Nez Percé
('pierced noses') A term applied by the
French to a number of tribes which practiced
or were supposed to practice the custom of
piercing the nose for the insertion of a
piece of dentalium. The term is now used
exclusively to designate the main tribe of
the Shahaptian family, who have not,
however, so far as is known ever been given
to the practice.
The Nez Percé or Sahaptin of later writers,
the Chopuunish (corrupted from Tsútpeli) of
Lewis and Clank, their discoverers, were
found in 1805 occupying a large area in what
is now western Idaho, north east Oregon, and
south east Washington, on lower Snake river
and its tributaries. They roamed between the
Blue Mountains in Oregon and the Bitter Root
Mountains in Idaho, and according to Lewis
and Clark sometimes crossed the range to the
headwaters of the Missouri.
By certain writers they have been classed
under two geographic divisions Upper Nez
Percé and Lower Nez Percé. The latter were
found by Bonneville in 1834 to the north and
west of the Blue Mountains on several of the
branches of Snake river, where they were
neighbors of the Cayuse and Walla Walla. The
Upper Nez Percé held the Salmon river
country in Idaho in 1834 and probably also
at the same time the Grande Ronde valley in
eastern Oregon but by treaty of 1855 they
ceded a large part of this territory to the
United States.
The 1877 flight
of the Nez Perce from their homelands while
pursued by U.S. Army Generals Howard,
Sturgis, and Miles, is one of the most
fascinating and sorrowful events in Western
U.S. history. Chief Joseph, Chief Looking
Glass, Chief White Bird, Chief Ollokot,
Chief Lean Elk, and others led nearly 750
Nez Perce men, women, and children and twice
that many horses over 1,170 miles through
the mountains, on a trip that lasted from
June to October of 1877.
Forced to abandon hopes for a peaceful move
to the Lapwai reservation, the Nez Perce
chiefs saw flight to Canada as their last
promise for peace. The flight of the Nez
Perce began on June 15, 1877. Pursued by the
Army, they intended initially to seek safety
with their Crow allies on the plains to the
east. Their desperate and circuitous route
as they tried to escape the pursuing white
forces is what we now call the Nez Perce
National Historic Trail.
This route was used in its entirety only
once; however, component trails and roads
that made up the route bore generations of
use prior to and after the 1877 flight of
the nontreaty Nez Perce.
The trail starts at Wallowa Lake, Oregon,
then heads northeast and crosses the Snake
River at Dug Bar. It enters Idaho at
Lewiston and cuts across north-central
Idaho, entering Montana near Lolo Pass. It
then travels through the Bitterroot Valley,
after which it re-enters Idaho at Bannock
Pass and travels east back into Montana at
Targhee Pass to cross the Continental
Divide. It bisects Yellowstone National
Park, then follows the Clark Fork of the
Yellowstone out of Wyoming into Montana. The
trail heads north to the Bear's Paw
Mountains, ending 40 miles from the Canadian
border.*
* US Forest Service
The reservation is located in Lemhi County,
Idaho, about the middle of the Lemhi valley,
which is 10 miles wide and about 21 miles
long. It is a fair grazing country, and has
about 5,000 acres or tillable land, with an
abundance of good water for all purposes.
The water courses run near the farming
lands, and with ditches could be utilized
for the irrigation or all the valley lauds.
All the land is avid, and irrigation is
necessary for the production of crops.
There is a quartz mine on the reservation,
but its extent has not been determined, as
the government does not allow any
prospecting, It also has an abundance of
timber of fir, pine, spruce, and mountain
cedar on the mountain slopes and sides. The
indigenous grasses get moisture from the
melting snow in the spring. There is
occasionally a little rain in the spring,
but after the 1st of June it is continually
dry until snow falls again in the autumn.
The Lemhi agency is located about 1 mile
from the south line, of the reservation,
midway from the ends. It is beautifully
situated on Hayden creek, a tributary of the
Lemhi River, which makes its confluence
about one-third of a mile from the agency.
The agency buildings are as follows: the
office, the agent's and physician's houses,
the girls' dormitory, the day school, and a
barn and ice houses They are all frame
buildings, The carpenter shop, blacksmith
shop, storehouse, laundry, clerk's house,
and boarding school building's are built of
logs. The implement building is of slabs.
The value of those buildings is about
$6,000, although they cost much more.
In the past the buildings were in a bad
condition, but the present agent has
repaired and repainted them, so they look
clean and are comfortable. Hayden creek
flows within a few steps of the agency
building and affords an abundance of clear,
pure cool water for the school, the agency,
and. or other purposes.*
*Idaho
Indians in the 1890 Census |
