Saga of Chief Joseph

by Helen Addison Howard

  At the distribution of Joseph’s possessions nearly every Indian was given something. According to the reporter:

  The great war bonnets and war clothing went to the three nephews. A dozen watches were among the gifts, three fine guns and an endless array of blankets. One of the three buffalo robes was given to Three Knives, or Professor Meany.

  Only fourteen of Chief Joseph’s horses were given away. The others were left for his two wives. The bands of horses are large enough to keep these two widows all their lives. The widows will be protected and the horses cared for by Red Star, a relative.14

  On Saturday morning all of the late chief’s household goods and food supplies, including sacks of flour, meats, bread, syrup, dishes, and table utensils were likewise distributed. The newly elected chief, Albert Waters, was presented with Joseph’s large bass drum. Then the potlatch closed with a war dance, enacted by young men, and a final oration in the Nez Perce language given by an old warrior who was dressed in furs and feathers and carried a calumet, a peace pipe, in his hand.15

  So concluded the funeral ceremony of Chief Joseph, warrior and statesman. In the words of Mrs. Eliza Spalding Warren, “his name will . . . take a place in history with those of Tecumseh, Brant, Black Hawk, Pontiac, and Sitting Bull; and by many he is considered the greatest of all the Indian warriors.”16

  It is gratifying to know that a Monument of Contrition was erected to Chief Joseph on the Bearpaw battlefield in northern Montana. The Honorable Lew L. Callaway, former Chief Justice of the Montana Supreme Court, in a letter to the author, dated January 8, 1947, related how this unique and appropriate idea originated: “When Chief Justice of Montana I spoke on the Bear’s Paw Battlefield on two occasions; first in 1928 on the desirability of having the field set apart as a National Monument. . . . The Great Falls Tribune printed a report of the meeting . . . saying . . . ‘Monument of Contrition for Failure to Keep Faith with Chief Joseph Urged. Walsh (then U.S. Senator), Leavitt (Congressman) Promise Aid in Creation of Chief Joseph Battlefield Memorial.’ That object having been attained, on [sic] Oct. 1931, a huge stone with a bronze plaque thereon was dedicated in commemoration of the surrender.”

  Speaking of monuments, L. V. McWhorter, in a letter under date of “Hunting Moon 25, 1942,” wrote the author that he and the well-known sculptor, Alonzo V. Lewis of Seattle, Washington, accompanied by three Nez Perces—Peopeo Tholekt, Black Eagle, and Many Wounds—toured the five major battlefields in the summer of 1928 to place markers at each site. These small monuments of synthetic stone, bearing a “bronze plate on the shaft . . . dedicatory to Chief Joseph and his Warriors,” were located at the White Bird, Cottonwood, Clearwater, Big Hole, and Bearpaw battlegrounds.

  Since the chief’s death many other honors have been bestowed by white Americans upon his memory. A few among them include a Liberty ship built at Portland, Oregon, during World War II which was christened the Chief Joseph on March 28, 1943. Erskine Wood, Portland attorney and son of Colonel C. E. S. Wood, delivered the launching speech. A dam on the Columbia River in Washington was dedicated in June, 1956, as the Chief Joseph Dam, one of the world’s largest hydroelectric developments. An elementary school in Great Falls, Montana, constructed in 1962, was named the Chief Joseph School. On December 18, 1964, the Daily Missoulian, Missoula, Montana, reported: “State highway commissioners . . . approved Chief Joseph Pass as the name for a cut through the mountains between U.S. 93 and Montana 43.” All of which recognition the chief would have gladly exchanged for the privilege of living and dying in his beloved Wallowa—the valley of winding waters.

  Appendix 1

  Genealogy Chart

  Some writers have erroneously stated that Young Joseph’s mother was a Cayuse. Were this true, Young Joseph would have been known as a Cayuse and not as a Nez Perce, since it is customary among the tribes of the Columbia River Basin for tribal descent to be traced through the maternal side of the family. The grandfather of Young Joseph was Chief Wa-la-mat-kin of the Cayuse tribe. He had two wives, Nez Perce Woman, and Cayuse Woman. As we are concerned only with the genealogy of Young Joseph, the descendants of Chief Wa-la-mat-kin and Cayuse Woman have not been included, but only those known through his marriage to Nez Perce Woman.

