soon after the Custer massacre, the chiefs of the Piegans, Bloods
and Blackfeet were invited by the head men of the Sioux to an Indian
council held at Cypress mountain. Among the attendants was Chief Little
Plume. When the Yanktons and Santees, of the Sioux nation, proclaimed
a war of extermination against the whites, Little Plume would not
consent, thereby breaking up the council, thus saving the lives of many
settlers. Judge Burcher and Mr. John Largent, of Sun River, who have
lived in northern Montana since the early sixties, always speak highly
of Chief Little Plume, and at the time of his last visit he was treated
kindly by those gentlemen. Little Plume is now living on the Blackfoot
reservation, in this state, and holds the honorable post of lieutenant
of Indian police. He is about seventy-five years of age.
Several years later a great battle was fought where is now located the
Floweree ranch. I am not able to state who were the forces, except that
the Blackfeet and Piegans were on one side.
Some of the old employes of the fur trading companies, who are now
living, state that the old Indians who were living when they came here
about fifty years ago were telling them then that the Flatheads and
Blackfeet were often having great battles in the valley of the Sun
river. One of these long-ago encounters took place near where is now
Allick Pambron’s ranch; no one can tell who were the participants. All
that the oldest Indians who are now living can say as to the time this
battle was fought is that it was “heap long ago.” It must have been
in prehistoric times, for the arrows they used then had flint points,
for many of this kind of arrow points have been gathered on this old
battlefield. Mrs. McKalvy, who is one of Mr. Pambron’s daughters, told
me a few days ago that she and her little brothers used to pick up
these points off this historic spot, filling several tobacco sacks for
General Gibbon at Fort Shaw.
In 1858, and near where the Sun river irrigation channel is taken from
the river, an agency for the Blackfeet Indians was built. In 1866 the
same Indians killed its occupants and burned the agency.
In June, 1869, a party of Piegans had come to the Healy and Hamilton
trading store at Sun river crossing, with buffalo robes, pelts and furs
to trade. They had with them a great many horses. At the same time
there was a party of Pend d’Oreilles, whose home was west of the main
range, and who were on their way back from the Judith country, where
they had been hunting buffalo during the previous winter, and at this
time were in camp several miles down the river. One day many of the
Pend d’Oreilles were at the trading store. The Piegans suspected that
there would be trouble that night. They placed their horses in a corral
that was near J. J. Healy’s house. Sure enough, late in the night, the
Pend d’Oreilles made an attack, and, when breaking down the corral
where the horses were, a desperate battle was fought, lasting about
twenty minutes or more. Next morning seven dead Indians were found.
One, after he was shot, fell into the well. The Pend d’Oreilles stole
all the horses. The bullet holes in Healy’s old house can be seen at
the present time. The following night, while the Pend d’Oreilles were
in camp on Flat creek, the Piegans recaptured their own horses and many
more besides.
Another time a white man named Clark was killed near the Middle bridge
by two Indians; one of them was hung to a tree by the citizens, and
the other was shot while trying to escape. Not later than one week ago
Judge Burcher, of Sun River, stated to me that he and D. H. Churchill,
in 1874, were across the Missouri river, opposite the mouth of Sun
river, and on the slope of the hill near where now stands the south
side school house in the city of Great Falls. There they found four
dead Indians, lying not far from each other. By the beadwork designs on
their moccasins, the judge recognized that they were Piegans. Likely
they had been killed by the Crows.
A Frenchman was murdered by Indians on the Sun river, south of Presly
Rowles’ house.
“Little Dog,” a Piegan chief, who was friendly to the whites and lived
most of the time (up to his death in 1869) in the Sun river valley, had
built a low log cabin for himself and family where now is located the
Birkenbuell ranch. He was a man gifted with good sense and considerable
intelligence for an Indian, and was as brave as a lion. But at last he
was murdered by his own people.
The following was written by J. J. Healy and appeared in the Benton
_Record_ in regard to this noted warrior:
“It so rarely happens that an Indian is gifted with good, solid sense
that when one of this kind is born into the world he soon becomes a
prominent member of his tribe. Not that Indians as a race are wanting
in intelligence, but there are few whose intellect is sufficient to
overcome their brutish instincts or to understand that their habits and
mode of life are slowly but surely wiping them from the face of the
earth.
