The Passing of the Frontier: A Chronicle of the Old WestHough, Emerson
History
The Passing of the Frontier: A Chronicle of the Old West
Hough, Emerson
Frontier and pioneer life -- West (U.S.); West (U.S.) -- History
The terrible revenge which the Sioux and Cheyennes took in the battle
which annihilated Custer and his men on the Little Big Horn in the
summer of 1876; the Homeric running fight made by Chief Joseph of the
Nez Perces--a flight which baffled our best generals and their men for
a hundred and ten days over more than fourteen hundred miles of
wilderness--these are events so well known that it seems needless to
do more than to refer to them. The Nez Perces in turn went down forever
when Joseph came out and surrendered, saying, "From where the sun now
stands I fight against the white man no more forever." His surrender to
fate did not lack its dignity. Indeed, a mournful interest attached
to the inevitable destiny of all these savage leaders, who, no doubt,
according to their standards, were doing what men should do and all that
men could do.
The main difficulty in administering full punishment to such bands was
that after a defeat they scattered, so that they could not be overtaken
in any detailed fashion. After the Custer fight many of the tribe went
north of the Canadian line and remained there for some time. The writer
himself has seen along the Qu'Appelle River in Saskatchewan some of the
wheels taken out of the watches of Custer's men. The savages broke them
up and used the wheels for jewelry. They even offered the Canadians for
trade boots, hats, and clothing taken from the bodies of Custer's men.
The Modoc war against the warriors of Captain Jack in 1873 was waged in
the lava beds of Oregon, and it had the distinction of being one of
the first Indian wars to be well reported in the newspapers. We heard a
great deal of the long and trying campaigns waged by the Army in revenge
for the murder of General Canby in his council tent. We got small glory
out of that war, perhaps, but at last we hanged the ringleader of the
murderers; and the extreme Northwest remained free from that time on.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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