  Among the original letters of John B. Monteith, agent of the Lapwai Reservation, which are preserved in the Idaho State Historical Library in Boise, the author found one letter to H. Clay Wood, dated April 24, 1876, in which Monteith states that old Joseph’s father was a Cayuse chief and his mother a Nez Perce. “Old Joseph was born near the mouth of Grand Ronde,” the letter continues. “Old Joseph took his wife from a band living on the Snake river near the mouth of the Ashotin. She was the mother of several children including Young Joseph. The Indians say she was only part Nez Perce. I am unable to ascertain of what other blood she was. It could not have been Snake as the Nez Perces and Snakes were always enemies.”

  Young Joseph’s own family, treated in the text, is not included here as there are no living direct descendants of the chief. The genealogy chart here1 was given to Mr. Omar L. Babcock, Superintendent of the Umatilla Agency, Pendleton, Oregon, by Mr. Philip Jones of the Umatilla Reservation. Through the courtesy of Mr. Babcock, it is reproduced here for the first time.

  Appendix 2

  Sidelights

  Other sidelights on the chief are furnished by Mrs. Frances G. Hamblen of Spokane, Washington, an artist who modeled a bust of Joseph in bas relief. As a girl of about eighteen she wrote the following perceptive description of the chieftain immediately after he had visited her father’s house in 1893:

  Moderately tall and heavily built. Hand that felt as big as a ham when shaking hands. Eyes small but particularly bright. At first one doesn’t notice his eyes (when he is apparently looking one’s way) but suddenly you perceive these bright, searching, direct little eyes riveted upon you. The first few times I met him, I could seldom detect him looking my way (except at meeting or parting) and it seemed as if he was oblivious to everything in the room. Knowing however, that Indians seemingly have no eyes and yet see—we observed the Chief carefully, soon finding that when we looked he did not, and visa [sic] versa. Being perhaps the most interested party, I sat next to him. He leaned back in a Morris chair with legs extended to the fire warming first this side then the other. As he also insisted on retaining his large overcoat in a house at summer heat, we asked him if he was sick. He shook his head and slapping his knee said, “Him cold.”

  An Indian’s expression is hard to analyze. It is such a combination of childlike simplicity, of cunning, of directness and evasion, of sadness and sternness, of cruelty. Then with all savages comes the smile, which in Joseph’s case I do not hesitate to describe as winning. This has also been the criticism of many others. The labial fold is always strongly marked. Then the development of the masseter make more strong lines about the corners of the mouth. So there is that expression on an Indian’s face that just before becoming a broad smile changes into austerity and grimness. Then the long development of certain muscles about the eye from squinting in a strong light and observing objects at a distance has given a look of almost grief to the face. But here again the expression is not perfect. These expressions are peculiar to the Indian and do quite as much toward making the Indian face as do the high cheek bone, big nose and long upper lips, low forehead. (All usually found.)

  Joseph does not speak good English. Mixes in a number of Nez Perce words but it is almost possible to understand him by his gestures, without any words. In these he is perfectly free and unconscious, moving with a native grace that is very pleasing. Several times he stood to better illustrate a climax. When any numbers were required he would lean forward, sit up in his chair, plant the elbow of his left arm on the chair arm and with forearm and wrist held up straight, fingers extended; and then with his right hand count off from these human digits exactly the number he wished. We asked him if he had hunted lately. Yes, he had killed a hi-u (big) grizzly this winter. He measured the height t
he bear stood from the floor. The grizzly were ferocious—“killed Boston man’s cow.” Had long claws and sharp teeth. Here Joseph’s sound teeth came together in a perfect snap as he bent his fingers claw shape. He shot with Boston man’s gun—not bow and arrows, and he pointed to several different spots on his own breast to show where he had hit the bear. I should not have liked to be Joseph’s enemy in battle. Upon my questioning him about bows and arrows he drew back and carefully aimed an imaginary bow at me with such a look in his eye that in an instant all civilization was gone and there stood the fearless savage pausing ere he sent the swift arrow on its message of death.

  Among the Indian pictures in the house was one of Joseph taken just at the close of the war. He expressed decided interest in this and explained about the bead ornaments he then wore. “Young man then,” he said. And then, pointing to himself, “Me old,” fifty-three snows.

  One of the ladies present—a physician—rose to go. Joseph’s manner is quite courtly. He at once rose and extended his hand nodding his head and smiling. I told him this was a medicine woman, whereat he and Dr. C. both laughed heartily. But he seemed to take it as all joke, so Dr. opened up her case and Joseph looked surprised to see these many bottles.

