USA > Idaho > History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana : 1845-1889 > Part 19
USA > Montana > History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana : 1845-1889 > Part 19
USA > Washington > History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana : 1845-1889 > Part 19
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168
INDIAN WARS.
his charge to the Nez Perce country. On the 24th of July Robie returned and communicated to Colonel Shaw, just in from the Grand Rond expedition, the disagreeable intelligence that the Nez Percés had shown a hostile disposition, declaring the treaty broken, and refusing to receive the goods sent them.1º This would have been unwelcome news at any time, but was most trying at this juncture, when half the force in field was quitting it to be mustered out of ser- vice. This exigency occasioned the call for two more companies of volunteers. Subsequent to making the call, Stevens decided to go in person to Walla Walla, and if possible to hold a council. A messenger was at once despatched to Shaw, with instructions to send runners to the different tribes, friendly and hostile, inviting them to meet him on the 25th; but accompa- nying the invitation was the notice that he required the unconditional surrender of the warring bands.
Stevens urged Colonel Wright to be present at the council, and to send three companies of regulars, in- cluding all his mounted men, to the Walla Walla Val- ley for that occasion. Wright declined the invitation to participate in the council, but signified his intention of sending Steptoe to Walla Walla to establish a post in that country.
On the 19th of August, Stevens set out from The Dalles with a train of 30 wagons, 80 oxen, and 200 loose animals, attended only by his messenger, Pearson, and the employés of the expedition. A day or two behind him followed the baggage and supply train of Steptoe's command. He arrived without accident at Camp Mason on the 23d, sending word in all directions to inform the Indians of his wish to meet them for a final adjustment of their difficulties at the council-ground five miles from Waiilatpu. At
10 See letters of W. H. Pearson and other correspondents, in Or. Statesman, Aug. 5, 1836; Or. Argus, Aug. 2, 1856; Olympia Pioneer and Dem., Ang. 5, 1856. Pearson, who was in the Nez Perce country, named the hostile chiefs as follows: Looking Glass, Three Feathers, Red Bear, Eagle-from-the-light, Red Wolf, and Man-with-a-rope-in.his-mouth.
169
FRUITLESS COUNCIL.
the end of a week a deputation of the lower Nez Percés had come in with their agent, Craig. At the end of another week all this tribe were in, but on the same day Father Ravelli, from the Cœur d'Alene mission, arrived alone, with the information that he had seen and conversed with Kamiakin, Owhi, and Qualchin, who refused to attend the council, and also that the Spokanes and other tribes declined to meet the superintendent, having been instigated to this course by Kamiakin, who had made his headquarters on the border of their country all summer, exercising a strong influence by the tales he circulated of the wrong-doing of the white people, and especially of Governor Stevens, and enmity among the northern tribes.
On the 10th the hostile Cayuses, Des Chutes, and Tyghes arrived and encamped in the neighborhood of the Nez Percés, but without paying the customary visit to Governor Stevens, and exhibiting their hos- tility by firing the grass of the country they travelled over. They had recently captured a pack-train of forty-one horses and thirty packs of provisions from The Dalles for Shaw's command, and were in an elated mood over their achievement.
The council opened on the 11th of September, and closed on the 17th, Stevens moving his position in the mean time to Steptoe's camp for fear of an outbreak. Nothing was accomplished. The only terms to which the war chiefs would assent were to be left in posses- sion of their respective domains. On his way back to The Dalles with his train of Indian goods, escorted by Shaw's command under Goff, on the 19th and 20th several attacks were made and two soldiers killed. Assisted by Steptoe, Stevens finally reached his des- tination in safety. After this mortifying repulse Gov- ernor Stevens returned to the Sound. Wright re- paired to Walla Walla with an additional company of troops, and sent word to all the chiefs to bring them together for a council. Few came, the Nez Percés
170
INDIAN WARS.
being represented by Red Wolf and Eagle-from-the- light, the Cayuses by Howlish Wampo, Tintinmetse, and Stickas, with some other sub-chiefs of both nations. None of the Yakimas, Des Chutes, Walla Wallas, or Spokanes were present; and all that could be elicited from those who attended the council was that they desired peace, and did not wish the treaty of Walla Walla confirmed.
