USA > Washington > History of Washington; the rise and progress of an American state, Vol. III > Part 24
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They arrived among their kindred on the east side of the Cascades in time to make them acquainted with their own grievances, as well as to spread their impressions of the treaties and treaty makers among the Yakimas, before they were summoned to the Walla Walla council, and this fact will account, in some degree at least, for the distrust so persistently manifested by Kam-i-ah-kan and his subordi- nates during the negotiations. It still further inflamed the remnant of the Cayuses, who nourished a strong resentment against the whites, on account of the punishment inflicted upon them in the winter of 1847. It furnished to all the tribes, except the Nez Perces, a new and strong reason for believing what they had long suspected, that the treaties proposed were nothing more than a device to get possession of their lands without paying for them. It would have had some effect on the Nez Perces also, but for the influence of
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the Lawyer, and the fact that they lived farther away than the others, and the reports brought back by these Klikitats had not been so early received or so generally discussed among them.
It is not hard to conceive how a report of this kind, so assiduously spread as it doubtless was, and supported, as it seemed to be, by proof of actual observation, should affect the minds of these savages, to whom many promises had been made and none of them fulfilled. For nearly twenty years past the settlers had been coming through their country, and if few of them had remained there, they had gone into the country of other Indians whom they knew, had taken their lands and paid nothing for them. Promise of payment had always been made. Glowing stories of what would be given them by the Great Father, when he should send his represen- tatives to treat with them, had been told them in Whitman's time and even earlier, but the treaty makers had not come until now, and now that they had come the promises they made were not kept. The Indian was required to do what he was asked to do, at once; the white man took his own time, and now, as it seemed, he was to do nothing.
An ambitious agitator like Kam-i-ah-kan, or a crafty one like Peo-peo-mox-mox, who ever had an eye to his own per- sonal profit and advantage, would not fail to use this seeming proof of what they had so long and so busily represented to be the fact, as effectively as possible. The conduct of both at the council indicates that they were in a large degree governed by it. Both believed that the commissioners would make promises that they knew were not to be kept, and they, on their part, would meet them with promises they did not intend to keep. But the Walla Walla chief, as his nature was, would contrive to get such personal and present
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advantage as he could; the Yakima would pursue a less selfish policy, and make use as he could of the occasion to further his grand plan for a general war.
Although he signed the treaty, and broke it almost imme- diately afterwards, he appears nevertheless to have been actuated by a sense of honor that is comprehensible and even admirable, if viewed from the Indian standpoint. In- dians everywhere despise a liar ; they admire people who "talk with straight tongues." This Indian would make no promises or protestations that he did not intend to keep. He said nothing, or at least but little, during the council, though often urged to speak. He listened with disdain to the speeches of the Lawyer, and other Nez Perce chiefs who were accepting the hospitality of the commissioners, and were favorable to the treaties, and evidently despised the empty expostulations of Looking Glass, and the evasions of Peo- peo-mox-mox, as unworthy of a really great chief. As a high-minded savage he would give no one occasion to say after- wards that he had broken his word. But the signing and breaking of a treaty was another matter. Did he not know that it was only a mere pretense-a snare laid for his people; a thing these commissioners did not intend to keep ? Would the Great Father, of whom they talked so much, keep it more sacredly than he had kept the treaties made for him with the tribes in the Willamette? Why should he not sign it, as readily as they did, and so gain time to further his grand purpose ? It was doubtless by reasoning of this kind that he justified the course he had marked out for himself, and resolutely intended to pursue. He would tell no lie, but he would meet the insincerity of these white negotiators with equal insincerity, and when the time came he would show that they had not deceived him. But while thus planning to
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sign an agreement that he would not assent to by spoken word, it was without doubt his influence more than any other that restrained the impetuous Cayuses and prevented the massa- cre of the commissioners. He was not yet ready to strike. He would wait until the frost came, and the river was frozen over. By that time his plans would have ripened; he would be able to strike in many places at once, and the settlers would not be able to send their troops to his country. Before they could prepare for successful resistance he would extermi- nate them.