“Little Dog, the soldier chief of the Piegans, was one of the noted
exceptions to this rule. He was braver than the bravest member of his
tribe, a terror to his enemies, but always a devoted friend of the
whites. No doubt he inherited the universal feeling of his race that
the whites were his natural enemies and oppressors, but he had the good
sense to understand and acknowledge that they were the superior of his
people in all things and that entire submission to their rule could
only be a question of time. And these truths he endeavored to impress
upon the minds of his tribe, using arguments when his great oratorical
powers were likely to prevail, but adopting force when, in opposition
to his commands, the warriors committed the slightest depredation upon
the surrounding settlements.
“Little Dog had a son who was the father’s counterpart in personal
appearance, and also possessed the reckless courage and remarkable
intelligence of his parent. It is said, and I have personal knowledge
of more than one instance in proof of the assertion, that these two
men were, in deadly encounter, more than a match for ten of the best
warriors of the tribe, and such was the confidence felt in their skill
and prowess that a war party under their command would follow them into
the very jaws of death. I will relate one instance to show the sort of
stuff these two Indians were made of.
“A war party of Piegans, consisting of twenty well armed and mounted
men, had encountered six Assinaboines. The latter had taken shelter in
an Indian war house, a structure built of logs and affording a strong
and safe defense to those within. After fighting hard all day, the
Piegans were unable to take the fortifications, and would probably have
withdrawn from the contest after the sun went down. But towards evening
Little Dog and his son, attracted by the firing, came up, and learning
that the war house was defended by only six men, they laughed at
their own warriors, the Piegans, calling them cowards and squaws, and
without a moment’s hesitation dashed up to the fort in the face of a
deadly fire from those within, leaped over the logs, killed four of the
defenders, and dragged the remaining two by the hair out of the fort
and turned them over to the squaws to be put to death.
“It was no uncommon thing when a war party returned to camp with horses
or other property stolen from the whites for Little Dog and his son to
turn out with pistols and tomahawks in hand, and kill every one of the
thieves and then return the property to its rightful owners; but when
the offenders were too numerous to be punished, the two men would leave
the tribe and live together with the whites until the time the improved
conduct of the tribe appeased their anger.
“But the depredations of the Piegans gradually became more frequent, in
spite of the efforts of the chief to prevent them, and finding at last
that his threats and punishments failed to have the desired effect, he
came to Fort Benton to consult with the agent as to the best course to
be pursued. Gad E. Upson was then agent for the Piegans and the agency
was located on Front street. The chief told his story and was advised
by the agent not to kill the offenders, but to arrest them and bring
them to Fort Benton and that he would punish them.
“In compliance with this advice, Little Dog and his son arrived in town
one day with a prisoner who had stolen some horses from the whites.
‘Hang him, shoot him; do anything you please with him,’ said the chief.
‘I can do nothing with him.’
“But however much the tribe feared the great chief and his son, they
were not willing to submit to this sort of treatment, and no sooner
had the prisoner been turned over to the whites than they concocted a
scheme to rid themselves of these dreaded men.
“While returning to camp, after delivering up the prisoner, the party,
who had provided themselves with a good supply of whisky, halted near
the river bank to rest and have a social time. The plotters, headed
by a half-breed named Isadore, suggested that as they were liable
to get drunk, they had better put away their arms to provide against
accidents. Little Dog and his son gave up their weapons without
hesitation, and the boy left the party to indulge in a bath in the
river.
“The spree then began. After the cowardly plotters had nerved
themselves sufficiently for the bloody work, they secretly recovered
their weapons and then began to quarrel with the chief. The latter,
with his usual intrepidity, replied to their sneers and insults with
contemptuous epithets, and finally brought the quarrel to a climax by
kicking three of them over the river bank. The cowards then opened fire
upon the defenseless chief and he fell riddled with bullets. Meanwhile
the son, attracted by the noise, left the water and came to the
assistance of his father. He was shot down four times, but reached the
spot where his father laid and fell dead upon his body.”
Many other skirmishes have taken place between Indians of different
tribes in this vicinity, of which I shall make no mention, and, as
Chief Little Plume said: “As long as there remains a Crow and Piegan,
so long will there be war.”