Wright remained at Walla Walla until November, the post of Fort Walla Walla11 being established on Mill Creek, six miles from its junction with the Walla Walla River, where the necessary buildings were completed before the 20th. In November Fort Dalles was garrisoned by an additional company under brevet Major Wise. The Cascade settlement was protected by a company of the 4th infantry under Captain Wallen, who relieved Captain Winder of the 9th infantry. The frontier being thus secured against invasion, the winter passed without many warlike demonstrations.
About the 20th of July the volunteer companies left on the Sound when Shaw's battalion departed for Walla Walla were disbanded, the hostile Indians be- ing driven east of the mountains, and the country being in a good state of defence. On the 4th of Au- gust Governor Stevens called a council of Indians at Fox Island, to inquire into the causes of discontent, and finding that the Nisquallies and Puyallups were dissatisfied with the extent of their reservation, not without a show of reason, he agreed to recommend an enlargement, and a re-survey was ordered on the 28th, which took in thirteen donation claims, for which con- gress appropriated nearly $5,000 to pay for improve- ments.
Having satisfied the Indians of his disposition to deal justly with them, he next made a requisition upon
11 Old Fort Walla Walla of the H. B. Co. being abandoned, the name was transferred to this post, about 28 miles in the interior.
171
CAPTURE OF LESCHI.
Colonel Wright for the delivery to him of Leschi, Quiemuth, Nelson, Stahi, and the younger Kitsap, to be tried for murder, these Indians being among those who had held a council with Wright in the Yakima country, and been permitted to go at large on their parole and obligation to keep the peace. But Wright was reluctant to give up the Indians required, saying that although he had made no promises not to hold them accountable for their former acts, he should con- sider it unwise to seize them for trial, as it would have a disturbing effect upon the Indians whom he was endeavoring to quiet. Stevens argued that peace on milder terms would be a criminal abandonment of duty, and would depreciate the standing of the au- thorities with the Indians, especially as he had fre- quently assured them that the guilty should be pun- ished; he repeated his requisition; whereupon, toward the last of the month, Major Garnett was ordered to turn over to the governor for trial the Indians named. The army officers were not in sympathy with what they deemed the arbitrary course of the governor, and Garnett found it easy to evade the performance of so uncongenial a duty, the Indians being scattered, and many of them having returned to the Sound, where they gave themselves up to the military authorities at Fort Steilacoom.
A reward, however, was offered for the seizure and delivery of Leschi, which finally led to his arrest about the middle of November. It was accomplished by the treachery of two of his own people, Sluggia and Elikukah. They went to the place where Leschi was in hiding, poor and outlawed, having been driven away by the Yakimas who had submitted to Wright, who would allow him to remain in their country only on condition that he became their slave; and having decoyed him to a spot where their horses were con- cealed, suddenly seized and bound him, to be delivered up to Sydney S. Ford, who surrendered him to Stevens at Olympia.
172
INDIAN WARS.
The particular crime with which Leschi was charged was the killing of A. B. Moses, the place being in Pierce county. Court had just adjourned when he was brought in, but as Judge Chenoweth, who resided on Whidbey Island, had not yet left Steilacoom, he was requested by the governor to hold a special term for the trial of Leschi, and the trial came off on the 17th of November, the jury failing to agree. A second trial, begun on the 18th of March, 1857, resulted in conviction, and the savage was sentenced to be hanged on the 10th of June. This action of the Governor was condemned by the regular army officers, there being in this case the same opposition of sentiment between the civil and military authorities which had existed in all the Indian wars in Oregon and Wash- ington-the army versus the people.
