“While Billy Clams and some of his people publicly abandoned the forms of Shaker religion rather than be banished, yet John Slocum and his people refused to so surrender, and the agent sent out his police and arrested John Slocum, Louis Yowaluch, and two or three more of these people—good, true men—and, loading their limbs with chains, confined them for several weeks in the dirty little single room of a jail at the Puyallup agency, near Tacoma. Their only offense was worship of a different form from that adopted by the agent and his brother. They had broken no law, created no disorder, and yet they suffered ignominious incarceration in a vile dungeon, loaded with chains, at the pleasure of the agent. The Shakers believed in God, in Jesus Christ, in heaven and hell, in temperance, sobriety, and a virtuous life. They abandoned the old Indian religion and all its vices and forms, including the power of the doctors or medicine-men. These medicine-men had a great hold on the Indian mind, and they joined the minister and the agent in their fight on the Shakers, because the Shakers fought them; so that there was seen the unique spectacle of the savage shamanism of the American Indian and the supposed orthodox religion of civilization hand in hand fighting the followers of Jesus Christ.”
“Imprisonment, banishment, threats, chains, and the general ill will of the agent and all his employees were visited on these Shakers who continued to practice their forms of worship, and yet they did continue it. In spite of the fact that they occupied a place only half-way between slaves and freemen, and were under the orders of the agent and subject to be harassed and annoyed all the time by him, yet they continued nobly and fearlessly to practice their religion and to worship God and Jesus Christ as they saw fit. To do it, however, they were forced to stay away from the reservations, where the greater number of employees were located, and their churches were built on Mud bay and Oyster bay, far away from the reservations.”
“But a brighter day came for these people, a day when they could stand up and defy every form or force of persecution. In 1886 Congress passed the Indian land severalty bill, an act providing for dividing lands in severalty to Indians, and providing that those who took lands and adopted the habits of civilized life should be American citizens, with all the rights, privileges, and immunities of any other citizen. In 1892 I was appointed by Judge Hanford to defend a prisoner in the United States district court at Tacoma. The prisoner was accused of selling liquor to a Puyallup Indian, but it appeared on cross-examination that this Indian owned land in severalty, voted, paid taxes, and exercised other rights of citizenship. The question was then raised by me on motion to dismiss, that these land-holding, tax-paying Indians were citizens of the United States, free and independent. The United States prosecuting attorney appeared to contest the claim, but after an extended argument Judge Hanford held with me, and the prisoner was discharged.”
“The effect of this decision was far-reaching. It meant that all land-holding Indians were no longer wards of the government, but free citizens and not under the control of the Indian agent. The Shaker people, hearing this, sent a deputation to see me, and I held a long consultation with them, assuring them that they were as free as the agent, and could establish their own church, own and build houses of worship, and do both in religious and worldly matters as other citizens of the United States could. This was glorious news to them. It meant freedom, it meant the cessation of persecution and annoyance by the agency employees, and they were jubilant.”
“Accordingly they met on June 6, 1892, at Mud bay, at Louis Yowaluch’s house, and organized their church on a regular business basis. The following officers were elected: Headman, Louis Yowaluch; elders, John Slocum, Louis Yowaluch, John Smith, James Walker, Charles Walker, John W. Simmons, and William James. At this meeting the following persons were also appointed ministers of this church, and licenses were issued to them, to wit: Louis Yowaluch, John Slocum, James Tobin, John Powers, and Richard Jackson. Provision was made to establish a church at the Puyallup reservation, where the power of the agent had hitherto kept them out, and William James, a Puyallup landowner, gave land for a church. After much talk about sending out ministers, etc., the meeting adjourned, after a two days’ session, and the Shaker church, after eleven years’ fighting against persecutions, was an established fact, free and independent, with its own officers, ministers, and church property.”
Fig. 68—Shaker church at Mud bay.
“The spectacle of an Indian church with Indian officers, preachers, and members, and of houses built by the Indians for church purposes, was too much for the average citizen of Puget sound, and the Shakers were continually disturbed, not only by the whites, but by the Indians who could not and did not appreciate the change to citizenship, so that I was constantly applied to for protection by the ministers and members of the Shaker church. A ‘paper’ has a great effect on the average Indian, and I issued on application several papers addressed in general terms to those who might be disposed to interfere with them, which had a quieting effect and caused evil-disposed persons to respect the Indians and their religion, or at least to let them alone. They now feel quite confident of their position, and are acting quite like the average citizen. Even the persons who persecuted them for eleven years now felt obliged to retire from the conflict, and a day of peace is reached at last.”
