return to City of Denver, etc.
CHAPTER I.
THE UTE REBELLION.
SINCE the preceding page were written, Colorado has been convulsed by a sudden,
unexpected and causeless uprising of the
Utes.
Strictly speaking, only a portion of the tribe participated in the outbreak; but
the confederated bands of Colorado are so intermingled by marriage and bound
together by so many ties of consanguinity and interest that it would be hard to
dissociate the innocent from the guilty, and a war upon the White River Utes,
the band directly responsible for the outbreak, would almost inevitably result
in drawing the whole tribe into the conflict, sooner or later. [Utah
History to Go,
Northern Ute Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Ute Reservation of Utah,
People of the Colorado Plateau-The Ute Indians,
Chronology of the Ute Tribe,
Ute Indians - Family Search.org,
The story of the outbreak has been so graphically told in the
journals of the day throughout the country that there seems to be no present
demand for an authentic history; but, on the other hand, now is the time to
summarize the whole wretched business for the enlightenment of future
generations. The bloody incidents of the campaign and the fatal blunders of the
"powers that be" in dealing with the red-handed murderers are all fresh in the
minds of our people, and it is not impossible that a calm review of the matter
may aid the public in arriving at some correct conclusions on the vexed question
of Indian management, at least as far as the Colorado Utes are concerned.
It was stated at the outset that the rebellion was causeless.
In some sense, the accusation is well founded; but away back in the past history
of the Utes may be found some shadowy excuses for their ingratitude and
treachery to Agent Meeker and the Agency employes [sic], to say nothing of the
Thornburg massacre, which, no doubt, seemed a proper thing for Captain Jack and
his warriors. As between the Utes and the Indian Bureau, the people of Colorado
think there is not much room to choose.
A few years ago, the writer was conducting a daily newspaper in
Denver, the policy of which was by no means friendly to the Utes; but, for a
time, its columns were devoted to the unpleasant task of showing how Indian
affairs were mismanaged in Colorado. It was no secret then that our people
feared the worst results from the state of affairs at the Northern Agency. They
could not have been much worse. All the supplies for the White River Indians
were at Rawlings, warehoused at Government expense, awaiting transportation.
Nothing had been done toward getting the supplies from the railway to the
Agency, and nothing was done for many months. The Indians were simply
destitute. They had neither provisions nor clothing. In their despair, they
went to Rawlings, where a train load of clothing, provisions and annuity goods
were stored, and which should have been distributed long before; but the meshes
of "red tape" entangled them, and not a pound of flour nor an article of
clothing could be issued at that point.
Rev. B. F. Crary, Presiding Elder of the Methodist Conference
for Northern Colorado and Wyoming, made a thorough investigation of the matter,
and wrote some stinging articles upon the subject which were printed in the
newspapers of the day; but the goods still rotted in the warehouse, and the
Indians went hungry and naked. For a wonder, however, they did not murder the
Agent and go upon the war path. Indian nature is an anomaly.
While the White River Utes were suffering from the neglect and
general incompetency of the Indian Bureau, the Southern or Uncompahgre Indians
were being treated to a mild manifestation of financial repudiation on the part
of the parental Government at Washington. By the Brunot Treaty, the Southern
Utes surrendered the San Juan country for a valuable consideration, the money to
be invested for their benefit and the interest to be paid for their use. There
was never any reason why this interest should not have been paid. The Indians
grumbled a good deal, of course, as they had a right to do; but Chief Ouray's
clear head and guiding hand prevented serious trouble. Colorado owes so much to
this Indian statesman that the debt bids fair to remain uncanceled.
But an Indian never forgets or forgives an injury, and all
these slights and injustices were treasured up against a day of reckoning with
the whites. All whites are the same to all Indians. If a horse-thief steals an
Indian pony, the Indian gets even with the first white man whose stock is
attainable. If the Indian Bureau fails to furnish supplies, the Indian forages
on the white settlers, begging what he can and stealing the rest. An Indian
with a grievance is worse than a bear with a sore head. He is never quite
satisfied with any atonement, vicarious or indirect. Indeed, his grievance
grows by what it feeds on of that character, and the more he is placated the
more implacable he becomes. That was Father Meeker's error, perhaps.
Still, in the main, the Government was good to the Utes. They
got cattle and sheep and ponies, and these multiplied amazingly, until now the
tribe is rich in flocks and herds, and their principal occupation, as well as
their favorite amusement, is horse-racing. As befits the "true lords of the
soil," they toil not, neither do they spin, nor labor with aught but their
jaws. Latterly, too, they have been well fed and well clothed. Their Agents
have been scrupulously careful to give them no just cause for complaint, having
good reason to fear an outbreak if they did so, for the Utes have been growing
more and more dissatisfied of late, and more imperious and unjust in their
demands. Yet, while they were well-treated no one looked for a rebellion, and
the massacre at Milk Creek and White River was as great a surprise to the people
of Colorado as it was to the Indian Bureau itself.
