The main body of his troops having arrived on the 27th, he started with 130 of his best mounted men, crossed Des Chutes, and ascended on its east or right bank. On the 28th, he sent forward Major Lee with twenty men to find the Indians, they all having fled from their usual encampments. At twelve o’clock at night, Major Lee returned, having found the Indians, and made the following report, which we give in Major Lee’s own language. He says:—
“We proceeded this morning up the river some twenty miles, when we discovered a considerable party of Indians with their families, removing across the plains, and evidently to station themselves higher up the cañon, which was close by. We charged upon them, killed one, took two females prisoners, and several horses; the rest escaped into the cañon, which was close by. Expecting a large war party out immediately, we hastened toward camp with the prisoners, but had not proceeded far when we discovered a large party of mounted Indians making after us with all possible speed; we rode down into a small cañon, turned our horses loose below us, and prepared for battle,—the Indians by this time all around us on the hills, tumbling down huge stones in our midst, and annoying us much with their savage yells, some with their arms. We were fighting some two or three hours, killed and wounded, I suppose, some six or eight, as they took care to keep at a respectful distance. They drew no blood from us, and got only in return for their loss their horses which we had taken, with four or five of ours that went out with them, unperceived, through a small cañon, during the engagement. We have all returned safe, though much fatigued.”
On the 29th of this month the whole of the camp moved to the mouth of the cañon, at the Meek crossing. On the 30th, ten A. M., as they entered the mouth of the cañon, the Indians appeared on the hills immediately above, drawn up in order of battle, to about their own number. The colonel ordered his horses and train to a safe position under a strong guard, dismounted his men, ascended the hill, drove and killed, as was supposed, some twenty or thirty Indians, with but one man (a Spaniard) slightly wounded, capturing forty horses, four head of cattle, and three hundred dollars’ worth of personal property, which the colonel had sold to the regiment, and credited to the paymaster, amounting to fourteen hundred dollars. Mr. Brown, first lieutenant, 5th company, died at Vancouver. The skirmishing and battle with the Des Chutes Indians brought them to terms, and a treaty of peace was made with them. The army was re-enforced by the arrival of Captain McKay’s company of British subjects, as claimed by a writer in the Spectator, of February 24, 1848, who says:—
“The party consisted of two Canadians, fifty or sixty half-breeds,—all British subjects,—and two or three American citizens, while there is not a single Frenchman in it. It is due to the British subjects, Canadians, and half-breeds, to state, that many more would have gone, but, they know well, that winter is not the time, in this country, to go to war, and that all that can be done at this season is, to rescue the prisoners, which could be effected only by negotiation, and acquire correct information, and make all preparations necessary, so as to be able to act with the propriety, decorum, and energy which the case required.
“Veritas.”
By the statements of “Veritas,” the feelings of the British subjects in our midst, at that time, can be seen. He evidently wished to claim credit for the British and half-breed subjects, who, in the operations of the provisional army, were found to be, to use no harsher term, a nuisance in the American camp, keeping the Indians and murderers well informed as to all the movements of the army, so that while they were permitted to remain, no movement of the army produced any satisfactory results.
This statement is made upon the verbal information given to us at the time, as well as from personal knowledge, and a letter of Colonel Waters to Governor Abernethy, under date, Wailatpu, April 4, 1848, in the Spectator, April 20, 1848. The colonel says of the Indians, “They know our circumstances about as well as we do ourselves, both as regards ammunition and provisions, and it need not be thought strange if they act accordingly.”
Soon after the re-enforcement of this provisional army by Captain T. McKay’s British subjects, there was a general engagement or battle. It commenced while the army was on the march in the open rolling prairie, between Mud Spring and the Umatilla. Nicholas Finlay, of the Whitman-massacre notoriety, met the scouts and officers, and while there was a consultation, or parley, it appears he prolonged it, to give time for the main body of the Indians to surround the troops; he then turned his horse, rode a short distance toward a party of Indians, and discharged his gun in the air, as a signal to commence the attack, while the peace commissioners were attempting to effect a compromise.
At Finlay’s signal, from five to seven hundred Indian warriors appeared on the plains all about them, with from two to three hundred Indian camp-followers, as spectators, all on horseback, consisting of boys and women, who had come to see the slaughter, and gather up the property that the Americans were going to throw down and run from, as soon as Nicolas Finlay fired his gun, and the warriors raised the yell. But instead of this, Colonel Gilliam, as soon as Finlay made his appearance, and other Indians were seen in the distance, ordered a hollow square to be formed to protect his train and cattle, and by the time the Indians were ready, he was, and the fight commenced, a sort of running, dashing, and, on the part of the Indians, retreating performance. There being no water near the place where the attack was commenced, it became necessary to continue upon the march, and they drove the Indians before them, till they reached water at night. By this time the Indians found that the Bostons were not all clochemen (women), as they had been told by the “British half-breeds.”
A stranger would naturally conclude from the accounts published in the Spectator at that time, that the company under Captain T. McKay did all the fighting on this occasion. They, we infer from the printed account as given in C. McKay’s letter, made some gallant dashes in true Indian style, and as prudent retreats back to the protection of the “Boston men,” making a great show of bravery and fight, without much effect. At the close of this demonstration, the Indians retired in their usual confused manner, while the Americans moved on to find water and a camp for the night. They continued their march till they reached Fort Waters, at Wailatpu.
At this place the commissioners called for the principal chiefs of all friendly tribes to meet them, to have a big talk. In this council, one Cayuse war-chief, Camaspelo, and two of the lower grade of the Nez Percés,—Joseph and Red Wolf,—with several prominent Indians of the Nez Percés, were present, and received the commissioners with the governor’s letter, and made the speeches hereafter given.