Life Amongst the Modocs: Unwritten History/Chapter 23
CHAPTER XXIII.
DOWN IN THE VALLEY OF DEATH.
SPOKE to the chief about the affair; I told him it meant a bloody war ; that the Indians of the valleys, wherever the Americans could reach, would be overthrown, and asked him what he would do.
He thought over the matter a day or two, then said he should keep his men together and out of the way as far as he could, and then, if attacked, would defend himself; that the Pit River Indians were not his Indians, that they had a chief of their own, and lived quite another life from his, and he could not be held responsible for their acts.
He urged, however, that they were right, that they had his sympathy, and that to assist them in the coming war would be the best and speediest way to establish the union of the three tribes, and get a recognition of rights from the Government of the United States. I knew very well, however, that it would not do
to go to war in a bad cause ; that that would ruin
all concerned, and establish nothing.
From the first I had tried to get Klamat to go with me to the scene of the massacre. He refused, and the Indians put up their hands in horror at the recklessness of the proposition.
Somehow, the picture of these two men struggling through the snow, pursued, wretched, lost, half- famished, kept constantly before me. If they were making way to Yreka, I could cut across the spurs of Mount Shasta and intercept them. My camp was not thirty miles from the road leading to that city from Pit River. I resolved to go at least that far and see what could be discovered, and what I could do to assist them.
With this view I got two young strong Indians, and set out early on the hard snow, carrying snow- shoes and a little bag of ground elk meat and grass seed.
Before night, I came upon and followed the road by the high blaze on the pines for some distance, and toward the valley, but found no trace of the fugitives. I camped under a broad, low-boughed fir tree that stood almost a perfect pyramid of snow, over a dry grassy plat down about the trunk and roots of the tree.
Early in the morning we went on a few paces to the summit overlooking the valley. The sun was rising in our faces. The air was so rich and pure we seemed to feed upon it. The valley se emed to
lay almost at our feet. This mountain air, in fact, all the atmosphere of the Far West, is delusive to a stranger, but this of the Sierras, and at that par ticular time, was peculiarly so. A tall, slanting, swaying column seemed to rise before us not five miles away. It was the smoke of an Indian camp, at least twenty-five miles distant.
We were full of fire, youth, and strength. We had been resting long in camp, and now wanted to throw off our lethargy.
u Let us go down," I said in a spirit of banter, yet really wishing to descend.
"Go!" cried the Indians in chorus. "To-ka-do; we will follow." And I slid down the mountain, laughing like a school-boy at play.
This was a turning-point in my life, taken without the least reflection or one moment s thought. Energy makes leaders, but it takes more than energy to make a successful leader.
Before night we sat down on a little hill over looking the camp not a mile away.
I had no plan. It was while sitting here waiting for darkness before venturing further, that one of the Indians asked me what I proposed to do. I did not know myself, but told him we would take a look at the camp so soon as it got dark and then go home.
We looked at the camp, more than a thousand strong. Indians keep no guard at night. They surrender themselves to the great, sad mother
night, with a superstitious trust, and refuse to take precaution till dawn.
I knew every foot of the ground. It was five miles to the Ferry, where had been the strongest house of the whites ; I wished to go there and see first how things stood, now that I was so near. We pushed down the valley and left the Indians singing and dancing over their achievements. They did not dream that there was a white man within a hundred miles.
The houses were all burned. The ferry-boat was still chained to the bank, and in the boat lay a naked corpse with the head severed from the body.
We sat down in the boat, eat the last of our scant provisions and prepared to return. The excitement now being over, with the seventy-five miles of wilderness before us, I began to feel uneasy. We were in the " Valley of Death." Desolation was around us. Half-burnt houses were passed here and there, and now and then in the grey dawn we could see the smoke of Indian camps in the edge of the wood and along the river-banks.
We made a detour to avoid the large camp at the entrance of the valley and toiled up the mountain in silence.
Before noon we struck the route by which we entered, and on the edge of Bear Valley came sud denly upon two squaws who were on their way there to dig klara. This is the root of the mountain lily. It is a large white substance like a potato, with grains growing on the outside like Indian corn. The
squaws dropped their baskets and hid their faces in their hands in sign of submission. They had not discovered us until too close to attempt escape. We greedily devoured their few roots, took them with us, and hastened on.
In the afternoon, when nearing the summit, one of the squaws dashed down the hillside through the thicket, We called to her to stop but she only ran the faster. We then told the other she could go also, and she bounded away like a deer. Our only object in keeping them with us was to prevent them giving the alarm, but since one could do this as well as two we had no occasion to keep the other.
We knew that under the excitement of fear they would soon reach camp, and, perhaps, induce pursuit, and therefore we redoubled our pace.
We travelled all night, but about dawn I broke down utterly and could stagger on not a step further.
The Indians tore off a dead cedar bark, formed it into a sort of canoe, and fastening withes to one end, placed me in it and drew me over the snow.
I ought to have recovered some strength but did not. I could not stand alone. After dark they built up a big fire in a close thicket, left me alone, and pushed on to camp.
Early in the morning other Indians came with provisions, and now being able to walk after a break fast on elk and deer meat, we soon reached camp.
After but one day and two nights rest I proceeded
over the mountain on snow shoes to Soda Springs, and gave the details, so far as I knew, of the destruction of the settlement in Pit River valley.
Mountain Joe advised that I should go at once to Yreka with the news. I mounted a strong nimble mule and set out.
On my way I met Sam Lockhart. This Lockhart was a leading man of the country and largely in terested in Pit River valley, where he had a great deal of stock, which was in charge of his brother, who fell in the massacre. My sad news was not news to Lockhart. The two men before spoken of had made their way through the mountain to Yreka, and the whole country was already in arms.
Lockhart was on his way to Red Bluffs, two hundred miles distant, for the purpose of raising a company there, to attack the Indians from that side, while the company already started from Yreka should descend upon them from the other. There was but little military force in the country, but the miners and men generally in those days were prompt and ready to become soldiers at almost a minute s notice. But in desperate cases, as in this, men not directly interested were prepared to arm and equip a substitute such as they could pick up about the camp. Lock- hart returned to Yreka with me.
We arrived in town late in the evening and I was taken at once to the law-office of Judge Roseborough. Some other lawyers were called in ; I was ordered, not asked, to take a seat, and then began a series of
questions and cross-questions from scowling and
savage men that quite alarmed me. But I was un
suspicious, and answered naturally and promptly all
that was asked.
I was very weary. I could hardly keep awake, and asked to be allowed to retire.
" You must not leave this room," said Lockhart savagely. The truth came upon me like a revela tion. I was a prisoner. Lockhart, who was half drunk, now began to talk very loud, swore furi ously, and wanted to murder me on the spot. I hid my face in my hands.
This, then, was the reward for my dangerous descent into the Valley of Death ! This, then, was to be my compensation for all I had dared and endured !
I could not answer another question. All this is painful to remember and difficult to write.