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The Last Indian War—The Nez Perce Story
By Elliott West - Published by Oxford University Press
Reviewed by Hugh
Elliott West is a Professor of History at the University of Arkansas with a special interest in Western History. He uses the term “Indian” to describe the native peoples instead of the currently politically correct “Native American.” This makes sense because the many documents and quotations that he cites in his notes are from the 19th century and exclusively use this word for the native people.
The Indian nation that called themselves Nimiipuu (“the real people”) were named Nez Perce by the French traders that first encountered them. The translation of the French name means, “Pierced nose people.” No one knows why the French named them this, because the Nez Perce do not pierce their noses. Perhaps a Frenchman saw an Indian with the sniffles and mistook the mucus for a decoration!
The homeland of the Nez Perce encompassed what today is northeastern Oregon, southeastern Washington and most of north central Idaho. They regularly crossed the Bitterroot Mountains to the plains of what is now Montana to hunt. They first saw white Americans when Lewis and Clark passed through on their way to the Pacific in 1805 and when they came back the following year. The meeting was friendly and the Nez Perce were quite helpful to the expedition.
As was the case throughout the United States, the westward migration of Caucasian settlers conflicted with the lifestyle of the Indians. West spends a great deal of the book describing this phenomenon and the interplay between the white people and the Nez Perce.
In 1855, a treaty was signed consigning the Nez Perce and two other tribes to limited territory on a reservation in central Idaho. Not all of the Nez Perce conformed to the treaty, but by 1877 the U.S demanded that the non-compliant bands move. Several battles and skirmishes with the army and white settlers ensued in the original Nez Perce territory.
Find the book at Oxford University Press
Finally, in July of 1877, about eight hundred Nez Perce began a long migration eastward by crossing the Bitterroots. This migration became a series of battles with the Army through Yellowstone Park and northward toward Canada until it ended with the surrender of Chief Joseph in October 1877 at Bear Paw Mountain.
In the book, West describes the circumstances that triggered the confrontations and the migration, the details of the trek and the battles, and the plight of the Nez Perce after the surrender.
West has several long but relevant sidebars that help set the context for the story. He explains the importance of the horse in Indian culture and to the Army. He provides some insight into the details of Army life in the 1870’s. (It was not nearly as romantic as depicted by Hollywood.) Many of the soldiers who became Indian fighters were veterans of the Union Army during the Civil War. They were also very much aware of what happened to Custer at Little Big Horn just a year before in 1876.
West describes the actions of John Gibbon, an Army officer who, at the Battle of Big Hole, barely avoided Custer’s fate. He says it must have seemed familiar to Gibbon who was wounded at Gettysburg leading the troops who repulsed Pickett’s charge.
West has a section describing the coming of the railroad and the telegraph to this part of the country, and how these innovations affected the war. He writes in detail about the buffalo and its demise and the importance of this animal to the Indian culture. The author describes a gold rush in Idaho and what difference this event made to the Indians. He also describes the efforts by Christian missionaries to convert the native people.
All of these issues are important to understand the differences in mindset of the Indians and the white people that led to lack of understanding, miscommunication, and finally to war.
The Last Indian War—the Nez Perce Story offers important insight into this special piece of our nation’s history. The book is easy to read because it is not simply a dry academic account. At the same time, it will appeal to the serious historian who takes the time to pursue the hundreds of references that West provides to document his sources.
Author Elliot West, Professor of History at the University of Arkansas
Excerpts from other reviews:
"No one has ever told the story of the Nez Perce so compellingly and so movingly-and many have told it. Even more impressively, West makes this wry, tragic, and deeply humane volume a window onto the wider changes transforming the United States. His idea of a Greater Reconstruction provides a framework for future histories of the era."--Richard White, Professor of History, Stanford University
"A distinguished scholar of American history makes a significant contribution to Oxford's excellent series Pivotal Moments in American History in this definitive analysis of the United States' war with the Nez Perce ... The 1877 war, the Nez Perce's epic journey to reach the Canadian border, American conquest and Indian exile is the heart of the book, and West tells it brilliantly."--Publishers Weekly starred review
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