The fight continued till late in the night. Two charges were made to disperse the Indians, the last led by Lieutenant-Colonel Shaw in person with twenty-four men, but whilst driving before him some one hundred and fifty Indians, an equal number pushed into his rear, and he was compelled to cut his way through them towards camp, when, drawing up his men, and aided by the teamsters and pickets, who gallantly sprang forward, he drove the Indians back when in full charge upon the corral.
Just before the charge the friendly Nez Perces, fifty in number, who had been assigned to holding the ridge on the south side of the corral, were told by the enemy, “We came not to fight the Nez Perces, but the whites; go to your camp, or we wipe it out.” Their camp, with their women and children, was on a stream about a mile distant, upon which I directed the Nez Perces to retire, as I did not require their assistance, and I was fearful that my men might not be able to distinguish them from the hostiles, and thus friendly Indians might be killed.
Towards night I notified Lieutenant-Colonel Steptoe that I was fighting the Indians, that I should move the next morning, and expressed the opinion that a company of his troops would be of service. In his reply he stated that the Indians had burnt up his grass, and suggested that I should return to his camp, and place at his disposal my wagons, in order that he might move his whole command and his supplies to the Umatilla, or some other point, where sustenance could be found for his animals. To this arrangement I assented, and Lieutenant-Colonel Steptoe sent to my camp Lieutenant Davidson with detachments from the companies of dragoons and artillery with a mountain howitzer. They reached my camp about two o’clock in the morning, where everything was in good order, and most of the men at the corral asleep. A picket had been driven in an hour and a half before by the enemy,—that on the hill south of the corral, but the enemy was immediately dislodged, and all the points were held, and ground-pits being dug.
The howitzer having been fired on the way out, it was believed nothing would be gained by waiting till morning, and the whole force immediately returned to Lieutenant-Colonel Steptoe’s camp.
Soon after sunrise the enemy attacked his camp, but were soon dislodged by the howitzer, and a charge by a detachment from Steptoe’s command.
On my arrival at the camp I urged Lieutenant-Colonel Steptoe to build a blockhouse immediately, to leave one company to defend it with all his supplies, then to march below and return with an additional force and additional supplies, and by a vigorous winter campaign to whip the Indians into submission. I placed at his disposal for the building my teams and Indian employees.
The blockhouse and stockade were built in a little more than two days. My Indian store-room was rebuilt at one corner of the stockade.
In the action my whole force consisted of Goff’s company of sixty-nine men, the teamsters, herders, and Indian employees, numbering about fifty men, and the fifty Nez Perces. Our train consisted of about five hundred animals, not one of which was captured by the enemy. We fought four hundred and fifty Indians, and had one man mortally, one dangerously, and two slightly wounded. We killed and wounded thirteen Indians.
One half the Nez Perces, one hundred and twenty warriors, all of the Yakimas and Palouses, two hundred warriors, the great bulk of the Yakimas, Walla Wallas, and Umatillas were in the fight. The principal war chiefs were the son of Ow-hi and the Isle de Père chief, Quil-to-mee, the latter of whom had two horses shot under him, and who at the council showed me a letter from Colonel Wright acknowledging his valuable services in bringing about the peace of the Yakima.
In his report to the Indian Bureau the governor adds: