More Indian Fighting.

Interesting Letter.

Indian Battle.

From the Southern Mines--Indian Hostilities--47 Killed.
(From Cram, Rogers & Co.'s Express.)

    SAVAGES.--The Oregonian of the last dates mentions a fight at Tule Lake, between a party of Indians and a company of troops under the command of Capt. Benj. Wright, and that forty of the former were killed. The paper adds, without comment, that the scalps of the Indians were brought in by the soldiers. In this case it would be difficult to say which party were savages.--Cin. Atlas.
    Not difficult at all. "A company of troops under the command of Capt. Benj. Wright" savages? Preposterous! Were they not brought up in a Christian land? and set out by a Christian government? They savages? The Indians, who defend their fires and hunting grounds, are savages. What right have they to scalps?--Columbus Columbian.
Kalida Venture, Kalida, Ohio, March 11, 1853, page 2


    SIR: It is with extreme regret that I report the probable murder, by Indians, of 1st Lieutenant Edmund Russell, 4th infantry. I have received no official report of this event, but a statement has reached this city through the papers that Lieutenant Russell had been sent with a small command by Brevet Colonel [George] Wright from Fort Reading to punish some marauding Indians; that he had captured several whom he disarmed and was proceeding in pursuit of others when his prisoners seized an opportunity while he was separated a short distance from his men and killed him with clubs and arrows.
    An Indian war may be said to exist on the upper waters of the Sacramento, extending many miles to the north and east beyond Yreka over 150 miles from Fort Reading. In making this report I cannot forbear stating that I have received similar information through two separate channels, making it probable that an inextinguishable desire of vengeance towards the whites exists along that border. A party of citizens under the conduct of Captain Ben Wright last fall massacred over thirty Indians out of forty-eight, who had come into Captain Wright's camp by invitation to make a "peace." Lieutenant Williamson, topographical engineers, and Captain Miller, assistant quartermaster, have each informed me of substantially the same particulars, derived by them from separate individuals of Captain Wright's party, to the effect that Captain Wright determined not to return to Yreka without bearing some evidence of success in his expedition against the Indians, and having failed to find them by hunting for them he invited them into his camp by means of a squaw. Upon this invitation forty-eight Indians came to his camp, and while there Captain Wright directed his men to charge their rifles afresh to make a sure fire, which was done in presence of the Indians without exciting their suspicion, and then, upon a signal indicated by Captain Wright, they suddenly fired upon the Indians and succeeded in killing about thirty-eight. The signal was the discharge of a revolver by Captain Wright, by which he killed the two principal Indians with whom he had been engaged in talk. Captain Wright returned to Yreka, which place the papers state he entered in triumph, his men bearing on their rifles the scalps of the Indians, and was received with a general welcome by the citizens of the town. Captain Wright reported that he had demanded of the Indians a return of stolen property, and on their refusal to deliver it up he had thus punished them.
    I state these particulars as I have heard them from what I suppose to be a reliable source, in order to explain the probabilities of an exterminating war on that frontier. The country belongs to the district to the command of which Brevet Colonel Wright has been assigned with two companies of dragoons and two of infantry. A third company of infantry has been ordered to the district from Columbia barracks; with this force everything will be done called for by the condition of things.
    To give security along the route of travel between Fort Reading and Yreka I have directed Colonel Wright to establish a system of dragoon escorts of which the citizens can avail themselves.
    I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
Colonel S. COOPER,
    Adjutant General U.S. Army, City of Washington, D.C.
Ex. Doc. 76, 34th Congress, 3rd session, 1857, pages 78-79


    My knowledge of the character and disposition of the Modoc Indians dates back to the autumn of 1851, when with Captain Ben Wright, and other citizens of Yreka (then called Shasta Butte City), I went into the Klamath Lake, or Modoc country, in pursuit of some two hundred head of stock, which had been driven off from Shasta Valley by the Modoc Indians. We went as far as Lost River, one hundred miles from Yreka, and succeeded in getting only about thirty-four head; the balance the Indians had either killed or got them off the trail, where we could not track them. Our party had several skirmishes with the Indians, as we passed along our route, killing about thirty of their number. Two of our company were severely wounded, but finally recovered.
    In August, A.D. 1852, immediately after the first train of emigrants had arrived at Yreka, over very nearly the same route we had traveled after the stock the year previous, a man came into Yreka, from the country of the Modocs, stating that the Indians there were very hostile, and that he was the only one out of a party of eight or nine, who had packed across the plains, that had escaped the Indians; and that he saved himself only by cutting the pack from one of his horses, mounting him without saddle or equipments, and charging through the Indian forces. This occurred at a place called "Bloody Point," on the east side of Tule Lake, and in the immediate neighborhood of Lost River.
    Immediately upon the reception of these tidings at Yreka, Capt. Ben Wright, since murdered by Indians near the mouth of Rogue River, enrolled a company of volunteers, of which I was chosen first lieutenant. We left Yreka on the 29th day of August, and making forced marches, soon arrived in the heart of the hostile country.
    On our arrival at Tule Lake, we met a train of sixteen wagons, and somewhere between forty and sixty persons. This party had been attacked by the Indians, and had fought them for several hours near the place where the party of packers were killed, of which we had heard the news at Yreka. The Indians had them completely surrounded, leaving no possible chance for escape.
    As soon, however, as our company had got within about a quarter of a mile from where they were then fighting, the Indians withdrew into the lake, which is shallow, full of small islands, its borders and islands thickly covered with tule, affording secure hiding places for them, either when laying in ambush, or when pursued.
    Captain Wright, seeing the Indians taking to their canoes, and pushing out into the lake, ordered a charge, which order was promptly executed. We fought them for about three hours, when night coming on, we retired. Many of us fought in water up to our armpits. In this engagement, we must have killed as many as thirty or thirty-five of the enemy. The Indians themselves say we killed twenty. Our company sustained no loss whatever.
    On our way to where the train was attacked and where it still remained, we found the body of a man in the tule, which had evidently been there several days. The coyotes and birds had torn off much of the flesh. We gave it as decent a burial as was in our power to do, and then proceeded on to the train. Here we found the emigrants nearly exhausted, from the effects of their recent engagement, and that they could not possibly have held out much longer, as they had but few guns, and were withal becoming short of ammunition. A man by the name of Freeman Hathorne was severely wounded. I believe there was but one woman with the train. We camped at this place overnight, and next morning found the bodies, as we supposed, of the first party of emigrants killed, and also the bodies of Coats, Ormsby and Long, who had left Yreka about three weeks before, to meet some friends whom they expected to arrive by this route. With these bodies there was also the body of a packer, who had been dispatched to the settlements to procure supplies for a train that were becoming destitute.
    During this and the next day, we found and buried twenty-one bodies making--with the one found in the tule, the day previous--twenty-two.
    We also found various articles of women and children's clothing, etc., indicating that entire families had been massacred. We found the body of but one female, however; we were all of the opinion that more had been killed or taken captives. In one of the Indian rancherias, we found the hair from a woman's head, shorn close. A detachment of our company saw an emigrant wagon, belonging to some of the murdered party, some distance off the road. I saw the tracks of two wagons, going in opposite directions; one to the northward, and the other to the south, towards the country of the Pit River Indians.
    Our company remained in the hostile Indian country about three months, traversing the road between Klamath and Clear lakes, furnishing each train with a sufficient escort, over the most dangerous part of the road, until all had passed through safely. We saw the Indians daily watching our movements, but they generally kept a respectful distance from the road; and I am glad to say, did not get an opportunity to slake their thirst with the blood of any of that portion of the emigration that passed through their country during our term of service.
    We had only light and occasional skirmishes with the Indians after we relieved the train at "Bloody Point," until the morning we left the Indian country for home, when we had a smart engagement, in which we killed about forty of them; impressing upon the minds of the balance, no doubt, the opinion that we had avenged the wrongs their tribes had committed towards the whites, at least during that season. In this affair we had two men, Poland and Sanbanch, severely wounded.
    We returned to Yreka, bringing our wounded on litters, rudely constructed, and were there discharged, on the 29th day of November, having been in active service just three months. The state of California has long since recognized and provided for this service--so that I have no claim whatever on this score, nor have I any claim, or claims, or interest in any claim, or claims, growing out of any volunteer service subsequently rendered, either in Northern California, or Southern Oregon, or on any of the emigrant routes leading to this coast.
    I served in the Rogue River war, of 1853, but that service has been paid by the United States.
    From my own personal knowledge of the treacherous character of the Modoc and other Indians in their vicinity, and their hostile disposition towards the whites, I freely affirm that a military force has been actually necessary in their region of country, for the protection of life and property, whenever an emigration from the eastward has passed through it.
    There is at the present time, I believe, a sort of pledge of honor given by the Modocs, that they will neither kill nor molest any more whites; but unless they are carefully and judiciously dealt with, and a competent agent sent among them, and located there, who can command their confidence and respect, I can have no faith that a peaceful relationship between them and the whites can long exist.
    What is true too, of the Modocs, in this respect, is also true of the Pit Rivers, and the Piutes.
    I make this statement at the solicitation of parties who hold just claims growing out of the service rendered under Captain Jesse Walker, of the Oregon Volunteers, in 1854, on the Southern Oregon emigrant road.
Proceedings of the Council of the Legislative Assembly of Oregon Territory, 1857, pages 59-62  Also printed in "Oregon and Washington Volunteers," House of Representatives 35th Congress, 2nd Session, Misc. Doc. No. 47, pages 41-43


    INTERESTING TO SISKIYOU VOLUNTEERS.--We are glad to perceive that the bill for the payment of volunteers under Captains Wright and McDermott, reported back on the 22nd by Senator Sprague from the Committee on Indian Affairs, passed the Senate on the 24th ult.--ayes 11, noes 11; the Lieut. Governor voting in the affirmative. The bill appropriates a sum not exceeding $23,000 for this purpose. These volunteers spent much time and money in a most dangerous and arduous service in defending the immigrants last fall against the Indians on the northeast frontier, and deserve a fair compensation from the state.
Shasta Courier, Shasta City, California, April 2, 1853, page 2


    We are informed by Mr. Horsley, of Cram, Rogers & Co.'s Express, that two companies of infantry from Benicia left Shasta City for Rogue River Valley on Monday last--one of which, Lt. Bates' company, is detained near the Tower House, on account of the sickness of several of the soldiers. The other company, under the command of Col. Wright, he passed at the foot of the Trinity Mountain on the south side. They will probably arrive at Fort Jones on Sunday next, where it is thought they will recruit a few days and then proceed to Rogue River Valley.
Mountain Herald, Yreka, September 17, 1853, page 2


    The reason of our being sent here was that the year previous several emigrant trains had been attacked by the Indians in this region and several persons killed. A volunteer force had spent the summer here and by their atrocities towards the Indians did not assist much in fostering a good feeling between the Indians and whites. One of their acts is the following--They invited the Indians in to make a treaty, promising them food whilst at the camp. The whites had cattle killed for them and impregnated the meat with strychnine, intending to poison those who had come to make the treaty. An Oregon Indian who was with the whites, it seems, was less of the savage than his white brethren [and] informed the Indians of what was going on, and they refused to take the meat. The whites then watched their opportunity and fell upon the Indians whilst sitting around the council fire, and cruelly butchered them. This when they had been invited to make a treaty--so it goes.
"Letter from California," Burlington Weekly Telegraph, Burlington, Iowa, June 2, 1854, page 1  The author is likely Lt. Thomas F. Castor, Company A, 1st Dragoons.


Dear Sir
    Having heard nothing from you since I left Dayton, although I should have written sooner myself, but had neglected until now, I did not see Mr. Parrish on his return. As I understand he sent by way of Scottsburg and I came by, or down Coquille, but I think it would be better for him to return soon, as there is likely to be difficulty again with the Chetco Indians; so I have learned from both whites and Indians. Both parties say that there has been three Indians killed. They say some of the Illinois or Deer Creek Indians had come down on the coast and joined the Chetcos. The Indians also say that there is some of them in their country.
    I see one of the chiefs from Chetco, their head chief having been killed, they came right to me wishing me to advise them what course to pursue. The only advice I could give them was to keep out of the way of the whites and not fight them. As they said, they had been governed entirely by what I had before told them, which was to take to the mountains when the whites commenced killing them. The Indians' story runs thus: Some five or six of them went into the house of a settler where there was some three or four men drinking or drunk. The Indians, being unarmed and not suspecting danger, entered the house and the men drew their revolvers and the scene commenced. The Indians fled, leaving three of their number, and ask me what they should do, and all I can say to them is to keep out of the way.
    Such is the yarn the Indians tell, yet it may not be as they state it. From what I have learned from the whites, they say the Indians threatened to kill some of the settlers. I will learn the particulars and inform you. I took the responsibility of advising in the matter and shall probably start in the morning myself on my own responsibility, as I have seen Lieut. Kautz and he cannot attend to the matter on account of business and also considered it foreign from his duty, when he had duty of his own to perform. I shall do nothing more than investigate the matter as lightly as I can and keep all parties concerned at peace until the arrival of a higher power, but if [I] see there is likely to be difficulty and it is in my power to prevent it I shall merely watch the matter, and if it needs attention, act, and shall always and with discretion and do all in my power to keep peace at all times. Such is the only principle which I shall act upon and hope it will meet your approbation. With this exception there is at present peace throughout the district.
    I expect an answer soon, and will then inform you what I do if anything.
Genl. Joel Palmer
NARA Series M2, Microcopy of Records of the Oregon Superintendency of Indian Affairs 1848-1872, Reel 5; Letter Book D, pages 70-71.  A copy can be found on NARA Series M234, Letters Received by the Office of Indian Affairs, Reel 608 Oregon Superintendency 1853-1855, frames 1046-1047.


Sir
    I received my appointment dated Sept. 14th, also forms of the 14th October, and would have written before this but have been absent on the arrival of the steamer going up and have neglected until now on that account. Since I have received your first, I have been busily engaged in investigating matters in this district, which has consumed all my time, but have at last succeeded, and everything goes on well at present.
    The Indians have been having some difficulty among themselves in relation to their women. First the Quartoes and Yah-shutes, which resulted in wounding slightly one Indian. This happened some two weeks before I received my appointment. They have tried since to have another meeting of the same nature, but I interfered and it resulted in an amicable settlement. About the same time a difficulty arose between the Euchres and Tututni bands which commenced thus: Two Indians of the Euchre band went at night and fired into a lodge in the Tututni village, killing one woman belonging to that band. The next day the Tututni band went in search of the party, found and killed them, which was likely to bring the two bands together in a war, but I arrived in time to prevent it, and made them settle the affair amicably according to their own custom, which is now satisfactory to all parties.
    When I visited Chetco I found things in a bad state; the Indians were scattered and living in great fear, and driven from their fisheries. I talked with the whites concerning it, one of which was Mr. Miller. He said that they were all willing that the Indians should come back, which I induced them to do. I also told them to rebuild their houses and prepare for winter, which they set about doing. Mr. Miller is quite a different man. He offers to assist them in building, or anything else they may desire, and defend them to the last. He says they have been shamefully treated, "but it is not his fault," and I find everyone speaks well of him except those who were against him before, which in my opinion was for private reasons to injure him. His enemies was all who did speak at that time, which there is only one left, a Mr. Tuttle, who is certainly the meanest man in existence, he being the person to have Miller arrested, and then committed a worse deed than ever has been done in the country before or since. I will give you the case as related by Mr. Miller and others. There was an Indian from Illinois Valley, belonging to Mr. Culver's district, came on a visit, being related to the Chetco Indians, and was stopping with them for a time, stole a powder horn belonging to Mr. Tuttle. They caught the Indian and whipped him. Shortly after a friend of the Indian who was whipped from Illinois Valley went to the house of Mr. Tuttle's in company with two Chetco Indians, one of which was a chief. When they arrived at the house, Mr. Tuttle said that the Illinois Valley Indian had threatened to kill him, and he intended to kill him, and closed the door and commenced disarming them. Mr. James Haggart, being present, told Mr. Tuttle not to kill the Chetco Indians, when Mr. Tuttle replied that he intended to kill them all. The Chetco chief started to follow Mr. Haggart out and Mr. Tuttle pushed him back and remarked, "You d----d old rascal, you have got to die, too," and did kill them all after disarming them. The Indians did not offer to resort, but fled to the hills, and came to see me to know what to do. At the time 1 had no authority to do anything, and the matter rests in that way.
    The Indians say they are content if I say so, but I intend visiting them again shortly with authority to do something for them if possible. It is my opinion that the most of the Indians in this district will be short of provisions if it should be a hard winter, as the rain fell early, in the midst of their fishing season, destroying all their dams and fisheries on the rivers. They also have not the same number of canoes, and not the same perseverance which they formerly had. They devote too much of their time among the whites, working for clothing and articles of not so much value as provisions to them, but you cannot get them them to look forward--only for the present; every day provides for itself is their doctrine.
    I shall endeavor to do the best I can, and obey your instructions, and exercise my own judgment when required. I have employed my whole time in seeing to the Indians since my return from the valley or your place. When I received my appointment, by the instruction of F. M. Smith I came to Port Orford, rented a house, and took all the government stores and property belonging to the Department that I could find, and am living in the house and attending to my duty as well as I can. I am always ready in a few moments' warning to make a trip to any part of the district when required. Such is the course I have pursued up to this time, which remains for you to say whether I have done right or not.
    I find an Indian agent has no credit in this town with what few persons there is left, though the place is nearly deserted at present. I am frequently asked the question when the Department intends paying their old debts contracted by Mr. Parrish.
    You must tell me when I am required to make out my report, and all concerning such matters as that which I am not posted up in. The rougher work I am best capable of doing, but am willing to try my hand at anything, but as far as peace between the whites and Indians is concerned, that shall be, and is, what I consider of most importance, although a little funds to distribute among the citizens of this district on old accounts is needed, but that is your own business, not mine.
Genl. Joel Palmer
    Superintendent
P.S. I shall write every mail although the steamer lands very irregular in the winter season at this place.
NARA Series M2, Microcopy of Records of the Oregon Superintendency of Indian Affairs 1848-1872, Reel 5; Letter Book D, pages 72-74.  A copy can be found on NARA Series M234, Letters Received by the Office of Indian Affairs, Reel 608 Oregon Superintendency 1853-1855, frames 1048-1051.


Dear General
    Yesterday on my return from Rogue River I was assaulted in the public street by Benj. Wright, and my life threatened on our first next meeting. I never was more astonished in all my life. I approached Wright as to a friend, to shake hands with him as a friendly recognition after a few days separation. Instead of being received, as I have always heretofore been received, in friendship, I was loaded with all the charges of crime and deceit against him imaginable and my life, by threats, placed in jeopardy. Wright charges me with having said to you, voluntarily, that he, "Wright, was an habitual drunkard, unfit at all times to do his duty, and that if you had any regard for your own reputation you would remove him." Where Wright got this information I cannot imagine, nor will he tell me. I suspect Kautz and Tichenor, both of whom are my bitter enemies, and with whom I am not now on speaking terms. Either of them would cut my throat without scruple, could they do so unsuspected. My difficulty with Mr. Kautz is well known in this community, and I know the public feeling is in my favor. Now, General, I am thrown into serious difficulty from a question of yours, which, out of friendship to you, I answered. I cannot understand this. I do not suspect for one moment that you have occasioned this, or that you have repeated, certainly not magnified, what I said. As to Wright I have always been on the closest intimacy with him--had he been my brother I could not have done more for him. I have assisted him in his matters, of every name and kind, freely and without cost. What I said to you in answer to your question about the habits of Wright is God's truth, known to be true by every honest citizen in this entire community, and I do not take back one word. I did not say this, however, to injure Wright, on the contrary, I believe that at that time I endeavored to shield, indeed, I think I spoke of him in the highest terms as an Indian agent. I now sincerely regret ever having said one word, in fact almost wish I had lied for Ben out and out. This affair has given me an immensity of anxiety for my personal safety, for I assure you it is not pleasant to have a man of Wright's desperate passion howling after you in the public street, threatening at every step your life. If you have been made to doubt my word in answer to your question concerning Ben's habits, please write such men as our postmaster, R. H. Smith, Peter Ruffner, Isaiah Porter, Michael Mills, E. A. Gamble, Aaron Dyer, Seth H. Lount, J. W. Sutton, or any other citizen in the entire town of Port Orford, with the exception of Tichenor and Kautz. Now I do not seek this investigation for the purpose of doing the least injury to Wright, for I would not willingly put even a straw in his way. I hope, however, that the inquiry may be made that it may be determined whether I have maliciously sought to injure a fellow citizen. I am charged by Ben with wishing to supplant him in his office. This is not so. If I once had the hope of succeeding him upon his resignation only, I have abandoned wholly such thought or wish. Nothing in the wide world would now induce me to accept the office, should it be offered me. Of this, at any rate, I have no hope, as I have no doubt your mind has been cruelly poisoned against me. Again, it appears that Tichenor has been busy in his efforts to make Ben believe that I was in favor, and earnestly espoused your removal. This, General, is false. It is true I said on my return from Portland that efforts were being made to remove you. In this there certainly could be no harm. I merely repeated here what everybody knew in Oregon, namely that efforts are being made to remove you. There is not that man living who ever heard me speak one word against you as a citizen or public officer. On the contrary I have ever spoken of you in the very highest terms, prompted to do so from your uniform kindness toward me, and from my knowledge of you as a citizen, and as an officer of government. Someone, who I cannot imagine, unless my suspicions are correct concerning Kautz and Tichenor, has sought to inflict upon me a cruel injury. I fear not to have my character and general conduct fully inquired into, and shall take pains when you come among us to have some things fully exposed. As regards Wright I shall treat him as I ever have done, in kindness, and cheerfully do all in my power to aid him in the performance of the duties of his office. What will be the result of this matter between Wright and myself I cannot tell. At all events I shall do all in my power to avoid further difficulty. I wish, General, you would write to me, that I may, if possible, disabuse Wright's present opinion--that he may know that I did not attempt to injure him maliciously . A word from you would be highly appreciated by me.
Joseph Lane Papers


Dear Sir
    Agreeable to instructions it becomes my duty to make known to you the present condition of Indian affairs within this district since the 15th of May.
    I have visited all the different bands of Indians within this district and find them doing well though the abundance of rain which has fallen since the fishing season has prevented them from getting their usual quantity of salmon upon which they rely entirely for subsistence at this season of the year. I received the seine and nets for fishing but find they are too small for salmon fishing and have thought it would be best to hire a larger one which is at Rogue River which is either to be bought or hired at a moderate price. The one I speak of is 600 yards long and 14 feet wide; such only is suitable for salmon fishing while the one I received from you is small and adapted only for fishing in small streams and for small fish. I intend trying the large seine and if it succeeds will hire it and assemble the different bands together at Rogue River which is the only stream which affords salmon at this season; all the rest of the streams' salmon do not run up until September, and I think by so doing that is by hiring the large seine and collecting the Indians at that river and superintending and being with the Indians myself that I can furnish the Indians all they may need and I am confident that by bringing them all or as many of them as I can on to Rogue River and being with them myself that I can control them much better than I can as they are scattered the whole length of the district.
    When I visited Chetco the Indians informed me that there had been one of their number killed by a man called Lewis Carley who told the whites that he had killed a Chetco Indian.
    And that he was ready to leave the country and went to Crescent City and there shipped for that purpose which was the last heard of him. The Indians complain but little of it and appear to be willing to submit to their fate let it [be] what it may without retaliating in any way whatever.
    As long as they are so near the line between California and Oregon I am of the opinion that there will always be outrages of that character committed. While it is impossible to prevent it the miners about the mouth of Rogue River have many of them left that place which affords greater security to the Indians as they are always more peaceable in an Indian country when they are few in number.
    And I think that I have it in my power whether they are few or many to control Indians in all cases--better than the whites can be controlled by any power.
To Gen Joel Palmer
    Superintendent
        Ind Affairs
Joseph Lane Papers


Dear Sir
    By last trip of Columbia I wrote you making inquiries concerning a difficulty that had just occurred between Benj. Wright and myself, said by him to have been occasioned in consequence of charges that I had made to you against him. To that letter I have not yet received any reply. At the time I wrote you I was ignorant of the source through which Ben received his information. I could only surmise; Ben refused at that time to give me the name of the person from whom he had received the information. He would only say that I told you that he "Ben was an habitual drunkard, at all times unfit to do duty." Of the treatment I at that time received from Ben, I have made you acquainted.
    I very well recollect the conversation I had with you as we descended the hill in front of the reserve, and I know just as positively that all I said to you was in answer to your question concerning Ben's habits. I replied to your question, as I or you would always expect a man of truth to answer a plain interrogatory. Had you not asked the question I certainly should not have given the answer. I think you will do me the justice to say that I made no effort to injure Wright, indeed I believe you will say that I spoke well of him as an agent.
    Had I desired to injure Wright fatally, I could have done so by statements backed by living evidence. All of this difficulty has been occasioned by Kautz, my most bitter enemy--a man with whom I have not spoken for a long time. The occasion of my trouble with Kautz is well known to all of our citizens, and let me add that it is not much to the credit of Kautz. Of course this is nothing to you. This difficulty between Ben and myself, prompted by Kautz, together with the active efforts of Ben, caused my defeat in the election just passed, and it is my opinion that such was the object of Kautz. In this place, where I have lived near four years, I received 40 votes. My adversary, Tichenor, got but 18 votes. This is certainly an index of my standing here, and is, of itself, quite a commentary upon the efforts of my enemies. And, General, I do not desire to injure Mr. Wright--on the contrary would be glad to see him continue in the office he now holds. I will also add that since my trouble with Ben, he has not tasted a drop of ardent spirits, and has fully determined to wholly abstain from the use of all kinds of intoxicating drinks. No one more rejoices at this resolution than myself. Now then as to the past. The answer I made to your question concerning Ben's habits, I do not, nor have I ever denied. I cannot bear to be considered the base man and liar that you probably have been made to think me. I must therefore refer you to our postmaster R. H. Smith, our justice of the peace John W. Sutton, Isaiah Porter, Nelson Seaman, Samuel Lount, or to any other citizen of Port Orford. I make this reference, not to injure Ben, but to vindicate my character as a man of truth. I hope to see you when you come among us, that this cruel misunderstanding (if it cannot bear a worse name as far as Kautz is concerned) may be properly explained. I assure you General it is not pleasant to have one's life threatened, particularly by a man that you are not disposed to injure.
Joseph Lane Papers


Dear Genl.
    I have just had a conversation with Capt. Ben Wright, sub-Indian agent of this place, who is very anxious to see you in regard to certain claims for services in the Indian department some time ago, and other matters for which he has not been paid, and in which he has expended a considerable amount of his own private funds.
    On hearing me say that I had written you, he requested me to say that any convenience you may require in coming to this point before you leave, he would join me in rendering. I hope you will make it convenient to come, so as to stop a few days at Port Orford. Your answer is anxiously looked for.
Joseph Lane Papers



    While on the route we met Ben Wright, the sub-Indian agent, an experienced hunter and trapper, whose life has been passed in the mountains and on the Western frontier. He was a man of some thirty-two years, with black curling hair, reaching, beneath a slouched Palo Alto hat, down to his shoulders; a Missouri rifle was slung across his back, and he rode a heavy black mule with bearskin mochillas. Altogether, he was a splendid specimen of a backwoodsman, of noble stature, lithe as an eel, of Herculean strength, and with all the shrewdness and cunning acquired by a lifetime passed among the North American Indians. Almost disdaining the comforts of civilized life, and used to the scanty fare of the hunter, he seemed peculiarly fitted for the office he held. I am thus particular in the description of Ben Wright, as his name has just been published among those who were butchered by the Chetco tribe at Rogue River in February last. He was in company, when we met him, with several others, any one of whom would nearly answer to this description. Some of them have shared his fate in the massacre above referred to.
William V. Wells, "Wild Life in Oregon," Harper's Magazine, October 1856, page 594



Genl Palmer
Dear Sir
    By this time you will have heard of the safe return of Lieut. Kautz and of the result of the battles he and party have had since they have been absent. No difficulty exists amongst the Indians on the coast so far. Ben [Wright] has been amongst them keeping reckless white men from committing violence upon them and so far has succeeded, not without much care and watchfulness on his part. As soon as he leaves a point, only for a few days, these restless lazy devils are at work stirring up a muss. At the forks of the Coquille, advantage was taken of his absence and some disgraceful acts committed. A company has been organized by Packwood (who is a discharged soldier) and have drawn up a muster roll and provision list, with all the pomp of authority, calling themselves the "Coquille Guards" and claiming to be in the service of the U.S. assisting the sub-Indian agent in maintaining peace. This maintaining peace is all poppycock, as they have well nigh involved those bands in a war with the whites by their rash conduct. Packwood has bought stores and ammunition on the faith of Uncle Sam and expects not only that it will be paid but that they will be paid for their services.
    These foolish and uncalled-for movements in certain quarters, and the eagerness of many to fan this firebrand, has brought me to reflect upon the cause, as these men do not seem anxious to fight the war bands near us, but are anxious to be quartered where there is no danger. I have examined their material and find them composed of the most trifling, lazy, no-account white men in the whole country. Squaw keepers, etc. who take this occasion to get up an excitement for the purpose of extracting from somebody subsistence to put them through the winter. I have advised Ben to discard all connection with them, and he will have nothing to do with them. Great care will have to be taken to prevent [omission] in all this excitement south or the department will be awfully swindled in the outcome.
    Your instructions to agents giving a discretionary power in the matter of temporary reservations, provisions etc. Ben interpreted to allow him to keep his Indians at their homes, if he thought he could maintain peace. This he has done, notwithstanding the whole length of his district on the east was exposed to invasion by the hostile tribes, and his Indians to be tampered with by them.
    The Indians at Coos Bay have been in corral by the sub-agent, and marshaled, enrolled and fed, at the expense of the U.S. While no chance of a connection between them and the hostile band could possibly take place, this in my view of the case is another means of tapping Uncle Sam's bank. Everybody here sees it; it is so plain as to be ridiculous. But then you will say, "This is out of your line of duties." I cannot be still notwithstanding the government have not used me as they should have done. Still while my friends are in a position to be imposed upon I must speak out. If I have done wrong have the kindness to tell me so, and I will cease to write.
    It is intended by Ben and I to come up on the steamer about 25th ult. and hope to find you at home. As Ben has business of importance to lay before you and through you to Gov. Curry, let us find you at home if possible.
Joseph Lane Papers




    We were just handed the following letter by Mr. William Wright, from Mr. Dunbar, Collector of Customs, detailing the particulars of the murder of his son, Capt. Benj. Wright, by the Indians in Oregon.
    C. W. Wright, Esq.--Sir, It is my painful duty to inform you of the death of Capt. Benj. Wright, sub-Indian agent of this vicinity. He had been among the Indians under him for several days, arranging matters with them, and giving them advice. Indian hostilities had been committed in Oregon to an alarming extent. It was feared that as they were not far from us--very near to some of the bands in his district--that they would frighten or persuade some of the peaceable Indians to join them. He had always confidence that he could control all his Indians, thus he went among them; though the war party was known to be in the vicinity, no danger was apprehended. On the 22nd day of February he was solicited by some of his own Indians to come (or go) amongst them on business; he did so in company with Captain John Poland of the volunteers. They slept in a house on the south bank of Rogue River. At about 3 o'clock on the morning of the 23rd inst., he was surrounded, having been betrayed by his own Indians, and awakened only to be butchered, he and his companions. It is reported by Indians that Ben was called to the door and then grappled and killed by a blow from a hatchet and then cut to pieces. It was necessary that they should make no noise at the time as there was a small force of volunteers a short distance off; after his death the company of volunteers were surprised and cut to pieces. Those before supposed peaceable joined the war party and made a descent upon the settlers, murdering all, laying waste to their improvements, and as far as we can learn from this to the California line, at the mouth of Rogue River, everything was destroyed but the picket fort, and the few there in the fort surrounded and hemmed in and have no communication. The whole country is in a state of war, and we are all forted up and hourly expect an attack. We are too weak to go to fight the Indians as they are strong in force, and so many of our people have been cut off, while their unchecked success has drawn to these the support of all the bands on this coast. Our only hope now is in the U.S. sending us aid; whether we will have our wishes and only hopes realized, I know not. Mr. Wright's effects are in my charge.
Richmond Palladium, Richmond, Indiana, April 24, 1856, page 2


    We learn, says the Philadelphia North American of Saturday, by a private letter from Port Orford, Oregon, that Capt. Ben Wright, sub-Indian agent of that district, was murdered by the Indians on the morning of the 23rd of [February]. He was, we believe, a Philadelphian. He died in the performance of his official duties. As the hostilities of the Indians had assumed an alarming character in Southern Oregon, and some of the warlike Indians are not far from the Port Orford settlements, it was feared that the peaceable Indians might be persuaded or intimidated into joining the savage army. Capt. Wright has always had great confidence in his power to control the Indians, and under the influence of this he went amongst the tribe of his charge, apprehending no danger, notwithstanding that a war party was known to be in the vicinity to which he went. On the 23rd of February, having been solicited by some of his own Indians to go among them on business, he went in company with Capt. John Poland, of the volunteers. They slept in a house on the south bank of the Rogue River. At about three o'clock on the morning of the 23rd of [February], the house was surrounded, and Capt. Wright and his companions were murdered by the hostile savages to which his own professedly peaceful Indians had betrayed them. Some of the Indians say that Capt. Wright was called to the door, grappled and killed by a blow from a hatchet, and then cut to pieces. There was a small force of volunteers a short distance off, but the work was done so noiselessly that they heard nothing of it, but were themselves immediately after surprised and cut to pieces.
    After this bloody massacre, the treacherous friendly Indians joined the war party in open revolt. They at once made a descent upon the settlements, laying waste all before them between Port Orford and the California line, and murdering all the whites encountered on their way. At the mouth of Rogue River, everything was destroyed except the picket fort, in which the few survivors had assembled. There they were hemmed in by the savages, the communications all cut off, and at the date of the letter alluded to, March 5th, the whole country was in a state of war.
    The writer, R. W. Dunbar, Collector of the Customs at Port Orford, says: "We are all forted up and hourly expecting an attack. We are too weak to go out to fight the Indians, so many of our people having been cut off. The unchecked success of the Indians has drawn to their support all the bands on this coast. Our only hope is in the United States government sending us aid." Port Orford, from whence the letter was sent, is a town on the southern coast of Oregon Territory, located at the head of Tichenor Bay, which is a small sheet of water setting in from the ocean, above Rogue River. The Indians north of Port Orford bear the designation of Quatomahs. Those immediately south of it are called Euchres, while on Rogue River there is another tribe called Tututnis. All these tribes are now hostile.
Buffalo Commercial Advertiser, Buffalo, New York, April 30, 1856, page 2




    Doubtless the news of the recent protracted fight at the Big Bend of Rogue River, between the U.S. Dragoons under Capt. Smith and the Shasta and Klamath Indians led on by old John, will have reached you before this is received. It is said that the Superintendent of Indian Affairs and the Indian agents joined in the conflict and fought side by side, with the regulars. Gen. Palmer used his pistol with good effect, till he obtained a musket as it fell from the hand of a dying soldier. Agent Nathan Olney rendered signal service, and William Wright with the memory of his brother's blood fresh on his mind entered upon the work in a manner becoming a man who seeks to avenge the murder of his kindred
"Port Orford Correspondence of the Statesman," letter of June 7, Oregon Statesman, Salem, June 17, 1856, page 2


    The murderers of Ben Wright, Tututni Bill and Jack, had Wright's scalp, yelling over it a few days ago; when Robert Metcalfe learned the fact, he drew his pistol upon him and made him give it up.
E. B. Stone, Coast Reserve, letter of November 1, 1856, Oregon Statesman, Salem, December 23, 1856, page 2


    RENEGADES AMONG THE INDIANS.--A renegade called Nigger Bill, is said by Lalakes, the Klamath chief, recently at Yreka, to be among the Modocs, inciting them to hostilities against the whites. He is a noted horse thief. The Yreka Union adds:
    "From information derived from Lalakes, it is rendered quite certain also that an Indian called Sitkim Bill, half Shasta and half Modoc, and some of his companions, murdered the two men on Willow Creek, in Shasta Valley, last summer, which was the immediate cause of the war. The Modoc chief told Lalakes that Sitkim Bill had killed two white men, and taken some mules and a very fine saddle. Lalakes also states that the Modoc chief disavowed any participation in the depredations committed on the whites, and said they had been done by some bad Indians, without his knowledge or authority."
Sacramento Daily Union, March 3, 1857, page 4  Bill was with Wright at the 1852 massacre.


    The murderers of Ben. Wright, late an Indian agent on the coast, had brought with them to the reservation his scalp, over which they held nightly dances. Mr. Metcalfe regarded this as an outrage, and demanded the scalp. Upon their refusal to deliver it up, he took the murderers (two in number) dragged them into his office, in the face of two hundred Indians, and there told them that unless the scalp was delivered in fifteen minutes he would kill them both. One of them was then set at liberty. The Indians continued to gather, and there seemed to be a general determination to kill the agent and the few employees who stood by him. Before the expiration of the allotted time, however, the scalp was delivered and peace restored.
J. Ross Browne, report of November 17, 1857, NARA Series M234, Letters Received by the Office of Indian Affairs, Reel 610 Oregon Superintendency 1857, frames 34-150


    Another theory theory is that this treachery by the Modoc chiefs is in retaliation for a similar wrong which they complain as having been done to them by white men some twenty years ago. One Ben. Wright, it is stated, in 1852 inveigled into his camp of white volunteers some thirty Modoc warriors unarmed, under the offer of a treaty of peace with that tribe, which was then at war with the whites and had just murdered a number of emigrants on Tule Lake. When the thirty Modocs came into his camp unarmed, it is said they were set upon by Wright's volunteers and all slain. This was base treachery, if the statement be true, and the Modocs do not appear to have forgotten or forgiven it, for Captain Jack and Schonchin both recently alluded to it with some bitterness in their talks with the Peace Commissioners.
"The Modoc Treachery," Sacramento Daily Union, April 14, 1873, page 2


    EDITORS UNION: Some false information has led to an incorrect statement in your leader of today headed "Modoc Treachery." You say, "One Ben. Wright in 1852 inveigled into his camp of white volunteers some thirty Modocs unarmed," etc. This cannot be true, for the Modoc Indians were, during that, year, as allies of the Klamaths, proceeded against by regular troops under command of Captain A. J. Smith (now brigadier-general U.S. Army, and who helped General Banks out of the Red River fiasco during the rebellion), commanding Companies C and E, Second Dragoons, and Captain Judah's company, Fourth Infantry, assisted by volunteers. But Ben. Wright at that time was in business at Crescent City, and, I believe, never was near the Modoc country. He was appointed Indian agent by President Pierce, and his agency was at Port Orford, where he never, probably, saw a Modoc. He was appointed agent, I think, in 1852. [The writer has his dates confused and is unaware of Wright's history before his time on the coast.] In the autumn or late summer of 1855 Ben. Wright was captured during a surprise massacre by the Rouge or Rogue River Indians assisted by some others from the coast tribes, tortured for two hours in every conceivable manner; and he was so much respected by the savages that one of them boasted of having eaten his heart. (I once heard Jo. Evans, the Indian, make the boast, and he fell by my hand.)
    Ben. Wright was always considered one of the best of the men of those days, and none who knew him would charge against him such a cowardly and treacherous act. He, Ben. Wright, could not have been where such a thing occurred. His memory is tender to many I know, and we all honor his memory, as we have honored him in life. I do not know but this has been the first tribute through the press that poor and noble Ben. has ever received, for then we had only couriers, sometimes, afterward, dignified by the name of the " military express."
    The shame of being killed by an Indian has never deterred good and brave men from defending the defenseless settler, and I remember that the talk in mess, in 1855-56, was how much an ambitious officer risked in the performance of his duty; and if killed by the "tarheads," his name would be named in the dispatches and returns, while his body would necessarily be consigned to a grave in the mountains, unmarked and unmourned.
    There may be a few gentlemen still on the coast who recollect "poor Ben Wright," and who knew him well, even better than the writer. To them, I say, let this stigma not rest on his memory.
    (The information on this subject used by us in the UNION editorial referred to in the above letter was furnished by a gentleman who, as a child, crossed the plains by way of the Modoc country in 1852, and then and there heard it related. It was communicated to us with such circumstances in detail that we fell fully authorized in using it as we did.--EDITORS UNION.)
Sacramento Daily Union, April 16, 1873, page 2


    EDITOR ARGUS:--In the Sacramento Union of the 14th, under the caption of "Modoc Treachery," it was stated that the cause of the brutal murder of the Pence Commissioners by the Modocs was in "retaliation for a similar act of treachery to the Indians, upon the part of Ben Wright and the volunteers under him, in 1852; that about thirty Indians were enticed unarmed into camp, and then murdered." In order that the matter may be shown in its true light, I propose to give the facts connected with the fight between Ben Wright's men and the Modocs. In September, 1852, the citizens of the town of Yreka were shocked and horrified by receiving the news of the murder by the Modoc Indians of a train of immigrants, coming into Shasta Valley, in a most brutal and cold-blooded manner. Other news of a like character soon followed, and a meeting was called for the purpose of obtaining volunteers to go out and assist and protect the immigrants while traveling through the Modoc country. A company of about forty men was made up, for the purpose of defending the immigrants from being wantonly butchered. Ben Wright, than whom a braver man, in the true sense of the word, never lived, was chosen commander of the company, and under his leadership they repaired to the vicinity of what was then known as Goose Lake, Klamath Lake and Lost River country. They met many immigrants coming in, and always gave them an escort--many of those chosen for escort duty were killed by the Indians. Everything that could be, was done by the volunteers to assist the immigrants, and prevent their butchery by these devils incarnate, but still they continued their work of murder; it being a frequent occurrence to see the bodies of women--young and old--outraged, disemboweled, lacerated and scalped; suckling infants brained upon their mothers’ breasts; men and boys scalped, their ears and nose cut off, their eyes dug out, the muscles of the legs and arms cut out to make bow strings for these "pets of humanity," besides other indignities that cannot here be mentioned. The volunteers, under their brave and tireless leader, remained in that section of the country until all the immigrants had passed over the dangerous road, and had killed but few Indians. At this time word was received from the Indians that they wanted a "good talk," and after consultation it was deemed advisable to make peace with them if possible, in order that in the future it might be safe for the travel to the state to come that way, and thereby settle up that portion of the country. Word was accordingly sent to them that they could have a "good talk," and a place chosen for it to be had. At the first meeting about a dozen Indians came, but nothing definite was arrived at. Conferences were held day after day, the Indians becoming more numerous and insolent, always demanding food and presents, which was furnished them. On the fifth day, in the morning, between sixty and seventy Indians came into camp, all of them being armed with their bows, and their quivers full of arrows, and conducted themselves in such a manner that it was evident that something was wrong. Ben Wright soon set the interpreters to work to find out what they meant, and learned through one of the squaws, who had become enamored with one of the interpreters (an Oregon Indian), that the Modocs were only waiting for a good opportunity to kill the whole company. Upon receiving this information Wright commanded his men to prepare themselves, as it was either "kill or be killed," and that when he gave the word, "to go in and every man do his best." His orders were obeyed. After the first fire about forty of the Indians stood in a line, about twenty-five yards distant and without flinching returned the fire of the volunteers; a perfect shower of arrows was hurled from their bows. One of the volunteers was mortally, three or four severely and five or six slightly wounded. The Indians did not run until about half their number was killed; then they broke and scattered, after which several more were made to bite the dust. In all, thirty-seven Modocs were sent to the "happy hunting ground." There were twenty-one volunteers engaged in the fight. Since that time the Modocs have given the whites but little trouble until the present war. I now believe their tactics were intended to be the same then as they so successfully carried out on the 11th of the present month, and that had they been allowed to get the advantage, not one of the volunteers would have been left alive.
    The time alluded to by J. S. Combs in his communication was in 1853, and not 1852, and the combination was between the Klamath and Rogue River Indians, and not the Modocs.
Placer Weekly Argus, Auburn, California, April 19, 1873, page 2


    The Union a few days ago alluded editorially to common report of an act of perfidy committed by a man named Ben. Wright upon the Modoc Indians, in the year 1852, somewhere near Tule Lake. The version of the story as it came to us was from a gentleman who (as a child) crossed the plains by way of Tule Lake in the year above stated. His recollection of it was that the war then being waged by Wright and his volunteers against the Modocs was provoked by the murder on the part of those Indians of a number of emigrants, that Wright was unsuccessful in bringing the Indians into a square fight, that he then, under pretense of arranging a peace, inveigled thirty or forty of them unarmed into his camp and there killed them. This statement was denied by a gentleman of Grass Valley, in a letter published in the Union. Now comes John M. Fulweiler, "one of the volunteers," with a statement in the Auburn Argus [the Placer Argus, of Auburn, California], April 19th, of the facts as he is acquainted with them. He says the volunteers headed by Wright numbered thirty or forty, made up in Yreka in September, 1852. He says Ben. Wright was a brave man "in the true sense of the word," and was chosen commander of these thirty or forty volunteers. We quote from Fulweiler's statement:
    "They [the volunteers] repaired to the vicinity of what was then known as Goose Lake, Klamath Lake and Lost River country. They met many immigrants coming in, and always gave them an escort--many of those chosen for escort duty were killed by the Indians. Everything that could be done was done by the volunteers to assist the immigrants and prevent their butchery by these incarnate devils, but still they continued their work of murder, it being a frequent occurrence to see the bodies of women young and old outraged, disemboweled, lacerated and scalped, suckling infants brained upon their mother's breasts, men and boys scalped, their ears and nose cut off, their eyes dug out, the muscles of the legs and arms cut out to make bow-strings for these "pets of humanity," besides other indignities that cannot here be mentioned. The volunteers, under their brave and tireless leader, remained in that section of the country until all the immigrants had passed over the dangerous road, and had killed but few Indians."
    Here is a sum of cruelties which must be accepted as a great provocation to severe retaliation on the part of Wright and his command. Whether it justifies what followed, we leave to the judgment of the reader. The Modocs sent word for "a talk." "It was deemed advisable to make a peace with them." They were invited to come in and "talk." We again quote from Fulweiler:
    "At the first meeting about a dozen Indians came, but nothing definite was arrived at. Conferences were held day after day, the Indians becoming more numerous and insolent, always demanding food and presents, which were furnished them. On the fifth day, in the morning, between sixty and seventy Indians came into camp, all of them being armed with their bows, and their quivers full of arrows, and conducted themselves in such a manner that it was evident that something was wrong. Ben. Wright soon set the interpreters to work to find out what they meant, and learned through one of the squaws, who had become enamored with one of the interpreters (an Oregon Indian) that the Modocs were only waiting for a good opportunity to kill the whole company. Upon receiving this information Wright commanded his men to prepare themselves, as it was either 'kill or be killed,' and that when he gave the word, 'to go in and every man do his best.' His orders were obeyed. After the first fire about forty of the Indians stood in a line about twenty-five yards distant, and without flinching returned the fire of the volunteers; a perfect shower of arrows was hurled from their bows. One of the volunteers was mortally, three or four severely and five or six slightly wounded. The Indians did not run until about half their number was killed--then they broke and scattered, after which several more were made to bite the dust. In all thirty-seven Modocs were sent to the 'happy hunting ground.' There were twenty-one volunteers engaged in the fight."
    On the other hand it comes to us from persons who lived for years in Yreka that Wright had at one time laid a plan for the wholesale poisoning of the Modocs with strychnined beef, which, owing to a revelation of the plot by an Indian who had heard of it, was abandoned in favor of the treacherous one of inviting the Modocs into camp to treat for peace and then killing them. We do not pretend to decide which of the statements is the true one, or whether the Modocs or Wright were to blame for originating the treachery in 1852. But it is worthwhile to investigate the matter thoroughly for the truth of history, which no temptations can justify any people, from any cause, in falsifying. As we must go behind the Ben. Wright slaughter of 1852 to find the causes which led to it in the massacre of emigrants by the Modocs, so we may also have to go behind these Modoc outrages to find the cause which inspired them. It has been often told in our hearing that the Oregonians who came to this state in 1848 and 1849 to mine for gold treated the Indians from Rogue River Valley to Shasta with great wantonness, and it is probable that the Modocs came in for a share of this bad treatment. When history records the cruel fact that a United States army deliberately slaughtered every man, woman and child of a small but bold and brave tribe of Indians, because five of their chief men treacherously murdered two of our peace commissioners, history should also be invoked to show the real causes which led the savages to that fatal act of treachery. If a white man shoots an unoffending Indian down in sport and wantonness and merely to try the range of his rifle, it does not justify the whole tribe of savages in killing and mutilating white women and children indiscriminately. But there also comes in the sharp-pointed query: "Do these savage atrocities quite justify the United States army in a war of extermination? in killing and scalping or braining men, women and children of the untutored Modocs?" We are much in error it the verdict of history shall not be more against the white Christian than the dusky heathen.
Sacramento Daily Union, April 21, 1873, page 2


