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MAJOR PETER RONAf 
 
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 HISTORICAL SKETCH 
 
 or THK 
 
 Flathead lodian Nation 
 
 From the Year 1813 to 1890. 
 
 f:niltriiri ng tlic Hixtorif of' the Estiihlisli- 
 
 mt'iit. of St. Miirfi's Iiiflidn JUis.tioit in 
 
 till- Hitter Hoot inllty. Mont. 
 
 M'it/i fikftrlie.s- of thf Jli.s.siotKiri/ IAf<- of 
 
 I'dthi'f liiirnJli find Other Kai-li/ 
 
 3/ is-aioniiries-. 
 
 WABSoftheeUCKFEETdFUTHEIIDS 
 
 .till! Shetfhc.s of lli.itory. Tfajtpin</ ami 
 
 Tratlintj in tin- Knrly Ihii/s, 'C^WT^y OP -"-5 ., 
 Illiistrntions. / '^ ^OPYR/GHr 
 
 y ( nVJ) 84'='' 
 
 BY PETER RONAN, '" " 
 
 United States Indian Agent, Flat 
 head Agency, Montana. 
 
 Published and Copyrighted by the Journal Pub- 
 lishing Co., Helena, Mont. 
 
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 PREFACE. 
 
 The compiling of tliis little work was done 
 by the author at the Flathead Agency, Mon- 
 tana, during leisure hours. It was published 
 in the Helena Montana Journal, and from the 
 columns of that paper transferred into book • 
 form. At the solicitation of friends it has been 
 sent out in its present shape. No merit is 
 claimed for the work, except that it is a plain 
 historical sketch of the Flathead Indian 
 nation, from 1813, to present date, with the 
 history of the establishment of St. Mary's Mis- 
 sion, by Father DeSmet, and scenes and 
 incidents of the olden times in Montana. 
 
 The Author. 
 Flathead Agency, 1890. 
 
 Isifflia 
 
 SIMS 
 
 IsiffllliiSi 
 
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 bffiim) 
 
 
 SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS. 
 
 Cox's Adventures on the Columbia River. 
 McMillan's Trading Post, at mouth of Mis- 
 soula River. 
 
 first Celebration of Christmas by white men 
 in Montana. 
 
 Torturing a Blackfoot prisoner. 
 War l^etween the Flatheads and the Hlack- 
 feet. 
 
 Good Traits of the Flatheads. 
 The War Chief 
 Indian Cure for Rheumatism. 
 Flathead Code of Morahty. 
 Flathead Tradition in Respect to Beavers. 
 The Name Flathead a Misnomer. 
 Description of the real Flatheads and the 
 Mode of Flattening the Heads. 
 Marriage of Pieie Michael. 
 At the Spokane Trading Post. 
 Letter from Okimagen, Feb. 1814. 
 St. Mary's Mi.ssion, in the Bitter Root Val- 
 ley. 
 
 The Flathead Tribe send a Delegation of 
 
 Indians to St. Louis, in 1836, to bring them 
 
 Catholic Missionaries, but they never returned. 
 
 A Second Delegation sent in 1837 — all 
 
 killed by Sioux Indians. 
 
 A Third Expedition successful in reaching 
 St. Louis, in 1839. 
 
 Father DeSniet accompanied the Indians 
 back to the Rocky Mountains. 
 
 St. Mary's Mission Established in 1841. 
 First Seed planted in Montana in 1842. 
 Arrival of F'ather Anthony Ravalli. 
 First Grist and Saw Mill Erected in Mon- 
 tana, 
 
 Jealousies of the Trappers and Fur Traders. 
 
 St. Maiy's Mission Abandoned. 
 
 Major Owen's Acquisition of Fort Owen. 
 
 1 
 
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 W4 
 
 
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 5«a 
 
 
 
 
 Wreck of the Missionaries at Horse Plains 
 and Thompson Falls. 
 
 St. Ignatius Mission Established in 1854. 
 
 St. Mary's Mission Re-Established in 1866. 
 
 The Great E.\plorers, Lewis and Clarke, 
 among the Flathead Indians 
 
 Election of Chief Victor. 
 
 An Indian Buffalo Hunt in Old Times. 
 
 Official visit of Senator 0. C. Vest, of Mis- 
 .souri, and Major Martin Maginnis, Represen- 
 tative from Montana. 
 
 Council with the Indians at Flathead 
 Agency. 
 
 Council with Chief Chariot at St. Mary's 
 Mission. 
 
 Description of Chief Chariot. 
 
 The Treaty Between Governor Stevens and 
 Chief Victor. 
 
 President Garfield's Agreement with Chief 
 Chariot and the Signatures Attached to the 
 same. 
 
 Synopsis of the Official Report of Senator 
 Vest and Representative Maginnis. 
 
 Ymt to Washington of Chief Chariot and 
 Delegation of Indians accompanied by Agent 
 Ronan. 
 
 A Council lietween the Agent, and Chief Char- 
 lot's band at St. Mary's Mission. 
 
 Number of Indians Living in Bitter Root 
 Valley in 1884. 
 
 Council held in 1884, Represented on the 
 part of the United States by Hon. J. K. 
 McCammon, Assistant Attorney General of the 
 Interior Department, Hon. W. F Sanders, on 
 the part of the Northern Pacific Railroad. 
 Indians Represented l)y Chief Michael, Chief 
 Eneas and Chief Arlee. 
 
 Sketch of the last of the War Chiefs, Arlee. 
 Adolph and Big Canoe 
 
 Bulwer's translation of Schiller's Burial 
 Song. 
 
 ^1?^^ fSl^l51fSi^l5 
 
 IgiBslHi 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 IN YE OLDEN DATS 
 
 A History of the Flathead Indian Na- 
 tion and Its Decline. 
 
 BLACKFEET WARS OF EXTERMINATION 
 
 Tbe First Christmas Celebrated Iby White 
 
 Men in Montana— The Early Traders of 
 
 the Missoula River. 
 
 By Major Pet«r Ronan. 
 
 [Copyrighted.] 
 
 On Thursday, the 17th of October, 1811, 
 there sailed from New York for Astoria the 
 good ship Beaver, owned and outfitted by 
 John Jacob Astor, the founder of the great 
 Northwest Fur company. Among the 
 cabin passengers was a young man by the 
 name of Cox, who, upon his return to 
 ■ England, in 1817, wrote "Cox's Adventures 
 on the Columbia River," and to his nara- 
 tive I am indebted for much of the early 
 information contained in those pages con- 
 cerning the Flathead Indians of Montana. 
 After the arrival of the ship at Astoria, Mr. 
 Cox was sent with a large party of hunters 
 and trappers to explore and establish trad- 
 ing posts on the upper waters and tribu- 
 utaries of the Columbia river. 
 
 The following is an extract from the 
 letter of instructions, sent from 
 headquarters at Astoria to Mr. Cox, who 
 was then trading for the company at Oka- 
 nagan. "You will assume the immediate 
 management of the brigade and everything 
 
 f 
 
 
also during the voyage, and make the best 
 of your way to Spokane House, where you 
 will make as little delay as possible. From 
 thence you will proceed to join Mr. McMil- 
 lin at the Flatheads; and if you are reduced 
 to eat horses, either at Spokane or further 
 on, they ought to be the worst." 
 
 The liberal writer of this economical ad- 
 vice was one of the chief managers of Mr. 
 Astor's trading post at Astoria, and was 
 spoken of in other respects to be a very 
 worthy, good natured individual. At Spo- 
 kane several horses had to be killed for food, 
 but as Mr. Cox was noted as a good liver 
 and fond of the substantial fat and lean, 
 candidly confessed that in his choice ot 
 horses for the kettle, he willfully departed 
 from his instructions by selecting those 
 whose ribs were least visible. 
 
 On the 24th of December, 1813, McMillan's 
 trading post was reached. The fort was 
 situated on a point at the mouth of the 
 Missoula river, and described as formed by 
 the junction of a bold mountain torrent 
 with the Flathead river, and surrounded on 
 all sides with high and thickly wooded hills, 
 covered with pine, spruce, larch, beech, 
 birch and cedar. The Flathead river is now 
 called the Pend d'Oreille river,» but appears 
 on the maps from its junction with the Mis- 
 soula river as Clarke's Fork of the Columbia. 
 At this point, which is now the western 
 boundary of the Flathead reservation, as 
 before stated, McMillan erected his fort. It 
 had a good trading store, a comfortable 
 house for the men, and snug quarters for 
 the officer of the company in charge, 
 his clerk and assistants. The Montana 
 historian may safely record those buildings 
 
 as the first ever erected within the broad 
 2 
 
 1 
 
 

 siMjmJ 
 
 
 
 
 
 mi 
 
 limits of her boundaries. Here Mr. Cox and 
 his fellow-voyagers took up their winter 
 quarters. A large band of Flathead warriors 
 were encamped about the fort. They had 
 recently returned from the Buflfalo country 
 and had avenged their defeat of the preced- 
 ing year by a signal victory over their ene- 
 mies, the Blackfeet, several of whose war- 
 riors, with their women, they had taken 
 prisoners, McMillan's tobacco and stock of 
 trading goods had been entirely expended 
 previous to this arrival, and the Indians 
 were much in want of ammunition; the 
 goods brought were therefore a source of 
 great joy to both parties. The natives 
 smoKed the much loved weed for several 
 days successively. The hunters killed a 
 few mountain sheep, and Cox brought up 
 a bag of flour, a bag of rice, plenty of tea 
 and coffee, some arrowroot, and fifteen gal- 
 lons of prime rum. 
 
 There was celebrated the first Christmas 
 ever celebrated by white men in Montana , 
 territory. Mr. Cox says: "We spent a com- 
 paratively happy Christmas, and by the side 
 of a blazing fire in a warm room, forgot the 
 sufferings we endured in our dreary progress 
 through the woods. There was, however, 
 in the midst of our festivities a great draw- 
 back, from the pleasure we should other- 
 wise have enjoyed. I allude to the un- 
 fortunate Blackfeet who had been captured 
 by the Flatheads. Having been informed 
 that they were about putting one of their 
 prisoners to death, I went to their camp to 
 witness the spectacle. The man was tied to 
 a tree, after which they heated an old barrel 
 of a gun until it became red hot, with which 
 they burned him on the legs, thighs, 
 neck, cheek and stomach. They then com- 
 
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 menced cutting the flesh from about the 
 nails, which they pulled out, and next sep- 
 arated the fingers from the hand joint by- 
 joint. During the performance of these cru- 
 elties, the wretched captive never winced, 
 and instead of suing for mercy he added 
 fresh stimulants to their barbarous ingenu- 
 ity by the most irritating reproaches, part of 
 which our interpreter translated as follows: 
 "My heart is strong; you do not hurt me; 
 you can't hurt me; you are fools; you do not 
 know how to torture: try it again; I don't 
 feel any pain yet. We torture your relations 
 a great deal better, because we make them 
 cry out loud, like little children. You are 
 not brave — you have small hearts, and you 
 are always afraid to fight." 
 
 Then addressing one m particular he said: 
 "It was by my arrow you lost your eye;" 
 upon which the Flathead darted at him 
 and with a knife in a moment scooped out 
 one of his eyes, at the same time cutting the 
 bridge of his nose almost in two. This did 
 not stop him; with the remaining eye he 
 looked sternly at another and said, "I killed 
 your brother, and I scalped your old fool of 
 a lather." The warrior to whom this was 
 addressed instantly sprung at him and sep- 
 arated the scalp from his head. He was 
 then about plunging a knife in his heart, 
 until he was told by the chief to desist. The 
 raw scull, bloody socket and mutilated nose 
 now presented a horrible appearance, but 
 by no means changed his tone of defiance. 
 
 "It was I," said he to the chief, "that 
 
 made your wife a prisoner last fall — we put 
 
 put out her eyes; we tore out 
 
 her tongue; we treated her like a 
 
 dog. Forty of our young warriors — " 
 
 The chief became incensed the moment his 
 4 
 
 
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 SIMM 
 
 
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 wife's name was mentioned; he seized his 
 gun and, before the last sentence was ended, 
 a ball from it passed through the brave fel- 
 low's heart and terminated his frightful 
 sufferings. Shocking, however, as this 
 dreadful exhibition was, it was far exceeded 
 by the atrocious cruelties practiced on the 
 female prisoners. We remonstrated against 
 the exercise of such horrible cruelties. They 
 replied by saying the Blackfeet treated their 
 prisoners in the same manner; that it was 
 the course adopted by all red warriors, and 
 that they could not think of giving up the 
 gratification of their revenge to the foolish 
 and womanish feelings of white men. 
 
 Shortly after this we observed a young fe- 
 male led forth, apparently not more than 
 fourteen or fifteen years of age, surrounded 
 by some old women, who were conducting 
 her to one end of the village, 
 whither they were followed by a 
 number of young men. Having learned 
 the infamous intentions of her conquerors, 
 and feeling interested for the unfortunate 
 victim, we renewed our remonstrances, but 
 received nearly the same answer as before. 
 Finding them still inflexible, and wishing 
 to adopt every means in our power consist- 
 ent with safety, in the cause of humanity, 
 we ordered our interpreter to acquaint them 
 that, highly as we valued their friendship 
 and much as we esteemed their furs, we 
 would quit their country for ever unless 
 they discontinued their unmanly and dis- 
 graceful cruelties to their prisoners. This 
 had the desired effect, and the miserable 
 captive was led back to her sorrowing group 
 of friends. Our interference was nearly ren- 
 dered ineffectual by the furious old priest- 
 esses who had been conducting her to the 
 5 
 
 
 
 
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 sacrifice. They told the young warriors they 
 were cowards, fools and had not the 
 hearts of fleas, and called on them in the 
 names of their mothers, sisters and wives to 
 follow the steps of their forefathers and have 
 their revenge on the dogs of Blackfeet. They 
 began to waver, but we affected not to un- 
 derstand what the old women had been 
 saying. We told them that this act of self- 
 denial on their part was peculiarly grateful 
 to the white men, and by it they would se- 
 cure our permanent residence among them, 
 and in return for their furs be always fur- 
 nished with guns and ammunition sufficient 
 to repel the attacks of their old enemies, and 
 preserve their relations from being made 
 prisoners. This decided the doubtful and 
 the chief promised faithfully that no more 
 tortures should be inflicted on the prisoners, 
 which I believe was rigidly adhered to, at 
 least during the winter of 1813. 
 
 The Flatheads were formerly much more 
 numerous than they were at this period, 
 but owing to the constant hostilities be- 
 tween them and the Blackfeet Indians their 
 numbers had been greatly diminished. 
 While pride, policy, ambition, self-preser- 
 vation, or the love of aggrandizement, often 
 deluges the civilized world with Christian 
 blood, the only cause assigned by the natives 
 of whom I write for their perpetual war- 
 fare, is the love of buffalo. There are ex- 
 tensive plains to the eastward of the moun- 
 tains frequented in the summer and au- 
 tumnal months by numerous herds of 
 buffalo. Hither ttie river tribes repair to 
 hunt those animals, that they may procure 
 as much of their meat as will supply them 
 
 until the succeeding season. In these ex- 
 6 
 
 » 
 
 
 
 
ElMfSJ 
 
 
 
 
 
 cursions they often meet and the most 
 sanguinary conflicts follow. 
 
 "The Blackfeet claimed all of that part of 
 the country immediately at the foot of the 
 mountains, east of the main range, which 
 was most frequented by the buffalo; and 
 alleged that the Flatheads, by resorting 
 thither to hunt, were intruders whom they 
 were bound to oppose on all occasions. The 
 latter, on the contrary, asserted that their 
 forefathers had always claimed and exercised 
 the right of hunting on these disputed lands; 
 and that while one of their warriors re- 
 mained alive the right should not be relin- 
 quished. The consequence of these con- 
 tinued wars was dreadful, particularly to the 
 Flatheads, who, being the weaker in num- 
 bers, were generally the greatest sufferers. 
 Independent of their inferiority in this re- 
 spect, their enemy had another great ad- 
 vantage in the use of firearms, which 
 they obtained from the company's trad- 
 ing posts established in the department of 
 Forts des Prairies. To those the Flatheads 
 had nothing to oppose but arrows and their 
 own undaunted bravery. Every year pre- 
 vious to the coming of McMillan's party 
 witnessed the gradual diminution of their 
 numbers, and total annihilation would 
 shortly have been the consequence but for 
 the establishment of the trading post at the 
 mouth of the Missoula, and the arrival of 
 Cox and his party with a plentiful supply of 
 arms and ammunition for trade, They were 
 overjoyed at haying an opportunity of pur- 
 chasing them, and quickly stocked them- 
 selves with a sufficient huantity of both. 
 
 From this moment affairs took a decided 
 change in their favor, and in their subse- 
 quent contests the numbers of killed. 
 
 
 
 
 
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 f2j»^[SJasi(sjMis) 
 
 wounded aud prisoners were more equal. 
 The Blackfeet became enraged at this, and 
 declared to the company's people at Fort 
 des Prairies that all white men who might 
 fall into their hands, to the westward of the 
 mountains, would be .treated by them as 
 enemies, in consequence of their furnishing 
 the Flatheads with weapons which were 
 used with such deadly effect 
 
 against their nation. This threat, as will 
 appear hereafter, was strictly put in execu- 
 tion. The lands of the Flatheads, in those 
 days were well stocked with deer, mountain 
 sheep, bears, mountain goat, wild fowl and 
 fish, and when an endeavor was made to in- 
 duce them to give up such aangerous expe- 
 ditions and confine themselves to the pro- 
 duce of their own country, they replied that 
 their fathers had always hunted on the buf- 
 falo grounds; that they were accustomed to 
 do the same thing from their infancy, and 
 they would not now abandon a practice 
 which existed for generations among their 
 people. 
 
