us after paying all our expenses. He paid us in gold, silver, and
greenbacks. Hogitsi was scared when he saw the pile; and when it came
to dividing, he certainly proved that he was no hog; for he simply
would not take his full share. He insisted that we should not have had
any if it hadn’t been for me; that it would “make him too rich.”
This streak of good luck gave me a new start. My wife felt better about
the trapping business; but she had no desire to repeat the experience
of that winter; and, as I found other profitable work to do, I did not
turn to trapping again as a business, though I have done a good deal of
this work at various times since. And I have also done a good deal of
trading in furs with the trappers.
This trading has brought me into acquaintanceship with a good many of
the mountaineers. It was through this that I came to know Kit Carson,
who came to my home hunting his trapper son-in-law, Sims, one winter.
Sims was wintering near at the time. Kit stopped over night with me. I
brought his son-in-law to my home and they made up their troubles. Kit
wanted to stay with me for a while. I took him in, and we boarded and
lodged him for several months. We had a good time together swapping
yarns that winter, I can tell you.
[Illustration: “‘We intend to tie you to that tree and burn you
alive.’”]
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
WORKING ON THE INDIAN RESERVATION
When the government undertook the task of settling the Indians on
the reservations, I was given the job of helping the Indian Agent of
the Fort Hall reservation gather and keep the Redmen within bounds.
This was no easy task. The Indians found it hard, after their many
years of roving life, to be restrained. They often grew discontented,
complaining at times that they were being cheated and otherwise
mistreated. It is a well-known fact that they often had much cause to
complain. The Indians have been abused shamefully by the whites at
times, and I know it. Our dealings with the Redmen reflect no great
credit on us.
If the Indians became disgruntled, as they frequently did, they
would slip away to the mountains in a sulky mood. Whenever they did
this, it was my business to bring them back. This task was not only
disagreeable, but sometimes dangerous.
At one time a band under the lead of old Sagwich got angry over
something, and struck for the hills, strongly determined that they
would not come back to the reservation again.
I was sent to bring them back; they had a week the start of me. I had
a good horse, however, and taking with me an Indian boy named Suarki,
to lead the pack horse, I started out. The second day we struck their
trail, and knowing well the signs they always leave behind them, we
followed it easily; but it led us over a hundred and fifty miles
through a rough country before we found the runaway band.
On the sixth day we came upon them camped on the Salmon River. We
pitched our camp about a hundred yards away. After unsaddling our
horses, I went over to have a talk with them.
[Illustration: Trading post at Fort Hall Indian reservation, Idaho.]
Old Sagwich was very angry. He said he knew what I was after, but he
wouldn’t go back; and I would not go back either, for they would fix me
so that I couldn’t give them any more trouble. He said I ought to be
their friend, but instead of that I was helping to bring more trouble
to them. The whites he accused of lying to them and robbing them of
their hunting ground and forcing them to work at something they knew
nothing about. They would bear it no longer; they would fight first.
The old chief grew angrier as he went on.
[Illustration: Piute Indian girl carrying corn (Southern Utah).
_Bureau of Indian Affairs_]
“You need not think of escaping this time,” he said to me. “We intend
to tie you to that tree and burn you alive.” I tried to reason with
them, telling them I knew I was in their power; but it wouldn’t do them
any good to kill me. If they did, the soldiers would soon follow and
kill the last one of them.
“We are not afraid of the soldiers,” he retorted. “We would rather die
fighting than starve.”
“Well,” I replied, “if you kill me, you will kill one of the best
friends the Indians ever had.”
But nothing I could say seemed to make any difference with old Sagwich.
He was determined to carry out his threat. If he had his way I knew he
would do it. The other Indians, however, were not so devilish. One of
them gave me some fresh elk meat, and I went back to my camp. Things
looked rather black for me that night. My only hope was that the other
Indians would not stand by old Sagwich.
[Illustration: At the Indian agency; squaw with papoose in Indian
cradle.
_Dr. T. M. Bridges_]
If the worst came, I had determined to sell my life as dearly as
possible. The Indians held a council that night. We kept close watch
till morning, but as no one offered to harm us, we began to feel a
little easier. After saddling our horses, I told Suarki I was going
over to have another talk with them, and instructed him that if they
made a move to kill me, he should leap on my horse and strike for home
to tell the Indian Agent.
