Idaho's Trail of Tears

The treaty period with the Shoshone and Bannock in southern Idaho began in 1863 after Col. Patrick Connor and the California Volunteers rode up from Salt Lake to “severely chastise” the Indians. Only after the infamous march and massacre at Bear River did Connor make an effort to broker treaties with the Indians. It never crossed his mind that they might have wanted to talk prior to his attack nor that they might have legitimate complaints about the trespassing emigrants, miners and settlers. In his mind, the Indians needed to be taught a lesson. So he unilaterally decided one quick and brutal strike would solve everything.

The starving Shoshone and Bannock had little bargaining power and were essentially left to sign terms of surrender even though no war had been declared, they were legally wards of the United States, and they had been the ones wronged. Facing Connor across the bargaining table the message was clear — sign a treaty, any treaty, or else. The most sweeping of the treaties was signed at Soda Springs in 1863, but never ratified by Congress.

One of the bands rarely discussed during this period lived in the Lemhi Valley and along the upper Salmon River. Calling themselves the Agaidika (Salmoneaters), they were a smaller band with few resources, but were known to be friendly and generous. In fact, it was the Agaidika who kindly helped Lewis and Clark in 1805 when they came wandering through with the most famous Agaidika, Sacajawea.

The Agaidika’s first major contact with white settlers occurred May 18, 1855, with the arrival of Mormon missionaries who brokered a deal to establish a fort in the valley southeast of modern day Salmon. They named their fort after King Limhi from the Book of Mormon, but the name became Lemhi over the years and the region was accordingly called the Lemhi Valley. Eventually everything fell apart when the Mormons aided the Nez Percé (the traditional enemies of the Bannocks), differences came up over the use of resources and the Mormon War flared in Utah. The Bannocks and a few Shoshone attacked Fort Lemhi and drove off the Mormons.

When the 1863 treaty was negotiated at Soda Springs, the Agaidika were included in the discussions, but because the treaty was never ratified they were largely forgotten. However, in 1867 Chief Tahgee of the Bannocks successfully negotiated an agreement with the government, and the Lemhi Shoshone complained to Gov. David W. Ballard that they, too, deserved some compensation for their lost land. They reminded him that they had always been friendly, but they were in dire straits. Their lands were being invaded by more and more miners, farmers and ranchers. The encroachment was particularly severe on the east side of the mountains in the gold fields of Montana, just 20 miles away.

A subsequent treaty was negotiated in September of 1868 at Virginia City, but it was never ratified by Congress either. Once again, the Lemhi Shoshone were left in limbo. In 1869, Chief Tendoy and his people, now becoming desperate, set up camp in Helena and received permission to hunt game on Crow lands. The Superintendent of Indian Affairs wrote a letter to Washington saying, “Set aside justice. Christian charity alone demands that something be done to relive these suffering creatures.” The plea fell on deaf ears and the Agaidika received neither justice nor Christian charity.

In 1871 and 1872, the Lemhi Shoshone saw more of their traditional hunting ground taken for establishment of Yellowstone National Park. Grasshoppers also wiped out their crops in the Lemhi Valley, and salmon runs were decimated by downstream traps. Balanced on a knife’s edge between starvation and survival, Tendoy again met with a government commission in 1873 seeking justice. Once again, he stood his ground and clearly stated where he and his people wanted to live. Nothing but the Lemhi Valley would do. The commission thought that was unreasonable and believed the Agaidika should move to Fort Hall with the Bannocks and other Shoshone bands. The talks ended in a stalemate. A later report stated, “These Indians were in the minority, their neighbors strong, and generally hostile, sometimes taking all their stock, and subjecting them to great hardship. … [They were] in a most deplorable state, living without lodges or tents, and their persons nearly naked. There were few exceptions.”

In 1874, the government finally began to provide some assistance to the Lemhi Shoshone. The Lemhi Agency was supposed to be sent $20,000 to help the Indians survive, but Indian Agent Harrison Fuller reported in 1875, “a great many died last winter from inclement weather, and not having received any annuities they were greatly exposed. They caught the whooping-cough, and it proved fatal in many cases.” Not only were the appropriations not properly made by Congress, but Fuller was also ordered to convince Tendoy to move to Fort Hall. The chief of the Lemhis again refused.