  He told us how he lived away from his people—how his wife had died, his children, all his family and putting his hand on his heart, he shook his head, “Sick-sick.”

  I asked him to tell me his Indian name—he merely grunted and shook his head. I asked again and he must have concluded that I was in earnest, for suddenly he leaned towards me in his chair and told his name, waiting for me to repeat each syllable after him. “Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekht.” The last syllable in true Indian style between a cough and a spit. When we had done this together several times, he told us what it meant, “Hi-u-mountains,” he said “Li-u (Thunder),” “Li-u Thunder in mountains,” and with his arm he described the course of the thunder which reached from the base, to the very summit of the mountains. His voice, too, was deep and full.

  About this time, Win brought in some sweet cider and Scoty [sic] said, “Joseph never drinks,” but after he explained to him that it was apple juice, Joseph took a glass—which he drained in one gulp.

  Here is something Joseph did—which every time made us all start in our chairs. The fireplace screen was drawn away from the fireplace about 6 inches on the side where Joseph sat. Every time he wished to expectorate, he did so—without changing his position and his unerring aim at the fire was surprising. I think he did not miss once—but we expected it every time just the same.

  This ended the notes of that evening visit, but Mrs. Hamblen also jotted down in her notebook another account of Joseph told her by a family friend:

  Mr. Law has spoken much of Joseph, admiring him unstintingly. Mr. Law is connected with the N. P. Ry. and was in charge of moving Joseph and his band as prisoners of war at the close of the Nez Perce war. . . . The Indians were much crowded in the cars—and their thirst was merely mocked by the tin reservoir in the car ends. So stops were made at water tanks where the Indians filed out and drank by the bucketfull [sic]. Finally the train stopped for supper. Joseph was invited to the private car to eat with the white chiefs. He might have been awkward—but he ate with knife and fork. Shortly after leaving this station it was reported that Joseph was missing. A thorough search was made through the train—but unsuccessfully. This was a loss not to be overlooked. The only plausible theory being that he was left at the place the train stopped for supper and the train was slowly backed up.

  Before long a figure was descried on the track. It was coming toward the train then Joseph was recognized. In one corner of his blanket he was carrying something which proved to be pies, rather dilapidated, but food for the sick squaws—as Joseph explained. After he had entered the car again he threw off the blanket. He stood there in nothing but a breech clout steaming with perspiration. “A more magnificent specimen of manhood I have never seen,” said Mr. Law. “He was the Apollo Belvedere.” Joseph’s intention was to overtake the train but he had already realized his incapability, for he said, “It is harder for me to catch this train than it was for General Howard to catch me.” Which shows that even a defeated Indian is capable of a pun.1

  Notes

  Introduction

  Archival material is reprinted with permission of Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections, Washington State University Libraries, Pullman.

  Steve Evans’s Voice of the Old Wolf: Lucullus Virgil McWhorter and the Nez Perce Indians (Pullman: Washington State University Press, 1996) pointed me toward Howard’s correspondence with McWhorter. I thank Trevor Bond and Megan Ockerman for providing me with copies of archival materials related to Howard and her work.

  1. Frederick E. Hoxie, review of Saga of Chief Joseph, Antioch Review 37, no. 2 (1979): 245.

  2. Howard to J. H. Gipson, 5 Oct. 1939, MS.1984.43, Caxton Press, File 7 (author files) (hereafter, CP).

  3. Howard to Lucullus V. McWhorter, 30 Sept. 1942, Cage 55, Lucullus Virgil McWhorter Papers, 1848–1945 (hereafter, LVMP).

  4. E. A. Brininstool to McWhorter, 22 May 1931, LVMP.

  5. Brininstool to McWhorter, 15 Nov. 1933, LVMP.

  6. Cover biography, 1941 ed. McGrath and Howard split the royalty payments for their work, but after he died in 1945, she began to downplay his contributions, balked at paying royalties to his estate, and, as she published Saga of Chief Joseph, arranged a new contract listing her as sole author (Howard to Bruce H. Nicoll, 5 Feb. 1964, CP).

  7. Howard to Gipson, 23 Feb. 1940, CP.

  8. Helen Addison Howard and Dan L. McGrath, War Chief Joseph (Caxton Publishing Co., 1946), 282, 284.

  9. Howard to Gipson, 2 Jan. 1940, and 23 Feb. 1940, CP.

  10. “New Biography of Chief Joseph,” Lewiston Daily Tribune, 31 Aug. 1941.

