Colonization
In the decades of regular contact for Southern Paiute and Euro-Americans, interactions became increasingly hostile. Emigrant travelers gave accounts of “war-like” people, though aggression was often provoked by companies with “utmost disregard” for “uncivilized Indians."[1] Emigrants sometimes fired at and chased bands away from Indigenous campsites.[2] Most bands would leave quickly when white people approached but would occasionally instigate violence.[3]
By the 1850s, most large trader caravans had ended. Travel on the Spanish Trail continued, mostly as passing emigrants to California. Slave trading continued after the arrival of more permanent settlers to Southern Utah, the members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.[4]
Permanent Settlers
Settlers from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints arrived in Southern Paiute land amid these hostile relations in 1850.[5] They were the first Euro-Americans to settle permanently in today’s Washington County. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints had a unique interest in Indigenous peoples,[6] believing them to be a lost tribe of Israel. They often referred to teh Indigenous peoples as “Lamanites” in reference to a group of people in The Book of Mormon, their book of scripture about the Americas.[7] "Indian" missions were a part of the Church before members trekked to Utah. Bringing “fallen” Indigenous people to their religion and lifestyle was not unique to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as many Americans believed these efforts to be benevolent.[8]
Following the acquisition of Utah Territory by the United States, Utah settlers expressed concern over Spanish trade and the kidnapping of Indigenous children between rival tribes and nations.[9] They also urged caution when trading ammunition with tribes and traders who might supply groups “at war with the United States.”[10]In 1852, Utah passed a law that simultaneously legitimized and limited slave-trading in the territory.[11] The law allowed slave-trading to continue by arguing that many slaves were kidnapped prisoners. They justified purchasing slaves as necessary action to prevent a worse fate. The law limited “indenture for the term of not exceeding twenty years” and required settlers to feed, clothe, and educate purchased slaves.[12] Around the same time, Utah’s first governor, Brigham Young argued regarding slavery to “Let them purchase them into freedom, and place them into their own household, where they can partake of their kindness, wisdom, and intelligence.”[13] Many settlers viewed slave-trading as a method of adoption. “Buying up” children was an assigned duty of Indian missionaries, that was linked tightly with proselyting.[14]
By 1852, settlers had moved farther south to Harmony, now called New Harmony.[15] Two years later, missionary work began. A group of twenty-five men were “set apart for this mission: viz. To Civilize & instruct the Indians.”[16] The fort at Harmony was just the beginning. Later that same year, Fort Santa Clara expanded the mission, bringing the first settlers into the Santa Clara Valley.[17] The mission continued to grow with more families called to settle in Southern Utah. Two more forts – Fort Pinto and Fort Hamblin – were both finished in 1856. These forts and the efforts of the missionaries paved the way for further settling of farm towns beginning the next year.[18]
Many Southern Paiute people were baptized and embraced a friendship with the settlers from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. However, Chief Tutsegavit said, “We want to follow our old customs.”[19]
Up until 1854, Southern Paiute bands occupied almost all “fertile valleys and oases”[20] from south-central Utah to southern Nevada. The settlement boom that followed the Southern Indian Mission resulted in many of the towns and cities we know today, “sit[ting] on land which was formerly a [Nung’wu] campsite.”[21] The settlement intrusions left many bands homeless, forced to seek survival in more hostile areas or depend on other bands. Many “became hangers-on around the white settlements,” slowly becoming erased within their own lands.[22]
The Mountain Meadows Massacre occurred in 1857. Local settlers initially placed blame on the Southern Paiute peoples. Whether or not, and to what degree, Native peoples may have been involved is still debated. In the last few decades, the primary role of Latter-day Saint settlers has become more firmly acknowledged.[23]
Citations
[1] Inter-Tribal Council of Nevada, NUWUVI: A Southern Paiute History (Reno, NV: Inter-Tribal Council of Nevada, 1976), printed by the University of Utah Printing Service, 58.
[2] Inter-Tribal Council, NUWUVI, 58;
Leroy R. Hafen and Ann W. Hafen, Journals of the Forty-Niners: Salt Lake to Los Angeles, The Far West and the Rockies Historical Series, 1820-1875, vol. 2 (Glendale, CA: Arthur H. Clark Co., 1960), 186.
