The story of Wallowa Valley tied to Chief Joseph

On June 16, 1873, President Ullyses Grant decreed the Wallowa Valley was for the Nez-Perce Indians and ordered it closed to a White settlers. From the article:

"The story of Wallowa Valley tied to
Chief Joseph is Wallowa County's most famous son.

"I buried my father in that beautiful valley of the winding waters. I love that land more than all the rest of the world." - Chief Joseph

The history of the Wallowa Valley is closely tied to the dramatic story of Chief Joseph and the Wallowa band of the Nez Perce, a story that reverberates through the past century to today.

Chief Joseph's true name was Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt (Thunder Rolling Down the Mountains).

He was the son of a Wallowa Nez Perce chief named Tu-eka-kas, who converted to Christianity in 1839 and received the name Joseph at his baptism - commonly known as Old Chief Joseph. Young Joseph was born in the Wallowa Valley in 1840.

Old Chief Joseph supported peace with white settlers of the Northwest and signed the Treaty of 1855, under which the Nez Perce retained lands extending from the Wallowa Valley into what is now Washington and Idaho. In a turn of events familiar across the West, however, gold was discovered in 1861 on the Nez Perce reservation and thousands of miners invaded the region.

In 1863, the U.S. Government negotiated a new treaty with the Nez Perce in an attempt to pacify white miners and settlers. The Nez Perce were left with a reservation in the Idaho Territory one-tenth the size of the 1855 lands. The Wallowa Valley had been taken.

Old Chief Joseph, long a proponent of peace, now took a stand: he refused to sign the 1863 Treaty or move his band from the Wallowa Valley. He remained in the Wallowa Valley until his death in 1871.

Young Joseph succeeded his father as chief of the Wallowa band. Although it is not commonly known, he was a political leader rather than a war chief.

For the next several years, a stalemate existed as Joseph's band remained in the Wallowa Valley in defiance of the 1863 Treaty.

Finally, in the spring of 1877, U.S. Army General Oliver Howard gave the United States' ultimatum: the Wallowa Band Nez Perce would leave within 30 days or be driven out by force.

Chief Joseph recognized the imbalance of military force and agreed to move. His band at this point consisted of about 400 Indians and only about 60 warriors.

They headed for the Nez Perce reservation in Idaho, crossing the Snake River at what is now Dug Bar in Hells Canyon.

In Idaho, the band joined with other non-treaty Nez Perce for a last gathering before moving to the reservation.

Sudden violence changed everything: a few young warriors staged a raid on nearby settlements in anger at the forced move, and several whites were killed. General Howard's troops moved in to punish the bands.

The combined non-treaty Nez Perce now numbered about 750, with fewer than 200 warriors.

A decision was made to flee to Montana and seek aid from the Crow tribe, a decision some historians believe Joseph opposed. Joseph did not want war. Even within his own band, it was his brother Ollokot who led the warriors.

Over the following three and a half months - and over some 1,400 miles -the Nez Perce fought a defensive war against U.S. Army forces in skirmishes and battles memorialized today on the modern Nez Perce Trail, including Big Hole, Camas Meadows and Canyon Creek.

From Idaho, the bands crossed the Lolo Pass into Montana, then moved south and east into the Yellowstone country of the Crow. The Crow offered no assistance; they even served as scouts for the U.S. Army against the Nez Perce. Finally the Nez Perce turned north, hoping to join Sioux chief Sitting Bull in Canada.

The end came on October 5, 1877, when Chief Joseph surrendered to Colonel Nelson Miles at what is now Bear Paw Battlefield in northern Montana - 40 miles from the Canadian border.

The Nez Perce were hungry and exhausted, and their leading warriors had been killed in the final battle, including Lean Elk, Looking Glass and Joseph's brother Ollokot.

Mistakenly identified as a war chief - rather than the political chief he actually was - of the rebel Nez Perce, Joseph had become famous throughout the country, even with some U.S. Army officials, for the heroism of the bands' fighting retreat. Whatever Joseph's role, there is no denying the bravery and skill shown by the Nez Perce.

Joseph and his people were, of course, not treated as heroes: they were moved first to eastern Kansas, then to a reservation in what is now Oklahoma. Many of them died there of disease.

Only in 1885 were Joseph and his remaining people returned to the Northwest - some to Idaho, but Joseph and others to the Colville Reservation in northern Washington. Chief Joseph died on the Colville Reservation on Sept. 21, 1904, at the age of 64. There Young Joseph is buried.

It is Young Chief Joseph's father, Old Joseph, who is interred beneath the monument at the north end of Wallowa Lake at a site that is now part of the Nez Perce National Historical Park and visited by thousands who pay their respects every year."