History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 55

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198

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A letter from R. M. Hagaman, dated at the Stinking Water mines, December 2, 1863, addressed to G. W. Kingsbury, makes mention of this party. Haga- man says :

A party from the Boise mines consisting of twenty-seven in all, one woman and three children among them, left our camp at Milk River a few days before we started for Benton, in a Mackinaw boat. We sent letters by them to Yankton and the states. The party was supposed to have in their possession over one hundred thousand dollars in gold dust. We learned from some half breeds from Fort Garry on the Red River that the whole party was killed and that they, the Sioux, lost forty-two warriors in the operation, and it was also reported that Little Crow was at Garry with some of the gold dust to trade.

Mr. Hagaman, the reader will remember, left Yankton in company with Judge Tufts, in August, 1863, for Idaho, taking passage on the steamboat. The boat failed to get through to Benton and the passengers were obliged to outfit at the Milk River post, Fort Peck probably, and proceed overland, which explains their meeting with the Heart River party.

A party of miners, named John H. Carter, John S. Backus and R. Schouler and brother, all formerly of Mapello County, Iowa, of Bannock City, left that place a week later than the massacred party and were detained a month after reaching the Missouri River for want of a mackinaw boat, after procuring which they set out and reached Fort Berthold in safety. Here they found one of the men who was with the unfortunate party as far as Berthold, who had remained in the fort, having a presentment of danger. From him a list of the names of the slain was obtained, numbering eighteen men, two women and three children, and the further particulars of the tragic affair, corroborating the account here given.

AN INDIAN ACCOUNT OF THE HEART RIVER MASSACRE

Joseph Henry Taylor, a frontiersman of good repute, who has published a number of sketches of frontier and Indian life, happened to meet with an Indian woman named "Red Blanket," a Santee, during his adventures in the Upper Mis- souri country, who had been a witness of this tragic affair, and who gave him an account of it in her own language, which Mr. Taylor translated and published among his frontier sketches. Mr. Taylor was formerly a printer and employed in early days in the Union and Dakotan office at Yankton, quitting that employment to pursue a life on the border, and so congenial did he find it, that he has not to this day abandoned it entirely, though he is now comfortably settled at Wash-

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burn, North Dakota, where he is engaged in publishing a newspaper. Red Blanket's story, as given to Mr. Taylor, corroborates the main points of the massacre or battle as previously reported, and is here reproduced :

When Sibley's soldiers started back up Apple Creek our chiefs and head men commenced to look about them. We had many camps scattered along Heart River and some on Square Butte Creek. We found no buffalo and but few elk and deer. The Uncpapas who had been living there scared or killed everything. Three days after the soldiers disappeared we commenced recrossing the big river at the foot of the high bluffs. Buffalo were plenty on the east side and that was why we returned. We made a large camp in a deep conlee facing the river with some timber and a large sandbar in front of some low willows. Besides our own (See) band were many lodges of Yanktonnais and Sissetons. I think it was six days after our return that, in the company of several women, we went to the river to bathe and wash some clothes. There was a narrow, swift running chute near shore and beyond this a hidden bar, then deep water again. On this morning, at the entrance of the chute from the main river, sat an old man, a Sisseton, fishing. The morning was calm. Up the river we could hear voices and the sound of paddles. After some time a large boat full of people came to view and were drifting near shore. We saw that they were white people and started to run away.

