We will soon
be off on a trip along the Oregon Trail through southern Idaho and into western
Oregon and Washington. There’s a lot of history along this nineteenth-century
superhighway.
Stretched
across more than a hundred miles of the road is the history of one of the
saddest tales on the emigrant trails—a series of events known by various names,
but most often as the Utter-Van Ornum Massacre. As with much of history, there
is a lot of confusion surrounding what happened. But here’s the gist of it.
Shoshone
Indians attacked an emigrant company of some 44 travelers somewhere west of the
present location of Mountain Home, Idaho, and somewhere south of present-day Boise.
Several pioneers were killed and after more fighting and needing water, four of
the eight wagons were abandoned. The emigrants lost other people in attacks
over the next few days as they traveled until the Shoshone departed. With little to eat, the
travelers left the remaining wagons and walked to the Owhyhee River, near the deserted
Fort Boise. Indians there traded salmon for the remainder of the emigrants’
belongings and guns, then severe hunger set in.
The senior
Van Ornum, along with a few surviving members of the Utter family, left the
hunger camp and moved on. The move did not save them, but it may have kept
them—at least the children—from being eaten. Four dead children were consumed in
the camp and there was talk of killing another for food. Instead, the body of a
man dead ten days was exhumed, but before he was eaten help arrived and 12
survivors were rescued.
Meanwhile,
Indians had attacked and killed the Van Ornum party, except for three girls and
a boy who were taken captive. It’s fairly certain the girls were soon killed,
and perhaps the boy—but his fate remains a mystery. There were claims and
stories of a white boy living with Indians at various places.
Responding
to one such story, the boy’s uncle came from Oregon and convinced army troops
from Camp Douglas in Utah to rescue the boy from a Shoshone band in Cache
Valley. After some shooting, some negotiating, and some double dealing, the boy
was taken. Although he had light hair and eyes, his identity was and is
suspect. He was about the right age to be the Van Ornum boy, but spoke no
English and was Shoshone in all his ways, and fought his “rescuers” to no
avail. The Shoshone said he was the son of a French mountain man and a sister
of Chief Washakie. A photo memorializes the capture, with the boy in the bottom
row, flanked by the army officer who led the expedition and his uncle.
The uncle
took him to Oregon, and to California soon after. Then history loses track of
the boy, and his fate is unknown.