On Feb. 2, 1875, a reservation was defined in the Lemhi Valley by President Ulysses S. Grant via executive order, but it was only 8 by 12 miles, barely a postage stamp piece of land upon which the mixed bands of 1,050 Agaidikas, Tukudikas (Sheepeaters) and Bannocks were expected to farm, keep livestock, live and raise their families. Sixty acres per person sounded reasonable to eastern politicians, but very little of it was arable.

Worse, the appropriation for aid in 1875 was cut to $15,000 despite the request of Agent Fuller to increase it to $30,000. It was all bureaucratic sleight of hand. The previously unratified treaties were used as justification for cessation of Agaidika claims to any land other than the reservation at Fort Lemhi. Moreover, many white settlers in the Salmon River region did not like having to share any prime land with the Indians. The agency was left with barely $14 per person to help support the Indians for the entire year even though the Indians were now supposed to stay on the reservation and not freely come and go to hunt and fish. Nobody was happy.

In hopes of resolving the issue, the government brought a delegation of Lemhi Shoshone, Fort Hall Shoshone and Bannocks to Washington, D.C., in 1880. This was a common tactic to impress upon Native Americans the power of the United States and coerce them into signing agreements. As for the Lemhi Indians, the government still wanted them to move to Fort Hall, the one place they did not want to be. Tendoy and three other Lemhi leaders eventually signed an agreement to relocate; however, the agreement had two provisions that needed to be fulfilled. First, a majority of the male population of the Lemhi people had to agree to the treaty. Second, it was to be ratified by Congress. For eight years, nothing more happened. Neither the Lemhi Shoshone nor Congress ratified the agreement.

On Feb. 23, 1888, Congress finally acted and passed “an act to accept and ratify the agreement submitted by the Shoshones and Bannocks, and Sheepeaters of the Fort Hall and Lemhi Reservation in Idaho.” However, Tendoy and his people refused to agree to the terms of the deal. Once again, the situation was deadlocked.

In 1905, Sen. Fred Dubois intervened and pushed for a new attempt to get the Agaidika moved to Fort Hall. In his judgment, the Lemhi Indians would be better off on the Fort Hall Reservation, the land in the Lemhi Valley could be used better by white people, and the government could lower expenses by pooling costs at Fort Hall. This time, with Chief Tendoy old and as his people with no other choice in the face of government refusal to properly send promised funds, negotiations were successful. Out of 137 males over the age of 18, there were 86 who agreed to be moved, provided they received compensation for any improvements on the Lemhi reserve. Congress agreed and in 1907 the Agaidika packed their belongings to leave behind the Lemhi Reservation in the mountains and head south to Fort Hall in the desert.

Nora Yearin Whitwell, one of the Lemhi Valley pioneers, recalled the scene, “They never left willingly. … They packed their meager belongings on horses, strapped the ends of their wick-i-up poles to the sides of their horses and they dragged them along. They were very sad and passed thru the valley, crying. The ranchers along the way could hear their crying for some distance before they passed their homes. The ranchers were near tears and some did cry. They were so sorry for them, having to go against their will. I’m still sorry for we had great respect for Chief Tendoy and his tribe.” It was the Agaidikas’ trail of tears, but Tendoy did not leave. He died May 9, 1907. Nearly 400 white people attended his funeral.

Arriving at Fort Hall in the spring of 1907, the Lemhi Indians were forced to accept the remaining poorer segments of land that were not allotted to the Indians already there. Funds that were supposed to go to the Lemhi people were diverted and used for general administration costs or divided among the entire population of the Fort Hall Reservation. Insult was added to injury. For 44 years, the Shoshone of the Lemhi Valley tried to get a fair deal. Facing starvation on land that could not support them and a government bent on pushing them out of their beloved mountains, they were left with no choice but to try to survive on reservation they never wanted. When the Fort Hall Reservation was reduced, many of the Indians who lost their land were those from the Lemhi Valley.

For the Agaidika, the removal to Fort Hall was never fully accepted. They traveled back to the Lemhi Valley each year to tend the graves of their relatives, to hunt, to fish and to visit the few Agaidika who remained behind in their homeland, not far from where they once welcomed Lewis and Clark with open arms.