That his agents were long at work among the Indians west of the mountains, and particularly in the Sound country, there is every reason to believe. One of the most active of these was Leschi, whose mother was a Yakima, and whose relations with Kam-i-ah-kan and Owhi were intimate. He was an eloquent orator, and traveled far among the tribes on both sides of the Columbia, appealing to them to rise against the whites, who were coming in ever increasing numbers year by year, to despoil them of their homes. He did not fail to picture to their imaginations that "Polakly Illahe," the land of darkness, where no ray from the sun ever penetrated; where there was torture and death for all the races of Indians; where the sting of an insect killed like the stroke of a spear, and the streams were foul and muddy, so that no living thing could drink of the waters. This was the place to which the white men intended to banish them, when they should be strong enough, and he called upon them to resist like braves so terrible a fate. The white men were but a handful now. They could all be killed at once, and then others would fear to come. But if there was no war, they would grow strong and many, and soon put all the Indians where torture awaited them.
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The work of this and other active agitators alarmed some of the Indians west of the mountains, while others were persuaded to join the uprising. In July Patkanim, who evidently remembered the outcome of his attack on Fort Nisqually in 1849, went with a party of his Snoqualmies to Fort Steilacoom and told the officers there that an uprising was imminent, and that he and his people would not join in it. Gibbs was present at this interview and acted as inter- preter. Later Yoh-ho-tow-it and Umtrets, two Klikitat chiefs of influence in a small party of that tribe who had left their own country some years earlier, and settled on the Cath- lapootle, after driving away the other Indians they found there, went to Fort Vancouver and told the officers there a story similar to that that Patkanim had told. All the tribes east of the mountains were bent on war, they said, and "it was good that the whites should fill the Dalles, Vancouver, and Steilacoom with soldiers-not a few, as they were then, but full-many soldiers." They promised to remain at home on the Cathlapootle, and keep their men there.
Gibbs was at Vancouver at the time, and acted as inter- preter at this interview also. But in spite of these warnings the military did nothing. They in fact did worse than noth- ing, for they permitted a small band of Klikitats, who had thus given them friendly warning that war was about to begin, to be driven back across the mountains, and one of the two chiefs to be killed, at the very beginning of hostilities. By this ungrateful negligence they needlessly made enemies of those who wished to be friendly, and sent a reinforcement to the enemy, to further incite them to hostility with the story of their wrongs.
It has been charged, as elsewhere noted, that Leschi did not sign the treaty with the Nisquallies, of which tribe he
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was a member and a leader. It is a noteworthy fact that Gibbs, who was manifestly not friendly to Stevens when his letter was written, says nothing of this. It seems certain, both from the rugged honesty of his character, the nature of his employment, and his unfriendly feeling toward the gover- nor, that he would not have failed to expose the forgery if one had been committed. It is noteworthy also that no attempt was made, either when this Indian was on trial for his life, or in the bitter controversy that attended and followed the trial, to show that he had not signed the treaty, though protesting at the time against some of its terms. The fact undoubtedly is that he signed it, as Kam-i-ah-kan and the other chiefs signed that with the Yakimas, deliberately intending to break it, although he did not have as much cause as they had for believing the government would not approve or carry out its part of it, for the Klikitats had not then been sent home from the Willamette Valley. It is to be remembered that it was never even insinuated that Leschi did not sign this treaty until long after both he and Stevens, as well as Gibbs and most of the white people who were pre- sent, and signed it as witnesses, were in their graves, and those who have believed the libel in recent years, have been able to base it upon no evidence more substantial than their own misunderstanding of what the Indians long after said about it.
The representation that the treaties were the cause of the war, like those that it was caused by some indignities offered to Indian women, belonging to tribes that did not join in the war at all, or that the settlers deliberately began it for pur- poses of speculation, must be laid aside as wholly un- worthy of belief. The Indians had other and far more serious cause for alarm, in what they saw going on about
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them on every hand. The situation was such that even a more enlightened people than they were, might well have felt suspicious and anxious, and when it is remembered how long and persistently matters had been misrepresented by the designing agitators among them, it appears surprising that the slaughter did not begin at the Walla Walla council.
