17. Helen Hunt Jackson, A Century of Dishonor, p. 127. Requoted from the Report of Secretary of Interior, 1872–73.
18. Wood, Joseph and His Land Claims or Status of Young Joseph and His Band of Nez Percé Indians, p. 33.
19. Ibid., pp. 31–32.
20. Letter from Monteith to Walker, November 22, 1873, in the Lapwai files.
21. Report of Secretary of Interior, 1872–73, House Executive Documents, Vol. I, 43rd Congress, 1st Session, p. 613. Report of John B. Monteith.
22. Ibid., p. 614. Monteith was referring, of course, to young Chief Looking Glass, about forty-one years old at this time.
23. History of North Idaho, pp. 46–47. The full text of Governor Grover’s letter is quoted therein. The italicized capitals are supposedly Grover’s.
24. Wood, op. cit., p. 45; second part of quotation from p. 7.
25. Ibid., p. 44.
26. Report of Secretary of Interior, House Executive Documents, No. 4, Special Session, 1867, p. 13.
8. The Earth-mother Drinks Blood
1. Curtis, The North American Indian, VIII, 13–14.
2. Wood, Joseph and His Land Claims or Status of Young Joseph and his Band of Nez Percé Indians, p. 34.
3. J. P. Dunn, Jr., Massacres of the Mountains, p. 637.
4. Oliver Otis Howard was born at Leeds, Maine, November 8, 1830, and died at Burlington, Vermont, October 26, 1909. He entered West Point in 1850 and was graduated fourth in his class, in 1854. He participated in the first battle of Bull Run in Virginia. At Fair Oaks he lost his right arm. He took part in the action at Second Bull Run, South Mountain, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Chattanooga, and Gettysburg. During Sherman’s march through Georgia, Howard commanded the right wing. He was promoted to brigadier general in the regular army in 1864, with brevet rank of major general.
In 1874 he was placed in command of the Department of the Columbia. He became Superintendent of West Point in 1880. He was promoted to major general in 1886 and placed in command of the Division of the East, a post he held until his retirement in 1894.
The author is no known relation of General Howard’s. On the contrary, her paternal grandfather, Adolphus Howard, served with General Lee’s Army of Virginia.
5. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 29.
6. Ibid., p. 31.
7. Original letters of John B. Monteith, in Idaho State Historical Library, Boise, Idaho.
8. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, I, 7, 579. Report of General of the Army. Mr. J. H. Horner, in a letter, August 28, 1941, gives the date of the killing as June 6.
9. Monteith, original letters.
10. “An Indian’s Views of Indian Affairs,” North American Review, April, 1879, pp. 419–20.
11. Report of Secretary of Interior, 1911, Executive Documents, No. 97, 62nd Congress, 1st Session, p. 112, “Memorial of the Nez Percés Indians.” From the notarized statement of Stot-Ka-i (also spelled Stot-Ka-Yai) made on July 10, 1911. He also spoke of another murder of an Indian over a dispute concerning land and improvements made by this Indian. Stot-Ka-i, however, was in error in respect to the settlement of the argument over the death of We-lot-yah, as Joseph went ahead and made his ultimatum.
12. J. H. Horner and Grace Butterfield, “The Nez Perce-Findley Affair,” Oregon Historical Quarterly, March, 1939, p. 49.
13. Ibid., p. 46.
14. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, I, 7–8. Report of General of the Army.
15. Horner and Butterfield, op. cit., p. 50.
16. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 32.
17. Helen Hunt Jackson (“H H”), A Century of Dishonor, p. 125.
18. Dunn, op. cit., p. 638.
19. Ibid. Requoted from Report of Secretary of Interior, Commission reports, Bureau of Indian Affairs, 1875, 1, 762. Ibid., 1876, I, 449.
20. Dunn, op. cit., pp. 638–39.
21. Report of Secretary of Interior, 1876, I, 449.
22. Wood, op. cit., p. 45.
23. Works of H. H. Bancroft, XXXI, 499.
24. Dunn, op. cit., p. 646.
25. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, p. 115. Report of John B. Monteith.
