Tejon agreed with him and Davidson soon after led a punitive expedition which was sent out from Fort Tejon to Owens Valley on July 21 of that year.38
Davidson’s troops left Fort Tejon and traveled along the south fork of the Kern River through Walker Pass to Owens Lake. From there he journeyed north along the Owens River as far as Owens Gorge. From there he backtracked to Fort Tejon. The entire trip was more than 600 miles (see Figure 2.4). Davidson did not find any pilfered horses, so his venture was a failure in terms of recovering stolen property. Instead, he spent his time studying the land and its people. His glowing report described a peaceful people (“an inoffensive, gentle race”)39 living in a Valley characterized by mild climate, fertile soil, and abundant water. He even proposed that the government set aside a major portion of the Valley as an Indian reservation. His favorable report probably facilitated the overrunning of the Valley by miners and settlers within a few years, which, in turn, led to clashes with the native population, and then, the establishment of Camp Independence in 1862.40
Figure 2.4 Route of Davidson Expedition (1859) Likely Followed by Owen’s Valley Paiutes in the Relocation of 1863. Reconfigured by Geraldine Raat from information found in Philip J. Wilkie and Harry W. Lawton, eds., The Expedition of Capt. J. W. Davidson from Fort Tejon to the Owens Valley in 1859, published in 1926 (Socorro, N.M.: Ballena Press).
In the same month that Davidson left for Owens Valley a Dogtown prospector discovered large quantities of gold in Mono Gulch, the same site where Jedediah Smith had found gold 30 years before. Within a few months the first township on the eastern side of the Sierra was established. By 1860 the town of Monoville, California (immediately north of Mono Lake), was the largest settlement between Salt Lake and the Sierra Nevada Mountains, peaking at about 700 residents and 22 liquor shops in that year.41 Soon after the town of Aurora in far western Nevada was founded, with a population of 1,400 in April 1861, which would grow to over 6,000 people by 1864. With a majority of males as its base population, the most popular forms of entertainment were Chinese brothels, female prostitutes, gambling houses, badger fights, and violence.42
Owens Valley became the thoroughfare for travel to Aurora and other camps. As the Los Angeles Star noted: “Within 60 or 80 miles of Owens Lake there is an immigration of about 50 huge wagons going to Aurora, loaded with valuable goods and machinery, which can reach their destination by no other route than Owens Valley; besides which there are on the road a great many thousand head of cattle, sheep and hogs for above destination.” Eventually, a new road was built that connected Aurora to San Francisco through Carson City, allowing Aurora to receive supplies from San Francisco that added to its growth. When the area was mined out the town was deserted after 1870.43
The winter of 1861–1862 was the spark that ignited the Owens Valley Indian War of 1862–1863. The weather was cold and wet. Sacramento reported a rainfall of over 15 inches for the month of January. Owens Valley residents said that the mountains were filled with snow, while the hills were soaked, and most of the streams became impassable. The whites could only subsist on their beef, while the extreme weather had driven off most of the game the Paiutes needed for survival. Collecting and foraging of plants became impossible.44
So it was that the herds of the white settlers became the only means of preventing starvation. As the native population gathered food from the ranges and ranches of the whites, violence against the Indian started. In retaliation cabins were burned and lone prospectors were killed by the Paiutes. In the spring of 1862 the settlers raided an Indian camp north of Owens Lake, resulting in 11 poorly armed Indians being killed and their dried meat destroyed. Before the war was over at least 60 whites and 250 Indians were dead. While most of the Owens Valley Paiutes sought peace in early 1861, Joaquin Jim, the leader of the southern Mono Paiutes, went on the warpath. He kept up his attacks on ranchers, miners, and the cavalry until 1864 and was never captured.45
Because the violence ebbed and flowed throughout 1862 and the spring of 1863, volunteer troops were sent from California to the Valley. Colonel James Henry Carleton, commander of the District of Southern California, in March 1862 ordered a calvary unit of volunteers under the command of Lt. Colonel George S. Evans to the “Owen’s Lake Valley,” acknowledging that the recent violence may be due to the action of the settlers and that “It is very possible … that the whites are to blame.”46 A month later Carleton was promoted to Brigadier General of volunteers during a march to Arizona to face Confederates and Indians (see Chapter 4).
The conflict did not end until the arrival of Captain Moses McLaughlin at Camp Independence who came from Fort Tejon in April 1863. Following the trail of the Davidson expedition of 1859, the not-so-biblical Moses stopped first at an Indian camp upon the Kern River about 10 miles from Keysville.
There he lined up 35 male Indians and had them either shot or sabered. While ordinarily this kind of wholesale slaughter would not have been approved by the officers of the Department of the Army of the Pacific, as one writer has noted, “no doubt, they were tired of the continual petitions from settlers and the constant rumors of Indian outbreaks and depredations. The problems of the war between the North and the South weighed too heavily upon them to worry about the cold-blooded murder of 35 Indians.”47 With the Indian wars of the West siphoning off too many soldiers who were needed by the Union Army, perhaps the commanders believed the harsh measures were necessary.
Upon arriving at Camp Independence McLaughlin inaugurated a new policy of shooting on sight and showing no mercy. This was an innovation as the army before then had tried to protect the rights and interests of both whites and Paiutes. He also changed tactics. Instead of chasing the enemy up canyons only to be ambushed, he sent his troops up the mountains at night and at daylight would drive the Indians toward the valley where another detachment awaited. Scouts were also sent after smaller bands, searching out the tule swamps along the river and destroying everything in their way—including people. Using a scorched earth policy, which included rape and murder, the army adopted the tactic of destroying cached food supplies of the Numu. During the month of May 1863 the volunteers destroyed 300 bushels of seeds near Bishop Creek, and kept no record of the number of Indians killed or wounded. With very little food available, and their women and children starving, the Indian men soon surrendered. By June 1863, after at least 331 Indians had been killed in the previous months, over 400 of Captain George’s Paiutes laid down their arms and came into Camp Independence. Throughout early July of 1863 the dejected bands of Captain Dick and Tinemaha also surrendered.48
With the arrival of nearly 1,000 Paiutes at Camp Independence a new set of logistical problems presented themselves. The army did not have enough rations to feed that many Indians as well as themselves. If they turned them loose the conflict between whites and Indians would be repeated. And, as for the whites of Owens Valley, they did not want the Numu in “their” valley and would certainly not leave them alone. It was obvious something had to be done as the volunteers had not planned or prepared for such a large aggregate of Indians. Finding a location outside of the Valley would not be easy as white adventurers and settlers were moving into all the good western lands. A reservation on infertile and rocky land that the whites did not want would be the usual and only solution. Fort Tejon, with its adjacent San Sebastian Reservation, would have to be reoccupied and become the target of the Owens Valley Paiute removal policy.49
On July 10 Captain McLaughlin had the Paiutes gather on the parade grounds of Camp Independence. With the assistance of his translator, José Chico (the same man who was personally involved in aiding the volunteers in the Keysville Massacre), McLaughlin counted the Numu and found them to number 998. Then, with the unarmed Paiutes surrounded by a volunteer force that formed a “wall of firearms,” and again with Chico’s assistance, the Numu were informed of the plans for their removal from