Old Sagwich was so sulky he wouldn’t even speak to me. The other
Indians, however, acted better. They said nothing of what had been
decided, but that day they packed up and took the trail towards home.
We followed them. On our way down the river we came upon one of the
Indians fishing. He told me about the council. Old Sagwich was stubborn
in his determination to kill me, but the rest wouldn’t consent and he
had to give up his bloody plan.
This experience made me feel that my job was too risky for the pay I
was getting. The Agent wouldn’t raise my wages, so I quit him and went
back to my home at Oxford, Idaho.
[Illustration: “Two Indians were behind them, both on an old horse of
mine.”]
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
FRONTIER TROUBLES
Later, we moved back into the Bear Lake, where we made our home for
twenty years. During this time I was often called on to do dangerous
service in the interest of our settlements. After the Indian troubles
were over, we had outlaws to deal with who were worse than Indians.
For a long time the frontier communities suffered from depredations
committed by cattle rustlers and horse thieves. Organized bands
operated from Montana to Colorado. They had stations about a hundred
miles apart in the roughest places in the mountains. They would often
raid our ranges and steal all the cattle and horses they could pick up,
driving them into their mountain retreat. They got so daring finally
that they even came into the settlements and robbed stores and killed
men. The colonists did not get together to stop these outrages till
after a fatal raid was made upon Montpelier, when a store was robbed
and a clerk was shot dead. This roused the people of the valley to
action. Gen. Charles C. Rich called upon the leaders of the towns to
send two men from each settlement--the best men to be had--to pursue
and punish the outlaws. Fourteen men responded to the call, among them
four of the leaders themselves. It fell to my lot to be one of this
posse.
We struck across the mountains east of Bear Lake, following the trail
of the robbers to their rendezvous on the Big Piney, a tributary of the
Green River. We knew that they had hidden themselves in this country,
for two of the men with us, whose stock had been stolen, had followed
the robbers to their den to recover their property. Finding the outlaws
in such force, they didn’t dare to claim their stolen stock but
returned to Bear Lake for help.
These men led us to the place where they had come upon the outlaws; but
the outlaws had evidently feared pursuit and moved camp. To hide their
tracks they had driven their wagons up the creek right in the water for
over a mile. Then they had left the creek and driven up a little ravine
and over a ridge. As we rode up this ravine, to the top of the ridge,
the two men who were in the lead sighted the tepees of the robbers in
the hollow below. They dodged back to keep out of sight, and we all
rode down into the thick willows on the Big Piney, hiding our horses
and ourselves among them. The two men that had sighted the outlaw
camp then slipped up the hill again on foot, secreting themselves in
the sagebrush at the top of the ridge, and watched the rest of the
afternoon to see whether the outlaws had mistrusted anything; but they
showed no sign of having seen us. At dark they came and reported.
We held council then to decide what plan to pursue to capture the
outlaws. As the robbers outnumbered us, more than two to one, and were
well armed, it was serious business. Our sheriff weakened when the test
came; he said he couldn’t do it, and turned his papers over to Joseph
Rich, as brave a man as ever went on such a trip. There were others who
felt pretty shaky and wanted to turn back, but Mr. Rich said we had
been picked as the best men in Bear Lake and he didn’t feel like going
back without making an attempt to capture the thieving band. One man
said he was ready to go cut the throats of the whole bunch of robbers
if the captain said so, but Mr. Rich said, “No; we did not come out to
shed blood. We want to take them alive and give them a fair trial.”
Every man was given a chance to say how he felt. Most of us wanted to
make the attempt to capture the outlaws, and the majority ruled.
How to do it was the next problem. It would have been folly for so few
of us to make an open attack on so many well-armed men. The only way
we could take them was by surprise, when they were asleep. This plan
agreed upon, Mr. Rich proposed that we go down the hill with our horses
and pack animals, get in line at the bottom, then, just at the peep of
day, charge upon their camp, jump from our horses, run into their tents
and grab their guns. When we had decided on this plan of action, Mr.
Rich said that this probably meant a fight. If it did we should let
them fire first. Should they kill one of us, we must not run; for if
we did so they would kill us all. We should give them the best we had.