 Mr. Cox stated in his writings of those 
 early days, that with exception of the cruel 
 treatment of their prisoners (which as it 
 was general among all Indians, must not be 
 imputed to them as a peculiar vice) Flat- 
 heads had fewer failings than any of the 
 tribes he ever met with. He described them 
 as honest in their dealings, brave in the 
 field, quiet and amenable to their chiefs, 
 fond of cleanliness, and decided enemies to 
 falsehood of every description. The women 
 were excellent wives and mothers and their 
 character for fidelity so well established that 
 the early traveler and trader bears witness 
 that he never heard of an instance of one 
 
 of them proving unfaithful t© her husband. 
 
 8 
 
 Id 
 
 
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 rney were also ftee trom the vice of back 
 bitinff, so common among the lower tribes, 
 and laziness was a stranger among them. 
 Both sexes were described as comparatively 
 very fair, and their complexions a shade 
 lighter than the palest new cop- 
 per after being freshly rubbed. They 
 are remarkably well made, rather 
 slender and very seldom corpu- 
 lent. The dress of the men in those 
 days consisted solely of long leggings, which 
 reached from the ankles to the hips, and were 
 fastened by strings to a leathern belt around 
 the waist, and a shirt of dressed deer skin 
 with loose hanging sleeves, which fell down 
 to their knees. The outside seams of the 
 leggings and shirt sleeves had fringes of 
 leather. The women were covered by a 
 loose robe of the same material reaching 
 from the neck to the feet, and ornamented 
 with fringes, beads, hawk-bills and thimbles. 
 The dresses of both were regularly cleaned 
 with pipe clay, which abounds in parts of 
 the country. They had no permanent 
 covering for the head, but in wet or stormy 
 weather sheltered it by part of a buffalo 
 robe, which completely answered all pur- 
 poses of a surtout. The principal chief of 
 the tribe was hereditary; but from their 
 constant wars they adopted the wise and 
 salutary custom of electing as their leader 
 in battle that warrior in whom the greatest 
 portions of wisdom, strength and bravery 
 were combined. The election took place 
 every year, and it sometimes occurred that 
 the general in one campaign became a pri- 
 vate in the next. This "war 
 chief," as they termed him, had no author- 
 ity whatever when at home and was as 
 any of the tribe to the heriditary chief; but 
 
 
 I — iIcttV r— I 
 
 
 
 
\smm 
 
 
 
 when the warriors set out on their hunting 
 excursions to the buffalo plains, he assumed 
 the supreme command, which he excer- 
 cised with despotic sway until their return. 
 He carried a long whip with a thick handle, 
 decorated with scalps and feathers and gen- 
 erally appointed two active warriors as aides 
 de camp. On their advance toward the 
 enemy he always took the lead, and on their 
 return he brought up the rear. Great regu- 
 larity was observed during the march, and if 
 any of the tribe fell out of the ranks or 
 committed any other breach of discipline, 
 he instantly received a flagellation from the 
 whip of the war chieftain. He acted with 
 the most perfect impartiality and would 
 punish one of his subalterns for disobe- 
 dience of orders with equal severity as any 
 other offender. Custom, however, joined to 
 a sense of tribal duty, had reconciled them 
 to these arbitrary acts of power, which they 
 never complained of or attempted to resent. 
 After the conclusion of the cam- 
 paign, or their arrival on their 
 own lands his authority ceases; 
 when the peace chief calls all the tribe to- 
 gether, and they proceed to a new election. 
 There was no canvassing, caucussing, cat- 
 hauling or intriguing, and should the last 
 leader be superseded, he retires from his 
 ofBce with apparent indifference, and with- 
 out betraying any symptoms of discontent. 
 At the time of which Mr. Cox wrote the 
 fighting chief had been five times re-elected. 
 He was about thirty-five years of age and 
 had killed twenty of the Blackfeet in various , 
 battles, the scalps of whom were suspended 
 in triumphal pride from a pole at tlie door 
 ' if his lodge. His wife had been captured by 
 
 i he enemy the year before and her loss made 
 10 
 
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 11 
 
 
 
 
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 rnmm 
 
 mMm 
 
 PS51 
 
Signal of Successful Flathead War Party 
 
jisiMja 
 
 IS1MJ3 
 
 
 
 
 
 a deep impression on him. He was highly 
 respected by all the warriors for his superior 
 wisdom and bravery, a consciousness of 
 which, joined to the length of time he had 
 been accustomed to command, imparted to 
 his manners a degree of dignity which was 
 not remarked in any other Indian. He 
 would not take a second wife, and when the 
 recollection of the one he had lost came 
 across his mind, he retired into the deepest 
 solitude of the woods to indulge his sorrow, 
 where some of the tribe stated 
 they often found him calling on her 
 spirit to appear, and invoking vengeance 
 upon her conquerors. When these bursts 
 of grief subsided his countenance assumed 
 a tinge of stern melancholy, strongly indi- 
 cating the mingled emotions of sorrow and 
 unmitigated hatred of the Blackfeet. He 
 was invited sometimes to the fort, on which 
 occasions he was sympathized with upon 
 his loss; but at the same time acquainted 
 with the manner in which civilized 
 nations made war. He was told that war- 
 riors were only made prisoners, who were 
 never tortured or killed, and no brave white 
 man would ever injure a female or a de- 
 fenseless man; that if such a custom had 
 prevailed among them, he would now by 
 the exchange of prisoners be able to recover 
 his wife, who was by their barbarous system 
 lost to him forever; and if it were possible 
 to bring about a peace with their enemies, 
 the frightful horrors of war might at least 
 be considerably softened by adopting the 
 practice of civilized nations. It was added 
 that he now had a glorious op- 
 portunity of commencing the career 
 of magnanimity by sending home 
 
 uninjured the captives he had made during 
 11 
 
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 siMia 
 
 
 "SKIS 
 

 
 ieMfmJieiMfsJ 
 
 the last campaign; that the friends of the 
 company on the eastern side of the moun- 
 tains would exert their influence with the 
 Blackfeet to induce them to follow his ex- 
 ample and that ultimately it might be the 
 means of uniting the two rival nations in 
 the bonds of peace. He was at first opposed 
 to making any advance, but on farther 
 pressing he consented to make the trial, 
 provided that the hereditary chief and the 
 tribe started no objection. On quitting the 
 fort he made use of the following words: 
 "My white friends, you do not know the 
 savage nature of the Blackfeet; they hope to 
 exterminate the tribe of the Selish, whom 
 y:u call Flatheads; they are a great deal 
 more numerous than we are, and were it not 
 for our bravery their object would have long 
 ago been achieved. We shall now, accord- 
 ing to your wishes, send back the prisoners; 
 but remember, I tell you, that they will 
 laugh at the interference of your 
 relations beyond the moantains 
 and never spare a man, woman or child 
 that they can take of our nation. Your ex- 
 ertions to save blood show you are good 
 people. If they follow our example we 
 shall kill no more prisoners, but I tell you 
 they will laugh at you and call you fools." 
 
 The war chief, true to his words, assembled 
 the elders and warriors, to whom he repre- 
 sented the subject of the discourse, and, 
 after a long speech, advised them to make 
 the trial, which would please their white 
 friends and show their readiness to avoid 
 unnecessary cruelty. Such an unexpected 
 proposition gave rise to an animated debate, 
 which continued for some time, but being 
 supported by a man for whom they enter- 
 tained so much respect, it was finally car- 
 13 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ried, and it was determined to send home 
 the Blackfeet on the breaking up of the 
 winter. The traders undertook to furnish 
 them with horses and provisions for their 
 journey, or to pay the Flatheads for so 
 doing. This was agreed to, and about 
 the middle of March the prisoners 
 took their departure tolerably well mounted, 
 and with dried meat enough to take them to 
 their friends. Mr. McMillan who had passed 
 three years in the Blackfoot country, and - 
 was acquainted with their language, in- 
 formed them of the exertions used to save 
 their lives and prevent farther repetitions of 
 torture; and requested them particularly to 
 mention the circumstance to their country- 
 men, in order that they might adopt a simi- 
 lar proceeding. Letters were also sent by 
 them to the gentlemen in charge of the dif- 
 ferent establishments at Forts des Prairies, 
 detailing the matter, and impressing on 
 them the necessity of their attempting to in- 
 duce the Blackfeet in their vicinity to follow 
 the example set them by the Flatheads. 
 
 In those days the Flatheads were a healthy 
 tribe and subject to few diseases. Common 
 fractures caused by an occasional pitch off a 
 horse., or a fall down a declivity in the ardor 
 of hunting, were cured by tight bandages 
 and pieces of wood like staves placed longi- 
 tudinally around the part, to which 
 they were secured by leathern thongs. 
 For contusions they generally bled either in 
 the temples, arms, wrists or ankles with 
 pieces of sharp flint, or heads of arrows. 
 Mr. Cox relates that he experienced some 
 acute rheumatic attacks^ An old Indian 
 proposed to relieve him provided he con- 
 sented to follow the mode of cure practiced 
 
 by him in similar cases on younsr warriors of 
 13 
 
 
 
 IsSral 
 
 ra^^isifswiei 
 
 \s\mM 
 
 \smm 
 
 \s\MM\ 
 
the tribe. On inquiring the method he in- 
 tended to pursue he replied that it merely 
 consisted in getting up early every morning 
 for some weeks and plunging into the river 
 and to leave the rest to him. This was a 
 most chilling proposition, far the river was 
 firmly frozen, and an opening had to be 
 made in the ice preparatory to each immer- 
 sion. The patient asked him; ''Would it 
 not answer equally well to have the water 
 brought to the bed warm?" But he shook 
 his head and replied that he was 
 surprised that a young white chief 
 who ought to be wise should ask so foolish 
 a question. As rheumatism was a stranger 
 among Indians, and as he was upwards of 
 three thousand miles from any professional 
 assistance, he determined to adopt the dis- 
 agreeable expedient, and commenced opera- 
 tions the following morning. The Indian 
 first broke a hole in the ice sufficiently rarge 
 to admit both. Enveloped in a large buff- 
 alo robe the patient proceeded to the spot, 
 and throwing off his covering, with the 
 Flathead jumped into the frigid orifice to- 
 gether. The Indian immediately com- 
 menced rubbing the shoulders, back and 
 loins of the white man, whose hair in the 
 meantime became ornamented with icicles, 
 and while the lower joints were undergoing 
 their friction, his face, neck and shoulders 
 were encased in a thin covering of ice. On 
 getting released he was rolled in a 
 blanket and taken back to the bed room, in 
 which a good fire was burning, and in a few 
 minutes he experienced a warm glow all 
 over his body. Chilling and disagreeable as 
 those ablutions were, yet, as he found them 
 so beneficial, he c@ntinued them for twenty- 
 five days, at the expiration of which his 
 14 
 
 m 
 
 
 f^J^pisi 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 physician was pleased to say that no more 
 were necessary, and that his patient had 
 done his duty like a wise man. He stated 
 that he was never after troubled with a rheu- 
 matic pain. 
 
 In the early times the Flatheads believed 
 in the existence of a god and evil spirit, and 
 consequently in a future state of reward and 
 punishment. Thej- held that after death the 
 good Indian went to a country in which 
 there was perpetual summer; that he would 
 meet his wife and children; that the 
 rivers would abound with fish, and the 
 plains with the much loved bufifalo; 
 and that he will spend this time in hunting 
 and fishing, free from the terrors of war, 
 or the apprehensions of cold or famine. The 
 bad man, they believed, would go to a place 
 covered with eternal snow; that he would 
 always be shivering with cold, and would 
 see fires at a distance which he could not 
 enjoy; water which he cannot procure to 
 quench his thirst, and buffalo and deer 
 which he cannot kill to appease his hunger. 
 An impenetrable wood, full of wolves, 
 panthers and sernents separates these 
 "shrinking slaves of winter" from their 
 more fortunate bretliren in the "meadows 
 of ease." Their punishment is not, how- 
 ever, eternal, and according to the different 
 shades of their crimes they are sooner or 
 later emancipated and permitted to join 
 their friends in the Elysean fields. 
 
 Their code of morality, although short, 
 was comprehensive. They held that hon- 
 esty, bravery, love of truth, attention to 
 parents, obedience to their chiefs and affec- 
 tion for their wives and children are the 
 principal virtues which entitle them to the 
 place'of happiness, while the opposite vices 
 
 15 
 
 IsiMraJ isiSsJ Isffiisl IsiMisJ 
 
 fsi^isirawsi 
 
 iSlMfSJ 
 
^) 
 
 MM2^M\MM 
 
 
 
 condemn to that of misery. They had a 
 curious tradition with respect to beavers. 
 They firmly believed that these animals were 
 a fallen race of Indians, who, in consequence 
 of their wickedness, vexed the Good Spirit, 
 and were condemned by him to their present 
 shape; but that in due time they will be re- 
 stored to their speech, and that they have 
 heard them talk with each other, and seen 
 them sitting in council on an oflFending 
 member. 
 
 The readers of natural history are already 
 well acquainted with the surprising 
 sagacity of these wonderful ani- 
 mals, now fast disappearing from 
 our waters; with their dexterity in cutting 
 down trees, their skill in constructing their 
 houses, and their foresight in collecting and 
 storing provisions sufficient to last them 
 during the winter months, but few are aware 
 of a remarkable custom amongthem, which, 
 more than any other, confirms the Indians 
 in believing them a fallen race. Towards 
 the latter end of autumn, a certain number, 
 varying from twenty to thirty, assemble for 
 the purpose of building their winter habita- 
 tions. They immediately commence cutting 
 down trees; and nothing can be more won- 
 derful than the skill and patience which 
 they manifest in this laborious undertaking; 
 to see them anxiously looking up watching 
 the leaning of the tree when the trunk is 
 nearly severed, and, when its creaking an- 
 nounces its approaching fall, to ob- 
 serve them scampering off in all 
 directions to avoid being crushed 
 When the tree is prostrate they quickly strip 
 it of its branches, after which with their 
 dental ciiisels they divide the trunk into sev- 
 eral pieces of equal lengths which they roll 
 16 
 
 f^'i 
 
 
 [h;^^ 
 
 ^j^^osi "eissi pwi5] 
 
 eiMialSl^ISJElMMl 
 
 ISlMMJElMimJ 
 
 f^r;^;isi[2i=;a^ 
 
 si>^^jmj 
 
bifflimj 
 
 PMS] 
 
 
 to the rivulet across which they intent to 
 erect their houses. Two or three old ones 
 generally superintend the others; and it is 
 no unusual sight to see them beating those 
 who exhibit any symptoms of laziness. 
 Should, however, any fellow be incorrigible, 
 and persist in refusing to work, he is driven 
 unanimously by the whole tribe to seek 
 shelter and provisions elsewhere. These 
 outlaws are therefore obliged to pass a mis- 
 erable winter, half starved in a burrow on 
 the banks of some stream where they are 
 easily trapped. The Indians call them "lazy 
 beaver," and their fur is not half so valua- 
 ble as that of the other animals, whose per- 
 severing industry secure them provisions 
 and a comfortable shelter during the sever- 
 ity of winter. 
 
 Even in those early times the hunters and 
 trappers could not discover why the Black- 
 feet and Flatheads received their respective 
 designations, for the feet of the former are 
 no more inclined to sable than any other 
 part of the body, while the heads of the 
 latter possess their fair proportion of ro- 
 tundity. Indeed it is only below the falls 
 and rapids that real Flatheads appear, and 
 at the mouth of the Columbia that they 
 flourish most supernaturally. 
 
 The tribes who practice the custom ot 
 flattening the head, and who lived at the 
 mouth of the Columbia, differed little from 
 each other in laws, manners or customs, and 
 were composed of the Cathlamahs, Kill- 
 mucks, Clatsops, Chinooks and Chilts. The 
 abominable custom of flattening their heads 
 prevails among them all. Immediately 
 after birth, wrote Mr. Cox, in 1814, the in- 
 fant is placed in a kind of oblong cradle 
 formed like a troiigh, with moss under it. 
 
 mmm 
 
 151MEJ 
 
 wmm 
 
 mmm 
 
 \sMm\smM\smM 
 
 WrS^ 
 
 mms\mms\ 
 
 \sMm\sMM 
 

 fMMl^ 
 
 
 ii 
 
 One end, on which the head reposes, is more 
 elevated than the rest. A padding is then 
 pressed upon the forehead, with a piece of 
 cedar bark over it, and by means of cords 
 passed through small holes in each side of 
 the cradle, the padding is pressed against the 
 head. It is kept in this manner upwards of 
 a year, and is not, I believe, attended with 
 much pain. The appearance of the 
 infant, however, while in this state 
 of compression is frightful, and its little 
 black eyes, forced out by the tightness of 
 the bandages, resemble those of a mouse 
 choked in a trap. When released from this 
 inhuman process the head is perfectly flat- 
 tened, and the upper part of it seldom ex- 
 ceeds an inch in thickness. It never after- 
 wards recovers its rotundity. They deem 
 this an essential point of beauty, and the 
 most devoted adherent of Charles I. never 
 entertained a stronger aversion to a Round- 
 head than these savages. Dr. Swan, in ex- 
 amining some skulls takea to England, con- 
 fessed that nothing short of ocular demon- 
 stration could have convinced him of the 
 possibility of moulding the human head 
 into such a form 
 
 They allege, as an excuse for this custom, 
 that all their slaves have round heads; and 
 accordingly every child of a bondsman who 
 is not adopted by the tribe Inherits not only 
 his father's degradation but his parental ro- 
 tundity of cranium. Why the great Selish 
 tribe of Montana were called Flatheads will 
 ever remain a mystery. The Indians do 
 not know by what means they came to be 
 called Flatheads. 
 