26. Ibid.
27. Ibid.
28. McWhorter, Hear Me, My Chiefs!, pp. 152 ff.
29. Howard, in Report of Secretary of War, 1877, I, 590.
30. McWhorter, op. cit., p. 182.
31. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 58.
32. According to Indian testimony, Alokut was not present at this council. Yellow Serpent, a Walla Walla chief, says: “Alokut was at Nihyawi [Umatilla River]. . . . General Howard made the first speech. He said: ‘. . . I see all of you to-day are before me. Only Alokut is absent.’” (Curtis, op. cit., VIII, 20.) Three Eagles, a Nez Perce and a friend of Joseph’s corroborates Yellow Serpent’s statement: “Alokut was not at this council; he was at Umatilla. He joined his brother [Joseph] at Lapwai after the council.” (Ibid., p. 23.)
33. Quoted by Brady, Northwestern Fights and Fighters, pp. 6–7, from Col. C. E. S. Wood’s Century article.
34. From a feature article by Addison Howard in the Daily Missoulian, Missoula, Montana, June 14, 1925.
9. The Council at Fort Lapwai—1877
1. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 53.
2. Curtis, The North American Indian, VIII, 20.
3. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 53.
4. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, I, 593. Report of Brigadier General Howard.
5. Ibid.
6. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 58.
7. Ibid.
8. “An Indian’s Views of Indian Affairs,” North American Review, April, 1879, p. 416.
9. New York Sun, September 25, 1904. From a news account on the death of Chief Joseph.
10. “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., p. 421.
11. Ibid. However, the general, in an article republished in C. T. Brady’s Northwestern Fights and Fighters, p. 85, denies making this remark, and denies that Joseph made the speech quoted above. Undoubtedly, the fact that every word spoken had to be interpreted gave rise to much misunderstanding.
12. Ibid. In his reply to Joseph’s article, Howard denies that Tuhulhutsut spoke as the chief said he did. Yet in his book, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, chap. X, the general credits Tuhulhutsut with speaking in much the same vein as Joseph declares. Howard denies, further, that he lost his temper, but in his official “Report of Brigadier General Howard to the Secretary of War,” Report of Secretary of War, 1877, Vol. I, he states that Tuhulhutsut did speak at great length on the philosophy of the Dreamer teachings, and that he (Howard) spoke sharply in reply and said that the tewat’s words were causing disaffection among the other chiefs. No doubt the fact that the speeches had to be translated caused misunderstanding. Howard’s command to the old chief to change his tone was probably misinterpreted by the translator to “shut up,” just as Joseph claims in his version published in the North American Review.
13. “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., p. 421.
14. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, p. 594.
15. Ibid.
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid., p. 595.
19. Ibid.
20. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 66.
21. “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., p. 422.
22. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 67.
23. “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., p. 422.
24. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 68.
25. “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., p. 422.
26. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, p. 595.
27. Ibid.
28. Howard, “Famous Indian Chiefs,” St. Nicholas Magazine, June, 1908, p. 697. Also found in the book of the same title on p. 193.
29. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, p. 117.
30. Ibid., p. 596.
31. Ibid.
32. Ibid.
33. According to Yellow Serpent, Howard had said in the council: “I am to give you thirty days to come in. This is the order I received from Washington.” Curtis, op. cit., p. 20.
10. Chief White Bird’s Murders
1. “An Indian’s Views of Indian Affairs,” North American Review, April, 1879, p. 423.
2. Helen Hunt Jackson, A Century of Dishonor, p. 131.
3. “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., p. 423.
4. Fourteenth Annual Report, Bureau of American Ethnology, Part II, pp. 713–14.
5. J. P. Dunn, Jr., Massacres of the Mountains, p. 636. Also Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, pp. 92–93, 101. Haines, in Red Eagles of the Northwest, p. 241, gives a somewhat different version based on the pamphlet by Will Cave, whose account was written many years after the events occurred. The account of Walaitits in this text is based on Yellow Bull’s own testimony.
