Building Strain in the Cache Valley Region
1
Mormon authorities in territorial Utah wafted between Brigham Young’s policy of feeding the Native Americans rather than fighting them, and the more common frontier belief that “Native inhabitants occasionally needed to be chastised.” The differing attitudes were on display during the Bear River Massacre. The settlers grew tired of feeding the Native Americans in the area and became frustrated with the tribes. Although Cache Valley settlers did not commit the massacre, settlers certainly felt a sense of relief when Colonel Connor and his soldiers reported the violence.
2
3
The Shoshone felt the hardships of Mormon settlers moving into the Cache Valley area almost immediately after Mormons arrived in the Great Basin region. Even before Cache Valley was settled in 1856, Shoshone tribe members complained to Garland Hurt, an Indian agent for the area, “that they had permitted the white people to make roads through all their lands and travel upon them in safety, use the grass and drink the water, and had never received anything for it, although the tribes around them had been getting presents.” These grievances were further highlighted when Mormon ranchers drove about 1400 head of Church cattle into Cache Valley, which had been prized hunting and camping areas for the Northwestern Shoshone.
Figure 1
4
In December of 1855, the territorial legislature of Utah granted Cache Valley to “Brigham Young, Trustee in Trust for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and those whom he may associate with him; together with all the products and benefits arising therefrom, for a herd ground and other purposes.” There was no mention of compensation for the Shoshone band. Federal officials may not have been aware of the legislature’s practice of deeding land to the Church while Young was Governor, and if they were, they did not interfere with the practice, since the Legislature was firmly under control of the Church.
5
Conditions of Native Americans living along the overland mail route were deteriorating, leading some bands to steal supplies from the mail company if provisions were not given freely. Correspondence sent between the mail company and the Office of Indian Affairs included a telegram stating that “Indians by Hundreds at several stations, clamorous for food and threatening. They will steal or starve, will they starve?” Problems of starvation and lack of supplies given to the tribes were exacerbated by the high turnover of Indian agents and superintendents in Utah territory.
6
7
8
9
One superintendent had only been in Utah long enough to write about the state of the reservations in the territory, and recommend one be set up for the Shoshone. One of the Indian agents in the area was so desperate for money to help Native Americans that he “sold all the cattle, farming utensils, grain and furniture of the homes and office, to supply starving Indians with food,” leaving virtually no public property for the Indian Department in Utah. In 1862, the condition had not gotten better, with Superintendent Doty of Indian Affairs reporting the Shoshone were in “a starving and destitute condition. No provision having been made for them, either as to clothing or provisions.” Doty bought some provisions and seconded that the band be placed on a reservation where they could learn to be herdsmen. The Deseret News, one of the major newspapers in the Territory, supported Doty’s actions and words, believing that the Cache Valley settlers would not be relieved of the “grievous tax” of feeding the Indians until they were settled on farms.
Figure 2
10
In 1862, Colonel Patrick Connor and a contingent of soldiers came to Utah to establish Camp Douglas and protect the Overland Mail route from the aforementioned attacks. Colonel Connor and his troops were less than thrilled about being assigned to Utah, away from the action of the ongoing Civil War. The Enterprise, a local newspaper, was quoted as saying, “Col. Connor’s boys have been spoiling for action… [it] would be a wise plan to let them vent a little of their pent up fighting spirit” on the Indians and “the matter should be attended to promptly” because the winter snows would limit the mobility of the Shoshone warriors.
12
11
13
Throughout late 1862, tensions between the Native Americans, primarily Bannock and Shoshone, and Cache Valley settlers steadily rose. Food, cattle, and other supplies were stolen from the settlers, causing skirmishes to break out between the two groups. Connor’s soldiers were also pulled into the violence, and killed several Native Americans in the region to send a message to the Shoshone. A general order had also been issued by the Department of the Pacific in April 1862, outlining actions to take against hostile Native Americans: “Every Indian captured in this district during the present war who has been engaged in hostilities against whites, present or absent, will be hanged on the spot, women and children in all cases being spared.” Although Connor’s actions seemed to be more personal than professional, this order surely played into the Massacre at Bear River.
14
15
In January of 1863, Connor’s troops were ready to move at any time. The troops moved out on January 21, with plenty of supplies and ammunition. Connor and his troops were hardly met with resistance from locals, with the Deseret News on January 28, 1863 commenting that “with ordinary luck the volunteers will ‘wipe them out.’” The locals had also experienced more violent skirmishes than usual, as many members of different bands had gathered in the area for a celebration to welcome the return of the spring season.
1. Brigham D. Madsen, The Shoshoni Frontier and the Bear River Massacre (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1985), 17.
2. U.S. Dept. of the Interior, Annual Report, 1855, Hurt to Young, Sept. 30, 1855, pp. 199-200; Deseret News, Sept. 12, 1855.
3. Madsen, The Shoshoni Frontier and the Bear River Massacre, 67.
4. Territory of Utah, Acts and Resolutions Passed by the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Utah, During the Sixth Annual Session, 1856-57, p. 4.
5. National Archives, Washington, D.C., “Letters, Utah,” Roll 900, Center to Latham, Dec, 19, 1861.
6. Ibid., Davies to CIA, Jan. 20, 1861.
7. Ibid., Doty to CIA, Oct. 21, 1861.
8. Ibid., Doty to CIA, Apr. 15, 1862.
9. Young, Manuscript History, May 19, 1862, pp. 551-52.
10. Deseret News, Oct. 1, 1862; see also Sacramento Union, Sept. 22, 1862.
11. See Madsen, The Shoshoni Frontier and the Bear River Massacre, 171-72 for a full description of the violence.
12. Deseret News, Dec. 17, 1862.
13. War of the Rebellion, pt. 1, p. 992.
14. Deseret News, Feb. 4, 1863.
15. See writings by Darren Parry, under Additional Information, for more details.
​
Figure 1. Map of the Homelands of Northern Shoshone, 1863, Digitized by J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6p01433.
Figure 2. Western Trails, Madsen, The Shoshoni Frontier and the Bear River Massacre, 27.