A site along the Bear River in southeastern Idaho, where for centuries the Shoshone wintered near warm springs, was blessed March 24 as the final resting place for the 250-350 tribal members who were massacred there by the U.S. Army in 1863.
"The ceremony was a significant event in healing some wounds that have endured for 140 years," said Elder Monte J. Brough of the Seventy, first counselor in the Utah North Area presidency, who offered the benediction.
The ceremony was held by the largely LDS Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation as 27 acres of the pasture land — much of where the massacre occurred — was deeded to the tribe after being purchased by the Trust for Public Land and various donors, following an effort spearheaded by the American West Heritage Center of Wellsville, Utah.
The massacre site will be restricted as sacred with a small interpretive center eventually located to one side. A larger interpretive center will be established at the American West Heritage Center in Wellsville.
"This is a modest effort to show that those people [who were killed] were important," said Elder Brough. He described the ceremony as "a profound experience in the history of these people. As I stepped on that site, I felt as I have on places that have special meaning It decidedly has that."
He said tribal members were warm in their appreciation for the property and event.
At the ceremony, a blessing on the land was offered by Shoshone Ricky Hasuse, and the history of the battle and subsequent activities of the tribe recounted by various speakers.
Bruce Parry, executive director of the Northwestern Band that has headquarters in Brigham City, Utah, said the tribe has Church roots going back to 1873. Chief Sagwitch, a survivor of the massacre who helped regroup the tribe, was baptized May 5 of that year along with 101 of his people. He and others remained faithful, laboring for many months to help construct the Logan Temple. After it was completed, he did ordinance work there for family members.
"The site has always been important to the tribe," said Brother Parry, a former temple ordinance worker and a Primary teacher in the Syracuse 3rd Ward, Syracuse Utah South Stake. "It is protected by high cliffs, there is ample water from hot springs, a lot of willows protect against the wind and snow; it is an ideal place to winter."
The massacre made it yet more significant because "more than 300 of our [tribal] members were killed there." Skirmishes mostly between the Indians and wagon trains on the Oregon Trail led to the conflict. The massacre took place on Jan. 29, 1863, when a band of soldiers from Camp Douglas under Col. Patrick Edward Connor marched at night across northern Utah. They found the Indians, nestled in the mouth of a ravine near the foothills, and attacked at dawn. Men, women, children and their old were asleep in wickiups. Their ponies were tethered in corrals and their food supply stored nearby. The Indians resisted the first attack as long as their bullets held out. Then a detachment climbed the bluff behind them and came down the ravine, flanking the tribe. After the shooting ended, ponies were taken, food destroyed and wickiups burned. Bodies of the slain were left to predators.
A plaque on the location describes it as the Bear River Massacre, "a military disaster unprecedented in Western history." This account of the conflict was hidden for many years as the departing army gave its version of the conflict to a passing newspaper reporter, one of the few accounts published during the ongoing Civil War.
LDS settlers in Franklin took in some of the wounded women and children and nursed them back to health until they could rejoin the remnant of their tribe. One adopted survivor was Pisappih Timbimboo, or Frank W. Warner, as he was later named. As a 2-year-old in the massacre, he was shot seven times. He became one of the first Native American LDS missionaries and a lifelong educator after graduating from Brigham Young College in Logan, Utah.
Following the massacre, the tribe wandered for a time, living off the land as best they could, said Scott R. Christensen, a Church historian who has done considerable research on the tribe. In 1873, Chief Sagwitch, after a series of dreams, contacted George Washington Hill, an Indian missionary in Ogden, Utah, and asked to be baptized and taught agriculture. The Native Americans established themselves first near Franklin, Idaho, then moved to a successful farm near the then-rowdy railroad town of Corinne, Utah. However, the townspeople, nervous about the Indian-Mormon connection, motivated the Army in Salt Lake City to move the Indians and restrain the Mormons as well. The Indians moved, frightened that a second massacre would take place if they did not.
Church leaders purchased a site four miles south of Portage, Utah, for the tribe, named Washakie. Called here was one of the first Native American bishops, Bishop Moroni Timbimboo, a grandson of Chief Sagwitch, who served in 1939.After several decades residents drifted away. Few of the Indians had filed for land titles and most were unaware of property taxes. Church leaders held title to much of the land and, thinking the town was abandoned, burned the empty buildings and sold the property to a rancher.
Unhappy tribal members met with Presiding Bishop John H. Vandenberg, who saw that those with unregistered titles were recompensed, and the tribe was deeded 185 acres nearby, its only holdings. The Washakie Cemetery was included in the acreage. Although losing their village was a blow, the new land enabled them to qualify to the federal government as an Indian Nation, which added to the assistance they received in areas of health, education and housing. In 1987, the tribe organized a formal council.
The tribe is slowly rebuilding, said Brother Parry. There are only 31 full-blood members remaining and many in the tribe live in urban centers. But "we are growing quite a bit," he said. "Four years ago there were 365 members. Now we are up to 435 — we have grown almost a fifth."
In addition, the heritage center in Wellsville is working to keep alive the language and cultural identity, said Rhonda Thompson, executive director.
"Our mission is to educate, enlighten and entertain about the American West. This is the indigenous tribe that roamed Cache Valley, southern Idaho, and the Great Salt Lake area."We want to tell their side of the story from their point of view," she said.
When the property came up for sale last year, the effort to raise funds succeeded "almost miraculously" with the purchase, she explained.
"The ceremony was incredible, a time of celebration and reflection. It was most amazing to watch what happened. Elder Brough gave the most incredible prayer, about how this needed to happen."
Necia P. Seamons of the Preston Citizen and Kersten Swinyard of Associated Press contributed to this article.
