Connecticut western news., 1873-02-14
The Modoc Side of the Question.

Our California exchanges come to us filed with additional details of the re- cent battle between the Modocs and the United States troops and volunteers. In addition to the particulars of this engagement - and the participants therein all concur in admitting that the Modocs fought with extraordinary cour- age-many facts interesting in view of the proportions that the war has as- sumed are given concerning the tribe itself, it's history and condition. Not o few have come forward to champion the cause of the Modocs, and to proclaim the wrongs that have led them to their present desperate stand against the United States Government and the people of California and Oregon. The Modocs, only handful now, and pit iful remnant of their former proud host, have ever been warlike tribe, though they have been true otheir treaty stip- ulations and have for many years been friendly and peaceable in their dealings with their white neighbors. Their de- privation of their tule lands large marshes abounding in fish, beaver, ot- ter, and wild fowl, and whose advanta- ges excited the cupidity of the whites was the cause of their present hostile attitude.
 A physician who has had twenty-two years acquaintance with the affairs of Siskiyou County, where their lands are situated, and who has had extensive practice among them, writes to the San Francisco Chronicle that the Modocs are of stature, appearance, and inteli- gence, like whites; that many of their women have been married to men of business in that neighborhood, and that their children have been raised, edu- cated, and married in and about Yreka He further states that in the course of his practice as physician in the house. holds presided over by these Indian wives, he has ever found |" as much con- venience for the administration of med icines-the sugar-bowl, the spoon and the cup, the clean bed, and the towel as he has found elsewhere, and far su- perior to many whites called citizens. /" A sympathizing editor writing of them, and apparently well versed in their his- tory, speaks of Captain Jack and his devoted followers as "really and truly heroes, as sublime in their heroism as Leonidas and his Spartan band, and equally deserving of naturalization in song and story" and contrasts their struggle for existence with the develop ments of this degenerate age of sham and shoddy, of Credit Mobilier, and Congressional corruption. "The Mo docs,'' he says, "are a short-haired tribe. By long contact with the whites they have become partially civilized. They speak English as well as some of their white neighbors, and are as well behaved as average white men," Nor have they failed to exhibit evidences of magnanimity which justify the opinion expressed of them; for, says the writer, when the war was forced upon them they did not strike without warning. "They made no secret of their purpose to resist any forcible attempt to remove them, and also to retaliate upon white settlers. When they attacked the lat ter they let the women and children go unharmed, and even without insult "a wonderful exhibition of magnanimity considering the light in which their own women have been regarded, and the manner in which they have been treated by white men,"
 These are some of the glimpses of the Modoc side of the question which come from California.