    [The Modocs'] devilishness is inherent, but their treachery was made more prominent by an incident which happened a short time previous to the war of which I am speaking. A party of men from Massachusetts, among whom were some from Boston, had a parley with a few of their prominent men on Lost River, and while they were parleying the Indians were killed. Often have I endeavored to parley with them, but always would they hallo back: "Waka Boston man," which meant "No talk with Boston men." They called all white men Boston men, and said that they had lied to them once and would lie again.
Robert C. Wood, in "Those Modocs," Kansas City Times, reprinted in the Daily Missouri Democrat, St. Louis, April 21, 1873, page 2


    When pursued the Indians would fly to the Lava Beds, the scene of the present war, and secrete themselves in a cave, which, from this circumstance, has since borne the name of "Ben. Wright's Cave." As winter approached, and no more trains were to be expected that season, Wright, not desiring to return without some results to boast of, arranged for a "peace talk" with the savages, on which occasion he agreed to kill an ox. It is well known to the old residents of Yreka that his intention was to poison the ox, and thus dispatch them all. When this fact became known the sensibilities of many residents of Yreka were severely shocked, but the general tide of opinion sustained him. This act of treachery was never really performed, but one was substituted, falling little short of it in atrocity. Pursuant to the agreement, the Indians came, numbering 47 warriors, under the command of their chief Schonchin, the father of the Schonchin who participated in the massacre of Gen. Canby and party. The two forces encamped close together. During the night it rained heavily, rendering the weapons of the Indians useless by relaxing the strings and the sinews upon the backs of the bows. When Wright in the morning saw them standing around their fires, drying their bows, he changed his plans, and, instructing his men accordingly, he advanced alone. Extending his hand to Schonchin, then suddenly drawing his pistol, he shot down the unarmed chief. This being the signal agreed upon, the rest rushed in and butchered them, only seven of the Indians escaping. I know this not only from general report at Yreka, but from the lips of one of Wright's men, who has related to me the circumstances many times. The next year emigrants abandoned that route, owing to the Indian troubles, and went by the old road; consequently, this ended the war at that time with the Modocs, and, until about the year 1868, no further serious trouble occurred between them and the whites. About that year, the whites, needing good grazing land, began to encroach upon what the Modocs had always considered their soil, and the government soon after removed the tribe to a reservation in Oregon; but they refused to stay, and gradually returned to their old hunting grounds, where they remained quietly, many of them working for the settlers in herding stock, until the attempt to force them back upon the reservation last fall. This they regarded as an attempt to drive them to starvation, and resisted it, as that country is well known to be intensely cold and almost entirely barren. The object of the government agents would seem to have been to drive as many Indians as possible to the reservation once a year, and keep them there long enough to number them, as a basis for appropriations.
    I have never personally visited the Lava Beds, but I have been in the vicinity, and have seen them with a glass from the top of Shasta Butte, or Mount Shasta, which rises 11,000 feet above the surrounding country, and 14,446 above the level of the sea. In the clear atmosphere of that country they were distinctly visible, and I fully concurred with the general opinion that they were almost if not quite impregnable. They are an immense irregular pile of volcanic rocks, which range from the size of a dry goods box to that of a large building. It is as if such a lot of rocks had been promiscuously tumbled together. They cover a space 10 to 12 miles long and three to eight miles wide. If supplied with water, of which they are generally supposed to be destitute, save from rainfall, I should regard the position as equal in strength to that of Gibraltar.
    The particulars of the massacre of braves by Wright at this "peace wa-wa" of 1852 were fully known to the tribe, and there can be no doubt that the intention of Wright to poison the beef must also have reached their ears, as it was universally known among the whites.
    It would not seem strange to me that the descendants of the victims of that treachery should cherish its memory, and even make it the business of their lives to avenge it. At the time it occurred the whites were disposed to regard almost any kind of warfare upon the Indians as legitimate, and there was no general reprehension of Wright's action. Knowing the Modocs as I do, I should have expected no different result from the meeting between their leaders and Gen. Canby. I do not, and cannot, deny that public opinion at the time sustained by Ben. Wright, but public opinion is only the acquiescence of the minority in the opinions of the majority, and the majority in California at that time were not very close discriminators as to nice points of morals, and they were also greatly excited. Of one thing, however, I am sure, namely, that the women and children of the Modocs should not be exterminated in punishment for Capt. Jack's crime, any more than my wife and children should have been scalped for the treacherous massacre of the Modocs by Ben Wright.
New York, April 21, 1873.
New York Tribune, April 23, 1873, page 1


    The San Francisco Chronicle and a few other leading papers of California, in order to justify the disreputable course they have taken against the whites and for the Indians since the Modoc outbreak, think they have found an excuse for their "pet wards" in the acts of Ben Wright and his men in 1852. Now, while we are not at all astonished that these papers are anxious to excuse their perfidy, we object to their slandering the dead by adding additional lies to their already too long a column.
    The article in the Chronicle of April 20th [transcribed below] is a tissue of falsehoods from beginning to end, and in keeping with everything that the Chronicle has written about this difficulty. There are many people living in Southern Oregon and Northern California that knew Mr. Wright while living, and understand all about his fight with the Indians in the lava beds on Tule Lake in the year 1852. All those that knew him speak of him in the highest praise as being a man of fine feelings, and brave and honorable in the highest sense of the terms. Instead of being treacherous to the Modocs, he foiled them in their own treacherous schemes, as is shown by the following statement of one of his own soldiers, who was present at the time of the alleged massacre:
    "They [the volunteers] repaired to the vicinity of what was then known as the Goose Lake, Klamath Lake and Lost River country. They met many immigrants coming in, and always gave them an escort--many of those chosen for escort duty were killed by the Indians. Everything that could be done was done by the volunteers to assist the immigrants and prevent their butchery by these incarnate devils, but still they continued their work of murder, it being a frequent occurrence to see the bodies of women--young and old--outraged, disemboweled and scalped; suckling infants brained upon their mothers' breasts; men and boys scalped, their ears and noses cut off, their eyes dug out, the muscles of the legs and arms cut out to make bow strings for these 'pets of humanity,' besides other indignities that cannot here be mentioned. The volunteers, under their brave and tireless leader, remained in the section of the country until all the immigrants had passed over the dangerous road, and had killed but few Indians."
    The Indians sent word that they wanted to "talk." We again quote the statement of the soldier:
    "At the first meeting about a dozen Indians came, but nothing definite was arrived at. Conferences were held day alter day, the Indians becoming more numerous and insolent, always demanding food and presents, which were furnished. On the fifth day, in the morning, between sixty and seventy warriors came into camp, all of them being armed with bows and their quivers full of arrows, and conducted themselves in such a manner that it was evident that something was wrong. Ben Wright soon set the interpreters to find out what they meant, and learned through one of the squaws who had become enamored with one of the interpreters (an Oregon Indian) that the Modocs were only waiting for a good opportunity to kill the whole company. Upon receiving this information Wright commanded his men to prepare themselves, as it was either 'killed or be killed,' and that when he gave the word, 'to go in and every man do his best.' His orders were obeyed. After the first fire about forty of the Indians stood in a line about twenty-five yards distant, and without flinching returned the fire of the volunteers; a perfect shower of arrows was hurled from their bows. One of the volunteers was mortally, three or four severely, and five or six slightly wounded. The Indians did not run until about half their number were killed--then they broke and scattered, after which several more were made to bite the dust. In all thirty-seven Modocs were sent to the 'happy hunting grounds.' There were twenty-one volunteers engaged in the fight."
    The above statement is endorsed as correct by Gen. Ross and others who were familiar with the circumstances when the affair happened.
Oregon Sentinel, April 26, 1873, page 2


    The Yreka Journal of tomorrow will contain a four-column statement of the Ben. Wright treachery of 1852, related by ex-Sheriff J. C. Burgess and J. G. Hallick, of this place, who were both members of the company and present at the so-called massacre.
"From the Front," Marysville Daily Appeal, Marysville, California, April 26, 1873, page 3  The full four-column article is apparently lost. Several paragraphs survive in the May 1 article from the Daily Appeal, below.


    The San Francisco Chronicle of the 20th inst. publishes a long account of the "Ben Wright Massacre" which, in many essential respects, misrepresents the facts connected with the event. After reading the Chronicle's version of the affair, we interviewed a gentleman now residing in this city, who was with Ben Wright at the time, and participated in the killing of the Indians. This gentleman's statement differs very materially from the report in the Chronicle. The well-known penchant of that journal for dishing up sensation stories at the sacrifice of truth, together with the credibility of the gentleman alluded to, who was both an eyewitness of, and a participant in, the murder of those Indians, render his plain statement of the affair entitled to belief in preference to the Chronicle's. With his permission we give the following account of the massacre of the Indians, taken substantially from his statement:
    In the fall of 1853 [sic], Ben Wright and a party of twelve men, including our informant, started from the Pit River country to go to Yreka, then but a small village. All the party were mounted and armed to the teeth, as the country through which they had to pass was known to be infested with bands of hostile Modocs. [Modoc country is not between Pit River and Yreka.] But a few weeks previous, emigrants had been murdered, their wagons plundered and burned, and stock driven off, the knowledge of which caused the party to travel cautiously and exercise a due degree of circumspection. The country over which the party passed was extremely rugged, and along towards evening, their horses began to manifest signs of fatigue. Wright and the party were desirous of pushing ahead until darkness came, both for the purpose of gaining distance, and also to avoid, if possible, encountering any wandering bands of Indians. The party knew that they were liable at any time to come across these nomadic marauders, as abundant signs of them were observed during the day. However, about sunset, the animals became so jaded that it was determined, after a brief consultation among those forming the party, to camp for the night. A favorable spot was selected, a little fire kindled, and the wearied animals turned out to graze. Apprehensive that there might be trouble, Wright gave instructions to his men to leave their saddles on the horses and merely to loosen the cinches, so as to be prepared for any emergency which might arise. Precautionary measures were observed, and the fatigued animals were turned loose. None of them were staked, the lassos being dragged about to allow a free range to the scanty crop of grass. Everything was thus arranged, and the party, keeping a vigilant eye about them, and not free from a sense of constant danger, waited for night to settle down, when it was hoped that the friendly cover of darkness would screen them from the observation of any passing band of Indians. From the time the party struck camp to darkness was about one hour. But Wright and his men were not required to wait long. Scarcely had twenty minutes elapsed from the time the party halted, when two Indians, who were recognized at a glance to belong to the murdering, thieving Modocs, were observed slowly approaching the camp. Both were mounted on ponies. Approaching within about fifty yards of camp, they dismounted and hitched their animals. Making signs of peace and friendship, they came near the fire and, unbidden, seated themselves on the ground, side by side, directly opposite from where Wright and the rest of the party were standing. Although very profuse in the professions of friendship, they were suspicious-looking devils, and did not fail to impress the men with a feeling of distrust. No appearance of arms was seen about their persons; but still they were narrowly and suspiciously watched. Not more than ten minutes had elapsed after the appearance of the first two Indians, when a couple more were seen riding towards the camp from the same direction in which the first approached. They came to where the two ponies were standing, dismounted, tied their horses, and making signs of peace, advanced towards the fire. They approached to where their comrades were sitting, and after exchanging a few words in their own language, which was entirely unintelligible to any of the whites present, they seated themselves. At about the same interval of time two more Indians were observed approaching the camp. These came in the exact manner in which the others had approached, and also took a seat by the side of their comrades. In this way twelve Indians came straggling into the camp. All were seated in a semicircle about the fire. Several ineffectual attempts were made on their part to enter into a conversation with Wright and others of the party; but finding the men rather sullen and disposed to regard the interlopers with an eye of suspicion, these Indians began to converse in lively tones among themselves--laughing and chatting--apparently in the best of humor. If Wright and his party were apprehensive that treachery was meditated on the part of those devils by their coming to the camp at that late hour and in the manner they had, their suspicions were doubly confirmed by the actions of one of the Modocs. One Indian of the last two which arrived at the camp acted in a way which was calculated to arrest the special attention of the whites, and arouse their suspicions of perfidy. This fellow, the gentleman informs us, was a tall Indian, who had hideous features, and a diabolical expression on his countenance. He approached the camp, and after standing by the fire a minute or two, sharply eying the men and the horses, stepped back to where his pony was tied, which he mounted and rode hastily away. It became painfully evident to the party that the Indians intended to murder them; that they were only waiting for reinforcements, which were doubtless near at hand, and for the approach of night, before making its attack. Wright in this emergency sent one of the men out to where the horses were browsing with orders to collect men together and tighten up the cinches. He then asked the opinions of several of the party, including our informant, what they thought of the appearance of affairs. All present expressed fears that the Indians intended to massacre them that night, and that the only means of escape lay in the simultaneous destruction of their unwelcome and unbidden visitors. Night was already commencing to settle down, and through the rapidly thickening twilight the forms of three more Indians were discovered, riding leisurely towards the camp. To remain inactive much longer, darkness would be upon them; they would soon be overpowered by numbers and massacred. In the last extremity, and as the only avenue of escape, it was determined to attack the Indians, killing and routing them, and then to mount their horses and seek safety in flight. A signal was hastily agreed upon, and while the Modocs were engaged in animated conversation among themselves, little dreaming that their victims, as they supposed, were plotting their sudden and total destruction, the attack was made. Quick as thought twelve of the party drew their revolvers, and almost with the rapidity of lightning fired at the Indians. So sudden was the movement, and so wholly unexpected to the Modocs that not one was able to rise to his feet before receiving a fatal bullet. Twelve of the party (one was dispatched to guard the horses) made the attack and there was only eleven Indians seated around the fire, the twelfth one having ridden away as before stated. Each man discharged several shots to make sure work. Of the eleven Modocs, our informant states not one escaped. Those who were approaching, hearing the report of firearms, and perceiving their comrades shot down, turned and fled. Without stopping to examine the dead bodies of the slain, Wright and his men mounted their horses and rode with all possible speed from the scene. To remain in camp would have been certain death to the party, as there were doubtless a considerable force of Indians in the vicinity. Later that night, the party halted on the summit of a high, barren ridge. Here they remained several hours, to enable their worn-out and jaded animals to rest. At the first appearance of daylight the party pushed ahead, and arrived at Yreka that day.
Oregonian, Portland, April 29, 1873, page 4  While this account is credible, its date, location, and association with the Modocs and Wright are uncertain. It's apparently not related to the 1852 massacre.


    Ben. Wright, an Oregon hunter and trapper who distinguished himself as the commander of several expeditions against the treacherous Modocs in 1851 and 1852, was born near Milton, this county, in 1829. The family moved to Madison County when Ben was six years of age. He lived there until 1847, when he accompanied a company of emigrants to Oregon, commanded by Captain Palmer, of Brookville. He was killed in a conflict with an Indian in southwestern Oregon in 1856. He has three sisters living, one of whom resides in Anderson, the wife of Dr. Hunt.
Cambridge City Tribune, Cambridge City, Indiana, May 1, 1873, page 14


    The Yreka Union of last week publishes a statement of the facts of the Ben. Wright "massacre," so called, as obtained from two of the participants in the affair, whose character for integrity is vouched for by the editor, Hon. William Irwin. From this statement it appears that Wright's company was organized for a war against the Modocs in consequence of the repeated massacre of numerous immigrant trains. The Modocs held several parleys with Wright, in which their conduct was very similar to that of their successors who are now in the Lava Beds, and was characterized by a series of broken promises, until Wright learned that the Indians had determined to fall upon his command the next morning while peace negotiations were in progress, taking them unawares and slaughtering them without affording them an opportunity for defense. The information of this intended treachery of tin murderous savages was conveyed to Wright by a squaw who was attached to one Fenning, a member of Wright's command. The conclusion of the story, the length of which precludes its re-publication in our columns, giving the particulars of the killing of the savages, is as follows:
    "Upon receipt of Mary's warning, Wright and his men, instead of acting on her well-meant advice, determined to stand to their post and boldly meet, if they did not anticipate, the intended treachery of the Modocs. At that time the waters in Lost River were not so high by some twelve or fifteen feet as they are at present. The banks of the river then consisted of two benches, the lower one but little above the surface of the water and overgrown with tules and willows; the other was several feet higher and spread off in an extended sagebrush plain. Now, this lower bench is entirely submerged by the waters of the river. Both Wright's and the Modoc camp were on the west bank of the river, Wright's on the upper bench and the Modocs on the lower among the willows. It was determined to attack the Modoc camp early the following morning, after Mary's revelation of their intended treachery. Sentinels were more than usually vigilant during the night, and the whole company, consisting of eighteen--fifteen white men, two Oregon Indians and one negro--were up and prepared for the fray at early dawn. Wright, as had been his custom since the two camps had been located in juxtaposition to each other, caused beef and other food to be taken down to the Modoc camp, and himself took a seat in their midst. They were engaged in drying their bows over their fires, stringing them up and adjusting arrows to the strings.
    "Wright renewed his demand for the surrender of the property of the murdered immigrants; the chief replied that he would not give it up; that he had more men than Wright, and could whip him. At this juncture, Modoc Mary, who was acting as interpreter, as if to avert a conflict, directed Wright's attention to a young Indian sitting in the group--a brother of a squaw with whom Wright had been cohabiting--and said: "See your brother-in-law." With this Wright rose up and attempted to shoot, but his pistol snapped. Wright's men had collected as by agreement, on the edge of the bench on which their camp was situated, and immediately over the Modoc camp. The discharge of Wright's pistol was the signal agreed on for the attack. As soon as Wright attempted to shoot, his men discharged a volley into the Modocs. Wright, on the failure of his pistol to go off, dropped to his hands and knees, and ran on all fours out of the Modoc camp into his own line, passing under the fire of his men, and escaped unhurt. The Modocs, whether prepared for, and intending to make, an attack on Wright and his men, as the latter believed, or not, when attacked rushed up the bank and grappled with their assailants. Then ensued a desperate, internecine, hand-to-hand conflict. The Indians, though they had taken from the immigrants a considerable number of guns and large amounts of ammunition, were practically without firearms, as they had not yet learned how to use them. This circumstance gave an immense advantage to the whites, and more than made up for the inferiority in numbers. The  bows and arrows of the Indians were of but little use in a hand-to-hand encounter. The result was that of the 49 Modoc warriors in camp at the commencement of the fight only seven or eight were alive at its close."
    In summing up the facts the editor drawn the following conclusions:
    "1st. The Indians, after agreeing to a treaty, evaded from day to day, on one pretext or another, its obligations, and when urged to carry out its terms by the surrender of the stolen and plundered property, peremptorily refused to do it, and defied Wright and his men; and 2nd.  Wright and his men were warned by Fenning's Modoc woman, as the Peace Commission was warned before the late massacre by Riddle's Modoc woman, that the Modocs intended treachery, and had their plans all matured to fall on and massacre them (the whites) at the very moment the whites attacked the Modocs. These declarations were so supported by circumstances that there remained not a shadow of doubt in the mind of Wright or any of his men that they disclosed the real purposes of the Modocs. And it may be remarked here that few men understood Indian character better or were quicker to read and understand their purposes from their demeanor than Ben. Wright. And in the light of the recent peace negotiations, with their tragical termination, there are perhaps few who will not believe that Wright and his party came to the correct conclusion when they believed the Modoc squaw's revelations of the intended treachery of her countrymen."
    The statement of facts is made by John G. Hallick, and is endorsed as correct in every particular by John C. Burgess, ex-Sheriff of Siskiyou County, both of whom were participants in the affray and are men of excellent repute where they reside.
Marysville Daily Appeal, Marysville, California, May 1, 1873, page 2