But the power which controlled the turbulent element there could not control it much longer. Soon after the Walla Walla council was dissolved a report spread through the country that gold had been discovered near Fort Colvile. In the preceding March four French Canadians, who had served their time with the Hudson's Bay Company, while prospecting along the banks of the Upper Columbia, near the confluence of the Pend d'Oreille, found sufficient color to fill them with the hope that they had found gold in paying quantity. News of their find soon reached the settlements, and was received with the greatest interest. For years past the residents in the Puget Sound region, along the Columbia, and in the Cowlitz and Willamette valleys, had seen the tide of immigration, which had once set strongly in their direction, turning southward to California. A State had been peopled and a government established in it, in a region which was but little known and rarely mentioned, until Marshall had discovered gold in the tail race at Sutter's mill. While this new region to the southward had been developing so rapidly, their own rich country had languished for want of interest and attention. Money was not plentiful in it, and employment, aside from that offered in the logging camps, was hard to find. But now a discovery of gold in their own country, although in a remote and not easily accessible part of it, filled them with hope. Many laid aside such
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employment as they had, whether on their own farms, or in the mills and lumber camps, and started for the mines.
As but little could be learned about the extent of the new mining region, or the nature of the deposits found, Colonel J. Patton Anderson, late United States marshal, but recently elected delegate to Congress, in place of Columbia Lancaster, set off for Colvile in quest of information. Wells, Fargo & Co. also sent an agent to examine the country and make report. But few waited for the information they would bring back. By the middle of July all the roads and trails leading toward the northeast had been found by the hopeful gold- hunters. Those from the Sound crossed the mountains by the Snoqualmie and Nachess passes, while those from the Cowlitz and the Willamette generally went up the Columbia to the Dalles, and thence crossed into the Yakima Valley. Later many went by way of Fort Walla Walla, where they left their boats and struck out over the sagebrush plains for Fort Colvile.
Not one perhaps of all these eager travelers anticipated any trouble from the Indians; certainly none of those who started earliest did so. Few of them had heard of the warnings sent by Father Pandozy to Major Rains, or of Father Ricard's letter to Governor Stevens, nor did they know of the truculent conduct of the Yakimas, Cayuses and Walla Wallas at the council. They knew only that treaties had recently been concluded with nearly all the tribes in Wash- ington, and assumed that the whole Indian country except the reservations was now open to settlement. They had the best of reasons for this assumption, for immediately after the Walla Walla council was concluded, official notice that the ceded lands were now open to settlement, signed by both Stevens and Palmer, was published in the newspapers
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of both Washington and Oregon .* Certainly if that were the case, those who were merely passing through it, intending in no way to dispute possession with its present occupants, were not likely to be molested. So confident were many that they set out in small parties and absolutely unarmed.
It was the country of the Yakimas, Walla Wallas and Cayuses, who had left the recent council in such bad humor, that these prospectors first invaded. It is not surprising, in view of what is now known, that the Indians looked upon them with suspicion. Remembering what the Klikitats, whom Palmer had sent home, had told them about the treat- ment they had received, it is not strange that they should regard these goldhunters as the advance guard of the settlers who, under pretense of hunting gold, were really coming to take possession of their country under the treaty. Many of these unarmed prospectors were murdered. One of the first to be killed was Mattice, a resident of Olympia, and soon after his partner Fanjoy, who had been interested with him in opening a coal mine in King County, was also murdered. They had been among the first to start for the new gold fields and were killed at, or near, the crossing of the Columbia. Other murders followed in rapid succession. Among those known to have been killed were Jameson, Walker, Eaton, Cummings and Huffman, and many others whose fate was never certainly known are believed to have been massacred.
