new members - Poindexter Descendants Association

POINDEXTER POINDEXTER POINDEXTER DESCENDANTS DESCENDANTS DESCENDANTS ASSOCIATION
ASSOCIATION
ASSOCIATION
OCTOBER OCTOBER 2007 2007 NEWSLETTER
NEWSLETTER
NEWSLETTER
Myles Connard POINDEXTER was one of PDA’s earliest members. His membership number is 38.
Shortly after he joined our association, he shared a truly fascinating family tale with us that has never
been published. It is the kind of story from which legends grow. Here for all future generations, we
present the real truth of a terrifying Indian attack on the Western Frontier.
“On a June night in 1887 two families in a wagon were hurrying across the Camas Prairie toward safety at
the Fort at Mount Idaho. The Nez Perce Indians attacked the wagon and several of the wagon party was
massacred. The next day, a party from the Fort rode out to the scene. John Chamberlain laid there dead,
with his daughter, Hattie, lying on his arm, also dead. Sitting on the ground between her father's legs was
a tiny tot covered with blood and dirt. She had been stuck through the neck with a knife which passed
between the bone and the jugular vein. Also, the end of her tongue had either been cut off or bitten off.
Little Effie lived.”
Following up on the above information, we subsequently found additional details to add to the story. Let
us first begin with a time line of events that outline what happened on 14 June 1877 between the Nez
Perce Indians and the settlers living nearby them in Idaho on that fateful night.
“14 June
Anger at being forced to leave their homes and move onto the reservation three warriors took their
personal revenge by killing four men living along the Salmon River.
Wahlitits gathered his cousin Sarpsis llppilp (Red Moccasin Tops) and his nephew Wetyetmas Wahyakt
(Swan Necklace) to act as horse holder. The young men left the camp. Wahlitits and Sarpsis llppilp kill
Richard Devine at Carver Creek, and Henry Elfers, Henry Beckrodge, and Robert Bland at John Day
Creek. Sarpsis shoots Samuel Benedict in the legs. Upon hearing the news, the encampment at Tolo Lake
breaks up. Nearby communities panic.
Looking Glass and Husishusis Kute hurry back to the reservation. The other three bands flee to a place of
safety on Cottonwood Creek. The Norton and Chamberlin families leave Cottonwood for the safety of
Mount Idaho at 9 p.m. Their wagons are attacked in the middle of the night.
John Chamberlin, his three-year-old daughter Hattie, and Benjamin Norton are killed. Lew Day and Joe
Moore are fatally wounded. They were buried in the Mount Idaho cemetery.
A raiding party of seventeen warriors kills James Baker, Samuel Benedict, and August Bacon in White
Bird and Harry Mason, William Osborne, and Francois Chodoze at Cooper Bar. Jack Manuel and his sixyear-old
daughter, Maggie, are wounded, and Jeanette Manuel is injured in a fall from her horse.
Ninety soldiers leave Fort Lapwai at 8:00 p.m. to begin driving the Nez Perce onto the reservation.
Norton-Chamberlin Party
In early June, the five non-treaty Nez Perce bands gathered at Tolo Lake, three miles south of Fenn, to
discuss plans for moving onto the reservation. Their council was brought to an abrupt end on June 14
when news came that three warriors had taken personal revenge and killed four white men on the Salmon
River. Despite the peaceful intentions of the chiefs and elders, the spark of war had been ignited.
That same night, a party of seventeen warriors headed south, back to the Salmon River. About halfway
between Fenn and Grangeville, the Norton and Chamberlin families fleeing from Cottonwood ran into
this group of warriors in the middle of the night.
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