History of Hamilton and Clay counties, Nebraska, Vol. I, Part 6

Author: Burr, George L., 1859-; Buck, O. O., 1871-; Stough, Dale P., 1888-
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Chicago : The S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 886

USA > Nebraska > Hamilton County > History of Hamilton and Clay counties, Nebraska, Vol. I > Part 6
USA > Nebraska > Clay County > History of Hamilton and Clay counties, Nebraska, Vol. I > Part 6

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Vol. 1-4

HISTORY OF NEBRASKA

"The council was held at the Pawnee Republic Village (near the present site of Scandia, Kansas, in Republic County ) and was attended by 400 warriors. When the parties assembled for their council, Lieutenant Pike found that the Pawnees had unfurled a Spanish flag at the door of the chief, one which had lately been presented by that government, through the hands of Lieutenant Malgoras. To the request of Lieutenant Pike that the flag should be delivered to him, and one of the United States hoisted in its place, they at first made no response ; but, upon his repeating his demand, with the emphatic declaration that they must choose between Americans and Spaniards, and that it was impossible for the nation to have two fathers, they decided to put themselves, for the time at least, under American protection. An old man accordingly rose, went to the door, took down the Spanish flag, and laid it at the feet of Lieutenant Pike, and in its stead elevated the stars and stripes."

1812. Treaty of amity with Pawnees by the Government.

Major Long's Report. 1819. The expedition of Major Long sent out by the War Department. Leaving Engineer Cantonment "just below Council Bluffs, on June 10th, it struck out over Indian country."

Similar treaties of amity to the one just mentioned as having been ratified with the Pawnees on January 5, 1812, had been made with the Maha (Omahas) on December 26, 1815, and with the Otoes on December 26, 1817, and Major Long was instructed to make investigation and see that these treaties were lived up to by white man and red man alike. So he visited the Pawnee villages on his course westward. It would be impossible to take space to go into every detail of the life and customs of each of the tribes to be treated in this chapter, but an account of this visit will be worth our time and space. At sunset, June 10th, Major Long's expedition went into camp at a small creek about eleven miles distant from the village of the Grand Pawnees. His account reads :-

"On the following morning, having arranged the party according to rank, and given the necessary instructions for the preservation of order, we proceeded forward, and in a short time came in sight of the first of the Pawnee villages. The trail on which we had traveled since leaving the Missouri had the appearance of being more and more frequented as we approached the Pawnee towns: and here, instead of a single footway, it consisted of more than twenty parallel paths, of similar size and appearance; at a few miles distance from the village, we met a party of eight or ten squaws, with hoes and other implements of agriculture, on their way to the corn plantations. They were accompanied by one young Indian, but in what capacity-whether as assistant, protector or taskmaster, we were not informed. After a ride of about three hours we arrived before the village and dispatched a messenger to inform the chief of our approach.

"Answer was returned that he was engaged with his chiefs and warriors at a medicine feast, and could not, therefore, come out and meet us. We were soon surrounded by a crowd of women and children, who gazed at us with some expres- sions of astonishment; but as no one appeared to welcome us to the village, ar- rangements were made for sending on the horses and baggage to a suitable place for encampment while Major Long, with several gentlemen who wished to accompany him, entered the village. The party after groping about for some time and traversing a considerable part of the village, arrived at the lodge of the principal chief. Here we were again informed that Tarrerecawaho, with all the principal men of the village, was engaged in a medicine feast. Notwithstanding his absence,

HISTORY OF NEBRASKA

some mats were spread for us upon the ground in the back part of the lodge. Upon them we sat down, and, after waiting some time, were presented with a large wooden dish of hominy or boiled corn. In this was a single spoon or the horn of a buffalo, large enough to hold a pint, which, being used alternately by each of the party, soon emptied the dish of its contents.

"After this strange reception and feast the expedition visited in turn the villages of the Republican and Loup (Wolf) Pawnees, lying a few miles apart, an hour's ride above the village of the Pawnee Grand."

Major Long, in his report, further commented on the thrift of these villages. For miles up and down the river large droves of horses were grazing; fields of maize and patches of tomatoes, pumpkins and squashes were seen in many places and added much to the apparent wealth of the community. That was before, and in sharp contrast to, the misfortunes that are soon to be chronicled as having overtaken this nation.

