236 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



dialects of one language (the so-called Yana) express the most unre- 

 lenting hostility for each other. In other words, the Indians who lurked 

 about in the Mill Creek hills for several decades after the settlement of 

 the valley, were probably the remnant of a comparatively pure group, 

 since there was little likelihood of intermixture. 



The Mill Creelc ''War" 



Between the years 1850 and 1865 this group was more or less under 

 observation by the government. Eumors of battle, murder and sudden 

 death came frequently from this region to the central authorities in San 

 Francisco and Sacramento. On one or two occasions attempts were 

 made by the War Department to apply the universal remedy for Indian 

 troubles — removal to a reservation. Details concerning the movement 

 of troops and some very heated correspondence relative to this tribe may 

 be found in the government records (War Records, Volume 50). The 

 names of some very distinguished Californians appear in this connection. 

 I recall especially Governor Stanford, and General Albert Sydney 

 Johnston. The only book I know of which deals exclusively with events 

 in the Yahi region is a small but vivid volume written by R. A. Ander- 

 son, an actor in the events, and sometime sheriff of Butte County 

 ("Fighting the Mill Creeks," Chico, Cal., 1909). This little work 

 checks up with the records of the War Department. The " war " with 

 this small tribe seems to be quite overlooked in the histories of Cali- 

 fornia. There is no mention of it in either Bancroft or Hittell. The 

 reason probably is that it was very much like what had happened, or 

 was happening, on a larger scale elsewhere. The War Department corre- 

 spondence is quite full for the period covered. 



The end of the Mill Creek "war" was uniisual and to some extent 

 tragic. A party of armed whites, acting without other authority than 

 resentment and an inborn savagery, surprised the tribe on the upper 

 waters of Mill Creek in 1865. Their effort apparently was to wipe out 

 this Indian group on the spot. On the admission of men who took 

 part in the action, fire was opened on the defenceless Indians in the early 

 morning, and an uncertain number of them, men, women and children, 

 shot down. A few, not more than three or four, perhaps, escaped into 

 the brush and got clear. The Mill Creek tribe as a tribe disappeared 

 from history at this time. With one or two possible exceptions, nothing 

 was seen of it again for over thirtv-five vears. 



"O"^ 



Hidden Life of the Survivors 



The survivors who escaped these executive measures of 1865 were 

 too few in number to resume their old mode of life. They were, on the 

 other hand, so small a party that they succeeded in hiding away. Little 

 by little they emerged from their hiding places and took up again the 