From the Knoxville Democrat.
    The late barbarous assassination of Gen. Canby and the Peace Commissioners, by the Modocs, and the war now raging between the United States and that tribe of Indians, adds the greatest interest to anything relating to them. With a view of getting an item, we the other day interviewed Mr. John Brownlee, of this city, who for years was a resident of the far West, and who, we supposed, knew something of the cutthroats now receiving the earnest attention of the government.
    The well-known modest demeanor for which Mr. Brownlee is distinguished made our surprise as great as was our satisfaction when we discovered what a rich "lead" we had struck, and listened to his many reminiscences of Indian warfare, and statements of historical events, "all of which he saw, and part of which he was," that now are being discussed from one extent of the Union to the other--by the pious New Englanders whose only knowledge of the red men is based upon the traditions of their ancestors who robbed them of their rocky hills of the East and caused them to occupy better lands in the West, and who now, to expiate the crimes of their daddies, send the murderers of the border hatchets, knives, red shirts and blankets, in charge often of a walleyed Puritan, with pockets full of testaments with which to lead the oppressed Indians to grace; by the business men of the Middle States who know but little of Indians and care less, and by the heroes of the hills and valleys of Oregon, Washington and California, whose everyday occupation has been from their birth to fight for their lives and their property.
    Captain Brownlee was thirteen years in the Indian country, and nearly all that time was engaged in active warfare with the Indians of California, Oregon and Washington. He was s bosom friend of the Wrights--Ben and Bill [Bill Chance? Bill White?]--two of the most noted Indian fighters of the plains. He was in all the prominent engagements from 1852 to 1858, and was one of the small band of nineteen white men who met and defeated the Modocs in 1854 [sic] near the very ground where they are now fighting.
    That engagement is now being earnestly discussed by the newspapers East, because it is claimed by some that that event bears some resemblance to the assassination of Gen. Canby and his party, and offers some excuse for the treachery of the Modocs. Captain Brownlee repels with indignation the aspersion that he and his friends were guilty of treachery on that occasion, and his statement, which is no doubt correct, proves the fallacy of the charge.
    In 1852-8, the Modocs murdered every immigrant who came within their reach. Hundreds were killed, and many women and children were carried into captivity. The government entirely failed to protect the immigrants and settlers. The murders became so common that there was danger of the whole white population being exterminated, and in answer to the pleadings of the settlers, Ben Wright gathered together eighty of his friends and "went for" the Modocs. The company was composed of residents of Jacksonville, Oregon, and Yreka, California. The command first took up the trail, and were for several months engaged in burying the bodies of the murdered emigrants. This having been done, attention was given to the murderers. Advancing upon the strongholds of the Modocs, several battles were fought without decisive results. Four months time was consumed in skirmishes and fights. In the fall, the wet and cold weather somewhat dampened the ardor of the Indians, who begged for "a talk." The request was listened to by Wright and a meeting appointed. Before this time, however, nearly all the whites had gone home, leaving with Wright but eighteen men, Mr, Brownlee being one of the number. At the time appointed the Modocs, to the number of fifty, all armed--about half with guns and the remainder with bows and arrows--met the whites at the natural stone bridge on Lost River, on the emigrant road near where the river enters into Tule Lake--the scene of many murders, and about thirty miles from the cave and lava beds.
    Both parties were surprised--the Indians at the small force of whites, and the whites at the large number of Indians, when it was intended that but the leading men of the tribe should be present at the "talk." Both parties camped together. Having perfect knowledge of the treacherous character of the Indians, every white man, although pretending sleep, remained wide awake all night, with his hand upon his rifle. During the night a slight rain fell, which unstrung the bows of the Indians, rendering them useless. In the morning, it was noticed that the Indians were earnestly engaged in drying their bows and strings, inspecting their arms and getting ready, as the whites were certain, to commence a slaughter. With men who for years had witnessed the villainy of the Indians, it was not necessary to wait until they had been struck before taking action. The word was given by Wright, and before the Indians could escape, thirty-five were killed within one hundred yards of the camp. The remainder escaped. Not a white was injured.
    Several years afterwards, Wright was murdered by Enos, a Modoc. He had charge of a number of friendly Indians on a reservation in Southern Oregon, and Enos, who had been with him four years, one night murdered Wright. [Enos was not a Modoc, and is not known to have previously been acquainted with Wright.] Mr. Brownlee was at that time in company with Bill Wright, the bother of Ben, fighting Indians in Washington Territory. [Ben Wright is not otherwise known to have had a brother Bill.] On hearing of the murder of his brother, Bill, accompanying with Mr. Brownlee, turned their faces south, and after swimming the Columbia River at night, in order to avoid the Indians, traveled five hundred miles through a hostile country, with but one object--to avenge the murder of their old captain. When they arrived at the reservation Enos had fled, but several years afterwards he was caught and executed for the murder.
    Capt. Brownlee was present at the great battle at Walla Walla in 1857 in which 300 whites fought 1000 Indians and whipped them, and was an eyewitness to the killing of the Indian chief, Peu-Peu-Mox-Mox, about which the red tape men at Washington and those who believe in conquering Indians with love made such a fuss at the time.
    The Walla Walla Indians and neighboring tribes had before 1857 been very troublesome. They had murdered settlers, stolen stock, and ended by brutally taking the life of Col. Bolon, an Indian agent and cousin of, Mrs. Geo. Kruch of this city, whose head they stuck on a pole. The United States troops sent to chastise them were defeated and forced to retreat. This made the Indians more villainous than before. Old Mox-Mox gathered his tribe to the number of 1000, and awaited the coming of more soldiers. The soldiers didn't come; but one morning without notice, he found in his front 300 old fighters, who had made a forced march of 80 miles in 24 hours and were ready to chaw old Mox and his band up. This the old rascal did not want done under the circumstances. The women and children and stock were is reach of the whites, and fight and a defeat would be utter ruin to him and his tribe. As in all similar cases, the dodge of a short "talk" was resorted to. He hoisted the white shirt of some murdered white man upon a stick, and alone boldly marched out to see the whites. When he got among them he was surprised at their force. He begged for peace, and promised to pay for all the stock stolen by his tribe, to deliver up all prisoners in his hands and to forever after be the friend of the white man. This talk satisfied the Colonel in command of the troops, but the old fighters couldn't see it. Mox-Mox was allowed to communicate with his warriors under guard. He was held a prisoner until the terms of his treaty were complied with. He shouted to his men and instead of talking peace, ordered them to remove their women and children and prepare for battle! The order was complied with, and next morning, instead of the prisoners promised, came 1000 painted warriors, who boldly charged the whites. Mox-Mox, when the fight commenced, sprang upon a lieutenant and stabbed him with a knife which he had concealed beneath his blanket and then grasped the rifle of his guard, named Warfield, a powerful man, and a life-and-death struggle ensued. Warfield, by his superior strength, threw the chief to the ground, and raising his rifle struck him over the head, killing him upon the spot. Thus died Mox-Mox, the great chief. The fight raged four days. The whites were driven back, forced to build trenches and a fort, but at last defeated the Indians, who retreated across the Columbia River.
    Captain Brownlee in his numerous fights with the Indians was several times severely wounded, and five times shot through his body. His right hand was nearly cut off by a ball through his wrist. His leg was fractured below the knee; he yet carries a pet in his throat in the shape of an Indian bullet, which moves at the touch. He has five balls in his body, and probably carries more lead in his carcass than any other man in Iowa.
    The Captain, like all other men who know anything about Indians, hates them to the bitter end. He believes they are all thieves and murderers, and should be totally wiped out. The treachery to Gen. Canby does not surprise him because he relates a dozen instances of the same character. In fact, he says, an Indian is pizen wherever you find him, and should be shot like a dog.
    The Modocs, the Captain says, is a tribe made up of the offscourings of the Pit River, Snakes, Klamaths and several other tribes, and are the meanest red niggers on the plains. When he fought them they were led by two white renegades, and the tribe is composed in part of white murderers, robbers and half-breeds. He has no faith in the soldiers defeating them, but says if he had the authority, he could organize a force which would turn up to the sun the moccasins of every Modoc in the Lava Bed in a month.
Weekly Osceola Herald, Des Moines, Iowa, May 8, 1873, page 4



    [Chief Schonchin] was not in the "Ben Wright" affair, although he was near when the massacre occurred. His reason for not being present was because he mistrusted that treachery was intended on the part of Wright; and, further, that a "treaty of peace" was proposed by him, which was to be accompanied with a feast, given by the white man; but that the talk was "too good,"--"promised too much''--and that, suspicious of the whole affair, he kept away; that forty-six Modocs accepted the invitation to feast with their white brethren, and that but five escaped the wholesale butchery. Of these five, the last survivor was murdered, June, 1873, during the cowardly attack on Fairchild's wagon, containing the Indian captives, near Lost River, after the surrender of Captain Jack.
    Now, whether the Indian version of the Ben Wright affair is correct, or not, that forty Indians were killed while under a flag of truce in the hands of white men of the Ben Wright party, in 1852--there can be no doubt. The effects of this act can be traced all the way down from that day to this, and have had much to do with making the Modocs a revengeful people.
    The friends of Ben Wright deny that he committed an act of treachery; yet there are persons in California who state positively that he purchased strychnine previous to his visit to the Modoc country, with the avowed intention of poisoning the Indians. Others, who were with him at the time of the massacre, testify that he made the attempt at poisoning, and finally, abandoning it, he resorted to the "peace talk" to accomplish his purpose. The excuse for this unwarrantable act of treachery was to punish the Modocs for the murdering of emigrants at Bloody Point, a few days previous.
    Ben Wright was a citizen of Yreka. He was esteemed as a man of good character and standing among his fellows in that early day. Born a leader, he was selected by the miners to command a company of volunteers, who were enlisted without authority of the government of the United States, the State of California, or the County of Siskiyou.
    This company was formed, under the common law of self-protection, in the early days of California, when Indian outrages were of common occurrence. In the
absence of regular provision for protection, the miners and settlers, in a spirit of patriotism, volunteered to punish Indians as well as to guard the peace of the country. Be it remembered that the massacre at "Bloody Point" was not the only act of savage ferocity committed by the Modocs. For five years had they been murdering the worn-out emigrants who were en route to California and Oregon.
    It was in harmony with frontier ideas of right, to punish these people for their crimes, without taking into consideration the causes that may have impelled
them to bloody deeds. The victims were not responsible for the acts of their predecessors on the line of travelers. However humane and just we may feel,
we cannot object to Ben Wright's motive, though all men who possess correct ideas of justice may deprecate the manner of avenging the wrongs committed.
Had he slain the entire tribe in fair battle, no just condemnation could have been pronounced against him. Had he avenged their horrible crimes by ambushing
them, by his skill and cunning, no man would have censured him; but to violate a flag of truce, under pretense of peace-making, was a wrong that fair-minded men, everywhere, condemn as an outrage against humanity and civilization.
A. B. Meacham, Wigwam and War-Path, Boston 1875, pages 298-301  Emphasis in the original. Refer to the book for an account of the Bloody Point massacre.


    Then, rising to his feet, [Captain Jack] pointed to the farther shore of the lake: "Do you see that dark spot there? Do you see it! Forty-six of my people met Ben Wright there when I was a little boy. He told them he wanted to make peace. It was a rainy day; my people wore moccasins then; their feet were wet. He smoked the pipe with them. They believed him; they sat down to dry their feet; they unstrung their bows, and laid them down by their sides; when, suddenly, Ben Wright, drawing a pistol with each hand, began shooting my people. Do you know how many escaped? Do you know?" With his eye fixed fiercely on mine, he waited a minute, and then, raising one hand, with his fingers extended, he answered silently [i.e., "five"]. Continuing, he said: "One man of the five--Te-he-Jack--is now in that camp there," pointing to the stronghold.
    I pointed to "Bloody Point," and asked him how many escaped there? He answered; "Your people and mine were at war then; they were not making peace."
    On my asserting that "Ben Wright did wrong to kill people under a flag of truce," he said: "You say it is wrong; but your government did not say it was wrong. It made him a tyee chief. Big Chief made him an Indian agent."
    This half-savage had truth on his side, as far as the government was concerned; as to the treachery of Ben Wright, that has been emphatically denied, and just as positively affirmed, by parties who were cognizant of the affair. It is certain that the Modocs have always claimed that he violated a flag of truce, and that they have never complained of any losses of men in any other way. I have no doubt that this
massacre had been referred to often in the Modoc councils by the "Curly-Haired Doctor" and his gang of cutthroats, for the purpose of preventing peace-making.
A. B. Meacham, Wigwam and War-Path, Boston 1875, pages 450-451  Emphasis in the original.


    Judge E. Steele, a lawyer of high character, a resident of Yreka, Cal., since 1851, and also an ex-Superintendent of Indian Affairs, in reporting an Indian difficulty in 1851, relates:--
    "That while hunting for two Indians who had committed some offense, we fell in with Ben Wright, who, learning from a squaw with whom he was living that the Indians had taken that course, he, with a band of Shastas, had started in pursuit and intercepted and captured them. We came in together, and took the Indians to Scott Valley, and there gave them a fair trial, proving their identity by both white men and Indians, and the Indian testimony and their own story, all of which was received in evidence. One was found guilty, and the other acquitted and set at liberty. Our
present superintendent of public instruction, Professor G. K. Godfrey, was one of the jury. During our absence the people remained under great excitement, as all kind of rumors were afloat; and our company was so small, and I had started into a country inhabited by hordes of wild Indians, and those of Siskiyou Mountain and Rogue River Valley notoriously hostile and warlike. Old Scarface, learning of the difficulty at Rogue River, contrary to advice given him when we left, had come out from the cañon, appeared on the mountain lying east of Yreka, as the Indians afterward told me, for the purpose of letting the whites know the trouble, as the
roads were guarded by the Indians on the mountains, so that travelers could not pass. As soon as he was seen, a wild excitement ensued, and a company started in pursuit. Scarface, seeing the danger, fled up the Shasta Valley, on foot, his pursuers after him, well mounted. After a race along the hills and through the valleys for about eighteen miles, he was finally captured and hung upon a tree, at what is now called Scarface Gulch.
A. B. Meacham, Wigwam and War-Path, Boston 1875, pages 674-675  Meacham is quoting from a reminiscence Steele prepared in 1873 on the causes of the Modoc War, transcribed here.


    Hon. John K. Wright, of Junction City, is in town. He is a blunt, outspoken and jolly cuss--one with whom it is a pleasure to "pull taffy."--Leavenworth Appeal.
    Since the above appeared Wright has been numerously congratulated by his friends on his appearance in a new field of usefulness. Parties wishing taffy pulled will apply at the "cottage on the hillside" beyond the Smoky bridge.
Junction City Union, Junction City, Kansas, January 2, 1875, page 3


    Mr. Parrish: He was very reckless, he used to drink a terrible amount of whiskey, and it was stated to me that in one of his drunken freaks he made his wife strip herself entirely naked and whipped her all through the streets of Port Orford.
    Mr. Minto: At the same time on one occasion he just stood against the whole of the settlers and defied them to touch an Indian he had with him. The whites wanted to kill him for his supposed participation in a transaction there. He was utterly reckless of danger. . . .
    Mr. Parrish: Wright was my guide when I had no other white man with me in the Port Orford district. He gave me a history of that--how he managed to slaughter these Klamaths. It was a terrible affair. He professed to be a friend of the Klamaths. There was a party of forty or fifty from California with him, and instead of making the impression upon the Indians that he was their enemy and had come to chastise them he gave them to understand that he was their friend. He slaughtered a number of bullocks and had a feast and got the Indians all together with the intention of slaughtering them. Wright stated to me that he had the plan all ready, his men all arranged waiting for a signal. He in the first place was to kill the chief. He got the chief down by the side of him and was telling him some fine stories and on a particular turn of matters he just drew his pistol and shot him, and that was the signal for the general slaughter, and his men just rushed right on the Indians. They were helpless, had no arms. Their bows and arrows and whatever they had were out of the way. They slaughtered in the neighborhood of 200 at that time. That was in the Klamath Lake country. That was the cause of the Lava Bed war where General Canby and Doctor Thomas were killed. The Port Orford and Rogue River war was before the slaughter perpetrated by Ben Wright. It was reported and truly I suppose that the Klamaths had cut off the party and Wright was sent out to chastise them and that is the way he took. He was looked upon as a mountebank and it finally culminated in his death
Josiah L. Parrish, "Anecdotes of Intercourse with the Indians," 1878, Bancroft Library P-A 59

"Historical Sketches of Oregon's Southern Coast," Coast Mail, Marshfield, Oregon, January 17, 1880, page 1


