It is necessary to preface all discussions of Shoshone Indians with a clarification of what is implied by the names attached to Shoshone subgroups. The commonly used appellation "Wind River Shoshone" implies no more than reservation membership. Thus, we also have "Owyhee Shoshone" and "Fort Hall Shoshone" (and Bannock). Wind River residents of admitted descent from other groups are also referred to as "Wind River people," if they are on the agency rolls. They were, of course, not known by this name or a native equivalent in the pre-reservation period. The names, "Eastern Shoshones" and "Eastern Snakes," by which the Shoshone of Wyoming are also known in anthropology, were first consistently applied by government officials during the 1850's and 1860's (cf. Lander, 1860, p. 131; Head, 1868, p. 179; Mann, 1869, p. 616). Lander also referred to the Eastern Shoshone as the "Wash-i-kee band of the Snake Indians" (Lander, 1859, p. 66). This term came into common use after Chief Washakie rose to prominence in the eyes of the whites.

Previous to this period the Eastern Shoshone were called Snakes and Shoshones (or variations thereof), indiscriminately. As has been mentioned, the only firm distinction was made according to whether or not the Indians in question owned horses and hunted buffalo. Although Lewis and Clark never visited the Wyoming lands, the tribal lists which they compiled at Fort Mandan before pushing west mention a group, said by Clark to be "Snake," called the "Cas-ta-ha-na" or "Gens de Vache" (Lewis and Clark, 1904-06, 6:102). They were said to number 500 lodges having a population of about 5,000 people. The Shoshone identity of this people is somewhat obscured by Clark's report of an affinity between their language and that of the Minitaree, but, on the other hand, they were said to "rove on a S. E. fork of the Yellow Rock River called Big Horn, and the heads of the Loup" (ibid.). The "Cas-ta-ha-na" are mentioned also during the return trip of the expedition. Lewis and Clark noted of the Big Horn River: "It is inhabited by a great number of roving Indians of the Crow Nation, the paunch Nation (a band of Crows) and the Castahanas (a band of Snake In.)." The editor of the journals, Reuben Thwaites, identifies the latter as "Comanche." (Ibid., 5:297.)

The paucity of boundary nomenclature found in the historical sources is continued in the ethnographic data, for the food-area terminology used by the Nevada and Idaho Shoshone is even more diffusely applied in Wyoming. One old Nevada Shoshone woman referred to the Eastern Shoshone as KwichundÖka, while a native of Wind River referred to his people as GwichundÖka, slight phonetic variants of the common term meaning "Buffalo eaters." This name appears in Hoebel (1938, p. 413) as Kutsindika. Hoebel also reports that the Idaho Shoshone referred to the Wyoming people as Pohogani, "Sage Brush Home" and Kogohoii, "Gut Eaters" (ibid.). (Hoebel's terms are here anglicized.)

Whatever names may be applied to identify the Shoshone of Wyoming, none refer to any sort of political group maintaining a stable territory. As Shimkin says (1947a, p. 246):

The identification of the Wind River Shoshone and their territory is not a simple matter. It is complicated by several facts. These people had no developed national or tribal sense; affiliation was fluid. Nor did they distinguish themselves by a special name. They merely knew that others called them ... Sage Brushers, ... Sage Brush Homes, or ... Buffalo Eating People. Furthermore, they felt no clear-cut distinctions of private or tribal territories.

One may speak of an eastern population of Shoshone Indians, but it would be inaccurate to speak of one Eastern Shoshone band, despite the fact that leadership was better developed in Wyoming than in other parts of Shoshone territory.

It is doubtful whether there was any accurate estimate of the Eastern Shoshone population until the post-reservation period. Burton (1861, p. 575) cited the no doubt exaggerated figure of 12,000 for the population led by Washakie. Forney numbers the total Shoshone population at 4,500 in 1859 (1860a, p. 733), while Doty raised this to 8,650 in 1863 (1865, p. 320). The more reliable estimate of 1,600 Eastern Shoshone was given by Agent Mann in 1869 (1870, p. 715), after the establishment of the Wind River reservation. This number was later reduced to 1,250 in official reports (Patten, 1878, p. 646). Kroeber has estimated the Wind River Shoshone population at 2,500 (1939, p. 137). These figures are not representative of earlier periods, for the ravages of smallpox and other new diseases made heavy inroads on the pre-treaty population, and it is probable that the population at the time of the treaty did not greatly exceed 1,500.

EASTERN SHOSHONE HISTORY: 1800-1875

According to Shoshone tradition, the winter camps of the Eastern Shoshone were in the valley of the Wind River, and their hunting territory extended north to Yellowstone Park and Cody and east to the Big Horn Mountains and beyond South Pass. Little is said by informants of excursions west of the Continental Divide, although historical evidence suggests that this was actually once their principal hunting grounds. In partial support of this contention, Shimkin says (1947a, p. 247): "The historical evidence gives some weight to the assumption that in 1835-1840 the Shoshones were mostly west of the Wind River Mountains." He also notes that hostilities between the Shoshone and Crow resulted in the westward withdrawal of the former again in the 1850's (ibid.). In an earlier article Shimkin also stated (1938, p. 415):

This [smallpox epidemics in the first half of the 19th century], and probably the increased aggressiveness of other Plains tribes with the spread of firearms as well, led to a recession of the Shoshone and their retreat to the west in the middle of the nineteenth century. A final wave of expansion onto the Plains came with white aid, following the treaty at Fort Bridger, July 3, 1868.

While agreeing in part with these conclusions, we would not confine the Shoshone restriction to the territory west of the Continental Divide to such limited periods. The following data suggest, rather, that "the heart of this people's territory," as Shimkin describes the Wind River country, did not extend west of the Wind River Range from at least 1800 until the reservation period and that the Shoshone, while frequently entering the Missouri River drainage, did so only for brief periods and usually in considerable fear of attack.

In Washington Irving's account of the Astoria party, one of our earliest reliable sources on the Wyoming Shoshone, the author tells how the Shoshone were pushed out of the Missouri River buffalo country after the North West and Hudson's Bay Companies put firearms in the hands of the Blackfoot (Irving, 1890, p. 197):

Thus by degrees the Snakes have become a scattered, broken-spirited, impoverished people, keeping about lonely rivers and mountain streams, and subsisting chiefly upon fish. Such of them as still possess horses and occasionally figure as hunters are called Shoshonies.

The westward-bound Astoria party traveled up the Wind River Valley in the middle of September, 1811, without sighting any Indians (ibid., pp. 199-200). This was exactly the time of year when, according to contemporary informants, the Shoshone buffalo party should have been gathering there. However, on the western side of the Wind River Range, they found "a party of Snakes who had come across the mountains on their autumnal hunting excursion to provide buffalo meat for the winter" (p. 202). In September of the following year, the eastward-bound party under Stuart encountered a party of "Upsarokas, or Crows" on the Bear River, who said that they intended to trade with the Shoshone (p. 289). This Crow party later ran off the trappers' horses. Throughout their trip to the Green River country, the trapping party was in continual fear of the Blackfoot (p. 298). Upon arriving on the Green River on October 17, 1812, they met a party of about 130 "Snakes" living in some 40 "wigwams" made of pine branches (p. 306). The ostensibly peaceful Crow had run off all but one of the horses of this camp and had stolen some women also. The Astoria chronicle, then, documents a situation that appears consistently in later sources: the Shoshone were usually encountered west of the Continental Divide and were continually on the defensive against powerful tribes to the east and north that seemingly entered their hunting grounds at will.

The activities of the early trappers in northern Utah and western Wyoming brought them into contact with a variety of Indian populations, not all of which are easily identifiable. This region is shown by the reports of the fur seekers to be characterized by a great fluidity of internal movement of Shoshone—and Bannock-speaking groups and by frequent entry by other tribes for purposes of war, trapping, and trade. The journal of J. P. Beckwourth gives a vivid, although not wholly reliable, account of the ebb and flow of population in the area under consideration. While camped near the east shore of the Great Salt Lake late in the year 1823, Beckwourth lost 80 horses to the "Punnaks [Bannocks], a tribe inhabiting the headwaters of the Columbia River" (Beckwourth, 1931, p. 60). His party pursued the Bannock to their village, some five days distant, and, after regaining part of the stolen herd, returned to camp to find some "Snake" (p. 61) (Shoshonean-speaking) Indians camped near by. He states that this group numbered 600 lodges and 2,500 warriors. The Indians were friendly and the locale was said to have been their winter camp (ibid.). Three years later, Beckwourth and his party were camped near the same site (today, Farmington, Utah) and encountered 16 Flathead Indians. Shortly thereafter the trappers were attacked by 500 mounted Blackfoot Indians, who were driven off (ibid., p. 66). Two days later, the fur party was joined by 4,000 Shoshone, who aided them in defeating another Blackfoot attack (pp. 70-71). (Beckwourth's population estimates are probably quite exaggerated.)

While Beckwourth's journals are poorly dated, it was no doubt during the late 1820's that his party was attacked near Salt River in western Wyoming by a body of unidentified Indians who, he claims, were 500 strong (p. 86). Shortly thereafter he fell in with friendly "Snake," or Shoshone, Indians. Near their camp were 185 Bannock lodges, with whose occupants the hunters had some difficulties (pp. 87-88). While in this vicinity, the camp of the trappers and the friendly Shoshone was attacked by a Blackfoot party, after which the trappers and Shoshone moved to the Green River (p. 89). At the Green River camp, the combined trapper-Shoshone group was visited by a party of Crow Indians. Beckwourth comments that "the Snakes and Crows were extremely amicable." Beckwourth reported further on Shoshone-Crow relations (p. 108):

At this time the Crows were incessantly at war with all the tribes within their reach, with the exception of the Snakes and the Flatheads and they did not escape frequent ruptures with them [over horses].