1831. It was about this time that calamities began to overtake the Pawnee nation, which had formerly numbered some 25,000 souls, and in its prime been the terror alike of trapper and trader and bands from other tribes who by chance ventured too far into the hunting grounds of these fierce fighting foes. In 1831, a terrible epidemic of smallpox carried off several thousand of their number, leaving the nation in a pitiable condition. Their agent, John Dougherty, in making his report to the Government, says :-

"Their misery defies all description. I am fully persuaded that one-half the whole number will be carried off by this frightful distemper. They told me that not one under thirty years of age escaped, it having been that length of time since it visited them before. They were dying so fast, and taken down at once in such large numbers that they had ceased to bury their dead, whose bodies were to be seen in every direction-lying in the river, lodged on the sand bars, in the weeds around the villages and in their corn caches."

1832. The removal of the Delawares to lands between the Platte and Kansas rivers led to a war with the Pawnees, and in this year the former tribe burned the great Pawnee village on the Republican River.

1834. Furthermore by treaty of October 9, 1834, the Pawnees sold their lands south and agreed to stay north of the Platte River and west of the Loup River, thereby considerably restricting their territory.

1834-1835. All of the Pawnee's plague-stricken southern villages were aban- doned and the miserable remnant of this once proud tribe reassembled on the Loup and westward along the Platte.

1835-1849. In this period, first the Sioux, their old enemies swept down upon the Pawnees, and began a war of extermination along the Cedar and North Loup rivers. The Pawnees found every man's hand against them and even the Govern- ment remained indifferent to their fate at the hands of the Sioux. Then, to make matters worse, the Cheyennes and the Arapahoes infested their old Kansas hunting grounds, as if eager to strike the final blow.

1849. The gold seekers on the way to California brought the cholera to the Pawnee camps. Again several thousand died, and the handful of survivors, reduced to beggary, besought the Government for protection, which was granted.

1857. By the treaty of September 4, 1857, the Pawnees ceded all of their original territory except a strip 30 miles long by 15 wide upon the lower Loup River.

HISTORY OF NEBRASKA

This was the old Nance County Reservation, whence they were finally removed to their final abode in Oklahoma.

1862-1865. During the Indian skirmishes that took place in those years, and during the Civil War period, the Pawnees furnished scouts to the Government and proved a valuable aid to the Government against the crafty Sioux, and reaped thereby a small measure of revenge for the time being, but the Sioux, after the war closed, reaped the final revenge upon the Pawnees.

1865-1822. In this period, the Pawnees were never safe if they ventured off their reservation. Red Cloud's crafty bands might sweep down upon them to kill and phinder.

1822. As if to cap the climax of their troubles, in this year they met the grasshopper invasion and their crops were destroyed. This meant starvation, but Congressional appropriation through land sales kept them alive until 1874.

1874. The Pawnees set their faces southward, forever to leave the Loup and the Platte.

The story of the rapid decay of this proud tribe is read in these figures of their numbers :-

1835, according to missionaries Dunbar and Allis, 10,000. In 1840, disease and war had reduced them to 7,500. In 1849, cholera had reduced them to 5,000. Later official reports gave 4,686 in 1856; 3,416 in 1861; 2,376 in 1874; 1,440 in 1879; 824 in 1889; and 629 in 1901.

PAWNEE WAR OF 1859

Before closing the narration of the experiences of the Pawnee tribes, there are two further incidents in their history which can be included in the Pawnee division of this Chapter, or elsewhere, but we will briefly treat them before passing on.

The "Pawnee War" occurred in the summer of 1859. At that time the Pawnees were occupying two villages on the south side of the Platte, about twelve miles south of Fontanelle, a village in the western edge of Washington County. This "war" was precipitated by the robbing of a settler, Uriah Thomas, of his pocket book containing $136 and valuable land papers, drinking up his whiskey, and taking off his fine oxen, leaving him locked up in the cabin. A few days later people from West Point, about thirty miles northwest, and Dewitt, on further up, came in and reported the Pawnee bands to be marauding and committing various depredations upon the settlers, burning their dwellings, destroying their furniture, driving off their stock. After some scouting about the country, a small band of Indians was located about a mile from Fontanelle. In attempting to capture them, two or three Indians were killed as they fled from their intended place of ambush, and soon the whole country was ablaze with excitement. It was generally believed that a retaliating war of extermination would be inaugurated by the Pawnees, and the few militia companies then organized were ordered out by Governor Black to hold themselves ready at a moment's notice. While the settlers along the Elkhorn assembled at Fontanelle in readiness, the crops suffered seriously from neglect, and as the reported band of 10,000 ferociously arrayed savages failed to appear, a band of 200 men prepared to go out and find the savages and render them a lesson that would long live in their memories. Governor Black accompanied the expedition,

