Copied from Beneath Ben Lomond’s Peak: A History of Weber County, 1824-1900, pg 267-270.
[As told by Mrs Mary R Jessop, 2816 Adams Avenue, Ogden, Utah. She is Mary Rhoby Perry Jessop, born May 7, 1855 to William Howard Perry (1823-1904) and Juliaette Stowell (1835-1931). Her brother Stephen is William Stephen Perry (1853-1887), born to their father’s other wife Alice Stowell.]
It was during the first summer that we lived at Huntsville, and I was but nine years old when I saw an Indian battle. [Her family moved to Huntsville in approximately 1862, while Mary was 9 in the summer of 1864.] One day a band of Shoshones came from the south, apparently from Weber Valley, and camped on the south side of the river on a meadow that belonged to father. We saw them when they were still high up on the divide, and we observed that they were traveling fast as if they were being pursued.
When we saw that they were going to make camp, my brother and I ran down across to the bottoms nearly to the river. We climbed up into the top branches of a high cottonwood tree and perched ourselves on a limb where we could look right across the river into the Indian camp. The savages seemed to be very excited while putting up approximately twenty tepees. My brother and I estimated that there were between fifty and seventy-five men and boys old enough to fight, besides the women and children. They had a lot of ponies. Some of the men had guns, but most of them had only spears and bows and arrows. There was a great deal of shouting, which apparently consisted of giving orders.
Pretty soon we saw another band of Indians riding down the hillside from the south along the same trail the Shoshones had traveled. We learned afterwards that they were Cheyennes and that they had already had a fight with the Shoshones earlier in the day. This was about three o’clock in the afternoon. The Cheyennes were all men. Their faces and bodies were gaudily painted and they were wearing war bonnets. As they came nearer, they spread out in a single file and came dashing up at full speed to attack the Shoshones. There were approximately fifty mounted savage warriors.
Some of the Shoshones jumped on their horses, while others fought on foot. All the men and the bigger boys went out to meet the Cheyennes. At first the attackers seemed to have the best of it and drove the Shoshones back into their camp. Then some of the women secured weapons and fought desperately also. But most of the women and children ran screaming and crying and hid themselves in the bushes. A few of them waded over to our side of the stream and secluded themselves in the bushes not far from the tree that we were in.
There were two white families living on the south side of the river, the families of William Mariar and Gerrit Wolverton. Their homes were about half a mile east of the place where the fighting occurred. They had a lot of cows and ran a dairy. That day the men were in Ogden. Therefore, when the first band of Indians arrived, a boy rode over to Huntsville for help. The men of the town crossed the river and got the white women and escorted them back to Huntsville just as the fighting began. The white men made no move to interfere between the two Indian bands.
The shouting of the warriors could be heard and the fighting could be seen from Huntsville. Many of the white people were badly scared. My brother and I, however, were foolish enough to look upon the battle merely as an exciting game. We regarded ourselves as being very lucky in getting reserved seats so close. We enjoyed watching the Indian warriors of both tribes as they rode at full speed and hung on their saddles with one leg while they shot arrows from under their horses’ necks.
The event that decided the battle was the death of the Cheyenne chief. He was mounted on a fine horse and fore a war bonnet that as fully five feet long. He rode up and down yelling and encouraging his men. In fact, all the warriors on both sides seemed to yell all the time. Suddenly the Cheyenne chief was shot and tumbled off his horse. Then the fighting centered around the efforts of both sides to get possession of his body. The Shoshones got the chief’s war bonnet. Then the Cheyennes rallied and drove them back. But the loss of their chief had taken the fight out of them, so the Shoshones again captured the body. That time they stripped off a beaded belt or coat he was wearing and I think they took his scalp. Then the Cheyennes charged back again and carried off the body. That ended the fighting. The Cheyennes gathered up their dead and wounded and retreated back up the trail to the south.
I do not known that any of the Shoshones were killed but they had quite a number of wounded. They followed the Cheyennes a short distance but soon returned to camp. The women and children came out of the bushes and busies themselves again in fixing up their camp.
My brother and I slipped down from our tree and ran back home. Talk about the Indians being so observing — I don’t think they saw us from the start to finish. They were too busy with their own affairs. When we arrived home, we certainly got scolded. Nevertheless that night after dark, when the Indians had lighted campfires and were dancing in celebration of their victory, my brother and I again slipped down to the river bank and stood watching the hilarious performance on the other side of the stream. We could also hear some Indian women crying and mourning, as some of the warriors may have been killed in the battle or died later as a result of their wounds. The worst wounds seemed to be inflicted by the arrows.
The next day we slipped away from home and went down to the river again. Everything seemed quiet over to the Indian camp. The natives seemed to be resting. So my brother and I joined hands, and by careful wading we crossed the river, which was running pretty swift. We slipped through the bushes and walked in among the tepees. Still no one saw us. Leaning against one of the tepees, we saw a willow pole about ten feet long. Attached to the top of it were several bloody objects which my brother said were scalps. They must have been taken recently, because the flies were bussing around them. One of the scalps had long gray hair, almost white.
While we stood looking at the scalps, we heard a noise behind us. We turned about quickly and there was a big Indian, standing straight and looking very angry. He pointed toward Huntsville and said, “Pike-away,” which means get out. Believe me, we got out in a hurry! We had no trouble in crossing the river this time, nor did we even stop to take hold of hands. As fast as our legs could carry us, we ran home. From then on we stayed on the Huntsville side of the stream.
It was generally believed that this band of Shoshones had recently attacked an emigrant train, because of the scalps they had and the additional fact of one of the squaws coming to town with a white baby in her arms. My mother made several offers to buy the infant, but the Indian woman refused. There was also a white girl about five years old with the band, but the Indians insisted that she was a half-breed. The red men stayed in camp several weeks, but finally moved up the river and on out of Ogden Valley.