Whitman massacre
| Whitman Mission National Historic Site | |||
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| Location: | Washington , United States | ||
| Next city: | Walla Walla | ||
| Surface: | 0.6 km² | ||
| Founding: | June 29, 1936 | ||
| Visitors: | 52,849 (2006) | ||
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The Whitman massacre , also known as the Walla Walla massacre , was an incident in the Oregon region near present-day Walla Walla , in which the doctor and missionary Marcus Whitman , his wife Narcissa and eleven other white settlers took place on November 29, 1847 were murdered by Indians of the Cayuse and Umatilla tribes .
The incident sparked the Cayuse War and is one of the most notorious episodes in the opening up of the western part of today's United States by whites. The assassination marked the tragic end of a multi-year relationship between the Whitmans, who led the first trek along the Oregon Trail , and the indigenous peoples of the region. The assassination is now seen as the result of a cultural misunderstanding between the settlers and the Indians. Part of the reason, however, was that Whitman could not prevent a measles epidemic from claiming a high number of Indian deaths.
The incident remains controversial to this day. Some historians see the Whitman couple as heroes of the early pioneering days. Others see them as white settlers who wanted to impose their culture and religion on the Indians living there. The Whitman Mission National Historic Site has been commemorating the massacre since 1936 .
causes
In 1836, Marcus Whitman, the Reverend Henry H. Spalding and their wives crossed the Rocky Mountains . Eliza Hart Spalding and Narcissa Whitman were the first white women to invade the Oregon Country . With the help of Dr. John McLoughlin , though against his advice, they settled in Waiilatpu, near Fort Walla Walla .
The Indian tribes of the Cayuse and Umatilla who were involved in the massacre in 1847 lived near the Waiilatpu mission founded by the Whitmans in 1836. In the following years, other whites also settled at the mission site. Joe Lewis, who arrived in 1847, was one of these settlers. Annoyed by the treatment he had received in the east of the American continent, he tried to incite the Cayuse against the mission. Among other things, he told them that Dr. Whitman, who at the time was trying to treat the Cayuse for a measles epidemic that killed many of them, in truth was deliberately spreading the disease among them. It was actually part of the Cayuse cultural traditions to kill their medicine men or shamans when their patients died. It is entirely possible that both the cayuse and umatilla in Dr. Whitman saw the person responsible for the numerous deaths. The Canadian painter Paul Kane was a guest at the mission shortly before the massacre and recorded the noticeable tensions between the Indians and the whites in his diaries.
Other factors that contributed to the massacre from today's perspective were a cholera outbreak , a conflict between the Protestant missionaries and Catholic priests, the aversion and arrogance of Narcissa Whitman towards the Indians and their lifestyle, the resistance of the Indians, under the influence of missionaries changing their lifestyle; and the death of a tribal member. Some anti-Catholic clergymen, including Henry Spalding, later also alleged that the Catholic priests persuaded the Indians to call Dr. Whitman was the originator of the measles epidemic and persuaded them to attack the mission. The motive given was that they wanted to take on the mission Whitman had not wanted to sell them. Priests named in different versions of this theory include Pierre-Jean De Smet , John Baptist Brouillet, and Joseph Cataldo .
Another cause of the massacre is seen in the treatment of Cayuse tribesmen who were recruited by John Sutter for the military service in Sacramento , California . They had been promised a regular army payment for their service. However, they only received promissory notes that could only be redeemed after recognition by the US government. However, this recognition came only 12 years after the Whitman massacre. The angry Cayuse are said to have stolen cattle on their way back to Oregon Country, among other things, in order to keep themselves harmless.
The massacre
On November 29, 1847, the Indians attacked Waiilatpu. The leaders of the raid, incited by Joe Lewis, were Tiloukaikt , Tomahas, Kiamsumpkin, Iaiachalakis, and Klokomas. Chief Beardy tried, however, to prevent his tribesmen from the attack.
Dr. Whitman was cruelly mistreated. Although he was fatally injured, he lived for several hours after the attack, even if he must have been unconscious for most of the time. In addition to Whitman and his wife, Andrew Rogers, Jacob Hoffman, LW Sanders, Mr. Marsh, Frank Sager, John Sager (the two male Sager orphans ), Nathan Kimball, Isaac Gilliland, James Young, Crockett Blewley and Amos Sales were murdered. The carpenter Peter Hall was able to escape at first and sounded the alarm in the fort. He wanted to go to Fort Vancouver to get more reinforcements, but never got there. It is unclear whether he was killed in an accident, for example when crossing the Columbia River , or was also murdered by Indians. His name is occasionally mentioned as the 14th victim of the massacre.
54 women and children were captured and held hostage, including Jim Bridger's daughter and the female Sager orphan children. One of the Hudson's Bay Company fur traders , Peter Skene Ogden , arranged for her to be released by offering 62 blankets, 63 cotton shirts, 24 rifles, 600 cartridges and seven pounds of tobacco in exchange for her.
Aftermath
The attack on the mission was the beginning of longstanding armed skirmishes between the Indians and the settlers. Even years after the incident, the settlers still urged their representatives to take punitive measures against the Indians. The newly elected governor , General Joseph Lane , therefore actually negotiated with the Cayuse about the transfer of the Indians who were involved in the massacre. The Cayuse chief pointed out, however, that the tribe lost considerably more members in the ensuing war than whites were killed in the attack on the mission.
This statement was not accepted by General Lane. After lengthy negotiations, sub-chiefs Tiloukaikt and Tomahas, as well as three other Cayuse Indians, agreed to stand trial in Oregon City . In the protracted court case under Marshall Joseph Meek , the Indians were all found guilty. The court ruling was controversial as various observers at the trial indicated that some prosecution witnesses were absent from the Whitman massacre. On June 3, 1850, Tiloukaikt, Tomahas, Kiamasumpkin, Iaiachalakis and Klokomas were hanged in public.
One of the consequences of the Oregon massacre is that the US Congress dealt with the living conditions in the Oregon Country. The Oregon Treaty and the establishment of Oregon as a federal state on August 14, 1848 can therefore also be seen as a result of the massacre.
literature
- William Henry Gray: A history of Oregon, 1792-1849, drawn from personal observation and authentic information Harris & Holman, 1870
- Albert Hurtado. Indian Survival on the California Frontier (Yale Western Americana Series) Vail-Ballou Press. 1988, p. 71, ISBN 0-300-04798-3
- Helen Hunt Jackson : A Century of Dishonor , University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 1994 (first published in 1885), ISBN 0-8061-2726-0
Web links
National Park Service: Whitman Mission National Historic Site (official site; English)