The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1892-03-03


Captain Jack and his bloodthirsty Modocs
lay in waiting on the morning of April II,
1878 Captain Jack had broken his pledges
again and again within few days pre-
ceding the peace talk" which he made
the cover of Il most barbarous massacre.
Friendly Indians, who knew the Modocs'
purposes, scouts, and above all squaw,
who had the privileges of Capt. Jack 8
lair, and learned by unerring signs that
mischief was on foot, warned the army
leaders and Indian commissioners not to
trust themselves within reach of the Mo-
docs. 1t was a singular state OF affairs
there at the Lava Beds of Tule lake, with
an "ar,ny with banners" on one side and a
handful of ugitives-outlawed sayages-
on the other The troops numbered several
hundred, the larger part being regulars,
provided with the best implements of war,
including cannon. The Indian warriors
numbered about two score, and had good
small arms but not much ammunition
The United States forces had been in the
field for months upon an expedition to
force the Modocs to go upon a reservation.
Several battles had been fought and the
Modocs, generally victorious, had secured
ammunition from the dead soldiers The
position occupied by the Indians had given
them the upper hand in many desperate
fight with great odds. 1t was in Il barren
region known as the Lava Beds, where
volcanic upheavals have left a regular
series of ridges, broken at the surface by
deep crevices running both lengthwise and
crosswise. The crevices formed hidden
passages for the Indians to move about,
and where it suited their purposes they
blocked them against the invading troops
by rolling huge rocks down from above
The army officers reported that one man
in the Lava Beds could keep twenty at
distance
When matters reached crisis, however,
the army surrounded the place, and with
its cannon and mounted troops was in
a fair way to win at all points. But be-
fore the blow came to settle the doom of the
Modocs forever hostilities were suspended
by orders from Washington at the request
of the Indian bureau What the diplomatic
world calls negotiation. but in the parlance
of the plains is known as peace talk"
was to be brought into use at moment
when the scalping knives of the Modocs
were dripping with blood and their victims
lay unburied and bleeding within sight of
the council tent Candy had reached the
spot prepared to fight and finish the bust
ness. Not that he wasa cruel Indian hater
On the contrary, he was a friend of the red
man and had proved it scores of times, even
as far back as the Seminole trouble But
he thought that patience had ceased to be
avirtue and it was time to cease talking and
go to shooting. The Modocs were not new
species. The soldiers knew them and the
settlers as we'll, They had grievances, too,
but had become nuisance all the same
the more because of brooding over their
grievances.
In the early days of California, 1s47 to
1849, they destroyed many whites and were
afterward whipped by Capt. Nathaniel
Lyons forces for their forays upon set
tiers. In 1852 the settlers organized, and
after terrible massacre invited the Mo-
docs to a peace talk" and killed II out of
46 warriors who responded. Naturally,
savage tradition didn't allow that sort of
negotiation to die out of remembrance
After years of war, in which they got the
worst of it, of course, they coded their
lands and agreed to go on reservation.
The band then went on the Klamath,
reservation, where they had no means of
living, were cheated out of their supplies,
and tormented by their natural enemies,
the klamaths. Groups of them strayed
back to their old home on klamath lake
and these in 1872 were about forty families