 Mr. Cox speaks of the marriage, in the 
 
 winter of 1813, at their fort, at the mouth of 
 
 he Missoula river, of Piere Michel, the 
 18 
 
 ii 
 
 
mmm 
 
 
 
 
 
 hunter, guide and interpreter of the expedi- 
 tion. As the descendants of the same Piere 
 Michel are now among the very best Indians 
 of the Flathead reservation, I shall give the 
 account of the marriage as it is probably the 
 earliest recorded in the annals of Montana. 
 It appears Michel accompanied the Flat- 
 heads on two of their war campaigns, and 
 by his unerring aim and undaunted bravery 
 won the affection of the whole tribe. He 
 was the son of a respectable Canadian by an 
 Indian mother. The war chief in particular 
 paid great attention to his opinion, and con- 
 sulted him in any difficult matter. Michel 
 wanted a wife; and having succeeded in 
 gaining the affection of a handsome girl 
 about 16 years of age, and niece to the her- 
 iditary chief, he made a formal proposal for 
 her. A council was thereupon called, at 
 which her uncle presided, to take Michel's 
 offer into consideration. One young war- 
 rior loved her and had obtained a previous 
 promise from her mother that she should 
 be his. He, therefore, with all 
 his relations, strongly opposed her 
 union with Piere, and urged his own claims 
 which had been sanctioned by her mother. 
 The war chief asked him if she had ever 
 promised to become his wife; he replied in 
 the negative. The chief then addressed the 
 councU, and particularly the lover, in favor 
 of Michel's suit; pointing out the great ser- 
 vice he had rendered the tribe by his bravery 
 and dwelling strongly on the policy of unit- 
 ing him more firmly to their interests by 
 consenting to the proposed marriage, which 
 he said would forever make him as one of 
 their brothers. His influence predominated, 
 and the unsuccessful rival immediately after 
 
 shook hands with Michel and told the young 
 19 
 
 I 
 
 
 p^^isi ps^ ra^i^ pwsi pms] ,11 
 

 
 
 
 
 woman, as he could not be her husband, he 
 hoped she would always regard him as her 
 brother. This she readily premised to do, 
 and so ended the opposition. The happy 
 Piere presented a gun to her uncle,some cloth, 
 calico, and ornaments to her female relatives; 
 with a pistol and handsome dagger to his 
 friend. He proceeded in the evening to the 
 chiefs lodge, where a number of her friends 
 had assembled to smoke. Here she re- 
 ceived a lecture from the old man, her 
 mother and a few other ancients on her 
 duty as a wife and mother. They strongly 
 exhorted her to be chase, obedient, indus- 
 trious and silent; and when absent with 
 her husband among her tribes always to 
 stay at home, and have no intercourse with 
 strange Indians. She then retired with the 
 old woman to an adjoining hut, where she 
 underwent an ablution and bade adieu to 
 her buckskin chemise, the place of which 
 was supplied by one of gingham, to which 
 was added a calico and green cloth petticoat 
 and a gown of blue cloth. After this was 
 over she was conducted back to her uncle's 
 lodge, where she received farther advice 
 as to her future conduct. A 
 procession was then formed by the two 
 chiefs, and several warriors carrying blazing 
 torches of pitch pine, to escort the bride and 
 her husband to the fort. They began sing- 
 ing war songs in praise of Michel's bravery, 
 and of their triumph over the Blackfeet. 
 She was surrounded by a group of young 
 and old women, some of whom were rejoic- 
 ing and others crying. The men moved on 
 first in a slow, solemn pace, still chanting 
 their war song. The women followed at a 
 short distance, and when the whole party 
 
 arrived in front of the fort they formed a cir- 
 
 J.'O 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 cle and commenced dancing and singing, 
 which they kept up about twenty minutes. 
 After this the calumet of peace went around 
 once more, and when the smoke of the last 
 whiffs had disappeared, Michel shook hands 
 with his late rival, embraced the chiefs and 
 conducted his bride to his room. Michel 
 was the only person of the party to whom 
 the Flatheads would give one of their 
 women in marriage. 
 
 On the 4th of April, 1814, Mr. Cox and his 
 party took leave of the fort and the Flathead 
 camp at the mouth of the Missoula river, on 
 their way to Spokane house, while they pro- 
 ceeded to make preparations for the ensuing 
 summer's campaign in the far business. On 
 the 15th they arrived at Spokane house, and 
 as the site of that ancient fur trading post is 
 now in the heart of the booming city of Spo- 
 kane, in Washington territory, I cannot re- 
 frain from copying the subjoined letter, 
 written by McGillivray from Okanagan, in 
 the same territory, at which place he had 
 wintered, but for want of conveyance could 
 not be forwarded to the fort at the mouth of 
 the Missoula river. Although accustomed to 
 the style of living on the eastern side of the 
 mountains and well acquainted with In- 
 dians, this was his first winter on the Co- 
 lumbia, and for information of the hatred of 
 those Englishmen, engaged undei the name 
 of "American Fur company," to everything 
 American, I shaU give an extract from one 
 of his letters: 
 
 Oakinagan, Feb., 1814. 
 
 "This is a horrible dull place. Here I 
 have been since you parted from us, perfectly 
 solus. My men, half Canadians and half 
 Sandwich Islanders. The library is wretched 
 aud no chance of my own books till next 
 
 H 
 
 
IS 
 
 
 
 
 
 m 
 
 year, when the Athalasca men cross the 
 mountains. If you, or my friends at Spo- 
 kane, do not send me a few volumes I shall 
 absolutely die of ennui. The Indians here 
 are incontestably the most indolent rascals I 
 ever met, and I assure it requires no small 
 degree of authority, with the few men I 
 have, to keep them in order. 
 
 The snow is between two and three feet 
 deep, and my trio of Owhyee generals find a 
 sensible difference between such hyperbo- 
 rean weather and the pleasing sunshine of 
 their own tropical paradise. Poor fellows! 
 They are not adapted for these latitudes, and 
 I heartily wish they were at home in their 
 own sweet islands, and sporting in the 'blue 
 summer ocean' that surrounds them. I 
 have not as yet made a pack of beaver. The 
 lazy Indians won't work. 
 
 I have hitherto principally subsisted on 
 horseflesh. I cannot say it agrees with me. 
 
 I have had plenty of pork, rice, arrowroot, 
 flour, taroroot, tea and coffee; no sugar. 
 With such a variety you will say I ought 
 not to complain, but want of society has de- 
 stroyed my relish for luxuries, and the only 
 articles I taste above par are souching and 
 molasses. What a contrast between the 
 manner I spent last year and thisi In the 
 first, with aU the pride of a newly created 
 subaltern, occasionally fighting the Yankees 
 "a la mode du pays," and anon sporting my 
 silver wings before some admiring "pay- 
 sanne" along the frontiers. Then what a 
 glorious winter in Montreal, with captured 
 Jonathans, triumphant Britons, astonished 
 Indians, gaping "habitants," agitated beau- 
 ties, balls, routs, dinners, suppers, parades, 
 drums beating, colors flying, with all other 
 
 pride, pomp and circumstances of glorious 
 22 
 
 m 
 
 [sj^isi 
 
 
 
 Sims 
 
 
siSmJ 
 
 
 
 
 war! But Othello's occupation is gone! and 
 here I am with a shivering guard of poor 
 islanders, buried in snow, sipping molasses, 
 smoking tobacco, and masticating horse 
 flesh. 
 
 ST. MARY'S MISSION, 
 
 situated in the valley of the Bitter Root, in 
 Missoula county, Montana territory, was es- 
 tablished by Catholic missionaries belong- 
 ing to the Society of Jesus; among the Flat- 
 head Indians, who made their home in that 
 lovely and picturesque valley in the year 
 l&ll. These Indians, whose heads are not at 
 all flattened, as the name given to them by 
 some misinformed traveler might be in- 
 ferred were living a nomadic life before the 
 missionaries came among them, and were 
 brave in war with other tribes of Indians 
 who were their enemies. The Flatheads 
 have always been friendly to the white race, 
 and until this date it is their proud boast 
 that the blood of a white man never stained 
 the hand of a Flathead Indian! Though 
 addicted to some superstitious practices 
 common to Indians of all tribes, they had 
 learned religious observances from Iriquois 
 Indians, who in their hunting and trapping 
 excursions had penetrated into the Bitter 
 Root valley from their homes in 
 the British possessions, where some of 
 them intermarried with the Flat- 
 heads and remarried with that tribe. 
 The Flatheads hearing the Iriquois teach- 
 ing the Catholic religion and prayers to their 
 children, which had been inculcated and 
 taught to the latter by the Jesuit Fathers, 
 in their far off homes, where that self sacri- 
 ficing order bad sought the Iriquois in their 
 lairs and taught and converted them to the 
 
 Catholic faith years before their advent 
 23 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 among the Flathead Indians. A great de- 
 sire arose in the hearts of the Flathead tribe 
 to learn more about the word of God and to 
 have missionaries among them to instruct 
 them in religion. The Iriquois advised a 
 delegation of Indians to be sent to St. jouis 
 to lay their wishes before the black gowns as 
 the Jesuit fathers were designated by the 
 Iriquois. A council of the Indians was 
 called by their chief and the proposition to 
 Bend to St. Louis for Catholic missionaries 
 was fully dizcussed. What an undertaking 
 for those wUd, untutored sons of the Eocky 
 Mountains, none of whom had ever seen a 
 white settlement, and encountered 
 but few white men in their lives 
 — and those were almost as wild 
 and untutored as the Indians, being 
 hunters and trappers in the "employment of 
 the Hudson Bay company. But their en- 
 thusiasm was aroused and the thousands of 
 miles to be traversed over trackless moun- 
 tains, treeless plains, sandy deserts, rocky 
 canons and deep, wide and rushing rivers — 
 and their path beset on every side by impla- 
 cable enemies of other tribes eagerly watch- 
 ing for an opportunity to waylay them with 
 the scalping knife and the tomahawk. But 
 it was possible that they could reach St. 
 Louis, and four of them volunteered to un- 
 dertake the lone and dangerous journey. 
 They started in the spring of the year 1836, 
 but they did not come back, nor were they 
 ever heard from. Whether killed while 
 passing through the roaming places of their 
 enemies or died of sickness or fatigue on 
 their wearisome journey has never been 
 known. 
 The next year, 1837, three Flatheads, aNez 
 
 Perces Indian and an Iropuois, the latter the 
 34 
 
 
 SIMS 
 
 PTl.V.fTJ 
 
|Dii>^:rra!|[?n^.fF]' 
 
 
 5\MM 
 
 
 
 father of Francois, a worthy and wealthy 
 Indian, who at this date is still a resident of 
 Bitter Root valley and is well and favorably 
 known by the settlers, started for St. Louis 
 on a similar errand, but were all killed by 
 the Sioux in Ash Hollow, on the South 
 Platte. "When the delegation reached Fort 
 Laramie, they were joined by W. H. Gray, 
 who afterwards wrote a history of Oregon, 
 who is yet a hale and hearty old man and 
 an honored citizen of Astoria, Oregon. Mr. 
 Gray was onihis way from Astoria to Mon- 
 treal, with a party of voyagers, having 
 in charge a boy by the name of 
 Ermintinger, whose mother was a squaw, 
 and whose father was one of the principal 
 managers of the Northwest Fur Company's 
 post at Astoria. The father was sending his 
 boy back to Montreal in charge of Mr. Gray 
 for the purpose of sending him to school. 
 The Flathead delegation journeyed on with 
 this party, but were met, as stated, in Ash 
 Hollow by a war party of Sioux, who de- 
 manded of Gray to what tribe the Indians 
 belonged whe were journeying through 
 their country with him. Mr. Gray, know- 
 ing that the Flatheads and Sioux were at 
 war with each other, in order to save their 
 lives, replied that they were Snake Indians. 
 The war chief then told Gray to get out of 
 the way with his white companions, 
 as it was his intention to slay the 
 Indians whom he said were Snakss, as 
 they were the enemies of the Sioiix. 
 The father of Francois.the Iroquois,who was 
 dressed like a white man, was told by the 
 Sioux warrior to get out of the way with 
 Gray and his companions, as they did not 
 want to kill him. But the brave and gener- 
 ous Iriquois replied that he was willing to 
 
 take chances with his companions, and all 
 25 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 M 
 
 
 sjMS] f^jmei fmjmsi pw^ 
 siMsJ IsiSsJ IsiMisJ 151»SJ 
 
prepared for resistence. Of course the whole 
 party of Flatheads, including the Iriquois, 
 and the Nez Perces Indians were slain and 
 scalped after a desperate fight, in which Mr. 
 Gray, young Ermintinger, and others of 
 Gray's party, took a hand in defense of the 
 Flatheads. Gray was shot in the forehead, 
 and exhibited the bullet wound to the 
 writer in the winter of 1883, while 
 on his way east with the Oregon 
 pioneers, over the Northern Pacific 
 railroad. The Sioux warriors contented 
 themselves by making prisoners of Gray's 
 party, whom they kept in capavity for a 
 short time with view of putcing them all 
 to death, as several Sioux were. killed in the 
 fight, and the son of the chief fell by the 
 hand of Gray. Better council prevailed, 
 however, and Mr. Gray and his compan- 
 ions were permitted to depart, and, as stated 
 before, that gentleman is still a citizen of 
 Astoria and wrote and published a history 
 of Oregon. News reached the Flatheads of 
 the tragic death of their delegation at the 
 hands of the Sioux warriors. But 
 this did not deter the Flatheads, and 
 their yearnings to know more of the 
 white man's God and religion, but only in- 
 creased by the dangers which lay between 
 them and the knowledge for which they 
 thirsted. In 1839, two young Iroquois an- 
 nounced in council of the Flatheads, that 
 notwithstanding the fate of the two previous 
 delegations who had set out for St. Louis, 
 they were ready to repeat the trial and con- 
 duct Catholic missionaries to the tribe. 
 Soon after this offer, it was learned that a 
 party of Hudson Bay employes were going 
 to make the voyage in canoes from the head 
 waters of the Missouri to St. Louis, and the 
 
 26 
 
 
 
 ps^ [amei pmsi p^i^ 
 
 
 
lawp 
 
 iSl^fSElMJ^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 young Iroquois made applicationto accom- 
 pany them and were accepted. In that 
 same year the Indians arrived at 
 St. Louis, and held audience with 
 the Cathohc bishop of that city 
 the Right Reverend Rosati. The bishop 
 had a scarcity of clergymen in his newly 
 formed diocese, but offered the Jesui* 
 fathers the new mission, and the superior of 
 that order accepted the offer of Father De 
 Smet to accompany the Indians back to the 
 Rocky mountains. 
 
 In the spring of 1840 one of the Iroquois 
 who made the voyage to St. Louis, suddenly 
 arrived in the Flathead camp on Eight Mile 
 creek, in the Bitter Root valley, and an- 
 nounced that his companion and a black 
 gown (Father De Smet) were coming with a 
 party of the Hudson Bay Fur company's 
 men. Upon this announcement the 
 chief ordered ten of his war- 
 riors to proceed ahead without 
 delay and conduct the missionary to the 
 Flathead camp, the chief following with the 
 whole tribe. Father DeSmet was met by 
 the advance warriors near Green river, and 
 under their guide he travelled on to the 
 head waters of the Snake river, where he 
 met the Flathead chief and his main camp 
 of followers. The father remained at their 
 camp some time, and satisfied himself of 
 the earnestness and good disposition of the 
 Indians, decided to go back to civilization 
 to report to his superiors and ask for assist- 
 ance. He iraveled with the Indian camp to 
 the three forks of the Missouri, and from 
 thence he was guided by a few warriors to 
 the next trading post, and from thence the 
 intrepid missionary made his way back to 
 
 St. Louis. 
 
 37 
 
 I 
 
 
 
 
 
 Sims 
 
 
In the spring of 1841, Father De Smet and 
 three brothers of the Society of Jesus, and 
 two fathers of the same order, returned to 
 the wilds of the Rocky mountains. The six 
 were of divers nationalities. Father De 
 Smet and two of the lay brothers were 
 Flemish; the other two fathers belonged one 
 to Italy, the other to France. The third 
 brother was a Frenchman. This band of 
 missionaries traveled from St. Louis over- 
 land, accompanied by a hunter named John 
 Gray, who was married to an Indian woman, 
 two Canadians and an Irishman named 
 Fitzpatrick, acting as guide, and driving 
 four carts and a wagon. With railroads now 
 sweeping acr.ss the vast prairies of Dakota, 
 Nebraska, and through the wild gorges of 
 the Rocky mountains into Montana, few 
 can appreciate the boldness and 
 trepidity of this little band of Catholic 
 missionaries, who, leaving civilization 
 behind, plunged into a pathless wilderness 
 and journeyed thousands of miles through 
 the country of hostile savages, some of 
 whom never before beheld the face of a 
 white man. It was a long, tedious and dan- 
 gerous trip, but having been undertaken for 
 the charitable and supernatural motive of 
 civilizing and christianizing the savages of 
 the forests of the Rocky Mountains, all dif- 
 ficulties were overcome, all dangers over- 
 looked and all fatigues joyfully borne. 
 