Gradually news of these outrages began to reach the settlements, and produced the greatest anxiety. The Oregon newspapers were filled with the most alarming reports; in
* This notice appeared in the Puget Sound "Courier," published at Steilacoom, on July 12th, while news of the gold discovery at Colvile had appeared, for the first time, in the preceding issue, on July 5th.
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one issue the "Statesman" estimated that fully seventy pros- pectors were killed. Edward Eldridge, who with two com- panions had crossed to Fort Colvile on foot, read at the Dalles, as he was returning, a list of fifty miners who were supposed to have fallen victims to the ferocity of the disaf- fected tribes. His own name was among the number. He and his two companions had been the last to leave the Sound, in July, and had been warned by Dr. Tolmie, at Fort Nisqually, that the Indians east of the mountains were com- mitting many murders. In spite of this warning they had persisted in going, and had taken with them but a single rifle for their defense, and this they abandoned before crossing the summit, because the provisions they were obliged to take with them were so heavy that they were compelled to lighten their loads.
Late in August Angus McDonald, the Hudson's Bay trader then in charge at Fort Colvile, sent word to the miners that Mattice had been murdered, and warned them to make preparation to defend themselves. By this time it had been ascertained that gold in paying quantity was not to be found in that region, and the disappointed prospectors were already leaving for their homes. Those who had not yet started quickly prepared to leave, on receiving McDonald's warning, and the mines were abandoned. On their homeward journey, by way of Fort Walla Walla, the miners found the Indians in a very ugly humor, and some of the later stragglers only escaped by representing themselves to be employees of the Hudson's Bay Company. All the Americans then living east and south of the Columbia were warned, by friendly Indians, to make their escape down the river, which most of them did, or took refuge among the friendly Nez Perces. By the last of September no white people, except the French
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Canadians who had once worked for the Company, remained in eastern Washington, and by the middle of October Fort Walla Walla itself was abandoned, all the powder and other war material it contained being first thrown into the Columbia River.
As soon as Indian Agent A. J. Bolon learned of the outrages the Indians were committing on the miners, he left the Dalles for the Catholic mission on the Ahtanum, near which Kam-i-ah-kan had his camp. Remembering the temper which this chief, and those about him, as well as the Cayuses and Walla Wallas, had shown at the council, he evidently guessed that the ill feeling of their tribesmen had been increased by the sudden invasion of their country by the prospectors, but hoped to be able to explain matters to the satisfaction of this chief, and secure his help to repress the threatened uprising. He knew that this influence would be amply sufficient for the purpose if he could secure it.
So confident was he of his own influence among these Indians, that he went unarmed and unattended. He set off on September 18th, and never returned alive. Several days later Nathan Olney, one of his associates in the Indian service, becoming alarmed for his safety, sent a trustworthy Indian to the Ahtanum to make inquiry, and if possible to render him assistance. Before he returned an Indian woman brought the news that he had been murdered. From these two Indians was learned all that was ever known of Bolon's fate.
It appears that he reached the mission in safety, but as had been the case for many months preceding, he was unable to find, or procure an interview with, Kam-i-ah-kan. This able manager wished for no conference with his enemies, or their agent, and sent Skloom, one of his lieutenants, to meet
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him. With this Indian, Bolon had a long interview, in which Skloom told him that his people and the neighboring tribes had long been alarmed by the coming of the Americans, and that they had, for a long time past, been taking council to- gether about means for their own defense. The last council, he said, had been held in the Grand Ronde. He had attended it, but had spoken against war, though most of the others present were in favor of it. Bolon had told him that if war was begun the Indians would surely be defeated. He had explained that the miners were not coming into the coun- try to remain, but were merely passing through it to some far-away gold mines, and that the attacks upon them must stop. If they were not stopped soldiers would be sent into the valley and war would begin. He also told Skloom that the Indians who had committed the murders already reported must be given up for punishment.
Whether any understanding was reached at this interview, or any promise made on either side, no one now can ever know, as we have only this Indian report of it. Skloom was evidently angered by Bolon's admonition that soldiers would be sent to punish his people, if the murders were not stopped and the murderers surrendered. Doubtless his version of the conference was soon communicated to Kam-i-ah-kan and others, but Bolon seems to have suspected no danger to him- self.
