The Rouge River War occurred in Oregon in 1855 at about the same time as the Yakima War in Washington. Captain Andrew Jackson Smith, the commander of Fort Lane, had tried to keep peace between the settlers and the Indians. At times he would even interpose his troops between them. In October, because of the threat posed by the settlers, he moved the Indian men to the fort. The women and children were to follow. Before they could, volunteers murdered 23 Indian old men, women, and children.
The next day, the Indians killed 27 settlers. General John E. Wool, the head of the Department of the Pacific, and commander of both Washington and Oregon, observed, “It has become a contest of extermination by both whites and Indians.” Wool, like many other army officers, was not anti-Indian. “Wool openly sympathized with the Indians. He directed his field officers not to fight Indians unless forced to do so, and at all other times to persuade the tribes to become peaceful.”242
That same year Nelson Lee”* and 20 others were attacked by Comanches as they were taking mules and horses to California to sell Four, including Lee, survived, but were captured by the Indians. The next morning, Lee’s feet were unbound and he was conducted through the Indian camp so he could see what had happened to those who had not made it. They had been cut and hacked. Some had their arms and hands chopped off. Others had their tongues drawn out and sharp sticks thrust through them. All had been scalped. When the Comanche village was reached, the survivors were tied naked to posts with their hands and feet stretched between them. A long line of perhaps 200 warriors approached them in single file carrying knives, tomahawks, and arrows.
As the procession passed a pair of these captives, 2 warriors broke from the line, seized them by the hair, scalped them, then resumed their places in line, and went on. The piece of scalp taken was about the size of a silver dollar and did not necessarily kill them, but blood ran freely over their faces and into their beards. The second time the line came past, the warriors cut the same 2 prisoners with their arrows. The Indians returned an uncounted number of times, until the 2 were hacked and covered with blood. After a couple of hours, the warriors started singing their war song, approached the 2 slowly, then drew hatchets and crashed them into the skulls of the prisoners. The bodies were thrown on the ground. Dogs came and lapped the blood from the wounds.
After a time, Lee tried to escape, but was caught and taken to the tent of Chief Spotted Leopard, where he was tied to stakes on his back. For 2 weeks he was kept tied down. The chief drew his knife across the tendon just below his knee. The chief frequently bent his leg back and forth, breaking the wound open. The purpose of this procedure was to cripple Lee so that he could not escape when he was finally allowed to move about. Later, while on the way back to the Comanche camp, he heard war whoops and shrieks of agony that grew fainter and fainter, then stopped. When he got into camp he saw parts of an army uniform. Lee never forgot what happened next:
Moving on beyond the camp into a grove, a spectacle presented itself that froze my blood. A white man had been subjected to the torture. A sharp stick had been thrust through his heel cords, by which he was suspended from a limb, with his head downward, as a butcher suspends a carcass. He, also, had been sacrificed with the accursed flints, his ears cut off and tongue drawn out. A slight convulsive shrug of the shoulders indicated that life was not wholly extinct. I gazed upon him in silence and terror and was relieved when they led me away.244
Three Englishwomen were brought into the camp where Lee was held. They told him the men in their wagon train had been massacred, the children carried away, “and crying babies killed by cutting a hole under their chins and hanging them ‘on the point of a broken limb.’” They said they had been repeatedly raped.245
Lee was sold twice during his captivity. Big Wolf sold him to Chief Spotted Leopard, who in turn sold him to Chief Rolling Thunder. Rolling Thunder liked him and asked if he would like to marry. Lee said yes, believing it would help his chances of escape. He was then given 6 daughters of the tribe from which to chose. He chose Sleek Otter, who proved to be a faithful and affectionate wife. His marriage did indeed improve his status in the tribe. “I was no longer made the center post at their war dances.”246
One day, Rolling Thunder informed him that the 2 of them would go on a 3-day journey, alone. At the end of the first day, they entered the village of a small tribe. The chief got drunk. The next morning Lee was very thirsty, but there was no water. Finally they found a little muddy water, and Lee was given the horn to scoop it up, but he could only get 3 parts mud to one part water. Rolling Thunder saw the problem, got off his horse, threw his rifle on the ground, and lay down to drink the muddy water. His hatchet was on his saddle. Lee grabbed the hatchet, leaped toward the chief, and buried the hatchet a full hand’s breadth in his brain. For 56 days he wandered lost in the wilderness, undergoing many hardships until a trader found him.247
