54 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 1 10 



Bonaparte, a Pend D'Oreille Chief (Plate i8, Right) 



Bonaparte (English name) 



Kols-seese-Kol-lay (Indian name) 



Bonaparte a Pend-d-oreille chief is noted for his generosity and benevolence 

 to his tribe and especially to those who are poor or needy. He is rich in horses 

 and cattle and a person is never known to be in need without his assisting 

 him and relieving his wants. He is a man of thirty-five years of age. 



Pierre Pichette said that Bonaparte's Indian name was an obsolete 

 form which he was unable to translate. Apparently he was a minor 

 chief in 1855, for his name is not signed to either the Flathead or 

 Blackfoot Treaties. 



Major Owen, in May 1856, told of a half-breed named Bonaparte 

 who attempted to arrange a horse race between his prized mount and 

 a Nez Perce race horse. However, Bonaparte's horse, which he had 

 obtained from the Spokan country 2 years before in exchange for 

 six horses, bore such a reputation for speed that its owner could get 

 no other Indians to race against it. (Owen, 1927, vol. i, pp. 125-126.) 



Indians living on the Flathead Reservation today say that Bonaparte 

 died in the 1870's. 



THE IROQUOIS AMONG THE FLATHEAD AND PEND D'OREILLE 



The fact that there were Christian Iroquois living in the camps of 

 the primitive Flathead and Pend d'Oreille before the middle of the 

 nineteenth century has whetted the curiosity and imagination of 

 students of Indian history. These Mohawk Iroquois were living more 

 than 2,000 airline miles from their native villages in the vicinity of 

 Montreal, Quebec. When and why did they make the long trek 

 westward through the lakes and forests, across the plains and the 

 great Continental Divide? 



The first Iroquois to travel into the northwestern wilderness beyond 

 the eastern forest belt were sturdy Mohawk canoeman employed by 

 the fur traders who outfitted and marketed their furs in Montreal. 

 By the late years of the eighteenth century these traders had estab- 

 lished posts on the Saskatchewan River and its tributaries as far west 

 as the present Province of Alberta, in the shadow of the Rockies. 



As early as 1798 or 1799 a second wave of Iroquois moved west- 

 ward. In company with a large number of Nepissings and Algon- 

 quians, a group of Iroquois men (and a very few women) followed 

 the canoes of the fur traders to the headwaters of the Saskatchewan 

 to hunt and trap independently. The number of Iroquois in this 

 migration has been estimated at from 40 to more than 100. On the 



