But General Howard did not sleep. He summoned troops from all his wide department of the Columbia. The telegraph carried the word into California, and down into Arizona.
When he had two hundred soldiers he led them, himself. Chief Joseph ferried his women and children over the roaring Salmon River on skin rafts towed by swimming ponies, and put the river between him and General Howard.
General Howard viewed the position, and was puzzled. His rival general was a genius in defense. He crossed the river, to the attack. Chief Joseph dodged him, crossed the river farther north, and circling southward cut his trail and his communications with Fort Lapwai; fell upon Captain S. G. Whipple"s First Cavalry, which was in his path--surrounded it, wiped out Lieutenant Sevier Rains and ten cavalrymen, scattered the reinforcements, and pa.s.sed on, for the Road-to-the-buffalo.
General Howard heard that he had been side-stepped, and that the Nez Perces were beyond his lines. With almost six hundred men, two field-pieces and a Gatling gun he followed at best speed. The "treaty"
or friendly Pierced Noses aided him; so did the Bannock Indians.
Chief Joseph had been joined by his friend Chief Looking Gla.s.s. Now he had two hundred and fifty warriors--also four hundred and fifty women and children, two thousand horses, as many cattle, and much lodge baggage. In all the history of wars, no general carried a greater burden.
On July 11 he turned at the banks of the south Clearwater, in northern Idaho, to give battle again. He had thrown up dirt entrenchments, and was waiting for General Howard"s infantry, cavalry, artillery and scouts.
General Howard formed line. He had graduated with honors at West Point in 1854, and had won high rank in the Civil War. But Joseph wellnigh defeated him--nearly captured his supply train, did capture a spring and keep him from the drinking water; and had it not been for reinforcements coming in and creating two attacks at once on the Pierced Noses" position, he would have made General Howard retire.
The battle lasted two days. It was really a victory for Chief Joseph.
"I do not think that I had to exercise more thorough generalship during the Civil War," General Howard confessed.
Chief Joseph withdrew his people in good order. General Howard in desperation sent the cavalry, under Chief-of-Staff E. C. Mason, to find the Pierced Noses and hold them. Colonel Mason did not find them--they found _him_, and he was very glad to return in haste to General Howard.
The Joseph people were now safely in the Lo-lo Trail, or the Road-to-the-buffalo, that wound up the Bitter Root Range, and down on the other side. On this trail the two captains Lewis and Clark had almost perished. What with the great forest trees fallen crisscross, the dense brush and the sharp tumbled rocks, no trail could be rougher.
Over and under and through the trees and rocks Chief Joseph forced his women and children, his ponies and cattle and baggage. Behind him he left blood and disabled horses and cows. One hundred and fifty miles behind him he left the toiling, panting soldiers, whose forty axe-men were constantly at work clearing a pa.s.sage for the artillery and the packs.
Even at that, the soldiers marched sixteen miles a day; but the Pierced Noses marched faster.
The telegraph was swifter still. Fort Missoula, at the east end of the trail, had been notified. Captain C. C. Rawn of the Seventh Infantry hastily fortified the pa.s.s down, with fifty regulars and one hundred volunteers. Chief Joseph side-stepped him also, left him waiting, and by new trails turned south down the Bitter Root Valley on the east side of the mountains! The Bitter Root Valley was well settled. The Pierced Noses molested no ranches or towns. They traded, as they went, for supplies.
Colonel John Gibbon, who had campaigned against Sitting Bull, now took up the chase. Chief Joseph did not know about Colonel Gibbon"s troops, and made camp on the Big Hole River, near the border in south-western Montana. He was preparing lodge-poles, to take to the buffalo country.
Here, at dawn of August 9, Colonel Gibbon with two hundred regulars and volunteers surprised him completely. A storm of bullets swept his lodges, before his people were astir. Everybody dived for safety.
Some of the warriors left their guns. The white soldiers charged into the camp. All was confusion; all was death--but the warriors rallied.
In twenty minutes the white soldiers were destroying the camp with fire. In an hour they were fighting for their lives. The Pierced Noses had not fled, as Indians usually fled in a surprise; they had stayed, had surrounded the camp place, and were riddling the soldiers"
lines.
The squaws and boys helped. On the other side, Colonel Gibbon himself used a rifle. He ordered his troops into the timber. The Chief Joseph people rushed into their camp, packed up under hot fire, and bundled the women and children and loose horses to safety. The warriors remained.
The soldiers threw up entrenchments. Colonel Gibbon was wounded. The Indians captured his field-piece, and a pack mule loaded with two thousand rounds of rifle ammunition. They disabled the cannon and drove off the mule. They fired the gra.s.s, and only a change of wind saved the soldiers from being driven into the open.
All that day and the next day the battle lasted. At dusk of August 9 Colonel Gibbon had sent out couriers, with call for reinforcements.
"Hope you will hurry to our relief," he appealed, to General Howard.
Couriers rode to the Montana forts, also. The whole country was being stirred. Even Arizona was getting troops ready.
This night of August 10 Chief Joseph learned from one of his scouts who had been posted on the back trail, that General Howard was hurrying to the rescue. So he withdrew his people again, to make another march.
He had lost heavily. Eighty men, women and children were dead. Out of one hundred and ninety men in the battle of the Big Hole, Colonel Gibbon had lost sixty-nine in killed and wounded, including six officers.
But the white men could easily get more soldiers; Chief Joseph could get no more warriors. He decided to join with Sitting Bull"s Sioux, in Canada.
