NO. 7 SOHON S PORTRAITS OF INDIANS — EWERS 5 



made the barometrical observations. [Report of Explorations, etc., i860, vol. 12, 

 pt. I, p. 196.] 



Governor Stevens' son, wlio accompanied the expedition, wrote 

 of Sohon as "the artist, barometer-carrier, and observer ... an in- 

 telHgent German, a clever skctchcr, and competent to take instrumental 

 observations." (Stevens, 1900, vol. 2, p. 68.) 



In one of the largest gatherings of Indians in historic times, Gov- 

 ernor Stevens and General Palmer, as United States Commissioners, 

 met the Walla Walla, Cayuse, Umatilla, Yakima, and Nez Perce 

 tribes of the Upper Columbia in late May and early June, 1855. This 

 "Walla Walla Council" was held on Mill Creek, a tributary of the 

 Walla Walla River, about 6 miles above the site of the ill-fated Whit- 

 man Indian Mission. The negotiations resulted in the cession to the 

 United States of over 60,000 square miles of land, and the setting 

 aside of three reservations for the Indians involved, one for the Walla 

 Walla, Cayuse, and Umatilla, one for the "Yakima Nation," and one 

 for the Nez Perce. The three separate treaties were signed June 9. 



.Although Sohon did not serve as an official interpreter at this 

 Council, he apparently helped to interpret the proceedings to a group 

 of Salishan-speaking Spokan Indians who attended the sessions. His 

 ■Records of the Walla Walla Council 30th May 1855, translated in 

 the language of the Spokan Indians by G. Sohon," a manuscript in 

 the collections of the Bureau of American Ethnology, is a parallel 

 English-Spokan text of the opening speech at the Council by General 

 Palmer. 



Sohon's pencil was active during the period of the Walla Walla 

 Council. He sketched the impressive parade of some 2,500 Nez Perce 

 Indians arriving at the Council ground on horseback May 24, the 

 feast given the chiefs by the Commissioners on the following day, a 

 general view of the Council in session, and the primitive scalp dance 

 celebrated by the Nez Perce on the day after the treaties were signed. 

 He also made pencil portraits of the principal chiefs of the tribes that 

 took part in the treaties. (The previously published drawings of 

 ^lustavus Sohon at the Walla Walla Council are listed in the Ap- 

 pendix, p. 68.) A remarkable aspect of this Council was the recording 

 of the proceedings in the Xez Perce language by a group of young 

 men who had been taught to read and write their own language by 

 Presbyterian missionaries. Sohon's previously unpublished drawing 

 of these Indian scribes at work appears as plate i. 



From the Walla W'alla Council ground Governor Stevens' party of 

 22 persons, including 2 Indian guides, moved eastward. At a council 