Proceedings were instituted to carry the case up to the supreme court in December, which postponed the execution of the sentence. The opinion of Mc- Fadden, acting chief justice, sustained the previous action of the district court and the verdict of the jury. Leschi's sentence was again pronounced, the day of his execution being fixed upon the 22d of Jan- uary, 1858. In the mean time Stevens had resigned, and a new governor, McMullin, had arrived, to whom a strong appeal was made by the counsel and friends of Leschi, but to no effect, 700 settlers pro- testing against pardon. When the day of execution arrived, a large concourse of people assembled at Steilacoom to witness the death of so celebrated a savage. But the friends of the doomed man had prepared a surprise for them. The sheriff of Pierce county and his deputy were arrested, between the hours of ten and twelve o'clock, by Lieutenant Mc- Kibben of Fort Steilacoom, appointed United States marshal for the purpose, and Frederick Kautz, upon a warrant issued by J. M. Bachelder, United States commissioner and sutler at that post, upon a charge of selling liquor to the Indians. An attempt was
173
EXECUTION OF LESCHI.
made by Secretary Mason to obtain the death-warrant in possession of the sheriff, which attempt was frus- trated until after the hour fixed for the execution had passed, during which time the sheriff remained in cus- tody with no attempt to procure his freedom.
So evident a plot, executed entirely between the prisoner's counsel and the military authorities at Fort Steilacoom, aroused the liveliest indignation on the part of the majority of the people. A public meeting was held at Steilacoom, and also one at Olympia, on the evening of the 22d, at which all the persons in any way concerned in the frustration of the sentence of the courts were condeinned, and the legislature re- quested to take cognizance of it. This the legislature did, by passing an act on the following day requiring the judges of the supreme court to hold a special ses- sion on or before the 1st of February at the seat of government, repealing all laws in conflict with this act, and also passing another act allowing the judges, Chenoweth and McFadden, Lander being absent from the territory, one hundred dollars each for their ex- penses in holding an extra session of the supreme court, by which the case was remanded to the court of the 2d judicial district, whither it came on a writ of error, and an order issued for a special session of the district court, before which, Chenoweth presiding, Leschi was again brought, when his counsel entered a demurrer to its jurisdiction, which was overruled, and Leschi was for the third time sentenced to be hanged; and on the 19th of February the unhappy sav- age, ill and emaciated from long confinement, and weary of a life which for nearly three years had been one of strife and misery, was strangled according to law.
There is another case on the record showing the temper of the time. Shortly after Leschi's betrayal and arrest, Quiemuth, who had been in hiding, pre- sented himself to George Brail on Yelm prairie, with the request that he should accompany him to Olympia, and give him up to Governor Stevens to be tried.
174
INDIAN WARS.
Brail did as requested, three or four others accom- panying him. Arriving at Olympia at half-past two in the morning, they aroused the governor, who, placing them all in his office, furnished fire and refreshments, locked the front door, and proceeded to make ar- rangements for conveying the party to Steilacoom before daylight.
Although caution was used, the fact of Quiemuth's presence in the town became known, and several per- sons quietly gained access to the governor's office through a back door, among whom was James Bunton, a son-in-law of James McAllister, who was killed while conversing with some of Leschi's people. The guard saw no suspicious movement, when suddenly a shot was fired, there was a quick arousal of all in the room, and Quiemuth with others sprang to the door, where he was met by the assassin and mortally stabbed. So dimly lighted was the room, and so unexpected and sudden was the deed, that the perpetrator was not recognized, although there was a warrant issued a few hours later for Bunton, who, on examination, was discharged for want of evidence.12
Few of the Indian leaders in the war on the Sound survived it. Several were hanged at Fort Steilacoom; three were assassinated by white men out of revenge; Kitsap was killed in June 1857, on the Muckleshoot prairie, by one of his own people, and in December fol- lowing Sluggia, who betrayed Leschi, was killed by Leschi's friends.13 Nelson and Stahi alone survived when Leschi died. His death may be said to have been the closing act of the war on Puget Sound; but it was not until the ratification of the Walla Walla treaties in 1859 that the people returned to their farms in the Puyallupand upper White River valleys.14 So antagonistic was the feeling against Stevens con-
12 Olympia Pioneer and Dem., Nov. 28, 1856; Elridge's Sketch, MS., 9. 13 Olympia Pioneer and Dem., July 3 and Dec. 11, 1857.