With our double-barreled shotguns loaded with buckshot, we would make
things pretty hot for them if they showed fight.
In order that we might know exactly the situation, and have our tents
picked out beforehand, so as not to get in a mixup, two volunteers
were called for to go down through their camp in the night and get
the lay of things. Jonathan Hoopes and I offered to go. Their tepees
were pitched on both sides of a little stream, which was deep enough
for us to keep out of sight by stooping a little. Down this stream we
stole our way, wading with the current so as not to make any noise,
till we got right among the tepees. The biggest one was pitched on the
brink of the stream. We could hear some of the men inside of it snoring
away lustily. Hoopes reached his hand up and found a blanket on which
were some service berries spread out to dry. Being hungry, we helped
ourselves, filling our pockets with them. After taking in the situation
fully, we slipped back to our boys.
There were seven tents in all, and fourteen of us--two to each tent.
Hoopes and I were to take the largest, the other boys were assigned
theirs. We waited for day to break; just as it did, the word was given;
we popped spurs to our horses and away we went. A few seconds and we
had leaped from them, rushed into the tents and begun to grab the guns
from the robbers, who, wakened so rudely, stared stupidly, while we
gathered in their weapons. By the time Hoopes was through passing them
out to me, I had my arms loaded with rifles and revolvers. Mr. Rich
told me to carry them up the hill a piece and stack them. “Shoot the
first man who makes a move to touch them,” was his order. When I looked
around, there sat three of our men on their horses; they hadn’t done
their duty, so some of the tents were yet untouched. I told Hoopes, and
he jumped over the creek to one of them. I was just gathering up some
weapons I had dropped when a big half-breed made a jump at me, grabbed
my shotgun and we had a lively tussle for a few minutes. He might have
got the better of me, for he was a good deal bigger than I, but Hoopes
jumped to the rescue and cracked him on the head with his revolver so
hard that it knocked him senseless for some time.
When the outlaws rallied themselves enough to sense what had happened,
they broke out of their tents in double-quick time, swearing and
cursing and demanding what we wanted.
Captain Rich told them to keep quiet, that they were all under arrest,
that we had the advantage, but we would not harm them if they behaved
themselves. Seeing that it was useless to resist, they settled down.
The captain then ordered them to kill a calf for us, as we had not had
anything to eat since noon the day before. They obeyed orders and we
soon had a good breakfast. Later in the day part of our men went out
and searched their herds. A good many cattle and horses belonging to
our men were found among them.
The leaders of the outlaws were not in this band. They were off making
another raid somewhere. One of the band of outlaws was deaf and dumb.
Captain Rich took this fellow aside and carried on a conversation with
him by writing. From the man he learned that the rest of the band were
expected in that night, but as they didn’t come, we concluded that they
had seen us and were lying off in the hills waiting a chance to ambush
us and rescue their comrades. We were too sharp to give them the chance
to do that. For three days we waited, guarding our prisoners. Then, as
we thought it too risky to try to take so large a band of desperate men
through the rough timbered country we must pass to get home, we took
forty head of their horses as bond for their appearance at court in
thirty days, and let the prisoners go.
When we were ready to set out, we carried their guns to the top of a
hill, and Hoopes and I were left to guard the weapons till we were sure
our men were far enough away to be safe; then we left the weapons and
struck out for home after them.
As no one ever came to redeem the horses, they were sold at auction.
This nest of outlaws was broken up for good the following year. Since
then that part of the country has had no serious trouble with horse
thieves and robbers.
One more rather exciting experience that befell me and then I shall
close these stories of my life in the rugged West.
It happened in 1870. Jim Donaldson, Charley Webster, or “Webb,” as we
called him, and I were taking a peddling trip to Fort Stanbow, the
soldier post that was temporarily established near South Pass for the
protection of the miners and emigrants. We had loaded up our three
wagons with butter, eggs, and chickens.
The Sioux Indians were then on the warpath. We had been warned to
keep an eye on our horses, but we thought little about it till one
day we were nooning on the Big Sandy--about where Lot Smith burnt the
government wagon trains--when, just as we sat down to eat, “Webb”
looked up to see our horses, which we had turned loose to graze,
disappearing in a cloud of dust. Two Indians were behind them, both
on an old horse of mine, and they were whooping the others across the
hills to beat time.