 When near Fort Bridger the travelers sent 
 their hunter, John Gray, ahead, who met 
 ten lodges of Indians and trappers, and told 
 them that the imporiaries were coming, and 
 besought them to go and meet them. The 
 Indians and himters started toward Green 
 river and after three days traveling, while 
 
 camped about five miles from Green river, 
 
 28 
 
 
 isimm 
 
 
 
 
mmM 
 
 MMm 
 
 MMM 
 
 
 
 
 m 
 
 another messenger arrived at the camp 
 and announced to them that Father 
 DeSmet, with his companions, would 
 arrive next day, and requested that the chief 
 trapper, Gabriel Pradhomme, and an Iro- 
 quois Indian, who was in the camp, sliould 
 go that same evening to meet the toil worn 
 missionaries. On the next day the traveling 
 party were conducted to the hunter's camp, 
 where they were welcomed with that roueh 
 enthusiasm and rude hospitality born of the 
 forest. Having rested and refreshed them- 
 selves, two of the hunters volunteered to go 
 and find the Flathead camp, and get fresh 
 horses to carry the fathers' baggage and pro- 
 visions, their stock being worn out. In the 
 meantime the missionaries, being almost out 
 of provisions. Father De Smet. with an Iro- 
 quois Indian, started for Fort Hall, on Snake 
 rivei, and the other missionaries and the ten 
 lodges followed them slowly. At Fort Hall 
 they were, after a few days, joined by Gabriel 
 Pradhomme, who with some young Indians 
 had driven in fresh horses for the fathers 
 use. The whole party then started from 
 Fo Wall tc meet the Flathead Indians, and 
 they were found at the head of Beaverhead 
 river, the largest tributary of the head- 
 waters of the Missouri, and sweeps through 
 a portion of what is now known as Beaver- 
 head county, in Montana territory. The 
 Indians received the Catholic fathers with 
 every mark of respect and gratitude, and 
 after remaining in camp for a few days they 
 divided, some lodges accompanying the mis- 
 sionaries to the Bitter Root valley and the 
 other Indians went in for their annual 
 buffalo hunt to the Musselshell river and 
 the Judith basin, promising to be back to 
 
 the Bitter Root valley in the fall. Traveling 
 29 
 
 em 
 
 fsjip5ipp7is]m[«5i[ajmsiraims]fs«g 
 
 isiMymJS 
 
 WJ 
 

 Si 
 
 
 
 with the Flathead Indians the missionaries 
 did not lose their time, but applied them- 
 selves to the acquirement of the Indian lan- 
 guage. 
 
 Arriving at Bitter Root valley in Septem- 
 ber, 1841, they set at work to instruct the 
 Indians, whom they found so well disposed, 
 to embrace the Catholic faith. A church 
 was erected and also a few rude log huts for 
 the accommodation of the missionaries. 
 This first settlement was built on the banks 
 of the Bitter Root river, just south wes' of 
 Fort Owen, where Stevensville now stands, 
 which never was a military post, but was 
 built and used as an Indian trading post 
 after the settlement of the missionaries, by 
 Major Owen. 
 
 In the meanwhile Father De Smet, with 
 the same Iriquois Indians who accompanied 
 him on his wearisome journey from St. 
 Louis, and Francois Lumpre, a Canadian 
 Frenchman, who at this date is still living 
 in the Bitter Root valley, and has a farm 
 about two miles west of the town ot Stevens- 
 ville, so called after Governor Stevens, who 
 made a treaty with the Flathead In- 
 dians, started for Fort Colville, situated 
 on the Columbia river, and now in Wash- 
 ington territory, where the English Hudson 
 Bay company had a trading post, and at 
 that time all the vast territory from the Co- 
 lumbia to Fort Hall on Snake river, now 
 braced in the territories of Washington, 
 Montana and Idaho, was claimed by that 
 company as their territory and lying in 
 British possessions. But the international 
 boundary survey, several years afterwards, 
 settled the question by giving the territory 
 then in dispute to the United States. Father 
 
 De Smet and his comnanies set out on this 
 '30 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 long journey of over three hundred 
 miles from the Bitter Root valley to the 
 trading post on the Columbia, through a 
 savage Indian country, untrodden save by 
 Indians and trappers in the employ of the 
 Hudson Bay company and American Fur 
 company, to buy seed for the Indians and 
 missionaries to sow the following spring in 
 the Bitter Root valley. 
 
 The Flathead Indians faithful to 
 their promise came back from their summer 
 hunt in the fall. On the 3d day of December, 
 1841, about one-third of the Flathead tribe 
 were baptized into the Catholic faith, and 
 the others who were under religious instruc- 
 tions were received into the fold on Christ- 
 mas day of that same year. So in a short 
 space of time a new Christianity — the Flat- 
 head tribe at that time numbering about one 
 thou,sand — was founded, and the mission- 
 aries were well pleased with the fervor of 
 their new converts. The mission was called 
 St. Mary's, as was called the river, and tho 
 towering snow clad peak in the range ot/po- 
 site the mission. 
 
 The following spring of 1842 the fathers 
 sowed the first grain brought to the Bitter 
 Root valley, by Father De Smet from Fort 
 Colville, and planted some potatoes. The 
 first year the crop of both yielded rich, to 
 the great enjoyment and delight of the In- 
 dians, who learned for the first time how to 
 till the soil and force it to yield a manifold 
 crop. 
 
 Although the missionaries now had wheat 
 
 they had no mill to grind it, so they were 
 
 obliged for the first years either to boil the 
 
 wheat or to pound it with rocks, and be 
 
 satisfied with the bread made out of that 
 
 coarse flour. Their principal food was 
 31 
 
 fSJMlSl 
 
 T'V^.r 
 
 B^^^ 
 
 siMieJisiMia 
 
 fmr;^i5l fSJ^^isi fSi^Misi 
 
 m 
 
 mmm 
 
 isimmMMm 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 Wj 
 
 Iniffalo meat, which they procured from the 
 Indians, and there were many times when 
 they were glad to share the Indian roots and 
 camas. Under the direction of the fathers, 
 a feiv Indians built log houses close to the 
 mission buildings. To protect themselves 
 from the Blackfeet Indians, who at that 
 time were coming into the valley in small 
 war parties to steal horses and kill if an op- 
 portunity offered itself, the fathers had a 
 palisade built around the premises, forming 
 a large yard, where in time of 
 daD8;er the Indians were allowed 
 to drive their horses at night 
 and guard them. Twice a year it was the 
 custom among the Indians to go a long dis- 
 tance hunting buffalo, leaving at home only 
 the old people and children; at such times 
 the danger was very great, and the fathers 
 had to guard against surprise. At the com- 
 mencement of the mission one of the fath- 
 ers accompanied the hunters in their excur- 
 sions, when they went out in a body, but 
 they soon found this to be impracticable, 
 and had to give up the good they could 
 have done by following the camp, chiefly in 
 instructing the Indian children at the mis- 
 sion. To follow the war and hunting par- 
 ties of the Flatheads was a delicate position 
 for the fathers; because, in case of any war 
 with their enemies, and having taken pris- 
 oners, through deference to the father, the 
 warriors would appeal for his advice as to 
 how to deal with them and natur- 
 ally his advice would incline to 
 mercy, a quality seldom or never shown 
 by an Indian to an enemy, and any exhibi- 
 tion of humanity towards a prisoner would 
 give them the suspicion that the father was 
 
 a friend of their enemy. Besides, the wild 
 32 
 
 
 \s\Mm 
 
 SlMMi 
 
 
 
FATHER RAVALLI. 
 

 
 
 excitement of the buffalo Hunt reigned su- 
 preme in the Indian camp while on their 
 hunting grounds, and very little room was 
 left in their light and giddy heads for the 
 dry lessons of the gospel. For this reason 
 the fathers had to content themselves in- 
 structing the Indians when they could gather 
 them at the mission. 
 
 In the spring of 1842 Father De Smet went 
 to Europe to ask for more missionaries and 
 for material aid, and in the fall of that year 
 the French father, with a lay brother, was 
 sent from Bitter Root to found the Cojur 
 d'Alene mission, in the Cceitr d'Alene moun- 
 tains, and for some time there was only one 
 father left among the Flatheads, Father 
 Menjarini, who is now living and stationed 
 at Santa Clara college, California. 
 
 But in the spring of 1843 there came to St. 
 Mary's from St. Louis two more fathers and 
 three lay brothers, but one of them. Father 
 Heken, started in the fall of the same year 
 with a brother for the new mission among 
 the Coeur d'Alenes, and was sent from there 
 the next spring to open another mission 
 among the lower Pen d'Oreilles. Meanwliile 
 Father DeSmet was not idle. In his voyage 
 to Europe ne had obtained from the superior 
 of the society three Italian fathers, among 
 whom Father Anthony Ravalli, that won- 
 derful man, who died at the St. Mary's mis- 
 sion, Stevensville, Missoula county, Mon- 
 tana, on the 2d day of , 1884, in the 
 73d year of his age. The pen of the histor- 
 ian and biographer, the brush of the artist, 
 and the chisel of the sculptor have already 
 combined to preserve his blessed memory 
 for all time, emblazoned in history, in poetry 
 and romance and preserved in imperishable 
 
 marble. 
 
 ?, 33 
 
 m 
 
 mi 
 
 
 JlialSsJ 
 

 
 
 
 
 fSJv^vlS" 
 
 151^^1^ 
 
 The three Italian fathers, including Father 
 Ravalli, in company with Father De Smet, 
 two lay brotherd from Belgium and six 
 sisters from Notre Dame, embarked at Ames 
 in a Norwegian vessel. Rounding Cape 
 Horn, they touched Valparaiso and Callao, 
 crossed the treacherous bar at the mouth of 
 the Columbia, July 31st, 1844, and on the 
 next day landed at Fort Vancouver, whence 
 after a few days' rest they ascended to St. 
 Paul's prairie, on the Willammette. The 
 great city of Portland, Oregon, was then al- 
 most a wilderness. In the spring of 1845, 
 Father Ravalli was sent ami;ng the Kalis- 
 pels, or Pend d'Oreilles, where he learned 
 the wonderful secret of living- without the 
 necessaries of life, as the other fathers who 
 preceded him had been doing. The father's 
 bill of fare was principally dried buf- 
 falo meat and roots and berries. 
 The acquisition of Father Ravalli 
 at St. Mary's mission was a boon, and 
 a blessing as he had studied medicine under 
 some of the ablest physicians of Rome; and 
 making himself an apprentice also in the 
 artist's studio and mechanic's shop, he 
 could handle witn skill the chisel and brush 
 of the artist as well as the tools and imple- 
 ments of almost every trade. It was princi- 
 pally to his skillfulness that the first grist 
 mill and sawmill was put up in Montana, 
 and run by water power. Father De Smet 
 brought with him from Belgium two fif- 
 teen-inch millstones, which were intended 
 to be worked by hand power but water was 
 utilized and a saw and gristmill was set in 
 motion, the machinery of which having 
 been constructed out of old wagon tires, and 
 the saw was made out of an old pit saw by 
 
 filing to the proper shape the teeth. The 
 34 
 
 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 \smM 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 capacity of the gristmill was about eight 
 bushels a day. The process was slow, but 
 bread could now be made from the wheat 
 raised by the missionaries and the Indians. 
 Everything was now in a flourishing con- 
 dition al St. Mary's mission, and the good 
 fathers were beginning to congratulate 
 themselves upon the success of their great 
 and fearless undertaking, until the evil in- 
 fluence and jealousies of the trappers and 
 traders in furs, who followed the Indian 
 hunting parties and haunted their settle- 
 ments and villages, began to make itself felt. 
 Those men —licentious, immoral and impure 
 generally, who accepted from the great fur 
 companies of the west, situations as trap- 
 pess, hunters, etc., lead wild and desolate 
 lives, and in their career of debauchery 
 among the simple natives.brooked no oppo- 
 sition, and looked with jealous eyes upon 
 the missionaries' teachings of Christianity 
 and virtue, and in the councils of the Indi- 
 ans began to sow the seed of discontent 
 against the missionaries for the new order 
 of things, which deprived the christianized 
 Indian from as many wives as he choose to 
 take and in prohibiting debauchery of the 
 Indian women by those lewd camp 
 followers. The talk of the trappers 
 against the missionaries began to give trouble 
 and the Indians when leaving the Bitter 
 Root valley on their annual buffalo hunt, 
 left the fathers without any protection 
 against the incursions of hostile tribes, par- 
 ticularly the Blackfeet, who took every ad- 
 vantage to harrass, murder and annoy the 
 Flatheads and the missionaries of St. Mary's. 
 Left without such protection, the Blackfeet, 
 once at the very door of the mission, killed 
 a half-breed boy who worked for the fathers. 
 35 
 
 m 
 
 i 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 ©) 
 
 i 
 
EKfmJ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Being thus harrassed and annoyed, in the 
 spring of 1850, Father Mengarim went down 
 to Willamette to consult with the superior 
 of the missions. This consultation resulted 
 in an order from the superior to abandon St. 
 Mary's mission for an indefinite period, 
 hence the intrepid Father Joset was sent up 
 by the superior from Cour d' Alene mission, 
 with an escort of christianized Indians to re- 
 move the mission and the effects of the mis- 
 sionaries. St. Mary's mission at that 
 time occupied the actual site of Fort 
 Owen. Major Owen, one of the his- 
 oric characters of the first 
 
 •white settlers of Mantana arrived upon the 
 scene, and to him Father Joset sold for a 
 small consideration all the improvements of 
 the mission, on condition as stated by that 
 missionarie, that if in three years the com- 
 munity would come back, as was their in 
 tention, they could redeem their property. 
 The intrepit Father Joset, with that great 
 and good man. Father Ravalli, a brother 
 and some Indians, driving four wagons, 
 three cows and sixteen yoke of cattle, 
 started for their destination. Major Owen, 
 left in possession of the property of the 
 fathers, began to build the actual fort, sub- 
 stituting the adobe which which now stand 
 to the stockade. At Hellgate, just below the 
 present site of Missoula, the missionaries 
 divided. Father Ravalli going by the Cffiur 
 d' Alene trail, now known as the Mullen 
 road, and Father Joset with all the baggage 
 went by the Jocko valley, having been or- 
 dered to go down by the Pendd'Oreille river; 
 he wintered that year with his party 
 below the mouth of the Jocko, on the Pend 
 d'Oreille river, near the site of Antoine 
 Revis' present home. Assisted by the In- 
 
 
 
 

 |gniw.rra; 
 
 I51>i^ 
 
 SIMM 
 
 
 
 
 dians, among whom was the chief Victor, 
 fatlier of the present Chief Charles of the 
 Bitter Root Flatheads, who accompanied 
 Father Joset on his journey, he set to work to 
 build five large, flat bottomed boats to con- 
 vey their baggage down the treacherous and 
 turbulent Pend d' Oreille river. It was a 
 bold and, it must be said, an unwise plan; 
 but the determined missionary in the spring 
 of the next year launched his boats and 
 committed himself, baggage and party to 
 the rushing waters of that swift and rapid 
 river, but the voyagers were destined to 
 wreck a raft near Horse Plains before they 
 proceeded over sixty miles of their journey, 
 upon which was loaded their wagons, hand 
 cars and other property; then at Thompson 
 Falls, a few miles further down the river, 
 two of the boats were wrecked and all the 
 cargo lost. Fortunately no lives were Io8t, 
 and after a long journey through the 
 wilderness, the worn wander- 
 
 ers arrived at their destination 
 It was not until the fall of 1854 that the 
 missionaries came back; but instead of re- 
 establishing St. Mary's mission again in the 
 Bitter Root valley they opened St. Ignatius 
 mission, that now flourishing institution on 
 the Flathead reservation. The location of 
 the mission established among the lower 
 Calispels or Pend d'Oreilles in 1844, on 
 Clark's fork of the Columbia, was found 
 unfit for a mission because of the scarcity of 
 arable land and also because of the extensive 
 floods which inundated the country in the 
 spring of the year. Determined to abandon 
 that place, and looking for a location where 
 they could have more land, and where they 
 could gather both the lower and upper 
 
 Calispels, they chose the actual site of St. 
 37 
 
 
 
 mMM 
 
 
 
 SIMM 
 
Ignatius, where it now stands, a monument 
 to tbe sagacity and forethought of those 
 fathers. By such choice it was thought the 
 central position among the different tribes 
 would concentrate them around St Ig- 
 natius, and that the Flatheads would 
 forsake the Bitter Root valley for a home 
 near the new mission, and settle down 
 among the Calispels, as the tribes spoke the 
 same language and were allied and related 
 by intermarriage. The founders of St. Igna- 
 tius mission were Father Hoken and Father 
 Minetry, the latter a venerable Jesuit and at 
 this date the parish priest of Missoula. In 
 the spring of 1855, for the Easter festival, 
 there was gathered at the new mission of St. 
 Ignatius not less than one thousand Indians 
 of mixed tribes — Calispels, Flatheads, Nez 
 Perces and Kootenais, and of whom one 
 hundred and fifty adults were baptized on 
 Christmas day of that year. 
 
 Very few of the Flatheads left the Bitter 
 Root valley to settle on the Jocko reserva- 
 tion, and it was decided to attend to their 
 spiritual wants by again re-establishing St. 
 Mary's mission at its original locality. In the 
 fall of 1866 Father Geordi, s. j., with a lay 
 brother was sent to Bitter Root to re-open 
 the mission and re-established it at its pres- 
 ent locality. In 1864, before the return of 
 Father Geordi to St. Mary's, two other mis- 
 sionary staticns were established in the 
 neighborhood of Missoula, one near French- 
 town and the other at Hell Gate. 
 
