Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1884-01-25
The Doctor.KiIIIpg Oregons.

was in the Dalles Of the Columbia in
command of tho military post in the spring
of 1858 (before there was an immigrant farm
east Of the Cascade Mountains), when several
of the chiefs of the small tribes OF Indians in
that vicinity, Waskows, Wshrams, and Des
Chutes, called upon me, with an interpreter,
to invoke my aid TO suppress a most extraor-
dinary custom which prevailed among them
of killing their doctors, or medicine men, il
they did not cure their patients. During the
previous winter three doctors in that neigh
borhood had been killed for that reason and
it was done by the relatives Of the deceased.
l told them to return at designated day,
about week later, bringing as auditors all
those they wished to be present. and would
give them in a formal council regular talk
on the subject.
They came with many followers, bringing
again William Chinook as interpreter, and
the council, one of their own seeking, was
conducted as is the wont of the red race,
with gravity and deliberaton. dwelt upon
the virtues of the medical profession. l told
them that our surgeons and physicians prop
erly received from the whites the utmost con
sideration aud gratitude. 1t was the fate of
all to die, and that to expect that always the
doctor could cure would be to make him ON
nipotent, to give him the powers of the Del
ty. He could alay the pains and comfort
and assuage the ailments of the unfortunate
patient if not able in all cases to restore him
to health. 1 then dwelt upon the sin aud
crime Of private revenge and retaliation If
a murder was committed, the punishment
should be administered not by the kindred of
the murdered man, but in the name of the
Law, under the authority of the whole tribe,
after careful sitting and weighing Of the evil
dence Of guilt, and of evil and malicious in
tent To permit the punishment of the &C.
cused TO be administered without investiga-
ton by brother or son or father of the per
son killed only leads to indiscriminate slaugh
ter and the development of evil passions. II
they wished to check this unfortunate custom
of killing doctors, they must first make
known this new law, and afterward arrest
! the next offender, and after careful trial and
assured evidence and conviction of his guilt
he should be sentenced to be hung. To pun
ish the criminal by shooting him with rife
| would not be sufficient. To prevent, mark
and stigmatize the crime we did not shoot the
murderer, but, putting a rope around his
| neck, we had the criminal suspended from a
tree or scaffold until he was dead. All this
Was said to them slowly, in plain words, and
in brief sentences, giving the interpreter a
fair chance to convey my meaning.
The sequel was as follows About three
months afterward, in midsummer, the small
]
viz, the Wishrams. Among this tribe was a
celebrated medicine man of great pretensions
| He devoted himself to the sick. But he did
not cure the small po1. Though all the In
| dians on one side of the river had been vac
cinated (and thus escaped), that band unfort-
unately had not been vaccinated and thus
| the pestence ragged among them and de-
stroyed a large portion of the tribe. As the
doctor had been always boastful of his won
derful powers as a physician, the indignant
tribe resolved on his death. There were no
trees on that side of the Columbia. Tying
I his hands and feet, they put rope around
his neck and attaching the other end to the
pommel of saddle, they started the horse,
and hung him in this shocking manner
That is much as they learned by all the
| preaching. II he was only hungit would be
all right, it would be the white mans justice I!
II rope was put around his neck and his
life thus taken, then it would make the kill
| ing justifable We had inculcated way of
restraining and preventing their long cherish
ed habit of killing an unsuccessful doctor,
aud this was the denOUement! The next
time they wanted to kill another doctor, in.
stead of a rifle, they used rope, and then it
became an orthodox and judicial proceeding.
The old doctor who WAS hung for his bad
luck, and his brave, unfnching devotion to
his duties (for there was no charge of neg
lect), may be accounted a martyr to his pro-
fession. His descendants may still adore his
memory. And if they deal in heraldry
would doubtless put the rope on his escutch
con, and glory in his fate.-Benjdmin Alrord
IN February Hdrper's.