Mr. Meeker had been in charge of White River Agency since early
in 1878. [White
River Agency] He found matters in bad shape when he reached his post of
duty; but, by determined effort and untiring industry, he soon brought order out
of chaos, and made the Indians more comfortable than they had been for years.
Mr. Meeker was eminently a man of affairs, highly educated, intelligent,
thoroughly honest and conscientious withal, so that his treatment of the savages
would have been strictly just, even if he had not been a lifelong devoted friend
of the Indian. As it was, he was enthusiastic in his devotion to the Indians,
and did everything in his power to promote their interests. Bred in the
humanitarian school of Horace Greeley, whose colleague he had been on the New
York Tribune, and in the Greeley Colony, of Colorado, Mr. Meeker -- or
Father Meeker, as he was almost universally known -- was the last man who would
or could have been suspected of imposing upon the wards of the Government, in
any particular. Yet it appeared during the spring of 1879 that Father Meeker
was making poor headway with his Indians, and, later on, it became evident that
he had lost all control over them. They wandered away from the Agency, making
mischief as they went; and on being remonstrated with and threatened with the
Agent's displeasure, they paid no attention to threats or remonstrances.
During the summer months, numerous depredations were reported
as having been committed by the White River Utes, while off their reservation.
Forest fires were started by them in every direction, burning away millions of
acres of timber and frightening the game out of the country. Property was
stolen or destroyed, and at least two houses, on Bear River, were burned by
renegade Utes from Mr. Meeker's Agency. Mr. Meeker did what he could to keep
his Indians at home, and appealed to the Government and military to restrain the
depredating Indians. Nothing came of his appeals. When a white man
accidentally crosses the line of an Indian reservation, he may expect to find a
cordon of United States bayonets surrounding him and soldiery enough to escort
him back; but marauding Indians, off their reservation, burning hay and houses
and forests, find nothing in the way of their enjoyment, unless the
long-suffering settlers rise to protect their rights.
Immediately following the outbreak at White River, came the
customary cry in the Eatern humanitarian press that the Utes were fighting to
protect themselves against the aggressions of white settlers; that the latter
were overrunning the reservation against the will of the Indians, and the latter
were forced to fight or fly. No baser calumny was ever printed against any
people. The reverse was true. The white settlers were forced to flee from
Routt and Grand Counties because they could not live near the reservation. The
insolent Utes were master of the whole northwestern country, far outside of
their reservation.
In the mean time, a curious thing happened, or, at least, a
thing that would have seemed curious had it related to any other people than the
noble red men of the mountains. At the very moment when these Utes were almost
in open rebellion, they began to find fault with Agent Meeker and to ask his
removal, not because he was incompetent or dishonest; not because he was trying
to make them behave themselves; not for any of the many stock reasons the
Indians have for becoming dissatisfied with their agents, but only because he
was carrying out the humanitarian idea of treating the Indians well and
instructing them in letters and the arts of peace.
On this point, there can be no doubt, whatever, for the
testimony of the Utes themselves is conclusive upon the question. About two
months before the massacre, Gov. Pitkin was visited at Denver by four chiefs
from White River -- Capt. Jack, Sahwitz, Musisco and Unkumgood -- who came on a
mission in behalf of the tribe, said mission being to secure the removal of
Agent Meeker through the influence of Gov. Pitkin. The Governor gave them two
audiences, each lasting two or three hours, and listened to all their
complaints. Press reporters were also present and noted carefully what was said
on both sides. Capt. Jack, who afterward led the attack on Maj. Thornburg, was
the spokesman of the Utes, his command of the English language being sufficient
to make him easily understood. He talked a good deal about one thing and
another, but at no time did he ever intimate that the Indians were not well
clothed, well fed and well cared for, or that the whites were making
encroachments on the reservation. Neither did he complain about the nonpayment
of interest due, or any other neglect to deal justly with the Indians. The
burden of his complaint was humanitarianism. He had a holy Indian horror of
hard work, and the strongest possible prejudice against education. The Agent
was teaching school and plowing land -- two unpardonable sins, according to
Jack's decalogue. Jack also had some fault to find with minor details of
management at the Agency, none of which in the least affected the condition of
his tribe; and he was also very severe on Chief Ouray, whose authority he openly
denied and defied. When asked if he and his associates would consent to let the
white men dig gold on the reservation, his refusal was prompt and vigorous, and
gave undoubted evidence that the prospector who set foot across the line would
almost certainly find it a veritable dead-line. At that time, however, no one
supposed that the hostility of the Indians to Agent Meeker would lead them to
murder him and his associates, and little attention was paid to the trivial
complaints of the White River delegation, though their visit was duly reported
to the proper authorities at Washington and elsewhere.
pp. 122-124.