14 Patkanim died soon after the war was over. The Pioneer and Democrat, kan. 21, 1859, remarked: 'It is just as well that he is out of the way, as in pite of everything, we never believed in bis friendship.' Seattle died in 1866,
175
WAR CLAIMS.
duct of the war at the federal capital, that it was many years before the war debt was allowed.
The labors of the commission appointed to examine claims occupied almost a year, to pay for which con- gress appropriated twelve thousand dollars. The total amount of war expenses for Oregon and Washington aggregated nearly six millions of dollars.15 When the papers were all filed they made an enormous mass of half a cord in bulk, which Smith took to Washington in 1857.16 The secretary of war, in his report, pro- nounced the findings equitable, recommending that provision should be made for the payment of the full amount.17
never having been suspected. Kussass, chief of the Cowlitz tribe, died in 1876, aged 114 years. He was friendly, and a catholic. Olympia Morning Echo, Jan. 6, 1876.
15 Deady's Hist. Or., MS., 35; Grover's Pub. Life, MS., 59; Or. Statesman, Oct. 20, 1857, and March 30 and April 6, 1858; H. Ex. Doc., 45, pp. 1-16, 35th cong. Ist sess. The exact footing was $4,449,949.33 for Oregon; and $1,481,475.45 for Washington=$5,931,424.78. Of this amount, the pay due to the Oregon volunteers was $1,409,604.53; and to the Washington volunteers $519,593.06.
16 Said Horace Greeley: 'The enterprising territories of Oregon and Washington have handed into congress their little hill for scalping Indians and violating squaws two years ago, etc., etc. After these [the French Spoliation claims] shall have been paid half a century or so, we trust the claims of the Oregon and Washington Indian-fighters will come up for con- sideration.' New York Tribune, in Or. Statesman, Feb. 16, 1858.
17 On the Oregon war debt, see the report of the third auditor, 1860, found in H. Ex. Doc., 11, 36th cong. Ist sess .; speech of Grover, in Cong. Globe, 1858- 9, pt ii., app. 217, 35th cong. 2d sess .; letter of third auditor, in H. Ex. Doc., 51, vol. viii. 77, 35th cong. 2d sess .; Statement of the Or. and Wash. delegation in regard to the war claims of Oregon and Washington, a pamphlet of 67 pages; Dowell's Scrap-Book of authorities on the subject; Or. Jour. Sen., 1860, app. 35-6; Dowell's Or. Ind. Wars, 138-42; Jessup's Rept on the cost of transportation of troops and supplies to California, Oregon, and New Mexico, 2; rept of commissioner on Indian war expenses in Oregon and Washington, in H. Ex. Doc., 45, 35th cong. Ist sess., vol. ix .; memorial of the legislative assembly of 1855-6, in H. Misc. Doc., 77, 34th cong. Ist sess., and If. Misc. Doc., 78, 34th cong. Ist sess., containing a copy of the act of the same legisla- ture providing for the payment of volunteers; report of the house com- mittee on military affairs, June 24, 1856, in HI. Rept, 195, 34th cong. Ist sess .; reports of committee, vol. i., H. Rept, 189, 34th cong. 3d sess., in H. Reports of Committee, vol. 3; petition of citizens of Oregon and Washington for a more speedy and just settlement of the war claims, with the reply of the third auditor, Sen. Ex. Doc., 46, 37th cong. 2d sess., vol. v .; Report of the Chairman of the Military Committee of the Senate, March 29, 1860; Rept Com., 161, 36th cong. Ist sess., vol. i .; communication from Senators George H. Williams and W. H. Corbett, on the Oregon Indian war claims of 1855-6, audited by Philo Callender, which encloses letters of the third auditor, and B. F. Dowell on the expenses of the war, Washington, March 2, 1868, in H. Misc. Doc., 88, p. 3-10, ii., 40th cong. 2d sess .: report of sen. com. on
176
INDIAN WARS.