One more instance to confirm this statement I wish to refer to. It was
in 1874. There were six of us working on an irrigation ditch near the
bank of the Sun river, two miles from Fort Shaw, and on the opposite
side of the river. One day, when we were eating our dinner that was
spread on the sod, and near to the edge of the woods which grew thick
on both sides of the stream, suddenly twelve Crow warriors rode up on
us. They wanted to know how far up the valley the Piegan camp was. It
appeared that the Piegans had been stealing some of their horses. Not
satisfied with the information they sought for, they dismounted and
began to take possession of our dinner. One of the Indians reached for
my coffee, which was in a tin cup; just then I gave him a shove which
landed him on his back on the ground, but he took it in good humor.
Another one grabbed Tom Cristy’s tin plate which contained his dinner.
Tom, being always a daring fellow, jumped to his feet and slapped the
Indian in the face; it was no fun for this Indian. He gave a savage
look, ground his teeth and tried to swear in English. His face, which
was already red with war paint, began to get still redder. By this
time indications were that there was going to be a general fight. At
this juncture I invited the leader of the party to come with me, and
told him I would direct him to where the Piegan camp was. He followed
me up a steep hill, to the elevation of about two hundred feet, and
in plain view of Fort Shaw, and, as it happened, a small squadron of
soldiers were preparing for target practice. There, said I, pointing
at the fort, is the Piegan camp. The Indian stared for a moment, then
his jaw dropped like the lower half of a bellows, and I fancy that his
complexion became nearer like that of a pale face than it ever was
before. They spared no time in going down the valley as fast as their
horses could carry them, and crossed the Missouri river at the ford
near the place now spanned by the Great Northern railway bridge. They
did not get any dinner either.
Evidently they did not know of the close proximity of Fort Shaw, for at
this time they were away from their home and in the Blackfeet country.
All this goes to show that the Blackfeet nation and Crows were always
enemies. Of course, “now” they are on their respective reservations,
and are taught the principle of “Love thy neighbor as thyself.”
ROBERT VAUGHN.
Oct. 20, 1898.
CHARLES CHOQUETTE COMING TO MONTANA IN 1843.
The following sketch, from Charles Choquette, appeared in the New York
Sun in the summer of 1899. Mr. Choquette says:
“My home was in the state of Missouri, near St. Louis. One day in 1843,
when I was twenty years old, I went to St. Louis, and, against the will
of my parents, hired to Pierre Choteau, who was the head man of a fur
trading company that operated on the upper Missouri river. A few days
after signing articles with the company I was put in charge of a crew
to take Mackinaw boats loaded with goods to trade with the Indians. Our
destination was Fort Union, which was a trading post belonging to the
company to whom I hired. The distance from St. Louis to Fort Union is
about two thousand miles. As oars were of little service, the big boat
had to be towed nearly all the way. First on one side and then on the
other, tugging on a rope, at times up to our waists in chilly water,
and at other times forcing our way through brush that grew thick on the
banks of the stream. After seventy-two days of hardships and dangers,
we arrived safely at Fort Union, which was near the mouth of the
Yellowstone river.
“It was not long before I and others were sent out along the various
streams and into the mountains to trap fur-bearing animals that were
very plentiful then. Many trappers had been killed by Indians, and
others were continually robbed by them. It was not until I finally
married a Blackfoot woman and traveled about with the tribe that I felt
reasonably safe of getting my season’s catch of furs to the company
posts. For several years after I arrived at Fort Union I went with one
or two companions each season up the Milk river to the Snowys or the
Little Rockies, and about half of the time the Indians stole our furs.
The first big catch I made was the time I met Jim Bridger, the great
trapper, hunter and scout, and one of the bravest men that ever lived.
Now I will tell how it happened that we met.
“In the spring of 1848 we returned to Fort Union and we had only the
few beaver we caught coming down the river. We had wintered up on the
Fourchette, and the Assinaboines had raised our cache. We worked around
the fort all summer, hunting for the company, and finally the time came
for us to start out for another season’s trapping. There were three of
us--Antoine Busette, Louis La Breche and myself. All summer we had been
trying to decide on the best place to go, where there would be plenty
of beaver and where we would be likely to be safe from the Indians.
