Sahaptin people
Encyclopedia
The Sahaptin people are a Native American
people that inhabited territory along the Columbia River
. The Nez Perce tribe is one of the major Sahaptin groups.
and adjacent portions of Oregon
and Washington, including the lower Snake River
, with its tributaries the Salmon
, Clearwater
, and Grand Ronde
rivers, from about 45° latitude down nearly to the entrance of the Palouse
, and from the Blue Mountains
of Oregon on the west to the main divide of the Bitterroot Mountains
on the east.
, Umatilla
, Tenino
(Warmsprings), Yakama
and others farther to the west, with whom they maintained close friendly relations, while frequently at variance with the Salishan tribes on their northern border — the Flatheads
, Coeur d'Alene
and Spokan
— and in chronic warfare with the Blackfeet
, Crows
and Shoshoni on the east and south.
They call themselves Ni Mii Puu, meaning simply "the people", or "we the people". The name Sahaptin or Saptin comes through the Salishan tribes. When Lewis and Clark
came through the area in 1805, they were called Chopunnish, possibly another form of Saptin. The popular and official name of Nez Percés, "Pierced Noses", originally bestowed by the French trappers, refers to a former custom of wearing a dentalium shell through a hole bored in the septum of the nose.
In 1805 they numbered, according to the most reliable estimates, probably over 6,000 but have greatly decreased since the advent of the whites, and they are still on the decline. Contributing causes were incessant wars with the more powerful Blackfeet in earlier years; a wasting fever, and measles
epidemic (1847) from contact with immigrants; smallpox
and other diseases following the occupation of the country by miners after 1860; losses in the war of 1877 and subsequent removals; and wholesale spread of consumption because of their changed condition of living under civilization. In 1848 they were officially estimated at 3,000; by 1910 they were officially reported at 1,530.
or brush shelter.
They had also sweat-houses and menstrual lodges. The permanent sweat-house was a shallow subterranean excavation, roofed with poles and earth and bedded with grass, in which the young and unmarried men slept during the winter season and occasionally sweated themselves by means of steam produced by pouring water upon hot stones placed in the centre. The temporary sweat-house used by both sexes was a framework of willow rods, covered with blankets, with the heated stones placed inside. The menstrual lodge, for the seclusion of women during the menstrual period and for a short period before and after childbirth, was a subterranean structure, considerably larger than the sweat-house, and entered by means of a ladder from above. The occupants thus secluded cooked their meals alone and were not allowed even to touch any articles used by outsiders.
Furniture consisted chiefly of bed platforms, baskets and bags woven of rushes or grass, wooden mortars for pounding roots and spoons of horn. The woman had also her digging stick for gathering roots; the man his bow, lance, shield, and fishing equipment. The Nez Percé bow of mountain-sheep horn backed with sinew was the finest in the West. The ordinary dress was of skins, with the addition of a fez-shaped basket hat for the woman and a protective skin helmet for the warrior.
Aside from fish and game, chiefly salmon and deer, their principal foods were the roots of the camas (Camassia esculenta) and kouse (Lomatium kous), the first being roasted in pits, while the other was ground in mortars and molded into cakes for future use. Women were primarily responsible for the gathering and preparing of these root crops.
was general, but kinship prohibition was enforced. Inheritance was in the male line. "The standard of morality, both before and after marriage seems to have been conspicuously high" (Spinden). Interment was in the ground, the personal belongings of the deceased being deposited with the body, and the house torn down or removed to another spot. The new house was ceremonially purified and the ghost exorcised, and the mourning period was terminated with a funeral feast. Sickness and death, especially of children, were frequently ascribed to the work of ghosts.
The religion was animistic
, with a marked absence of elaborate myth or ritual. The principal religious event in the life of the boy or girl was the dream vigil, when, after the solitary fasting for several days, the fevered child had a vision of the spirit animal which was to be his or her tutelary through life. Dreams were the great source of spiritual instruction. The principal ceremonial was the dance to the tutelary spirit, next to which in importance was the scalp dance.