The number of white persons known to have been killed by Indians18 in Oregon previous to the establish- ment of the latter on reservations, including the few fairly killed in battle, so far as I have been able to gather from reliable authorities, was nearly 700, be- sides about 140 wounded who recovered, and without counting those killed and wounded in Washington.19
Two events of no small significance occurred in the spring of 1857-the union of the two Indian superin- tendencies of Washington under one superintendent, J. W. Nesmith of Oregon, and the recall of General Wool from the command of the department of the Pacific. The first was in consequence of the heavy expenditures in both superintendencies, and the sec- ond was in response to the petition of the legislature of Oregon at the session of 1856-7. The successor of Wool was Newman S. Clarke, who paid a visit to the Columbia River district in June.20
interest to be allowed on the award of the Indian war claims, in Sen. Com. Rept, 8, 37th cong. 2d sess .; letter of secretary of the treasury, contain- ing information relative to claims incurred in suppressing Indian hostilities in Oregon and Washington, and which were acted and reported upon by the commission authorized by the act of August 18, 1856, in Sen. Ex. Doc., I and 2, 42d cong. 2d sess .; report of the committee on military affairs, June 22, 1874, in H. Repts of Com., 873, 43d cong. Ist sess .; letter from the third auditor to the chairman of the committee on military affairs on the subject of claims growing out of Indian hostilities, in Oregon and Washington, in HI. Ex. Doc., 51, 35th cong. 2d sess .; vol. vii., and Id. Doc., vol. iv., 36th cong. Ist sess .; communication of C. S. Drew, on the origin and early prosecution of the Indian war in Oregon, iu Sen. Misc. Doc., 59, 36th cong. Ist sess., relat- ing chiefly to Rogue River Valley; Stevens' Speech on War Expenses before the Committee of Military Affairs of the House, March 15, 1860; Stevens' Speech on War Claims in the House of Representatives, May 31, 1858; Speeches of Joseph Lane in the House of Representatives, April 2, 1856, and May 13, 1858; Speech of I. I. Stevens in the House of Representatives, Feb. 31, 1859; Alta California, July 4, 1857; Or. Statesman, Jan. 26, 1858; Dowell and Gibbs' Brief in Donnell vs Cardwell, Sup. Court Decisions, 1877; Early Affairs Siskiyou County, MS., 13; Swan's N. W. Coast, 388-91.
18 See a list by S. C. Drew, in the N. Y. Tribune, July 9, 1857. Lindsay Applegate furnishes a longer one, but neither list is at all complete. See also letter of Lient John Mullan to Commissioner Mix, in Mullan's Top. Mem., 32; Sen. Ex. Doc., 32, 35th cong. 2d sess.
19 I arrived at this estimate by putting down in a book the names and the number of persons murdered or slain in battle. The result surprised me, although there were undoubtedly others whose fate was never certainly as- certained. This only covers the period which ended with the close of the war of 1855-6; there were many others killed after these years.
20 The distribution of United States troops in the district for 1857 was two
177
NESMITH AND CLARKE.
Nesmith did not relieve Stevens of his duties as superintendent of Washington until the 2d of June,21 soon after which General Clarke paid a visit to the Columbia River district to look into the condition of this portion of his department.