 In 1867 Father Ravalli, who, after passing 
 some time at St. Peter's mission, on Sun 
 River in the Blackfoot country, where, 
 owing to his great surgical skill and tender 
 nursing, many a poor frost bitten miner 
 owed to him life and limb that were over- 
 
 1 
 
 P 
 I 
 
 i 
 
 Dn'.W.fn]||ci-|.W 
 
> 
 
 o 
 
 z 
 
 UJ 
 
 o 
 < 
 
 < 
 
 lU 
 
 I 
 I- 
 < 
 
mmM 
 
 
 
 
 
 taken in the great storm which prevailed 
 during the famous stampede from Helena 
 to Sun river, was ordered again to St. Mary's. 
 Montana nov having become settled up to 
 some extent by miners who flocked from 
 east and west to her rich gold fields, Father 
 Eavalli, besides attending to the Indians 
 with Father Geordi, was kept constantly 
 travelling from one mining camp to another 
 in both capacities of priest and physician, 
 attending to the spiritual wants of Catholic 
 miners as well as aleviating the suffering of 
 sick and friendless men and women who 
 followed the gold excitement to the then 
 wilds of the Rocky mountains, with his 
 wonderful medical skill. Tliere were 
 at that time very few physicians in 
 the country, and a great many 
 accidents were constantly occurring in the 
 mines as well as from fights and shooting 
 scrapes among the wild and lawless. A 
 large majority of those people had no means 
 to pay a doctors fee; and often Father Ra- 
 valli was summoned from his quiet retreat 
 at the mission of St. Mary's to ride to dis- 
 tant mining camps — perhaps two hundred 
 miles away — to extract the bullets from the 
 wounds of a desparado, to set limbs of an 
 unfortunate miner caught in a "drift;" to 
 sooth the sick bed of a helpless woman or 
 her children; or to administer the last sacra- 
 ment to a dying Catholic. The good father 
 never refused his help to any man. to what- 
 ever color, nation or denomination he might 
 belong, and always obeyed a call either from 
 rich or poor no matter what the distance, 
 how rugged the trail or how dangerous the 
 undertaking. For this reason and for the 
 great success he had in his medical practice, 
 
 and for his amiable, genial and attractive 
 39 
 
 « 
 
 m 
 
 
 mmm 
 
 Mmm 
 
 
 
manners lie became very popular among all 
 classes. The miners particularly noting his 
 disinterestedness showed themselves very 
 generous toward him, and by those means 
 he was the principal support of St. Mary's 
 mission. 
 
 In 1869 Father Georda having been 
 elected provincinal or superior general of 
 all the Jesuite missions io the Rocky moun- 
 tains, and being obliged to visit them, 
 Father D'Astie. S. J., took his place in the 
 Bitter Root at St. Mary's, and with Father 
 Ravalli attended to the spiritual wants of 
 the Flathead Indians. That great and good 
 man, Father Ravalli, has passed away; but 
 Father D'Astie still survives, and today is 
 at his post at St. Ignatius mission, minister- 
 ing to the wants and guiding the remnant 
 of that once great tribe of Flatheads, as 
 well as the Kootenais and Pend d'Oreilles, 
 in the ways of religion, civilization and 
 morality. How beautiful is the faith which 
 produces those valorous missionaries I 
 Armed with the sole standard of the cross, 
 with no other compass than obedience, they 
 run fearlessly to their goal, which is the at- 
 tainment of God's great glory by the salva- 
 tion of souls. They wait but for the oppor- 
 tunity of saving souls, to fly to unexplored 
 countries, to ever-growing danger of death. 
 Strangers to the wealth, the honors, the 
 pleasures of this world, disinterested in all 
 their undertakings, they take no other con- 
 solation amid infuriated waves, in frightftil 
 solitudes, in the primeval forest, than that 
 
 of passing through them to do good. 
 40 
 
 a 
 
 

 
 
 
 The Advanced Ideas In Which Explorer 
 Clarke Found the Flatheads. 
 
 The new state of Montana, as well as the 
 United States government, should not forget 
 that they owe a debt of gratitude to the 
 Flathead Indians for the friendly welcome 
 extended to the early explorers and pioneers 
 of this country, which is attested to by 
 Lewis and Clarke in their official reports to 
 President Jefferson and published so widely 
 both in America and Europe. Captains 
 Clarke and Lewis, with their followers, as 
 before mentioned, were the first white men 
 the Fathead Indians ever beheld. At the 
 date of this writing, May 1890, there still 
 lives at St. Ignatius mission, on the Flat- 
 head reservation, an old Indian woman 
 named Ochanee, who distinctly remembers, 
 and relates in the Indian language 
 the advent of those two great' 
 captains, with their followers, into the Flat- * 
 head camp in the Bitter Root valley, and 
 the great astonishment it created among the 
 Indians. The explorers crossed over the 
 Big Hole mountains and arrived at the 
 Flathead camp in the Bitter Root valley in 
 the year 1804. Ochanee claims to have been 
 about 13 years of age at that date. She is a 
 lively old woman, and still has all of her 
 mental faculties, and can describe camps, 
 scenes and events which are vividly por- 
 trayed in the published reports of Lewis and 
 Clarke descriptive of the 
 
 FLATHEAD AND NEZ PERCES INDIANS, 
 
 who were then hunting and camping to- 
 gether. During the stay of the explorers in 
 the Flathead camp Captain Clarke took 
 unto himself a Flathead woman. One son was 
 
 the result of this union, and he was baptised 
 
 41 
 
 
 fssisifmjms 
 
 I® 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 
EiMja 
 
 BImMj 
 
 
 
 [SJMlSlfSJ^lSl 
 
 LsiMja 
 
 i 
 
 after the missionaries came to Bitter Root 
 valley and named Peteter Clarke. This half- 
 breed lived to a ripe age, and was well known 
 to many of Montana's early settlers. He 
 died about six years ago and left a son, who 
 was christened at St. Mary's mission to the 
 name of Zachariah, and pronounced Sacalee 
 by the Indians. The latter has a son three 
 years of age, whom it is claimed by the In- 
 dians, indirect decent, to be the great grand- 
 son of the renowned Captain Clarke. 
 
 Explorations from the Mississippi to the 
 Pacific ocean, page 308, Lieutenant Mullan, 
 of the United States army, so widely known 
 in Montana, and after whom the name is 
 given to the Mullan tunnel, near Helena on 
 the Northern Pacific railroad, sent with 
 Governor Stevens to explore the Bitter Root 
 valley, rendered the following 
 
 TRIBUTE OF ADMIRATION 
 
 to the Flalheads. The lines are drawn from 
 the report published at the time by order of 
 the government. Captain Mullen is now a 
 resident of Washington, D. C, but occasion- 
 ally comes to Montana to renew old ac- 
 quaintanceship among the Indians he de- 
 scribes, and pioneers of his expedition, who 
 settled in Montana; notably among the lat- 
 ter is Baron O'Keefe, David O'Keefe, and 
 Ben Welch, of Missoula county. The re- 
 port says: "When I arrived at the camp 
 with my guide, three or four men came out 
 to meet us, and we were invited to enter the 
 lodge of the great chief. With much eager- 
 ness they took care of our horses, unsaddled 
 them and led them to drink. As soon as 
 the camp had been informed of the arrival 
 of a white wan among them all the princi- 
 pal men of the tribe collected at the lodge of 
 the chief. 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 mi 
 
 M 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
iM^^i^iSlX^g^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 "All being assembled, at a signal given by 
 the chief, 
 
 THEY PRAYED ALOUD. 
 
 I was struck with astonishment, for I had 
 not the least expectation of such conduct on 
 their part. The whole assembly knelt in 
 the most solemn manner, and with the 
 greatest reverence, they adored the Lord. I 
 asked myself: Am I among Indians? Am 
 I among people whom all the world call 
 savages? I could scarcely believe my eyes. 
 The thought that these men were penetrated 
 with religious sentiments, so profound and 
 beautiful overwhelmed me with amazement. 
 
 "I could never say enough of those noble 
 andgeneious hearts among whom I found 
 myself. They were pious and firm, men of 
 confidence, full of probity, and penetrated 
 at the same time with a lively and 
 religious faith, to which they re- 
 main constant. They never partake 
 a repast without imploring the blessing of 
 heaven. In the morning when rising, and 
 at night when retiring, they offer their pray- 
 ers to Almighty God. The tribe of the Flat- 
 heads among the Indians is the subject of 
 their highest esteem,and all that I witnessed 
 myself justifies this advantageous opinion." 
 
 Here is another testimony from the Hon. 
 Isaac J. Stej^bens, ex-governor of Washing- 
 ton territoi'y', who made the Flathead treaty 
 in 1855, at Grass Valley, a few miles below 
 the city of Missoula, and 
 
 WHO WAS AFTERWARDS KILLED 
 
 in sight of the city of Washington fighting 
 
 bravely for the union. Giving orders to 
 
 Lieutenant Mullan, he says: 
 
 ■'Tell those good Flatheads that the words 
 
 of Father De Smet, in their behalf, have 
 
 been received by their great father 
 43 
 
 m 
 
 ^1 
 
 I 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 MmM 
 
 
 the president of the United States, and that 
 all good people are devoted to them. I 
 would like to rebuild St. Mary's. Let them 
 know I am attached to tliem, and ready to 
 aid their old benefactors in their well being. 
 This would be most pleasing to me." 
 
 Governor Stevens also wrote to the Indian 
 agent then in charge: "You are already 
 aware of the character of the Flatheads. 
 They are the best Indians of the mountains 
 and plains — honest, brave, and docile; they 
 only need encouragement to become good 
 citizens — they are christians, and we are as- 
 sured that they live up to the christian code." 
 
 This message is from the report 
 to the president in 1854, and 
 from the pen of that gifted soldier and 
 statesman, who afterward made the Flat- 
 head treaty, and as stated before died for the 
 preservation of the union. 
 
 THE ELECTION OF CHIEF VICTOR. 
 
 / The chief who preceded the great Victor, 
 father of the present chief Chariot, had the 
 euphonious Indian name, Etsowish Semme- 
 gee-itshin, "The Grizzly Bear Erect," but 
 was baptized Loyolo, by Father DeSmet. 
 This chieftain died, on the 6th of April, 
 ls64, and was lamented by the Indians with 
 tokens of sincere grief. As the departed 
 chief, contrary, so Indian custom, had not 
 designatea his successor, a new chief was to 
 be chosen after his death. The election 
 ended in an almost unanimous voice for 
 Victor, a brave huater, remark- 
 able for the generosity of his 
 disposition. The inauguration took place 
 amid great feasting and rejoicing. All the 
 warriors, in their gala costumes, marched to 
 his wigwam, and ranging themselves around 
 it, discharged their muskets, after which 
 
 
 f^KlSl'Sf^a^ 
 
 [CT].v^.frO||[}^.^.f?j| 
 
 fliSSl 
 
 mmm 
 
 \5\MM\SmM 
 
 
iGTi.^.rpJi'iGTi.w.rTii! 
 
 
 amis' 
 
 
 
 each one went up to him to pledge his affec- 
 tion to a hearty shaking of hands. During 
 the whole day numerous parties came to ex- 
 press to the missionaries how much satisfac- 
 tion they felt at having a chief whose good- 
 ness had long since won their hearts. Victor 
 alone seemed sad. He dreaded the respon- 
 sibility of the chieftainship, and thought he 
 should be unable to maintain the good 
 effected in his tribe by his predecessor. 
 
 TO BE A GOOD HUNTER 
 
 and a good warrior are the two qualities 
 par excellence that constitute a great 
 man among the tribes. As both 
 qualifications were combined inj the new 
 chief, Victor, perhaps a description of the 
 manner of conducting an Indian hunt in 
 old days may not be uninteresting to the 
 reader. 
 
 Father DeSmet says the chase absorbs the 
 whole attention of the Indian. The knowl- 
 edge that he has acquired by long experi- 
 ence of the nature and instincts of animals, 
 is truly marvelous. He is occupied with it 
 from earliest infancy. As soon as a child is 
 capable of managiue a little bow, it is the 
 first instrument his father puts into his 
 hands to teach him how to hunt little birds 
 and small animals. The young Indians are 
 initiated in all their stratagems. They are 
 taught with as much care how to approach 
 aiid kill the animals as in civilized society a 
 a youth is instructed in reading, writing and 
 arithmetic. 
 
 An expert Indian hunter is acquainted 
 with the habits and instincts of all the 
 quadrupeds which form the object of the 
 chase. He knows their favorite haunts. It 
 is essential for him to distinguish what kind 
 of food an animal first seeks, and the most 
 
 I 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 EiMia 
 
 
 SIMS 
 
 
 

 
 favorable moment of quitting his lair for 
 procuring nourishment. The hunter must 
 be 
 
 FAMILIAR WITH ALL THE PRECAUTIONS 
 
 that are necessary to elude the attentive ear 
 and watchful instincts of nis intended vic- 
 tims; he must appreciate the footstep lliat 
 has passed him, the time that has elapsed 
 since it passed, and the direction it has pur- 
 sued. The atmosphere, the winds, ra n, 
 snow, ice, forests and water are the books 
 which the Indian reads, consults and ex- 
 amines on leaving his hut in pursuit of 
 game. 
 
 In those days the tribes found their sub- 
 sistence in the chase; the flesh of animals 
 afforded them food and the skins clothing. 
 Before the arrival of the whites, the method 
 of killing the different species of animals 
 was very simple, consisting ordinarily of 
 strategems and snares. They still have re- 
 course to primitive method in the hunt for 
 large animals, when they have no horses 
 capable of pursuing them and guns for kill- 
 ing them are wanting. The trap prepared 
 for the buffalo was an enclosure, or pen, and 
 is one of she more early ways and perhaps 
 the most remarkable for its execution; it 
 demands skill, and gives a good idea of the 
 sagacity, activity and boldness of the 
 Indian. As on all other occasions 
 of moment, the jugglers were consulted 
 and the hunt was preceded by a great variety 
 of superstitious practices. Father De Smet 
 described one of these hunts 
 
 NEAR THE JUDITH BASIN. 
 
 The buffalo roamed the plains in bands of 
 several hundreds, and often several thou- 
 sands. He states that in his travels he had 
 
 seen with his own eyes, as far as he could 
 
 46 
 
 IfSi^fl^ 
 
 BMpipvi^ r^p;^;^ 
 
 vm 
 
 \s\mi^ 
 
 \s\mm 
 
 isi>i^^;^ 
 
 
L51>±fyM 
 
 
 
 
 
 discern on these immense plains, thousands 
 and thousands of these noble animals, mov- 
 ing slowly, like an interminable troop, in 
 one direction, and browsing the grass as 
 they progressed. They had a fearful appear- 
 ance; their hairy heads inspired with terror 
 those who were ignorant of the pacific habits 
 of this noble quadruped. When alarmed, 
 the tramp of their hoofs, their bellowings, 
 and the columns of dust which they raise, 
 resemble the deep murmurs of a tempest 
 mingled with peals of thunder, lessening as 
 
 they grow more remote. 
 47 
 
 
 
 ^i^^is] pmei pMsi fawisi 
 eiMjsJ IsiSa IsiMisJ EiMra. 
 
famsifsipis] 
 
 
 
 
 A Description of a Buflfalo Hunt By tlie 
 Flatliead Indians. 
 
 A tribe that had few guns, few horses to 
 run down the animals which needs pursu- 
 ing, and skins for clothing, were compelled 
 to employ the old or primitive method of 
 hunting, which existed from time immem- 
 orial. The Indians described as engaged in 
 this hunt were encamped in a suitable 
 place for the construction of a park or en- 
 closure. The camp described contained 
 about three hundred lodges, which repre- 
 sented 2,000 or 3,000 souls. They had se- 
 lected the base of a chain of hills whose 
 gentle slope presented a narrow valley and 
 a prairie, in which all the lodges were 
 ranged. Opposite the hills there was a fine 
 large praiiie. 
 
 After the construction of the lodges a 
 great council is held, at which all the 
 chiefs and all the hunters assist. They 
 first choose a band of warriors to 
 prevent the hunters from leaving the camp, 
 either alone or in detached companies, lest 
 the buffalo be disturbed, and thus be driven 
 away from the encampment. The law 
 against this was extremely severe, not only 
 all the Indians of the camp must conform to 
 it, but it reaches to all travelers even when 
 they are ignorant of the encampment or do 
 not know there is a hunt in contemplation. 
 Should they frighten the animals they are 
 all punishable; however, those of the camp 
 are more rigorously chastised in case they 
 transgress the regulation. Their guns, their 
 bows and arrows are broken, their lodges 
 cut in pieces, their dogs killed, all their pro- 
 visions and their hides are taken from them. 
 
 If they are bold enough to resist the penalty 
 
 48 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 IsiBaJ 
 

 
 
 
 i 
 
 they are beaten with bows, sticks and clubs. 
 Any one who should set fire to the prairie 
 by accident or imprudence, or in 
 in any way frighten off the herd would be 
 sure to be well beaten. 
 
