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WALLAWALLA, UMATILLA, CAYUSE
The Wallawalla' were a strong Shahaptian group inhabiting
the Walla Walla valley and the adjacent bank of the Columbia from Snake
river southward to the territory of the Umatilla, in Washington, their
principal village being near the mouth of the Walla Walla. Geographically
and linguistically they were closely associated with the Nez Perces. On
their return up the Columbia in 1806 Lewis and Clark were met by the Wallawalla
chief "Yellept," whose acquaintance they had made the preceding
year, and by him conducted to a village of fifteen large mat lodges on
the northern bank opposite the mouth of Walla Walla river. Later they
were ferried across the larger stream, and encamped near the principal
village. The explorers have this to say of the tribe
"these people . . . are very well dressed, much more so particularly
their women than they were as we decended the river last fall most of
them have long shirts and leggings, good robes and mockersons. Their women
wear the truss when they cannot procure the shirt, but very few are see
with the former at this moment. I presume the success of their winters
hunt has produced this change in their attire they all cut their hair
in their forehead and most of the men wear the two cews over each sholder
in front of the body; some have the addition of a few small plats formed
of the ear-locks and others tigh a small bundle of the docked foretop
in front of the forehead. their ornaments are such as discribed of the
nations below and are woarn in a similar manner." . . . "sometime
after we had encamped, three young men arrived from the Wallahwollah Village
bringing with them a steel trap belonging to one of our party which had
been neglegently left behind; this is an act of integrity rarely witnessed
among Indians. During our stay with them they several times found the
knives of the men which had been carelessly lossed by them and returned
them. I think we can justly affirm to the honor of these people that they
are the most hospitable, honest, and sincere people that we have met with
in our voyage."
The Umatilla lived within what is now Oregon, occupying the valley that
bears their name, and the country about its mouth on the southern bank
of the Columbia. Linguistically they are most closely akin to the Yakima,
from whose speech their own differs but slightly.
The Cayuse were a sullen, arrogant, warlike tribe ranging near the Blue
mountains in Washington and Oregon, from the head of Touchet river to
that of John Day river. Of alien speech, they were on such intimate terms
with the Shahaptian tribes of that region that even in 1851 their language
was becoming obsolete, and for many years there has been none who could
speak it. There is still current a tradition that long ago a portion of
the tribe left the others and moved southward, but they were so harassed
by the Shoshoni that they were forced westward and have never since been
heard of. These were doubtless the Molala, the only tribe known to have
used a dialect akin to that of the Cayuse, and found at a later date between
the Cascades and the Willamette. The tradition says that these people
occupied underground dwellings, which is the only indication of the primitive
culture of the Cayuse. Since they were first observed by white men they
have not differed in culture from the Shahaptian tribes, although in language
they were totally distinct, belonging to the Waiilatpuan linguistic family.
The name of the Cayuse has been well known because of their slaughter
of the whites at Whitman mission. The mission had been established by
Doctor Marcus Whitman in 1838 near the site of Walla Walla. Nine years
later an epidemic of smallpox spread among the Indians, who believed that
the white men were killing them by means of sickness placed in the flour
ground at the mill, and that the Doctor's medicine was administered for
the purpose of making their destruction sure. A number of them, principally
Cayuse, murdered Whitman and many of his associates, and took captive
several women and children. The prisoners were ransomed about a month
later by agents of the Hudson's Bay Company, and volunteers were despatched
to the scene by the governor of Oregon. The Cayuse fled to the hills,
and for two years led an unsettled, wandering existence, afraid to return
to the lower country because of the presence of the soldiers. In the spring
of 1850 they surrendered five of the principal culprits, who were hanged
at Oregon City.
An account of these events was obtained from Yellow Bull, a Nez Perce,
whose memory was aided by his Cayuse wife, the daughter of one of the
principal actors in the tragedy.
"When the white men arrived at Waiilatpu about seventy years ago,
Whitman built a mill, and the Indians there took their grain to it, and
they lived well. The tribes seemed to feel as if he were their father.
All at once some kind of disease came from the flour. A Nez Perce named
Kulkulshmulshmul, my mother's brother, went to Waiilatpu, where he had
a wife. When he came back he gave an account of what was going on there.
He was crying because his wife had died of the sickness: she had taken
some of the Doctor's medicine, and spots came out on her face. Two hundred
people had died. An employe at the mission, a man who had many wives,'
told the Indians that Doctor Whitman was putting poison in their medicine
and killing them. One of the Indians made himself sick in order to test
the Doctor, saying that if the Doctor's medicine killed him they would
know that he was the cause of the death of the others. He took the medicine
and died. Then the head-men met in council and made an agreement that
the Doctor should be killed because two hundred of the people had died
after taking his medicine. In the morning several men rode up to the Doctor's
house. He did not know why they came. My mother's brother was with them,
but did not go into the house with them. One of the Cayuse chiefs, named
Tilokaikt, said, 'Tamahus is not here.' So Tamahus, who was a medicineman,
was sent for. He was the father of my wife. He was asked why he had not
come, -if he was afraid. He answered, `I am not afraid.' He entered the
room, and the Doctor gave him a seat at his side. Whitman said to him,
`Fill the pipe, and let us smoke.' Tamahus and Whitman were great friends.
While they smoked, two or three other Indians went in and asked Tamahus:
`Why are you smoking
How long are you going to smoke? Are you afraid of him? You did not come
here to fill a pipe and smoke, but to kill this man.' The pipe was a tomahawkpipe
with a steel blade. After smoking, Tamahus turned out the ashes, and,
sitting at the right of Whitman, he struck him on the head with the tomahawk.
So Tamahus murdered Whitman, his friend. The other Indians then began
to shoot. Five other white people butchering cattle outside were killed,
and some at the sawmill, so that about twelve were killed altogether.
Whitman's wife was killed while carrying a bundle down the stairs. The
Indians thought this bundle contained something which would be death to
all those outside. One old white man, who had run up to Tamalius and begged
for his life, had been spared, and he told them after the massacre not
to throw this bundle into the creek, for if they did it would poison the
people.
"After the killing a council was held, and it seems that there was
some disagreement as to who had made the plans for the killing and should
assume the responsibility. After two years Tilokaikt decided that it was
better for the tribe that the five give themselves up to be hanged. So
they surrendered, because the people were accusing them and making discord
in the tribe."
In 1855 these three allied tribes signed a treaty by which they accepted
their present reservation at the head of Umatilla river, in Oregon. They
were active in the war that followed, as they had been industrious in
their opposition to the treaties and sedulous in their efforts to unite
the Indians in a plan to destroy the commissioners and their escort.
At the end of the war they were gathered on the Umatilla reservation in
Oregon, where they now live, so much intermarried among themselves and
with the Nez Perces, whose language they all have adopted, that a separate
enumeration is impossible. Their total population in 1910 was 910.
EDWARD S. CURTIS
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