Wood River times. [volume] (Hailey, Idaho) 1882-1915, 1893-08-01
SOME WHITE SAVAcEcv
Killing Indians with Small-pox
sacreing Them by Treac,

Killing Indians with SmalI Pow
sacreing Them by Treacncrv
Men who have had experience ~,
Indians hold that for every u @ila
person killed by Indians ab,u, "I ~,
Indians will in the long run di, 'sa
the white mans agency. John GU
bell. formerly freightcr to thu ~
dian country and an upper Mi,s,na,
River boatman, says that he has W..
messed several incidents wherein sar
age barbarity was pitled agains. ~.
white mans strategy. In each ~
stance the savages were paid bacl !,
q more than decimallY increased r,,;a
for the damage done. N'''
One case occurred, says witt.
in the Kansas City Star, in the vi
cinity OF old Fort Boise. Indians h,s
done great injury to a man named
james Beckwith. They gloated oye,
what they had done. They yera
large in number the whites vera
small, and for business and o7ho,
reasons it was deemed Impossible fl
wage open warfare. The situa,jnn
however, was such, that it was
deemed best to curtail the power of
the Indians as they were nsoept
and threatening, as the Northwest
Indians now are.
Beckwith went down the Misseuu
River to place where smallpox or. :,
listed. He obtained smallpox wins
in form that could be easily I ans,
ported. One story was that he car.
ried the 20 SIN in an air-tight, CAMS.
ter-l.k arrangement. When be
reached hi, destination he injected
some clothing. which was immedi
ately put in posse SsiOn of the In.
dians, so that the poisonous germs Of
the smallpox, which are shor i we'd
would not loose their efficacy The
result was that the epidemic broke
out and increased to pestilence In
more than so per cent Of the cases
the disease assumed the continent and
the hemorrhagic FORMS and the fatal.
ity was not far from leo per cent
In their dclirium scores ran into
the river, and death was thus acccler.
ated in it's approach. The white men
shut themselves up in what was
called the old fort. large abandoned
structure, larger part OF which was
made of frame Here the pestilence.
stricken Indians tlocked. They
humbly came TO the white men whom
they had SO recently abused and ex.
ulted over in their brutal, savage
way.
After the abandoned old fort haa,)
been converted from laZar house to|
charnel house by the action of dis.
ease the means of egress were barred
and in order to stamp out the con.
tagiOn fire was applied. Scores Of
dead bodies were consumed. The
contagion was thus stamped out, the
power of the Indians was broken
without the loss of a single white
man, and the insults avenged. This
occurred between forty and fifty years
ago.
On another occasion young Ger.
man, who was employed in menial
capacity in a private fort of A. NJ
Harvey, in ignorance or otherwise
disre1arded instructions given him.
and on a certain occasion when there
was danger, strayed from the fort
about quarter OF mile. He was
killed by Indians and cut into small
pieces.
The mutilated remains were then
left as a warning to the whites OF the
Indians proves. just as in the
smallpox case, the whites did not ap
pear to notice the indignity, and also
as in the smallpox case, the Indians
regarded this as an indication of COW,
ardice. The Indians, however. kept
away for short time after the muir.
der to see what would be done. Then
they came around to trade. This
fort had an alley-likc entrance
guarded by door or gate-like arrange.
ments at each extremity The sides
were walled or boarded high. The
white men managed to get the alley
full of Indians.
They had previously allowed In
dams in here after the murder in
order to disarm suspicion. The whites
opened the outside barriers, but
placed behind thin inside barrier a
masked cannon. This was heavily
loaded with iron sluGs parts of black
smith shop refuse and materials Of
that nature. Without warning this
was discharged into the packed mass
of SavageS. A moment later the mar.
row way was filled with dead AND
maugled Indians. The outer way
was shut and others were killed. FOL
a long time after this the Indians
were we'll behaved.
Evolution of n Name.