 As soon as the law is promulgated, the 
 construction of the pen is commenced. 
 Everybody labors at it with cheerful ardor, 
 for it is an affair of common interest on 
 which the subsistence of the entire tribe 
 during several months will depend. The 
 pen has an area of about an acre. To en- 
 close it in a circular form stakes are firmly 
 fixed in the ground and the distance between 
 them filled with logs, dry boughs, masses 
 of stone — in short with what 
 
 even they can find that will answer the pur- 
 pose. The circular palisade has but one 
 opening; before this opening is a slope em- 
 bracing fifteen or twenty feet between the 
 hills. This inclined plain grows wider as it 
 diverges from ihe circle; at its two sides they 
 continue the fence to a long distance on the 
 plain. As soon as these preparations aie 
 completed, the Indians elect a grandmaster 
 of ceremonies and of the pen. He is gener- 
 ally an old man, a distinguished personage 
 belonging to the Wah-Kon, or medicine 
 band, and famous in the art of jugglery, 
 which the Indians of those days deemed a 
 supernatural science. His office is to decide 
 the moment for driving the buffalo into the 
 enclosure and give the siarnal for 
 the commencement of the hunt. He 
 plants the medicine mast in the 
 center of the park, and attached to it the 
 three charms which are to allure the ani- 
 mals in that direction, viz: a streamer of 
 scarlet cloth two or three yards long, a piece 
 
 of tobacco and a buffalo's horn. Every 
 4 49 
 
 m 
 
 m) 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 

 
 Pm^ 
 [51^^^/mJ 
 
 
 
 
 morning at the early dawn he beats his 
 drum, intones his hymns of conjuration, 
 consults his own Wah Kon and the mani- 
 tou's or guiding spirits of the bnffalos, in 
 order to discover the favorable moment for 
 the chase. The grand-maste-r has four run- 
 ners at his disposal who go out daily and 
 report to him the true result of their obser- 
 vations; they tell at what distance from the 
 camp the animals are, their probable num- 
 ber, and in what direction the herd is march- 
 ing. These runners frequently go forty or 
 fifty miles in different dircotions. In 
 all their courses they take with them 
 a wak-kon ball, which is intrusted to them 
 by the grand master. It is made of hair cov- 
 ered with skin. When the mourners think 
 that the suitable moment has arrived they 
 immediately dispatch a man of their num- 
 ber to the grand master with the ball and 
 the good news. So long as the mysterious 
 ball is absent the master of ceremonies can- 
 not take food; he prolongs his vigorous fast 
 by abstaining from every meat or dish that 
 does not come from some animal killed on 
 the area of the park, until the liunt is over; 
 and as they often remain a month or more 
 awaiting the must favorable moment of be- 
 ginning, the grand master must find himself 
 reduced to very small rations, unless he 
 makes some arrangement with his con- 
 science. It is probable that he eats stealthily 
 at night, for he has no more appearance of 
 fasting than his brethren of the camp. 
 
 Let us now suppose all to be in readiness, 
 and the circumstances all favorable to the 
 hunt. The grand master of the camp beats 
 his drum to announce that the buffalo are 
 in numerous herds at about fifteen or twenty 
 
 miles distance. The wind is favorable, and 
 50 
 
 
 
 WMSl 
 
 F^m-M 
 
 
 m 
 

 Ei^is 
 
 mmm 
 
 
 
 
 comes directly from the point in which the 
 animals are. Immediately all the horsemen 
 mount their ponies; the footmen armed 
 with bows, guns and lances, take their posi- 
 tions, forming two long, oblique diverging 
 rows from the extremity of the two barriers 
 which sprmg from the entrance of the pen 
 and extend into the plain, and thus fold- 
 ing the lines of the enclosure. When 
 the footmen are placed at distances of ten or 
 fifteen feet, the horsemen continue the same 
 lines, which separate in proportion as they 
 extend, so tliat the last hunter on horseback 
 is found at about two or three miles distance 
 from the pen and at very nearly the same 
 distance from the last hunter of the other 
 line in an opposite direction. When men 
 are wanting, women and even children, oc- 
 cupy stations. After the formation of these 
 two immense lines, one single Indian, un- 
 armed, is sent on the best horse in the camp 
 in the direction of the buffaloes to meet 
 them. He approaches against the wind and 
 with the greatest precaution. At the dis- 
 tance of about one hundred paces 
 he envelopes himself in a buffalo 
 hide, the fur turned outside, and 
 also envelopes his horse as much as possible 
 in the same manner, and then makes a 
 plaintive cry in imitation of that of a buffalo 
 calf. As if by enchantment, this cry at- 
 tracts the attention of the whole herd. 
 After some seconds several thousands of 
 these quadrupeds, hearing the pitiful plaint, 
 turn towards the pretended calf. At first 
 thes' move slowly, then advance into a trot, 
 and at last they push forward in full gallop. 
 The horseman continually repeats the cry 
 of the calf, and takes his course towards the 
 
 pen, ever attentive to keep at the same dis- 
 51 
 
 fW\ 
 
 m 
 

 
 
 
 tance from the animals that are following 
 him. By this stratagem he leads the vast 
 herd of buifalo through the whole distance 
 that separate him from his companions, 
 who are on the qui vive, full of ardor and 
 impatience to share with him in his sport. 
 
 When the buffaloes arrive in the space be- 
 tween the extremities of the two lines, the 
 scene changes. The hunters on horseback 
 giving rein to their stock rejoin each other 
 behind the animals. At once the scent of 
 the hunters is communicated among the 
 frightened and routed animals which at- 
 tempt to escape in every direction. Then 
 those on foot appear. The buffalo, . finding 
 themselves surrounded and enclosed on all 
 sides, accept the single opening into the cir- 
 cular opening before them, low and bellow 
 in the most frightful manner and plunge 
 into it with the speed and fear of despera- 
 tion. The lines of hunters close in gradu- 
 ally, and space becomes less necessary as the 
 mass of buftalo and groups of hunters 
 become more and more compact. Then the 
 Indians commence firing their guns, draw- 
 ing their arrows and flinging their lances. 
 Many animals fall under the blows before 
 gaining the pen; the greater number, how- 
 ever enter. They discover only to late the 
 snare that has been laid for them. Those in 
 front try to return, but the terrified crowd 
 that follow force them to go forward, and 
 they cast themselves in confusion into the 
 enclosure amid the hurrahs and joyful 
 shouts of the whole tribe, intermingled 
 with the firing of guns. As soon as all are 
 penned the buffalo are killed with arrows, 
 lances and knives. Men, women and chil- 
 dren, in an excitement of joy, take part in 
 
 general butchery and the flaying and cutting 
 52 
 
 
 
 m. 
 
 [^Jy^WISI 
 
 ISlMfSJ 
 
 
 
Elvira 
 
 
 
 
 up of the animals. To look 
 at them without disgust in this 
 operation, one must have been a little 
 habituated to their customs and manners. 
 While men cut and slash the flesh, the 
 women, and children in particular, devour 
 the meat still warm with life — the livers, 
 kidneys, brains, etc., seem irresistible at- 
 tractions. They smear their faces, hair, 
 arms and legs with the blood of the buffalo. 
 Confused cries, clamerous shouts, and here 
 and there quarrels fill up the scene. It is a 
 picturesque and savage scene — a very pan- 
 demonium — a sight very difficult to despict 
 by words or to recount in minute details. 
 In the hunt described, and at which Father 
 DeTruit was present, six hundred buffalo 
 were killed. After the butchery the skins 
 and flesh are separated into piles, and these 
 piles are divided among the families in pro- 
 portion of the number of which they are 
 composed. The meat is afterwards cut in 
 slices and dried; the bones are bruised and 
 their grease extracted. The dogs also re- 
 ceive their portion of the feast and devour 
 the remainder in the nrcna of the pen. Two 
 days after the hunt not a vestige of the car 
 nage remained. Before separating the In- 
 dians pass several days in dancing and 
 mirth. 
 
 
 ® 
 
 mmmmmsi 
 
 \s\mM 
 
 
 mi 
 
 
^jmS] famS] fSKl^ P^l^ pmSI 
 
 isiMMj Isiffl^ isiS^ ieiSmJ IsSis 
 
 The Treaty Which Chief Chariot Swears 
 He Never Signed. 
 
 On the Cth day of September, 1883, there 
 arrived al the Flathead agency United States 
 Senator George G. Vest, of Missouri, and 
 Major Martin Maginnis, territorial represen- 
 tative from Montana, being the sub-com- 
 mittee of the special committee of the United 
 States senate appointed to visit the Indian 
 tribes in northern Montana. The co nmittee 
 were accompanied by Schuyler Crosby, gov- 
 ernor of Montana, and were met at Arlee, 
 the railway station, by the United States In- 
 dian agent and several hundred Indians. I 
 quote from the official report of said com- 
 mittee: 
 
 The scene at the station as we 
 left the train was very picturesque 
 and interestiog. Some Sve hundred 
 Chinamen, lately engaged in the construc- 
 tioD of the Northern Pacific railroad, were 
 encamped near the station, and their sallow 
 countenances exhibited unmistakable evi- 
 dences of apprehension as the Indians ex- 
 tended us a welcome m one of their charac- 
 teristic dances, accompanied by a good deal 
 of noise and much reckless riding on their 
 ponies around the Chinese camp. Sur- 
 rounded by this wild but hospitable escort, 
 we proceeded to the agency, and upon the 
 following day met the Indians in council, 
 the tribes on the reservation being repre- 
 sented by Michel, head chief of the Pen d' 
 Orcilles; Arlee, second chief of Flatheads, 
 and Eneas, head chief of the Kootenais." 
 
 A full account of the proceedings of said 
 council will be found in the official 
 report ot Senator H. L. Dawes, of Massa- 
 chusetts, chairman of the special commit- 
 
slJ^Ej^jBiMm 
 
 
 
 
 tee of the senate of the United States 
 to inquire iuto the condition of Sioux In- 
 dians on their reservation, and also to in- 
 quire into the grievances of the Indians in 
 Montana territory. As this chapter is only- 
 intended to present the status of Chariot's 
 band of Bitter Root Flathead Indians, I 
 shall only touch upon that subject. 
 
 After holding council with the confeder- 
 ated tribes of Indians on the Flathead reser- 
 vation, the sub committee proceeded from 
 the reservation to hold a council with Char- 
 lot, head and heriditary chief of the Flat- 
 heads, and arrived at Stevensville, in the 
 Bitter Root valley, on September 10, 1883. 
 The official report says: On the morning 
 after our arrival we visited St. Mary's mis- 
 sion in the suburbs of Stevensville, and 
 learned much about the condition of Chariot 
 and his band from the Jesuit fathers. Father 
 Ravalli who has been among them for fifty 
 three years, has been partially paralyzed for 
 more than five years and unable 
 to leave his bed, but his intellect 
 is vigorous and his cheerfulness 
 most astonishing. Lying in his little 
 room with his crucifix and books, he pre- 
 scribes for the sick, and even performs dif- 
 ficult surgical operations, for he is a most 
 accomplished physician and surgeon. This 
 remarkable man was the trusted friend and 
 companion of Father DeSmet, and he is 
 probably better acquainted with the differ- 
 ent Indian iribes of the west, their lan- 
 guage, habits and superstitions than any 
 one living man." 
 
 This great and good man has gone to his 
 
 reward since Senator Vest's report was 
 
 written. 
 
 "After an interesting conversation with 
 55 
 
 fmimsi [Sf^is] fsimsi 
 IsiMisJ iM^raJ BMraJ 
 
i 
 
 Father Ravalli of two hours, the arrival ol 
 Chariot, head chief of the Flatheads. and 
 five of his principal men, was announced, 
 and an equal number ot whites being pres- 
 ent we entered upon an interview, which 
 at times was very dramatic and even stormy. 
 
 Chariot is an Indian of fine appearance 
 and impressed us a brave and honest man. 
 That he has been badly treated is unques- 
 tionable, and the history of the negotiation 
 which culminated in the division of his 
 tribe, part of them under Arlee, the second 
 chief, being now on the Jocko reservation, 
 and part still in the Bitter Root valley with 
 Chariot, is, to say the least, remarkable. 
 
 In report of the commissioner of Indian 
 affairs for the year 1872, pages 109, 110, 111, 
 112, 113, 114, 115, 116 and 117, will be found 
 this history, and in exhibit B, herewith 
 filed, will be found a communication from 
 Major Ronan to the commissioner of Indian 
 affairs, in which the main facts are clearly 
 stated. 
 
 In 1855 a treaty was made between the 
 United States, represented by Governor 
 Stevens and Victor, chief of the Flaiheads 
 and father of Chariot, known as the Hell 
 Gate treaty. By this treaty a very large ter- 
 ritory, extending from near the forty-second 
 parallel to the British line, and with an 
 average breadth of nearly two degrees of 
 latitude, was ceded to the government: and 
 on yielding it, Victor insisted upon holding 
 the Bitter Root valley above the Lo Lo Fork, 
 as a special reservation for the Flathead 
 people. 
 
 By the 9th and 11th articles of the treaty, 
 the president was empowered to determine 
 whether the Flatheads should remain in the 
 Bitter Root valley or go to the Jocko reser- 
 
 I 
 
 [^ 
 
 m 
 
 
 1 
 
 i 
 
 m 
 
Ml PMI^ POT^ Pml^ PMlisl PM^ f^lv^ 
 M. CTi.W.ra ra.W.ra u^S^jTU Ui]^m cnW.ra m^. 
 
 
 vation, and the president was required to 
 have the Bitter Root valley surveyed and ex- 
 amined in order to determine this question. 
 
 Up to the time of General Garfield's visit 
 in 1872, seventeen years afterwards, no sur- 
 vey was made as the Indians claim, nor 
 were any schoolmasters, blacksmiths, car- 
 penters or farmers sent to the tribe, as pro- 
 vided for in the treaty. 
 
 In the meantime the Bitter Root valley, 
 by far the most beautiful and productive in 
 Montana, was being filled up by the whites, 
 and on November 14, 1871, the president 
 issued an order declaring that the Indians 
 should be removed to the Jocko reservation, 
 and on June 5, 1872, congress passed a bill 
 appropriating $50,000 to pay the expense of 
 this removal, and to pay the Indians for the 
 loss of their improvements in the Bitter Root 
 valley. 
 
 This order the Indians refused to obey, 
 and serious apprehensions of trouble be- 
 tween them and the white settlers caused 
 the appointment by the secretary of the in- 
 terior of General Garfield as special commis- 
 sioner to visit the Flatheads and secure, if 
 possible, their peaceful removal to the Jocko 
 reservation. 
 
 General Garfield states in his report that 
 he found the Indians opposed to leaving the 
 Bitter Root valley, for the reason that the 
 government had for seventeen years failed 
 to carry out the treaty of 1855, and that no 
 steps had been taken towards surveying and 
 examining the Bitter Root valley, as pro- 
 vided in the treaty. On August 27, 1872, he 
 drew up an agreement which reads as 
 follows: 
 
 Flathead Reservation, August 27, 1872. — 
 
 Articles of agreement made this 27th day of 
 67 
 
 vmi 
 
 m^ 
 
 w^ 
 
 \(^) 
 
 
 
 m 
 
 'M) 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 
 siMiaj 
 
 
 BiMjmj 
 
 m 
 
lsl>^^ja 
 
 i^iMra 
 
 
 
 
 
 August, 1872, between James A. Garfield, 
 special commissioner, authorized by the sec- 
 retary of the interior to carry into execution 
 the provisions of the act approved June a, 
 1872, for the removal of the Flathead and 
 other Indians from the Bitter Root valley. 
 of the first part, and Chariot, first chief, 
 Arlee, second chief, and Adolph, third cliiff 
 of the Flatheads, of the second part, wit- 
 nesseth: 
 
 Whereas, it was provided in the eleventh 
 article of the treaty concluded at Hell Gate, 
 July 15. 1855, and approved by the senate 
 March 8, 1859, between the United States 
 and the Flatheads, Kootenai and Teiid 
 d'Oreille Indians that the president sliall 
 cause the Bitter Root valley above the Lo 
 Lo Fork to be surveyed and examined, and 
 if in his judgment it should be found better 
 adapted to the wants of the Flathead tribe, 
 as a reservation for said tribe, it should be 
 so set aside and reserved; and whereas the 
 president did, on the 14th day of November, 
 1871, issue his order setting forth that "the 
 Bitter Root valley had been carefully sur- 
 veyed and examined in accordance with 
 said treaty," and did declare that "it is 
 therefore ordered that all Indians residing 
 in said Bitter Root valley, be removed as 
 soon as practicable to the Jocko reservation, 
 and that a just compensation be made for 
 improvements made by them iii the Bitter 
 Root valley, and whereas, the act of congress 
 above recited approved June 5, 1872, makes 
 provisions for such compensation; therefore: 
 
 It is hereby agreed and covenanted by the 
 parties to this instrument: 
 
 First. That the party of the first part 
 shall cause to be erected sixty good and sub- 
 stantial houses, twelve feet by sixteen each, 
 58 
 
 ■ 
 
 1 
 
 
 ®1 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 if so large a number shall be needed for the 
 accommodation of the tribe, three of said 
 houses for the first, second and third chiefs 
 of said tribe, to be of double the size men- 
 tioned above; said houses to be placed in 
 such portion of the Jocko reservation, not 
 already occupied by other Indians, as said 
 chiefs may select. 
 
 Second. That the superintendent of In- 
 dian affairs for Montana territory shall cause 
 to be delivered to said Indians GOO bushels of 
 wheat, the same to be ground into flour 
 without cost to said Indians and delivered 
 to them in good condition during the first 
 year after their removal together with such 
 potatoes and other vegetables as can be 
 spared from the agency farm. 
 
 Third, That said superintendent shall as 
 soon as practicable, cause suitable portions 
 of land to be enclosed and broken up for 
 said Indians, and shall furnish them with 
 sufficient number of agricultural imple- 
 ments for the cultivation of their grounds. 
 
 Fourth. That in carrying out the forego- 
 fng agreement as much as possiljle shall 
 be done at the agency by the employes 
 of the government; and none of such labor 
 or materials, or provisions furnished from 
 the agency, shall be charged as money. 
 