That this peace was extremely uneasy and manifestly ephemeral was clearly shown by later developments when the Shoshone, accompanied by some Ute, attacked a Crow trading party, which later mustered support and retaliated (pp. 183-184). However, at an even later date Beckwourth was able to report that 200 lodges of Shoshone had joined forces with the Crow, ostensibly because of the trading possibilities afforded by Beckwourth's presence among the latter (p. 249).

The relations between the Shoshone and Crow during the 1820's apparently were not much unlike those that prevailed at the time of the passages of the Astoria parties. The Crow, although not relentless enemies of the Shoshone, as were the Blackfoot, constituted a constant source of danger. Beckwourth's journals give evidence of amicable relations between the American trappers and the Shoshone, although he described the more bellicose Bannock as "very bad Indians, and very great thieves" (p. 87). Other sources document more serious difficulties with "Snake" Indians. Peter Skene Ogden reported in 1826 that the American trappers had suffered severe losses at the hands of the Snake Indians during the preceding three years (Simpson, 1931, p. 285), but these mishaps probably occurred in Idaho. In 1824, however, Jedediah Smith and Fitzpatrick lost all of their horses to the "Snakes" on the headwaters of the Green River (Alter, 1925, pp. 38-39; Dale, 1918, p. 91), and some members of Etienne Provot's trapping party were killed by "Snakes" in the winter of 1824-25 (Dale, 1918, p. 103).

Little information is available from the eastern side of the Wind River Mountains during the 1820's. We do know, however, that Ashley entrusted his horses to the Crow Indians on the Wind River before setting out for the mountains in the spring of 1824 (ibid., p. 89).

In 1831, an American Fur Company trapper, Warren Angus Ferris, noted that the two main Crow bands were located chiefly on the Yellowstone River and its tributaries, but their "war parties infest the countries of the Eutaws, Snakes, Arrapahoes, Blackfeet, Sious, and Chayennes" (Ferris, 1940, p. 305). He had this to say of the Eastern Shoshone (p. 310):

Of the Snakes on the plains there are probably about four hundred lodges, six hundred warriors, and eighteen hundred souls. They range in the plains of Green River as far as the Eut Mountains; southward from the source to the outlet of Bear River, of the Big Lake; thence to the mouth of Porto-nuf [Portneuf], on Snake River of the Columbia.... They are at war with the Eutaws, Crows, and Blackfeet, but rob and steal from all their neighbors.

Ferris saw few Indians in his travels through the Jackson Hole area in 1832 and 1833. However, in "Jackson's Little Hole," presumably at the south end of Hoback Canyon, he noted, in August, 1832, several large, abandoned camps, which he assumed were those of the "Grosventres of the prairies" (p. 158). The supposed Gros Ventre party was later seen on the Green River and was said to have consisted of 500 to 600 warriors (pp. 158-159). These may well have been Blackfoot, for Zenas Leonard reported a Blackfoot attack on the upper Snake River in western Wyoming in July, 1832 (Leonard, 1934, p. 51). The Indians most frequently sighted in the Green River region, however, were the Shoshone. In June, 1833, Ferris saw "several squaws scattered over the prairie engaged in digging roots" (Ferris, 1940, p. 205). These women apparently belonged to "some fifty or sixty lodges of Snakes, ... encamped about the fort [Bonneville's] who were daily exchanging their skins and robes, for munitions, knives, ornaments, etc., with the whites" (ibid., p. 206).

Further evidence of the virtual absence of the Shoshone from Missouri waters in the fur period comes from Zenas Leonard. When preparing to spend the winter of 1832-33 on the Green River, the trappers met a party of 70 to 80 Crow who said "they were going to war with the Snake Indians—whose country we were now in—and they said also they belonged to the Crow nation on the East side of the mountains" (Leonard, 1934, pp. 82-83). These Crow stole horses from the party, and the trappers pursued them to their village at the mouth of the Shoshone River, near modern Lovell, Wyoming. In the summer of 1834, Captain Bonneville's trappers, one of whom was Zenas Leonard, trapped on the waters of Wind River, but no mention is made of Shoshone (ibid., pp. 224-226). In October, however, they met the Crow in the Big Horn Basin, and they wintered on Wind River in their company (pp. 255-256). No Shoshone were reported in the area.

The Irving account of Captain Bonneville's adventures contains additional information on Eastern Shoshone settlement patterns. It is here also that we receive our first information on the Shoshone who later are known to us as the Dukarika and who inhabited the mountainous terrain of the Wind River Mountains and adjacent high country (Irving, 1850, p. 139). The journal also supplements Leonard's account of the trappers' sojurn in Wind River Valley, which, Irving wrote (1837, 2:17) was infested by Blackfoot and Crow Indians and was one of the favorite habitats of the latter (p. 22). One of the trapping party's members was taken captive by the Crow on the Popo Agie River, which flows past Lander, Wyoming, but was released unharmed (pp. 24-25). It is to be noted that the trappers were in the Wind River Valley at the end of September but saw no Shoshone, although this was approximately the time of the annual buffalo hunt. Upon leaving Wind River, Bonneville headed for the Sweetwater River, which, he stated, was beyond the limits of Crow country (p. 26). He then went to Hams Fork, a tributary of the Green River, and encountered a Shoshone encampment with the Fitzpatrick party (p. 27).

It is doubtful whether Shoshonean peoples hunted extensively east of the Continental Divide in the period following their eighteenth-century retreat from the northern Plains and before the disappearance of the buffalo west of the Rockies. Although the great herds of the Missouri drainage were not found in the lands inhabited by the Shoshone, it is quite possible that there were sufficient buffalo there to meet the needs of the population. Bonneville met a group of twenty-five mounted Bannock in the neighborhood of Soda Springs, Idaho, in November, 1833, and, at their invitation, joined them in a buffalo hunt there (p. 33). After taking sufficient meat, the Bannock returned to their winter quarters at the mouth of the Portneuf River (p. 35). The winter of 1834-35 again found Bonneville on the Bear River, this time on its upper reaches, where he made winter camp with "a small band of Shoshonies" (p. 210). Farther upstream was an encampment of "Eutaw" Indians, who were hostile to the Shoshone (p. 213). Bonneville, however, managed to prevent conflict between the two groups. One advantage of this winter camp, and a possible source of attraction for the Ute Indians, was the presence of antelope during the winter. Bonneville witnessed one successful "surround" by horsemen, aided in their efforts by supernatural charms reminiscent of Great Basin antelope drives (pp. 214-215).

Nathaniel Wyeth evidently saw few Shoshone in his travels through Wyoming, and his journals do not add greatly to our understanding of the area. He traveled from the Snake to the Green River in June and July, 1832, via the Teton country and mentioned no Shoshone except for a small encampment near Bonneville's post on the upper Green River (Wyeth, 1899, pp. 203-205). However, he reports that a white trapper was attacked in July, 1833, on the lower Wind River by a party of fifteen Shoshone who had left Green River shortly before (p. 207), and, in 1834, he found himself among "too many Indians ... for comfort or safety" while near Hams Fork, Wyoming (p. 225).

The journals of Osborne Russell provide documentation of population movements in Wyoming during the years 1834-1840. Despite the decline of the fur trade during this period, the area was still turbulent. In November, 1834, a party of trappers was reported as having arrived at Fort Hall, Nathaniel Wyeth's new post, after having been routed by the Blackfoot on Hams Fork (Russell, 1955, p. 8). The spring of 1835 took Russell to the west side of Bear Lake, where he found "about 300 lodges of Snake Indians" (p. 11) and in July of that year he encountered a small party of Shoshone hunting mountain sheep in Jackson Hole (p. 23). The lure of trade still attracted many other Indian groups into the Green River country during and preceding the time of the summer rendezvous. Russell reported an encampment of 400 lodges of Shoshone and Bannock and 100 of Flathead and Nez PercÉ on the Bear River above the mouth of Smith's Fork on May 9, 1836. The congregation was so large that it was forced to fragment in order to seek subsistence; all planned to return on July 1, when supplies were expected (p. 41). Russell spent the winter of 1840-41 with some 20 lodges of Shoshone in Cache Valley, Utah, and near Great Salt Lake (p. 112).

The general territorial situation had changed little by the end of the fur period. Wislizenus, who visited Wyoming in 1839, commented (1912, p. 76): "In the vicinity [of the Big Horn Mountains] live the Crows.... They often rove through the country between the Platte and the Sweet Waters, which are considered by the Indians as a common war ground." Tribes friendly to the Shoshone visited the week-long rendezvous on the Green River. Wislizenus notes that "of the Indians there had come chiefly Snakes, Flatheads, and Nez PercÉs, peaceful tribes, living beyond the Rocky Mountains" (p. 86).

The journal of Thomas J. Farnham, written in 1839, documents the growing economic difficulties of the Shoshone of the Wyoming-northern Utah area. In July of that year, Farnham received news that the Shoshone on the Bear River were "starving" and subject to the depredations of marauding Blackfoot and Siouan war parties (Farnham, 1906, p. 229). While on "Little Bear River" (a Bear River tributary), Farnham observed that, despite the present barrenness, he had heard that this area was formerly rich in buffalo and that game had abounded in the mountains (p. 233). Further indication of the growing poverty of the Shoshone country is seen in his comment that the Shoshone suffered less from enemy attacks because "the passes through which they enter the Snake country are becoming more and more destitute of game on which to subsist" (pp. 262-263).

Poverty, it would seem, did not bestow complete immunity upon the Shoshone of Wyoming nor did it entirely inhibit occasional forays against their enemies. Father De Smet, who was present at the Green River rendezvous in 1840, wrote that the "Snakes" were then preparing a war party against the Blackfoot (De Smet, 1906, 27:164). But by 1842, the Shoshone had other concerns than the traditionally hostile Blackfoot. Medorem Crawford noted that on July 23, 1842, the encampment of whites then situated near the Sweetwater River was joined by a party of over one hundred "Sues and Shians who had been to fight the Snakes" (Crawford, 1897, p. 13). The Shoshone had experienced previous armed encounters with Siouan groups to the east, but the pressure of the latter in these years was such that the Crow and Shoshone allied for defense against the powerful eastern tribes (Fremont, 1845, p. 146). The Crow, according to Fremont, had been present at the 1842 rendezvous on Green River (p. 50). Despite the alliance, Fremont regarded the Wind River Mountains as the eastern limit of Shoshone occupancy. He noted in 1843 that the Green River was twenty-five years earlier "familiarly known as the Seeds-ke-dee-agai, or Prairie Hen River; a name which it received from the Crows, to whom its upper waters belong" (p. 129), and both Farnham (1906, p. 261) and Russell (1921, pp. 144-146) placed the Shoshone no farther east than the Green River drainage in the years immediately preceding Fremont's observation.