6. Curtis, The North American Indian, VIII, 23. This account is corroborated by Yellow Bull, p. 164, also by Joseph, “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., p. 424.
7. Curtis, op. cit., VIII, 23.
8. McWhorter, Hear Me, My Chiefs!, pp. 189 ff. E. S. Curtis’ informant, Yellow Bull, claims the three young men were drunk. (Curtis, op. cit., VIII, 164.) Two Moons corroborated this fact to McWhorter, but other Indian sources denied it.
9. Elfers had rendered a legal decision in the Mason case unfavorable to the Indians. For a further discussion see p. 126 of this volume. For additional Indian testimony see McWhorter, Yellow Wolf: His Own Story, pp. 44–45, and note 11, p. 45.
10. Curtis, op cit., VII, 164.
11. McWhorter, Hear Me, My Chiefs!, p. 196.
12. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf: His Own Story, p. 45. Yellow Wolf’s reference to “thirty-five other men” who remained in camp with Joseph and Alokut may be a misprint as other Indian witnesses all mentioned only five men as staying.
13. Curtis, op. cit., VIII, 24–25. From the account by Three Eagles.
14. Ibid., p. 50.
15. “An Indian’s Views . . . ,” op. cit., pp. 424–25.
16. Ibid. This statement is substantiated by Mr. Samuel Tilden, Nez Perce of Arlee, Montana, in a letter to the author dated November 10, 1934. Tilden was a member of the hostile bands.
17. Curtis, op. cit., VIII, 22.
18. McWhorter, Hear Me, My Chiefs!, p. 505.
19. Ibid., p. 506.
20. Ibid.
11. The Settlers Prepare for War
1. Even by the military the term “citizens,” rather than “civilians,” was customarily applied to the white settlers, whether they lived on farms or in the towns. The two terms, however, will be used interchangeably in this volume.
2. Howard, Chief Joseph, His Pursuit and Capture, p. 91.
3. Report of Secretary of War, 1877, I, 601. Report of Brigadier General Howard.
4. Howard, op. cit., p. 88.
5. Harry W. Cone reports that White Bird’s young men who murdered the settlers in cold blood told him in the Nez Perce tongue that the Indians were on the warpath, and they warned the friendly whites to stay home. Cone spread the alarm, and the surviving ranchers barricaded themselves on Slate Creek. Cone also recounts the story of Tolo, a friendly Nez Perce woman, who brought reenforcements to the settlers from the mining town of Florence. Cone, “The White Bird Battle,” MS. in Idaho State Historical Library, Boise.
6. Maggie Manuel was the daughter of Mrs. John J. Manuel. She is now Mrs. Maggie Bowman, and was residing in Butte, Montana, in 1934. At the time of the Salmon River massacres she was seven years old. Mrs. Bowman testifies under oath that she saw Chief Joseph drive a knife into her mother’s breast while she was nursing her baby in their cabin home. She claims their house was set on fire that day and her mother and the infant cremated. Later she recovered the charred remains of her mother’s earrings.
But James Conley, who saw service in the Nez Perce War, says he went to the Manuel home, accompanied by other men, and although they raked over the ashes they failed to find any human bones.
Harry Cone, who speaks the Nez Perce language and was also in the war, says that Yellow Bull was in command of the Salmon River group of Chief Joseph’s tribe and encamped near his home on Slate Creek. Yellow Bull, Mr. Cone reports, boasted that he had Mrs. Manuel with him. (Yellow Bull, however, was a member of White Bird’s—not Joseph’s—band.)
C. T. Stranahan of Lewiston, former Nez Perce Indian agent, testifies that later an Indian in Yellow Bull’s band told him under a pledge of secrecy that the story then circulating about Mrs. Manuel’s murder by Chief Joseph and her subsequent cremation was untrue. Two members of Joseph’s band told this Indian that the chief took no part in the massacre. Instead he “stayed for some time by her side and made his men leave her alone.”