Only 3 years after the Mormon Cow War, Mormons were again involved in atrocities. Utah had asked to be admitted to the Union as a state several times. Congress refused each time because some Mormons practiced polygamy. President James Buchanan appointed a new territorial governor in the place of Mormon governor Brigham Young. Buchanan sent federal troops to enforce the appointment. In 1857, a group of Indians and Utah citizens gathered to confront these troops. They attacked a party of 140 and murdered most of them.248
* The Choctaw settled in Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Arkansas, Texas, and Oklahoma. They supported the Americans in the Revolution and the War of 1812.9
† The Seminoles lived in Florida. The name means “one who has camped out from the regular towns.” The reason for this is that the Seminoles broke off from other tribes (primarily Creeks) and moved south in the 1700s.10
† The Creeks were in Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Tennessee, Texas, and Oklahoma. Their villages were organized into Red towns and White towns. The warriors lived in the former and the peacemakers in the latter.11
§ The Chickasaw were in Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee, Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina, and Oklahoma. They supported the British in the French and Indian War, halted all French traffic on the Mississippi for a time, and successfully resisted the attack of French armies 3 times. Some warriors fought on both sides in the Revolutionary War.12
¶ The Cherokee lived in Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Virginia, Arkansas, Kansas, and Oklahoma. They poisoned water to catch fish and used blowguns to kill small game. Tribal organization included a White Chief who helped make decisions about farming, lawmaking, and disputes, a Red Chief who advised about warfare, and a War Woman who went on war parties but did not fight and decided which prisoners would live and which would die.13
*During the French and Indian War, the Fox tribe fought against the French. The French and Chippewa drove them to new homelands. They and the Sac and others defeated the Illinois in 1769. They formed a temporary alliance with the Sioux to attack the Chippewa, but were defeated.126
*Through much of their history, Comanche raided whites and other tribes to steal horses. They had a long history of fighting the Texas Rangers and the army. The Native American Church was chartered by the Comanche in 1918; one of its practices involves the sacramental use of peyote. By the 1930s, about half the Indians in the country were members.138
* Kiowa migrated frequently. Their first known home was in western Montana. Lewis and Clark found them in Nebraska in 1805. The Kiowa raided other tribes such as the Caddos, Navajos, Utes, Apache, Arapaho, Cheyenne, and Osages.142
*Savage was from Illinois. He quit school at 14, lived for several years among the Sac and Fox and other Indians, then went to California, where he lived mostly among Indians and was like a chief. He spoke 5 Indian languages, plus German, French, Spanish, and English.166
*This is the same J. J. Warner, an Indian agent, who in 1856 told the Santa Isabel Indians that he intended to take all unbranded animals in their possession away from them, asserting that those animals were hi
s property! The lieutenant commanding the local army post, William A. Winder, told the chief of the Santa Isabels that if any attempt should be made by Warner to take the animals, they should bring them to the lieutenant for safekeeping. Winder reported to his commander, Major W. W. Mackall, that “this is one of the many cases of injustice practiced upon these Indians, and by the very men whose duty it is to protect them.”188 John Bigler, stating that in their 4 counties within a very few months, Indians had murdered at least 130 whites.197
* Nelson Lee was born in New York City, fought in the Black Hawk War and the Mexican War, was in the U.S. Navy, the Texas Navy, and was a Texas Ranger.243
CHAPTER 8
Atrocities in the Civil War and Post-Civil War Eras
In the 1850s, soldiers in the West included some derelicts, drunks, and criminals hiding out from the law. This ragtag army was outnumbered by the Indians.1 When the Civil War began in 1861, a substantial part of the army in the West was occupied trying to prevent clashes between the settlers and the Indians. That war would be the most destructive in world history up to that time.2 The Union suffered horrendous casualties. More soldiers were needed, and they were taken from the West. Duane Schultz outlined what that meant:
With the outbreak of the war … western lands found themselves virtually defenseless. Troops were ordered back east to fight the Confederates. Only thirty-nine soldiers of the Second Infantry remained on duty at Fort Larned on the Arkansas River. Fort Wise had 33 men, Fort Kearny 125, and 90 were quartered at Fort Laramie. In all the vast plains covering some 200,000 square miles, fewer than three hundred troops patrolled.3
After the Civil War, the army was reduced to about 30,000 men, and it remained at that strength (or perhaps even smaller) until the Spanish-American War began in 1898.4 The peacekeeping forces were again spread very thin. Trouble and atrocities continued to occur—they could not be controlled.