Siouan aggressions continued over an indefinite period, for Bryant reported in June, 1846, that about 3,000 Sioux had collected at Fort Laramie preparatory to an attack against the Shoshone and Crow (Bryant, 1885, p. 107). Bryant and his companions informed the Shoshone of the impending raid when they arrived at Fort Bridger on July 17, 1846. The approximately 500 Shoshone assembled there broke camp immediately, presumably to organize a defense (pp. 142-143).

During the decade of the 1840's, accounts of the presence of Shoshone beyond the Continental Divide are found with increasing frequency. In 1842 W. T. Hamilton, while on the Little Wind River, noted that the trappers and the Shoshone were in continual jeopardy in this region because of "Blackfeet, Bloods, Piegans and Crows" (Hamilton, 1905, p. 52). Although his party was attacked by a Blackfoot group at this time, they sighted a Shoshone party shortly thereafter (p. 61) which was under the leadership of Chief Washakie (pp. 63-64). Other Shoshone joined this group, claiming that they had fought with Pend Oreille Indians near the Owl Creek Mountains on the north side of the Wind River Valley (p. 69). (The identification of this group may well have been erroneous in view of the northerly locale of the Pend Oreille.) The Shoshone met by Hamilton later gathered at Bull Lake to prepare an attack against the Blackfoot on the Big Wind River (p. 71); twenty "Piegans" were later encountered in the Owl Creek Range (p. 80).

These events apparently transpired in the late spring or early summer of 1842, for summer found Washakie's people at Fort Bridger (p. 92), and later at Brown's Hole on the Green River in northwestern Colorado where a "few Ute and Navajos came up on their annual visit with the Shoshone, to trade and to race horses." The Shoshone left for their fall trapping in September (p. 97), but some were there in winter camp when Hamilton's party returned to Brown's Hole to winter (p. 118).

Hamilton's later travels took him on a buffalo hunt into the Big Horn Basin with Washakie in October, 1843 (p. 182). At "Stinking Water" (Shoshone River) the party encountered Crow Indians on their way to visit the Shoshone (p. 183). The buffalo-hunting group returned to the Green River in November for the winter (p. 186). At this time Hamilton noted that Washakie claimed the Big Horn country as far as the Yellowstone River, but that the Crow, Flathead, and Nez PercÉ hunted upon it and it was regarded as neutral hunting ground by other tribes (p. 187). October, 1848, again found Hamilton in the Big Horn country, where he met a party of Shoshone in the Big Horn Mountains (p. 197). The group was in pursuit of a Cheyenne war party that had stolen horses from them; the offenders were overtaken on the North Platte River and the horses were recovered (p. 198). Hamilton was informed that Washakie was then on Greybull Creek, but planned to move to the Shoshone River (p. 199).

Further information on the activities of the Shoshone east of the Continental Divide comes from Bryant, who, on July 14, 1846, sighted near Green River (Bryant, 1885, p. 136):

... a party of some sixty or eighty Shoshone or Snake Indians, who were returning from a buffalo hunt to the east of the South Pass. The chief and active hunters of the party were riding good horses. The others, among whom were some women, were mounted generally upon animals that appeared to have been nearly exhausted by fatigue. These, besides carrying their riders, were freighted with dried buffalo meat, suspended in equal divisions of bulk and weight from straps across the back. Several pack animals were loaded entirely with meat and were driven along as we drive pack mules.

The apparent increase in the use of the Wind River Valley and adjacent areas was in part a result of Crow amity in the face of a common enemy, but it can also be explained in terms of the Shoshone need to seek their winter store of buffalo meat regardless of dangers. The buffalo herds west of the Continental Divide were greatly diminished by 1840, and, by the end of the decade, the intrusion of emigrants must have decimated the remaining stock. As early as 1842, Fremont commented that he saw no buffalo beyond South Pass (Fremont, 1845, p. 63), and in 1849 Major Osborne Cross observed that "scarcely any were to be met with this side of the South Pass" (Cross, 1851, p. 178). The Major later wrote (p. 182):

Game in this section of the country is scarce, compared with the ranges passed over on the route. We had now gone nearly through the whole buffalo range, as but few are now met with on Bear River. Fifteen years ago they were to be seen in great numbers here, but have been diminishing greatly since that time.

Despite periodic forays to the east, the report of Indian Agent Wilson of Fort Bridger in 1849 indicates that the generally recognized area of Shoshone occupancy was substantially unchanged (J. Wilson, 1849, p. 1002):

Their claim of boundary is to the east from the Red Buttes [near Casper, Wyoming], on the North Fork of the Platte, to its head in the Park, De-cay-a-que or Buffalo Bull-pen, in the Rocky Mountains; to the south, across the mountains, over to the Yam pa pa, till it enters Green or Colorado River; and then across to the Back bone or ridge of mts. called the Bear River mountains, running nearly due west towards the Salt Lake, so as to take in most of the Salt Lake, and thence on to the Sinks of Mary's or Humboldt River; thence north to the fisheries on the Snake river, in Oregon and thence south (their northern boundary) to the Red Buttes, including the source of Green River.

Joseph Lane, the Superintendent of Indian Affairs in Oregon territory also wrote in that year that "the Shoshonee or Snake Indians inhabit a section of country west of the Rocky mountains, from the summit of these mountains north along Wind river mountains to Henry's fork...." (Lane, 1857, p. 158).

Continuing reference to the presence of Shoshone east of the Continental Divide is found in reports dating from the 1850's, although the Green River country continued as the central area of Eastern Shoshone occupation. Indian Agent Holeman sought to bring the Shoshone to a treaty conference at Fort Laramie in 1851 and reported (Holeman, 1852, p. 445):

... met the village assembled on Sweet Water, about fifty miles east of the South pass. On the 21st of August I had a talk with them, which resulted in their selecting sixty of their headmen, fully authorized to act for the whole tribe....

In September, 1852, Brigham Young arranged a peace conference between the Ute and Shoshone. The Mormon governor reported (Young, 1852, p. 438):

I then asked the Shoshones how they would like to have us settle upon their lands at Green River. They replied that the land at Green River did not belong to them; that they lived and inhabited in the vicinity of the Wind River chain of mountains and the Sweet River (or Sugar Water, as they called it), but that if we would make a settlement on Green River they would be glad to come to trade with us.

Difficulties soon developed between the Mormons and the Indians on Green River (Holeman, 1858, pp. 159-160). The report of Lieutenant Fleming of Fort Laramie in 1854 suggests that the Shoshone had not relinquished the Green River country to the Mormon colonists, despite Young's claim (H. B. Fleming, 1858, p. 167):

The mountain men have wives and children among the Snake Indians, and therefore claim the right to the Green River country, in virtue of the grant given them by the Indians, to whom the country belongs, as no treaty has yet been made to extinguish their title.

The Morehead narrative in Connelley's edition of the Doniphan expedition notes that some two or three thousand Shoshone were camped on the Green River in the summer of 1857; Chief Washakie was present at this encampment (Connelley, 1907, p. 607). And Alter's biography of James Bridger states that in the winter of 1857-58 "Chief Washakie and two thousand Shoshone tribesmen at the crossing of the Green had no particular difficulty that winter" (Alter, 1925, p. 303). Forney, in June, 1858, wrote of his plans to establish the Shoshone "under Chief Wash-A-Kee" on the tributaries of the Green River (Forney, 1860b, p. 45) and reported that the group was located on that river in May, 1858 (Forney, 1859, p. 564).

Albert H. Campbell, General Superintendent of the Pacific Wagon Roads, wrote in 1859 that the Shoshone were restricted to the area west of the Rockies (1859, p. 8):

The Snakes have received very little attention hitherto from the authorities of the United States, and frequent wars with their powerful neighbors, the Blackfeet and Crows, have compelled them in a manner to withdraw from the buffalo range and keep within the mountain fastnesses, where they derive a scanty subsistence from roots and the smaller game.

The total context of historical material indicates, however, that the Shoshone were hunting buffalo on the eastern side of the Continental Divide during this period and, in so doing, were following a pattern of transmontane hunting familiar to us among the Plateau tribes. Forney wrote in September, 1858 (1859, p. 564):

I have heretofore spoken of a large tribe of Indians known as the Snakes. They claim a large tract of country lying in the eastern part of this Territory, but are scarcely ever found upon their own land.

They generally inhabit the Wind River country, in Oregon and Nebraska Territories, and they sometimes range as far east as Fort Laramie, in the latter Territory. Their principal subsistence is the buffalo, and it is for the purpose of hunting them that they range so far east of their own country. This tribe numbers about twelve hundred souls, all under one principal chief, Wash-a-kee. He has perfect command over them, and is one of the finest looking and most intellectual Indians I ever saw.

The duration of the previously mentioned peaceful interlude between the Crow and the Shoshone of Wyoming cannot be accurately determined. However, Lander reported them at war in 1858 (1859, p. 49):

The Crow and Shoshonee Indians having broken out into open war in the north, did not permit of my risking or exposing the large stock of mules of the expedition at the camp selected as the wintering ground of last year's expedition, on Wind River.

Lander encountered Washakie and "the whole of the great tribe of the eastern Shoshonees" hunting antelope on the headwaters of the Green River (p. 68). The Shoshone spent the winter on Wind River but "the last account from them say they are in a starving condition; they are at war with the Crows, and are afraid to go out to hunt for game" (p. 69). The Shoshone had fought with the Crow on October 27, 1858, which had probably prevented them from attempting the fall buffalo hunt. They apparently undertook a hunt during the following spring, for Will H. Wagner, an engineer on the South Pass wagon road, observed in May of 1859 that only a few Shoshone lodges were found on Green River, the main body still being in the Wind River Valley (Wagner, 1861, p. 25).