At this time they were near rifle shot of the old man. He arose and made the blanket signal to keep out in the main stream. Next came a puff of smoke and a rifle report from the boat and then the old man fell over. Then we all screamed and ran until we met our husbands and brothers with their guns, bows and arrows. Then us women hid in the edge of the bushes. The long boat stopped in shallow water at the entrance of the narrow channel. More of our people came swarming out from the timber and the shooting became almost continuous, when the loud report of cannon from the boat scared us all. We were afraid soldiers from Sibley's Army might be coming again upon us, the one loud report sounding over and over so many times. Then came what we feared, wounded and dying men. We women picked them up and carried many from the bar to the lodges up the coulee. One woman was killed in trying to save her husband. I had a brother killed. It sent my heart to the ground. Several of our fighters procured logs and rolled them across the bar toward the boat, firing from behind. Others screened along the cut bank of the chute. It was in the middle of the afternoon when some one shouted that the old white man dressed in black had fallen. It was he who had killed so many of our people. He hid in one corner of the boat. He would rise at times and look about him. Our warriors believed he was a priest or medicine man. When the shout went up that the medicine man was killed everyone rushed upon the boat. All were not yet dead, but we soon killed them. One woman was found under the big box, dragged forth and cut to pieces with knives. She looked terrified but did not cry. A crying baby was taken from her arms and killed. I did not see the little girl, though she might have been there for all I would know. I helped kill the woman. They had killed my brother. The boat was half filled with water ; the one shot from the cannon had caused it to leak and sink in shallow water, and that is where they stayed until all were dead. But the strangest of all is yet to come. The dead body of the man in black was nowhere to be found. In the same corner of the boat lay the body of a man with some such face, white whiskers and long white locks of hair. But he lay dressed in blood spattered yellow buckskin shirt and pants. We stripped many bodies of their clothes and in so doing found belts of what we thought was wet or bad powder. It was thrown away. We lost near thirty men altogether. Some did not die right away, but those who did were placed in the trees beyond the village. The old Sisseton fisherman went to his death trying to save trouble and lives by warning the boatmen to put out in the main stream that they might quietly pass by unnoticed. The white men mistook the motive perhaps, so killed him and paid forfeit by losing their own lives. Those who knew the Sisseton best say this was the motive that impelled the signal.

Several years later, in the fall of 1876, Mr. Taylor met an Arickaree Indian chief named Whistling Bear in the Upper Missouri country, who related to him another incident in this Heart River horror, as follows :

About two weeks after the white men belonging to the boating party were killed on Burnt Creek Bar some Uncpapa friends of the Mandans came into our village at Fort Berthold and told us about it. Girard, the trader, being my brother-in-law, and with whom I talked about the story, advised my getting together a small band of trusty men and go hunt up the place where the fight took place. He explained further that unless some of the Sioux knew gold dust by the color there must be abundant gold dust, either laying about among the effects in the boat or in belts upon the bodies of the slain, and then I was shown a sample so that no mistake would be made. In the early morning of the closing days of the "cherry moon" we left our village at Fort Berthold for the perilous trip. There were ten of us in all. We followed the river close, and on the third day we noticed

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the soaring buzzard on the river near the mouth of Burnt Creek. A misty line of fog that followed the curved line of the channel-water at sunrise rose high in air as we reached the sand bar at Burnt Creek. The big black appearing boat was seen at last. It was partly sunken. We saw no cannon. The bodies of the dead, partly dismembered, were being fed upon by buzzards. Upon some of them we found belts filled with gold dust. On other bodies near by the sacks or belts of buckskin had been cut open and contents spilled upon the sand. At the boat we found a coffee pot which we filled with gold dust. There were no Sioux seen. We visited their deserted camps in the coulee back from the timber grove. In the trees were many blanketed dead. We then made our way back to our village at Fort Berthold. To Girard we gave the gold. He in turn presented me with a large horse, and a few presents, and a feast to my companions on the trip.

JACOBSON KILLED AT JAMES RIVER FERRY

On the night of Tuesday, May 5, 1863, J. A. Jacobson and Thomas W. Thompson, who lived near Vermillion, were in camp at Greenway's Ferry, on the east bank of the James River, about five miles from Yankton. The men were asleep in their wagon and were on their return from Fort Randall, where they had delivered a load of Government freight. Just at daylight of the 6th a band of hostiles attacked the camp with rifles and arrows, sending a volley into the wagon, and instantly killing Jacobson, and seriously wounding Thompson, who sprang out and made for the ferry house, having been hailed by Greenway, who had been aroused and had opened fire on the Indians from the window of his cabin. Thompson was followed by a volley of arrows, one of which struck him in the back of the neck, after passing through a heavy coat collar, and lodged in contact with the bone. The coat collar probably saved his life. The Indians secured the team and made off, but the horses subsequently escaped and were found in the neighborhood of the ferry. Lieutenant Fowler, with a detachment of Company A, Dakota Cavalry, started out in pursuit, but they were unable to discover the trail. Colonel Pollock, at Fort Randall, also sent out a detachment, but nothing was discovered that would lead to the capture of the marauding party. The affair created intense excitement, and caused the loss of a number of farmers who removed from the territory. This tragedy led to im- mediate action on the part of General Cook, to protect the settlements, which had been left to the militia, and to Company A, Dakota Cavalry, during the six months prior, the cavalry company being required to patrol the entire frontier from the Big Sioux to Choteau Creek on the western borders of Bon Homme County while a good deal of harsh criticism was heard of the apparent indif- ference of the military authorities to the safety of Dakota's settlers.