In 1861, Apache chief Cochise vowed to exterminate all whites in Arizona.5 Second Lieutenant George N. Bascom was stationed at Fort Buchanan. He was ordered to find Cochise and demand the return of a boy and some stock seized in an Apache raid near the fort. Bascom and Cochise met in Bascom’s tent. Cochise, even though he had vowed to kill all whites, denied that his people had any part in the raid or its plunder. He truthfully blamed the White Mountain subtribe of Apache and offered to help get the boy and the stock back. Bascom told Cochise he and his party would be held hostage until the boy and stock were returned. Cochise drew his knife, slashed the tent, and escaped. The rest of his party—his brother, 2 nephews, and a woman with 2 children—were taken prisoner. Cochise already held 3 white prisoners before the meeting, but that night he seized a wagon train and got 2 more. The Apache also had 8 Mexican teamster prisoners, who were bound to wagon wheels and the wagons set on fire.
The next day, Cochise appeared under a flag of truce. Three Butter-field stagecoach employees who knew him went out to talk. The white flag was thrown down, the Indians seized one employee, James F. Wallace, both sides opened fire, the other 2 employees were hit, and one died. Bascom’s troops later found the burned wagon train with the charred corpses of the Mexican teamsters still attached to the wheels. They also found the remains of Cochise’s 6 white hostages, who were perforated by many lance holes and cut up to such an extent that Wallace could be identified only by his dental fillings.
Leaving behind the Indian woman hostage and her 2 children, Bascom took the rest of his prisoners (including Cochise’s brother) to the scene where the bodies of Cochise’s hostages had been found and hanged all of them. Their bodies stayed there for months as a warning.6 This was the beginning of the Apache Wars. Cochise inflicted “frightful tortures” on his captives during that time.7 During the next 2 months, it is believed his people killed 150 whites and Mexicans.8
In nearby New Mexico in 1861, settlers repeatedly raided the Navajo Indians and took captives who were later sold as slaves.9 The same year at Fort Lyon in New Mexico, a series of horse races was run between the soldiers and the Navajo Indians. The feature race was between an army lieutenant on a quarter horse and Navajo chief Manuelito on a Navajo pony. Many bets were made. Manuelito lost control of his pony early on, and it ran off the track. The Indians charged that its reins and bridle had been cut with a knife. The soldier judges declared the lieutenant the winner. When the soldiers returned to the fort, angry Indians followed, and the gates were shut on them. One Indian tried to force his way in and was shot and killed.