In February, 1860, Lander wrote a summary of Eastern Shoshone territorial use as of 1859 (1860, pp. 121-122):

The Eastern Snakes range from the waters of Wind river or latitude 43° 30' on the north and from the South Pass to the headwaters of the North Platte on the east, and to Bear river near the mouth of Smith's Fork on the west. They extend south as far as Brown's Hole on Green River. Their principal subsistence is the roots and seeds of the wild vegetables of the region they inhabit, the mountain trout, with which all the streams of the country are abundantly supplied, and wild game. The latter is now very scarce in the vicinity of the new and old emigrant roads.

The immense herds of antelope I remember having seen along the route of the new road in 1854 and 1857 seem to have disappeared. These Indians visit the border ground between their own country and the Crows and Blackfeet for the purpose of hunting Elk, Antelope and stray herds of buffalo. When these trips are made they travel only in large bands for fear of the Blackfeet and Crows. With the Bannacks and parties of Salt Lake Diggers they often make still longer marches into the northwestern buffalo ranges on the head waters of the Missouri and Yellow Stone.

These excursions usually last over winter, the more western Indians who join them passing over a distance of twelve hundred miles on the out and return journey.

Under the leadership of Washakie, which dates from approximately the beginning of the period of heavy emigration to the Far West, the Shoshone of Wyoming had maintained amicable relations with the whites. The early 1860's, however, saw increased clashes between Indians and whites in the Bear River country and in southern Idaho. While the activities of Chief Pocatello's band and of other hostile groups will be further discussed in the section on Idaho, it would be well at this point to clarify relations between Washakie's followers and the people of Bear River. It is impossible to differentiate a Wyoming group as distinct from the Shoshone of Bear River in earlier periods, and, in view of the presence of buffalo in the country of the Green and Bear rivers until at least 1840, it is more than probable that southwestern Wyoming, northern Utah, and southeastern Idaho were common grounds roamed over by several nomadic hunting groups. Lander recognized the affinity between the areas, although he distinguished Washakie's Eastern Shoshone from the Utah residents on the basis of their respective relations with the whites (Lander, 1860, pp. 122-123):

The Salt Lake Diggers intermarry with the Eastern Snakes and are on good terms with them.

Among these Indians [the "Salt Lake Diggers"] are some of the worst in the mountains. Washakie will not permit a horse thief or vagabond to remain in his band, but many of the Mormon Indians go about the country with minor chiefs calling themselves Eastern Snakes.

Old Snag, a chief sometimes seen on Green River, who proclaims himself an Eastern Snake, and friend of the Americans, is of this class....

Southern Indians pass, on their way "to buffalo," (a technical term,) through the lands of the Eastern Snakes and Bannocks, and the latter are often made to bear the blame of their horse-stealing proclivities.

Doty reported depredations on the road between Fort Laramie and Salt Lake City in 1862 (Doty, 1863, pp. 342, 355), and in the following year the Army attacked a large number of the hostiles on Bear River and inflicted very severe losses on them (War of the Rebellion, 1902, pp. 185-187). Doty reported from Box Elder, Utah, on July 30 of the same year (ibid., p. 219):

A treaty of peace was this day concluded at this place by Gen. Connor [who led the Bear River attack] and myself with the bands of the Shoshones, of which Pocatello, San Pitch and Sagwich are the principal chiefs.

Earlier, on July 2, 1863, a treaty was entered into at Fort Bridger between Doty and the bands of "Waushakee," "Shauwuno," "Tibagan," "Peoastoagah," "Totimee," "Ashingodimah," "Sagowitz," "Oretzimawik," "Bazil," and "Sanpitz" (Doty, 1865, p. 319). Doty noted at this time that the Shoshone "claim their ... eastern boundary on the crest of the Rocky mountains; but it is certain that they, as well as the Bannacks, hunt buffalo below the Three Forks of the Missouri, and on the headwaters of the Yellowstone" (p. 318). Doty continued (pp. 318-319):

As none of the Indians of this country have permanent places of abode, in their hunting excursions they wander over an immense region, extending from the fisheries at and below Salmon Falls, on the Shoshone [Snake] river, near the Oregon line, to the sources of that stream and to the Buffalo country beyond....

The Shoshonees and Bannocks are the only nations which, to my knowledge hunt together over the same ground.

The Shoshone continued to hunt beyond the mountains after the Fort Bridger treaty. Superintendent Irish reported in September, 1864, that the "Shoshonees" were at Bear Lake awaiting their payment and were impatient to "go to their winter hunting grounds on Wind River" (Irish, 1865, p. 314). Three hundred Cheyenne lodges were reported in Wind River Valley in May, 1865, but the group subsequently withdrew to the "Sweetwater mountains and thence to Powder River" (Coutant, 1899, 1:440). In September, 1865, Irish reported that the Shoshone frequented the Wind River country and the headwaters of the North Platte and Missouri rivers (Irish, 1866, p. 311). The Superintendent described the pattern of movement that had become established (ibid.):

Their principal subsistence is the buffalo, which they hunt during the fall, winter, and spring, on which they subsist during that time, and return in the summer to Fort Bridger and Great Salt Lake City.

Agent Luther Mann of Fort Bridger added (1865, p. 327):

They spend about eight months of the year among the Wind River mountains and in the valley of the Wind River, Big Horn and Yellowstone....

The Shoshonees are friendly with the Bannacks, their neighbor on the north ... but are hostile toward the tribes on their eastern boundaries, viz: Sioux, Arapahoes, Cheyennes, and Crows.

Mann observed that the Eastern Shoshone numbered some 150 lodges. However, he also noted that Washakie claimed to be too weak to fight his enemies. In his next year's report, Mann wrote that on September 20, 1865, the Shoshone set out from Fort Bridger for the Wind River and Popo Agie valleys where they hunted buffalo, deer, elk, and mountain sheep and passed the winter. Only five to ten lodges remained on Green River for the winter (ibid., p. 126).

The Shoshone had some difficulty with hostile tribes during their hunts in the Wind River Valley. The battle of Crowheart Butte (near Crowheart, Wyoming) has become a legend on the Wind River Reservation, and the facts of the event have become well embellished. More reliable informants claim that the Crow were encamped at the present site of Kinnear, Wyoming, on the north side of Big Wind River and were driven out after a strong attack by the Shoshone. The Crow detachment was evidently not merely a war party, for the men were accompanied by their women and children. Hebard, using documentary material unavailable to the writers, places the date of this battle as March, 1866 (Hebard, 1930, p. 151). There is no further mention in the sources of Crow occupation of the Wind River Valley.

This was not the end of the Shoshones' troubles, however, for in the following year (1867), Indian Agent Mann noted (1868, p. 182):

Immediately after the distribution of their annuity goods last year, they left this agency for their hunting grounds in the Popeaugie [Popo Agie River, near Lander, Wyo.] and Wind River valleys, the only portion of the country claimed by them where they can obtain buffalo.

Early last spring the near approach of hostile Sioux and Cheyennes compelled them to leave before they could prepare their usual supply of dried meat for summer use.

Mann further reported that, after being paid the annuity on June 8, 1867, "they have since gone to the valley of the Great Salt Lake, as is usual with them, preparatory to their return to their hunting grounds in autumn" (p. 183). These accounts further document the manner in which the Utah and Wyoming populations merged.

The Sioux were apparently especially active east of the Wind River Range in these years and many other attacks were reported. The Shoshone went to Wind River in 1868 and were again attacked by the Sioux. Agent Mann reported that year that a few small bands of Shoshone had not hunted buffalo in two years for fear of attack (Mann, 1869, pp. 616-618).

The government had a good deal of difficulty in persuading the Shoshone to remain on the reservation established by the treaty of 1868. Captain J. H. Patterson, the new agent, wrote in 1869 (1870, p. 717): "So powerful are the Sioux, it is only after winter is far advanced, and from that time until early in the spring, that the Shoshones can remain on the reservation." They passed the winter of 1868-69 at Wind River, but the Sioux attacked on April 26, 1869, before they broke winter camp (J. A. Campbell, 1870, p. 173). On September 14, 1869, Siouan warriors attempted another foray into Wind River Valley but were repulsed by troops. Fearful of another early attack and wary of their new reservation co-residents, the Northern Arapaho and Washakie left Wind River at the end of April of the following year (1870). The Shoshone departed with little stored meat, since they were unable to pursue the buffalo far out on the prairie (G. W. Fleming, 1871, p. 643).

In the following years, we hear little of the hunting activities of the Shoshone. They were moved permanently to the Wind River Reservation, where, according to Agent James Irwin in 1873, they showed a strong desire to abandon their nomadic ways and to learn agriculture (Irwin, 1874, p. 612). Irwin claimed that, although the Bannock population of the "Shoshone and Bannock Agency" at Wind River was transferred in 1872 to Fort Hall, 216 still unsettled Shoshone had expressed intent in the following year to move to Wind River. The Shoshone experienced little success in their early attempts at farming, and the government food allotments were seldom adequate to last through the year. This, combined with the traditional value placed on the buffalo hunt, perpetuated the nomadic pattern for a number of years. As late as 1877, Agent Patten wrote (1878, p. 605):

During the month of October last [1876], while the Shoshones were on one of their annual hunts, the village became divided; Washakie, with the greater portion, struck across the country from the base of the Sierra Shoshone Mountains to the mouth of Owl Creek on Big Wind River; the smallest party, under two braves named Na-akie and Ta-goon-dum, started for the river above the mouth of Grey Bull, where having arrived the prospect of a successful hunt was propitious. Large herds of buffalo were everywhere in sight; but the next morning after their arrival this little band, comprising men, women, and children, were suddenly attacked by Dull Knife's band of hostile Cheyenne warriors.