    Following upon the heels of the Rogue River war came the great difficulty with the Modoc tribe, and the most serious Indian trouble of this region, until the great war with the same tribe in 1873 handed down the name of Captain Jack with those of Osceola, Tecumseh, Black Hawk and Sitting Bull, and made the lava beds of California live in history with the "dark and bloody ground" of Kentucky and the Everglades of Florida. To properly understand this and other Modoc troubles, it is necessary to consider a number of people and events. The Modocs were the most hostile, restless, and troublesome of all the tribes in this region, and their character for cruelty and treachery must be constantly borne in mind. We are met at the outset by a controversy about the character and services of Ben. Wright, the central figure of this Modoc campaign. That he rendered good service in protecting immigrants in the fall of 1852 is granted by all; but the nature of his dealings with the Indians before and after that time, and alleged acts of treachery and cruelty during the campaign, are matters of great dispute, in regard to which great care has been taken to learn the truth that the name of a brave man may be handed down to posterity crowned with all the honor justly its due, and unsullied by any stain that malice or ignorance might seek to fasten upon it. Ben. Wright will be treated justly, and his career candidly set before the reader, who shall judge what meed of praise or censure to award him. His parents were Quakers, but the peaceful tenets of that sect seem to have taken but slight hold in the mind of their son. Young Wright was possessed of a spirit of restless adventure, as brave and reckless a man as ever lived, and spent his life on the frontier, where he fought Indians until he became skilled in their manners and method of warfare. The spring of 1851 found him one of the pioneers of Siskiyou County, on Scott River, and the same summer on the Klamath, from whence he went on his first campaign against this same tribe that year. He lived the life of a "squaw man," and seemed to take pride in looking and acting as much like an Indian as possible. He had glossy black hair, which he wore long, falling in waving tresses on his shoulders, and this with his suit of buckskin made his resemblance to an Indian very striking when his back was turned. He also took pride in acting like an Indian in his intercourse with them, scalping the fallen and committing other barbarities, such as cutting off the ears, noses and finger joints of the wounded, before the breath of life had left their bodies. It is no pleasure to relate such facts as these, but they are given in the interest of truth. He fought Indians because he loved the excitement of it. It suited his nature. The same cruelties were practiced by a few others of his company, who were there for the same reason, while the balance abhorred such proceedings, and only remained in the campaign from a sense of duty. One little incident will serve to illustrate his dealings with the savages and the character of the man. While scouting with a small party along the bank of Tule Lake, during his campaign in 1852, Wright observed a well-worn trail leading from the tules into the sagebrush. He demanded of a squaw who was with them whither the trail led. She told him nowhere, that it was made by the Indians who came out of the tules to gather sagebrush for firewood. That she was telling the truth the men believed, for they could see where the trail branched off in all directions among the brush, but it pleased Wright to discredit the information. He spoke a word to Swill, a renegade Umatilla Indian, who instantly shot the squaw dead. She was left where she fell, and formed a meal for a California lion that night.
     Having seen the character of Ben. Wright, it is now in order to inquire into the causes that led to, and events that followed, his memorable campaign. Early in the summer of 1852, John Ormsby received a letter at Yreka, by way of Sacramento, from an uncle, stating that he and many others were coming on the old Oregon Trail to Yreka, and that great suffering would ensue if they were not met by a supply of provisions. This was the first emigration into Yreka by this route, and as the character of the Modoc Indians was well understood, it was thought necessary to send armed protection as well as provisions. James Thomas, now living at Fort Jones, then an auctioneer, took the letter in his hand and rode up Miner Street, calling for volunteers and subscriptions. A crowd quickly collected, and a meeting was held in front of the Yreka House. The situation was explained, and money and volunteers flowed in thick and fast. A company was raised in a few minutes, a large quantity of supplies were contributed, and then the question was asked, who would take charge of the expedition? At this juncture Charles McDermit, the recently elected sheriff, stepped forward and offered his services, which were gladly accepted. As hastily as possible, preparations were completed and the expedition started in the direction of Lost River.
     The first train of emigrants they encountered before reaching the Modoc country, and they hastened on. After passing Tule Lake they met a party of eight or nine men who had packed across the plains. McDermit and his company went on, and the packers continued towards Yreka. When they reached Bloody Point they were suddenly attacked by the Modocs. All were killed save one named Coffin, who cut the pack from one of his animals, charged through the savages and made his escape. Bloody Point is a place on the north bank of Tule Lake, where a spur of the mountains runs down close to the lake shore. Around this the old emigrant road passed, just beyond being a large open flat covered with tules, wild rye and grass. This was a favorite place of ambuscade.
     When Coffin arrived in Yreka with the news of the massacre the excitement and horror were great. Ben. Wright was sent for, and a volunteer company of twenty-seven men was quickly organized and bountifully supplied with arms, horses and provisions by the benevolent citizens of Yreka.
      While this was being done, the work of death still went on in the Modoc country. At Black Rock Springs McDermit had met two trains, and had detailed three of his men to guard and guide them. These three men were John Ormsby, Thomas H. Coats and Long. About the last of August, the trains encamped on Clear Lake, and in the morning when all was ready for the start, the three guides rode ahead to pick out a camping place for noon. One of the trains, having some repairs to make on their wagons, remained behind, while the other, consisting of thirty men, one woman and a boy, with six wagons, took up the line of march. In this train were David M. Morrison, the captain; W. L. Donnellan, wife and boy; Joseph Thompson, Lenas Cook and a brother, Jonas Stow, William Stow, Freeman Hawthorn, Washington Anson, Shinn, Cribb, McKay, Martin, Peter Rudolph, Charles Herzog, George Fiock, and others. Many of these afterwards became well-known citizens, while some of them still reside in the county.
      As the train came over the divide between Clear and Tule lakes and saw the road spread out before them, they could plainly see the Indians swarming in the rocks about Bloody Point, while, all unconscious of danger, the three men were riding leisurely into the ambuscade awaiting them. All efforts to warn the victims were futile, and they soon disappeared around Bloody Point and were never seen again alive. Soon the reports of their rifle shots were borne back to the anxious ears of their friends, who hastened on and reached the fatal point of rocks. The Indians had again concealed themselves in the reeds and tules to await their new victims.
      As the train wound along the bank of Tule Lake, past Bloody Point, the Indians on the bluff and in the tules set up a demoniacal yell and poured in a volley of arrows, wounding two men. These were put into the wagons, and the company was divided into a front and rear guard, and with their rifles, of which there were but few in the train, kept the savages at a respectful distance until they emerged upon the open flat, when they made a corral of their wagons and retired within it for protection. All night they lay behind their defenses surrounded by hundreds of watchful foes, unable even to go a few hundred yards to the lake for water. Eternal vigilance was the price of their safety, for by constantly being on the alert they kept the Indians beyond bow-shot, as they feared to place themselves within range of the deadly rifles. Once the savages set fire to the tall grass and wild rye that grew thick and high about the camp, intending to rush in under cover of the smoke and take the place by storm, but were frustrated by the building of a counter fire that burned out and met the coming flames, leaving an open space they dared not cross. With yells of rage and disappointment they retreated to the rocks and tules. The morning light was welcomed with joy by the beleaguered emigrants, who could then see the movements of the foe. About noon they saw the savages again take their station among the rocks and tules at Bloody Point, and by this they knew that the other train was approaching. With this train, however, was an old mountain man who had seen Indians before, and knew better than to walk into the trap he could plainly see was set for him. Roads were nothing to him, and when the emigrants in the corral were listening for the sound of conflict, lo! over the brow of the ridge appeared the old trapper and his train, and entered the corral with the others, leaving the Indians to howl their rage and disappointment.
      As the afternoon wore on the beleaguered emigrants descried a body of horsemen to the westward, riding down upon them at a breakneck speed. Here was a new enemy, they thought, another band of savages, and they prepared to receive them with a storm of bullets. Surely these red and blue shirts and broad slouch hats are not the habiliments of savages; see, they have rifles in their hands and each man has tied his handkerchief to his gun and is waving it in the air as a token of peace and friendship. It is Ben. Wright and his band of brave men rushing to their rescue. Wright's company knew nothing of the death of Coats, Long and Ormsby, but they grasped the situation at a glance, and now, stopping not to speak or draw breath, on they rushed, passed the corral of terrified men, down towards Bloody Point, between the Indians on the bluff and their canoes in the water. Leaping from their saddles and leaving their animals to run where they would, they made a furious onslaught upon the surprised and terrified savages. The Indians also had seen their approach, and from their dress knew them to be Californians who had come to fight. They might fool around a train of emigrants with considerable impunity, but a company of mounted Californians was entirely a different proposition, as Ben. Wright had taught them the year before, and when they saw them ride for the point to cut off retreat to the water, instead of going to the corral as they had expected, the savages stampeded for their canoes.
      Then commenced a slaughter, a carnage. The Indians thought of nothing but flight and rushed by the score for their canoes, while rifle, pistol and knife made havoc among them. The fugitives and fighters were all mixed up together; for a mile up and down the bank of the lake on the edge of the tules did the battle go on, each man fighting independently and being sometimes among a dozen fleeing braves, dealing death blows on all sides. Even when the terrified savages had reached their canoes they were fired upon, and a great many were killed before they could get beyond range.
      The Indians only admitted a loss of twenty in this fight, which is about half of the actual number killed, besides many wounded.
      The next day, and for several days thereafter, search was made for remains of the Modocs' victims. Scattered about in the tules they found the mangled bodies of emigrants whose death had not before been known. Two of these were women and one a child. They were mutilated and disfigured in a most horrible manner, causing even the strong-hearted men to turn away from the ghastly spectacle with a shudder. In reading of the massacre that occurred on Lost River a few months later, this horrible sight must be kept in mind. Here were found also portions of wagons, and the Indians were discovered to have in their possession firearms, clothing, camp utensils, money and a great variety of domestic articles, showing that some emigrant train had fallen a complete prey to the fiends. It was evident that a whole train of emigrants, how many no one could tell, had been murdered. Twenty-two bodies were found and buried by Wright's company and fourteen a few days later by a company of twenty-two men that went out from Jacksonville under Colonel John E. Ross. Of these last several were women and children, horribly mutilated and disfigured. Ross' company remained but a few days and then returned to Jacksonville.
      After burying the bodies found in the tules, Wright's company escorted the large trains that had collected here as far as Lost River and went back on the trail to Clear Lake, where a camp was established. At this point scattered bands of emigrants were collected into large trains and sent on through the hostile country under escort. Thus all the fall did these men guard the emigration through the Modoc country, occasionally having a little encounter with the savages, until, near the last of October, the last train had passed through in safety. By this time the number of men had been reduced to eighteen, Captain McDermit having gone back to Yreka with Judge Irwin's train, as well as most of his men, who had been detailed to the various trains till all had thus returned. These eighteen decided to remain and further punish the Indians for their depredations and to compel them to make a treaty that would ensure safety to emigrants in the future. Besides this the savages had stock, property, and money taken from their slaughtered victims which it was thought they could be compelled to disgorge. Actuated by these motives, they established a camp on the peninsula and opened an aggressive campaign against the savages, whose rancheria was upon an island some distance out in the lake. All efforts to bring on an engagement with them were futile, for they remained in their secure retreat beyond the reach of the whites. In this way the men exhausted their scanty supply of patience and provisions.
      While here the command was visited by Major Fitzgerald with a company of dragoons from Fort Jones, accompanied by Captain McDermit. They soon returned, however, leaving a boat they had brought with them. Provisions and ammunition had become scanty, and Wright sent four men to Yreka for a new supply, having just enough food to subsist the remainder until their return. Wright's camp was on the peninsula, while the Indian rancheria was on an island some distance out in the lake. The water in the lake was very low, and there was a thick growth of tules between the camp and the island. Being unable to attack the savages in their secure retreat or to get them to come to dry land, Wright opened negotiations with them, to get them into his power under cover of a truce. To this end, he dispatched several men in the boat with old Mary, a squaw belonging to one of the men, with a message of peace. The next day they went again and returned with two young Indians in a canoe. These were feasted and sent back, returning the next day with forty more. The men, only fifteen in all, had but little ammunition, and would not risk a fight then, but carefully watched the savages, fearing an attack by them. This continued four or five days, and completely exhausted their scanty supply of provisions. Camp was then moved to the mouth of Lost River, to be nearer the expected supplies, no invitation being given the Indians to follow them. Here they were absolutely without food for six days, save scraps dug up from the sand, thrown away when camped here before. The cause of the delay was that the messengers arrived in Yreka in November and stopped to help elect Franklin Pierce President of the United States. This made it necessary for them to get gloriously drunk, and the fear of shocking their systems caused them to sober up gradually, a week being consumed in the operation; then the supplies which were contributed by the citizens to aid in the good work of extermination were gathered up slowly, and when they started for the field they had lost a week's time.
      The hungry men in camp could have killed an animal for food, but this they did not want to do, fearing to deprive themselves of their horses. On the sixth day it was decided that one of the men, who was still strong enough to accomplish the feat, should ascend the hill that overlooked the trail and see if he could spy the expected train. If so, he was to fire his pistol; if not, they would kill one of the animals for food and then start for Yreka. As the man dragged his toilsome way up the hill all eyes were riveted upon him, and when he reached the top and stopped to scan the distant horizon they stood with speechless anxiety, their eyes following his every motion. Five, ten minutes he stood there, seeming as many hours to the watchers below, then slowly he raised his arm, and a puff of white smoke shot upward from his hand.
      Then ensued a scene of most frantic joy. Men hurrahed and hugged each other. Weak and feeble as they were, they started down the trail to meet the coming train. As soon as the supplies reached the camp, food was prepared and eaten with avidity by the famished men. Their stomachs were too weak to retain it, and they gorged themselves again and again. They rapidly recovered their strength and spirits, and with a liberal supply of food and ammunition were again ready for the work they had on hand.
      Invitation was again sent to the Modocs to visit this camp, and in response a large number of them came up and camped nearby on the bank of the river. The two camps were on the west side of the river, and about one-fourth of a mile above the natural bridge, not far from where the fight between Captain Jack and the troops ushered in the memorable Modoc War of 1873.
      Some half hundred braves with their squaws made their home in camp and lived upon the provisions of the whites. Wright endeavored to prevail upon the Indians by specious promises to deliver up the plunder they had taken from the emigrants, and they promised so to do and to live in peace in future. They brought in a few old guns and pistols, after much delay, and then said they would give no more, that they were in greater numbers than the whites and would as soon fight as not. Old Schonchin, the head chief, seeing that there was trouble brewing, left the camp, as did a number of others. It appears to have been Wright's intention from the time he first opened negotiations, to get them to return as many of the stolen articles as possible, and then to bring on a fight and kill all of them he could. From this point of view there is no excuse for the act which followed, not even the fact that the Indians themselves meditated treachery and were only forestalled a few hours. The only palliation that can be found is the utter horror and indignation felt by all at the fiendish barbarities they had seen committed by these savages, and the known desire of the people of Yreka, whose agents they were, that the heartless fiends be exterminated from the face of the earth. On this ground alone can their justification rest.
      To properly understand the scene to be described, a correct idea must first be had of the location of the camp. The river at that time, the middle of November, 1852, was very low, and had two banks, one low bench down by the water's edge and another rising like a terrace back from and above it. On the lower bench was the place where the whites cooked and ate, while they slept in the camp some twenty paces distant on the high bank. But a few yards down the stream, on the low ground, was the Indian camp. It was the custom of both parties to leave their arms in camp and mingle together where the cooking and eating were done. One night Old Mary informed Wright that the Modocs had planned a massacre of the whites for the following morning. When the men were gathered as usual on the lower ground, the savages were to slip in between them and the camp where their guns were, and kill every of one them. She advised him to take his departure immediately, but this was not his object, which was to kill Indians. The same squaw may have also warned her friends that she believed Wright intended treachery; and this may have been the reason for their intended act. However that may have been, it began to look to Wright as though he must hurry up or the Modocs would get the advantage of him. Instead of leaving the place, he matured a plan for slaying the whole band. Six men were sent across the river at the natural bridge and posted on the bank just opposite the Indian camp, where they lay all night on their arms. The rest of the men were disposed on the high land back of the camp, ready for duty. It was agreed that Wright should go into the Indian camp, and when all was ready shoot one of the braves and fall to the ground. At this signal all were to pour in a deadly rain of bullets over his head.
      Taking some beef in his hand, Wright advanced into the camp, threw down his load and sat down upon the ground. He noticed that the Indians were drying their bows around the fire and straightening their arrows, a slight rain having damaged the weapons. They scowled upon him as he sat, in no good humor at being temporarily foiled in their design by the interposition of the elements. Old Mary came in and sat down beside Wright. Pointing out a young buck whose sister had been given to him a few days before, she said "That is your brother-in-law." "I'll make a brother-in-law of him," exclaimed Wright, as he shot the young buck dead with his revolver, and fell prone to the ground to escape the volley of bullets that was poured into the camp. Startled by this sudden onslaught, the survivors of this rain of death attempted to escape across the river, but were driven back by the six men in ambush there. Seeing all avenues of escape closed to them, the Modocs turned at bay and fought desperately for their lives. They rushed up the bank to grapple with the foes that were shooting them down. Then ensued a terrible hand-to-hand struggle, revolvers on one side against arrows and knives on the other, ending in a complete victory for the whites. Of the forty-nine braves that stood about the campfire that morning but two escaped to relate and revenge the treachery that sealed in death the lips of the flower of their tribe. These two were Curly Headed Doctor and John Schonchin, who took a terrible revenge twenty years later in the murder of the peace commissioners. Mr. Hallick and Mr. Burgess say that John Schonchin was not there, but the Indian himself during the negotiations in 1873 claimed to have been one of the two survivors of that bloody massacre, and on that based his inflexible determination to be revenged. A few squaws were killed in the fight, for flying bullets are no respecters of persons, and a squaw is but mortal.
      The party that created such sad havoc among; the Modocs was composed of Ben. Wright, J. G. Hallick, William T. Kershaw, David Helm (Old Tex), Isaac Sanbanch (Buckskin), George Rodgers, Morris Rodgers, Jacob Rhodes, E. P. Jenner, Coffin, J. C. Burgess, William Chance, William White, a man called "Rabbit," William Brown, Poland, Nigger Bill, and two Oregon Indians named Benice and Bob.
      The casualties among Wright's men were three wounded, Sanbanch severely in the back, Poland in the stomach, and Brown in the forehead and left wrist. Two men were sent in haste to Yreka for a surgeon, while the balance proceeded slowly with the wounded, expecting to meet the surgeon at Willow Springs. It was soon discovered, however, that Poland and Sanbanch could not ride, and two days were lost in going to the mountains for wood to make litters for them. The consequence was they failed to meet the surgeon, R. B. Ironside, at the appointed time and place, and his small party, fearing the Indians had made a rally and cut them off, returned to Yreka. A large volunteer company was immediately organized to go out to the rescue, but they met the slowly returning veterans near Sheep Rock, bearing their wounded on litters between two mules. The next day they arrived in Yreka.
     Notice of their coming had been received in the town several hours before they appeared, and a great crowd was collected to greet them home. It was a grand triumphal march. The little band of sixteen, escorted by the other company, rode into town, dirty, shaggy and brown from their long campaign, Indian scalps dangling from their rifles, hats, and the heads of their horses. Scores of scalps were thus flaunted to show to the admiring crowd the work they had accomplished in the field. Cheers and shouts rent the air as they slowly rode through the dense throng, and stopped before the stable of Burgess Bros., where Third Street now opens into Miner. The enthusiastic crowd lifted them from their horses and bore them in triumph to the only place then considered a place of celebration, the saloons, and a grand scene of revelry commenced. Whiskey was free, and all made free with it, and a big dinner was given them at the Yreka House. For a week one grand carousal was maintained by a majority of the members of Wright's company and a host of their particular admirers, chiefly the riffraff and scum of the town. To the credit of Hallick, Burgess, and a few others, be it said, they severed connection with their late companions when they became too violent. The revelers took the town by storm; everything had to give way to them. They exhibited their hirsute trophies, flourished their weapons, and told what deeds of valor they had done, and what they would do to anyone who doubted the story. No one durst oppose them, but when they became too violent and demonstrative their weapons were coaxed from their hands, the bars of the saloon being decorated with them. One instance of the high-handed way they managed affairs is the following:
      The kitchen of the American Hotel at that time was presided over by a colored individual, who had the temerity to speak slightingly of the prowess of these valiant heroes. One evening there was a great outcry at the door of Joe Goodwin's saloon, and upon the crowd rushing out to ascertain the cause, they found one of the exterminators, who accused the negro of having knocked him down. This offense, whether it had been committed or not, was more than they could bear. The next morning they made a raid upon the culinary department of the hotel, captured the offending man and bore him away in triumph. He was taken to a vacant lot, near where Mr. Huseman lives, stretched over a pine log, and severely whipped on his bare back with a rawhide. Having thus vindicated their honor, and demonstrated the innate heroism of their natures, they gave the negro, all bloody and weak from the terrible scourging he had received, notice to leave town under pain of death. Gradually the better citizens began to exert their influence, and as soon as the rampant fighters perceived that they would no longer be indulged in their eccentricities, they subsided into nothingness, and the campaign was over.
      It would have been a more pleasant task to have related a different ending to this campaign, but this book deals in facts, and facts are sometimes stubborn things. Harry Laurenz Wells, History of Siskiyou County, California, 1881, pages 129-133


