Chief Joseph & the Flight of the Nez Perce (29 page)

Before the sun was barely over the horizon, his contingent of horses, wagons, pack mules, and more than 500 men was winding its way up bluffs on the far side of the Yellowstone. His intention was simple. He would march them without compromise until they either met the Nez Perce or received word that the hostiles had achieved their goal and made it across the border into Canada.

While Miles was receiving Howard's message, a very different scene was unfolding 150 miles up the Yellowstone. Sturgis's worn-out men were camped on the riverbank, drying their clothes and trying to fortify themselves on the meager rations they had carried. Howard was limping his footsore, dispirited troops north in slow and labored pursuit of Sturgis, and the tired, despondent Nez Perce, who had only recently crossed the river themselves, were camped a few miles ahead of Sturgis in a wide canyon that formed a broad passageway from the river to the high, open buffalo plains. None knew the location of the others.

For the Nez Perce, the journey had reached a point of crisis. The young men were once again killing wantonly, convinced, often with good cause, that all whites were eyes for the military. The people were almost too tired to move, but they knew it was too dangerous to stop. The horses were so exhausted and worn-out that many had to be left behind. Nerves were frayed; tempers were flaring. All the latent tensions between the bands were beginning to surface.

Joseph, who until now had remained quietly in the background, began to speak up for the health and welfare of the people. The ceaseless killing by the young men was getting them nowhere, and as many of their people were dying from the hard marches as from encounters with the soldiers. His band had not sought this flight and had not countenanced all this killing. They had wanted peace. If White Bird and Toohoolhoolzote wanted revenge and killing, that was fine for them. He was more concerned with tired bodies and weary spirits than he was with angry hearts and warrior pride.

But the young warriors were once again beyond listening. It was necessary that they go out each day and scout a broad perimeter around the people, but once out of camp they could not be controlled. They burned white people's camps, burned their houses, burned their hay bales, burned their corrals. Smoldering ruins were greeting the soldiers all along the line of pursuit.

The place where the people had camped was a flat-bottomed, mile-wide dry creek bed of sagebrush and alkali, known as Canyon Creek, that ran like a corridor up from the Yellowstone River to the open buffalo plains six miles to the north. With high, chalky escarpments on either side, it was a dangerous place for ambush, made all the more so because the cliff walls came close together at the far north end where the canyon gave way to open country.

But the people were not concerned. They knew General Howard was still far back beyond the Yellowstone and that the river crossing would slow him even further. He offered no threat to them in this camp. The warriors had even taken to mocking him, calling him General Day-and-a-Half-Behind. They would keep good watch, but they had no fear of ambush at his hands.

But even without strong pursuit from the soldiers, the camp was now a hard place. Many elders were sick and blind, their health failing rapidly, and many small children had lost their parents. Most of these children had found shelter with uncles or aunts or other families, but there were still too few blankets, and many children, as well as many of the elders, were constantly cold and hungry. The women had all they could do to keep everyone warm and fed. It also fell to them to prepare the dead for burial and to aid the old and blind who could not take care of themselves.

The hard daily pace meant that the people barely had any time for rest between setting up camp late at night and breaking it early in the morning. Firewood too was becoming difficult to find, and the water was alkaline and not good for cooking and drinking. If the men brought back no game from hunting, food was scarce. All knew that the warriors must eat first because it was they who protected the people. Oftentimes, after the warriors and the elders and children had been fed, there was nothing left for the women themselves.

The young boys too were having a difficult time with the horses. The herd had developed a sickness that kept their sores from healing, and it was not easy to find good grass for them to eat. Getting them to move each day was becoming harder and harder. When the spirit of the horse gave out, the spirit of the Nez Perce would give out.

