The Battle of the Big Hole: A History of General Gibbon's Engagement with Nez Percés Indians in the Big Hole Valley, Montana, August 9th, 1877.Shields, G. O. (George O.)
History
The Battle of the Big Hole: A History of General Gibbon's Engagement with Nez Percés Indians in the Big Hole Valley, Montana, August 9th, 1877.
Shields, G. O. (George O.)
Big Hole, Battle of the, Mont., 1877
Looking Glass was at the other end of the camp. His voice was heard
calling out, "Wal-lit-ze! Tap-sis-il-pilp! Um-til-ilp-cown! This is a
battle! These men are not asleep as those you murdered in Idaho. These
soldiers mean battle. You tried to break my promise at Lo Lo. You
wanted to fire at the fortified place. Now is the time to show your
courage and fight. You can kill right and left. I would rather see you
killed than the rest, for you commenced the war. It was you who
murdered the settlers in Idaho. Now fight!"
Thus praised and railed at by turns, the men recovered their presence
of mind and charged back into the camp. The fighting was now muzzle to
breast. This deadly encounter lasted for some minutes more, when the
Indians again took to the river bank and delivered their fire with
great precision and deadliness on the troops in open ground. In the
hottest of the fight, Tap-sis-il-pilp was killed. Wal-lit-ze, upon
being told of his companion's death, rushed madly upon a group of
soldiers and was shot dead in his tracks. Thus did two of the three
murderers who were said to have brought on the war pay the penalty of
their crimes with their own blood. The implied wish of their chief that
they might be killed was realized.
Before these two men were killed, so says a surviving Nez Perce, an
almost hand-to-hand fight occurred between an officer and an Indian.
The Indian was killed. His sister saw him fall, and springing to his
side, wrenched the still smoking revolver from his hand, leveled it at
the officer and shot him through the head. The Indian who described the
event did not know who the officer was, but every soldier in the
Seventh Infantry knows and mourns the squaw's victim as the gallant
Captain Logan. Another Indian, named "Grizzly Bear Youth," relates a
hand-to-hand fight with a citizen volunteer in these words:
"When I was following the soldiers through the brush, trying to kill as
many of them as possible, a big, ugly ranchman turned around, swearing,
and made for me. He was either out of cartridges or afraid to take time
to load his needle gun, for he swung it over his head by the barrel and
rushed at me to strike with the butt end. I did the same. We both
struck at once and each received a blow on the head. The volunteer's
gun put a brand on my forehead that will be seen as long as I live. My
blow on his head made him fall on his back. I jumped on him and tried
to hold him down. He was a powerful man. He turned me and got on top.
He got his hand on my throat and commenced choking me.
"All turned dark and I was nearly gone. Just then a warrior came up.
This was Red Owl's son, He ran up, put his gun to the volunteer's side
and fired. The ball passed through the man and killed him. I had my arm
around the waist of the man when the shot was fired, and the ball,
after going through the volunteer, broke my arm."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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