    Among the many adventurous spirits drawn by the discovery of gold in California to the Pacific Coast, where they became unconsciously and by the force of circumstances makers of history and founders of empire, was a young Pennsylvanian from the vicinity of Philadelphia, named Benjamin Wright. [His brother writes that he was born in Indiana.] He was of a good family and Quaker antecedents, and had a sister who was afterward a belle in Washington society. Of the hopes or disappointments which led him to determine upon coming to California in that early day nothing is known, and probably he was only one of the many Argonauts who sought the Golden Fleece. Drifting northward, we hear of him first at Yreka, in 1851, where he seems to have become well-known for brave and energetic characteristics, and to have been willing to lead in encounters with the ever-treacherous and murderous Indians of Northern California and Southern Oregon; going with other citizens of Yreka to recover a band of horses stolen from the miners by the Modoc Indians.
    In the summer of 1852 he is again heard of, heading a party to arrest two Rogue River Indians who had murdered a citizen of Scott's Valley, in which expedition he was successful, the Indians being taken while fleeing to the Modoc country. They were fairly tried; one was hung, and one acquitted. Wright was at this time about thirty-two years of age; tall, lithe, with long, curling black hair falling down to his shoulders; features rather fine and pleasing, a quick-moving dark eye, and a shrewd rather than an intellectual expression of countenance. Dressed in the fringed buckskin suit affected by frontiersmen, a Palo Alto hat slouched over his handsome face, astride of his heavy black mule, with bearskin mochilas, and a rifle slung across his back, he was the ideal of a knight of the frontier. Less daring and less honorable deeds than have been done by him and his class have made the knights and heroes of transatlantic history.
    In 1852, there was a large emigration across the plains to California and Oregon. Those destined for the Rogue River or Shasta valleys, after parting company with the main emigration through the Humboldt Valley, took a route that led northwesterly to about the latitude of 42°, and thence westward through a succession of alkaline and marsh-skirted lakes, until it reached the range of mountains separating this uninviting region from the beautiful valleys on the other side of the Sierra. From the earliest explorations of this country it had proved a dangerous region to the unwary traveler--the more so as the Indians inhabiting it became aware of the value of the property of white men, and by occasional murders and robberies possessed themselves of firearms in addition to bows and arrows.
    About the first of August of the year above mentioned, a train of sixty male emigrants arrived in Yreka by this route--the advance of a long succession of emigrant companies to arrive for two months later. These men represented that in passing through the country lying between Goose Lake on the east and Lower Klamath Lake on the west, ranged over by the Modoc tribe of Indians, they had found these savages prepared for hostilities, but afraid, apparently, to attack them, as they were well-armed and traveled compactly. That they would attack some weaker parties coming after them they had not a doubt.
    On receiving this information, Charles McDermit, a large-souled man, at that time Sheriff of Siskiyou County--the same who afterward, and during the Civil War, commanded Fort Churchill in Northern Nevada--determined to take steps to prevent the unsuspecting and wearied emigrants from being plundered and murdered by the Modocs. Those who had lived a few years on the frontier knew the danger; those who were coming did not. And being aware of this, Captain McDermit soon had under his command a company of about thirty men--brave, resolute and unselfish border-knights, anxious to rescue from peril their brothers from the East, and wild with the thought that perhaps even then unresisting women and helpless babes were being butchered with all the horrors of savage warfare. Arming and equipping with haste--having the countenance and support of the citizens of Yreka, many of whom expected relations to arrive that year, and by that route--Captain McDermit, in a few days' time, was upon the road, and his company succeeded in reaching Goose Lake while but two trains were known to have passed that point. Both, being well-armed bodies of men, were allowed to pass through the Modoc country with only a slight skirmish, in which two men were wounded.
    The third train consisted of ten wagons, and about twenty poorly armed men, five of whom had families accompanying them. To these Captain McDermit explained the danger from Indian attack, and sent with them two of his company as guides. Daily, in advance, could be seen an Indian spy; and as the company approached the since-famous Lost River country, signal fires were lighted, though no Indians appeared in sight. Satisfied that an ambush was being prepared, the guides determined, if possible, to avoid the snare. The old emigrant road passed for about a mile close upon the margin of Tule Lake, where it was overhung by high cliffs, the terminal rocks of a ridge running north, and forming the eastern boundary of the Lost River Valley. Turning to the north before coming to this ridge, the guides led the wagons over it, and into the valley, by a route hitherto unused. As the Modocs discovered the failure of their scheme of ambush, they came out of their hiding places in swarms, howling and yelling in demoniacal rage. Previously, a Dutchman belonging to the train, who could not be convinced of danger so long as he did not see Indians, had ventured alone toward the lake to shoot ducks. The Indians waited until he was within fifty yards of the lake, when they broke cover, and made a dash in his direction. He proved to be a swift runner, however, and reached the train in safety, though he left most of his clothing upon the tough sagebrush through which he was obliged to force his way. This double disappointment greatly excited and incensed the Indians, who gathered near the train, making frantic demonstrations, but hesitating to attack. The emigrants hurried forward their teams to take up a position in open ground; the Indians endeavoring to stampede the cattle, succeeding in which they would have had the whites at their mercy.
    On arriving at a proper place for a halt, the train was brought to a standstill, the wagons drawn up in a circle, with the cattle in the enclosure, and preparation made for a fight; an event which, at the same time, the whites were anxious to avoid. One-third of the company, with one of the Yreka men who could speak the jargon in use among the Oregon and Californian tribes, then advanced toward the Indian ranks, calling out to their chief to come and fight if he wished it, as they were ready. This apparent desire for battle, together with the mysterious appearance of the wagons, which had their covers tied down close to conceal the women and children, inspired the Modocs with apprehensions, and the chief proposed to hold a conference, unarmed, with the speaker of the whites. Accordingly both advanced, until within seventy-five yards of each other, and entered upon a pretended friendly council.
    While the conference was going on, one by one the Indians on an eminence not far off were seen to fasten their bows to their feet, secrete arrows at their backs, and, making a show of being unarmed, join the chief. Of this movement the speaker was warned by his friends in waiting; and the chief, being remonstrated with, sent away his men. After parleying for some time, the Modocs agreed to retire and allow the emigrants to proceed without further interruption. As they once more set the train in motion, a party of Modocs, mounted, made their appearance from behind the north end of the ridge, where they had evidently been stationed to intercept any fleeing members of the company when it should have been attacked at the south end. That evening the company encamped fifteen miles west of the point of attack, expecting to be followed; but a cold rainstorm setting in, which lasted nearly all night, seemed to have damped the aggressiveness of the Modocs. Starting on again early in the morning, they had not gone over a quarter of a mile, when, looking back, they could see their campground covered with the savages, a second time disappointed. Soon after they passed beyond the limits of the Modoc country, and were safe.
    These incidents occurred on the 19th and 20th of August. On the 23rd, while encamped, about nine o'clock in the evening, there came into their midst a most pitiable object--a half-dressed, almost wholly starved and demented man, riding barebacked a jaded and famished horse, whose general condition seemed in sympathy with his rider's. The man, who was hardly able to articulate, was lifted to the ground, fed and tended until he could give some half-intelligible account of himself. He belonged, he said, to a party of nine men traveling on horseback, with pack animals. They had been duly warned by Captain McDermit, and on approaching Tule Lake had avoided the narrow pass, taking the same cutoff used by the previous train. Seeing no Indians, they were riding carelessly down the west side of the ridge into the valley. Suddenly from the rocks behind them came a cloud of arrows, with a few bullets--the Modocs at this time being in possession of not more than six or eight guns in the whole tribe. At the first fire eight of the men were unhorsed. The horse ridden by the ninth man fell, and his rider, dropping his gun in the excitement, sprang upon a loose horse, which, taking fright, ran with him for miles up the valley, urged on by the yells of the Indians. Frantic himself at the suddenness and appalling nature of the calamity which had overtaken him, he used no discretion, nor attempted to control the animal until it dropped from exhaustion--as he believed, dead.
    The fugitive was now near the Lost River, which he swam, taking a west course. On approaching Lower Klamath Lake, he discovered an Indian, which so alarmed him that he turned back and swam the river again; roaming about, not knowing what direction to take, until on the following day he came upon his horse, that, having recovered from its fatigue, was glad to welcome back its master. Mounting, he rode day and night, until he came to the camp, as above mentioned. He had about a tablespoonful of rose berries tied up in a corner of his handkerchief, which he said he was saving for food, as he expected to be out all winter, and should need them. Fright, want, and solitude had fairly turned his brain.
    Taking this poor creature with them, the company moved on, arriving at Yreka on the 24th, where the story of the massacre of the eight men was quickly spread abroad. A public meeting was called the same night to organize a volunteer company to go out upon that portion of the road leading through the Modoc country, for the protection of the emigration. A courier was dispatched to Wright, who was mining on Cottonwood Creek, twenty miles distant. By daylight next morning he was seen in the streets of Yreka, and men were crowding around him, eager to volunteer under his leadership to punish the Modocs or to protect their friends. Those who could not volunteer generously contributed arms, horse equipments, provisions, blankets or ammunition--whatever they possessed--that would enable those who could to undertake the sterner duty of the camp and the field.
    To understand with what interest the people already on the Pacific Coast watched for each year's immigration, it is necessary to know something of their relative conditions. Those already here were the fathers, husbands or brothers of those upon the road; and were relatives, or, at the farthest, neighbors of many to whom they were not so nearly related. Often they had thousands of dollars worth of property in stock coming overland from the States. Most of these men had made the journey across the continent, and knew by experience that after passing Fort Hall the hardest and most perilous part of it remained to be performed. By July, on this side of the Rocky Mountains, grass was dry, except in certain favored localities; water scarce, and the heat and dust excessive. The larger the emigration, the greater the suffering from these causes. Every week, as the season advanced, added to the evils to be endured. Often food became scarce in whole trains, and for other trains to relieve the want was to place themselves in the same situation. Yet the help was usually afforded, and it sometimes happened that almost a whole emigration arrived in a famishing condition. Knowing this, supplies were annually forwarded to meet the later trains. The long, toilsome, wearisome journey was dreaded for their friends by those on this side, and great anxiety felt concerning their condition during the last stages of their journey. The maddening thought that to all the trials attending emigration might be added that of savage warfare was not to be borne. Even those who had no friends on the road that year sympathized with those who had, and were eager to give assistance. It was this general impulse to shield from harm the coming emigration which so quickly set on foot the movement to raise a company of volunteers. The estimation in which Wright was held was shown by the fact of soliciting him to take the captaincy of the company. As Yreka, in 1852, was but a small town, and as preparations had to be made for weeks of service, it was three days before the horseshoeing, the saddlemaking or mending, the packing of stores, and gathering up of arms and ammunition, was completed; when at last Ben Wright, with thirty good and true men, and two friendly Indians, one of them a servant of Wright, set out upon his errand of mercy.
    In the meantime the Modocs were carrying on their predatory warfare with success, unknown to Captain McDermit, whose men, engaged in piloting trains, were scattered along the road for a hundred miles, and unable to do military duty. The fate of some of these travelers only their bones remained to tell. About the last of August a company of twenty-nine men, one woman and a child, arrived at Black Rock Springs, several days east of Tule Lake. They found there six of McDermit's company; two of whom--Mr. Coats, representative of Siskiyou County, and a Mr. Ormsby, of Yreka--were sent to escort them through the Modoc country. Before proceeding far on this portion of the journey, they were joined by another company of thirty-two armed emigrants, who had for pilot a third man named Evans--an old mountaineer, well acquainted with the country.
    On the 3rd of September, when within half a day's drive of Tule Lake, the latter company halted for repairs, while the former one kept on, Messrs. Coats and Ormsby riding in advance. It would seem from what happened now, that these gentlemen could not have been informed of that which had occurred a few days previously. It is certain that two of the Yreka men, named Smith and Toland, escorting a train through Tule Lake, were wounded and taken to Yreka in emigrant wagons, which probably accounts for the fact that the men coming after them were uninformed and unprepared for an attack. The guides were three-quarters of a mile ahead of the train, on the old road next the lake, and were just turning the point of the ridge which hid them from sight, when those behind saw a large number of Indians suddenly start to view among the rocks. Immediately one of the company, mounted on a swift horse, hastened in pursuit, to warn Coats and Ormsby of their danger; soon disappearing, like them, behind the point of the bluff. The train was poorly armed, there being but seven guns in the company. These were examined; the woman and child (the family of W. L. Donellen) hidden under some bedding, the wagon covers tied down, and the train proceeded, soon entering upon the narrow pass of a mile in length. As it moved along under the bluff, the arrows began to fall thick and fast. But the men kept, as much as possible, the wagons between them and the Indians, and by urging their teams, and using their guns judiciously, made the dangerous mile with but one man wounded--shot with an arrow through the back and lungs.
    Hastening on to the open valley--still dogged by the Indians, who were kept at a distance by the guns--the train was halted and the cattle corralled between the wagons. They now perceived that some of the savages were mounted upon the horses and wore the clothing of Coats, Ormsby, and the third man who had preceded them, and understood what had been their fate. The Modocs, finding that the company were prepared to defend themselves, tried various devices to approach, or to force them from their position; making screens of tules, which they pushed slowly before them, so as almost to be unobserved while they crawled along the ground, and when they saw this artifice was discovered, setting fire to the dry tules to the windward. The latter danger the emigrants met with a "backfire," and retained their position.
    Thus passed the remainder of that day and night, and the next day until about noon, when the company behind came up. By the advice of Evans they had taken the cutoff over the ridge, eluding an ambush set for them at the point of rocks, and causing great excitement among the Indians, who hurried about yelling, apparently distracted with rage. After being reinforced, the whole body of the emigrants moved to the border of the lake, the first train having been without water for more than twenty-four hours. The Indians, made desperate by the prospect of losing their prey, followed, and, skulking in the tules, shot their arrows after them. As they were very numerous, the situation of the emigrants was precarious; for, whether they moved or remained to fight, there was almost the certainty of being cut off at last by the savages, who possessed the advantage of numbers and familiarity with the country.
    While watering their cattle at the lakeside, what appeared to them a party of Indians, mounted, came in sight from the west, riding down upon them, causing a hasty movement of armed men to the front. As the cavalcade came nearer, their leader, Captain Ben Wright, advanced alone, addressing them in English, and explaining his errand. Great was the relief and joy when it became known that a volunteer company from Yreka had come to their rescue, prepared to fight the Modocs. A fat bullock driven from Salt Lake was slaughtered, as an act of hospitality to the volunteers, who, while they feasted, learned the requirements of the situation in which the emigration was placed by the hostility of the Indians. Their grief and anger on learning the fate of Coats and Ormsby prepared them to mete out vengeance, and an immediate attack was determined upon, in which the armed portion of the emigrants offered to participate.
    Leaving a guard with the wagons, the volunteers, with a reinforcement of a dozen men, made a reconnaissance of the lakeshore--the Indians running wildly about in much excitement, trying to intercept their course. But their inferior arms placed them at a great disadvantage, and in the skirmishing the Indians were driven into the lake, the volunteers following until up to their armpits in water. Concealed among the tules were the canoes of the Indians, in which they finally made their escape to the since-famous lava beds. One of these canoes was upset by their pursuers, drowning several of the fleeing Indians. What with the killed and drowned that afternoon, there were twenty-five Modocs less at nightfall.
    In skirmishing around the lake, the bodies of the three men killed the day before were discovered, horribly mutilated. To their poor remains such decent burial was given as the circumstances permitted. The bodies of the eight emigrants massacred two weeks previous had been devoured by wolves, only their bones being found. These ghastly appeals for retributive justice furnished sad subjects for campfire conversation that night. The next day the emigrants continued their journey toward Yreka, escorted [for] a day's travel upon the road by Wright's company. They carried the story of these outrages to the settlements, and the liveliest feelings of horror and indignation prevailed among all classes of people, both in California and Oregon, and a company of volunteers was raised in Jacksonville, by Captain John E. Ross, and sent out to assist in protecting the emigration.
    Wright had his headquarters at Clear Lake, a few miles east of Tule Lake, the circle upon the ground made by his horse corral being visible at the present day. For two months the volunteers traveled back and forth, in heat and dust, escorting emigrants over a stretch of a hundred miles of road. To support them in the field for this length of time required a good deal of self-denial on the part of the people, who contributed supplies, not only to them, but to some of the emigration who had exhausted their provisions before arriving at Wright's post. In raising these supplies, Captain McDermit was most untiring and efficient, giving of his own money and time unsparingly; while to Captain Ben Wright was left the command of the fighting men. Wright's lieutenants were W. T. Kershaw and H. N. White. Among his company were Messrs. E. P. Jenner, J. C. Burgess, John G. Hallick, William Tenning, William Bram, Evans, Murray, Fielding, Sanbanch, Poland and Helm, with others whose names are unknown.
    When the Modocs learned that they were watched by a force of armed whites, they were compelled to cease their outrages, and remained in their fastnesses on the south side of the lake, which could not be approached by the volunteers without boats. But from two prisoners, whom Wright succeeded in capturing, he learned enough to inform him that twenty-five known murders committed in the forepart of the season did not comprise the sum total of their atrocities. Indeed, one of the captured Indians was wrapped in a cradle quilt when caught--an article that suggested a whole chapter of horrors--and from these guilty wretches he obtained knowledge of two young women held in captivity by the Modocs, and a large amount of property in their possession belonging to murdered emigrants, fourteen of whom had been found at Lost River Fort by Ross' company.
    To liberate the captives and recover the property stolen was now the aim of Wright. But no artifice or argument of his could overcome the caution and cunning of the enemy, who during six or eight weeks eluded all his attempts to draw them out of their caves. At one time he pretended to withdraw his men, and the whole company traveled easterly for a considerable distance. Meeting a train with ox teams, loose cattle and all the encumbrances of emigrants, Wright formed a plan to bring on an encounter with them, by hiding most of his men in the emigrant wagons, concealing every appearance of arms, dressing some of the volunteers in women's clothing, and permitting the train to drag its slow length carelessly along past the Bloody Point of Tule Lake, as if wholly unsuspicious of danger. But the Modocs were not to be caught. They were too well skilled in treacherous devices not to see guile in such apparent guilelessness, and remained unmoved in their rocky strongholds.
    About the last of October the emigration was believed to be all in, and the volunteers returned to their homes. Very soon after, it was discovered that some families were still missing, and probably upon the road. Wright then determined to return to the Modoc country, and to take with him lumber to make boats in which to cross the lake, and force from the Modocs their guilty secrets. On arriving at Bloody Point with only eighteen men, he found that a small train, containing men, women and children, had been driven from the road into the tules, where all were murdered, their wagons broken up and secreted, and property carried off. This discovery made Wright and his men doubly determined upon getting at the Modocs. At length, by means of a couple of boats, and with the aid of his Indian servant and a Modoc squaw, Wright succeeded in invading their rocky retreat in the lava beds, and putting himself in communication with the chiefs.
    Here he found abundant evidences of murder and plunder: women's dresses with arrow holes through them, and infants' socks and clothing, among them. Wright offered to make a treaty of amity and commerce with the Modocs, provided they would deliver up their two captives, and restore the cattle, horses, arms and other property taken from the whites that season, amounting to many thousands of dollars; but otherwise, he should make war upon them, and kill as many as possible. After a good deal of negotiating, much prevarication and deceit, the chiefs consented to a meeting for a conference, the place being fixed by Wright near his camp on Lost River. Four of the Modocs only presented themselves at the time agreed upon, bringing with them an old gun and a couple of poor horses.
    With a good understanding of the Indian character, Wright regarded these four in the light of spies only, and determined upon making a demonstration of power, as the only means of inspiring respect. One of the four chiefs was required to go back to his people and bring in the two white women and the property as before demanded, while the other three were detained as hostages. The messenger returned next day, with forty-five warriors, but without the prisoners or the plundered property. Here was a critical turn in affairs, but without showing any fear Wright proceeded with the council as if he did not apprehend treachery. The Indians were generously feasted on the same beef eaten by the volunteers. Again Wright stated his terms of amnesty and friendship, which the Modoc chiefs treated with slightly veiled contempt.
    "You held our men as hostages when you outnumbered us," they said; "now we think we should hold you."
    Perceiving that the Modocs had no real intention of agreeing to the only terms on which a treaty could be made with them, Wright knew that the safety of himself and his company depended upon anticipating the intentions of the enemy. He therefore allowed the council to be prolonged until nightfall, when the Indians encamped on the opposite side of the river, near the Stone Ford or Bridge, as it was commonly called. The usual hour of attack among Indians is early morning. During the night, about half of Wright's men crossed the river, and concealed themselves as close as they safely could to the Indian camp. Wright, to be sure that he was not mistaken, waited to attack until he heard preparations for attacking him going on in the Modoc camp, and the person of the head chief could be distinctly discerned. Then he fired, and the chief fell. At the signal the remainder of the company dashed across the river, and the slaughter commenced. Unable to see their assailants, the Indians were mowed down by the rifles and revolvers of the volunteers. Out of forty-eight only two or three escaped. Of the eighteen volunteers, four were wounded.
    Wright and his company returned immediately to Yreka, the wounded men being carried fifteen miles on litters made of their guns lashed together. Arrived at that place, the volunteers were welcomed with rejoicing, the sick tenderly cared for, and the freedom of the town extended to Captain Wright. No man ever had a greater degree of popularity among his peers than Wright enjoyed at this time. Those whose lives and property were saved by the exertions of the volunteers owed them a debt of gratitude not soon to be forgotten. Those whose wrongs they had attempted to redress or avenge held their services in high esteem. Nor was there ever a question raised as to the propriety of Wright's conduct at that time in extricating his company from a dangerous predicament, by surprising the Modoc camp and killing as many as he could of the murderers of innocent persons, since they refused to accept amnesty and a treaty of peace and commerce.
    But two or three years afterward, owing to some personal jealousies--arising out of Wright's popularity, quite as much as anything, apparently--it began to be said that he had not deserved the encomiums lavished upon him in 1852, but that instead, he had acted very dishonorably in the closing scene of that campaign, and in fact that he had been inspired from the first with mere bloodthirstiness of disposition; and even that he had killed the Modocs by poison and not in battle. The flimsiness of these accusations is easily shown. In the first place, he did not seek the captaincy of the rescuing company--it sought him. He arrived in the Modoc country after a large number of persons had been murdered, variously estimated from thirty-six to seventy-five, and under circumstances to render the wrong peculiarly aggravating. One of his company, writing to a citizen of Yreka, said: "No man, seeing what we have seen, and having a drop of the milk of human kindness in his veins, could refuse to give his last dollar, if required, to prevent the repetition of such atrocities as have been committed at this place. For God's sake do not be slow in sending recruits and supplies!"--which does not sound like the utterance of a man bent only on killing Indians from wantonness. Several respectable citizens of Siskiyou County, members of Wright's company, have denied over their own signatures, given publicly, that there was any treachery connected with the killing of the Modocs--but that the volunteers simply defended themselves from an intended massacre by the Modocs, who greatly outnumbered them, and might be reinforced by much larger numbers. Had there been any other way left, Wright certainly would have taken it, rather than have left the captives and the property in the hands of the Modocs, neither of which were ever recovered, the girls dying in the hands of their captors, for after having been forced to extricate his company in the manner adopted, he could not remain a day longer in the Modoc country, even had he not had four wounded men requiring surgical assistance.
    Wright probably returned to mining, as nothing is heard of him in public life until in 1855, when he appears again as a Sub-Indian Agent in Oregon, in charge of the Indians about the mouth of Rogue River--the Tututnis and Mikonotunnes--Indians as savage as the Modocs, but less intelligent and brave. A bloody Indian war was being carried on in the Rogue River Valley, extending to the Umpqua Valley, and threatening to involve all the Indians on the west of the Cascade Range. The Oregon Superintendent had done all that was in his power to prevent the infection spreading, by gathering up the coast tribes and placing them on temporary reservations, in charge of agents. In November, 1855, we find W. R. Dunbar, Collector at Port Orford, writing to the Superintendent:
    "Ben is on the jump day and night. I never saw in my life a more energetic agent of the public. His plans are all good, there can be no doubt of it--that of maintaining peace, and that of quieting the fears of the Indian--so that he and the white man may return to their usual pursuits."
    By another correspondent he is styled "Our much-esteemed and efficient Indian Agent."
    The only published document signed with his name is the following letter, which explains itself.
    "Sir:--In consequence of existing excitement on the part of the white citizens of this district, occasioned by the presence of warlike bands of Indians on our borders, I deem it expedient and necessary to request you to allow the present military force stationed at Port Orford to remain, as a means of enabling me to carry out my plans for the preservation of peace among the Indians of my district, and for the security of white citizens.
Major Reynolds, U.S.A."
    In another communication of Mr. Dunbar, he says:
    "Ben goes at once to Rogue River, and if the whites will let his business alone, he can maintain peace in his widely extended district.  *  *  *  He will try to restore quiet, and at all hazards prevent the whites misusing the Indians."
    He seemed at this time to have the entire confidence of the Indians, whom he counseled, fed and protected from the rage of white men who had lost friends in the Indian wars, or who, for baser reasons, wished the Indians out of their way. With the shrewdness which distinguished him, Wright had availed himself of the superstitions of the savages to strengthen his influence among them, and they believed that he could not be killed by a bullet or any missile. He had also allied himself to the Indians, after the fashion of the early fur traders, by taking to wife an intelligent Indian woman, who acted as his interpreter, and drew a salary from the Department in that capacity. So far as one knew, and to all appearances, Wright was the person of all others to control the wild creatures placed in his charge. But Indian character is hard to understand, and seldom thoroughly reliable.
    A bitter struggle had been going on for months between the Rogue River settlers and the natives of the valley, who had conceived the notion that they could exterminate the whites, and were trying to do it. The Indian Department, which, like the Military Department, often feels it to be a duty to take sides against the white race as opposed to the Indian race, and to ignore the claims of labor and civilization in humoring the demands of indolent savages, who require land enough for each individual to support a thousand by agriculture, had decided to "protect" the tribes on the coast by removing them to a distant reservation, and they had consented to be thus protected. But emissaries from the Rogue River were among them, stirring them up to suspicion and hatred, increasing the natural dread which the Indian has of any change from the locality familiar to him. Worst among these mischief makers was one Enos, a half-breed, who had been once in Fremont's employ as a guide, and who added intelligence to evil propensities, and this man it was Wright's intention to arrest, as one means of preventing the spread of the war spirit among the Indians of his district.
    In February, 1856, the first companies of volunteers called out to protect settlements having finished their term of service, the Governor of Oregon called for several new companies to be organized. One of these had a recruiting camp about four miles above the mouth of Rogue River, and on the night of the 2nd a part of the men went down to Whaleshead, a small town at the mouth, where a dance was being held to celebrate Washington's birthday.
    The captain of the volunteers, Ben Poland, was also at Whaleshead that night, and, in company with Wright, was at the house of a Mr. J. McGuire. Toward daylight on the 23rd, some of the Mikonotunnes came to McGuire's house and informed Wright that Enos was at their camp, and they wished the agent to come over the river and take him away, as he was making trouble for them. Calling on his friend Poland to accompany him, Wright, without a suspicion of treachery, did as he was desired, crossed the river to the Indian camp, in the discharge of his duty, and met his fate. No one ever knew the manner of his death, only as it was truly or falsely revealed by the savages themselves, and boasted of by Enos. That it was horrible, there is no doubt. It was said, on Indian authority, that he was cut to pieces with knives, his heart cut out and roasted, and a part of it eaten by his Indian wife, who had told the Mikonotunnes to kill him in that manner, since they believed he could not be shot. This part of the story may be only sensational. But it is certain that the Indians, to save whom from harm he exerted all his great energies, betrayed and foully murdered him.
    As the story is usually told, the impression is given that the Modocs, or an Indian woman who was a friend of the Modocs, murdered him in revenge for the killing of over forty of their people by the Yreka volunteers in 1852. There is, however, no truth in that assertion. He was killed at a general uprising of the barbarous and murderous tribes which inhabited the coast from the Coquille River to the California line; the special treachery practiced upon him being attributable to the superstition above mentioned. It is not probable that the Indians who killed him knew anything about the Modoc affair, as they had no intercourse with that people; or, if they had any, it was only as enemies, for the Modocs were friends with no tribes east of the Cascades.
    On the night or morning when Wright and Poland were killed, twenty-four other persons were murdered, others wounded, and two women carried into captivity. Every house but one in a distance of ten miles was burned--the Indians attacking at seven different points during that day. At the volunteer camp, out of fifteen men only two escaped. At Whaleshead and along the road, another thirteen were massacred. During the week following, five other persons, making thirty-one in all, suffered death at the hands of the savages. For a whole month all the inhabitants of that district, about one hundred and thirty, were crowded into a small, rude fort which had been erected at the breaking out of the Rogue River war, only venturing far enough away by day, and under guard, to dig potatoes left in the ground over winter, or to kill one of their own cattle escaped from the Indians, for food. One of the volunteers who escaped made his way to Port Orford, where Major Reynolds was stationed with ten men. But the troops could not go to the relief of the beleaguered people at Whaleshead because the Indians threatened Port Orford, and it became necessary to fortify in all haste for their own defense. Six generous-souled men got into an open boat, and coasted along down to the mouth of Rogue River, but were drowned in the surf in an attempt to land--thus only adding to the loss of life. Captain Tichenor took his schooner Nellie down, but could not effect a landing, and another vessel, the Gold Beach, with volunteers on board, made an effort to go to the relief of the people at Whaleshead, from Crescent City, but failed. No help could reach them from the interior, over mountain trails covered with snow, and almost impassable at any time. A messenger who was sent out from Port Orford, and reached the Umpqua Valley, conveyed the first news of the massacre, which was forwarded to San Francisco, and troops were sent from here to Port Orford with orders to march to the relief of these people, of whom nothing had been heard for a month.
    They were found by Colonel Buchanan huddled in their miserable little fort, and
overjoyed to be released. There were no newspapers in this part of Oregon to chronicle the events of that trying period of its history. A few letters from private individuals found their way into the public prints, and all of these spoke in terms of respect and regard of the murdered Indian Agent, Ben Wright, whose death was generally regretted. When the United States troops and Oregon volunteers had fought and punished the Indians until they were quiescent, the Indian Superintendent removed them to the far-off reservation which they dreaded, and an Agent was put over them who made them fear him.
    One day he found a party of the Mikonotunnes howling and yelling over a white man's scalp--the ebony locks of poor Wright, whose body never had Christian burial. He ordered them to give it to him. They refused. He marched two or three of the leaders before him to the guardhouse, and gave them fifteen minutes to deliver to him the scalp. They held out until the time was almost up; but, not liking the looks of the Agent's revolver, finally yielded, and the trophy passed into his hands. Ross Browne, who was sent to report upon the condition of Indian affairs in Oregon, in 1857, tells about this. About this time, Enos, the half-breed concerned in the murder of Wright, was arrested, and finally hung at Port Orford. These are all the facts publicly recorded of Wright. None of them are dishonorable to him. Why was it then, that as soon as he was dead, and could not call his slanderers to account, the story was set afloat of his poisoning the Modocs? In General Wool's report for 1856, he says:
    "I will simply remark that the death of Sub-Indian Agent Wright, who was represented by General Lane, in debate in the House of Representatives, as being friendly to the Indians, was caused by an old grudge against him for attempting, before he was appointed Agent, to poison a whole band of Indians."
    That this was not true is here shown. General Wool was prejudiced by some person or persons who gave him false information. The same stories were revived during the Modoc War of 1872-3, and the Canby massacre was made to be consequent upon Wright's alleged crime. But from the facts here given it is evident: first, that the Modocs required no provocation to commit massacres; second, that Wright gave them no such provocation; and third, that if he had, the fact of his death at the hands of another and distant tribe at the beginning of a great uprising could have nothing to do with it. It is only meet that justice should be done: and here upon this page let us record a verdict in favor of our Knight of the Frontier, who, so far as we know, always labored in the cause of humanity.
The Californian, August 1881, pages 152-162