Trading posts were established in the upper Columbia region, and from the Catholic
Canadian and Iroquois
employees of the Hudson's Bay Company
traders they first learned of Christianity
, and as early as 1820 both they and the Flatheads had voluntarily adopted many of the Catholic forms. Of the Nez Percés it has been said: "They seemed to realize the paucity of their religious traditions and from the first eagerly seconded the efforts of the missionaries to instruct them in the Christian faith."
As a result of urgent appeals from the Flathead Indians for missionaries, a Presbyterian
mission was established (1837) among the Nez Percés at Lapwai, near the present Lewiston, Idaho
, under Reverend H.H. Spaulding, who two years later set up a printing press from which he issued several small publications in the native language. Regular Catholic work in the same region began with the advent of Fathers Blanchet and Demers
on the Columbia (1838) and of De Smet
and the Jesuits in the Flathead country (1840). The establishment of the Oregon Trail
through the country of the Nez Percés and allied tribes led to the introduction of an epidemic disease, by which they were terribly wasted, particularly the Cayuse
, who, holding responsible Dr. Whitman, in charge of the Presbyterian mission in their tribe, attacked and destroyed the mission, murdering Whitman and his wife and eleven others. The Catholic Bishop Brouillet, who was on his way at the time to confer with Whitman for the purchase of the mission property, was not molested but was allowed to bury the dead and then found opportunity to warn Spaulding in time for him to reach safety. In consequence of these troubles all the Presbyterian missions in the Columbia region were discontinued, but the work was resumed in later years, and a considerable portion of the Nez Percés are now of that denomination.
The Catholic work in the tribe was given in charge of the Jesuits, aided by the Sisters of Saint Joseph
, and centering at St. Joseph's mission, Slickpoo, Idaho. For fifty years it was conducted by Fr. Joseph Cataldo,. S.J., who gave attention also to the neighbouring cognate tribes. The Catholic Indians were reported in the early 20th century at over 500.
, another treaty was negotiated between another Nez Percés chief known as Lawyer (whose band had converted to Christianity and was now assimilating to white culture) and General Howard of the U.S. Army in which Lawyer surrendered all but the Lapwai reservation. Chief Joseph of the Wallowa band refused to sign the new treaty, stating that the Treaty of 1855 was promised to be the rule of law for "as long as the sun shines," protecting their home land from white intrusion. Since Nez Percés custom dictated that no single chief spoke for all others, when Joseph and others (including Toohoolhoolzote and Looking Glass) refused to sign the treaty, it was done so with the understanding that the U.S. Gov't was still bound by their original agreement, and that only Lawyer's band would be bound by the new treaty that only they signed.
However, General Howard gathered numerous other Nez Percés to make their "X" on the document so as to give the illusion that Joseph and the others had indeed signed the treaty. Thus, in the eyes of the U.S. government, they would also be subject to its terms.
Joseph steadfastly refused to be a party to the treaty or to its terms, only relenting when it became clear that the survival of his people depended on it. But as they made the arduous trek out of their home land and to the new reservation, a small group of young Nez Percés warriors broke off and murdered numerous white settlers along the Salmon River. These events were what set in motion the Nez Percés war (1877). After successfully holding in check for some months the regular troops and a large force of Indian scouts, Joseph, Looking Glass, and other chiefs conducted a retreat for over a thousand miles across the mountains but were finally intercepted and forced to surrender within a short distance of the Canadian frontier. Despite the promise that he should be returned to his own country, Joseph and the remnant of his band were deported to Oklahoma
, where they wasted away so rapidly that in 1885 the few who survived were transferred to the Colville reservation in Washington. Throughout the entire retreat no outrage was committed by Joseph's warriors. The main portion of the tribe took no part in the war.
In 1893 those of Lapwai were given individual allotments, and the reservation was opened to white settlement.
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
people that inhabited territory along the Columbia River
Columbia River
The Columbia River is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river rises in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, Canada, flows northwest and then south into the U.S. state of Washington, then turns west to form most of the border between Washington and the state...
. The Nez Perce tribe is one of the major Sahaptin groups.