Commander Lieutenant Colonel Manuel Chaves turned his troops on the 500 or so Indians gathered outside the fort. Captain Nicholas Hodt described what happened then. Indian women and children ran in all directions, but were shot and bayoneted. A soldier murdered 2 children and a woman. Hodt demanded that he stop, but he did not. The commander directed the howitzers to fire on the Indians. The sergeant in charge of the mountain howitzers pretended not to understand the command to fire, for he considered it to be unlawful, but being cursed by the officer of the day, and threatened, he felt he had to execute the order or else get himself in trouble. Thirty to 40 Navajo were killed. The rest fled and turned to raiding.10
Sometime before 1864, a Denver man reported what he had found after an Indian raid:
About 100 yards from the desolated ranch [we] discovered the body of the murdered woman and her two dead children, one of which was a little girl of four years and the other an infant. The woman had been stabbed in several places and scalped, and the body bore evidences of having been violated. The two children had their throats cut, their heads being nearly severed from their bodies.11
Colonel Kit Carson* arranged for 5 Apache chiefs to go visit with Colonel James H. Carlton in Sante Fe around 1862. On the way, 2 of the chiefs met some soldiers commanded by Captain James Graydon, a former saloon keeper. Graydon offered them beef and flour, then the 2 groups parted, only to meet a second time. Graydon went into the chiefs’ camp, had a drink with them, then shot them dead. The other 3 met with Carlton and told him they no longer wanted to fight.13
Herman Lehmann, who was captured as a boy and raised as a warrior, participated in a joint Apache-Comanche raid near the headwaters of the Llano River in Texas. He later admitted that they had “burned a house and killed a man, his wife and four or five children. We tortured them before we killed them.”14
As usual, it wasn’t just the Indians who were killing. In 1862, Confederate lieutenant colonel John Robert Baylor ordered one of his commanders to do away with all hostile Indians:
The Congress of the Confederate States has passed a law declaring extermination of all hostile Indians. You will therefore use all means to persuade the Apaches or any tribes to come in for the purpose of making peace, and when you get them together, kill all the grown Indians and take the children prisoners and sell them to defray the expense of killing the Indians.15
THERE WERE two causes of the Santee Sioux Uprising in Minnesota, one chronic and one acute. The chronic cause was the failure of the government to pay the annuity due the Sioux so that they could buy food and other supplies from the government warehouses. The completely unrelated acute cause was the bravado of 4 young Sioux who had come home empty-handed from a hunting expedition.
By its 1851 treaty, the government agreed to make payments to the Sioux once a year. The payment due in mid-June was a large part of their income. In 1862 crops had failed. Their custom was to start their buffalo hunt in July, just after the payment was made, but July passed with no payment. The reason for this was that the government couldn’t decide whether to pay in gold or Civil War greenbacks, and therefore made no payment at all. But the food and materials that could be purchased with the payment were already present in warehouses on the reservation.16
About 3,000 hungry Sioux confronted Indian agent Thomas J. Galbraith, demanding the food and other things due them. He told them that the provisions could only be distributed when he got the money. Galbraith asked that they go hunting and come back in a month. They did. When they retur
ned on July 14, he told them that the money still wasn’t there and that he would give them no food. On August 4, mounted warriors broke into a warehouse and started carrying away flour. Lieutenant Timothy J. Sheehan threatened them with a howitzer, and they left. Sheehan persuaded Galbraith to release some provisions. Sheehan also requested a meeting with the Sioux and local traders.17
Santee Sioux chief Little Crow* represented the Sioux at the council meeting. He protested they had no food and the warehouses were full, and asked that the Indian agent arrange for them to have food, “or else we may take our own way to keep ourselves from starving. When men are hungry, they help themselves.”19 Agent Galbraith put the matter to the traders, who could distribute provisions on credit if they chose. They deferred to Andrew J. Myrick, the most prominent trader, who, offended by Little Crow’s statement, said, “So far as I am concerned, if they are hungry, let them eat grass!”20 But Captain John S. Marsh, the commander at Fort Ridgely, ordered Galbraith to start distributing food at once. Then Galbraith visited the Lower Agency (there were two agencies) on August 15, observed that the harvest there seemed abundant, and told Little Crow he had changed his mind, and there would be no distribution until the money arrived.21 The tinder was waiting for the spark.
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