Canada was a long way; maybe a thousand miles. General Howard and Colonel Gibbon pursued. Joseph crossed the mountains again, into the southward. He veered east for the Yellowstone National Park. On the road he found two hundred and fifty fresh ponies. General Howard sent Lieutenant G. B. Bacon with cavalry to cut in front of him and defend a pa.s.s; and camped, himself, for a short rest, on the Camas Meadows, one day"s march behind the enemy.
Chief Joseph turned on him, deceived his sentries with a column of fours that looked like Lieutenant Bacon"s men coming back, and ran off all of General Howard"s pack mules.
"I got tired of General Howard, and wanted to put him afoot," said Chief Joseph.
And he almost did it; for had not the cavalry horses been picketed close in, they would have been stampeded, too.
General Howard had to wait for mules from Virginia City. Lieutenant Bacon wearied of watching the pa.s.s; left it--and Chief Joseph marched through, into the Yellowstone Park.
Now Colonel Miles, at Fort Keogh, far in the east, had been notified.
He sent out Colonel S. D. Sturgis and six companies of the fighting Seventh Cavalry, with Crow scouts, to head Joseph off.
Colonel Sturgis made fast time to the southwest. But Chief Joseph fooled him; pretended to go in one direction and took another, leaving the Seventh Cavalry forty miles at one side.
Colonel Sturgis obtained fresh horses from General Howard, and started in chase. On September 17 he came up with Chief Joseph"s rear guard, captured several hundred ponies and sent back word to General Howard that there was to be a decisive battle.
General Howard hurried. He marched all night. When he got to the battle-field he found only the Seventh Cavalry there, with three killed and eleven wounded, and everybody exhausted. Chief Joseph was marching on, north, in a great half circle. Somebody else must head him off.
General Howard sent a dispatch to Colonel Miles.
"The Nez Perces have left us hopelessly in the rear. Will you take action to intercept them?"
From Fort Keogh on the Yellowstone, one hundred and fifty miles eastward, Colonel Miles sallied out. It was a relay race by the white chiefs. He took four mounted companies of the Fifth Infantry, three companies of the Seventh Cavalry, three companies of the Second Cavalry, thirty Cheyenne and Sioux scouts and some white scouts, a Hotchkiss machine gun, a twelve-pounder Napoleon field-piece, a long wagon train guarded by infantry, and a pack train of mules.
A steamboat was ordered to ascend the Missouri, and meet the troops with more supplies. Telegraph, steamboats, trained soldiers, supplies--all the military power of the United States was fighting Chief Joseph.
Joseph reached the Missouri River first, at Cow Island. There was a fort here, guarding a supply depot. He seized the depot, burned it, and leaving the fort with three of its thirteen men killed, he crossed the river.
Canada was close at hand. Pretty soon he thought that he had crossed the line, and in the Bear Paw Mountains he sat down, to rest. He had many wounded to care for; his women and children were worn out. He had marched about two thousand miles and had fought four big battles.
"I sat down," said Joseph, "in a fat and beautiful country. I had won my freedom and the freedom of my people. There were many empty places in the lodges and in the council, but we were in a land where we would not be forced to live in a place we did not want. I believed that if I could remain safe at a distance and talk straight to the men sent by the Great Father, I could get back to the Wallowa Valley and return in peace. That is why I did not allow my young men to kill and destroy the white settlers after I began to fight. I wanted to leave a clean trail, and if there were dead soldiers on it I could not be blamed. I had sent out runners to find Sitting Bull, to tell him that another band of red men had been forced to run from the soldiers, and to propose that we join for defense if attacked. My people were recovering. I was ready to move on to a permanent camp when, one morning, Bear Coat and his soldiers came in sight, and stampeded our horses. Then I knew that I had made a mistake by not crossing into the country of the Red Coats; also in not keeping the country scouted in my rear."
For he was not in Canada. The Canada border lay a day"s march of thirty-five miles northward yet. And he had not known anything about Colonel Miles, the Bear Coat.
Colonel Miles brought three hundred and seventy-five soldiers, and the cannon. Chief Joseph had already lost almost one hundred of his men and women. But his brother Ollicut, Chief White Bird, and the Drummer Dreamer, old Too-hul-hul-so-te, were still with him; and one hundred and seventy-five warriors.
The first charge of the Bear Coat cavalry, early in this morning of September 30,1877, scattered the camp and cut off the pony herd. Chief Joseph was separated from his wife and children. He dashed for them, through the soldiers. His horse was wounded, his clothes pierced, but he got to his lodge.
His wife handed him his gun.
"Take it. Fight!"
And fight he did; his people fought. They dug rifle-pits, the same as white soldiers would. There was fighting for four days. The Bear Coat lost one fifth of his officers and men. He settled to a close siege, shooting with his cannon and trying to starve the Pierced Noses. He was much afraid that Sitting Bull was coming down, and bringing the Sioux. He sent messages to notify General Terry, in the east, and General Howard, in the south.
Chief Joseph"s heart ached. His brother Ollicut was dead. Old Toohulhulsote was dead. Looking Gla.s.s was dead. Twenty-four others had been killed, and forty-six were wounded. He had over three hundred women and children. Of his own family, only his wife and baby were left to him. Sitting Bull did not come.
"My people were divided about surrendering," he said. "We could have escaped from the Bear Paw Mountains if we had left our wounded, old women and children behind. We were unwilling to do this. We had never heard of a wounded Indian recovering while in the hands of white men.