Chief Joseph & the Flight of the Nez Perce (41 page)

By the end of the following day, every storekeeper and saloonkeeper had such a story, and they ranged from the likely to the absurd. One saloonkeeper claimed an argument had broken out in his establishment over a game of cards, and an errant shot fired by one of the participants had passed between the arm and the body of a Nez Perce man who happened to be in the saloon at the time. The Indian, he reported, had not even moved but had merely lifted his other arm to show bullet holes in his shirt that had been made by other gunshots he had encountered during battles on the retreat. Such things, the warrior had said, were common and not worth getting concerned about so long as they didn't hurt.

Another store owner spoke of conversing with a Nez Perce in sign language for twenty minutes before the man asked, in perfect English, by what measure the people of this town sold their flour.

Most of the stories were fanciful or fabricated, and almost all were embellished. But all who encountered the Nez Perce on their forays through the town agreed that they had never seen Indians of this sort before. They had money, they were well behaved and civil, they did not steal, and they did not drink. All this contrasted not only with their previous experience with Indians but also with the soldiers themselves, who had entered the town dirty and rambunctious and, despite their lack of pay, had proceeded to prevail upon the good offices of the saloonkeepers to get so drunk that many had to be carried back to their barracks.

Such stories were happily grabbed up by the newspaper stringers, who were thrilled at last to be in a place where bars and eating establishments were readily available and great stories, whether verifiable or not, were to be had for the asking. They crafted flowery dispatches and sent them out across the telegraph lines, where the stories quickly made their way into the newspapers in Chicago and New York and other major cities in America. The feeds filtered down to the smaller papers, and soon what was being seen, reported, and fabricated in Bismarck was being discussed and recounted as truth at kitchen tables and in parlors all across the country.

Among these stories were descriptions of Joseph, the noble leader, dressed in embroidered moccasins and a buckskin shirt heavily decorated with red, white, and blue beads, wandering from store to store, making purchases with money of which he seemed to have an endless supply. He was depicted as “cutting an elegant figure,” with white ermine-tail tassels hanging from his shirtsleeves and a wolfskin sash, lined with red cloth, suspended from his hip. He was said to have carried a medicine bag slung across his chest, and he wore a string of large white beads around his neck.

Some descriptions had his hair adorned with white paint, others his forehead and ears decorated with red paint. These portraits in writing made him seem every inch the regal warrior, and, accurate or not, became his indelible image in the American reading public's mind. He was, as the papers said, one of Cooper's “good Indians”—a noble savage, innocent of the wicked ways of modern society, worthy of respect and even admiration, but doomed by the inevitable tide of civilization to be washed out of existence unless he and his people could adapt to the changes in the world that no one, red or white, could resist or control.

The following morning, with Miles already in St. Paul, Joseph was presented with the invitation to the banquet that the city fathers had planned in his honor. It was addressed to “Joseph, Head Chief of the Nez Perces” and read:

It was signed by the leading citizens of the town, including the mayor, George Sweet, and Dr. H. R. Porter, who had been the only surviving battle surgeon after the horrifying massacre of Custer's Seventh Cavalry at the Little Bighorn.

Joseph received it with pleasure and respect. It indicated that the town would not turn on him and his people now that Miles had departed, and it showed the kind of respect that he valued in the interaction between people. He would be pleased to attend, and he would return the honor by bringing some of the other head men as a sign of appreciation.

At noon he, Husis Kute, Yellow Bull, and several of the other men made their way from the tent camp up the hill to the great, looming Sheridan House hotel. They were greeted warmly under the grand wooden portico and were ushered into a high-ceilinged parlor, where the women and children of the town, dressed in their finest clothes, were waiting for an audience.

The Nez Perce leaders formed a reception line and received the guests graciously, shaking each of their hands and expressing thanks for the kind treatment that the Nez Perce people had been accorded by the white citizens of this fine town.

One woman was so overcome at being in the presence of these noble men of nature that, upon being introduced to Joseph, she could not resist kissing him. Others were more reserved, but all treated the guests with a deference usually associated with royalty, which, in a sense, the townsfolk believed these chieftains to be.

At the table, after receiving an official welcome in which the formal invitation was read as if it were a proclamation, Joseph and the others were treated to a meal of roast beef, fish, potatoes, cabbage, beans, pies, and pudding. They ate using knives and forks, which amazed and gratified the onlookers, who apparently had expected them to eat with their hands, never stopping to think that the average Indian probably had more experience and dexterity with a knife than any white man or woman. Most amazing of all to the onlookers was the fact that Joseph wiped his mouth with a napkin rather than on the end of his sleeve.

The meal was followed by a round of speeches. Mayor Sweet spoke at some length, welcoming the guests and proclaiming them friends. He told them that the wise men of the white race had dug down into the rocks of the earth and uncovered the truth that the earth has been occupied by many races of living beings, each succeeding the other, and each a little higher than the one before.

As a result, the white race had now ascended to a controlling position on the globe, and the Indian race, though good, had to change its habits and live in the manner of the white race in order to flourish. The buffalo, he said, were like the red race and were now being supplanted by the fields and cattle of the white race. Such was the way of nature, and such was the fate of the Indians if they did not change their way of life and become cultivators of herds of cows and sheep.

After Sweet's speech, Husis Kute spoke, saying he was thankful for the words of the white chief and that sharing dinner, like shaking hands, was an act of friendship. He hoped, he said, that the white people and Nez Perce people could be friends and that their children could grow up together. Joseph, when called upon to speak, was slow to express himself and seemed to be having difficulty controlling his emotions. He did not speak long, saying only that he tried always to entertain good sentiments in his heart and that he entertained them at this moment. All people, he said, should have good sentiments and express them. If all did so, there would be no trouble all the world over, for those who live with good sentiments never have trouble. For his part, he wished only to speak well of others.