    What was the Ben Wright massacre? Until it was given prominence by the great Modoc War in 1873, few people not residents of Northern California or Southern Oregon had ever heard of it, and yet it is one of the most stirring incidents of our Indian history. The first question that suggests itself is, Who and what was Ben Wright? The first half of the query can be readily answered, but the last is still a matter of dispute. People who knew him vary in their estimate of his character, in
proportion to their divergent ideals of true manhood. I will place him before you as he is described by those who knew him best, including his warmest friends--and
I do not know that he had any enemies--and each can measure him by his own ideal standard of humanity and classify him accordingly.
    Ben Wright, so those who knew him intimately assert, was reared in the state of Indiana, where his father was a manufacturer of considerable wealth. His parents belonged to the brotherhood of Quakers, but the peaceful tenets of that sect found no lodgment in the heart of young Wright. Possessed of a dauntless spirit and a
restless desire for adventure, he left the home of his boyhood while yet a beardless youth, and sought the wild frontier of the West. There he found kindred spirits from every state in the Union from Maine to Florida, as well as the French, English and Scotch trappers from Canada and the "greasers" of Mexico. They were a wild, reckless set of men, with whom strength, firmness and bravery were the standard of manhood, with whom whiskey was a necessity, and whose only female associates were the Indian women of the various tribes with whom they came in contact. In such society young Wright's character was molded and shaped for its life work. For years be traversed the plains and mountains of the West with the brigades of trappers, enduring hardships of every description, fighting Indians and wild animals, until he came to have few equals and no superior in all the arts of the mountaineer. When gold was discovered in California, like hundreds of his companions, he went to the mines in search of new adventures. It was in this way we find him in the mines on Scott River and then on the Klamath in 1851.
    He mined a little and hunted a great deal, living the life of a "squaw man," a term used to signify one whose cabin was occupied by an Indian woman either temporarily or permanently. With the character and customs of the savages he was thoroughly familiar, and all the arts of savage warfare had been acquired in a school where one must either learn or perish. He seemed to pride himself upon his resemblance to an Indian. His glossy black hair fell in long, waving tresses upon his shoulders, and this, with his buckskin suit, made the resemblance very striking when his back was turned; nor was the illusion entirely dispelled by a glimpse at his face, bronzed by years of frontier life. One night, during a campaign against the Modocs the previous fall [sic], a disturbance was heard among the horses picketed near camp, and two Modocs, who were prisoners in the camp, thinking their friends were stampeding the animals, broke from their guards and made a dash for liberty. Wright was one of the first to rush out into the darkness in pursuit, but before he had taken half a dozen steps one of the men, thinking he was an Indian, seized him by his streaming hair and jerked him backwards upon the ground. The mistake was discovered in time to save his life; and though often urged to cut his hair, and thus prevent such mistakes in the future, Wright would never consent to part with his flowing locks. Not only did he look like an Indian, but he acted like one in all his dealings with them, scalping the fallen and committing other barbarities, such as cutting off the ears, noses and fingers of the wounded before their eyes had closed in death. He was not alone in this, for other members of the company followed their leader's example with all the zeal of a disciple. He was an ideal man in their eyes. Added to his other qualifications, for such they were in Indian warfare, was the fact that he scarcely knew the sensation of fear, tempering his bravery with a cautiousness that experience had taught him was necessary in dealing with so treacherous a foe. He hesitated not to crawl into the very heart of an Indian camp when out reconnoitering, trusting to his agility and nerve in case of discovery. He fought Indians for the love of excitement, as did some of his followers, and took as much delight in being on the warpath as did the proudest warrior that ever bore a scalp home in triumph to his lodge. Such was Ben Wright. The men who composed his company in 1852 varied from those who sought to pattern after him as closely as possible to those who, having gone into the field at first from a sense of duty and a desire to defend helpless emigrants from the attacks of ruthless savages, remained to punish the perpetrators of the horrible butcheries they had witnessed.
    Having seen who were the actors in this memorable campaign, let us proceed with its details and the horrible incidents that led to it.
    The Applegate Trail, which led from Fort Hall to Southern Oregon, was laid out in 1846, and was used that fall by a few emigrants. They suffered so severely in the Umpqua Canyon that the route was shunned by emigrants after the next year. In 1848 Peter Lassen laid out the celebrated Lassen Road, using this trail as far as Pit River. In 1849 the emigrants on this route were snowed in and suffered severely in the mountains of Plumas County, California, and again the route was abandoned by emigrants. In 1852, however, those bound for Northern California and Southern Oregon came over this trail because of its shortness, and the fact that causes which had brought it into disrepute did not exist between Yreka or Rogue River Valley and Fort Hall. The trail led through the heart of the Modoc country, passing along the bank of Tule Lake and across the Natural Bridge on Lost River.
    Early in August, 1852, John Onsby [sic--Owenby, Owensby, Ormsby] received a letter at Yreka from his uncle, having come by the way of Sacramento, stating that he and many others were coming on the old Oregon trail to Yreka, and that great suffering would ensue if they were not met by a supply of provisions. James Thomas, an auctioneer, took the letter in his hand and rode up Miner Street, calling the people together. Before the crowd which quickly gathered the letter was read and a call made for volunteers and subscriptions. Such a call was never made in vain in a mining camp; volunteers and gold dust poured in thick and fast. Preparations were completed as quickly as possible, and a company of men, well armed, and with pack animals carrying a generous supply of provisions, started in the direction of Lost River, with the hearty cheers of the benevolent citizens of Yreka. Captain Charles McDermit, after whom Camp McDermit, Nev., is named, was in command of the expedition. When the Rebellion broke out Captain McDermit joined the army, rose to the rank of colonel, and died in battle with the Indians, in 1866, in Nevada.
    The relief party encountered the first train of emigrants before reaching Lost River, who reported that they had been annoyed by the Modocs. They pushed on through the Modoc country, and after passing Tule Lake met a party of eight or nine men who had come across the plains with pack animals. Warning them to look out for the Indians, McDermit and his men continued on, while the packers resumed their journey towards Yreka.
    The emigrant road after it crosses the divide between Clear and Tule lakes, going west, passes along the south base of a high ridge which terminates in a rocky bluff on the east shore of Tule Lake. Winding around this point of rocks on the very margin of the water, it opens out into a large flat covered with wild rye and grass. This was a favorite place of ambuscade, and has been well named "Bloody Point."
    As the packers passed around the bluff at Bloody Point they were attacked by scores of Indians, and all save a man named Coffin were killed. This man cut the pack from one of the animals, charged through the yelling savages on horseback and made his escape. The Modocs, unlike most of the tribes of the West, were not horsemen, and were unable to pursue the fugitive.
    When Coffin arrived in Yreka with news of the massacre the excitement and horror were great. Ben Wright was sent for, and within a few hours a volunteer company of twenty-seven men, bountifully supplied with arms, horses and provisions by the citizens, were riding in haste toward Tule Lake, to rescue the  emigrants that were supposed to be following close behind the murdered packers.
    Meanwhile the work of death went on in the Modoc country. At Black Rock Springs McDermit had met two trains, and had detailed three of his men, John Onsby, Thomas H. Coats and ------ Long, to guide and guard them to Yreka. He then went on, distributing his men and provisions among the trains he met until both were exhausted.
    It was about the 1st of August that the two trains referred to encamped on Clear Lake, but two or three days behind the packers. In the morning Coats, Long and Onsby rode ahead to select a camping place for noon. One of the trains remained behind to make some repairs, while the other, consisting of six wagons, thirty men, one woman and a boy, slowly followed the trail. The captain of this train was David M. Morrison, and the woman and boy were the family of W. L. Donnellan, who was with them.
    As they crossed the divide and the road to Tule Lake was spread out before them, they could plainly see the Indians swarming in the rocks at Bloody Point, while the three guides were riding directly into the jaws of death. In vain they endeavored to warn them. Unconscious of danger the men rode on, passing around the fatal point, and were never seen alive again. The sound of rifle shots was soon borne to the anxious ears of the emigrants, telling the story of a brave defense, while the silence that followed was vocal with its tale of death.
    The train moved slowly on, and the Indians again concealed themselves in the rocks and tules to await their new victims. As the emigrants rounded Bloody Point, they were greeted with a shower of arrows and yells that might well fill their hearts with fear. Two men were wounded. These were placed in wagons, and the others, divided into a front and rear guard, kept the savages at bay with the few rifles they possessed until they reached the open flat, where they made a corral of the wagons and retired within it for protection.
    The Modocs, well hidden among the rocks and tules, bombarded the corral with arrows, though their fear of the rifles kept them at so long a range that they did but little damage. The day wore away and the darkness of night settled around that beleaguered camp and its distressed occupants, many of whom scarcely hoped to see the light of another day. Oh, the horrors of a night spent in the midst of savage enemies! Only one who has experienced them can realize their hours of agony.
What form the attack will take, or from what point the enemy will appear, are unknown; the faintest sound is magnified into a footfall, and the slightest waving of the grass becomes the form of a crouching, creeping savage.
    Intervals of fierce yelling and then a profound silence, followed by an attack upon the camp, first on one side and then on another, succeeded each other throughout that terrible night. At one time the Indians set fire to the wild rye, and made a rush upon the corral under cover of the smoke, but a counterfire built by the emigrants burned out and met the other, leaving a clear space across which they dared not come. A howl of rage and a shower of arrows told of their disappointment and anger.
    At length the welcome daylight came, and the men began to dig for water. The lake was only a few hundred yards away, but the tules on the bank were full of
savages, and to reach it was impossible.
    As noon approached the Modocs were seen to again take their stations among the rocks at Bloody Point, and by this they knew that the other train was approaching. With that train was an old mountaineer who had seen Indians before, and knew better than to run into a trap when he could see it plainly before him. Roads were nothing to him, and when the emigrants were listening for sounds of the expected conflict, lo! over the brow of the ridge appeared the old trapper and his train, and entered the corral with the others. The Indians were baffled, and filled the air with yells of rage and disappointment.
    Slowly the day wore along. In the afternoon a band of horsemen was seen riding down the lake shore from the north, at breakneck speed, toward the camp. Here was a new enemy, they thought, another band of savages, and they looked carefully to the priming of their rifles. Surely those red and blue shirts and broad slouch hats could not be the habiliments of savages. The approaching horsemen had rifles in their hands, and each had tied a handkerchief to his gun and waved it aloft as a token of peace and friendship. It was Ben Wright and his brave company of volunteers, who had ridden day and night since leaving Yreka and were now coming boldly to the rescue.
    They knew nothing of the death of Coats, Long and Onsby, but they grasped the situation at a glance; and now, stopping not to speak or draw breath, on they rushed past the corral of emigrants, down toward Bloody Point, between the Indians among the rocks and their canoes in the water. Leaping from their saddles and leaving their animals to run where they would, they made a fierce onslaught upon the surprised and terrified savages.
    The Indians had seen their approach, and from their dress and conduct knew them to be Californians who had come to fight. They might fool around a train of emigrants with considerable impunity, but a company of mounted Californians was a different proposition, as some of these same men had taught them the year before; and when they saw them ride for the point to cut off retreat, instead of going to the corral as they had expected, the savages stampeded for their canoes in terror.
    Then commenced a slaughter--a carnage. The Modocs thought only of flight, and madly rushed for their canoes, while rifle, revolver and knife made havoc among them. For a mile up and down the lake shore did the battle rage, each man fighting independently, and being sometimes among a dozen fleeing braves, dealing death blows right and left. Even when the Indians had reached their canoes the deadly bullets followed them till they were out of range or had hidden themselves in the tules.
    Not one of that brave band of avengers was injured, while the death cry had been given by at least forty Modoc braves, and as many more had carried to their island home in the tules aching reminders of the fight, to live or die as Nature might decree. (In after years the Modocs would only admit a loss of twenty in the battle at Bloody Point.)
    For several days search was made made among the tules for victims of the Modocs. They found the mangled bodies of many emigrants whose death had not before been known. Two of these were women and one a little child. They were mutilated and disfigured in a most horrible manner, causing even these strong men to turn away from the ghastly spectacle with a shudder. In reading of the massacre that occurred on Lost River a few months later the horrible sights those men had witnessed here must not be forgotten.
    They found also portions of wagons, and the Indians were discovered to be in possession of firearms, clothing, camp utensils, money and a great variety of domestic articles, showing that a whole train of emigrants, how many none could tell, had fallen a complete prey to the savages. Verily, it was a Bloody Point indeed! Twenty-two bodies were found and buried by Wright's company, and fourteen by a company that had come out from Jacksonville, Or., commanded by Colonel John E. Ross. Of these last several were women and children, their bodies gashed and mutilated in a most revolting manner.
    Ross returned to Jacksonville, while Wright escorted the trains that had collected here as far as Lost River, when he returned and established a camp on Clear Lake. At that point scattered bands of emigrants were collected into large trains and sent through the hostile country under escort.
    About the end of October the last train passed along, accompanied by Captain McDermit, whose men had all returned in details. Their labor of duty was over, and they could have returned to Yreka with honor and glory, but they wanted to remain and chastise the Modocs so severely that they would forever remember it was dangerous to murder even helpless emigrants. In this they were supported by the people of Yreka, who supplied them bountifully with provisions. This motive was strong enough to keep them all there, and was the only one that actuated many of them; but it must be admitted that Wright and a few others had an additional object in opening an aggressive campaign. The savages were known to have stock, property and money taken from the murdered emigrants, and this they hoped to secure.
    The company had now dwindled to nineteen, who established a camp on the lake shore at a point known as the "Peninsula," and endeavored to open communication with the savages, whose rancheria was on an island some distance out in the lake. Here they were visited by Major Fitzgerald with a company of dragoons, accompanied by Captain McDermit. This party brought a boat with them, which they turned over to Wright a few days later, and departed for Yreka.
    They had spent some time in camp here in their futile efforts to reach the Indians, and their stock of provisions and ammunition was running low. Four men were sent to Yreka for supplies, with instructions to return at once.
    There was a thick growth of tules between the camp and the island, and the men were baffled in all their efforts to reach it. Being unable to either go to the savages or induce them to come out and fight, Ben Wright determined to open negotiations with them, and get them in his power under cover of a truce. To this end he dispatched several men in the boat with Old Mary, a squaw belonging to one of the men, with a message of peace. They returned unsuccessful. The next day they went again, and this time were accompanied on their return by two young Indians in a canoe. These were feasted and sent back, returning the next day with forty more. The men, fifteen in all, dared not risk a fight then, but closely watched the Modocs to prevent treachery on their part. The result of thus hobnobbing with their intended victims was that in a few days their provisions were entirely exhausted.
    They then moved camp to the mouth of Lost River, to be nearer the expected supplies, and failed to invite their guests to accompany them. Here they were absolutely without food for six days, save old duck bones and scraps dug from the sand, thrown away when they were in camp here before. Had the Modocs known of their distressed condition and loss of ammunition they would probably not have left them in undisturbed possession of their camp.
    The cause of delay was that the messengers arrived in Yreka on election day, and, being good Democrats, aided to elect Franklin Pierce President of the United States. This made it necessary for them to get gloriously drunk, and to so remain for several days; then the supplies contributed by the people were gathered up slowly, and when they again started for the field they were a week behind time.
    The famishing men could have killed a horse for food, but they feared to deprive themselves of their animals. At length, on the sixth day, it was decided that one of their number, who was still strong enough to accomplish the feat, should climb a neighboring hill that overlooked the trail and see if he could espy the expected train. If so, he was to fire his pistol; if not, they were to kill one of their animals for food and return to Yreka. Slowly the man dragged his toilsome way up the hill, with fourteen pairs of hungry eyes following his every step. At last he stood upon the summit and scanned the distant horizon. Five--ten minutes, that seemed like hours, passed, and still he stood like a stone monument on the brow of the hill. At length he slowly raised his arm, and a puff of white smoke shot upward from his hand.
    Then ensued a scene of frantic joy. Men hurrahed and hugged each other, and started with feeble footsteps to meet the coming train. When they reached it they made a fierce onslaught upon the provisions. Again and again they filled their stomachs with food they were too weak to retain. In a few days they were recruited; and now fully supplied with provisions and ammunition, were again ready for their work of vengeance.
    Invitation was sent to the Modocs to visit the new camp, and some half hundred braves, with their families, came and camped on the bank of the river, living on the provisions of the whites. Wright sought by specious promises to induce them to deliver up the property taken from the emigrants, and this they agreed to do. They brought in a few old guns and pistols, and then said they would give no more; that they were stronger than the whites, and would as soon fight as not. Old Schonchin, the head chief, left the camp with a number of others when he saw that trouble was brewing.
    To properly understand the scene, a correct idea must first be had of the location of the camp. The river at that time, the middle of November, 1852, was very low, and had two banks--one low bench down by the water's edge, and the other rising like a terrace back of it. On the low bench the men did their cooking, while they slept on the high bank above. The Indian camp was but a few yards down the stream on the low ground.
    It was the custom of both parties to leave their weapons in camp and mingle unarmed where the cooking was done. One night Old Mary informed Wright that the Modocs had planned a massacre of the whites for the following morning. When the men were gathered on the lower ground eating their breakfast, the savages were to slip in between them and their camp, where their guns were, and kill every one of them.
    This was not pleasant news for Wright. It had been his intention from the first to coax all the valuables possible from them, then pick a quarrel and kill all he could of them. It seemed now that they were likely to get ahead of him, and the biter would be bitten. It was evident to him that he must either depart hastily in the night, or else forestall their treachery by equal treachery on his part. He decided to do the latter, and quickly formed a plan to slay the whole band.
    Six men were sent across the river at the Natural Bridge and posted on the bank just opposite the Indian camp, where they lay on their arms all night. The other men were stationed on the high bank in the rear of the Modoc camp and within twenty paces of it. It was arranged that Wright would go into the Indian camp at daylight, and when all was ready, shoot one of the braves and fall to the ground out of harm's way. This was to be the signal for them to pour a deadly rain of bullets among the doomed savages.
    Taking some beef* in his hand, Wright advanced into the Indian camp, threw down his load and sat down upon the ground. The Indians were drying their bows by the fire and straightening their arrows, a slight rain during the night having damaged them. He was satisfied from this and the scowls upon their faces that the warning he had received was true. They seemed to be in an ill humor at being temporarily foiled in their design by the interposition of the elements. Old Mary came into the camp and sat down upon the ground beside Wright, a short distance from the fire.
    Calling his attention to a young brave whose sister had been given him as a wife a few days before, she said, "That is your brother-in-law."
    "I'll make a brother-in-law of him," exclaimed he, as he shot the young warrior dead with his pistol, and fell prone upon the ground to escape the volley of bullets that was poured into the Indians about the fire.
    The onslaught was so sudden that the survivors of that rain of death stood for a moment as though stunned, and then fled in terror. As they sought to escape across the river they were turned back by a deadly volley from the six men in ambush on the other side. Seeing all avenues of escape were closed, and that half of their number already lay dead upon the ground, the Modocs turned at bay and fought desperately for their lives. They charged up the bank to grapple with their assailants, and a most sanguinary hand-to-hand struggle followed. Their arrows and knives were so match for the revolvers of the whites, and the contest was soon ended by the death of the last Modoc who made that desperate charge.
    *The story has been circulated and generally believed that an attempt was first made to poison the Indians by inviting them to banquet upon a beef that had been prepared with strychnine. I investigated this matter carefully and am satisfied the story is not founded upon fact. The only evidence to support it was of the poorest kind of hearsay, while all the direct testimony that can be had, that of surviving members of the company, controverts it. Even old citizens of Yreka, with equal opportunities to judge of the facts, differ in their opinions on the subject. J. G. Hallick and J. C. Burgess, two members of the company, say that when their men were in Yreka after provisions a certain physician suggested that they poison the savages, and offered to furnish the material. The fiendish barbarities they had committed upon helpless emigrants had so filled the people of Yreka with utter horror and indignation that they wanted the perpetrators exterminated. It was with this feeling that they supplied the company with provisions and ammunition. The physician, who looked upon the savages as so many ravenous wild beasts, proposed this way of disposing of them as the cheapest and most effectual. The men said they would consult with their companions about it, and departed without taking the poison with them. The proposition was rejected with scorn by the better element of the company, and with contempt by the others. The latter were hunting Indians for excitement and pleasure; they wanted to shoot them, and would as soon think of killing them with poison as the enthusiastic hunter would think of placing out arsenic for the noble buck his hounds had aroused on the mountains. Nevertheless, it was whispered about in Yreka that Ben Wright was going to poison the Modocs, and when he returned and showed that the Indians had been killed in battle, it was then reported that he had attempted to do so and failed. No amount of denial was able to head off the slander. It was spread abroad, and even carried to the ears of the Modocs in after years, who now firmly believe that Wright had attempted to poison them. These I believe to be the bottom facts of the poison story. The beef Wright took to camp on the morning of the massacre was but one of several pieces he had given his intended victims, who were boarding with him, as it were. Meacham, Joaquin Miller and others have laid considerable stress in their writings about the Modocs upon this poison story, but have done so because they did not take the time to investigate. However well written and entertaining their writings may be, they are very poor history.
    Of the forty-nine braves who stood about the campfire that November morning but two escaped to relate the treachery which had sealed the lips of the flower of their tribe. Those two were John Schonchin and Curly-Headed Doctor, who twenty years later took a terrible revenge in the murder of the peace commissioners. (Mr. Hallick and Mr. Burgess both say that John Schonchin was not present, but that Indian himself, during the negotiations in 1873, claimed to have been one of the two survivors of that bloody massacre, and on that based his inflexible determination to be revenged.)
    A few squaws were hit by the flying bullets and went the way of all good Indians. Three of the attacking party were wounded; two of them so badly that their companions had to make litters upon which to convey them to Yreka.
    The names of the men who made such sad havoc among the Modocs were: Ben Wright (killed by Indians in 1856), J. G. Hallick (now living in Yreka), William T. Kershaw, David Helm (Old Tex), Isaac Sandbauch (Buckskin), George Rodgers, Morris Rodgers, John C. Burgess (now living in Yreka), Jacob Rhodes, E. P. Jenner (now living in Scott Valley), ------ Coffin, William Chance, William White, a man called "Rabbit," William Brown, ------ Poland, Nigger Bill, and two Oregon Indians named Benice [sic] and Bob.
    Notice of the coming of the party had been received, and every man in town (there were but few women and less children there at that time) was on the street to welcome them home. It was a grand triumphal march. Escorted by a company that had gone out to meet them, they rode through the streets, dirty, shaggy and brown from their long campaign. Indian scalps dangled from their rifles, hats and bridles, and were thus flaunted to show to the admiring crowd the work they had accomplished in the field. Cheers and shouts rent the air as they slowly rode along, and at last they were fairly lifted from their horses and borne in triumph to the saloons, where a grand scene of revelry commenced.
    For a week the carousal was maintained by a majority of the company and a host of their admirers, chiefly the riffraff and scum of the town. They carried things with a high hand; everything had to give way to them. The warriors exhibited their hirsute trophies, flourished their weapons and recounted their deeds of valor. As their revolvers were generally kept in hand ready to convince anyone who doubted, the number of open skeptics was small.* Finally the better class of citizens began to exert their influence, and the noisy ones subsided into nothingness when they realized that their outrageous conduct would no longer be endured.
    *One instance of the way they managed things is as follows: The kitchen of the American Hotel at that time was presided over by a negro, who had the temerity to speak in a slighting manner of them and their valor. One evening there was an outcry at the door of Joe Goodwin's saloon, and upon the crowd rushing to the door to ascertain the cause they found one of the exterminators, who accused this negro of having knocked him down. This offense, whether it had been committed or not, was more than they could endure. The next morning they made a raid upon the hotel kitchen and captured the offender. He was taken to a vacant lot, stretched over a pine log, and severely whipped on his bare back with a rawhide. Having thus vindicated their honor and demonstrated their valor, they gave the negro notice to leave town on pain of death. Nearly fainting from the terrible scourging he had endured, their victim turned his bleeding back upon the town where such things could be done forever. To the credit of Hallick, Burgess and a few others, be it said, they severed their connection with their late companions when they became too violent.
West Shore, Portland, October 1884, pages 314-320