The Plains were evidently still unsafe, and hunting parties traveled in strength. But the end of the buffalo period was not far off, for hide-hunters and settlers had already made massive inroads on the herds, and the open-range cattle-raising industry had begun. It is interesting to note, however, that the itinerary followed in 1876 was much the same as that related by Shimkin's informants and by ours. Except for that given in the one account by Hamilton, it has no antecedents in the historical literature.

EARLY RESERVATION PERIOD

Wind River Shoshone informants speak little of activities west of the Continental Divide and tend to place their early economic life almost entirely in the Missouri drainage. This is not surprising when it is considered that eighty-six years had passed between the signing of the Fort Bridger treaty of July 3, 1868, establishing the reservation, and the field work reported here. Almost seventy years had elapsed between that date and Shimkin's 1937-1938 field work. That informants have a one-dimensional view of earlier periods in Shoshone history may well be expected. The type of data that deals with locales and events, the movements of peoples and situational adaptation is history of a different kind from the traditional cultural material with which anthropologists usually work. It would be an understatement to say that it would tax the memory of any human being to ask exactly where and when his people hunted many years before he was born. One of the oldest living Shoshone, for example, responded to our question about the location of the chief's lodge in the camp by saying that the chiefs lived in log cabins near the Agency. And even this was quite a mnemonic feat.

Most of the following data was obtained from informants and pertains primarily to the early reservation period. Even for such a relatively late time, the information is not wholly reliable and is often vague and fragmentary. Certain aspects of these data are perpetuated in Wind River tradition, however, and are valid for even earlier periods than the one discussed. These concern the yearly economic cycle, the rhythm of movement from buffalo prairies to the mountains, the coalescence and fragmentation of social groups, the types of fish and game taken and the technology involved—cultural facts not immediately linked to situational, historical factors. These comments on reliability of informants' data should be borne in mind throughout the account below.

The stable center of Eastern Shoshone settlement pattern was the winter camp. All informants agreed that the chief winter camps were in the valleys of the Big and Little Wind rivers, in the region of the present Diversion Dam and Fort Washakie, respectively. There they were protected from winter storms, and the winds blew enough snow from the ground to allow the horses to graze. In the bottomlands by the streams they found water and firewood and enjoyed the protection of the cottonwood trees. In the period before the ending of intertribal hostilities in Wyoming camps were closely clustered to allow for mutual defense in the event of an attack, but after the pacification of the area, people pitched their tipis farther apart. Although never safe from attack, the Shoshone had greater security during the winter, since the cold and snows made their enemies relatively immobile also.

Winter residence at Wind River was not obligatory. Smaller groups were said to camp on the western slope of the Wind River Mountains, in the vicinity of Pinedale, and others remained near Fort Bridger. Contemporary informants gave no confirmation of Shimkin's statement that a group of Shoshone, under Washakie, customarily wintered in the Absaroka Mountain foothills on the head of the Grey Bull River (Shimkin, 1947a, p. 247). Also, Shimkin's chart, which shows that Shoshone occasionally spent the winter in the Powder and Sweetwater River valleys (p. 279), probably indicates the true situation only for the period after the area became secure from attack, in the 1870's. All of these locales would be highly vulnerable to hostiles, as was the Wind River Valley in the pre-reservation era, and it is highly probable that Shimkin's informants spoke of post-reservation events and not of a traditional pattern.

Subsistence during the winter was gained chiefly from the stored yield of the fall buffalo hunt. The meat was dried and pounded and placed in large rawhide bags. True pemmican was not manufactured, although the pulverized buffalo meat was mixed with dried roots and berries preparatory to being eaten.

Stores frequently ran low towards the end of winter, and some hardship resulted. However, the stored food was supplemented by elk which had been driven out of the mountains by snow, and by antelope and deer meat. Rabbits were also snared.

Some informants stated that the Shoshone went into winter camp as early as October. Others, however, reported that the winter camp was made as late as December. It would seem that November to December are the more probable times. Support for this date is found in Shimkin (1947a, p. 279).

The winter camp broke up in February or March, and the spring buffalo hunt was then launched. This was a collective venture, as opposed to the sporadic and individual hunting that went on during the winter. Informants were extremely vague in saying whether all the winter camp went on the spring hunt together or whether they broke up into parties. Shimkin states that the Shoshone split into four bands when buffalo hunting (p. 247). Some of my own informants, however, said that all hunted in one group under Washakie. Others said that there were several chiefs, and each took his people where he chose.

The buffalo in springtime were not of good quality, and the lean, tough meat was considered very inferior to the fat meat obtained in the fall. Informants said that the chief purpose of the spring hunt was to obtain hides for tipis (and all the other uses to which buffalo hide was put) and to get fresh meat. The spring hunt was generally pursued in the Big Horn Basin, although there were buffalo in the Wind River Valley itself, which were also hunted. Although the former locale is most frequently mentioned, it should be assumed that the migratory habits of the buffalo imposed some variability.

After the spring hunt, the Shoshone reconvened in Wind River Valley and in June held their Sun Dance. This was a period of general gathering and involved visits of people from other areas.

After the Sun Dance was concluded, the participants withdrew from the valley lands and retired to the Green River country and the mountains until the autumn buffalo hunt. At this time, the larger buffalo-hunt and Sun Dance group broke into small units and scattered in several directions. Shimkin maps some of the trails followed by the summer hunting parties (p. 249). Although there was considerable deviation from the trails he indicates, they show a penetration of the Yellowstone and Jackson Hole country, the Owl Creek Mountains, and the Green River and Bear River regions.

Shimkin's chart of the yearly subsistence cycle shows June and July as a period of intertribal rendezvous while August and early September were spent in family groups (p. 279). My informants indicated that small groups of families were the essential social and economic units from June to September; the trade rendezvous held in the Green River country ended by 1840. Some Shoshone said the summer group consisted of only one tipi, while others claimed that this was a post-reservation pattern. In earlier times, it was said, the need for security from attack caused groups of from six to ten tipis (this figure is highly uncertain) to travel together. These summer groups were probably the most stable and cohesive units in Eastern Shoshone society, although there was a good deal of interchange of members.

Although each summer group often followed the same general route every year, other groups could and did hunt this territory. There was no sense of group or band ownership of the lands habitually visited, and a group could alter or change its route. In June many people went to the Sweetwater region and across South Pass to hunt antelope. Antelope were also hunted at various times of the year north of Wind River on the benches at the foot of the Owl Creek Range and in the Green River country. In the latter area, the Eastern Shoshone were frequently joined in September by Shoshone and Bannock from Idaho.

There were several routes to the Jackson Hole and Yellowstone country. The Yellowstone does not seem to have been visited as frequently before the final pacification of the area, owing, no doubt, to the proximity of Crow and Blackfoot. Some groups followed the most direct route—through the Wind River Valley and across Togwatee Pass (the present route of U. S. Highway 287). Others hunted first in the Owl Creek Mountains and then crossed west into the Wind River Valley at Dubois and thence through Togwatee Pass. Still another route led through the "Rough Trail," now called Washakie Pass, in the Wind River Range and gave access to the Pinedale area and the western slope of the range. From that point, groups hunted in this immediate region or went northwest to Jackson Hole or south to the Fort Bridger area. Any one of these routes could be used for the return to Wind River and the subsequent fall buffalo hunt, but there was a tendency to return by a different trail than that used on the outward trip.

Summer subsistence activities were varied, but none called for extensive coÖperation beyond the immediate family or the small summer group. Antelope hunting west of the Continental Divide called for some joint endeavor, though not on the scale of the buffalo hunt. Moose and elk were hunted by smaller parties in the high mountain parks and forests of the Wind River, Grand Teton, and Owl Creek Mountains. The last range was especially noted for a plentiful supply of mountain sheep. Deer were killed and rabbits were taken throughout the year. Sage hens were snared in the spring, and duck were killed on Bull Lake in Wind River Valley in the fall. After 1840, there were almost no buffalo left on the west side of the Wind River Range, although before that time they were pursued there by the Shoshone. However, the Wind River Valley abounded in buffalo until relatively late, for the worst excesses of the white hide-hunters did not begin until after the Civil War. Buffalo were also killed in the Owl Creek and Wind River foothills and were taken also in Jackson Hole and Yellowstone Park. Also, a smaller variety of buffalo, called timber buffalo, which did not follow the migratory pattern of the larger Plains type, was killed in the high mountain parks.

Fish were of fundamental importance, especially, according to Shimkin (1947a, p. 268), during the spring. Mountain trout were the main fish; the Eastern Shoshone did not join their colinguists in salmon fishing on the Columbia waters, at least during this later period. Shimkin specifically states that "no private ownership of good fishing places existed, and dams and weirs were not maintained from year to year" (ibid.). This accords with our own field data.

Summer economic activities involved little estensive coÖperation and, since game was scattered through the mountains rather than concentrated in large herds, the small groups of families were the most effective economic units. It is significant in this connection that, as soon as the security of the country was guaranteed by the presence of the whites, the one-or two-tipi summer camp displaced its somewhat larger predecessor. Game in the pre-treaty period was plentiful in the Wyoming mountains and a single family or small group of tipis could gain adequate subsistence; the principal reason for larger gatherings in the summer was defense. The yield probably became better after camp groups became smaller, for locales were not hunted out as rapidly.

The only economic activity other than the buffalo hunt which called for the coÖperation of a large group of men was antelope hunting. Antelope were usually surrounded by the hunters and run in circles by relays of mounted men. Unlike the Nevada population, the Eastern Shoshone did not build brush corrals or employ antelope shamans.

Women's economic life could be pursued by individuals. In addition to cooking, dressing skins, and other household chores, women's efforts provided all the vegetable foods consumed by the Shoshone. This activity went on from summer into fall. Various berries were collected; gooseberries, currants, buffalo berries, and chokecherries being the most important. All these berries grew near streams and ripened about August. Gooseberries and chokecherries can be found in the mountains and foothills while buffalo berries and currants grow in the lower valleys. The berries were dried and stored for future use.