  11. McWhorter to Howard, 2 Oct. 1941, LVMP.

  12. T. C. Elliott, review of War Chief Joseph, Oregon Historical Quarterly 42, no. 4 (1941): 332; Francis Haines, review of War Chief Joseph, Pacific Northwest Quarterly 33, no. 1 (1942): 99. Haines also published a scathing review in Pacific Historical Review 10, no. 4 (1941): 484–85.

  13. Howard to Charles M. Gates, 21 Nov. 1945, Cage 197, Helen Addison Howard Papers.

  14. Melda Ludlow, who had evaluated War Chief Joseph for Caxton, had questioned the press’s plan to publish Howard’s book “near the same time the Yellow Wolf book will come out,” warning that McWhorter’s firsthand information would overshadow Howard’s work, which relied on secondary sources (7 Oct. 1939, CP).

  15. Trevor James Bond, “From Treasure Room to Archives: The McWhorter Papers and the State College of Washington,” Pacific Northwest Quarterly 102, no. 2 (2011): 69.

  16. Howard to McWhorter, 15 Sept. 1941; McWhorter to Howard, 18 Sept. 1941; Howard to McWhorter, 28 Sept. 1941; McWhorter to Howard, 2 Oct. 1941, LVMP.

  17. Howard to Gipson, 21 April 1964, and 13 May 1964, CP.

  18. Helen Addison Howard, Saga of Chief Joseph (Lincoln: Bison Books, 1978), 16.

  19. Annie Laurie Bird, “Evaluation of Proposed Revisions for War Chief Joseph,” 27 July 1964, CP.

  20. Howard, Saga of Chief Joseph, 335.

  21. Hoxie review, 245, 246.

  22. Leo Ruth, “The Scene,” English Journal 61, no. 5 (1972): 765.

  Prologue

  1. Dr. Cyrus T. Brady, Northwestern Fights and Fighters, p. 3.

  2. Col. G. O. Shields, Blanket Indians of the Northwest, p. 90.

  3. Ibid., p. 117.

  4. Col. Nelson A. Miles, Serving the Republic, p. 181.

  5. Interview with Judge Lippincott, April, 1934. The judge was then a resident of Butte, Montana.

  6. The “Great Spirit [Chief] Above” is the name used by the Nez Perces to refer to a Supreme Being. Other tribes refer to the Deity as the “Great Manitou.” See “An Indian’s Views of Indian Affairs,” North American Review, April, 1879, p. 430; and James Mooney, “The Ghost Dance Religion,” Fourteenth Annual Report, Burea
u of American Ethnology, Part I, p. 719.

  7. Al J. Noyes, The Story of Ajax, p. 37.

  1. The Valley of Winding Waters

  1. The name “Nez Perce,” being of French origin, was formerly written with the final e accented (Nez Percé). However, since the name is no longer pronounced in the French manner, the Anglicized form of spelling will be used throughout this text.

  2. “An Indian’s Views of Indian Affairs,” North American Review, April, 1879, p. 416. An interview with Chief Joseph.

  3. Edward Curtis, The North American Indian, VIII, 4.

  4. H. J. Spinden, “The Nez Percé Indians,” Memoirs of the American Anthropological Society, II, 171–72.

  5. Washington Irving, Adventures of Captain Bonneville, Part II, pp. 56–57. It is the belief of Mr. J. H. Horner, pioneer and historian of Wallowa Valley, Oregon, that Captain Bonneville camped “at Joseph’s main winter camp, just below the mouth of Joseph Creek on the Welleweah, now called Grand Ronde River.”

  6. Francis Haines, “The Nez Perce Delegation to St. Louis in 1831,” Pacific Historical Review, VI (March, 1937), 78. See also his Red Eagles of the Northwest, pp. 59–60, where he says: “They [the Nez Perces] were not divinely inspired toward Christianity, nor were they seeking for a higher moral standard. They wanted better ‘medicine’ to increase their prestige and power. They did not seek reading and writing as tools but as magic formulae to aid their ‘medicine.’ Hence it is absurd to argue whether they were seeking Catholic or Protestant teachers, or whether they really asked for the white man’s ‘Book of Heaven.’ They were looking for new incantations to use on this earth, and not seeking information on a possible world to come.”