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... using white colonization of the Oregon Country was closing the connections between the Cayuse Indians and the Whitman mission. With the number of whites now living in the former Cayuse land came many diseases that were unfamiliar to the Indians. Common sicknesses that whites were accustomed to were killing the Natives. The Cayuse became unresponsive to the Whitman's because the couple helped the people who were killing them.
In 1847, Narcissa said something about the continued white settlement. the poor Indians are amazed at the overwhelming numbers of Americans coming into the country... They seem not to know what to make of it (Burns and Ives). In 1847, a spread of meals infected both the settlers and the Cayuse (Morris). When several Cayuse children attending the mission school died because of meals, the tribe became enraged (Emayzine).
The Indians watched their family members die in front of them. They blamed Marcus because he couldnt cure the sick Natives. Most of the sick white children lived but most of the Cayuse children died. The tribe became furious and the Whitman Massacre occurred (Burns and Ives). On November 29, 1847, several Cayuse Indians, led by Chief Tiloukaikt, took their revenge on the Whitman's and the white settlers for the death of their people (Burns and Ives). While at the mission to get some medicine, Tiloukaikt and a warrior named Tomahas tomahawked Marcus to death (Emayzine).
Other Cayuse stormed into the mission and burned it down and several other buildings down (Burns and Ives). In the end, the raiders killed thirteen others, including Narcissa, and held forty-six others captive for several months (Morris). The Oregon country raised a volunteer militia, led by Cornelius Gilliam. He was a fundamentalist clergyman who had fought Indians in the East because of his belief in the policies of extermination. As the militia was being formed, Peter See Ogden of the Hudson's Bay Company negotiated with the group Natives to release the hostages (Emayzine). In return for the release of the hostages, the band of Cayuse Indians received blankets, guns, and tobacco (Morris).
Even though the hostages were released, Gilliam and his militia went on attacking Cayuse Indian groups (Emayzine). The attacking of uninvolved Cayuse Indian groups led to war between the Cayuse Indians and the militia (Burns and Ives). Several Indian groups joined with the Cayuse Indians because they thought that there would be less white settlement in the Oregon Country. Gilliam was killed by his own gun in an accident. The militia disbanded when different tribes in the Columbia River Basin began to unite (Emayzine).
The war went badly for the Cayuse tribe. Many of its male members were either deceased or wounded extensively. The remaining Cayuse Indians eventually joined other tribes in the Walla Walla Valley area, such as the Nez Perce and Yakima (Burns and Ives). In 1850, after more than two years since the Whitman Massacre incident (Oregon) and two years after the attack on innocent Cayuse Indians (Burns and Ives), Chief Tiloukaikt, Tomahas, Clokamus, Isiaasheluckas, and Kiamasumkin, the other tribal members who participated in the Whitman Massacre, turned themselves in (Oregon).
They did so because of the fear that the entire Cayuse Indian tribe would be destroyed (Burns and Ives). The now surrendered Indians were put under the protection of Joseph Lane, the new Governor of the Oregon Territory. Tiloukaikt and the others were brought Westward, past the Cascade mountain range, into Oregon City. In Oregon City, there was a U. S. District Court where the Indians would be put on trial (Oregon).
On May 24, after the trial had lasted for four days, the jury found Tiloukaikt, Tomahas, Clokamus, Isiaasheluckas, and Kiamasumkin guilty of murder. They were sentenced to have a public execution on June 3. The Indians attorneys wanted to have another trial based on Judge O. C. Pratt's rulings. The attorneys accused Judge Pratt of convincing the jury members to push for a guilty verdict.
This motion was denied and the execution was carried out on its planned date (Oregon). Their execution was in the form of hanging. Before the execution occurred, the Indians were given the chance to receive Presbyterian rites. Showing disregard for the Whitman's religion, they accepted Catholic rites instead (Emayzine).
Just before Tiloukaikt was executed, he said something to the crowd gathered at their execution. Did not your missionaries teach us that Christ died to save his people? So we die to save our people (Morris). The Whitman Massacre and the Cayuse War had its bad results for the remaining Cayuse Indians and other Indian groups living within the Oregon Country. The Cayuse Indian lands were now open to white settlers from the east. Congress established a territorial government in Oregon and made more military posts and forts.
The other tribes living in the Walla Walla Valley region now distrusted whites and feared for the white settlement of their lands (Emayzine). There is still some bitter resentment between the existing Cayuse Indians and the white settlers. In Walla Walla, the citizens celebrate the efforts of the Marcus and Narcissa Whitman to convert the Natives to Christianity. Indians in the area see this parade as a slap on their culture. Marjorie Waheneka, a Cayuse Indian descendant, is quoted as saying, They didnt have enough patience to learn about the people. They didnt try to learn about the Indians lifestyle.
Theirs was the superior one. Thats what made me so bitter (Morris). Today, there are some reminders of the Whitman's in Washington state and elsewhere. A bronze statue of Marcus exists in the Capitol rotunda where each state is represented by one of its famous residents in D.
C. In Walla Walla, there is another statue of Marcus in its city center. Ten years after the Whitman Massacre occurred, Cushing Eels, a colleague of Marcus, founded a school in his name. This school eventually became Whitman College (Morris). The Whitman's have played an important role in the settlement of the West. They led the first Great Migrations to the Oregon Territory.
This encouragement of western expansion also lead to their untimely murders by the hands of the Indians whom they were working with. Even though they made mistakes, the Whitman's etched their names in American history. Bibliography: Bibliography Burns, Ken and Ives, Stephen. Marcus Whitman and Narcissa Whitman. New Perspectives on the West 1996.
web (30 Dec. 1998). Mayer, Eric. Northwest Tribes. Dr.
Es Social Science Webzine. Online. web (4 Feb. 1999). Morris, Keiko. Uncomfortable history: the Whitman Massacre. The Seattle Times 16 Nov. 1997.
Online. web 111697. html (30 Dec 1998). The Whitman Massacre. 50 th Anniversary Exhibit Homepage 3 December 1998. Online. web (26 Jan. 1999).
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Research essay sample on Oregon Territory White Settlers