Roots, also, were a valuable adjunct to the diet. Yamp, the principal root, was found in the mountains. Bitterroot was dug on prairie hills, wild potatoes were found in the foothills, and the wild onion grew in the valley floors. Although special trips were not made to root grounds (in contrast to the congregations for camas in Idaho) the women dug them out with pointed sticks near favorable hunting camps. One informant spoke, for example, of the rich yamp grounds in the Big Horn Mountains. All the women of the camp group went out together to dig roots. This was for purposes of companionship; each woman dug and kept her own tubers.

In September, the scattered camp groups reunited at Wind River for the fall buffalo hunt. The buffalo was a critical factor in Wind River subsistence, for it provided the margin of survival through the long winter. The Eastern Shoshone were frequently joined in the buffalo hunt by other Shoshone from the Bear River country and, less often, by Shoshone and Bannock from Idaho. The last two groups usually hunted buffalo in Montana with certain Plateau tribes, and their routes did not usually coincide. Informants uniformly said that all the Eastern Shoshone went out to hunt buffalo together, and Shimkin (1947a, p. 280) states that "in full strength, often with Bannocks or others accompanying them, they would cross the Wind River Range" for the fall hunt. It seems certain that, insofar as they may have penetrated far north into the Big Horn Basin, numerical strength was necessary during the immediate pre-reservation period and shortly thereafter.

As the buffalo camp moved out on the range, scouts were sent ahead to locate the herds. The actual techniques used by hunters were much the same as among the Plains tribes. Ideally, two horses were used, one for riding within reach of the herd, the other a swift horse trained to run close to the buffalo while avoiding the animal's horns. The herd was surrounded and run, and the flanking hunters shot arrows and launched spears at the prey. When a buffalo was killed, the hunter threw an arrow or some personal, identifying possession on the carcass to mark it as his.

This was apparently the main technique for buffalo hunting. They were not stampeded over cliffs, as was the practice of some Indian tribes. One informant said that Chief Washakie would not permit it for reasons of conservation. Occasionally, hunters on foot stalked and killed buffalo with the bow and arrow, but such activities did not take place during the communal hunts.

When on the fall hunt, individual hunters did not attack the herds, for the animals might stampede for long distances after only one or two were killed. The fall hunt was organized coÖperatively, but informants denied the existence of the typical Plains police, or soldier, societies or any comparable form of institutionalized discipline to prevent individual hunting.

The time spent in the fall hunt, including travel, appears to have been about two months—from mid-September to mid-November. Meat and hides were prepared by the women and packed back to winter camp. Shimkin doubts the efficiency of the buffalo hunt (1947a, p. 266). If it is assumed that each family had from five to ten horses, three of which were needed to drag the tipi and utensil-loaded travois and three for riding, only two horses were, according to his reasoning, available for packing. Since one would be loaded with hides for trade, only one was available for carrying meat. The supply carried was sufficient for no more than twenty days, Shimkin concludes.

The mounted buffalo hunters were not the only Shoshone inhabitants of Wyoming, and one more group remains to be discussed. In the mountain chain extending from the Wind River Range northwest to the Teton and Gros Ventres ranges and northward into Yellowstone lived a Shoshone population known as the Dukarika, or Sheepeaters. These Dukarika are not to be confused with a Shoshone population of the same name in the mountains of Idaho. The two were socially and geographically separate; their common name is due only to the fact that there were mountain sheep in the habitats of both. The name thus has no more significance in terms of political organization than do the food names applied to Shoshone living in certain areas of Nevada and Idaho.

There is little documentary information on the Dukarika, and contemporary Wind River informants knew very little about them. Our earliest reference to these secluded people is found in Bonneville's journals, when, in September, 1833, three Indians were sighted in the Wind River Range. Irving writes (1850, p. 139):

Captain Bonneville at once concluded that these belonged to a kind of hermit race, scanty in number, that inhabit the highest and most inaccessible fastnesses. They speak the Shoshone language and probably are offsets from that tribe, though they have peculiarities of their own, which distinguish them from all other Indians. They are miserably poor, own no horses, and are destitute of every convenience to be derived from an intercourse with the whites. Their weapons are bows and stone-pointed arrows, with which they hunt the deer, the elk, and the mountain sheep. They are to be found scattered about the countries of the Shoshone, Flathead, Crow, and Blackfeet tribes; but their residences are always in lonely places, and the clefts of rocks.

Osborne Russell, when trapping in Lamar Valley in Yellowstone Park in July, 1835, observed (1955, p. 26):

Here we found a few Snake Indians comprising six men, seven women, and eight or ten children who were the only inhabitants of this lonely and secluded spot. They were all neatly clothed in dressed deer and sheep skins of the best quality and seemed to be perfectly contented and happy.

The Indians had "about thirty dogs on which they carried their skins, clothing, provisions, etc., on their hunting excursions. They were well armed with bows and arrows pointed with obsidian" (ibid.). Russell also saw other "Mountain Snakes" near the headwaters of the Shoshone River (ibid., p. 64). Speaking of the Dukarika, Hiram Chittenden says (1933, p. 8):

It was a humble branch of the Shoshone family which alone is known to have dwelt in the region of Yellowstone Park. They were called Tuakuarika, or more commonly Sheepeaters. They were found in the park country at the time of its discovery, and had doubtless long been there. The Indians were veritable hermits of the mountains, utterly unfit for warlike contention, and seem to have sought immunity from their dangerous neighbors by dwelling among the inaccessible fastnesses of the mountains.

Chittenden continues:

We-Saw [an Indian who accompanied Capt. Jones in 1873] states that he had neither knowledge nor tradition of any permanent occupants of the Park save the timid Sheepeaters.... He said that his people [Shoshone], the Bannocks, and the Crows, occasionally visited the Yellowstone Lake and River.

Captain W. A. Jones, when on his 1873 expedition to Yellowstone Park, commented that one of the Indians with him, a Sheepeater, knew the route back to Wind River (Jones, 1875, p. 39). Beyond these few citations, the Sheepeaters are almost unmentioned.

In contrast to the previously described Shoshone, the Dukarika traveled mostly on foot, although a very few had horses. They hunted timber buffalo near the mountain lakes and killed elk, deer, and the mountain sheep for which they were named. Antelope were occasionally hunted near Pinedale by those who owned horses. The best hunting grounds were considered to be those near Pinedale and on the west slope of the Wind River Range. Although some Sheepeaters inhabited Yellowstone Park, their main hunting grounds were farther south. The Sheepeaters were by no means the only Indians who made use of the Yellowstone region. Hultkrantz also mentions entry by parties of "Kiowa, Plains Shoshoni, Lemhi Shoshoni, Bannock, Crow, Blackfoot and Nez PercÉ" (Hultkrantz, 1954, p. 140).

All game was tracked and cornered by dogs and dispatched with the bow and arrow; the buffalo lance was used only by mounted hunters of Plains buffalo. Dogs were also used for packing—both on back and by travois.

In addition to their hunting activities, the Sheepeaters speared trout in the spring and summer. Nets, traps, and weirs were apparently not used. They also made use of the wild vegetables (previously listed) that grow in the mountains.

The Sheepeaters stayed in the mountains during the winter and did not join the valley winter camps of the buffalo hunters. They lived on stored meat and also continued to take elk, rabbits, and deer. Hunting was usually done on snowshoes.

Their camp groups were small, and, although no exact figure could be obtained, they never numbered more than the occupants of a few buffalo-hide tipis. Each such group had its leader who decided the hunting itinerary. The Dukarikas had no over-all political organization; each small camp group was politically and economically autonomous. "Dukarika," then, can be assumed to be a term defining a type of economic adaptation rather than a social unit.

The discreet Dukarika social units did not assert hunting rights to particular territories. Any group could hunt where it pleased, and they in no way resisted or resented the entry of the mounted Shoshone during the summer. Although they undoubtedly had contact with the latter, they did not join the spring or fall buffalo hunts, nor did they at any time during the pre-treaty period acknowledge the political leadership of the valley people. After the reservation was established, however, they left the mountains and settled in the Trout Creek section of the Wind River Reservation.

EASTERN SHOSHONE TERRITORY

Thus far, we have presented the pertinent historical data on Shoshone ecology in Wyoming and adjacent parts of northern Utah and we have described the annual cycle of economic activities during the early reservation period. The following summary of information on Eastern Shoshone territory will consider both kinds of data but will not attempt to delineate the social and political affiliations of the peoples using the lands. This subject, as the previously cited statement by Shimkin suggests (p. 300), is extremely complex and will be reserved for further discussion.

The most perplexing problem presented by the Eastern Shoshone is the extent of their penetration into the Missouri River waters. Although the Shoshone evidently undertook forays at least as far east as Fort Laramie, contemporary informants and historical sources agree that their main hunting grounds extended no farther east than the Sweetwater and other headwaters of the North Platte River. We have no certain information of Shoshone use of lands east of the upper Sweetwater River, and informants gave no data on this sector.

Wind River Shoshone informants relate the itineraries of buffalo-hunting parties northward into the Big Horn Basin. The fall and spring buffalo hunts were said to have taken place in the region of Thermopolis, Wyoming, and as far north as Cody and Greybull, Wyoming. The region east of the Big Horn Mountains was thought by informants to have been occasionally visited, but was acknowledged as the hunting grounds of hostile tribes. The presence of a "mixed party of Shoshone and Flatheads" in the Big Horn Mountains was noted by the westward-bound Astoria party in 1811 (Irving, 1890, p. 196) and indicates some early penetration of the area, although the presence of Flathead Indians suggests that the party had entered the area via Idaho and Montana and not from Green River. However, pre-reservation historical data show that before the 1840's the Eastern Shoshone largely restricted their buffalo hunting to the region west of the Continental Divide and sporadically penetrated the Wind River and Big Horn basins only after the buffalo disappeared from the country beyond the Rockies. Their entry into the eastern buffalo range became more frequent in the 1850's, but it by no means constituted an exclusive monopoly on lands there. They depended upon their numbers for protection and were forced to compete with other tribes for the right to hunt on the land. Their hunting excursions were in the nature of forays and were unsuccessful in some years. They enjoyed security and some assurance of success in the hunt only after they had been placed under the protection of Federal troops and the Crow had been placed on reservations. That the center of Shoshone occupancy lay west of the Continental Divide was affirmed by Chief Washakie. Agent Head wrote in 1867 (1868, p. 186):

Washakee said that the country east from the Wind river mountains, to the settled portions of eastern Nebraska and Kansas, had always been claimed by four principal Indian tribes—the Sioux, Arapahoes, Cheyennes, and Crows.