Jumping to our feet we dashed after them afoot. This was useless,
of course. “Webb” and Donaldson jerked out their revolvers and took
several shots at the rascals, but they were out of revolver reach and
getting farther away every second, while we stared and damned them.
It was a pretty pickle we were in--forty miles from nowhere, with three
wagons loaded with perishable stuff, and not a horse to move them. We
got madder and madder as we watched the thieving devils gradually slip
out of sight beyond the sand hills.
Then we went back to our wagons--cussing and discussing the situation.
For an hour or more we tried to puzzle a way out of our difficulty. It
was no use. The more we worried the worse it looked. All the money I
had was invested in those eggs and butter and they would soon be worse
than nothing in the hot sun. The other boys were in as bad a fix as I
was. We just couldn’t see a way out of it; but we kept up our puzzling
till suddenly we heard a rumbling noise.
A few minutes later a covered wagon drawn by a pair of mules came in
sight.
An old man--“Boss Tweed” the boys had nicknamed him--was the driver. In
the seat with him was a boy, who had a saddle horse tied behind. They
were surely a welcome sight to us.
We told them of our trouble. The old man reckoned he could help us
out. He proposed that we load the supplies of two of our wagons on his
larger wagon, then trailing our other wagon behind, his old mules he
thought could haul us into South Pass. It looked like our only chance,
but “Webb” thought he had a better plan.
The Indians, he said, must make their way out of the country through
a certain pass. There was no other route they could escape by. If we
three would take the mules and boy’s horse and ride hard through the
night, we might get ahead of the thieves and retake our horses.
“Anything for the best,” said the old man; but the boy objected. We
shouldn’t take his horse. He started to untie his animal, but we
stopped him. Our situation was a desperate one; he had to give in.
We unhitched the mules, and strapped quilts on their backs. Donaldson
and I jumped on them; “Webb” took the horse. Then we struck the trail
single file, my old mule on lead with Jim to whip him up and “Webb”
behind him to whip Jim’s mule. It was a funny sight. I never meet Jim
but he calls up that circus parade loping along over the hills out on
the Big Sandy.
[Illustration: Uncle Nick (E. N. Wilson, author of this book), landing
a big trout out of Jackson Lake, Wyoming.
_S. N. Leek, Jackson, Wyoming_]
The old mules were slow, but they were tough. They kept up their steady
gait mile after mile through the night. We couldn’t see any trail--just
the gap in the mountains against the sky to guide us as we loped and
jogged and jogged and loped through the long night.
When daylight came to light our way, we found ourselves at the place
where the trail took up over the pass. Soon it forked, the two branches
of the trail going up two ravines which were separated by a low,
narrow ridge. We saw no fresh tracks on either trail, so we knew the
Indians had not passed this point. It looked as if we had got ahead of
them as “Webb” hoped.
We rode up one ravine about a mile from the forks, keeping out of the
trail so as to leave no tracks to alarm the thieves if they came our
way. Here we stopped and “Webb” went up on the ridge to where he could
overlook the country and at the same time watch both trails. Our plan
was to wait till we found out which trail the Redskins took. Then we
could post ourselves on either trail and head them off as they came up
the one or the other ravine, it being but a short distance between the
trails.
“Webb” had not been on watch long before he sighted them coming about
six miles away. He waited till they reached the forks. Luck favored
us. They took our trail. Seeing this “Webb” slipped down to tell us.
We hastily hid our horses in the tall brush that bordered the little
creek, chose a place where the big birches hung over the trail, and got
ready. “Webb” and Donaldson, having revolvers, were to take the lead
Indian, while with my rifle I was to settle accounts with the other.
We hadn’t long to wait till here they came crowding our horses full
tilt along the trail. We held ourselves till we had the dead drop on
them, then we all fired. My companions both caught their Indian in the
head. I took mine right under the arm. Their horses jumped and they
both tumbled off so dead they didn’t know what struck them. It may seem
a cruel thing to do, but we were not going to take any chances.
I never have found any joy in killing Indians. And I never have killed
any except when circumstances compelled it; nor have I ever felt like
boasting about such bloody work. These rascals certainly deserved what
they got. They had stolen all we had and left us in a very serious
difficulty. They were Sioux Indians who were escaping from a battle
with the soldiers of Fort Stanbow.