 Fifth. The whole of the $5,000 in money 
 now in the hands of the said superintendent 
 appropriated for the removal of said Indi- 
 ans, shall be paid to them in such forms as 
 their chiefs shall determine, except such 
 portion as is necessarily expended in carry- 
 ing out the preceding provisions of this 
 agreement. 
 
 Sixth. That there shall be paid to said 
 tribe of Flathead Indians the sum of $50,000, 
 as provided in the second section of the act 
 59 
 
 w\ 
 
 I 
 
 vmi 
 
 
 
 
 
above recited, to be paid in ten annual in- 
 stallments, in such manner and material as 
 the president may direct; and no part of the 
 payments herein promised shall in no way 
 affect or modify the full right of said Indians 
 to the payments and annuities now and 
 hereafter due them under existing treaties^ 
 
 Seventh. It is un ierstood and agreed that 
 this contract shall in no way interfere with 
 the rights ot any member of the Flathead 
 tribe to take land in the Bitter Root valley, 
 under the third section of the act above 
 cited. 
 
 Eighth. And the party of the second part 
 hereby agree and promise that when the 
 houses have been bttilt as provided in the 
 first clause of this agreement they will re- 
 move the Flathead tribe to said houses (ex- 
 cept such as shall take land in the 
 Bitter Root valley) in accordance 
 with the third section oi the act above cited, 
 and will thereafter occupy the Jocko reser- 
 vation as their permanent home. But 
 nothing in this agreement shall deprive said 
 Indians of their full right to hunt and fish 
 in any Indian country where they are now 
 entitled to hunt and fish tinder existing 
 treaties. Nor shall anything in this agree- 
 ment be so constructed as to deprive any of 
 said Indians so removing to the Jocko 
 reservation from selling all their improve- 
 ments in the Bitter Root valley. 
 
 [Signed] James A. Garfield, 
 
 Special commissioner for the removal of 
 the Flatheads from the Bitter Root valley. 
 Chaelot, 
 (His X mark) 
 First Chief of the Flatheads. 
 Arlee, 
 (His X mark) 
 Second Chief of the Flatheads. 
 60 
 
 
 M 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 famsifsi^isi 
 
 M^^^M 
 
 mmm 
 

 
 
 Adolf, 
 (His X mark) 
 Third Chief of the Flatheads. 
 Witness to contract and signatures: 
 Wm. H. Clagett, 
 D. G. Swain, 
 Judge Advocate U. S. army. 
 W. F. Sanders, 
 J. A. Vial, 
 B. F. Potts, 
 Governor of Montana. 
 I certify that I interpreted fully and care- 
 fully the foregoing contract to the three 
 chiefs of the Flatheads named above. 
 Baptist Robwanen, 
 (His X mark) 
 
 Witness to signature: 
 
 Interpreter. 
 
 B. F. Potts, 
 Governor. 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 A History of the Treaty with Old Flat- 
 liead Cliief, 
 
 The United States sub-commissioner's re- 
 port continues: 
 
 Chariot, although his name or mark is 
 affixed to the published agreement, declares 
 that he never signed it or authorized the 
 signing, and the original agreement con- 
 firms his statements. He has refused to 
 leave the Bitter Root valley, some 3G0 of the 
 tribe remaining with him. Under the third 
 section of the act of 1872, patents for IGO 
 acres of land each were issued to fifty-one 
 members of the tribe, and Major Ronan, 
 then agent, tendered them these patents, but 
 they refused, and still refuse to take them. 
 In regard to. General Garfield says in his 
 report: 
 
 A large number of heads of families and 
 young men notified the superintendent that 
 they had chosen to take up land in the val- 
 ley under the third section. But it was evi- 
 dent that they did this in the hope that they 
 might all remain in the valley and keep 
 their tribe together as heretofore, believing 
 that each could take up 160 acres. 
 
 The publication of the Garfield agreement 
 with Chariot's signature or mark affixed to 
 it created the impression that all trouble 
 was over with the Indians, and a large 
 white emmigration poured into the Bitter 
 Root valley. The result is that the Indians 
 who adhered to Chariot are yet in the val- 
 ley, miserably poor, with one or two ex- 
 ceptions, surrounded by whites who are 
 anxious for their removal, and the young 
 men, with no restraint upon them, loung- 
 ing around the saloons in Stevensville and 
 
 utterly worthless. As the case now stands 
 63 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 f^«§]f^»^ 
 
 
 these Indians have no title to any portion of 
 the Bitter Root valley, as they refuse to 
 take the patents and are defying the order 
 of the president for their removal to the 
 Jocko reservation. 
 
 Chariot told us that he would never go to 
 the Jocko reservation alive; that he had no 
 confidence in our promise, "for," said he, 
 "your Great Father Garfield put my name 
 to a paper which I never signed, and the 
 renegade Nez Perce, Arlee, is now drawing 
 money to which he has no right. How can 
 I believe you or any white man?" 
 
 Continues the report: We are compelled 
 to admit that there was much truth and jus- 
 tice in his statement. That his name was 
 falsely published as signed to the Garfield 
 agreement is unfortunately true, as shown 
 by the original. 
 
 General Garfield in his report, page 111, 
 says: 
 
 The provisions of the contract were de- 
 termined after full consultation with the 
 superintendent and the territorial delegate, 
 and finally the chiefs were requested to 
 answer by signing or refusing to sign it. 
 Arlee and Adolph, the second and third 
 chiefs, signed the contracts and said they 
 would do all they could to enforce it; but 
 Chariot refused to sign, and said that if the 
 president commanded it he would leave the 
 Bitter Root valley, but at present would not 
 promise to go to the reservation. The other 
 chiefs expressed the opinion that if houses 
 were built and preparations made according 
 to the contract. Chariot would finally con- 
 sent to the arrangement and go with the 
 tribe. In a letter to J. A. Vial, superinten- 
 dent of Indian affairs, bearing the same date 
 
 with the contract and to be found on page 
 63 
 
 ii 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 m^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 5mm 
 
 

 115 of the report of the commissioner ol 
 Indian affairs for 1872. General GarfielJ 
 says: 
 
 In carrying out the terms of the contract 
 made with the chiefs of the Flatheads for re- 
 moving that tribe to this reservation (Jocko) 
 I have conchided, after full consultation 
 with you, to proceed with the work in the 
 same manner as though Chariot, first chief, 
 had signed the contract. I do this in the be- 
 lief that when he sees the work going for- 
 ward he will conclude to come here with the 
 other chiefs and then keep the tribe un- 
 broken. 
 
 The report of Senator Vest and Delegate 
 Maginnis further says: It is unfortunate 
 that General Garfield came to this conclu- 
 sion, and it is still more unfortunate that 
 the published agreement as shown by the 
 report of the commissioner of Indian affairs 
 has the signature of Chariot affixed to it, 
 whilst, as stated, the original agreement 
 on file in the department of the in- 
 terior does not show the signature of Char- 
 lot, but confirms this statement that he did 
 not sign it. The result of this publication 
 has been to imbitter Chariot and render him 
 suspicious and distrustful of the government 
 and its agents. Many interested parties be- 
 iieved or pretended to believe, that the 
 agreement as published is correct, and that 
 Chariot really signed it, and they have re- 
 peated the statement until he and his band 
 are exasperated at what they consider an 
 attempt to rob them of their land by false- 
 liood and fraud. 
 
 The great cause of Chariot's bitterness, 
 
 however, is the fact that Arlee, second chief, 
 
 is recognized by the government as the head 
 
 of the tribe, and has received all its bounty. 
 64 
 
 ^J™^ pv^^TSl "SIvpC]-! p-^^ 
 
 siMia l^iMimJ siMisJ IsilM 
 
 
 \W^ 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
MICHEL REVAIS, OFFICIAL INTERPRETER 
 FLATHEAD AGENCY •'< 
 

 
 
 
 
 sims] 
 
 mmm] 
 
 This is such an insult as no chief can 
 forgive and it must be remem- 
 bered that Chariot is the son of 
 Victor and the heriditory chief of his tribe. 
 Looking at all the circumstances, the re- 
 moval of part of his tribe without his con- 
 sent, the ignoring his rights as head chief, 
 and setting him aside for Arlee, the publica- 
 tion of his name to an agreement which he 
 refused to sign, we cannot blame him for 
 distrust and resentment. In this the out- 
 rage is the greater for the reason that Char- 
 lot and his people have been the steady, un- 
 flinching frieads of the whites under the 
 most trying circumstances. When Joseph, 
 the Nez Perce chief, came into the Bitter 
 Root valley on his raid into Montana, 
 Chariot refused to accept his proffered hand, 
 because the blood of the white man was 
 upon it; and he told Joseph that although 
 the Flatheads and Nez Perces were of kin, 
 if he killed a single white in 
 the valley or injured the property 
 of the white settlers the Flatiieads would at- 
 tack him. To the action of Chariot the 
 white settlers owed their safety, and at our 
 conference an old warrior was pointed out 
 (now blind and feeble), by one of the Jesu- 
 ites, who had drawn his revolver and pro- 
 tected the wife of the blacksmith at Stevens- 
 ville from outrage at the hands of the Nez 
 
 Perces. 
 
 After exhausting argument and persua- 
 sion we told Chariot very firmly that he and 
 his people must either take patents or go to 
 the Jocko reservation, that we knew he had 
 been the friend of the whites and had been 
 badly treated, but that the white settlers 
 were all now around him and his people 
 were becoming poorer every day, whilst his 
 young men were drinking and gambling. 
 
 
 
 ml 
 
 m 
 
 i 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 mmm 
 
 W) 
 
 His only reply was that he would never 
 be taken alive to the Jocko reservation, and 
 we finally left him with the understanding 
 that he would come to Washington and 
 talk the matter over with the great father. 
 
 The Cliief Went to Wasliington and Talked 
 Matters Over. 
 
 I am glad to learn that the interior de- 
 partment has ordered Chariot and some of 
 his tribe to be sent to Washington, and it is 
 to be hoped that some agreement or ar- 
 rangement can be had which will obviate 
 the necessity for using force against these 
 brave and unfortunate people. In any 
 event, deeply as we sympathize with these 
 people, and deplore the manner in which 
 Chariot has been treated, we are satisfied 
 with the welfare of both the whites and In- 
 dians in the Bitter Root valley absolutely 
 demands the removal of the latter to the 
 Jocko reservation. Their presence in the 
 valley is a continued source of danger and 
 disgust. The titles to the lands are unset- 
 tled and improvement is stopped by reason 
 of the uncertainty existing in regard to the 
 ultimate decision of the questions growing 
 out of the present state of affairs. The Bit- 
 ter Root valley is no place for them. Their 
 condition is becoming more desperate every 
 year and the few who have accumulated 
 property are daily becoming poorer from 
 their established usuage of never refusing to 
 feed those who are hungry. If the necessity 
 should at last come for removing them by 
 force it should be done firmly but gently, 
 and as Chariot and his band have received 
 nothing out of the J50,000 paid to Arlee and 
 
 those went with him, congress should ap- 
 66 
 
 \m\ 
 
 a 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 
 
iu/-^m 
 
 
 Major Roman, Chief Charlot, and Indian Delegation, 
 Visit Washington in 1884. 
 
 ;/ 1 
 

 pwmi pm^ fmims] fsr^Pl pmsi 
 siMJ^ Isi^lJ^ IsiMy^ l^^^jeJ isiSm 
 
 propriate such an amount as will provide 
 them on the reservation with houses, grain 
 and cattle, as stipulated in the treaty of 1885 
 and the Garfield agreement. 
 
 CHARLOT's trip to WASHINGTON. 
 
 On the 16th day of January, 1884, the 
 United States agent for the confederated 
 tribes of Indians living upon the Flathead 
 or .locko reservation, in accordance with in- 
 sti-uctions of the honorable commissioner of 
 Indian affairs, took his departure from Mis- 
 soula, Montana Territory, for the city of 
 Wasliington, accompanied by the following 
 named delegation of Chariot's band of Bitter 
 Root Flathead Indians: 
 
 1. Head Chief Chariot— Slem-Hak-Kah. 
 "Little claw of a grizzly bear." 
 
 2. Antoine Moise — Callup-Squal-She. 
 "Grain with a ring around his neck." 
 
 3. Louis— Licoot-Sim-Hay. "Grizzly bear 
 far away." 
 
 4. John Hill— Ta-hetchet. "Hand Shot 
 Off." 
 
 5. Abel or Tom Adams— Swam- Ach-ham. 
 '■Red Arm." 
 
 And the official interpreter, Michel Ra- 
 vais, whose Indian name is Chim-Coo-Swee, 
 "The Man Who Walks Alone." 
 
 The object of ordering the Indians to 
 Washington was in accordance with the 
 recommendationsof Senator Vest and Major 
 ^fartin Maginnis, the sub-committee of the 
 United States senate committee, and was to 
 try to secure Chariot's consent to remove 
 with his band from the Bitter Root valley, 
 and to settle upon the Jocko reservation. 
 Nearly a month was spent at the national 
 capital, and during that time several inter- 
 views were held by the Indians and the 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 agent with the secretary of the interior, 
 Hon. H. M. Teller, but no offer of pecuniary 
 reward or persuasions of the secretary could 
 shake Chariot's resolution to remain in the 
 Bitter Root valley. An offer to build him 
 a house, fence in and plow a sufficiency of 
 land for a farm, give him cattle and horses, 
 and seed and agricultural implements, and 
 to do likewise for each head of a family be- 
 longing to his band. Also a yearly pension 
 of $500 to Chariot, and to be recognized as 
 the heir of Victor, his deceased father, and 
 to take his place as the head chief of the 
 confederated tribes of the Flatheads, Pend 
 d' OreiUes and Kootenai Indians living on 
 the Jocko reservation, had no effect. His 
 only answer to those generous offers was 
 that he came to Washington to get the per- 
 mission of the Great Father to allow him to 
 live unmolested in the Bitter Root valley, 
 the home of his father and the land of his 
 ancestors. He asked for no assistance from 
 the government, only the poor privilege of 
 remaining in the valley where he was born 
 and where' the dust of his tribe who lived 
 before him was mingled with the earth. If 
 any of his tribe desired to accept the bounty 
 of the government and remove to the Jocko 
 reservatioa they were at liberty to do so, and 
 he would offer no objection; but it was his 
 own and individual wish to live and die in 
 the Bitter Root valley. 
 
 At the last interview held with the secre- 
 tary of the interior Chariot was told if he de- 
 sired to live in the Bitter Root valley, he 
 could do so as long as he remained in peace 
 and friendship with the white settlers. No 
 promise of assistance was given the chief or 
 his band by the secretary so long as they re- 
 
 I 
 
 i 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 Si 
 
 
 fSl^^lSl 
 
 immm 
 
 m> 
 
Ei>ifi[a 
 
 
 
 
 
 mained in the Bitter Root valley. After an 
 interview with President Arthur, arrange- 
 ments were made for departure to Montana, 
 without havine accomplished anything 
 whatever looking to the removal of the 
 chief and his hand to the Jocko reservation. 
 
 Before departure from the capital, the sec- 
 retary of the interior held a special inter- 
 view with the agent, none of the Indians 
 being present, and after patiently listening 
 to his recital of the extreme poverty of Chief 
 Chariot and his band, who received no aid 
 or assistance from the government, the sec- 
 retary gave the agent verbal instructions to 
 proceed to the Bitter Root valley, as soon as 
 practicable after his return to the Jocko 
 reservation, and report to him through the 
 commissioner of Indian affairs the wants 
 and necessities of this unfortunate tribe; and 
 also to give his views in detail as to the most 
 practicable method for the department to 
 relieve their wants, which should have con- 
 sideration, and also to encourage them to 
 remove to the Jocko reservation. 
 
 On the evening of the 7th of March, 1884, 
 the agent arrived in Missoula, Montana, 
 from Washington with the Flathead In- 
 dian delegation, where he procured wagon 
 transportation and sent them to their homes 
 in Bitter Root valley. The members of the 
 Flatliead tribe were in the mountains hunt- 
 ing for game with which to support their 
 families, as they had no other resource for 
 food in the winter season. The agent sent 
 out runners to call them in, so that he 
 could proceed according to verbal instruc- 
 tions given to him by the secretary of the 
 interior, on the 1st day of March, 1884. at his 
 
 office in the interior department at Wash- 
 69 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 
 BKlSi 
 

 
 
 
 m 
 
 ington, which was in effect, to go to the Bit- 
 ter Root valley and report as to their neces- 
 sities and wants and to their affairs gener- 
 ally. Previously the agent had but very 
 little intercourse officially with Chariot's 
 band of Indians, but from conversation 
 with the secretary of the interior he became 
 convinced that his relations with them after- 
 ward would become of a closer character. 
 
 From consultations and councils with the 
 Indians after his return the agent was h d to 
 believe that the greater portion of Chariot's 
 band would consent to remove to the Jocko 
 reservation, if he would promise that the 
 government would assist in building a house 
 for each family, fence for each a field and 
 furnish seed for the first year or two; give a 
 wagon, harness and plow, with other agri- 
 cultural tools, and also furnish at least two 
 cows for each family, besides permitting 
 those who had land improvements in Bit- 
 ter Root valley to sell the same. 
 
 A COUNCIL WAS HELD 
 
 and twenty-one families agreed to remove, 
 and to them, following the views of the hon- 
 orable secretary of the interior, the agent 
 promised: 
 
 First — A choice of 160 acres of unoccupied 
 land on the Jocko reservation. 
 
 Second — Assistance in the erection of a 
 substantial hoi;se. 
 
 Third — Assistance in fencing and break- 
 ing up a field of at least ten acres. 
 
