The pioneer West : $b Narratives of the westward march of empire
History
The pioneer West : $b Narratives of the westward march of empire
Frontier and pioneer life -- West (U.S.)
On informing the Snakes of what had taken place, they expressed great
delight. “Right!” they said. “Pun-naks very bad Indians”; and they
joined in the scalp-dance.
We afterward learned that the Pun-naks, when they fled from our
vengeance, had previously sent their old men, and a great proportion of
their women and children, to the mountains, at which we were greatly
pleased, as it spared the effusion of much unnecessary blood. They
had a great “medicine chief” slain with the others on the island; his
_medicine_ was not good this time, at least.
We proceeded thence to a small creek, called Black Foot Creek, in the
heart of the Black Foot country.
It was always our custom, before turning out our horses in the morning,
to send out spies to reconnoitre around, and see if any Indians were
lurking about to steal them. When preparing to move one morning from
the last-named creek, we sent out two men; but they had not proceeded
twenty yards from our _corral_ before a dozen shots were fired at them
by a party of Black Feet, bringing them from their horses severely
wounded. In a moment the whole camp was in motion. The savages made a
bold and desperate attempt to rush upon the wounded men and get their
scalps, but we were on the ground in time to prevent them, and drove
them back, killing four of their number.
The next day we were overtaken by the Snakes, who, hearing of our
skirmish, expressed great regret that they were not present to have
followed them and given them battle again. We seldom followed the
Indians after having defeated them, unless they had stolen our horses.
It was our policy always to act on the defensive, even to tribes that
were known enemies.
When the Snakes were ready, we all moved on together for the head of
Green River. The Indians numbered six or seven thousand, including
women and children; our number was nearly eight hundred altogether,
forming quite a formidable little army, or, more properly, a moving
city. The number of horses belonging to the whole camp was immense.
We had no farther difficulty in reaching Green River, where we remained
six days. During this short stay our numberless horses exhausted the
grass in our vicinity, and it was imperative to change position.
It was now early in September, and it was time to break up our general
encampment, and spread in all directions, as the hunting and trapping
season was upon us. Before we formed our dispersing parties, a number
of the Crows came to our camp, and were rejoiced to see us again. The
Snakes and Crows were extremely amicable.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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