Territory
The prominent Sahaptin tribe formerly held a considerable territory in western IdahoIdaho
Idaho is a state in the Rocky Mountain area of the United States. The state's largest city and capital is Boise. Residents are called "Idahoans". Idaho was admitted to the Union on July 3, 1890, as the 43rd state....
and adjacent portions of Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
and Washington, including the lower Snake River
Snake River
The Snake is a major river of the greater Pacific Northwest in the United States. At long, it is the largest tributary of the Columbia River, the largest North American river that empties into the Pacific Ocean...
, with its tributaries the Salmon
Salmon River (Clackamas County, Oregon)
The Salmon River is a 33.9 mile river in Oregon's Cascade Range and drains a portion of southwestern Mount Hood.The entire length of the river is protected National Wild and Scenic River, the only such river in the contiguous 48 states....
, Clearwater
Clearwater River (Idaho)
The Clearwater River is a river in north central Idaho, which flows westward from the Bitterroot Mountains along the Idaho-Montana border, and joins the Snake River at Lewiston. In October 1805, the Lewis and Clark Expedition descended the Clearwater River in dugout canoes, putting in at "Canoe...
, and Grand Ronde
Grande Ronde River
The Grande Ronde River is a tributary of the Snake River, long, in northeastern Oregon and southeastern Washington in the United States. It drains an area southeast of the Blue Mountains and northwest of the Wallowa Mountains, on the Columbia Plateau...
rivers, from about 45° latitude down nearly to the entrance of the Palouse
Palouse River
The Palouse River is a tributary of the Snake River located in the U.S. states of Washington and Idaho. It flows for southwestwards, primarily through the Palouse region of southeastern Washington...
, and from the Blue Mountains
Blue Mountains (Oregon)
The Blue Mountains are a mountain range in the western United States, located largely in northeastern Oregon and stretching into southeastern Washington...
of Oregon on the west to the main divide of the Bitterroot Mountains
Bitterroot Mountains
The Northern and Central Bitterroot Range, collectively the Bitterroot Mountains, is the largest portion of the Bitterroot Range, part of the Rocky Mountains, located in the panhandle of Idaho and westernmost Montana in the Western United States...
on the east.
Heritage
They are of the Shahaptian linguistic stock, to which belong also the PalousePalus (tribe)
The Palus are a Sahaptin tribe recognized in the Treaty of 1855 with the Yakamas . A variant spelling is Palouse, which was the source of the name for the fertile prairie of Washington and Idaho.- Ethnography :...
, Umatilla
Umatilla (tribe)
The Umatilla are a Sahaptin-speaking Native American group living on the Umatilla Indian Reservation, who traditionally inhabited the Columbia Plateau region of the northwestern United States....
, Tenino
Warm Springs (tribe)
The Warm Springs tribes are several Sahaptin Native American tribes of northern Oregon. They were also known as the Walla Walla . The Warm Springs tribes are the Upper Deschutes , the Lower Deschutes , the Tenino, and the John Day...
(Warmsprings), Yakama
Yakama
The Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation, or simply Yakama Nation , is a Native American group with nearly 10,000 enrolled members, living in Washington. Their reservation, along the Yakima River, covers an area of approximately 1.2 million acres...
and others farther to the west, with whom they maintained close friendly relations, while frequently at variance with the Salishan tribes on their northern border — the Flatheads
Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Nation
The Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Reservation are the Bitterroot Salish, Kootenai and Pend d'Oreilles Tribes. The Flatheads lived between the Cascade Mountains and Rocky Mountains. The Salish initially lived entirely east of the Continental Divide but established their...
, Coeur d'Alene
Coeur d'Alene Tribe
The Coeur d'Alene are a Native American people who lived in villages along the Coeur d'Alene, St. Joe, Clark Fork and Spokane Rivers; as well as sites on the shores of Lake Coeur d'Alene, Lake Pend Oreille and Hayden Lake, in what is now northern Idaho, eastern Washington and western Montana.In...
and Spokan
Spokane (tribe)
The Spokane are a Native American people in the northeastern portion of the U.S. state of Washington. The Spokane Indian Reservation, at , is located in eastern Washington, almost entirely in Stevens County, but includes two very small parcels of land and part of the Spokane River in...