Newton Edmunds, a citizen of Yankton and one of the pioneers of Dakota, was appointed governor of the territory, October 5, 1863, to succeed William Jayne, who had been chosen delegate to Congress and who resigned the governor- ship in February, 1863. During the interval following Jayne's resignation, John Hutchinson, secretary and acting governor, had performed the duties of the executive office.

There had been no emigration to the territory during 1863. A few settlers doubtless came in, but owing to the prolonged drouth, very little grain or other produce was grown during the year.

Secretary Hutchinson, who had been the responsible governor after the 4th of March, 1863, issued the following "official notice" to the people during the summer of 1863, while General Sully was absent with his expedition, which ex- plains itself :

Executive Office, Yankton, D. T., August 15, 1863.

To the People of Dakota Territory :-

The hostile demonstrations of Indians in this territory, and the frequent reports of the appearance of Indians, suggests the propriety of speedy information being given to the commanders of troops, in order that any Indians who may be seen may be pursued and captured and protection given to the settlements.

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You are therefore requested to report promptly to the commanders of troops nearest to the point where Indians are seen, who will immediately take such steps for their pursuit as may be necessary.

The safety of every inhabitant demands that this request should be strictly complied with. JOHN HUTCHINSON, Acting Governor.

After the return of Sully's Indian expedition, it was discovered that the Yankton Indians had been a wall of defense for the settlements of the territory against the hostile hordes of Little Crow during the absence of the troops on the expedition. Every art known to the hostiles was used to seduce the Yank- tons from their allegiance and friendliness, but it availed nothing. "Old Strike" was not to be deceived by the boasts which their emissaries made to him of the certainty of the success of the Indian arms during the summer, bolstered by the statement that they had white generals to lead them and plenty of everything, which confirmed the reports of white men being with the Red River Indians early in the season, inciting them to war. The Yanktons furnished a few re- cruits to the hostiles, who were young, reckless dare-devils who acted on their own notion and in defiance of the commands of the chiefs. As a tribe, they opposed the hostiles and furnished the most faithful scouts to Sully; and in a number of instances attacked and destroyed or captured small bands of the enemy and marched them as prisoners into Fort Randall. Major Burleigh was to be greatly credited for this condition. He had taken pains to explain to the chiefs the power of the Government and the certainty of punishment being meted out to the hostile Sioux, not only by the soldiers but in the loss of their annuities which they had been receiving from the hands of the Great Father. And so the Yanktons remained our most faithful allies and friends and afforded a strer pro- tection to the settlers than would have been furnished by the same or even a greater number of soldiers, for the reason that the hostiles knew they would be unable to reach the settlements and commit any depredations without being de- tected and punished by some one of the warrior Yankton bands who were con- stantly on the lookout for their encroachments, and knowing every trail and path that hostile parties would pursue, they were sure to head them off, which they did in every instance. Soldiers would not have been able, under the strictest patrol system, to have afforded such protection, though well enough to follow up and punish transgressors after the damage is inflicted. It may therefore be concluded that it was a most fortunate circumstance, our having this Yankton reservation on the border of the settlements, peopled by a tribe who had intelli- gence enough to perceive where their best interests were.

APPOINTMENTS

Hon. George P. Waldron was appointed provost marshal of Dakota Terri- tory in June, 1863. Judge Joseph R. Hanson was appointed by Captain Waldron to the chief clerkship in his office in July following.

Hon. Enos Stutsman was appointed private secretary in the executive office by Acting Governor Hutchinson, in June, 1863.

