LETTER TO THE EDITOR
This story was published in the March 19, 1939, edition of the Lewiston Tribune.
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To the Tribune: The persistent efforts made by a certain group of people to erect a monument to Chief Joseph on the Nez Perce reservation have aroused the resentment of the Nez Perce Indians who denounce the project as unjustifiable and an attempt to foist something which is contrary to the facts and actualities of the Nez Perce war.
The movement, apparently, is without the endorsement of the Indians and appears to have foundation on written history which has never been verified by the Nez Perce Indians. Because of this, the leading members of the tribe are inclined to look upon the project with incredulity. Certainly, the Nez Perces have never indicated any desire to memorialize anybody who was not a full-blood tribesman and who, in the view of the Indians, did not do the things that are claimed for Chief Joseph.
In justification for the erection of the memorial, the writer has been reminded by those sponsoring the movement that the history of Chief Joseph cannot be altered, as in the following excerpt of a letter: "Jim how tong would it take the historians if you could convince them - to change the idea in the mind of the people who will support this project to believing that it was not Joseph but some other who deserved the honor? Fifty years - another generation or two, anyway. Let's build this memorial for Joseph, because public ideology as to Nez Pierce history has it this way." And so further prevarication of Indian history would be suggested.
The writer recognizes the importance of history as one of the greatest sources of knowledge, and as one of the fundamental structures upon which our cultural civilization is founded. But history is not infallible as it may be understood from many controversies arising over some points of human affairs during thousands of years back. And the Indian subject is one wherein the historians have erred. The failure of the writers to penetrate into the subject matter has been due to their inability, or lack, of understanding the Indians, their traditions, their mind and attitude as framed through centuries of primitive existence, and their reactions to the controversies between the Indians and the whites in the early periods of history.
As to the Joseph memorial, there is no doubt in the minds of the Nez Perce Indians that the chief was not the man who occupied the position of leadership during the war, as history would have it. There are incontrovertible evidences which seem to have escaped the knowledge of those who are interested in the Indian history.
The Nez Perces cannot subscribe to the proposition that such a memorial would be educational, and the dissemination of its historical features be made a part of the school curriculum.
The objection to the Joseph memorial is intensified by the fact that the chief has never been absolved from an alleged killing of a non-combatant and defenseless white woman at Whitebird on that tragic day. June 15, 1877. An Indian survives today who witnessed the killing, and his testimony is to the effect that Chief Joseph, being under the influence of liquor, plunged the fatal dagger into the breast of Mrs. J. J. Manuel, as she lay helpless on a cot in her own home. This incident has been known to many of the Nez Perces who fought in the war. It has been generally believed by the white people of the Salmon river region that the chief was guilty of the deed. General Howard knew of the matter soon after the war, and he recorded his disbelief in his narrative of the war.
Whether Joseph had in his mind this incident or not, he issued a statement some time after the war that "the Nez Perces never make war on women and children; we could have killed a great many women and children while the war lasted, but we would feel ashamed to do so cowardly an act."
J. M. PARSONS
Kamiah, Idaho.