Only the young warriors were taking any pleasure in the current situation. They left in the morning and roamed through the hills, looking for any white settlers or any sign of possible trouble. On this morning, after backtracking down the canyon, they found a stagecoach standing near a small log building on the trail that ran beside the river. There were no people around, but the horses were grazing in a nearby corral, and bags of mail and the passengers' luggage were still on the stage. Not concerning themselves with the whereabouts of the passengers or station master, the warriors lit the building and some haystacks on fire and rehitched the horses, then crowded on top of the stage and rode at breakneck speed back toward the main camp, scattering pieces of mail and clothing all along the canyon.

In the distance, some of Sturgis's scouts, who had just crossed the river a few miles farther down, saw the plume of smoke and raced to see what was happening. They caught a glimpse of the retreating stage with its Nez Perce riders heading up the flat sagebrush canyon bottom. Far ahead, maybe four miles up the valley, they could make out the entire retreating Nez Perce party.

They sent messengers riding full speed back to the river where Sturgis and his men were just beginning to unsaddle their horses and accept the reality of their humiliating failure to overtake the Nez Perce. The cries of “Indians, Indians!” brought them back to life and sent them running for their mounts. Perhaps they yet would be able to overtake and capture the hostiles.

But Sturgis's scouts had not gone unnoticed by the Nez Perce. Their own scouts had seen the riders watching them from behind. They did not know who these soldiers were—Howard should have been far back on the other side of the river—but they were well aware from past travels to the northern buffalo plains that this canyon was gradually narrowing and that whoever arrived at the narrow mouth first could control the exit. Whoever these soldiers were, they could not be allowed to beat the people to this opening. If they did, they could set up a few riflemen on the bluffs and create a blockade from which there could be no escape.

The day was cold and rainy, with strong, sharp winds. The people had just finished packing when they saw their back scouts giving the blanket signal for imminent attack. Knowing they dared not lose the race to the canyon mouth, they lifted the wounded and sick onto travois and began their desperate run north up the canyon. Some of the elders were almost too weak to ride, and many of the women had to travel with an infant strapped to their back and a toddler holding on for dear life around their waist. But there was no time to worry about comfort. They had to beat the soldiers to the narrow gap where the canyon opened out onto the buffalo plains.

Joseph rode among the people, trying to organize the departure to make sure that no children or horses were left behind, while the warriors whipped their horses up the side of a tall, flat-topped mesa that rose in the middle of the canyon. From that vantage point they would be able to shoot down on any pursuing soldiers, holding them at bay while the people and the horses moved along the canyon floor.

Soon the soldiers were sighted coming up the canyon several hundred strong. They were mounted men, not foot soldiers, and would be able to overtake the people if they were not held off. From their hiding places on the mesa, the Nez Perce shot the soldiers off their horses one by one. The sound of the gunfire echoed off the canyon walls, making it difficult for the soldiers to identify the number or the location of the snipers. Poker Joe added to the confusion with his heavy fifteen-pound rifle, which had a concussion so loud that the soldiers thought perhaps they were being fired upon by a cannon.

Uncertain how many warriors they were confronting and the nature of the weaponry being arrayed against them, Sturgis's commander, Major Lewis Merrill, ordered his charging cavalry to dismount, form a skirmish line, and advance on foot. The act amazed the Nez Perce, who feared men on horses far more than foot soldiers. But it made their task easier. They now had only to hold these men down while the people made good on their escape.

Leaving a few warriors behind to keep up sporadic firing, the others rode back to join the fleeing families. Every time the soldiers came too close, the Nez Perce shooters retreated, leaving the exhausted soldiers no one to fight when they finally climbed the buttes or made their way up to the rocky promontories from which the shooting had come.

The dismounted soldiers followed the escaping Indians as best they could through the rain and cold, but the terrain was rutted with hillocks and folds and washes and ravines. The Nez Perce easily outdistanced them while the soldiers managed only to march themselves into a state of exhaustion. They were only one day removed from their forced march of sixty miles, and they were still cold, hungry, and tired. Many of them were young and confused and frightened by this confrontation with an unseen foe. The veterans among them were almost tearful with rage that they had been forced to dismount when a real confrontation and possible capture had been only minutes away.

