Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/573

CHAPTER XXII.

THE MODOC WAR.

1864–1873.

Land of the Modocs—Keintpoos, or Captain Jack—Agents, Superintendents, and Treaties—Keintpoos Declines to Go on a Reservation—Rids—Troops in Pursuit—Jack Takes to the Lava-beds—Appointment of a Peace Commissioner—Assassination of Canby, Thomas, and Sherwood—Jack Invested in his Stronghold—He Escapes—Crushing Defeat of Troops under Thomas—Captain Jack Pursued, Caught, and Executed.

The Modoc war, fought almost equally in California and Oregon, is presented in this volume because that tribe belonged to the Oregon superintendency, and for other reasons which will appear as I proceed. From the time that certain of Frémont's men were killed on the shore of Klamath Lake down to 1864, when superintendent Huntington of Oregon entered into a treaty with them and the Klamaths, the Modocs^[1] had been the implacable enemies of the white race, and were not on much more friendly terms with other tribes of their own race, sustaining a warlike character everywhere. They lived on the border-land between California and Oregon, but chiefly in the latter, the old head chief, Sconchin, having his home on Sprague River, which flows into the upper Klamath Lake, and the subchiefs in different localities.

Keintpoos, a young subchief, had his headquarters

1. Modoc, according to E. Steele of Yreka, is a Shasta word signifying 'stranger,' or 'hostile stranger,' and came into use as a name by white miners, through hearing the Shastas use it. Ind. Aff. Rept, 1864, 121. Linsey Applegate, who is familiar with their history, has a list of persons killed by them, to the number of 95. Historical Correspondence, MS.