— and in chronic warfare with the Blackfeet
Blackfeet
The Piegan Blackfeet are a tribe of Native Americans of the Algonquian language family based in Montana, having lived in this area since around 6,500 BC. Many members of the tribe live as part of the Blackfeet Nation in northwestern Montana, with population centered in Browning...
, Crows
Crow Nation
The Crow, also called the Absaroka or Apsáalooke, are a Siouan people of Native Americans who historically lived in the Yellowstone River valley, which extends from present-day Wyoming, through Montana and into North Dakota. They now live on a reservation south of Billings, Montana and in several...
and Shoshoni on the east and south.
They call themselves Ni Mii Puu, meaning simply "the people", or "we the people". The name Sahaptin or Saptin comes through the Salishan tribes. When Lewis and Clark
Lewis and Clark Expedition
The Lewis and Clark Expedition, or ″Corps of Discovery Expedition" was the first transcontinental expedition to the Pacific Coast by the United States. Commissioned by President Thomas Jefferson and led by two Virginia-born veterans of Indian wars in the Ohio Valley, Meriwether Lewis and William...
came through the area in 1805, they were called Chopunnish, possibly another form of Saptin. The popular and official name of Nez Percés, "Pierced Noses", originally bestowed by the French trappers, refers to a former custom of wearing a dentalium shell through a hole bored in the septum of the nose.
In 1805 they numbered, according to the most reliable estimates, probably over 6,000 but have greatly decreased since the advent of the whites, and they are still on the decline. Contributing causes were incessant wars with the more powerful Blackfeet in earlier years; a wasting fever, and measles
Measles
Measles, also known as rubeola or morbilli, is an infection of the respiratory system caused by a virus, specifically a paramyxovirus of the genus Morbillivirus. Morbilliviruses, like other paramyxoviruses, are enveloped, single-stranded, negative-sense RNA viruses...
epidemic (1847) from contact with immigrants; smallpox
Smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease unique to humans, caused by either of two virus variants, Variola major and Variola minor. The disease is also known by the Latin names Variola or Variola vera, which is a derivative of the Latin varius, meaning "spotted", or varus, meaning "pimple"...
and other diseases following the occupation of the country by miners after 1860; losses in the war of 1877 and subsequent removals; and wholesale spread of consumption because of their changed condition of living under civilization. In 1848 they were officially estimated at 3,000; by 1910 they were officially reported at 1,530.
Culture
The clan system was unknown. Chiefs were elective rather than hereditary, governing by assistance of the council, and there was no supreme tribal chief.Accommodations
Their permanent houses were communal structures, sometimes circular, but more often oblong, about twenty feet in width and sixty to ninety feet in length, with framework of poles covered by rush mats, with floor sunk below the ground level, and earth banked up around the sides, and with an open space along the centre of the roof, for the escape of smoke. On the inside were ranged fires along the centre at a distance of ten or twelve feet apart, each fire serving two families on opposite sides of the house, the family sections being sometimes separated by mat curtains. One house might thus shelter more than one hundred persons. Lewis and Clark mention one large enough to accommodate nearly fifty families. On temporary expeditions they used the ordinary buffalo-skin tipiTipi
A tipi is a Lakota name for a conical tent traditionally made of animal skins and wooden poles used by the nomadic tribes and sedentary tribal dwellers of the Great Plains...
or brush shelter.
They had also sweat-houses and menstrual lodges. The permanent sweat-house was a shallow subterranean excavation, roofed with poles and earth and bedded with grass, in which the young and unmarried men slept during the winter season and occasionally sweated themselves by means of steam produced by pouring water upon hot stones placed in the centre. The temporary sweat-house used by both sexes was a framework of willow rods, covered with blankets, with the heated stones placed inside. The menstrual lodge, for the seclusion of women during the menstrual period and for a short period before and after childbirth, was a subterranean structure, considerably larger than the sweat-house, and entered by means of a ladder from above. The occupants thus secluded cooked their meals alone and were not allowed even to touch any articles used by outsiders.