But Sturgis also had recognized the strategic realities of the situation. In an attempt to head off the fleeing Nez Perce, he had sent another group of mounted soldiers along the bluff on top of the canyon wall in an effort to secure the canyon mouth before the Nez Perce got there. But his forces were now spread too thin. There were too few men on the ridgetop to pose any threat to the Nez Perce by themselves, and since the men in the bottom of the canyon had dismounted and were now on foot and unable to catch up, the men on the top of the canyon wall finally had to withdraw.

Eventually, Sturgis gave up the pursuit. This had been his one best chance. But his men were tired and wet, he had outraced his supply wagons, leaving his troops with nothing to eat and nothing to drink except the alkali-laden groundwater, and he now had wounded he needed to tend and transport. Once again, the Nez Perce had beaten him in a footrace. They had made it to the narrow canyon mouth. He would take up the chase again when his men were rested. But for now, the Nez Perce had made their escape.

For the Nez Perce, it had been a strange encounter. They had not expected these soldiers, but neither had they felt threatened by them. The soldiers had shown no stomach for a fight and no intelligent plan of attack. A few well-placed riflemen had easily been able to hold them at bay. But it was unclear who they were or what their intentions had been.

Nonetheless, to stop any further pursuit, the warriors pushed boulders across the narrow mouth of the canyon and blocked the trail with stumps and brush. Since there was no easy way up the canyon wall, they knew that the soldiers would have to either turn back or remove the rocks and brush before continuing. If a few warriors remained high up among the rocks of the canyon, they could snipe at any soldiers who tried to remove the brush. That would slow any pursuit until the people were safely onto the high, open buffalo country. Even if the soldiers did break through, the Nez Perce knew that pursuit would not be strong. White men had to have three meals a day or their spirits became weak. They would not follow hard until their supply wagons caught up. By then the people would be far ahead. Only the bluffs and badlands along the Missouri, several days' journey ahead, could now slow their passage into the Old Woman Country.

With the soldiers blocked behind them and warrior sharpshooters poised in the rocks above the narrow canyon mouth, the Nez Perce spent a comfortable night in preparation for the next leg of the journey. Though they were not well supplied with food, they knew that it was only a short journey to the buffalo plains where the warriors would be able to catch enough buffalo and antelope to keep them fed. They could also make new robes and blankets from the hides of the animals the warriors killed. The children and elders would again be warm; the people would again be well fed and comfortable.

The next morning they awoke to another day of cold, driving rain. The Missouri was only several days ahead, and Canada only several more after that. Yellow Wolf, Ollokot, and several warriors stayed behind to scout the back trail and hold off any advancing soldiers trying to make it through the canyon gap.

But soon another threat revealed itself. On the adjacent hillsides, far behind, Yellow Wolf noticed groups of Indians moving among the scattered pines. He assumed they were Snake or Assiniboine, the people the Nez Perce called “Walk-Around Sioux.” Both frequented this country on buffalo hunts and were likely to be in the area. But upon closer approach, Yellow Wolf saw that these were Crow warriors. With their pasted-on hair, sometimes so long as to touch the ground when they walked, and their war lances adorned with eagle feathers, they were easily recognized.

The chiefs and warriors were upset. They rode up and confronted the Crow. The Crow responded that they were not really fighting—that the Nez Perce should travel slowly and the Crow would soon come ahead and join them. But none of the Nez Perce believed that this was anything more than a ruse. These men were clearly scouting for the soldiers and hoping to have a chance to steal Nez Perce horses.

There was a brief skirmish, with a bit of halfhearted shooting, before the Crow galloped off, leaving the Nez Perce to return to the main camp and tell the people it was as Looking Glass had said—the Crow were no different from the Flathead, the Bannock, and the Shoshone, other tribes that had promised friendship but had sold their honor for a life of safety and white-man ease.

But it was the Crow skill as horse thieves that most concerned the Nez Perce. Crow warriors could move silently through the grass, sneak in among the herd, and cull animals without even being noticed. If they were now riding with the soldiers, a whole new level of vigilance would be needed.