IHISTORY OF NEBRASKA

as nominal commander, though the real command fell upon C'ol. (later Governor) John M. Thayer. In a few days' march a band of some 5,000 Pawnees, Omaha and Poncas were overtaken. Instead of putting up stiff fight, when they discovered the paleface expedition in close proximity, the Indians attempted to escape. Later, some 2,000 were brought together for a parley. They were given a choice between surrendering the braves who had committed the depredations around West Point, pay the expenses of the expedition out of certain moneys dne to them from the Government, or-fight. They chose the former, surrendered seven young braves, and signed the necessary agreement. In returning they passed the home of one of the imprisoned braves, whose squaw sprang out and handed him a knife with which he stabbed himself. While the whites were ministering to the supposed dying man, the squaw seized the knife, eut the eords binding the other prisoners and made possible their escape. Pursuing guards reported they had either killed or wounded all six of the escaped prisoners and the expedition re- sumed its return journey. Finally, the Government paid the Indians all that was due them and the expedition paid its own expenses, and thus ended the "Pawnee War."

PAWNEE-SIOUX MASSACRE, 1873

On the fifth day of August, 1823, occurred the battle between the Sioux and Pawnee Indians, in what has since come to be known as Massaere Canyon, a ravine about four miles north of the subsequent site of Trenton, Hitcheock County. This episode was about the finishing toneh of the Pawnee's military career. About 250 Pawnee men, 100 women and 50 children were on a buffalo hunt, which had lasted sinee .July 3d, and had been sufficiently successful that they were about to return to their reservation with the meat and skins of some 800 buffaloes.

The moment of the attaek was early in the morning, when most of the men were hunting straggling buffaloes, and the women were making preparations for the day's journey. The Sioux, comprised of some 600 of the Ogallala and Brule bands, surprised the Pawnees, who briefly resisted but soon fled to avoid being surrounded and completely annihilated. They abandoned all of their possessions, including their winter's supply of meat and other provisions, robes and saddles. Some 69, 20 men, 39 women and 10 children were killed, and 11 women and children captured. The Government had some knowledge of the proximity of the Sioux, and Major Russell of the army, with 60 privates and 20 seouts, was camped within a few miles of the scene of the massacre and was then on his way to intercept the Sioux. When the Sioux discovered the soldiers, they fled to the northwest.

MAJOR FRANK NORTH AND THE PAWNEE SCOUTS

In general, the record of the Pawnees in their relations with the whites was much better than most of the other Nebraska tribes. While occasional depredations, and such incidents as precipitated the "Pawnee War" of 1859 stain this record, it cannot be questioned that the Pawnees rendered as valuable service to the whites and the Government as any Nebraska tribe ever did.

As brief a manner as any to explain this to the reader will be to give a short account of the work of Major Frank North and his Pawnee Seonts. In 1856 when Frank North was a young boy, he came to Nebraska and mingled with the

HISTORY OF NEBRASKA

Indians along the Missouri in the region of Omaha, and learned their mode of warfare, their language, which he came to speak as fluently as his mother tongue. and thereby won their confidence. In 1861 he became a clerk and interpreter at the Pawnee reservation, and by 1863 had developed into a daring scout. During the work of building the Union Pacific the fierce Arapahoes, Cheyennes and Sioux persisted in attacking the laborers. A few excerpts from an account by his niece, Mrs. Sarah Clapp, in Nebraska Pioneer Reminiscences, will serve not only to explain his work, but the attributes of the Pawnee scouts.

"It was useless to call on the regular troops for help as the Government needed their help to check the armies of Lee and Johnston. A clipping from the Wash- ington Sunday Herald on this subject states that 'a happy thought occurred to Mr. Oakes Ames,' the main spirit of the work (of building the Union Pacific). Ile sent a trusty agent to hunt up Frank North, who was then twenty-four years old. 'What can be done to protect our working parties, Mr. North?' said Mr. Ames. 'I have an idea,' Mr. North answered. If the authorities at Washington will allow me to organize a battalion of Pawnees and mount and equip them, I will undertake to picket your entire line and keep off other Indians. The Pawnees are the natural enemies of all the tribes that are giving you so much trouble, and a little encouragement and drill will make them the best irregular horse you could desire."

