Special to the Herald Times
The White River Museum has a collection of letters that Meeker founding father Thomas Baker kept for many years. There are letters from Nathan Meeker and prominent figures like Chief Ouray, ex-Indian Agents, and the violently anti-Indian Colorado Governor Pitkin, as well as various Army officers from 1874-1879. The letters tell a compelling story from a dramatic period of local history to be shared here.
Due to space constraints, the first part of this letter from 1878 was published last week – read it here. Here’s the rest.
But that important work of furnishing a water supply was undertaken by having the irrigating ditch surveyed, for which Congress made an appropriation, and then everything stopped because the Indians were opposed to moving the agency, and some of them threatened, while they generally declared they would not live there and not one of them would have anything to do with farming, because Indians were never made to work, but white men were. All they wanted was their regular supply of rations and annuity goods. In consequence, at least two months’ most valuable time was lost.
Meanwhile, I could only study the situation, and try to come to a decided resolution. A great embarrassment arose from the necessity for getting the Indians to consent to the expenditure of the $3,000 appropriated for building the irrigating ditch, and I wrote fully to the Commissioner that their objection was to the removal at all, not to the ditch, for even they knew, ignorant as they were, that if the removal was to be made, it was for the purpose of having farming land, and in this case, the water supply of the ditch would follow as a matter of course, and as much so as a well for getting drinking water.
Further, those Indians are divided into two parties, Douglas, the chief of all, and Jack, an aspirant to his place, so that if one side consents to any measure the other side is sure to oppose; therefore, to get the consent of the whole to any measure, particularly a government one, was entirely out of the question, and to propose a government measure is to press the government between them, so that to ask that they shall agree upon a policy or measure is just as absurd as to ask that the Democrats and Republicans shall in like manner agree, for government is run, when it runs at all, by the party in power, and cannot be blocked by the party out of power. Apparently, in response to such a statement of the case the Commissioner sent me $1,000 for the construction of the irrigation ditch.
By this I was encouraged, for I supposed, of course, the Commissioner waived the obtaining of the Indians’ consent since the agency was to be moved whether or not, and water must be had, and accordingly I told Douglas and other leaders that the Commissioner would get a “heap mad, by and by,” and they had better not object to moving to Powell Valley. Then they surrendered and agreed we might move. Upon this, I made agreement with Mr. Lithgow, on Bear River, to execute the first 2,000 feet on the line of the ditch, through a cottonwood forest, and requiring the most resolute work to grub out the big trees and clean out a perfect jungle of willow thicket, and he came on with teams and went ahead.
About this time Curtis came to the agency, having been employed by the Ute commissioners at Los Pinos, and seeing the state of affairs, he proposed to employ a band of Indians to dig the remainder of the ditch. Of course I agreed to this at once, for it would follow that if the $3,000 was obtained, and as much so as when a man marries a woman, they consent. But we had no small job before us, for, when Douglas and his band proposed to work, Jack and his party opposed, and Douglas drew off; and so two or three weeks were spent. Jack’s position was this, that Indians ought not to work, that it was the white man’s business, and that they should dig the ditch. In this dilemma I sent for Jack’s right-hand man, Somesick, and told him that this opposition to the rest of the Indians working must stop or I would write to the Commissioner and tell him about him. Upon this Somesick said they might go to work, and Jack coming around, he agreed also. Thereupon Douglas and his band went to work under Curtis, who is an old hand at digging ditches, the contract being this, that Curtis was to have 25 cents a yard and the Indians $15 a month, and double rations. Curtis made a machine by which there was a vast saving of labor, when the out is only a foot or so, and he ate, and slept, and lived with the Indians, and worked early and late. Twenty-five Indians were at work full a month when freezing weather came and stopped all operations for this year, and they worked in a most faithful manner. They completed over 5,000 feet, most of the way about a foot deep, and the remainder from three to live feet deep, and I venture to say that the same number of average white men would not have done better. The Indians’ work came to $303, which was paid them in cash, and Curtis to about $200, from which should be deducted $20 or $30 which he paid for dried fruit and other things in his own money. I think the Indians were fully paid and Curtis did not have too much; indeed, I feel as if I could have been willing to pay him $100 out of my own little salary to secure such a great success. The ditch, so far finished, will water at least 1,000 acres, all we shall want in two years. The result of all this is that as many Indians want to go to farming next year, and to have farm implements and houses as I can possibly provide for; in fact, while working on the ditch all the tools that could be got together were in use, and more would have worked if I had tools. I am absolutely embarrassed by their needs, for they want wagons and plows, and harnesses, and corrals, and seed of all kinds, so that it seems to me there is no kind of question but what they will work, and be glad to, for they believe they will have something and be better off. It is true these workers belong to a party, and fortunately to the “administration”, and they take pride in being conquerors, and particularly so because they are on the side of the government, but I have no doubt but the other side will, in a year or so, come over, and then some other subject will be found to quarrel about.
Fortunately, the work begun and laid out in the new location is in the right direction, and when things come together agreeably, to the original plan, they will fit without confusion or loss, though minor things must be expected always, so that we seem to have no obstacles except such as present themselves to daily work and duties, and are inherent in the nature of things. If the department will sustain me, as they seem willing to do, I think I shall get along well.