 Fourth — The following gifts: Two cows 
 to each tamily, a wagon and harness, a 
 plow, with all other necessary agricultural 
 implements, seed for the first year and pro- 
 visions until the first year was harvested. 
 
 This was a moderate promise, and the In- 
 70 
 
 
EIMISj 
 
 ElMJS 
 
 
 
 Mite 
 
 
 dian department fulfilled it to the letter, 
 and also authorized the construction of an 
 irrigation ditch to cover tlie lands settled 
 upon by the Flat heads. The government 
 still generously assists these people to up- 
 hold their hands in striving for a civilizen 
 independence and a sustained well doing. 
 
 The greater portion of families who re- 
 moved under this arrangement held patents 
 to lands in the Bitter Eoot valley, but left 
 their farms for new homes, trusting to the 
 government to make proper disposition of 
 the same at some tuture time for their 
 benefit. 
 
 On the 12th of August, 1884, the agent 
 made a thorough census, and found that 
 this once great tribe, under the chieftainship 
 of Chariot, in the Bitter Boot valley, con- 
 sisted of the following numbers: 
 
 Married men 79 
 
 Unmarried males over 16 years 25 
 
 Boys under 16 years G8 
 
 Total number of males 172 
 
 Married women 100 
 
 Marriageable girls 4 
 
 Girls under age pueberty 61 
 
 Total number of females 165 
 
 In all 342 individuals, of whom 101 were 
 heads of families, who were then married or 
 had been so. 
 
 In January, 1885, the agent issued sup- 
 plies to Chariot's band in the Bitter Root 
 valley, this being the first distribution of 
 any kind made among them by the govern 
 nient since the Garfield agreement and for 
 years before that agreement was drawn up. 
 Wagons, plows, harness and agricultural 
 implements were also issued by the agent 
 and it was hoped that by devotion to agri- 
 cultural pursuits that an area of prosperity 
 
 mil 
 
 i 
 
 
 siMraJ IsiHsJ BiMfsJ 
 
 

 
 m 
 
 and civilization would dawn upon this rem- 
 nant of a once great and powerful tribe. 
 
 Sketches of Big Canoe, Adolph and Arlee, 
 of Montana Indian Fame, 
 
 Big Canoe, who was war chief of the 
 Pend d'Oreilles, died in 1882, at the Flat- 
 head agency, and was buried in the Indian 
 burying ground at Fort Ignatius mission. 
 He was 83 years of age at the time of his 
 death, and was considered by the Indians to 
 be one of the greatest war chiefs the tribe 
 of the Pend d' Oreilles ever had. -The stories 
 of battles led by him against Indian foes 
 would fill a volume. As this aged warrior 
 was well known to the old settlers of Mis- 
 soula county, I feel tempted to give one of 
 his stor'es, which was related to the writer 
 in front|of a blazing camp fire some years be- 
 fore his death, and which was noted down 
 almost word for word as repeated from his 
 lips by the interpreter. 
 
 STORY OF BIG CANOE. 
 
 Many snows ago, when I was a boy, and 
 while Joseph or "Celp-Stop" (Crazy Coun- 
 try) was head chief of the Pend d' Oreilles, I 
 was one of a large hunting and war 
 party who left the place where 
 the white men call Missoula, for 
 the purpose of killing buffalo and stealing 
 horses in our enemies' country. We (the 
 Flatheads and Pen d'Oreilles) were at war 
 with the Blackfeet, the Crows the Sioux, the 
 Snakes and the Gros Ventres. The Nez 
 Percies were our allies and friends and as- 
 sisted us to fight those tribes. 
 
 While encamped in the Crow country 
 Big Smoke, one of the bravest war chiefs of 
 
 the Pen d'Oreilles, discovered Crow signs, 
 
 73 
 
 i 
 I 
 
 
 
 m 
 
 Eransiri5JM§l o 
 

 
 ■ar^Uf]' 
 
 
 and taking a party of his braves with him, 
 followed upon the trail. The Crow camp 
 was soon discovered, and, as Big Smoke 
 started out more to get horses than to secure 
 scalps, informed his warriors that he did 
 not intend to attack the small party of 
 Crows, who were now at his mercy, as the 
 Pen d'Oreillesand Flatheadshad crept upon 
 their camp undiscovered, and the Crows 
 were resting in fancied security, their horses 
 grazing upon the pleasant slopes unguarded, 
 while the old warriors lolled about the 
 camp smoking their pipes, and the young 
 men were engaged in the wild sports and 
 rude game practiced among the tribe. 
 
 The announcement that we were not to 
 have a fight was received with great marks 
 of disfavor by our braves, and, as I was a 
 young man and had not as yet taken my 
 first scalp, I could not restrain myself, but 
 cried like a woman. Big Smoke was known 
 to be the bravest man in the tribe and no 
 one of us dared impute his action to 
 cowardise, and we therefore acquiesced in 
 his plans, and when night came silently 
 and cautiously we ran off the whole band 
 of Crow horses and left our enemies on 
 foot. We soon found our main encamp- 
 ment and the horses were divided up. One 
 particular fine black horse was given to our 
 head chief. The day after our return the 
 chief announced to us that our powder and 
 lead was nearly exhausted, and as there was 
 no way of procuring any without going to 
 the Crow trading post, asked if there was 
 any of his warriors brave enough to under- 
 take the feat. 
 
 Alexander, or Tem-Keth-tasme, which 
 
 means No Horse, who afterwards suc- 
 73 
 
 mm 
 
 M 
 
 iSi 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 SIMM 
 
 SIMM 
 
 ceeded Joseph as chief, and who was 
 then a young warrior and burning 
 to distinguish himself, immediately volun- 
 teered, and disguising himself as a Crow, 
 after darkness came on, set out on his per- 
 ilous journey. Arriving at the Crow stock- 
 ade, he was immediately admitted by the 
 trader, and was at once discovered to be a 
 Pend d'Oreille by a Crow who was lounging 
 about the post. Word was sent to the Crow 
 camp that an enemy was in the stockade, 
 and soon a loud demand was heard at the 
 gate for admittance. The gate was opened 
 and a single Indian was admitted. He was 
 a tall, noble-looking fellow, dressed in the 
 full war costume of a Crow brave. Halting 
 immediately in front of Alexander, he 
 reached out his hand and cordially grasped 
 the hand of the Pend d'Oreille. "Canoe 
 man you are brave. You have 
 come among your enemies to purchase 
 powder and lead. You are dead but still 
 you live. I am Red Owl. Your warriors 
 stole into my camp; they took my horses; 
 they were strong, but stole upon us while 
 we were unaware and spared the lives of 
 my band. Canoe-man on that night I lost 
 my war horse — a black horse with two holes 
 bored in his ears. He was my fathers gift 
 to me. Is there such a horse in your camp? 
 Alexander replied that such a horse was 
 given to his chief by Big Smoke after the 
 capture. "Red Owl will go back with you 
 into his enemies camp," and striding out of 
 the stockade he harangued, and then pick- 
 ing out twenty of his braves desired them to 
 accompany him. Alexander was then al- 
 lowed to make his purchases and on the 
 
 next morning accompanied by Red Owl 
 
 74 
 
 
 m 
 
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 i 
 
 H 
 
 
 mmm 
 
 ISIMJSJSIMS 
 
 
 
 siMjsJ 
 
EMM 
 
 MMM 
 
 
 
 
 mMm 
 
 and twenty of his warriors set out for the 
 Pend d'Oreille camp. 
 
 When arriving there the Indians were as- 
 tonished 10 behold their trusted brave, Alex- 
 ander, leading the Crow warriors arme 1 to 
 the teeth, up to the lodge of their chief, who 
 was soon surrounded by his brave Fend 
 d'OreiUes in such overwhelming numbers 
 that there was no escape or even hope to es- 
 cape for the Crows. Red Owl dismounted 
 and asked Alexander which was his chief. 
 The person being pointed out Red Owl ad- 
 dressed him: "Chief of the Canoe Indians, 
 your braves captured a band of horses from 
 my people. Among them was my war, 
 and I love him, for he was the gift of my 
 father. I desire the horse and have brought 
 you as good to replace him." Our chief, 
 who did not like to part with the horse, and 
 who perfectly knew the advantage he pos- 
 sessed, bent his head in silence. Red Owl 
 repeated his speech, but our chief 
 gave no reply but stood in stolid 
 silence. "Chief of the Pend d'Oreil- 
 les," exclaimed Red Owl, "twice 
 have I spoken to you, and you gave me no 
 answer. I repeat it again for the third 
 time!" We were listesing to the conversa- 
 tion, continued Big Canoe, and as young as 
 I was; I could not but admire the brave 
 Crow; surrounded as he was with his fol- 
 lowers by implacable enemies, only await- 
 ing the signal to begin the slaughter. But 
 the brave bearing of the Crow, and his in- 
 different manner won the respect of us all, 
 and we could not help but admire him; and 
 to such an extent did this feeling prevail 
 that a murmur of applause went arouud 
 when the Crow concluded his last sentence. 
 
 JSIMJS 
 
 
 
 
I — \'\3^,:'f!i — 1 1 I — lArfty) I — I 
 
 15^^^ 151^^^ 
 
 
 mmM 
 
 
 Ira 
 
 straightening himself up to his full height, 
 the Crow continued' turning to us: "Pen 
 d'Oreilles, you have heard me addiess your 
 chief; he gave me no answer; he buried 
 his head low ; he changed his color ; this 
 the subterfuge of a woman. Pend d'Oreilles. 
 your chief is a woman ; I give him my 
 horse ! " And mounting at the head 
 of his band he rode from 
 
 our camp and not one movement was made 
 to stay his progress. So overwhelmed was 
 our chief with confusion that he gave no 
 orders, and Red Owl, with his followers, 
 returned sate to his camp. 
 
 ADOLPir, 
 
 first war chief of the Flatheads, died at the 
 agency in 1S87, at the age of 78 years. He 
 marshalled and led the young warriors 
 when the council was held at the agency, 
 represented on the part of the United States 
 by Hon. Jos. K. McCammon, assistant at- 
 torney general of the interior department. 
 The Northern Pacific Railroad company 
 was represented, as attorney, by Hon. W. F. 
 Sanders, now senator from Montana, while 
 the Indian leaders and speakers in the coun- 
 cil were Michel, chief of the Pend d'Oreilles; 
 Eneas, chief of the Kootenais, and Arlee, 
 chief of the reservation Flatheads. The 
 council was held to negotiate with the In- 
 dians for the right of way for the Northern 
 Pacific Railroad company. On occasions 
 the scenes were wild and stormy, but the 
 level heaiied McComraon carried out the 
 views of the government to a wise, generous 
 and honorable settlement, and the memory 
 of Mr. McCammon is cherished by the old 
 chiefs of the tribes who still survive. 
 
 Adolph was considered a great warrior 
 76 
 
 ]g 
 
 SSISI [2J^W ^vpSl 
 
 l5iSa IsiMja SlMl^ 
 
 
 IfSJ^iryisi 
 
and led the Flitheads as war chief against 
 their enemies, wliich constiuuted all of the 
 tribes who hunted buffalo on the Atlantic 
 slope, except the Nez Perces, who were the 
 friends and allies of the Flatheads. 
 
 A battle with the Gros Ventres was fought 
 some fifty years ago, about one mile west of 
 O'Keefe's ranch, at the mouth of the can- 
 yon where the Northern Pacific crosses the 
 great Marant tressle and sweeps from the 
 east into the Jocko mountains. Chief Fac- 
 tor Kitson, of the Hudson Bay Fur com- 
 pany, who had his headquarters at Thomp- 
 son Falls on the Pend d' Oreille river, came 
 with a pack train of supplies from that post 
 to trade with the Flathead Indians, who 
 were encamped near the site of the present 
 city of Missoula. Having made his trade 
 and secured the furs Mr. Kitson started his 
 pack train up the canyon to unload at the 
 company's warehouse at Thompson Falls. 
 Two South Sea Islanders in the employ of 
 Chief Factor Kitson went ahead with the 
 train, but as they gained the entrance to 
 the canon were fired upon by an ambushed 
 party of Gros Ventres, consisting of about 
 100 Indians. The two packers were slain, 
 Mr. Kitson and others of his party were 
 about a mile in the rear of the advance party 
 or he and his companions would have 
 shared the same fate Kitson turned back 
 and informed the Flathead camp of the at- 
 tack and the chiefs at once sounded the 
 alarm. The warriors mounted their horses 
 and headed by Adolph and Arlee made an 
 advance on the camp of the hostiles. The 
 Gros Ventres retreated across the hills and 
 up Savallie creek, which is about seven 
 
 miles west of Missoula. The Flatheads 
 77 
 
 I 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 killed and scalped about one half of their 
 number before they made their escape. The 
 canon leading from O'Keefe's ranch to the 
 reservation was called Coviaca Defile, after 
 one of the unfortunate South Sea islanders 
 who was killed by the Gros Ventres. 
 
 ARLEE. 
 
 On Thursday, August 8, at 4:30 p. m., 
 Arlee, the last war chief of the Flatheads, 
 and of the confederated tribes, died at his 
 ranch, near the Flathead agency, and the 
 Northern Pacific railroad station, called 
 after him. His deathbed was surrounded by 
 his Indian relatives, head men of the tribes 
 and friends. Major Ronan, United States In- 
 dian agent, Mrs. Ronan, Dr. Dade, the 
 agency physician, and others connected 
 with the agency staff were present. The 
 Sunday before he died he was visited by 
 Bishop Brondel, of Helena, and Rev. J. 
 D'Aste, S. J., superior of St. Ignatius mis- 
 sion, and from the latter received 
 the last sacraments of the Cath- 
 olic church. Arlee was baptized 
 in his youth in the Bitter Root valley by 
 Father De Smet. He accented the terms of 
 General Garfield and removed to the Jocko 
 reservation, and was made head chief of the 
 reservation Flatheads by Mr. Garfield. 
 Chief Charles never recognized Arlee after- 
 wards; never spoke to him nor visited him 
 up to the day of his death. Arlee was buried 
 near the little church at the agency. He 
 has gone to the happy hunting ground, and 
 as he was the last of the war chiefs of his 
 race and as an illustration of the prepara- 
 tion of the dead chieftain for the grave, a 
 translation of Schiller's beautiful burial 
 song is here given. The translation is be- 
 lieved to be by Bulwer: 
 78 
 
 m 
 
 [ZJl 
 
 
 
 
Arlee, Last of the Flathead War Chiefs 
 
cHi.Wi^l cfn.W.ra c^Mra mMlT^ nm&: 
 
 
 
 
 BURIAL OP THE CUIEFTAIN. 
 See on his ma!, as if of yore, 
 
 How lifelike sits he here; 
 With the same aKf)ect that he wore 
 
 When life to hiui was dear. 
 But where the right arm's strength, and where 
 
 The breath he used to breathe 
 To the Great Spirit aloft in air, 
 
 The peace pipe's lusty wreath? 
 And where the hawk-like eye, alas! 
 
 That wont the deer pursue 
 Along the waves of rippling grass. 
 
 Or fields that shone with dew? 
 Are these the limber, bounding feet 
 
 That swept the winter snowb? 
 What startled deer was half so fleet. 
 
 Their speed outstripped the roe's. 
 These hands that once the sturdy bow 
 
 Could supple from its pride. 
 How stark and helpless hang they now 
 
 Adown the slift'ened side! 
 Yet weal to him! at peace he strays 
 
 Where never fall the snows. 
 Where o'er the meadow springs the maize 
 
 That mortal never sows; 
 Where birds are blithe in every brike, 
 
 "Where forests teem with deer, 
 Where glide the fish through every lake, 
 
 One chase from yoar to yeir! 
 With spirits now he feasts above; 
 
 All left us, to revere 
 The deeds vve cherish with our love, 
 
 The rest we bury here. 
 He"e bring the 1 st gi'ts; loud and shrill 
 
 Wall death dirge of the brave! 
 What pleased him most in life may siill 
 
 Give pleasure in the grave. 
 We lav the axe beneath his head 
 
 He f wung when strength was strong, 
 To bear on which his hunger fed— 
 
 The way from earth is long! 
 And here, new sharpened, place the knife 
 
 Which served from the clay, 
 From which the axe had spoiled the life, 
 
 The conquered scalp away. 
 
 
 amsi pms] pms] psis] pmsi p»^ 
 
MONTANA'S Tribute to Father Ravalli 
 
i 
 
 LIST OF ENGRAVINGS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Major Peter Ronaii Frontispiece 
 
 Signal of Successful Flathead War Party 1 1 
 Indians who conducted Father DeSmet 
 
 from St. Louis to Hitter Root Valley. . . i7 
 
 Father Ravalli 33 
 
 Millstone now in St Ignatius Mission 
 
 Museum which ground first flour in 
 
 Montana 35 
 
 St. Ignatius Mission Flathead Valley .... 39 
 
 Agent's Residence 62 
 
 Michael Revais, ofificial, interpreter. . . 64 
 Major Ronan, Chief Chariot and Indian 
 
 delegation visit to Washington in 1 884. 67 
 
 Chief Arlee and family 72 
 
 Arlee, last of the Flathead War Chiefs . 78 
 
 Montana's tribute to Father Ravalli 81 
 
 
 
 
;^' 
 
 
 
 
 Tf^ 
 
 
 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 
 
 Copvright Mav 5, 1890. 
 No. 14879 V. 
 
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 PRESERVATION TECHNOLOGIES. 
 111 Thomson Park Drive 
 Cranberry Twp.. PA 16066 
 (412)779-2111 
 

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