“The Shaker church now reaches over nearly the whole of western Washington. The story of Slocum’s death and visit to heaven, and his return to preach to the Indians, is accepted by them as a direct revelation of the will of God. They say that they do not need to read the Bible, for do they not have better and more recent testimony of the existence of heaven and of the way to that celestial home than is contained in the Bible? Here is John Slocum, alive, and has he not been to heaven? Then, why read the Bible to learn the road, when John can so easily tell them all about it? The Bible says there are many roads; the Catholics have one, the Presbyterians another, and the Congregationalists a third; but John Slocum gives them a short, straight road—and they choose that.”
“The Shaker church now has a building for church purposes at Mud bay, at Oyster bay, at Cowlitz, Chehalis, and Puyallup. They have about a dozen ministers regularly licensed, and about 500 members. Most of the Indians at Skokomish belong, while the Squaxins, Chehalis, Nisqually, Cowlitz, and Columbia River Indians, and in fact the majority of the Indians of western Washington, either belong or are in sympathy with its teachings, so that it is now the strongest church among them. They are sending out runners to the Yakimas east of the Cascade mountains, and expect before long to make an effort to convert that tribe.”
“The Indian is inclined to be weak, and to adopt the vices of the white man, but not his virtues. However, this is not true of the Shakers. They do not drink intoxicants of any kind, and make a special effort at all times to banish liquor. This is the strong element in their faith, and the one for which they fight hardest. They feel upon their honor in the matter, and contrast the members of their church at every place with those belonging to the other denominations—and it is too true that an Indian does not seem at all to be restrained from drink by belonging to the other churches as he does in the Shaker church. In the others he feels no personal interest. The honor of neither himself nor his people is involved, and if he disgraces himself it reflects, in his opinion, rather on the white man’s church. Not so with the Shakers. No white man belongs to their church, and it is their boast that no white preacher can keep his Indian members from drink as they can—and it is true. After their opposition to liquor, next comes gambling. From these two vices flow nearly all troubles to the Indian, and the Shakers are certainly successful in extinguishing their spread among the Indians. They make special war on drunkenness, gambling, and horse racing, and preach honesty, sobriety, temperance, and right living.”
“The Presbyterian church occupies a queer position, with regard to these people. The Reverend M. G. Mann has been the missionary to the Indians of Puget sound for many years, and has succeeded in making a very favorable impression upon them. He has been specially attentive to the Shakers, and, to his credit be it said, has never tried to coerce them, and has only dealt with them kindly. So far has this gone that Louis Yowaluch was long ago taken into the Presbyterian church, and is now an accredited elder therein. Louis does not know, seemingly, how to escape from his dual position, or rather does not seem to think that he needs to escape. It all seems to be for the best interest of his people, so he continues to occupy the position of elder in the Presbyterian church and headman of the Shaker church.”
“At a recent meeting of the Presbyterian ministers the position of these Shaker people was fully discussed, and the strongest language was used in saying only good about them, and every effort seems to be made by the Presbyterians to claim the Shakers in a body as members of the Presbyterian church. If this account were not already too long, the reports of the church on the subject would be quoted, but the fact speaks volumes for the character of the Shakers and their teaching.”
“In conclusion: I have known the Shaker people now intimately, as their attorney, for more than a year, and out of the many drunken Indians I have seen in that time not one was a Shaker. Not one of their people has been arrested for crime in that time. They are good citizens, and are far more temperate and peaceable than those Indians belonging to the other churches. I feel that their church is a grand success in that it prevents idleness and vice, drunkenness and disorder, and tends to produce quiet, peaceable citizens, and good Christian people. I think the Presbyterians make a mistake in trying to bring the Shakers into their fold—they ought rather to protect them and give them every assistance in their autonomy. It adds the greatest incentive to their labors, and makes them feel as if they were of some account. It lets them labor for themselves, instead of feeling, as always heretofore, that some one else—they hardly knew who—was responsible. Their forms of Christianity are not very unorthodox—their Christianity is quite orthodox, not exactly because they take Slocum’s revelation instead of the Bible, but the result is the same—a Christian.”
“James Wickersham.”
“Tacoma, Washington, June 25, 1893.”
From competent Indian informants of eastern Washington—Charles Ike, half-blood Yakima interpreter, and Chief Wolf Necklace of the Pä’lus, we gather additional particulars, from which it would appear that there are more things in the Shaker system than are dreamed of in the philosophy of the Presbyterian general assembly.