Naturally I cannot but imagine what would be the result if I should retire and Army rule should come in. I think of a West Point officer taking charge of these Indians. He has a good knowledge of mathematics and general accounts; he has read some history and many novels; he is a judge of good wine, or thinks he is, and he is honorable, honest, and what is called a perfect gentleman. But he has a few deficiencies; he knows nothing of farming, and, like all the rest of the Army, he has a profound conviction that this great interior is wholly unfitted for growing crops, for wherever he has been located in Montana, Idaho, Arizona, Colorado, or New Mexico, none of the officers or men have ever raised their vegetables. He says it cannot be done; he has no knowledge of the primary wants of families, as they progress. from one state to another — no idea of what is needed in the household to lessen women’s labor, to command the obedience of children. He has not the remotest notion of the township or neighborhood organization by which schools, roads and fences are established or regulated; and finally, he knows little or nothing of what constitutes a day’s work at rural industry — how much a man should do, or how he should do it; nothing as to how much a seed is sown to an acre of any kind of grain, nor when it is to be sown or reaped; nothing of hot-beds nor of small-fruit culture, and simply because such things are not in his line; nor does he pretend that they are. Possibly there may be some subordinate or private who understands such matters, or thinks or says he does; but if such is the case, he will not be likely to have enlisted, because, with such qualities as would enable him to direct the Indians, un-far more profitable to work on his own account.
I think it is true that at every military post is a sutler’s store, and that there, liquor is sold. I think it is true that more than half of all soldiers drink when they can, and true because they have enlisted from a class that drink; so that the proposition to turn the Indians over to the Army amounts to this: That men who do not practice industry, or who have avoided it, are expected to make others love it; that intemperate, unchaste, and dissolute men are to inculcate temperance, chastity, and morality to those who are like themselves; that they are to learn others to make homes and to establish the domestic hearth, when they have none of their own, and to educate families in economy cleanliness, household arts and household industries, while they have no families and no households; nor could they have had in the uncertainty as to their abiding places. In short, it seems required that the soldiers shall exercise all the qualities of experts in whatever relates to the civilized and social state, except in the solitary branch which they understand; as if, when one wants his wagon repaired, he will go to a shoe-maker, or his piano tuned, he will go to a lawyer. There is not a single factory nor business establishment in the land which can run for a single week unless with operatives who understand their work; and no business man who understands his own interest, but will instantly discharge an employee who gets drunk, because he knows that such a man is a damage to him every hour.
Another thing I think of when I consider this subject, which is, the Indians fear soldiers and are prejudiced against them more than one can be told, and I judge, so far as I can learn that they are afraid their women will be led astray. Even if the soldiers were every way competent to civilize the Indians I think this prejudice will stand in the way for years, and if the plan so proposed shall be carried out I certainly expect outbreaks on the part of the Indians — even among these peaceful Utes — while I am certain there could be no progress in farming nor education.
Now, note, I am only speaking from my knowledge and experience, and labor and success with the White River Indians, and I say it would be a cruel and unwise thing to bring soldiers here and break up what seems so happily begun. Of the wild Indians of the Upper Missouri I have nothing to say, except that whenever a tribe of Indians anywhere cannot by some means or another be brought into subjection I think the taste of military rule for a few years would do them good, and I think all the Indian tribes had better be making up their minds pretty quick whether they are going to work or whether they propose to continue to be paupers. When I get round to it in a year or so, if I stay as long, I shall propose to cut every Indian down to bare starvation point if he will not work. The “getting around to it” means to have plenty of tilled ground, plenty of work to do, and to have labor organized, so that whoever will shall be able to earn his bread.
N. C. MEEKER.
HON. H. M. TELLER, U.S.S.,
Washington, D.C.
P.S.–To answer more specifically as to what I want for the Utes, I have to say that the Commissioner granted $3,000 last summer for quite a number of objects, and I am enabled to buy what I want, or if I ask for things not provided for I most always get them. I am about to order some two dozen one-horse plows and harnesses, since a great many Indians want to go to work. But there are a good many things they want or will just as soon as they get in houses, such as chairs, crockery, looking-glasses, and, in particular, stoves, of which we shall want a dozen next season, but I don’t know as they can be had. Quite a number want wagons also. I have proposed to the Commissioner that I be authorized to take horses for wagons and stoves, and talked with the Indians about swapping for such things, but they don’t like the idea very well. It seems to me it would be a good plan to fit up two or three Indian families, the most deserving, with such things in order that the rest may see how such things go. I have been ordered to establish a police force among the Indians but I don’t see how I can when so few stay in one place, being here to-day and gone to-morrow, and I see no hope till I can get families into houses, and stay in them. I have a pretty poor opinion of log-houses because they never can be made to look anyhow and they are as cold as barns, freezing through and through, so there is not much to choose between them and the wick-i-ups. Besides, they are costly to build, the logs being crooked and heavy. I can build adobe houses full as cheap, and putting on a rough outside coat of lime mortar, by driving in, six-penny nails to clinch and make perfectly neat house, and which they will be warm in winter and cool in summer, for I know how to do it. The Indians will make such brick, but they cannot chop nor do heavy work; it is out of the question. The most hopeful thing is that there are several families complaining bitterly of cold, and they want houses. I shall build one log-house right away for one who has three cows and two wives.
N.C.M.