"The plan was new but looked feasible. Accordingly, Mr. Ames went to Washington, and, after some effort, succeeded in getting permission to organize a battalion of four hundred Pawnee warriors, who should be armed as were the U. S. Cavalry and drilled in such simple tacties as the service required, and my uncle was commissioned as a major of volunteers and ordered to command them. The newspaper clipping also says: 'It would be difficult to estimate the service of Major North in money value." General Crook onee said, in speaking of him, Millions of Government property and hundreds of lives were saved by him on the Union Pacific railroad, and on the Nebraska, Wyoming and Montana frontiers. . ..

"During the many skirmishes and battles fought by the Pawnees under Major North, he never lost a man ; moreover, on several occasions he passed through such hair-breadth escapes that the Pawnees thought him invulnerable. In one instance, while pursuing the retreating enemy, he discovered that his command had fallen baek and he was separated from them by over a mile. The enemy, discovering his plight, turned on him. He dismounted, being fully armed, and by using his horse as a breastwork, he managed to reach his troops again, though his faithful horse was killed. This and many like experiences caused the Pawnees to believe that their revered leader led a charmed life. He never deceived them, and they loved to call him 'Little Pawnee Le-Sharo' (Pawnee Chief), so he was known as the White Chief of the Pawnees."

So, just as the settler was compelled to use back-firing to fight prairie fires, the Government and settlers were enabled to "fight the fire of other tribes with the fire of the Pawnee's valor" in the eleventh hour of this tribe's Nebraska career.

THE SIOUX

The tribe that probably played the next greatest part in Nebraska Indian history. or at least in the last three decades of the Indians and white settlers' cohabitation in this territory, was the Sioux.

HISTORY OF NEBRASKA

Prof. H. W. Foght, in his "Trail of the Loup" gives a short historical account of this tribe, which will serve to introduce them to the reader, before any chronologi- cal survey of their Nebraska career is undertaken.

"The Sioux belonged to one of the most widely extended and important Indian families of North America. In the very earliest days of the advent of the white men they appear to have held sway on the Atlantic seaboard, around the Virginias and Carolinas. They later abandoned their sedentary and agricultural tendencies and roamed to the banks of the Ohio. From their own traditions it is accounted that the Sioux parted company with the Winnebagoes at some point on the Ohio, probably near the mouth of the Wabash, and crossed northeasterly through Illinois, and took possession of the headwaters of the Mississippi. In the meantime other tribes of that great family reached the Mississippi until they came to the Missouri, there dividing, some of them going southward to Arkansas. The portion called the 'Omahas' ascended the Missouri and made their home in eastern Nebraska, The Poncas and Iowas are also usually classed as belonging to this Sioux family, as well as the Otoes, Peorias, and Missouris, first mentioned by Father Marquette in 1673. But the Sioux were the most important of the Siouan stock. The Sioux called themselves Dakotah, Nakotah, or Lakotah, according to their respective dialeets, a name signifying 'allies.' But from the early French designation of Nadaousioux' a shortening brought it down to the modern 'Sionx.' This warlike nation early relinquished sedentary habits and became roaming buffalo hunters. For many years the Niobrara River in Nebraska formed the line of demarkation between the Sioux and Pawnees. In 1837 the Sioux sold to the Government all their claims to lands east of the Mississippi; in 1851, relinquished the greater part of Minnesota and Dakota. In 1857, they expressed dissatisfaction with the handling of their treaty relations by the Government by a massaere of white settlers at Spirit Lake, Iowa, and, in 1862, their chieftain, Little Crow, led a warfare upon the outlying settlements in Minnesota, and took advantage of the Government's em- barrassments consequent upon the Civil war. This bitter war lasted until 1869. when they were driven out of Minnesota by General Sibley.

While Little Crow and his bands escaped to Canada, Red Cloud and his cohorts came to Nebraska, where they started a long struggle.

The valley of the Platte was then the thoroughfare to California. Plainsmen dared not cross in small companies and the pioneers were foreed to arm to the teeth. The trail from the Missouri to the Rockies then became marked with bleaching bones, burnt wagons and rotting harness."

1832. The first great manifestation of the Sioux after white settlement was feebly attempted in Nebraska was in 1832 in what is now Jefferson County. Near the junction of the Big Sandy and the Little Blue rivers was fought one of the most desperate battles ever waged on the American continent. In this encounter the Sioux met defeat at the hands of the Pawnees, and it proved to be the Waterloo of the Plains for some three decades, and gave the Pawnees mastery of the Nebraska country at that time. According to best accounts, 16,000 savages participated in the conflict. The Pawnees were under the command of the chief Tae-po-ha-na, while the Sioux were led by Oco-no-me-woe, of whom it is elaimed the celebrated Sioux chief, Sitting Bull, is a lineal descendant. The struggle for supremacy lasted three days and the Sioux were completely worsted, losing over 3,000 men. The Pawnees sustained a loss of 2,000 men. The story of this encounter was told to Mr.