    Early in the summer of 1852, a letter was received at Yreka from an immigrant, who was on his way to that place, saying that great suffering would ensue if the train was not met by a supply of provisions. In consequence of this statement, a company of men was organized, with Charles McDermit as captain, and provisions being contributed by merchants and others of Yreka, the train set out for Lost River. After passing Tule Lake they were met by a party of men who had packed across the plains. McDermit and his company went on, and the packers continued toward Yreka. When they reached Bloody Point, on the north side of Tule Lake, they were surprised by the Modocs who were hid in the tules bordering the trail, and who rose up and discharged volleys of arrows at them at short range. All these men were killed save one, Coffin by name, who cut the pack from a horse, mounted the animal and riding to Yreka gave the alarm. Bloody Point is a place on the north side of the lake where a spur of the mountains runs down close to the lake shore. Around this spur the old emigrant trail passed, just beyond being a large, open flat, covered with tules, wild rye and bunch grass. This was a favorite place of ambuscade.
    When Coffin arrived in Yreka the news at once spread far and wide. Ben Wright was sent for, and a company of twenty-seven men quickly volunteered to serve under him in an expedition to annihilate utterly and without remorse the treacherous and bloodthirsty hostiles who performed the deed. These set out without loss of a moment, being well supplied with arms, horses and provisions by the benevolent citizens of Yreka. But meanwhile the savages had not been idle. McDermit, not hearing of the tragic fate of the packers, had continued on, meeting at Black Rock two teams, for whose guidance he detailed three men, John Onsby, Thomas H. Coats, assemblyman-elect of Siskiyou County and a favorably known young man, and James Long. About the last of August the teams encamped at Clear Lake, and the next day the three guides rode on in advance to select a proper halting place at noon. One of the trains delayed somewhat to make repairs to wagons, and thus was separated from the foremost one, which included thirty men, one woman and a boy. As they came over the divide, they saw the Indians about Bloody Point, while the guides were unsuspectingly riding into danger. They disappeared around the point when shots were fired, and the three were butchered relentlessly by the savages, who retired again to the tules to wait for fresh victims. The men with the train divided themselves into a front and a rear guard and kept the savages at bay until reaching the flat. Here they made a barricade of their six wagons and retired within it for protection. By being constantly on their guard they managed to thwart the attempts of the Indians to dispossess them, but were kept closely beleaguered until noon the next day, when the Modocs drew off to attack the other train. These men, however, more wise than the first, drove over the hill, thus avoiding the ambush so carefully laid for them, and found safety in the barricade with the others.
    In the afternoon Ben Wright appeared, and taking in the situation at a glance, did not pause to communicate with the whites, but furiously charged the Modocs even in the midst of the tules, and attempted to cut them off from their boats. The savages stampeded and, making for the water, were mingled indiscriminately with Wright's men, who killed them almost without resistance. All along the bank of the lake the fight raged; the volunteers shooting and cutting with a ferocity suited to a combat with such cruel adversaries. The savages sought only to reach their boats and get out of range, and even in this they but partly succeeded, for an undetermined number, ranging from twenty to forty, if we may believe the ordinary accounts, met a richly deserved fate.
    Several succeeding days were spent in search for the Modocs' victims, and the mangled bodies of many immigrants were found, whose death had not been heard of. Two of these were women and one a little child. They were all mutilated and disfigured horribly, beyond recognition in probably every case. Portions of wagons were found, and camp utensils, firearms, clothing, money, and other articles, which conclusively showed that an entire emigrant train must have fallen a prey to the demoniacal hostility of the Indians. Twenty-two bodies were found and buried by Wright's company and fourteen by that of Captain Ross. Of these last several were of women and children, and all disfigured and mutilated.
    The stay of Captain Ross' Jacksonville company was necessarily shorter than that of the Yreka men, but considerable service was done, nevertheless, in protecting immigrants and assisting in the search for the murdered people. The company left Jacksonville in hot haste after thirty men had volunteered, the news of the attack on the pack train arriving in the evening. By the next morning the company was ready to march. Daniel Barnes was chosen first lieutenant, Nathan Olney, second. Returning homeward, Captain Ross escorted Snelling's train, the largest one of the year, safely to its destination at Yreka, and afterwards proceeded to Jacksonville.
    A three-months' campaign by Wright's company, with active scouting and a good deal of skirmishing with hostile parties, effectually protected the immigrant trains coming west. Captain Wright, being well supplied with ammunition and provisions contributed by the people of Northern California, was enabled to protract his stay until all the immigrants had passed, some of whom were provided with escorts from his company and McDermit's, reducing Wright's strength to eighteen men. With these he determined on a campaign against the savages, the main body of whom were securely posted on an island in Tule Lake. A company of U.S. dragoons under Major Fitzgerald had materially assisted, by scouting along the shores of the lake, obliging all the hostiles to seek refuge on the island. A boat was provided, being hauled out from Yreka, in which six armed men reconnoitered almost daily the savages' position. The Modocs had large supplies of fish, grass seeds, wo-cus (pond lily), camas, and ip-a, which were their chief articles of sustenance, stored away in caches around the lake. These were nosed out by Wright's men, assisted by five Shastas and Swill, a Columbia River Indian, a stray Umatilla, and destroyed. The loss affected the Modocs seriously, and they thought of coming to terms. Old Mary, a stray squaw, was sent out to the island, and after a day or two forty Indians came over and peace appeared about to spread her snowy wings over the scene. The object of Captain Wright, however, was not to secure peace, but to kill Indians; and this he set about. As to the manner in which he did it, accounts differ widely.
    Captain Goodall, now residing at Kanaka Flat, near Jacksonville, may be esteemed a credible witness, as he lived in Yreka in 1852 and was intimate with the most of the members of the Ben Wright expedition, particularly with the leader. It is reasonable to suppose that he was in Wright's confidence as he was instrumental in sending out the party, and was the more apt to know with certainty concerning it as he, also, was an Indian fighter of experience. The Captain says: "Ben Wright had several powwows with them, and when at length it was found necessary to close the campaign on account of approaching winter and snow, a final talk was had, in which a beef was killed and well dosed with strychnine which I bought in Yreka and sent out to Wright. This was given to them and by them eaten half raw. But the plan failed of killing all of them off, for the heat of the fire deprived the poison of its strength. However it was successful thus far, that it made them all very sick with the 'jerks,' and actually killed five of them--that is, made good Indians of them; or in other phrase 'sunned their moccasins.'' Captain Wright and company were discharged at Yreka, their muster rolls and accounts made out by Captain Goodall, and they were duly paid by the state in scrip, and afterwards by the United States in greenbacks.
    This is one, and an apparently fair version. Next comes the more commonly accepted, but very improbable one of Wright's having poisoned forty Modocs, thus annihilating the whole band with the exception, some say, of two who slipped out of camp just before the feast of poisoned meat began. Several writers have adopted this tale, for example, A. B. Meacham in his ridiculous book "Wigwam and Warpath." It will be seen that the above stories differ only as to the number of Indians killed; which would naturally be exaggerated as time went on. Hence as between the two, we must incline to that of Captain Goodall. Wright, it is said, persistently denied the story; not probably from any deference to refined people's feelings, and certainly not from any desire to screen himself from any measure of obloquy, for he was probably very far from caring for anybody's opinion.
    Finally we shall consider the account published in the History of Siskiyou County in 1881. This account, evidently prepared with great pains and unlimited attention to accuracy of details, was written to be read by people who might be presumed to know a great deal concerning the matter. Thus far, we believe, it has escaped adverse criticism, which in the event of error it would be nearly certain to meet. A synopsis of the account is as follows:
    Negotiations being in progress, word was sent to the Modocs to come in and feast. The camp was on Lost River, and the Indians who speedily came in camped nearby and on the bank of the river, both camps being about one-fourth of a mile above the natural bridge, and not far from the spot where Captain Jack and the troops first fought, ushering in the Modoc War of 1873. Some half hundred braves, with their squaws, made their home in camp and lived upon the provisions of the whites. Old Schonchin, head chief, foreseeing trouble, left the camp, as did others. It appears to have been Wright's intention from the first to endeavor to get the Indians to restore the valuables they were thought to have stolen from immigrants, and then to bring on a fight and kill all of the savages he could. The time was November; the river was very low and had two banks, forming a high and a low terrace. On the higher one the whites slept, while they cooked and ate on the lower one. The Indians camped but a few yards away, mingled with the whites during eating times, both parties leaving their arms in camp. Wright, it is said, discovered a plan on the part of the Indians to surprise and massacre his force; but be that as it may, he was too quick for them, and put in effect his own plan without delay. Sending six men across the river to where they would be opposite the Indian camp and hence able to cut off their passage across the stream, Wright himself went down among the Indians who were scattered about the campfires and shot dead, as a preconcerted signal, a young buck. The other whites, being ready, continued the work of destruction and soon no men were left alive except John Schonchin and Curly-headed Doctor. These two escaped and were heard of twenty years after, in the murder of Canby and Thomas. Forty-seven braves and several squaws were killed. Wright's men numbered but nineteen, including two Indians. Their casualties consisted in severe wounds to Isaac Sanbanch, Poland and Brown. The rest were uninjured. Wright's company then returned to Yreka and were grandly feted by the people. They rode into town accompanied by a guard of honor, their forty-odd scalps and sundry other mementoes dangling from their rifles, hats, and horses' heads. Cheers rent the air. The enthusiastic crowd lifted them from their horses and bore them to the saloons, where the best was none too good. Whiskey was free for all, and a grand dinner was given in honor of the returned avengers. For a week, high carnival reigned.
    We have seen how these accounts vary; and probably the reader, in trying to settle his doubts, consciously or unconsciously inclines to the last version. Being the result of long and careful investigation and weighing of testimony of parties of all shades of opinion, it should be accepted in preference to the idea of any one man. That poison was prepared by parties in Yreka is true, but all the surviving members of Wright's company deny any attempt to use it, and give as their reason the very evident fact that there was no fun in it; most of them were there killing Indians for the pleasure of doing so, and the use of poison would have taken all the amusement away. In killing them with bullets and knives from an ambuscade all the conditions requisite to pleasure in Indian killing were satisfied. Only sickly sentimentalism could regret the worst fate which might be meted out to such monsters of cruelty and wickedness as the Modocs. It is apparent that in point of cruel vindictiveness and unsparing malignity they were the worst savages who ever inhabited this coast. Their attacks on the immigrants were utterly causeless, and could have had no motive except the love of diabolical wickedness, for the property of the whites, even their firearms, was totally useless to the Indians, and the captured women were killed. Hence the motives which are supposed usually to incite barbarous men to such deeds of murder, were wanting.
David D. Fagan, History of Benton County, Oregon, A. G. Walling publisher, Portland 1885, pages 204-208


    It is a pleasing task to lift from under the accumulating layers of human progress the deserved fame of those early pioneers who gave up their lives in the successful struggle against the many and serious obstacles to the early settlement of the then wild and undeveloped territory of Oregon. Now, when all those obstacles have been overcome, when the desired development of the state has reached its present elevated stage, when the future is so bright for all who are frugal and industrious, the grim, heroic old warriors claim at our hands the long-delayed recognition of their services.
    It is the aim of the writer of this, and succeeding papers, to show to the reader a few of the old heroes of Oregon, to picture a few of the many dangers to which they were exposed, to detail a few of their remarkable exploits, to tell of some of their desperate and bloody encounters with the wild Indians, and the no wilder beasts of the deep forests of early times.
    Among the many early adventurers who came to Oregon for the sake of adventure was Benjamin Wright. A mere youth when he crossed the plains in 1847, his naturally romantic mind was filled with dim, yet to him real, outlines of his future life. Having landed at Oregon City but a few weeks prior to the Whitman massacre, he was among the first to respond to the hurried call for volunteers to chastise the murderers. He entered the company commanded by Captain Lee, which was sent to garrison The Dalles. While there he formed the acquaintance of several persons who were afterwards to act with him in many fierce encounters with the Indians and in discovering and establishing several mining and farming localities. Between one of them--Nathan Olney--and himself sprang up a deeply rooted friendship, which continued unbroken during the remainder of their lives, and as we pass along the narrative we shall see them scouting and fighting, side by side, during many long, weary days of pioneer warfare.
    I met him for the first time in 1851, while encamped in the mines, near Yreka, Cal., and listened to a recital of his earlier career in the Cayuse War, his residence at The Dalles, his trip from thence to the mines in Shasta County, and from thence up to Yreka, with a feeling of mingled awe and veneration for one so young, yet so celebrated for all that could make a hero in the eyes of one of my own age, for I was yet in my teens.
    We will soon reach the line of interesting narrative, but before we approach that point allow me to say that it will be necessary for the reader to follow me a little further in my preparations, so that a better understanding of that which is to follow may be obtained. From the time I first met him in 1851, till February, 1855, with a few slight interruptions, I was with him, and participated in the majority of his campaigns, and if, in perusing these pages you deem me guilty of irrigating them with the water of romance, believe it not, for his life was a romantic one, and I must tell it as he told it to me, as I witnessed it, and as I obtained it from other witnesses. We shall, for a greater portion of the time, camp, scour, hunt, fight, and perchance occasionally run, in the southern portion of Oregon, and more particularly in the Klamath Lake district, among the Modocs and Pit River Indians, in 1851-2. We will note well the country as we follow the trail, so that the country as it then was may be distinctly seen, for it is yet capable of great development.
    We must, as varying circumstances render it necessary, dip down over the California line and bring up a portion of the history of that interesting locality, for the history of the southern portion of Oregon bordering on the line, and that part of California lying contiguous to it, will be seen to be almost identical. We will also take a peep at the rise and progress of primitive mining, and the miners, farms and farming, merchants and merchandising, "and," as Cervantes puts it, "many other things that will be explained."
    Benjamin Wright was born about the year 1830. His father was a pastor of a small Presbyterian church in the suburbs of Philadelphia. The thoughts of  "Ben," as he was familiarly called by all, were, in early youth, turned towards Oregon and its hidden treasures of adventure, by reading the many frontier stories then afloat in the East, and more particularly by one called Lena Leota, or, The Prairie Flower, which is, to this day, not forgotten nor unread. This book, more than any other, riveted his attention and made more strong his determination to cross the plains and enjoy the open camp, the chase of the buffalo, the long night rides, and the deadly battle with  the wild Indians.
    Not until his 17th year did he meet with an opportunity to begin his long-meditated journey. He was habitually reticent on one particular point, and that was the manner of bidding adieu to home and all its endearments, but it was, probably, an old-fashioned runaway. His route from Philadelphia to Fort Leavenworth was a crooked one, and his choice of conveyance was not at all times dependent on his own free will. His adventures were numerous, and not at all times wholly disagreeable. In many instances his impressible mind was so delighted with new scenes of enjoyment that he almost abandoned his original intention of floating off to Oregon on the tide of immigration, and quite made up his mind to delay for a time his journey to his fancied elysium. But after remaining a few days at Fort Leavenworth, he fell in with a family named Arnot, composed of husband, wife and an adopted daughter named Ruth. Ben soon capitulated to the charms of the young lady; she likewise surrendered to his. As the Arnots were en route to Oregon, Ben experienced no difficulty in adhering to his original purpose of going to the same place, and engaged himself to Mr. Arnot as teamster and general helper.
    The journey progressed as favorably as did similar journeys in those days of always apprehended Indian attacks, sickness and many other minor yet annoying mishaps. While encamped on Sweetwater River, near Hell Gate, for a few days, to rest the weary, worn-out stock, and to give the equally tired women an opportunity for rest in washing piles of dirty clothes, and patching up the thousand rents visible on various parts of the men's garments, an incident occurred which changed the nature of the mild, good-natured Ben, to a calm, determined, bitter hater of the Indians, and gave to Oregon a strong, active arm to aid her in her endeavors to rid the soil of the useless, cruel savages. As was usual with emigrant trains, the wagons were formed into a circle, large enough to contain the campfires; besides, in case of an attack by Indians, the stock could be driven inside the enclosure and thus prevent a stampede, while the men could use the wagons as breastworks in repelling the attack. The grass was abundant, yet the stock seemed inclined to wander further away for newer pastures, and it was found necessary to keep a guard continually over them.
    Another train was camped nearby and word had come from it that Indians had been seen lurking near by. Captain Kane, in charge of the train in which we are immediately interested, deemed it necessary to send out a picket of twenty-five men to watch for any Indians that might be lurking in the locality. Richard--or "Dick"--Pugh, a sturdy Welshman, was given charge of the picket, in which went Ben, who was eager to see for himself what an Indian fight really looked like, though he afterwards said he did not desire to become by personal experience convinced of the sensation caused by the passage of a flint-headed arrow through his ribs, nor, even, through any other part of his body. But the mere contingency of being compelled to undergo such an unwelcome experience did not deter him from making one of the party.
    The camp was formed on the bank of the river, with low, broken, wooded hills on the opposite side of the stream, which rose as they extended back until they formed a rocky ridge a mile distant. The narrow bottom, one hundred yards wide, on which stood the camp, was bounded on the side parallel with the stream by a shelving wall of rock thirty feet high, admitting of ascent in but one place, which was narrow and difficult. The available force of the train was about fifty-four men, well armed--for those days--while the larger train nearby had a roster of over eighty, making a force, if possessed of average courage, equal to four times their number of savages--a force that it was not likely that they would be called upon to encounter at any point on their route.
    The rocky wall would afford fine shelter for an attacking party, and a strong lookout was kept on it at all hours. The other train was in a more favorable location, but equal caution was used, and all felt comparatively safe.
    Pugh, with his reconnoitering party, filed away over the rocky wall and out upon a more level piece of ground, yet difficult to walk upon, as the surface was thickly studded with sharp, angular rock. The men scattered out, each endeavoring to be the first to scent an Indian, as they slowly wended their way further and further away from camp.
    The sun was low, no Indians in sight, and the men were on the point of turning back, when yells and scattering rifle shots broke suddenly out, floating in a wild medley over the broken country, creating a most hideous din. Back ran Pugh and his men as fast as the stony nature of the ground would permit. Both camps were in wild commotion, and the deadly racket rose higher and higher as the men neared their camp. The Indians lurking on the higher hills had noted the departure of Pugh and his men, and quickly gathering their forces, made a dash upon the stock, hoping to create a wild stampede. But they were met by the guards with a firm front, who were quickly reinforced by men from the camps. The stock was driven towards camp, while the numerous savages were held off by the constantly increasing numbers of men from the trains.
    The Indians soon abandoned the struggle for the stock, and swooped down upon the lesser train, raining a storm of bullets and arrows among the women and children, while they dashed up almost to the wagons, which they would have captured but for the sudden arrival of Pugh and his men at the scene of action. Down the men poured from the rocky wall, Ben in front, wild with exultation, firing volley after volley into the swarms of mounted Indians, who, taken by surprise at the sudden onslaught, decamped in all directions, yet manifesting a desire to keep up the engagement.
    Ben neared the camp just in time to see his cherished Ruth--the only one on earth he loved, save his mother--fall, shot dead by a rifle ball. Wild with grief and fury at the savage act, stopping only to see her lifted up and carried away, he dashed off after the savages alone, though soon followed by men from the train, and did not stop fighting till all hope of doing further damage to them was over. He knew she was dead, and slowly and alone he entered the camp, only to hear her mother weeping over his lost treasure. From that time forward he swore to devote his life to revenge, though, in later years, experience or satiety modified his passion, and his record remains unmarred by ungenerous warfare.
    Nothing more, worthy of note, occurred during the remainder of the journey. The passage of the Cascade Mountains with the stock was the most serious part of the journey. Few of the recent comers to Oregon can form even a faint picture of the hard struggles encountered by the immigrants of early days as they tramped knee-deep and deeper in snow and slush ice over the ridges and marshes of the Cascade Mountains, with Mt. Hood--grand though he may be to look at on a summer day, from a safe distance--frowning, the cold-hearted old villain, on the tired, hungry, sick and worn immigrant, offering no aid, no comfort save a bed of snow to those who came in advance and paved the way for those of later years to come and admire his stately presence.
    It might be well, in this place, to notice a peculiar annoyance to which the early emigrants were subjected, that is, the Indian letter carriers. Probably no age of the world, no place, was ever free from the ravages of silver-tongued sharpers, and the early emigrants, for such reasons, were not allowed to pursue their way unmolested by them. Even should they succeed in warding off the assaults of the hostiles, an apparently friendly Indian, or Canadian half-breed who could speak tolerable English, would spring up from out a cluster of willows near some camping ground, and after the emigrants' surprise had given place to a more pleasurable sensation, the well-tutored savage would pour forth into the willing ears of his credulous and soft-hearted listeners, in a week and half-starved tone, the oft-told tale of his wonderful escape, but that day, or the day before, from some hostile tribe who had sought to deprive him of his precious life, all because he was an oft-tried and firm friend of the whites, showing at the same time a bullet hole through blanket, legging or shirt, to attest the truth of his assertions, and oh! he would not be there to gratify his sympathetic friends in allowing them an opportunity to extend him their consolations, only that he was a very brave and active warrior, whose equal could nowhere be discovered, and if they would give him something to eat, even a very small piece of bread, and--in an undertone--a little whiskey would be a very great addition.
    The conditions were usually complied with, and then he would inform them that he was a regular-built letter carrier, by appointment of some well-known functionary of the plains, a United States officer of some post, or of some big Hudson Bay man, and that it would only cost a pilgrim twenty-five cents per letter, postage included, to have them taken to the nearest place, from whence they could be dispatched to their destination. In a short time he would collect his pouch full of both letters and money, bid them an affectionate farewell, and amble off into the brush and await the next train. By the end of the season he would have enough money and letters to last him till the next immigrant season.
    As has before been mentioned, Wright returned to The Dalles with Coe's company of volunteers and there met his old acquaintance Dick Pugh and became acquainted with Nathan Olney.  Upon the arrival of Col. Gilliam with the main body of Willamette volunteers at The Dalles, Wright, Olney and Pugh went on with him to the Deschutes River. When out with a detachment about twenty miles up the river the three friends went out on their own hook for a better view of the surroundings, when Wright had another "taste," as he termed it, of real Indian fighting.
    They ascended to the top of a high ridge. Descending the opposite side, and when well out of sight of their comrades, they saw half a dozen mounted Indians, in war paint and feathers, bearing down upon them from their right front, in true Indian warrior style. Wright and Olney were in for a fight, but Pugh, older and more cautious by nature, counseled a retreat as the wiser if not the more valiant course to pursue, but was overcome by the heedless advance of the two daredevil youths. Dick followed more for company’s sake than for glory or any other consideration.
    They were soon within firing distance, and began preparations for an encounter. The arms of our trio consisted of flintlock shotguns and Allen's pepperbox revolvers, while the arms of the approaching savages were equally effective, though consisting principally of bows and arrows and war clubs. The Indians, as was their usual custom, began moving around in a circle while gradually drawing nearer. The young men, after the manner of frontier narratives, dismounted for the purpose of taking better aim, and immediately began a furious discharge of bullets upon the yelling nomads. No effect was immediately apparent, other than to greatly alarm their own horses, which began a fearful rearing and plunging, rendered more frantic when the Indians sent showers of arrows in among the group of struggling horses and men. After much struggling the horses gained their liberty and away, heads and tails elevated. But before this had happened two of the Indians had involuntarily dismounted, one dead, the other wounded.
    The young white braves had the pleasure, as soon as the two fallen Indians had been picked up by their friends, of seeing them decamp in haste over the hills. But, alas, their own horses were gone also. Our victorious though crestfallen heroes went at a double-quick towards their comrades, who were swarming up over the hill to their rescue, while, off a quarter of a mile, on the line of the retreating savages, appeared a numerous band of Indians, who whooped and yelled defiance, but did not advance.
    The same day the detachment returned to the main body, which, on the succeeding day, returned to the place of the encounter, where quite a skirmish was had with the Indians, and Wright behaved with such cool, determined bravery that Colonel Gilliam publicly thanked him on the battlefield and presented him with another horse, also gave a horse to each of the other two.
    A few miles east of John Day's River, on the immigrant road a few miles from Well Springs, occurred another battle a few days after, which was fiercer, of longer continuance and more destructive than any other former engagement. In this one Wright was severely wounded, but not before he had the satisfaction of believing that he had sent several Indians off to their happy homes.
    Before he was wounded, and during the heat of the battle, he had noticed the prancing, saucy manner of a young brave, who was always in advance and who exerted a great influence in keeping the others up to their work. Wright, with blood up, every nerve stirring to its utmost tension, with excitement and youthful vigor, determined to capture the saucy, wild young warrior, or, at least, measure with him his muscular manhood. The company to which he was temporarily attached had been bearing the brunt of the battle, and several of its members had been disabled and had been placed under as good shelter as could be provided.
    The Indians were charging and retreating successively, yet vigorously maintaining the fight. At last Wright called out loudly to his companions, "Come on, boys, we must whip the dirty thieves out of those sand ridges or they'll lick us before night. I'm going to have that young fellow with the red feathers on his head, anyway." And off he started, not waiting to see if anyone followed him. On a dead run, on his fortunately well-trained horse, he dashed after his coveted prize, who was in front of the other Indians brandishing a war club and yelling lustily. The whole company followed, and before Wright reached his objective point the Indians were in full retreat.
    The volunteers continued to advance, Wright in the lead. Up and over the low sand ridges down into the shallow hollows, the pursuers and pursued went at headlong speed, firing at each other as occasion permitted.
    Wright generally kept his coveted prize in view--for the intrepid young redskin was always at the post of danger--and bent all his energies to gain it. Suddenly the Indians halted and faced about--from the right--from the left--in the rear, appeared clouds of yelling Indians pouring down upon the volunteers. Mounted and painted and feathered, they closed in upon their supposed prey in dense masses. The fight became stationary and of a serious nature. The fight was for life. Flintlock and percussion guns, horse pistols and pepperbox revolvers, bows and arrows, spears and war clubs hissed and whizzed, blazed and cracked in furious uproar, while the mutual yells of the combatants rendered the noise deafening.
    In a few minutes the whole column became engaged, and the little band of brave men were liberated, and the Indians driven from the field. Six or seven of the whites were wounded, among them Wright, who on this occasion won and ever after bore the title of captain. He was severely hurt, but had the supreme satisfaction of knowing that the object of his chase have been killed, for he saw him fall and was at one time, during the changes of the fight, standing over his dead body, but could spare no time to pluck the coveted feathers from his head as a trophy. At another skirmish on the Touchet he was again slightly wounded, but only partially recovered from his first wound.
    At the conclusion of the war the troops returned to The Dalles, where they virtually disbanded. Many remained in the upper country, being much pleased with it, among them Capt. Wright, Olney and Pugh. Olney, having some means in company with Pugh, established a trading post three miles below The Dalles. Capt. Wright took charge of their boats and transported goods from Portland up to the post.
    From early youth Capt. Wright was a careful reader of books, and, from a little later period, of human character. He had a fine gift of language and was quite an antiquarian, young as he was. In his random researches he picked up a tradition among the Wascopam Indians which bears a striking resemblance to one of the mishaps of Ulysses during his wanderings. When Ulysses arrived at the island of Aeolus, he was given good winds and the adverse ones tied up in a bag and stowed away on board. When he was asleep, his sailors, hungry and destitute, complained that they had nothing, while Ulysses had all, and to attest the truth of the matter, pointed to the bags of bad winds.
    The coyote, so the Indian legend goes, was a useless wanderer and always doing things that he had no business to do, and was always hungry. (Bill Nye found that out.) There was no darkness in the world; all was light and happiness, for the darkness was tied up in a bag, and put in charge of two old squaws. One day a coyote accosted them, and, being hungry, as usual, asked them to let him look into the bag, and if there was anything fit to eat in it, he would be much pleased to obtain it. Of course he was denied his request, whereupon he became enraged, flew at the bag, tore it open, and--horror! all was immediately enveloped in darkness.
    When the news of the discovery of gold in California reached The Dalles, in the summer of 1848, Olney, Wright and Pugh formed the project of going to the mines by following Fremont's trail, which he made in 1845. Hiring about sixty Indians as guides, packers, hunters and miners, they were ready for a start in a short time after getting the news of the discovery. When the cavalcade was ready it presented quite a formidable appearance. Over two hundred and fifty horses and mules, six white men and about seventy Indians. The parting dance and powwow had been held by the Indians the night before, and early in the morning of the 10th day of August, 1848, the cavalcade left The Dalles and set out upon its long, tedious and uncertain route, on the Fremont trail towards Klamath Lake and California.
O. W. Olney, Sunday Oregonian, Portland, August 9, 1885, page 3  Apparently O. W. Olney is Orville Dewey Olney.