receipt for and bring them here at once. "I. Roop."
No attention was paid to this appeal-at least no troops were sent and no arms and ammunition were furnished.
CADY AND BLODGETT KILLED BY THE INDIANS Told by Dwelley and LeGrow
During the winter of 1859-60 Asa S. LeGrow, Melzer B. Dwelley, Hank Tufts,-Cady, Joseph Blodgett, and others- quite a large party-had a camp in the lower end of Long Valley. Dwelley, perhaps LeGrow, and some of the rest of the
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party belonged in Sierra valley, but that winter they were ranging their cattle near where they were camped because there was less snow there than at home.
The Indians had been troublesome that winter and in the spring the Sierra valley men drove their stock home as soon as they could get feed there. After several drives had been made, they got back to camp early one afternoon and Cady and Blodgett went out to drive up the horses. They belonged to Dr. Weber, who had cattle running in Dry valley just east of there, and Blodgett had them on shares. A little dog went with them and in a couple of hours he came back to camp. The men there thought that something must be wrong and as soon as they could, about dark, they started out on the trail of their two friends. They soon found the trails of other horses running into the trail they were following, and believing these had been made by the Indians, they went back to camp. Upon further search later on it was found that they had both been killed by the Indians.
THE PAH-UTE WAR. 1860
Taken from Thompson and West's "History of Nevada," Captain Weatherlow's Statement, the Newspapers of the day, and from what was told by the early settlers of Honey Lake and Long Valleys.
The winter of 1859-60 was the hardest one the whites had seen in the Great Basin. "The Territorial Enterprise," pub- lished in Carson City, in December, 1859, when telling of the arrival of Governor Isaac Roop from Honey Lake said: "The Indians in Truckee Meadows are freezing and starving to death by scores. In one cabin the Governor found three children dead or dying. The whites are doing all they can to alleviate the miseries of the poor Washoes. They have sent out and built fires for them, and offered them part of their provisions. But in many instances the starving Indians refused to eat, fearing that the food is poisoned. They attribute the severity of the winter to the whites. The Truckee river is frozen hard enough to bear up loaded teams." We have seen how near Governor Roop came to freezing to death on that trip.
The unkind treatment which the Indians received at the hands of many of the newcomers in Nevada awakened their anger
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against the whites, and when the hard winter came on numbers were led to believe that the Great Spirit was angry because there were so many white men in their country and in consequence the storms and cold weather were freezing and starving them.
In the latter part of April and the first of May, 1860, nearly all the Pah-ute Indians gathered at Pyramid lake to hold a council. They wanted to decide what to do in view of the faet that the whites were taking their land and killing off all their game. There were a good many chiefs there with their forces, among them the chiefs from Smoke creek, the Black Rock coun- try, and Humboldt Meadows. Old Winnemucca, whose Indian name was Po-i-to, was the head captain over all, the medicine chief of the tribe. He didn't have much to say one way or the other, but was known to be in favor of war. He was a shrewd politician and as long as things were going his way he was will- ing to keep still and make it appear that somebody else was responsible for what was done. There was, however, one chief among them who knew enough to foresee the result of a war with the whites. This was Numaga, whom the whites called "Young Winnemucca," the war chief. He was not, as the whites always supposed, the war chief of the Pah-utes. There was but one general chief. and that was Poito, at Pyramid lake. Young Winnemucca was the chosen leader of that branch of the tribe living on the reservation and did not claim any other authority. He and Old Winnemucca were in no way related and were never friendly.
Numaga was an Indian statesman of intellect, eloquence, and courage combined. He had lived in California and could speak the English language, and understood the superiority of the white race over the Indian. His power outside of his own band was only that of a superior mind working to better the condition of his race. "They knew he was capable, they believed him to be sincere, and it resulted in giving him influence more potent throughout the tribe than Poito's commands, consequently the whites came to look upon him as the war chief, and he would have attained that position had he outlived Old Winnemucca, alias Poito."
Before the council Numaga went to all the Indians and talked to them and tried his best to keep them from beginning a war that would result in their destruction. They listened to
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him respectfully, but their silence told him that they were opposed to him. He then went away by himself and lay face down on the ground without food or drink for three days. Some of the Indians told him that he had better go and live among the whites; others threatened to kill him and he told them to do so for he did not care to live.
When the council met the chiefs all got up and told their wrongs and demanded war. After they had all spoken Numaga walked in looking like a ghost and poured forth such a torrent of eloquence as these warriors had never before listened to. He told them that no doubt they had great wrongs, but the white men were as many as the stars above their heads and like sands in the beds of the rivers. If they whipped the white men of Nevada, those from California would come to help them and they would cover the land like a blanket. He told them they would be driven from their homes into the barren rocks of the north where their ponies would die, and where the old men and women would starve and they would have to listen to their children crying for food.
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