Further evidence that the valleys of the Big Horn and Wind rivers were used only for buffalo hunting and not stably occupied in the pre-reservation period is indicated by the Shoshones' ignorance of the hunting grounds in the surrounding mountains. Captain Jones used Shoshone guides from Camp Brown on the new Wind River Reservation when he undertook his exploration of Yellowstone Park in 1873. The captain and his party penetrated the Owl Creek Range, north of the reservation and found at the head of Owl Creek a lovely park (Jones, 1875, p. 54):

This park bears many evidences of having been used as a hiding place. Our Indians knew nothing of it, and yet there are all through it numerous trails, old lodge poles, bleached bones of game, and old camps of Cheyennes and Arapahoes.

Shimkin (1947a, p. 248) notes that this park was one of the "foci" of Shoshone nomadic activity, a place to which Wind River people repaired for summer hunting. Although this is true for later times, it certainly was not so in the pre-reservation period when hunts on the Missouri waters were conducted only for limited periods and in the plains and valleys where buffalo were to be found.

Until the late 1860's the Wind River Valley and the Big Horn Basin and Mountains were zones of penetration rather than occupation of the Eastern Shoshone. Another such zone is in the Tetons and Yellowstone. This is confirmed by the journal of Captain Jones, who commented upon the unfamiliarity of his Shoshone guides with the country around Yellowstone Lake (Jones, 1875, p. 23). He wrote (p. 34):

... the Indians have failed to find the trail back to Yellowstone Lake.... The explanation of this is that they are "Plains Indians," and are wholly unaccustomed to travel among forests like these.

Later, the exploring party reached the upper Yellowstone River, above the lake, where Jones commented (p. 39):

We have now reached a country from which one of our Indians says he knows the way back to Camp Brown by the head of Wind River. He belongs to a band of Shoshones called "Sheepeaters," who have been forced to live for a number of years in the mountains away from the tribe.

The Yellowstone area was frequently entered by the Crow and was evidently not a Shoshone hunting territory, except for the Sheepeaters. Jackson Hole is more commonly mentioned by informants as a place of summer hunting activity, but the above information from Jones would suggest that parties entered it from the Green River country rather than from Wind River. The Eastern Shoshone apparently did not move west of the Tetons except when visiting the Shoshone and Bannock of Idaho. It should be mentioned at this point that the Shoshone and Bannock also hunted in the Jackson Hole and Yellowstone country, probably to a greater extent than did the Eastern Shoshone, and the frequent mention of parties of Blackfoot and other hostiles in the country both east and west of the Teton Range indicates that the weaker Shoshone experienced no little danger there.

The valley of the Salt River in western Wyoming was used by both Idaho and Wyoming Shoshone. Idaho Shoshone and Bannock frequently entered the valleys of the Green River and its tributaries to hunt antelope in the fall. These people apparently mixed so frequently with the Eastern Shoshone in this area that it is most expedient to differentiate the respective populations according to where they wintered. On the west, Wind River Shoshone informants now make little mention of any use of the Bear River and Bear Lake country, despite the apparent interchangeability of population in the pre-reservation period; again, it must be assumed that informant data does not much antedate the move to Wind River.

The southern and southeastern limits of the Shoshone range in Wyoming are most vague. They probably extended as far south as the Yampa River in Colorado and the Uinta Range in Utah; Lander places their southern limits at Brown's Hole, in northwestern Colorado on the Green River (Lander, 1860, p. 121).

It is doubtful whether the country as far east as the North Platte and south to the Yampa was intensively exploited. Informants knew of no significant activities which went on in those areas, although they thought that antelope were occasionally hunted there. Most agreed that the Sweetwater River and Rawlins, Wyoming, were in Shoshone country, but Casper, Wyoming, and the Medicine Bow Mountains were excluded. Shimkin's map shows no regular utilization of the southeastern corner of Shoshone country (Shimkin, 1947a, map 1, p. 249), although my informants spoke of antelope hunts on the south side of South Pass. We can conclude that this whole area was, like many other sections, an area of occasional penetration. It is doubtful whether the poorly watered country between the Green and North Platte rivers was intensively used by any Indian group.

SOCIAL AND POLITICAL ORGANIZATION

A good deal of Eastern Shoshone social organization has already been described in the section on the subsistence cycle and in the context of historical data. Although the summer was spent in scattered groups, the collective buffalo hunt and the large winter camp made these Shoshone among the best organized of all the Shoshone population. Horses, a richer game supply, and the constant need for protection caused the Eastern Shoshone to travel in much larger groups than those of Nevada and perhaps also of Idaho, and leadership was, correspondingly, more highly developed. We hear early of the "'Horn Chief,' a distinguished chief and warrier of the Shoshonee tribe," who was frequently encountered in the Bear River region (Ferris, 1940, pp. 71-73). Ferris also tells of two other Shoshone chiefs, but does not localize them or their following (p. 309):

The principal chief of the Snakes is called the "Iron Wristband," a deceitful fellow, who pretends to be a great friend of the whites, and promises to punish his followers for killing them or stealing their horses. The "Little Chief" a brave young warrior, is the most noble and honorable character among them.

Ferris also mentions a Shoshone leader named "Cut Nose," who, he said, assumed white dress and left the tribe (p. 310).

During the 1840's the name of Washakie is mentioned with increasing frequency in historical sources and thereafter this chief overshadows all other leaders. We first hear of him from the trapper Russell who recorded a conversation at Weber River, Utah, in which the Shoshone leaders were discussed (Russell, 1921, pp. 114-116).

One remarked that the Snake chief, Pah-da-hewak um da was becoming very unpopular and it was the opinion of the Snakes in general that Moh-woom-hah, his brother, would be at the head of affairs before twelve months, as his village already amounted to more than three hundred lodges, and, moreover, he was supported by the bravest men in the nation, among whom were Ink-a-tosh-a-pop, Fibe-bo-un-to-wat-see and Who-sha-kik, who were the pillars of the nation and at whose names the Blackfeet quaked with fear.

The death of the first two brothers in 1842 and 1843 resulted in considerable disorganization, according to Russell, and "the tribe scattered in smaller villages over the country in consequence of having no chief who could control and keep them together" (pp. 145-146).

Washakie is next mentioned in Hamilton's journal as a Shoshone chief encountered on Wind River (Hamilton, 1905, p. 63). In 1849, Agent Wilson listed him among the chiefs of the mounted Shoshone (J. Wilson, 1849, p. 1002).

The principal chiefs of the Sho-sho-nies are Mono, about forty-five years old, so called from a wound in the face or cheek, from a ball that disfigures him; Wiskin, Cut-hair; Washikick, Gourd-rattle, (with whom I have had an interview;) and Oapichi, Big Man. Of the Sho-sho-nees Augatsira is the most noted.

Washakie maintained good relations with the whites and in 1852 appeared in Salt Lake City to arrange peaceful trade with the Mormons. Also in 1852, Brigham Young's peace conference between the Ute and Shoshone included "Anker-howhitch (Arrow-pine being sick) and thirty-four lodges; on the part of the Shoshones, Wah-sho-kig, To-ter-mitch, Watchenamp, Ter-ret-e-ma, Pershe-go, and twenty-six lodges...." (Young, 1852, p. 437). Of these five Shoshone chiefs, only Washakie is subsequently mentioned in the literature. Brigham Young apparently recognized Washakie as the leader of the Eastern Shoshone, for in or about 1854 he sent a Mormon, Bill Hickman, to establish contact with Washakie in the Green River country (Hickman, 1872, p. 105). Superintendent Forney reported of the Shoshone in 1859 (1860a, p. 731):

One of these [the fourteen bands listed by Forney], by common consent, is denominated a tribe, and is under the complete control of Chief Was-a-kee, assisted by four to six sub-chiefs. These number, at least, twelve hundred.

If this census is accurate, this number must have included most of the Eastern Shoshone population.

Washakie gained fame as the friend of the white man. This reputation was well deserved, for the wagon route through southwestern Wyoming was made quite safe for the emigrants through his efforts. Furthermore, hostile, predatory bands never developed among the Eastern Shoshone as they did among the Shoshone and Paiute to the west. In a report dated February, 1860, Lander observed (1860, p. 121): "No instance is on record of the Eastern Snakes having committed outrages upon the whites." We obtain a fuller description of Washakie in the same report (p. 122).

Wash-ikeek, the principal Chief of the tribe, is half Flathead. He obtained his popularity in the nation by various feats as a warrior and, it is urged by some of the mountaineers, by his extreme severity. This has, in one or two instances, extended so far as taking life. The word Washikee or Washikiek signifies "Gambler's Gourd." He was originally called "Pina-qua-na" or "Smell of Sugar." "Push-i-can" or "Pur-chi-can," another war chief of the Snakes, bears upon his forehead the scar of a blow of the tomahawk given by Washikee in one of these altercations. Washikee, who is also known by the term of "the white man's friend," was many years ago in the employment of the American and Hudson's Bay Fur Companies. He was the constant companion of the white trappers, and his superior knowledge and accomplishments may be attributed to this fact.