You can easily believe we were mighty glad to get back those horses and
strike the trail again towards our wagons. We found things all right
there. The old man had taken good care of our produce while we were
away. He was just as happy as we were over our success. But do you
think he would take any pay for his trouble? Not a cent. It was pay
enough, he said, to feel so good because he had helped us out of a bad
fix. When we got to South Pass, however, we found his home and left
him some supplies with our good wishes. He was away at the time, so he
couldn’t object.
The boy who had refused us his horse didn’t object, though, to taking
five dollars for his pay. I’ve always found a heap of difference among
the human beings one meets in his travels.
* * * * *
The years that have followed these wild days have not been so filled
with exciting adventures, yet no year has passed without its rough
and trying experiences; for it has been my lot to live always on the
frontier. Even now my home is in Jackson’s Hole--one of the last of
our mountain valleys to be settled. In 1889 I first went into this
beautiful valley, and a few years later I pioneered the little town now
called Wilson, in my honor.
It was here that I was brought again into close contact with my
Shoshone friends--the Indians from whom for many years I had been all
but lost. In 1895, when the so-called Jackson’s Hole Indian war broke
out and several Indians were killed and others captured and brought
to trial for killing game, I was called on to act as interpreter.
My sympathies went out to the Indians at this time. They were
misunderstood and mistreated as they always have been. The Indian has
always been pushed aside, driven, and robbed of his rights.
It is a sad thought with me to see the Redmen giving away so rapidly
before our advancing civilization. Where thousands of the Indians once
roamed free, only a scattered few remain. The old friends of my boyhood
days with Washakie have almost entirely passed away. Only once in a
great while do I find one who remembers Yagaki, the little boy who
once lived with their old chief’s mother. But when I do happen to meet
one--as I did last year when I found Hans, a wealthy Indian, who lives
now on his ranch at the Big Bend in Portneuf Canyon--then we have a
good time, I tell you, recalling the days of long ago when Uncle Nick
was among the Shoshones.
[Illustration: A lily pond in the Yellowstone Park, which was part of
the land of the Shoshones.
_Caspar W. Hodgson_]
GLOSSARY
EDITORIAL NOTE. The Indian words and definitions given in this glossary
have been carefully checked by a scholar of national reputation, who
has studied the Shoshone language. He has pronounced the words as
nearly correct as one can represent in our symbols these differing
dialects of the Indian tribes. It has been the effort of the editor
to be accurate, but it is difficult to give exactly the sounds of the
Indian language.
=Angitapa= (Ăn′gi-tạ-pä′). Name applied by Shoshone Indians to Rock
Creek, Idaho.
=Antelope= (ăn′tḗ-lōp). Animal akin to the deer, a native of the
Western plains and open mountain valleys. Commonly called
pronghorns. The North American pronghorn is not a true antelope.
=Balzamoriza= (bäl′zạ-mō-rī-zạ). A species of plant with showy yellow
blossoms, and velvety leaves, belonging to sunflower family.
Commonly known as “spring sunflower.” The seeds were used by
Indians for food. It grows about one foot high.
=Bannocks= (Băn′nŏcks or Pä′no͝oks). Tribe of western Indians allied
to Shoshones. Dr. Robert Lowie, of the American Museum of Natural
History, gives the name _Banaite_ as the one he found applied by
the Lemhi Indians to the Bannocks.
=Chaps= (from Spanish-American chaparajos). Leather or sheepskin
leggings worn by cowboys to protect their legs from thorny bushes
while riding.
=Chief Joseph.= Leader of Nez Percé Indians during sixties and
seventies, who with Chief Looking-Glass and others led his tribe
in a revolt against the United States, and afterwards fled with
his people towards Canada, but was overtaken by soldiers under
General Miles, captured, and held in this country.
=Coyote= (kī-ō′te). Animal of the wolf family, a native of Western
plains. Picturesquely described by Mark Twain in his _Roughing It_.
=Echo Canyon.= A canyon about twenty miles in length, leading from
southwestern Wyoming westward into Utah. Through this canyon
ran the pony express and overland trail. The canyon is so named
because of the clear echoes made by its red sandstone cliffs.