On the day following he started to return to the Dalles, accompanied by three Indians, one of whom was a son of one of the chiefs. By some this was supposed to be Kwal- chin, son of Owhi, who was a half-brother of Kam-i-ah-kan, and by others he is supposed to have been a son of Sho-ah- way, another chief. After proceeding for some distance from the mission this young man, whoever he was, dropped behind
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the party and shot Bolon through the back. With the help of his companions he then cut his throat, killed his horse, built a fire and burned the bodies of horse and rider together.
When the Indian woman arrived at the Dalles with her story, Major Rains was at Vancouver, but Major Haller had just arrived from the Snake River country, where he had recently punished the murderers of the Ward party. His command had not yet come up, but realizing that it would be desirable to act promptly, in case the news of Bolon's murder should be confirmed, he immediately set about pre- paring the two companies then at the fort to take the field, intending to leave his own tired troops to garrison the place when they should arrive.
Before starting on his Snake River campaign he had received a letter from Lloyd Brooke, of Brooke, Bumford & Noble, the traders and stock-raisers who were occupying the site of the old Whitman mission, advising him of the hostility of the Cayuses and Umatillas, and giving warning that they might attack the commissioners during the council. This letter had been shown to Stevens, on his arrival at the Dalles, and to Rains, and had been of service in convincing the latter that he ought to send an escort with the treaty-makers to protect their lives, and the property they took with them .* He also knew from other sources that the Indians had been in bad humor for a long time, and was therefore prepared to believe that serious trouble was imminent.
He also sent word to Major Rains, as it would be neces- sary to have his order, or approval, before his expedition could start, but he received no reply for several days. Finally, when all was ready, he moved both companies to the opposite
* From a manuscript written by Colonel Haller some years before his death, and now in the Bagley collection.
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side of the river, so that they might start northward so much the more promptly when orders should arrive.
Meantime Rains had received a letter from Secretary Mason, who, in the absence of Governor Stevens, was acting governor of Washington, advising him of the murder of Mattice, and asking him to send a strong force to the Yakima, to protect the prospectors. Soon after this letter was dis- patched news came that other miners had been murdered, and Governor Mason made a hurried visit to Fort Steilacoom to urge Captain Maloney, then in command of that post, to send a force directly across the mountains by the Nachess Pass, to cooperate with whatever troops should be sent from the Dalles. With this request Maloney complied, so far as he thought prudent, by sending Lieutenant Slaughter with forty men, by the road the settlers had opened two years earlier, across the mountains, to the headwaters of the Yakima.
The acting governor then dispatched a second letter to Major Rains, informing him of what Maloney had done, and urging him again to act promptly. To this Rains replied that he approved of Maloney's action, and only regretted that he had not thought it prudent to send a full company with the lieutenant, instead of a detachment. He also sent an order to Haller to proceed northward immediately, but with only one company.
By the time this order reached Haller he had received further information, which he thought justified him in taking the full force with which he had already crossed the river. It consisted of 107 officers and men, all mounted, a pack train with provisions for a month, and a howitzer. It was directed to sweep through the Yakima Valley and cooperate with Slaughter, so far as might be necessary or desirable.
COL. GRANVILLE O. HALLER.
Born in York, Pa., January 31, 1819; commissioned second lieutenant in the 4th regiment United States infantry, November 17, 1839; served in the Florida war during the winter of 1841-42, and with General Taylor in Texas in 1845. Was in the battles at Palo Alto and at Resaca de la Palma, at the beginning of the Mexican war, and was with General Taylor until after the capture of Monterey. His regiment was then transferred to General Scott's column, and he was in most of the battles from the siege of Vera Cruz to the taking of the City of Mexico, and particularly distin- guished himself at the Molino del Rey and Chapultepec. He came to the coast in 1852, and was stationed at the Dalles, in 1853. His part in the Indian war and the subsequent history of Washington is fully set forth in the general narrative.
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