DENio] THE ASSINIBOIN 399 



Names and Events tn History. — There is no great event in the 

 history of the Assiniboin that gives them cause to rejoice. True, 

 they have occasionally gained a battle, but at other times have lost 

 greatly by wars. Upon the whole they have had the worst of it; at 

 least they, being a smaller nation than the Blackfeet and Sioux (their 

 enemies) have felt the loss more severely. The principal calamity 

 that first overtook them, and by which they suffered greatly, was the 

 smallpox in 1780. (See Mackenzie's travels and other authors.) 

 On this occasion they lost about 300 lodges of their people, and it is 

 to this day mentioned by them as their greatest first misfortune. In 

 the spring of 1838 this disease was again communicated to them, be- 

 ing brought up the Missouri by a steamboat, and although every 

 precaution had been used, the boat cleansed, and no appearance of 

 disease for a long time aboard, yet it in some way broke out among 

 the Indians, beginning with the Sioux tribes and ending with the 

 Blackfeet. Being an eyewitness to this, we can with certainty give 

 an account of its ravages. When the disease first appeared in Fort 

 Union we did everything in our power to prevent the Indians from 

 coming to it, trading with them a considerable distance out in the 

 prairie and representing to them the danger of going near the infec- 

 tion. All efforts of the kind, however, proved unavailing, for they 

 would not listen, and 250 lodges contracted the disease at one time, 

 ■who in the course of the summer and fall were reduced to 65 men, 

 young and old, or about 30 lodges in all. Other bands coming from 

 time to time caught the infection and remained at the fort, where 

 the dead were daily thrown into the river by cartloads. The disease 

 was very virulent, most of the Indians dying through delirium and 

 hemorrhage from the mouth and ears before any spots appeared. 

 Some killed themselves. 



On one occasion an Indian near the fort after losing his favorite 

 child deliberately killed his wife, his two remaining children, his 

 horses and dogs, and then blew his own brains out. In all this the 

 Indians behaved extremely well toward the whites, although aware 

 they brought the disease among them, yet nothing in the way of 

 revenge took place, either at the time or afterwards. Being obliged 

 to be all the time with them, helping as much as possible to save a 

 few, they had plenty of opportunities should they have wished to 

 do damage. Every kind of treatment appeared to be of no avail, 

 and they continued dying until near the ensuing spring, when the 

 disease, having spent itself, ceased. The result was that out of 

 1.000 lodges and upward of the Assiniboin then in existence but 

 400 lodges or less remained, and even these but thinly peopled. 

 Relationship by blood or adoption was nearly annihilated, all prop- 

 erty lost or sacrificed, and a few very young and very old left to 