We concluded to try the country of the Yellowstone. There were many
Indians to pass--Cheyennes and Crows and Snakes--besides the chance of
war parties of other tribes, but once in the mountains beyond these
people who always hunted on the plains, we felt we would be safe. We
played Indian ourselves and traveled nights, hiding in some good place
during the daytime.
“We left the fort late in August. Each of us had a saddle horse and two
pack horses. Our outfit was simple; a couple of skillets and pots, a
little bedding, an Indian lodge for shelter, a couple of axes, three
dozen traps, and plenty of ammunition and tobacco. Having crossed the
Missouri just below the mouth of the Yellowstone, we struck out over
the rolling prairie, keeping far enough back from the latter stream
to head its long coulees and breaks. None of us had ever been up the
Yellowstone, but we had obtained a general idea of the country from
the Indians who visited the fort. On every side there were buffalo and
antelopes in countless thousands, from which we could have selected
a fat one for our breakfast, but there was no water, and we were as
thirsty as we were hungry; so we kept wearily on towards some wooded
breaks a long ways ahead, where water as well as game was sure to be
found. When we got within a mile of our destination, a dozen or more
horsemen suddenly rose up out of the valley and came straight at us.
Our hearts sunk; it seemed as if we had jumped out of the frying pan
into the fire. Our horses were played out; we could not retreat, and
were preparing to dismount and fight the best we knew how when we
discovered that the strangers were white men. We had never expected to
meet anything but Indians in that wild country. On they came, a big,
strong, broad shouldered, flaxened-haired, and blue-eyed man in the
lead, riding as fine a saddle animal as I ever saw. They were now quite
close; they came within a few paces and stopped.
“‘How?’ exclaimed the big man.
“‘How, how,’ we exclaimed, shaking hands with him in turn.
“‘Who are you?’ he asked, ‘free trappers?’
“‘No,’ I replied, ‘we belong to the Company. And you?’
“‘My name is Bridger,’ he said, ‘Jim Bridger. Maybe you’ve heard of me.’
“We had. There wasn’t a man west of the Mississippi river who did not
know him or know of him, for he was the greatest hunter, trapper, and
Indian fighter of us all. As we rode along with him and his men to
their camp, we told of Indians we had seen the day before, and advised
Bridger to move at once, as there was a big camp in the vicinity. He
laughed, and just then we came to the edge of the valley, and, with a
sweep of his hand, he said: ‘Does that look much like running?’
“It didn’t; around a number of small fires his band of white
men--eighty in all, as we afterwards learned--were whiling away the
time, smoking, cooking, cleaning guns, and mending clothes.
[Illustration: ALONE IN THE ROCKIES.]
“‘No,’ said Bridger, as he noticed our astonishment, ‘we only move when
we get ready to, and God help the Indian outfit that tries to stop us.
We’ve fought our way out here and we can fight some more.’
“This was Bridger’s first trip into the Yellowstone country, he having
before always trapped south of it. He told us that he left St. Louis
in July and had fought his way through the country of the Sioux, the
Pawnee, the Cheyenne, and the Crow, and that he intended to winter
wherever he could find a good fur country. Well, we joined in with him
and next day moved westward. It was on the Little Big Horn that we met
him, and did not think that twenty-six years later our soldiers would
be killed by the Indians there. We traveled on up the Yellowstone for
a number of days until we came to the mountains, where, on a little
tributary of the river, we built some cabins, got everything in shape
for the winter, and then spread out over the country, each one for
himself, in search of beaver and other furs. Bridger was sick nearly
all winter, but kept doctoring himself with various roots he found and
along towards spring recovered his health. He was unable to do any
trapping himself, but his men got a big pile of fur, beaver, otter,
fisher and marten, of which he owned a share. It was his intention to
turn his furs over to the American Fur Company and get drafts for them
on St. Louis, so when spring came we all packed up and started for the
nearest post, which was Fort Cotten, situated on the Missouri river
about forty miles below the Falls.