Furniture consisted chiefly of bed platforms, baskets and bags woven of rushes or grass, wooden mortars for pounding roots and spoons of horn. The woman had also her digging stick for gathering roots; the man his bow, lance, shield, and fishing equipment. The Nez Percé bow of mountain-sheep horn backed with sinew was the finest in the West. The ordinary dress was of skins, with the addition of a fez-shaped basket hat for the woman and a protective skin helmet for the warrior.
Food
In their primitive condition the Nez Percés, although semi-sedentary, were without agriculture, and they depended on hunting, fishing, and the gathering of wild roots and berries.Aside from fish and game, chiefly salmon and deer, their principal foods were the roots of the camas (Camassia esculenta) and kouse (Lomatium kous), the first being roasted in pits, while the other was ground in mortars and molded into cakes for future use. Women were primarily responsible for the gathering and preparing of these root crops.
Religion
Marriage occurred at about the age of fourteen and was accompanied by feasting and giving of presents. PolygamyPolygamy
Polygamy is a marriage which includes more than two partners...
was general, but kinship prohibition was enforced. Inheritance was in the male line. "The standard of morality, both before and after marriage seems to have been conspicuously high" (Spinden). Interment was in the ground, the personal belongings of the deceased being deposited with the body, and the house torn down or removed to another spot. The new house was ceremonially purified and the ghost exorcised, and the mourning period was terminated with a funeral feast. Sickness and death, especially of children, were frequently ascribed to the work of ghosts.
The religion was animistic
Animism
Animism refers to the belief that non-human entities are spiritual beings, or at least embody some kind of life-principle....
, with a marked absence of elaborate myth or ritual. The principal religious event in the life of the boy or girl was the dream vigil, when, after the solitary fasting for several days, the fevered child had a vision of the spirit animal which was to be his or her tutelary through life. Dreams were the great source of spiritual instruction. The principal ceremonial was the dance to the tutelary spirit, next to which in importance was the scalp dance.
Trading posts were established in the upper Columbia region, and from the Catholic
Catholicism
Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....
Canadian and Iroquois
Iroquois
The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America...
employees of the Hudson's Bay Company
Hudson's Bay Company
The Hudson's Bay Company , abbreviated HBC, or "The Bay" is the oldest commercial corporation in North America and one of the oldest in the world. A fur trading business for much of its existence, today Hudson's Bay Company owns and operates retail stores throughout Canada...
traders they first learned of Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
, and as early as 1820 both they and the Flatheads had voluntarily adopted many of the Catholic forms. Of the Nez Percés it has been said: "They seemed to realize the paucity of their religious traditions and from the first eagerly seconded the efforts of the missionaries to instruct them in the Christian faith."
As a result of urgent appeals from the Flathead Indians for missionaries, a Presbyterian
Presbyterianism
Presbyterianism refers to a number of Christian churches adhering to the Calvinist theological tradition within Protestantism, which are organized according to a characteristic Presbyterian polity. Presbyterian theology typically emphasizes the sovereignty of God, the authority of the Scriptures,...
mission was established (1837) among the Nez Percés at Lapwai, near the present Lewiston, Idaho
Lewiston, Idaho
Lewiston is a city in and also the county seat of Nez Perce County in the Pacific Northwest state of Idaho. It is the second-largest city in the northern Idaho region, behind Coeur d'Alene and ninth-largest in the state. Lewiston is the principal city of the Lewiston, ID - Clarkston, WA...
, under Reverend H.H. Spaulding, who two years later set up a printing press from which he issued several small publications in the native language. Regular Catholic work in the same region began with the advent of Fathers Blanchet and Demers
Modeste Demers
Modeste Demers was a Roman Catholic Bishop and missionary in the Oregon Country. A native of Quebec, he traveled overland to the Pacific Northwest and preached in the Willamette Valley and later in what would become British Columbia.-Early life:...
on the Columbia (1838) and of De Smet
Pierre-Jean De Smet
Pierre-Jean De Smet , also known as Pieter-Jan De Smet, was a Belgian Roman Catholic priest and member of the Society of Jesus , active in missionary work among the Native Americans of the Midwestern United States in the mid-19th century.His extensive travels as a missionary were said to total...