[3] Jedediah Smith, The Southwest Expedition of Jedediah S. Smith: His Personal Account of the Journey to California, 1826-1827 (Glendale, CA: Arthur H. Clark Co., 1977), 50-51;
John D. Lee, “Letter: From Elder John D. Lee to President B. Young,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), February 16, 1854, 3, Utah Digital Newspapers, https://newspapers.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6zp51h4.;
Enoch Reese, “Extracts: From a Letter Written by Enoch Reese to Gov. Young,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), March 16, 1854, 1, Utah Digital Newspapers, https://newspapers.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6q53j0h.
[4] Inter-Tribal Council, NUWUVI, 51.
[5] Juanita Brooks, “Indian Relations on the Mormon Frontier,” Utah State Historical Quarterly 12, no. 1-2 (1944): 4, https://issuu.com/utah10/docs/volume_12_1944/6.
[6] Brooks, “Indian Relations,” 1
[8] Inter-Tribal Council, NUWUVI, 67-68.
[9] “General Items,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), November 15, 1851, 2, Utah Digital Newspapers, https://newspapers.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6rj5cwz.
[10] “General Items,” Deseret News, 2.
[11] (1851) Acts Resolutions and Memorials Passed by the First Annual and Special Sessions of the Legislative Assembly of the Territory of Utah, 1851 (Salt Lake City: Legislative Assembly, 1852), 91-94, The University of Utah J. Willard Marriott Digital Library, https://collections.lib.utah.edu/details?id=716954.;
Brooks, “Indian Relations,” 6-7;
Thomas D. Brown, Journal of the Southern Indian Mission, (Utah State University Press, 1972), 104-105.
[12] (1851) Acts Resolutions and Memorials;
[13] Brigham Young, “Governor’s Message,” Deseret News (Salt Lake City), December 25, 1852, 4, Utah Digital Newspapers, https://newspapers.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s6z043kk.;
Christopher B. Rich, Jr., "The True Policy for Utah: Servitude, Slavery, and "An Act in Relation to Service"," Utah Historical Quarterly 80, no. 1 (November 2012), 54-74, https://issuu.com/utah10/docs/uhq_volume80_2012_number1/56.;
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, "Indian Slavery and Indentured Servitude," Church History Topics, accessed May 1, 2024, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/indian-slavery-and-indentured-servitude?lang=eng.
[14] Brooks, “Indian Relations,” 6, 9.
[15] Brown, Journal of the Southern Indian Mission, 3.
[17] James G. Bleak, The Annals of the Southern Mission: A Record of the History of the Settlement of Southern Utah (Draper, UT: Greg Kofford Books, 2019), 16, 18.
[19] Inter-Tribal Council, NUWUVI, 72.
[20] Inter-Tribal Council, 72.
[21] Inter-Tribal Council, 72.
*Brackets used to include the preferred name of bands in Southern Utah,
[22] Inter-Tribal Council, 73, 8.
[23] Casey W. Olson, "The Evolution of History: Changing Narratives of the Mountain Meadows Massacre in Utah's Public School Curricula," PhD diss. (Utah State University, 2013), 192-193, https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3074&context=etd.
Images
Edward W. Clay and Henry R. Robinson, Joseph the Prophet Addressing the Lamanites, 1844, S. Brannan and Co. Prophet Office, New York, digitally published by the National Museum of American History, Behring Center, Harry T. Peters "America on Stone" Lithography Collection, https://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/nmah_325400.
Sammy, the adopted Indian boy and Christopher, "Tiffer", the oldest son of C.J. Arthur, Undated, Utah Tech University Special Collections and Archives, Juanita Brooks Papers (WASH-018), Photographs, 1861-1951, https://archives.utahtech.edu/repositories/2/archival_objects/1544.
Charles Roscoe Savage, Baptism of 130 Indians of the Shebit Nation at St. George, by the Mormons [stereograph], 1875-03, 1875, Utah Tech University Special Collections and Archives. 1875. C.R. Savage Photographs (WASH-080). https://archives.utahtech.edu/repositories/2/archival_objects/20665.