According to their statements, Yowaluch, or Ai-yäl, as he is known east of the Cascades, was noted as a gambler before he received his revelation. His followers are called Shäpupu-‛lĕma, or “blowers,” by the Yakima, from the fact that on meeting a stranger, instead of at once shaking hands with him in the usual manner, they first wave the hand gently in front of his face like a fan, and blow on him, in order to “blow away the badness” from him. They first appeared among the Yakima and other eastern tribes about six years ago, and are gradually gaining adherents, although as yet they have no regular time or place of assembly. They are much addicted to making the sign of the cross—the cross, it is hardly necessary to state, being as much an Indian as a Christian symbol—and are held in great repute as doctors, their treatment consisting chiefly of hypnotic performances over the patient, resulting in the spasmodic shaking already described. In doctoring a patient the “blowers” usually gather around him in a circle to the number of about twelve, dressed in a very attractive ceremonial costume, and each wearing on his head a sort of crown of woven cedar bark, in which are fixed two lighted candles, while in his right hand he carries a small cloth, and in the left another lighted candle. By fastening screens of colored cloth over the candles the light is made to appear yellow, white, or blue. The candle upon the forehead is yellow, symbolic of the celestial glory; that at the back of the head is white, typical of the terrestrial light, while the third is blue, the color of the sky.
Frequently also they carry in their hands or wear on their heads garlands of roses and other flowers of various colors, yellow, white, and blue being the favorite, which they say represent the colors of objects in the celestial world. While the leader is going through his hypnotic performance over the patient the others are waving the cloths and swinging in circles the candles held in their hands. In all this it is easy to see the influence of the Catholic ritual, with its censers, tapers, and flowers, with which these tribes have been more or less familiar for the last fifty years.
A single instance will suffice to show the methods of the blower doctors. The story is told from the Indian point of view, as related by the half-blood interpreter, who believed it all. About six years ago two of these doctors from the north, while visiting near Woodland on the Columbia, were called to the assistance of a woman who was seriously ill, and had received no benefit from the treatment of the native doctors. They came and almost immediately on seeing the patient announced to the relatives that the sickness had been put into her by the evil magic of a neighboring medicine-man, whom they then summoned into their presence. When the messenger arrived for him, the medicine-man refused to go, saying that the doctors were liars and that he had not made the woman ill. By their clairaudient power—or possibly by a shrewd anticipation of probabilities—the doctors in the other house knew of his refusal and sent another messenger to tell him that concealment or denial would not avail him, and that if he refused to come they would proceed to blow the sickness into his own body. Without further argument he accompanied the messengers to the sick woman’s house. As he entered, the chief doctor stepped up to him and looking intently into his face, said, “I can see your heart within your body, and it is black with evil things. You are not fit to live. You are making this woman sick, but we shall take out the badness from her body.” With the cloths and lighted candles the two doctors then approached the sick woman, and commanded her to arise, which she did, although she had been supposed to be too weak to stand. Waving the cloths in front of her with a gentle fanning motion, and blowing upon her at the same time, they proceeded to drive the disease out of her body, beginning at the feet and working upward until, as they approached the head the principal doctor changed the movement to a rapid fanning and corresponding blowing, while the assistant stood ready with his cloth to seize the disease when it should be driven out. All this time the medicine-man standing a few feet away was shaking and quivering like one in a fit, and the trembling became more violent and spasmodic as the doctors increased the speed of their motions. Finally the leader brought his hands together over the woman’s head, where, just as the disease attempted to escape, it was seized and imprisoned in the cloth held by his assistant. Then, going up to the medicine-man, with a few rapid passes they fanned the disease into his body and he fell down dead. The woman recovered, and with her sister has recently come up to the Yakima country as an apostle of the new religion, preaching the doctrines and performing the wonders which she has been taught by the Nisqually doctors.
This is the Indian story as told by the half-blood, who did not claim to have been an eye-witness, but spoke of it as a matter of common knowledge and beyond question. It is doubtless substantially correct. The hypnotic action described is the same which the author has repeatedly seen employed in the Ghost dance, resulting successively in involuntary trembling, violent spasmodic action, rigidity, and final deathlike unconsciousness. The Ghost dancers regard the process not only as a means of bringing them into trance communication with their departed friends, but also as a preventive and cure of disease, just as we have our faith healers and magnetic doctors. With the Indian’s implicit faith in the supernatural ability of the doctor, it is easy to suppose that the mental effect on the woman, who was told and believed that she was to be cured, would aid recovery if recovery was possible. It is unlikely that death resulted to the medicine-man. It is more probable that under the hypnotic spell of the doctors he fell unconscious and apparently lifeless and remained so perhaps for a considerable time, as frequently happens with sensitive subjects in the Ghost dance. The fact that the same process should produce exactly opposite effects in the two subjects is easily explainable. The object of the hypnotic performance was simply to bring the mind of the subject under the control of the operator. This accomplished, the mental, and ultimately the physical, effect on either subject was whatever the operator wished it to be. After bringing both under mental control in the manner described, he suggested recovery to the woman and sickness or death to the medicine-man, and the result followed.
Until the advent of these women from beyond the mountains such hypnotic performances seem to have been unknown among the Yakima and other eastern tribes of the Columbia region, the trance condition in the Smohalla devotees being apparently due entirely to the effect of the rhythmic dances and songs acting on excited imaginations, without the aid of blowing or manual passes.