Lyman's History of old Walla Walla County, Vol. 1 / Embracing Walla Walla, Columbia, Garfield and Asotin counties

by William Denison Lyman

We had our next encounter with the Indians at Wells Springs between Willow Creek and Butter Creek. We camped there for the night—in the morning we had just gotten out of camp when we began to see Indians—Indians in every direction, in squads of ten and fifty, just coming thick. There were enough of them to eat up our little band of three hundred. We went only about a mile and a half when Col. Gilliam called a halt and we began preparations for a fight.

It was estimated over one thousand Indians were on the ground. A party of chiefs came out and called for a talk. Col. Gilliam, Tom McKay, Charlie McKay and Mungo, the interpreter, went out to meet them. When they met it was learned there were Indians from all the northern tribes besides the Cayuses. There were Coeur d'Alenes, Flatheads, Pend d'Oreilles and Spokanes.

The Cayuses had sent runners to all the different tribes telling them the Whites in Oregon had killed all the Catholics and Hudson's Bay men who were friends to these Northern Indians—they told them they had killed Tom McKay, their best friend, and were now coming to kill them and take their country. But when an old chief met the commission, he saw and recognized old Tom McKay and knew then they had been deceived and asked an explanation.

When Tom McKay, who was intimately acquainted with those northern Indians, and whose influence over them exceeded that of any other man in the country, told them the true story and that they were only up there to punish the murderers of Dr. Whitman and people, the old Flathead chief promised to take no part and to draw off all except the Cayuses. When the haughty Cayuse chief, named Grey Eagle, heard this he was so enraged he turned on McKay and said, "I'll kill you, Tom McKay," and drew his gun to fire, but McKay was too quick for him and fired first, killing the chief.

Grey Eagle was a great medicine man, and had boasted he could swallow all the bullets fired at him and McKay shot him in the mouth. As the Indians turned to run, Charlie McKay shot Five Crows, breaking his arm, but he escaped. It will be remembered he was the Indian who held captive a girl from the Mission. Five Crows, however, shot the powder horn off McKay, so you can see they were in pretty close quarters.

We boys gave McKay great credit for the service he done us—for our little band of three hundred looked pretty small compared with the foe.

Now, the battle was fairly on. The Northern Indians drew off on a hill and the Cayuses made a dash on us, about six hundred strong, all well mounted, riding in a circle and firing whenever a chance came. The Indians never left their horses—if they dismounted, the horse was fastened to the rider. When an Indian was killed we would always find the horse standing by his fallen rider, usually tied by the hair rope to his wrist.

(The horse rode by Grey Eagle was a beautiful gray, and McKay's son Alec rode him many years.) The fight lasted the whole day long—that cannon that had caused so much vexation of spirit was of but little use, as the Indians scattered so—it was fired a few times at a squad of Indians at long range—it served more to terrorize them than to kill, as it made a tremendous noise and they no doubt thought it great medicine. It was an impressive sight to see those hundreds of Northern Indians, splendidly mounted and armed after the Indian fashion, sitting on their horses at one side all day long, watching the progress of the fight. What a picture that would have made!

We camped that night on the battleground, but the next morning the Indians were gone. I think neither side could claim a victory. As we traveled that day Indians kept in sight all day, but did not interfere with us until we reached the Mission at Waiilatpu, where we performed the sad duty of gathering up the remains of the martyrs and burying them. We found parts of bodies lying around, scattered about. We found a skull with a tomahawk wound in it—we supposed it was that of Mrs. Whitman. We also found locks of her beautiful yellow hair in the yard. It was taken to Oregon City and placed among the Oregon State Documents.

We made a sort of stockade by building a wall breast high of adobe from the old buildings—also built a corral for the horses by placing rails end in the ground, and corraled the horses every night and guarded them by day. We slaughtered what cattle we could find and jerked the meat so we would have supplies in case we were corraled by the Indians. We subsisted on Indian and Mission cattle—no bread.