Mr. Stranahan further reports General Howard told him personally that Joseph did not harm Mrs. Manuel, but instead did everything to protect her.
In 1900 Mr. Stranahan cornered Yellow Bull about the mystery of Mrs. Manuel. He promised the chief not to reveal the information until after his death, which occurred July 20, 1919. Yellow Bull told Mr. Stranahan that Mrs. Manuel was taken captive. After the Indians crossed the divide into Montana, her captor and another warrior had a fight over her. One or the other killed her and dragged her into the brush, but Yellow Bull refused to reveal the name of the murderer. Reported in Robert G. Bailey, River of No Return, p. 189.
McWhorter’s Indian informants told him Red Wolf tried to abduct Mrs. Manuel on horseback “when she snatched the knife from his belt and attempted to kill him. He struck her, felling her to the ground, and she died from the fall.” Presumably she was carried back to her home and the house then set afire. (McWhorter, Hear Me, My Chiefs!, pp. 215–16.)
This Indian statement is probably the most factual of all and agrees in essentials with Charles Moody’s account which appeared in the Century Magazine, March, 1911. He relates that both Manuel and his wife, mounted on a horse apiece, the father with Maggie riding double, and Mrs. Manuel holding the baby, tried to escape the Indians. They were overtaken by the raiders and fired upon. The same arrow wounded both Maggie and her father but both were able to hide in the brush. The Indians then captured the mother and baby, with the results already described by McWhorter.
The circumstances surrounding the disappearance of Mrs. Manuel are the most hopelessly confused of any incident connected with the war. It appears more reasonable for the charge of murdering her, though, to be placed against Tuhulhutsut and Yellow Bull (Chuslum Moxmox) than Chief Joseph. Only one member of the latter’s band, Philip Williams (Lahpeealoot), joined in the second Salmon River raid and did accidentally wound Maggie Manuel with an arrow. See McWhorter, op. cit., p. 199; pp. 213–14. But both Tuhulhutsut and Yellow Bull are mentioned as being with the sixteen or seventeen other warriors on the foray, along with the latter’s son, Red Moccasin-top. Tuhulhutsut is described as the strongest man in the Nez Perce tribe and was very active in battle despite his age. As an example of his great strength the Indians affirm he got drunk on one occasion and became so troublesome in his village that eight of his own men tried to subdue and tie him up. But so powerful was he they were forced to let him go. See McWhorter, op. cit., p. 184. The Indians admit the raiders taking part in the second foray were intoxicated when the Manuel home was pillaged. Yet Chief Joseph was known among both whites and Indians as a teetotaler. See Kate McBeth, The Nez Percés Since Lewis and Clark, p. 98. Besides, the day of Mrs. Manuel’s disappearance, June 15, Two Moons, Wetatonmi, Alokut’s wife, and Yellow Wolf all affirm Joseph and his brother were busy moving their camp from Tolo Lake to Cottonwood, while warriors kept Joseph under surveillance to prevent his escape to Kamiah or Lapwai! McWhorter accuses Arthur “Ad” Chapman of hatching and circulating the vicious story implicating Joseph.
Furthermore, despite Maggie Manuel Bowman’s sworn testimony to th
e contrary, Patrick Brice is known to have rescued her from the bushes in a wounded condition and carried her to her home, which was already “only a heap of smoldering ashes. Among the embers lay the charred body of a woman and her infant. The Indians had taken Mrs. Manuel and her baby back to the house, killed them, and then fired the house.” See Charles S. Moody, “The Bravest Deed I Ever Knew,” Century Magazine, March, 1911, p. 783.
Out of all the contradictions, one fact is indisputably clear: Mrs. Manuel disappeared as a result of drunken Indians plundering her home during the second marauding expedition. But the charge of murder against Joseph, in the light of all present evidence, does seem preposterous and wholly without foundation.
Saga of Chief Joseph Page 36