The Rev. Melancthon Hoyt was appointed United States commissioner for the Second Judicial District by Chief Justice Bliss. This was the first appoint- ment to this office made in the territory.

In September, 1863. Hon. John W. Boyles, of Vermillion, was appointed receiver of the United States land office at that place, Mr. Wilkinson, the former incumbent, having resigned to take the agency of the Indians at Fort Buford.

St. A. D. Balcombe, of Minnesota, and chairman of the Minnesota consti- tuitional convention of 1858, was appointed United States agent of the Winne- bago Indians in 1863. His agency was at Crow Creek, or Fort Thompson, where the Santees were located.

General Todd, having commenced proceedings to contest the seat in Con- gress claimed by Governor Jayne, as delegate from Dakota, Congress ordered

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a preliminary investigation of the grounds of contest before admitting Governor Jayne, and on the report of the committee having charge of the matter, Mr. Jayne was given the seat on prima facie evidence, without prejudice to Todd, who went on with the contest.

On the 14th of July, 1863, the Sioux City Journal, a weekly newspaper, with Mr. Ed B. Stillman as publisher and editor, began its career at Sioux City, which at that time was regarded as a formidable rival of Yankton.

The Fort Randall News was the title of a weekly newspaper published dur- ing the summer of 1863 by the soldiers stationed at that post.

The office of United States assessor of internal revenue for the District of Dakota Territory was created by act of Congress in the winter of 1862, and Joseph Labarge, of Cole County, was the first incumbent. The duties were not onerous, while the salary was ample, which furnished abundant reason for ac- cepting the position.

CHAPTER XXIX POLITICS AND PROCLAMATIONS 1863

POLITICIANS DISTURBED-REPUBLICAN PARTY DIVIDED-JUDGE BLISS AND DR. W. A. BURLEIGHI, LEADERS OF THE RESPECTIVE FACTIONS-VERY SLIGHT ATTENTION GIVEN TO THE LEGISLATIVE ELECTION OF 1863-REPUBLICAN AND UNION CONVEN- TION TO ELECT DELEGATES TO TIIE NATIONAL CONVENTION OF 1864-FIRST TERMS OF COURT IN SECOND DISTRICT-THANKSGIVING-PROCLAMATIONS OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN AND GOVERNOR EDMUNDS.

There was a growing disaffection in the camp of the republican and union party during the year 1863, the outgrowth of the Jayne and Todd campaigns of the year previous and the irregularities and frauds of that election, which had been given wide publicity through the legislative investigation of 1862-63, and due also to personal ambitions. Another prolific cause of party soreheaded- ness was attributed to Surveyor General Hill, who had been bringing into the territory from his Michigan home publie land surveyors and their assistants, who had received the surveying contracts, to the exclusion of a number of surveyors who were bona fide residents of the territory. Judge Bliss retained a rank sup- porter of the democratic candidates as clerk of his court ; Captain Waldron, the provost marshal, was in the insurgent business up to his ears and was looked upon as one badly tainted with party treason; while Attorney General Gleason was an avowed supporter of the General Todd element, their legal advisor and general counsellor. Scores of other republicans, not so conspicuous in public life, trailed along the same path, presaging a well defined split in the party before the contest came on in 1864.

Chief Justice Bliss and Secretary Hutchinson were also looked upon as inimical to the "regular" organization, owing to their attitude toward the Todd versus Jayne contest, which was not yet decided by Congress. Though as a board of canvassers they had given the certificate to Jayne, they were now looked upon as favoring Todd, because of the frauds that had been disclosed since the certificate was issued.

The agent of the Yankton Indians, Maj. Walter A. Burleigh, was a frequent visitor to the settlements of Dakota, and seemed to be a gentleman quite demo- eratie in manners, though strongly republican in politics. He had been a physi- cian in Pennsylvania and enjoyed a lucrative practice. While he had abandoned the practice in Dakota, he never refused to lend his professional services in case of emergency, and those who had occasion to be treated by him were loud in their praise of his skill. He would take no fee for such services. He was popular with the farmers all through the Missouri Valley, and it was said of him that he had, in many instances, aided in starting a bare-handed pioneer to get his cabin up, a few acres broke, and a cow or two. It was not, however, divined at this time that this active social gentleman, whose ordinary stride, as he walked .bout the town, would keep the average pedestrian trotting along beside him if he desired to "keep up," was destined to take a most important and prominent part in the political, agricultural, commercial and transportation interests of the terri-

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NEWTON EDMUNDS Second governor of Dakota. Served from September, 1863 to September, 1866

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tory and become a great leader in its largest enterprises. But the events of the coming winter and spring served to bring him into the foreground, where he remained for a long term of years, bearing the most conspicuous part of any of our public men.