HISTORY OF NEBRASKA

D. (. Jenkins, who narrated it to the first chronieler who preserved it for Ne- braska historical traditions by Monsieur Mont Crevie, an old French trader, who claimed to have spent forty years of his life among the Indians of the plains and mountains and had married a squaw in every tribe where he could find one who would have him. The facts are also further corroborated by an old blind Pawnee warrior who claimed to have been the only survivor of the terrible conflict. This last claim must have been incorrect for there were doubtless many other survivors among the Indians met by the first settlers of the various counties.

1832-1844. It will be noticed in the chapter hereafter following giving the order and chronology of the settlements of the various communities in Nebraska that between 1810, when the first post was established at Bellevue, and 1819, when Fort Atkinson was attempted sixteen miles north of present Omaha. and 1844. there were no really permanent white settlements made in Nebraska.

The early annals of the river counties in eastern Nebraska attribute many Indian residences to that territory in that period. Then for the next twenty-five years after 1844, when the early permanent settlements began along the Missouri River side of Nebraska, many encounters with Indians are recorded. Most of these are of too small a scope for us to take the space to chronicle them, so only the more important ones will be sketched here.

Probably Jefferson, Thayer, Nuckolls, Webster, Kearney. Buffalo, Dawson. Lincoln, Keith, and old Cheyenne counties suffered from Indians during the carly settlement periods more than any other counties, because largely through these counties the old "Oregon trails" and the western and more unprotected end of the other Overland trails, traversed.

DEPREDATIONS

1864. The effect upon the settlements then already made in Nebraska of the outbreaks of the Sioux, especially in Dawson, Buffalo, Adams, Nuckolls and Thayer counties, can be well conveyed by an excerpt from the old Hebron Journal, by E. M. Correll.

"The attention of the whole nation was occupied by the great war of the Re- bellion in 1864, so that the Indian raid of that year, the most carefully planned and skillfully executed known in the history of the western frontier, received but little attention and seemed in comparison of so little importanee as scarcely to deserve a place in National history.

"Yet the military strategy and precision, and the secrecy and success and the cool butchery and cruelty of the attack, make it Napoleonic in its design and execution, and should place it on the pages of history alongside of the other great and bloody butchery by savages. At this time, many ranches dotted the great military road at intervals of a few miles. These ranches had become in many instances valuable farms, with substantial improvements, graced by woman's taste- ful care. A number of such ranches were in Thayer County upon and contiguous to the Government road. The Indians had been peaceful and quiet for a long time. and the settlers along the road were prosperous and happy. Without a single note of warning the crisis came. From Denver City to Big Sandy, a distance of over six hundred miles, near the middle of the day. at precisely the same time, along the whole distance a simultaneous attack was made upon the ranches, No time was

HISTORY OF NEBRASKA

given for couriers, no time for concentration, no time for the erection or strength- ening of places of defense, but as the eagle swoops down upon his prey, the savage warriors attacked the defenseless white men. No principle of kingly courtesy actuated the breasts of the painted assailants. It mattered little to them that they were in vastly superior numbers, and the opponents in part women and children. All alike were made to feel their cruelty or their lust. No mercy was shown. No captives were taken but women, and death was preferred to the captivity that awaited them. Could the eastern philanthropists who speak so flatteringly of the 'noble red man of the West' have witnessed the cruel butchery of unoffending children, the disgrace of women, who were first horribly mutilated and then slain, the cowardly assassination of husbands and fathers, they might, perhaps (if fools can learn), be impressed with their true character. On the morning of the 7th of Angust, Indians must have been secreted in the ravines (of which there are many adjacent to the military road ), and, at a given hour, rushed forth and commenced their work of destruction. At morn, the Government road was a traveled thor- oughfare, dotted with prosperous and happy homes: at night, a wilderness, strewn with mangled bodies and wrecks, and illuminated with the glare of burning homes."

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History of Hamilton and Clay counties, Nebraska, Vol. I, Part 6

Author: Burr, George L., 1859-; Buck, O. O., 1871-; Stough, Dale P., 1888- Publication date: 1921 Publisher: Chicago : The S.J. Clarke Publishing Company Number of Pages: 886

Author: Burr, George L., 1859-; Buck, O. O., 1871-; Stough, Dale P., 1888-
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: Chicago : The S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 886