Nesmith recommended to the commissioner at Washington City that the treaties of 1855 be ratified, as the best means of bringing about a settlement of the existing difficulties, and for these reasons: that the land laws permitted the occupation of the lands of Oregon and Washington, regardless of the rights of the Indians, making the intercourse laws a nullity, and rendering it impossible to prevent collisions between them and the settlers. Friendly relations could not be cultivated while their title to the soil was recog- nized by the government, which at the same time
companies of the 4th infantry at Fort Hoskins, under Capt. C. C. Augur; detachments of the 4th inf. and 3d art. at Fort Yamhill, under Lieut Phil. H. Sheridan; three companies of the 9th inf. at Fort Dalles, Col Wright in command; one co. of the 4th infantry at Fort Vancouver, Colonel Thomas Morris in command; one co. of the 3d art. at the Cascades, under Maj. F. O. Wyse; three companies of the 9th inf., under Maj. R. S. Garnett, at Fort Simcoe; one co. each of the Ist dragoons, 3d art., 4th and 9th inf., Col E. J. Steptoe in command, at Fort Walla Walla; one co. of the 9th inf., under Capt. G. E. Pickett, at Fort Bellingham, on Bellingham Bay, established to guard the Sound from the incursions of northern Indians; one co. of the 9th inf., under Capt. D. Woodruff, in camp near Fort Bellingham, as escort to the northern boundary com .; one co. of the 4th inf., under Maj. G. O. Haller, at Fort Townsend, two and a half miles from Port Townsend; one company of the 9th inf., under Lieut D. B. Mckibben, at Fort Slaughter, on Muckle- shoot prairie, near the junction of White and Green rivers; two companies 4th inf., Capt. M. Maloney in command, at Fort Stcilacoom; and en route for Fort Walla Walla, arriving in the autumn, one company of the Ist dra- goons, nnder Capt. A. J. Smith, making, with one company at Fort Ump- qua, a force of between 1,500 and 2,000 regular troops, to hold in subjection 39,000 Indians.
21 Nesmith found the agents already in charge of the Indians in the Puget Sound district to be E. C. Fitzhugh at Bellingham Bay, G. A. Paige at Kit- sap reservation, M. T. Simmons general agent for Puget Sound, R. C. Fay at Penn's Cove, Whidbey Island, Thomas J. Hanna at Port Townsend (vice E. S. Fowler), W. B. Gosnell in charge of the Nisqually and Puyallup Indians on the Puyallup reservation, S. S. Ford in charge of the Cowlitz, Chehalis, Shoalwater Bay, Willopah, Quilehutes, and other coast tribes in this quarter, A.J.Cain in charge of the Indians on the north side of the Columbia from Van- conver to opposite The Dalles, assisted by A. Townsend, local agent at White Salmon, A. H. Robie in charge of the Yakima district, William Craig in charge of the friendly Cayuses, R. H. Lansdale in charge of the Flathead dis- trict. The Nez Percés had declined an agent, fearing he might be killed, which would involve the tribe in war, and the other tribes were unfriendly and withont agents. A. P. Dennison had charge of the district of eastern Oregon. Ind. Aff. Rept, 1857, 325-83.
HIST. WASH .- 12
178
INDIAN WARS.
failed to purchase it, but gave white people a right to settle in the country.
About the middle of April 1858 Colonel Steptoe notified General Clarke that an expedition to the north seemed advisable, if not absolutely necessary, as a petition had been received from forty persons living at Colville for troops to be sent to that place, the Indians in the vicinity being hostile. Two white men en route for Colville mines had been killed by the Palouses, who had also made a foray into the Walla Walla country and driven off the cattle belonging to the army. On the 6th of May Steptoe left Walla Walla with 130 dragoons, proceeding toward the Nez Perce country in a leisurely manner. At Snake River he was ferried across by Timothy, who also accompanied him as guide. At the Alpowah he found thirty or forty of the Palouses, who were said to have killed the two travellers, who fled on his approach. On the 16th he received in- formation that the Spokanes were preparing to fight him, but not believing the report, pursued his march northward 22 until he found himself surrounded by a force of about 600 Indians in their war-paint-Pa- louses, Spokanes, Cœur d'Alênes, and a few Nez Percés. They had posted themselves near a ravine through which the road passed, and where the troops could be assailed on three sides. The command was halted and a parley held with the Spokanes, in which they announced their intention of fighting, saying that they had heard the troops had come to make war on them, but they would not be permitted to cross the Spokane River.
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