and the Jesuits in the Flathead country (1840). The establishment of the Oregon Trail
Oregon Trail
The Oregon Trail is a historic east-west wagon route that connected the Missouri River to valleys in Oregon and locations in between.After 1840 steam-powered riverboats and steamboats traversing up and down the Ohio, Mississippi and Missouri rivers sped settlement and development in the flat...
through the country of the Nez Percés and allied tribes led to the introduction of an epidemic disease, by which they were terribly wasted, particularly the Cayuse
Cayuse
The Cayuse are a Native American tribe in the state of Oregon in the United States. The Cayuse tribe shares a reservation in northeastern Oregon with the Umatilla and the Walla Walla tribes as part of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation...
, who, holding responsible Dr. Whitman, in charge of the Presbyterian mission in their tribe, attacked and destroyed the mission, murdering Whitman and his wife and eleven others. The Catholic Bishop Brouillet, who was on his way at the time to confer with Whitman for the purchase of the mission property, was not molested but was allowed to bury the dead and then found opportunity to warn Spaulding in time for him to reach safety. In consequence of these troubles all the Presbyterian missions in the Columbia region were discontinued, but the work was resumed in later years, and a considerable portion of the Nez Percés are now of that denomination.
The Catholic work in the tribe was given in charge of the Jesuits, aided by the Sisters of Saint Joseph
Sisters of Saint Joseph
Sisters of Saint Joseph may refer to seven Roman Catholic congregations of women religious:* Religious Hospitaliers of St. Joseph* Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet* The Congregation of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Peace...
, and centering at St. Joseph's mission, Slickpoo, Idaho. For fifty years it was conducted by Fr. Joseph Cataldo,. S.J., who gave attention also to the neighbouring cognate tribes. The Catholic Indians were reported in the early 20th century at over 500.
Treaties and conflict
In 1855 they sold by treaty a large part of their territory. In the general outbreak of 1855-56, sometimes designated as the Yakima war, the Nez Percés, almost alone, remained friendly. In 1863, in consequence of the discovery of goldCalifornia Gold Rush
The California Gold Rush began on January 24, 1848, when gold was found by James W. Marshall at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California. The first to hear confirmed information of the gold rush were the people in Oregon, the Sandwich Islands , and Latin America, who were the first to start flocking to...
, another treaty was negotiated between another Nez Percés chief known as Lawyer (whose band had converted to Christianity and was now assimilating to white culture) and General Howard of the U.S. Army in which Lawyer surrendered all but the Lapwai reservation. Chief Joseph of the Wallowa band refused to sign the new treaty, stating that the Treaty of 1855 was promised to be the rule of law for "as long as the sun shines," protecting their home land from white intrusion. Since Nez Percés custom dictated that no single chief spoke for all others, when Joseph and others (including Toohoolhoolzote and Looking Glass) refused to sign the treaty, it was done so with the understanding that the U.S. Gov't was still bound by their original agreement, and that only Lawyer's band would be bound by the new treaty that only they signed.
However, General Howard gathered numerous other Nez Percés to make their "X" on the document so as to give the illusion that Joseph and the others had indeed signed the treaty. Thus, in the eyes of the U.S. government, they would also be subject to its terms.
Joseph steadfastly refused to be a party to the treaty or to its terms, only relenting when it became clear that the survival of his people depended on it. But as they made the arduous trek out of their home land and to the new reservation, a small group of young Nez Percés warriors broke off and murdered numerous white settlers along the Salmon River. These events were what set in motion the Nez Percés war (1877). After successfully holding in check for some months the regular troops and a large force of Indian scouts, Joseph, Looking Glass, and other chiefs conducted a retreat for over a thousand miles across the mountains but were finally intercepted and forced to surrender within a short distance of the Canadian frontier. Despite the promise that he should be returned to his own country, Joseph and the remnant of his band were deported to Oklahoma
Oklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
, where they wasted away so rapidly that in 1885 the few who survived were transferred to the Colville reservation in Washington. Throughout the entire retreat no outrage was committed by Joseph's warriors. The main portion of the tribe took no part in the war.
In 1893 those of Lapwai were given individual allotments, and the reservation was opened to white settlement.