The audience was grateful but a bit disappointed. People had expected something more extensive, something with more woodland eloquence. They attributed his halting words to his discomfort at speaking in the confines of a room rather than outdoors under the shade of great oaks, as at a grand Indian council. And when, at the end, he came near to tears and fell silent, they attributed this not to sadness or loneliness but to the overwhelming emotion he felt for the kind treatment he had received at the hands of his white brothers and sisters.

Almost unnoticed during this whole period was the quiet ascendance of Ad Chapman, who on this afternoon was standing at the side of Husis Kute and Joseph, serving as their interpreter. He had assumed this role after the surrender and had become increasingly essential as the Nez Perce and the whites were forced to try to communicate with each other.

Tom Hill, the man Joseph had trusted to communicate his thoughts to Miles and Howard during the negotiations at the Bear's Paw, had been sent out by the soldiers after the capture to search for the fleeing Nez Perce and had taken the opportunity to escape. This had left Chapman, the lying, cowardly, bullying rancher, as the sole person who could speak both languages well enough to serve as an intermediary between cultures. With their limited English, and no other white person around who spoke their language, the Nez Perce had no choice but to rely on him and trust that he reflected accurately both what they were saying and what was being said to them.

And in fact, to a great extent this was what Chapman was doing. Though a scoundrel and braggart, he was not a fool. He recognized opportunity when he saw it, and the chance for a government paycheck certainly qualified as an opportunity. From the moment of the surrender, he had stuck close to Miles and Joseph, making himself indispensable as a bridge between languages. Now, with Miles gone, he had attached himself completely to the chief. He willingly embellished his prior relationship with the Nez Perce in Idaho, conveniently ignoring its acrimony, and soon was so closely identified with Joseph that the correspondents were describing him as the chief's “bosom companion” and “old neighbor and life-long friend.”

For Joseph it was a precarious situation. Chapman had become his tongue and his ears. A man who was willing to eradicate a brand on a Nez Perce horse to claim it for his own, as Chapman had been known to do back in Idaho, was not above eradicating the meaning of a Nez Perce word to turn a situation to his own advantage. But Joseph knew that, properly controlled, Chapman could be a great asset in pleading the people's case for return to their beloved homeland.

At the banquet, the arrangement seemed to work well. But later that evening, Chapman was put in a position to use his interpreter's skills in a less than comfortable mission. He was called upon to communicate the contents of the dispatch that Miles had received about the transfer of the people to Fort Leavenworth. He accompanied the soldiers with the orders down to Joseph's tent and spoke the words that Miles himself had not had the heart to say.

Upon hearing about the new move, Joseph put his head down and murmured, “When will these white chiefs begin to tell the truth?” Chapman did not have to interpret his words to the soldiers in order for them to understand what was in the tired chief's heart.

For the remainder of the night and into the early morning, Nez Perce men and women met in council to discuss their situation. They did not want to leave Bismarck. They had been treated well in this white people's town, and it was here that the soldier chief Miles had promised they could stay. Now they were being told to leave again.

How did they know this was not one more lie? How could they know what this new place would be like? How could they know they were not to be killed? They did not wish to travel in that great snorting metal beast that moved on rails, and they did not wish to move farther to the east. They wanted to stay here until spring, then return to their homeland.

Joseph listened, but he knew that in the end the people would have no choice but to comply. Their only hope was the promise, given by the soldiers and conveyed by Chapman, that they would see Miles again in the white man's city of St. Paul. Maybe there he could provide them with some understanding. Maybe there he could bring them news of their families who had escaped with White Bird. Winter was getting strong, and their fear and sadness were growing.

The following morning the people were moved up near the railroad yards from their camp by the river. The women had spent the night and early morning cooking the four days' ration of beef the army had given them and packing it together with the two days' supply of hardtack they had been allotted. As much as possible, they were ready for the journey.

They stood watching anxiously as the great belching black engine surged and backed its way into position. The army had assembled a special transport train out of eleven dilapidated coaches and several freight cars. It wheezed and surged and snorted acrid, choking smoke as the frightened people loaded their supplies and packs of clothing and household goods into the cars. Then, amid a crowd of townsfolk who had gathered to see them off, the Nez Perce climbed on board the strange, frightening metal beast, assisting their children and wounded and physically carrying a number of soldiers who had been assigned to accompany them but were too hung over to stand or walk.

Joseph sat on one of the wooden seats, staring out the open window at the assembled townsfolk who had come to see them off. Before leaving, he had been forced to sell the beloved horse that had carried him on this long and difficult journey. He had wanted to take the horse with him, but the government had informed him that it would not be responsible for feeding and transporting the horse to the new destination many miles away. Reluctantly, he had sold it for $35, receiving white man's money in exchange for an animal who had been his Nez Perce legs and part of his Nez Perce spirit. He was now little different than the Indians sitting around the buildings at Fort Berthold—a man without freedom, without hope, and dependent for survival on white man's money and white man's goods.

As the train pulled away, he nodded and waved to these citizens of Bismarck who had treated his people so well and with whom he had hoped, at last, to be able to stay. The people in the crowd waved back, sorry to see the departure of this good Indian and his good people—people who had brought money, excitement, and a national spotlight to their little frontier town.

Orlando Goff, the photographer who had been fortunate enough to have Joseph sit for a photograph upon his arrival, was already selling cards with pictures of the great chief. The man who had purchased Joseph's horse was besieged with at least twelve purchase offers, some almost doubling his money. But he was holding out for higher profits. There were, he believed, “millions” to be made from Joseph's ponies if they were allowed to multiply.