Other names than that of Washakie are noted among the lists of chiefs in Wyoming and Utah during the early 1860's. Among the Indians reported killed at Bear River in 1863 were Bear Hunter, Sagwich, and Leight (War of the Rebellion, 1902, p. 187). In the same source, the chiefs Pocatello and San Pitch were said to be still at large. These chiefs were usually in Utah and were independent of Washakie's band, although the relations between Wyoming and Bear River would suggest considerable interchange, even inseparability, of population. The virtual impossibility of dividing bands and populations during this period is indicated by Doty's list of the participants in the Fort Bridger Treaty of 1863. Doty claimed that between three and four thousand Indians were represented by the signatories and over one thousand people were present at the treaty (1865, p. 319):

They are known as Waushakee's band (who is the principal chief of the nation), Wonapitz's band, Shauwuno's band, Tibagan's band, Peoastogah's band, Totimee's band, Ashingodimah's band (he was killed at the battle on Bear River) Sagowitz's band (wounded at the same battle) Oretzimawik's band, Bazil's band, Sanpitz's band. The bands of this chief and of Sagowitz were nearly exterminated in the same battle.

In a later compendium of chiefs Powell and Ingalls listed Sanpits as a Cache Valley chief over a group of 124, Sai-guits as the leader of 158 Shoshone also in Cache Valley, Tav-i-wun-shean as headman at Bear Lake with 17 people, and Po-ka-tel-lo as chief over 101 Indians at Goose Creek (Powell and Ingalls, 1874, p. 419).

Washakie evidently owed his position to a combination of his status as a war-leader, as a recognized intermediary with the whites, and as an unusually strong personality. However, as we shall see later, there were other chiefs among the Wyoming Shoshone, and Washakie's position, although always strong, was never completely unchallenged. Much of his strength derived from recognition by the whites, and the government officials made every effort to bolster Washakie's prestige actively. Lander, for example, urged: "Any steps which could be taken to augment the power of Washakee, who is perfectly safe in his attachment to the Americans and northern mountaineers, would also prove beneficial" (Lander, 1860, p. 123). Also, Agent Mann reported in 1868 the deviation of many Shoshone from Washakie's leadership in the following terms (1869, p. 618):

This diminution of his strength is not satisfactory to Washakie; hence I have instructed all who have the means and are not too aged belonging to these bands to follow Washakie, impressing them with the fact that he alone is recognized as their head, and assuring them that if they expect to share the reward they must participate in all dangers incident to the tribe. [Mann refers to residence on the often attacked Wind River Reservation.]

This situation grew worse shortly after the treaty. Mann reported in 1869 (1870, p. 716): "A strong party is now separated from Washakie, and under the leadership of a half-breed, who has always sustained a good character, but who is, nevertheless, crafty and somewhat ambitious." Mann's successor. Captain J. H. Patterson, said in the same year. (Patterson, 1870, p. 717):

Washakie, the head chief, is rapidly losing his influence in the tribe, though he has yet the larger band under his immediate command; all or nearly all of the young men are with the other chiefs. This division looks badly.

He goes on to identify some of these chiefs (ibid.):

Shortly after my arrival [June 24, 1869] Nar-kok's band of Shoshones came in to receive their goods. Washakie's, Tab-on-she-ya's, and Bazil's bands were near at hand.

The size of these bands is indicated in the following year, when Agent Fleming commented that Washakie's people "were joined by Tab-en-shen and Bazil, with about 64 lodges" (G. W. Fleming, 1871, p. 644). However, Washakie maintained his position of spokesman for the Eastern Shoshone. Governor J. A. Campbell claimed in 1870 (1871, p. 639):

Wash-a-kie ... has great influence with his tribe, which I have endeavored to retain for him by always recognizing him as their chief, and referring all others of his tribe to him as the only one through whom I can hold any communication with them.

Wind River Shoshone informants showed more confusion over chieftainship and patterns of leadership, in general, than on any other subject. All knew of Washakie and recognized his chieftaincy, but of those chiefs mentioned in sources confirmation was received only of Nar-kok, and this from but one informant. Shimkin mentions four main bands, each with its own chief (1947a, p. 247):

The band led by Ta'wunasia would go down the Sweetwater to the upper North Platte [for the buffalo hunt]. That led by Di'kandimp went straight east to the Powder River Valley; that led by No'oki skirted the base of the Big Horn Mountains, passing through Crow territory, then swung south again to the Powder River Valley. Washakie ascended Big Wind River, and then crossed the divide to winter near the headquarters of the Greybull.

Except for Washakie, No'oki was the only one of the above chiefs given also by our informants. Parenthetically, it should be emphasized that most of our informants stated that all the Eastern Shoshone hunted buffalo together for self-protection. The preceding historical account also suggests that Shimkin's data do not represent a stable traditional pattern, since the Plains were almost untenable until after the treaty, except for short hunts in strength.

The following is a list of Wind River chiefs in the early reservation period, as given by informants. It should be remembered that a man might have more than one name, and phonetic transcriptions usually vary according to the recorder (and the informant).

Wantsea
Wanhi (Wantni)
Ohata (Ohotwe)
DupeshipÖoi (DupÍshibowoi)
Dabunesiu
Bohowansiye (Bohowosa)
Witungak
DÖnotsi
Noki (No'oki of Shimkin)
Wohowat
YohodÖkatsi
Noiohugo
Tagi
Tishawa
Wahawiichi
Sunup
Nakok (Narkok)

Washakie was mentioned by most informants as the head chief of the Eastern Shoshone. One old woman, however, said that he was more of a chief in the eyes of the whites than among the Shoshone; another commented that there were many chiefs, but that only Washakie was known by the whites. Washakie's most important function was to represent the Shoshone before the whites; this is understandable since the whites would deal with nobody else.

It was also commonly agreed that Washakie led the collective buffalo hunt, although the oldest man on the reservation claimed that there were many chiefs and that there was no special leader for the buffalo hunt. Informants said, furthermore, that the head chief acted as such only during those times of the year when all the people were together. Some stated that he directed them to the winter encampment and told them where to go in springtime and summer. Washakie was said to have acted at these times in council with the lesser chiefs and decisions were made known to the camp through an announcer. One informant said that Noki (No'oki) acted as announcer. The statement that Washakie assigned summer hunting areas to bands is undoubtedly erroneous, for it conflicts with the testimony of most informants that each group went where it chose.

There was also disagreement on the extent of Washakie's influence. According to some informants, the term "Buffalo Eaters," as applied to Washakie's Wind River band, did not denote the people in the Green River country. Wanhi was said to be the chief of the people in the Fort Bridger area and not Washakie, who was chief only in Wind River. This division probably refers to the split between those who chose to settle on the reservation and those who did not.

Despite considerable confusion about the role of the subchiefs, or lesser chiefs, they appear to have been men of prestige who had their own small following, although they recognized the personal influence of Washakie during large gatherings and general band endeavors. When not on the buffalo hunt or in winter camp these smaller groups of families, led by one or two of the minor leaders, functioned autonomously. Their itineraries and activities have already been described.

The small band was undoubtedly a much more basic unit in Eastern Shoshone society than the "tribe" as a whole. Intermarriage linked the small camp groups, although one could marry into his own unit if incest rules, as determined by kinship bonds, were not violated. There was no obligatory rule of residence, but the couple more frequently resided after marriage with the bride's family. This was not necessarily a permanent arrangement, and visits were made to the families of either mate for extended periods. This, combined with individual freedom of choice of band membership, caused affiliations to be shifting and fluid. Ultimately these Shoshone were bilocal and neolocal. As has been said, the bands were not territory-owning units, and their chief functions were to provide economic coÖperation and defense against enemies.

Leadership was an attained status and was not transmitted by descent. Raynolds, however, refers to Cut-Nose as being the "hereditary chief of the Snakes," according to information received from Jim Bridger (Raynolds, 1868, p. 95), and the reservation chieftaincy passed patrilineally in Washakie's family until the Reorganization Act established the tribal council. However, all informants agreed that one became a chief owing to merit—primarily through renown as a warrior. That the chieftaincy was neither inherited nor permanent is indicated by the proliferation of chiefs' names in historical sources. Except for such figures as Washakie and Pocatello, a chief is rarely mentioned twice, and it can be hypothesized that many were the leaders of ephemeral predatory bands that arose for specific purposes of defense or agression against the whites and dissolved shortly after the period of emergency passed. Finally, any man who had achieved renown and prestige or was the leader of a camp group, was known as a "chief," for the lack of institutionalization and formalization of the office made its tenure most nebulous.

It was not even necessary that a Shoshone chief be a Shoshone. During 1858, we hear of a Delaware Indian named Ben Simons, undoubtedly a former fur trapper, who was at the head of some 150-400 Shoshone on the upper Bear River (Gove, 1928, pp. 133, 146, 277). And Washakie, himself, was born into the Flathead tribe. Washakie's Flathead father was killed by the Blackfoot, and his mother sought refuge with the Lemhi River Shoshone of Idaho. He eventually gained renown in the Green and Bear River country as a warrior and attained his final position as a successful mediator with the whites.

Finally, Washakie's career gives additional evidence that there were no hard and fast lines between the so-called "Eastern Shoshone" and other Shoshone groups. Washakie's wanderings, according to Wilson, took him into Utah, Idaho, and Montana (E. N. Wilson, 1926, pp. 68-73). This was consistent with the general Shoshone pattern of visiting between areas for short or extended periods. The unique character of Washakie's leadership can best be explained in terms of contact with the whites and the Shoshones' need to expand into the buffalo grounds east of the Rocky Mountains. First, Washakie united and represented all those Shoshone who did not choose to join their fellows in northern Utah and southern Idaho in hostilities against the whites. Second, Washakie was an able and vigorous war leader under whom the embattled Shoshone could rally. Although at no time a separate, territorially distinct and exclusive group, the Eastern Shoshone evidently became somewhat differentiated from their people to the west by the latter's long distance from the shrinking buffalo grounds and by their distaste for the warlike activities of their Utah and Idaho fellows. The Eastern Shoshone, however, did not attempt to maintain the area over which they roamed to the exclusion of other Shoshone and of the Bannock. Their neighbors and colinguists to the west, if they were properly mounted, could and did join with them in buffalo hunting.

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