II. THE EASTERN SHOSHONE
It is necessary to preface all discussions of Shoshone Indians with a clarification of what is implied by the names attached to Shoshone subgroups. The commonly used appellation "Wind River Shoshone" implies no more than reservation membership. Thus, we also have "Owyhee Shoshone" and "Fort Hall Shoshone" (and Bannock). Wind River residents of admitted descent from other groups are also referred to as "Wind River people," if they are on the agency rolls. They were, of course, not known by this name or a native equivalent in the pre-reservation period. The names, "Eastern Shoshones" and "Eastern Snakes," by which the Shoshone of Wyoming are also known in anthropology, were first consistently applied by government officials during the 1850's and 1860's (cf. Lander, 1860, p. 131; Head, 1868, p. 179; Mann, 1869, p. 616). Lander also referred to the Eastern Shoshone as the "Wash-i-kee band of the Snake Indians" (Lander, 1859, p. 66). This term came into common use after Chief Washakie rose to prominence in the eyes of the whites.
Previous to this period the Eastern Shoshone were called Snakes and Shoshones (or variations thereof), indiscriminately. As has been mentioned, the only firm distinction was made according to whether or not the Indians in question owned horses and hunted buffalo. Although Lewis and Clark never visited the Wyoming lands, the tribal lists which they compiled at Fort Mandan before pushing west mention a group, said by Clark to be "Snake," called the "Cas-ta-ha-na" or "Gens de Vache" (Lewis and Clark, 1904-06, 6:102). They were said to number 500 lodges having a population of about 5,000 people. The Shoshone identity of this people is somewhat obscured by Clark's report of an affinity between their language and that of the Minitaree, but, on the other hand, they were said to "rove on a S. E. fork of the Yellow Rock River called Big Horn, and the heads of the Loup" (ibid.). The "Cas-ta-ha-na" are mentioned also during the return trip of the expedition. Lewis and Clark noted of the Big Horn River: "It is inhabited by a great number of roving Indians of the Crow Nation, the paunch Nation (a band of Crows) and the Castahanas (a band of Snake In.)." The editor of the journals, Reuben Thwaites, identifies the latter as "Comanche." (Ibid., 5:297.)
The paucity of boundary nomenclature found in the historical sources is continued in the ethnographic data, for the food-area terminology used by the Nevada and Idaho Shoshone is even more diffusely applied in Wyoming. One old Nevada Shoshone woman referred to the Eastern Shoshone as Kwichundöka, while a native of Wind River referred to his people as Gwichundöka, slight phonetic variants of the common term meaning "Buffalo eaters." This name appears in Hoebel (1938, p. 413) as Kutsindika. Hoebel also reports that the Idaho Shoshone referred to the Wyoming people as Pohogani, "Sage Brush Home" and Kogohoii, "Gut Eaters" (ibid.). (Hoebel's terms are here anglicized.)
Whatever names may be applied to identify the Shoshone of Wyoming, none refer to any sort of political group maintaining a stable territory. As Shimkin says (1947a, p. 246):
The identification of the Wind River Shoshone and their territory is not a simple matter. It is complicated by several facts. These people had no developed national or tribal sense; affiliation was fluid. Nor did they distinguish themselves by a special name. They merely knew that others called them ... Sage Brushers, ... Sage Brush Homes, or ... Buffalo Eating People. Furthermore, they felt no clear-cut distinctions of private or tribal territories.
One may speak of an eastern population of Shoshone Indians, but it would be inaccurate to speak of one Eastern Shoshone band, despite the fact that leadership was better developed in Wyoming than in other parts of Shoshone territory.
It is doubtful whether there was any accurate estimate of the Eastern Shoshone population until the post-reservation period. Burton (1861, p. 575) cited the no doubt exaggerated figure of 12,000 for the population led by Washakie. Forney numbers the total Shoshone population at 4,500 in 1859 (1860a, p. 733), while Doty raised this to 8,650 in 1863 (1865, p. 320). The more reliable estimate of 1,600 Eastern Shoshone was given by Agent Mann in 1869 (1870, p. 715), after the establishment of the Wind River reservation. This number was later reduced to 1,250 in official reports (Patten, 1878, p. 646). Kroeber has estimated the Wind River Shoshone population at 2,500 (1939, p. 137). These figures are not representative of earlier periods, for the ravages of smallpox and other new diseases made heavy inroads on the pre-treaty population, and it is probable that the population at the time of the treaty did not greatly exceed 1,500.
EASTERN SHOSHONE HISTORY: 1800-1875
According to Shoshone tradition, the winter camps of the Eastern Shoshone were in the valley of the Wind River, and their hunting territory extended north to Yellowstone Park and Cody and east to the Big Horn Mountains and beyond South Pass. Little is said by informants of excursions west of the Continental Divide, although historical evidence suggests that this was actually once their principal hunting grounds. In partial support of this contention, Shimkin says (1947a, p. 247): "The historical evidence gives some weight to the assumption that in 1835-1840 the Shoshones were mostly west of the Wind River Mountains." He also notes that hostilities between the Shoshone and Crow resulted in the westward withdrawal of the former again in the 1850's (ibid.). In an earlier article Shimkin also stated (1938, p. 415):