The first term of the United States District Court for the Second District convened at Yankton the second Monday in May, 1862, Judge Bliss presiding ; United States attorney, Gleason ; marshal, Shaeffer, and clerk, James M. Allen. The grand jury was composed of Obed Foote, foreman; C. S. White, J. M. Stone, Henry Arend, Otis Wheeler, Culban Oleson, Ole Oleson, Canute Nelson, David Fisher, William Thompson, D. W. Reynolds, Nelson Collamer, C. F. Putnam, Benjamin F. Barge, Nels Nelson. At this term, which remained in ses- sion but one day, no business was transacted.

The fall term of court for 1862 convened October 5th. The same officers were present as at the May term, with the exception of Marshal Shaeffer, who had resigned, and George M. Pinney had succeeded to that place. The grand jury was made up of J. M. Stone, foreman ; John Keltz, John Rouse, John Law- rence, J. R. Hanson, H. T. Bailey, Obed Foote, B. F. Barge, C. S. White, M. Hoyt, Peter Johnson, J. S. Presho, Enos Stutsman, Henry Bradley, John Stanage. This grand jury remained in session four days but there was no business before the court. The session was held at the first council chamber on the southeast corner of Broadway and Fourth street. During the session and while waiting for the grand jury to complete its labors, the chief justice and others held an immigration meeting and partially organized a territorial agricultural society, urging that through such an association they could give material aid to the work of immigration by stimulating an interest in agricultural pursuits and dissemi- nating information throughout the country regarding the resources of Dakota as an agricultural field. The chief justice had taken a claim adjoining Picotte's townsite on the north, and was preparing to open up a farm. The family of the chief justice joined him late in the summer of 1863, and spent some time at their cozy home in Blissville, which was the name given to the judge's country scat north of Picotte's and adjoining the well-known Stone farm on the west, where the judge had taken a homestead. Ile was preparing at this time to make sub- stantial improvements on his place. He was now in the public eye, and had many ardent supporters as a candidate on the republican ticket for the nomination for delegate to Congress, which would be chosen in 1864; and he was known to look favorably upon these efforts of his friends, cherishing, as he did, a strong prefer- ence for a legislative career, for which he was amply endowed. There was, there- fore, more than ordinary meaning to his work as a claim holder and a plow holder.

The severity of the drouth, Indian hostilities, and General Sully's Indian campaign must have monopolized the attention of the politicians of the terri- tory, for up to August 31st no move had been made to nominate the legislative ticket, and the election was appointed for the 7th day of September following. Party lines throughout the northern states had been almost entirely ignored owing to the Civil war, which brought into the same political fold republicans and union democrats on the single issue of the preservation of the Union, and in order that the harmony of this relation might be undisturbed, the republican. as well as the democratic committees, as a rule. refrained from calling conventions under the party title. On the Ist of September the following call was issued by the unconditional union voters of Yankton County, and about the same rule was followed in the other counties :

All legal voters of Yankton County, who have an abiding faith in the great principles of the declaration of independence ; who are unalterably opposed to secession and disunion ; who consider the preservation of the American Union as paramount to all earthly objects. and who desire to lend their hearty and unreserved support to the present national adminis- tration in its effort to suppress the existing rebellion and uphold by word and deed every measure of that administration which is calculated in good faith to restore our nationil union peace, prosperity and tranquility, are cordially invited to be present at the house

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of Ilon. Kund Larson, near the Lake Settlement in Yankton County, on Thursday, September 3, 1803, at 2 o'clock P. M., there to put in nomination eight loyal candidates for the coming Legislature.

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History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 55

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920 Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1198

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198