The white Indian boy

I was born in Illinois in 1842. I crossed the plains by ox team and came to Utah in 1850. My parents settled in Grantsville, a pioneer village just south of the Great Salt Lake....

A few tame Indians hung around the settlements begging their living. The people had a saying, “It is cheaper to feed them than to fight them,” so they gave them what they could;...

The night came at last when we were to leave. Just after dark I slipped away from the house and started for the bunch of willows where I was to meet the Indian. When I got there...

It was the custom of the Shoshone chieftains in those early days to gather all of their tribe every three years. As this was the year for the great tribal meeting, we started fo...

The camp finally began to break up in earnest. Small bands went off in different directions to their various hunting grounds that had been decided on by the council. We were amo...

Cold weather was coming. Some snow had already fallen in the mountains. Hanabi and her friends went to work to make me some better clothes. Very soon they had a fine suit ready.

of them went off howling with sore heads. That night Washakie came home and held a big council. I don’t know what they said, but the next day two or three families left our camp...

My Indian mother was as good and kind to me as any one could be, but she did not seem to realize that there was another loving mother miles and miles away whose heart was sorrow...

As winter began to break up we got ready to move to the spring hunting grounds, but when we rounded up our horses we found that about fifty head of the best ones were missing. T...

After this second Crow scare, things quieted down again. I kept on breaking colts, and whipping kids once in a while. One day while I was riding a wild colt, the boy whom I had...

Nothing went wrong while we were getting ready for the long trip to market, and finally everything was in shape to pack up. Our camp by this time was very large, for Indians had...

Snow had already fallen on the mountain tops when Washakie got back, so he was in a hurry to get the camp moved to the winter range. Mother and Hanabi began at once to arrange t...

We were now traveling towards the Crow country. I think our Indians were a little afraid that the Crows were going to try to stop them; but Washakie said that he was going throu...

After the trading party had been gone two days, the rest of our band moved down the creek to where it sank in the sand hills. Here three of the wounded Indians got so bad that w...

During the time that I was disabled and had to stay in the tepee, my old friend, Morogonai, would come and talk to me for hours. He told me all about the first white men he ever...

Our winter camp was a very beautiful place with plenty of game and an abundance of good dry wood. We had nearly everything that was needed to make us happy. My leg and all of th...

When we started to leave the village, how my mother did cry! I tried to comfort her by telling her not to feel bad, for I should soon be back. Little did I think it would be the...

Soon after I reached home, another call was made for men to go out and stop the soldiers from entering the territory. I wanted to go, but my father would not let me. I said that...

About the time I had decided to go back to my Indian friends, word came that the Pony Express was to be started, and Mr. Faust induced me to stay and be one of the pony riders....

The Indians became so troublesome that the soldiers from Camp Floyd were called out to stop their dreadful work. I got a letter from Major Egan directing me to meet him at Camp...

Just before the soldiers left Camp Floyd, the Overland Stage line was opened from St. Joseph, Missouri, to Sacramento, California. Shortly afterward the telegraph line was compl...

When I returned from Nevada to Utah, I found that mother had moved to Cache Valley, so I went up there and stayed all winter with her. It proved to be a very sad winter for me,...

“What became of your old Indian mother, Washakie, Hanabi, and the rest?” This question has been asked me again and again. “Did you ever see them again?” “What other experiences...

But the Indians were not always a burden. They sometimes gave me good help. At one time in particular I found an Indian who proved a friend in need. It was during the winter of...

When the government undertook the task of settling the Indians on the reservations, I was given the job of helping the Indian Agent of the Fort Hall reservation gather and keep...

Later, we moved back into the Bear Lake, where we made our home for twenty years. During this time I was often called on to do dangerous service in the interest of our settlemen...