The Battle of Frenchtown (1855), Washington Territory: the Political and Demographic Context rev 9/4/11
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In the wake of the Battle of Frenchtown, also known as the battle of Walla Walla, feuding between Governor Stevens and General Wool went public. Wool’s view was that Indian wars were instigated by white miners and settlers, then expanded in scope by their militia.Kurt Nelson, in his book “Fighting for Paradise: A Military History of the Pacific Northwest,” provides us with the following summary of the battle’s origins and consequences.While U.S. Army General John Wool was critical of the Oregon volunteers for widening the war (and mutilating Peo-peo-mox-mox), Washington Territorial Governor Stevens was rich with praise. After attempting to negotiate treaties with other Indians, Stevens arrived in the Walla Walla Valley from the east on December 20, 1855. Governor Stevens was convinced that the Oregon Volunteers had saved his party, as he had heard that the Indians of the area were prepared to ambush him. It was General Wool’s unwillingness to provide an escort for the Governor which led, in part, to the Washington Territorial troops no longer being placed under federal control throughout the rest of the war. Others contended that the Oregon Mounted Volunteers merely expanded the war needlessly. Many Indians had been unwilling to join the Yakimas, until the attack on the seemingly peaceful Cayuse and Walla Walla, which was seen as unprovoked. Further, treatment of Peo-peo-mox-mox, taken under a flag of truce, and then mutilated, was the provocation that sent many tribes, or at least their young men, into the war parties attacking the whites. In the way of further explanation, another quote from Richard Kluger is helpful.In retrospect, Steven’s strategy seems daring and unduly provocative. He was denying the tribes time to let his hard-edged reasoning sink in, likely because he feared they might use a protracted delay to organize coordinated intertribal resistance, uncommon among native peoples, but by no means unthinkable. Stevens was proceeding aggressively, moreover, without military support or the immediate prospect of any. In fact, the U.S. Army commander for the Pacific coast region, General John Wool. … had so few troops at his disposal that he favored a go-slow settlement policy and was outspoken in his belief that white settlers, in their eagerness to displace the natives, were the ones that ignited most of the violence along the frontier. It was precisely this land-hungry breed, of course, who Stevens had been sent west to serve. As he had just done with Leschi [in the southern Puget Sound area] and then at Point Elliot, … the governor would now miscalculate the will of the tribes east of the Cascades to resist him, treaty or no treaty. [Kluger, p.113]With Wool’s prior assessment having been re-confirmed by the Battle of Frenchtown, he also made it clear that he considered the killing and desecration of Chief Peopeo Moxmox to be disgraceful. And of course, Governor Stevens voiced the opposite opinion. Again quoting from Kluger,The governor … continued to believe that the suddenly dire Indian problem was not the result of oppressive and relentless treatymaking on his part, but the tribes’ treachery in forsaking their solemn vows to uphold the written agreements. The problem of low manpower was especially apparent east of the mountains, where Stevens was encamped near Walla Walla on December 28 [18 days after the battle] when he addressed a haughty letter to General Wool, … accusing him of shirking his duty by leaving pacification to “the citizen soldiery [i.e., the volunteer militias] alone to fight the battles and gain the victories.” … Stevens compounded his slur by going on to recommend “that you will urge forward your preparations with all possible dispatch. Get all your disposable force in this valley in January, establish a large depot camp here, occupy Fort Walla Walla and Yakima country, and be ready in February to take the field.” Then, as a civilian territorial official presuming to direct the top U.S. Army officer in their part of the nation, he outlined his own sweeping “plan of campaign” for the Snake River region in eastern Washington Territory. [Kluger pp. 143-4] Stevens was not alone in demanding the Army move aggressively against the Indian population of the region. Stevens reflected the view of many settlers - that the U.S. Army wasn’t doing its job in protecting them from the Indians. In the territory’s capital, Olympia, Washington, the local newspaper, ‘the Pioneer and Democrat’ recorded this increasingly public exchange of recriminations, while putting an extremely partisan Democratic party spin on all news. The newspaper fully supported the conduct of the O.M.V. The Pioneer and Democrat was blatantly pro-Stevens and justified all of his actions and that of the volunteers, with continuing diatribes against General Wool and the U.S. Army. True, insufficient numbers were clearly a problem for the U.S. Army, and territorial volunteers were necessary for defensive purposes to supplement an over-stretched Army. General Wool had been calling for reinforcements from back east, but it took several months for them to be re-deployed to the Pacific. When the volunteers assumed offensive operations, however, they were little more than vigilantes terrorizing the Indians. In addition to unprovoked attacks on Indians that were not hostile, such as occurred with the Oregon Mounted Volunteers at the Battle of Frenchtown, the fact that among their victims there was a significant percentage of children and women was especially appalling – e.g. the Mashel River and Grande Ronde massacres. The latter two massacres were credited to units of the Washington territorial militia. Added to these were the subsequent fatalities caused by drowning while fleeing the attacking militia in panic, or those dying of exposure and hunger following the raids on their villages and food supplies. Continuing with Kluger’s description of the unfolding drama, Arriving at Fort Vancouver in southernmost Washington Territory, he [General Wool] assessed the situation, decided that a winter campaign against the Indians would be disastrous, ordered forts to be built in the Yakima and Walla Walla valleys …. and conveniently forgot to answer the Governor’s earlier letter until February. In his reply, Wool reiterated his outspoken view that Indian misconduct was generally set off by white settlers’ abuses, and in the belief that volunteer militias were prone to turn into unbridled vigilantes eager to bash any redskin within reach, he called for all actions against the Indians to be carried out solely by regular army troops. [Kluger p. 144] In addition to sounding off in ‘The Pioneer and Democrat’ directly or through his friends, Stevens was soon writing Secretary of War Jefferson Davis demanding that General Wool be sacked. Stevens stepped up his effort to vilify General Wool by telling Davis that if the tribes in this region were to be subdued, the War Department had better recognize “the necessity of removing from command of the Department of the Pacific, a man who has by his acts, so far as this territory was concerned, shown an utter incapacity.” [Kluger p.164] Knowing that, in the end, it was likely to be he, Stevens, that would be the one to lose his current job, not the General, Stevens figured that the best way out of the trap was to advance. Time was running out for him due to all the controversy he had stirred up with his outrageous conduct vis-a-vis both the Army and with the territorial courts. Ever popular with the more jingoistic sector of the populace, however, Stevens got himself elected as the territorial delegate to Congress. This gave him the platform in D.C. for pursuing his vendettas, while seeking political cover for salvaging his career. 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