“We crossed the Yellowstone and swung up into the Musselshell country,
trapping leasurely along the way, and by the time we reached the point
of the Snowy mountains our animals, even the saddle horses, were so
heavily loaded with furs and skins that they could carry no more. At
that time of the year beaver trapping was at its best and they were so
numerous that every one of us hated to quit. So we made a big cache of
our furs, each one putting a tag with his name on his bundle. Three
men were then sent to the fort to notify the company to come and haul
in the furs, and the rest of us continued on our course, skirting the
foot of the Snowy, the Judith and the Belt mountains. I never saw
beaver more plentiful, and it was not long before our horses were again
well laden. It was in the latter part of April that we came to the
Missouri river, exactly where the city of Great Falls stands to-day.
All the morning we had seen occasional Indians riding and dodging about
ahead of us, and finally we came to the bank of the Missouri, opposite
the mouth of Sun river and could look up that valley for quite a
distance and we were not surprised to see a string of lodges scattered
along the edge of the timber as far as the eye could reach. ‘Bridger,’
says I, ‘those are surely Blackfeet and we’ve got to fight them.
Don’t you think we had better find a better place to camp than this
unprotected flat?’
“‘No,’ he replied, ‘this is good enough for us. If they come at us here
I reckon they’ll get their bellyful of trouble.’
“I said no more, and we went into camp beside the river, at the upper
end of the flat on which the city is built. Night came on and the
horses were all brought in, hobbled, and staked close to the river,
and we made our beds in a circle about them, each one piling his furs,
saddles, and whatever he had at the head of his couch as a sort of
breast-work. Double guards were put on and betimes the rest of us
turned in. I don’t think many of us slept much at first and the time
seemed to pass slowly. At midnight the sentries were changed, Bridger
himself taking a turn. It was just daylight when the air was filled
with whoops, yells and the high-keyed war song of about 400 Indians, as
they charged down upon us from all directions.
“‘Don’t get excited, boys, and be sure of your aim. Take it easy, now,’
Bridger hollered out.
“Well, ‘twas good advice, and we did our best, but I tell you the sight
of 400 yelling, painted and feathered Indians coming down on you just
as fast as their horses could run was mighty trying to one’s nerves.
I guess they expected to find us asleep and to stampede our horses in
the first round. But when our rifles began to crack and some of them
began tumbling out of their saddles, they were more surprised than we,
and they turned and wheeled off. Some of them tried to pick up their
dead, but we made it too hot for them. One fellow, who had his horse
shot under him as he was trying this, lit out, running, and I guess as
many as a dozen bullets struck him at once. He tumbled all in a heap.
They had done some shooting, too, and two of our men were dead and one
wounded. Besides that, some of our horses had been shot. We could count
eleven Indians lying out on the plain here and there, and some of the
boys started out to scalp them, and did get the hair off several of the
nearest ones. But that brought the others back again, and for a while
we had another exciting time, as some of the bravest came right at
us. If the rest had followed them it would have been all day with us;
but they didn’t have the nerve, and of those who did attempt to close
in on us few got away. One great, tall fellow had his horse shot from
under him and when he struck the ground he made for Bridger, holding a
wicked-looking war club in his right hand and a knife in the other. His
gun was empty and he had thrown it away.
“Bridger just laughed as he saw him come, and he motioned us to let
him alone. His gun was empty, too, but he had a pistol in his left. He
wouldn’t use that, though. When they met the Indian aimed a blow at him
with his war club, but Bridger caught it on the barrel of his rifle and
it flew away off to one side. Then the Indian tried to knife him, but
Bridger just punched him with his rifle barrel, so the fellow couldn’t
close in, and all of a sudden he hit him square in the forehead and
smashed his skull just as cool and easy as could be. We all saw this
out of the tail of our eyes, you may say, for we were pretty busy on
our own account for a while. But our rifles and good shooting were
too much for the Indians, and we made them draw off once more, having
killed a lot of them and they only one of our party. We thought then
that they had got enough of it and would go away. About 10 o’clock,
however, they charged once more, but they didn’t come with half the
spirit they had previously shown, and in a few minutes they left us for
good and recrossed the river at the ford below. That afternoon we saw
them break camp and move up Sun river towards the mountains. They had
left forty-seven of their number on the plains before us.”
I have known Mr. Charles Choquette for twenty-nine years. He formerly
lived in the Sun river valley and was engaged in farming and stock
raising there for several years. He has always been considered one of
our best citizens.