Collection: Directories and Documents > Tanis Thorne Native Californian & Nisenan Collection

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Title: Handbook of Yokuts Indians - Pahmit's Story Collection Type: Directories and Documents Collection Name: Tanis Thorne Native Californian & Nisenan Collection # of Pages: 11 Download PDF: User Login Required Download OCR Text: User Login Required

Date Scanned: 2024-09-03 22:09:32 OCR Software Version #: tesseract 5.4.1 Item Sourced From: PDF First Created: 2025-03-17 03:18:10 Last Updated: 2025-03-17 03:18:10

Original Held At: Searls Historical Library Location: 161 Nevada City Hwy, Nevada City, CA 95959

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226, HANDBOOK OF YOKUTS INDIANS and all of the Indians left the place. This was just after the big water that the white people call sixty-two [flood of 1862]. They never lived at Watot Shulul again. Nahalets’ wife, Hawtulu, and a few of her people went to the old Nutunutu (Noo-too’-noo-too) village on the Burris ranch at Kings River. The chief there was Pah-ko’-ake. I knew him for a long time. Hawtulu died there when she was an old lady. My people went to the old village at the ‘‘Fish’’ Rice Rancheria south of Farmersville. There my father took sick and died. We buried him there. Just a few months before I was born my father and mother lived at the old Chunut village of Heuwmne (He-oo-um’-ne) about four miles south of Waukena. This was the place where the big ditch is south of the Artesia school and where Mr. Sweet had the slaughter house. Mother had one child, a little boy. His name was Wehpes (Weh’-pees). White people called hin Bill Foster. While my parents were living there [1854], soldiers on horseback came to take them with all of the other Lake Indians to the Fresno River Indian Reservation. None of the Indians wanted to go. But the soldiers hunted until they found most of the Indians. The soldiers beat the Indians with whips and hit them with their swords and ran their horses over them when they would not go. Some Indians were shot because they ran away. My mother said she saw twelve Indians killed. The rest had to go anyway. It took about ten days to get all of the Indians together. The soldiers did not let them take time to carry any grub. Then it took four days to drive them to Fresno River Reservation. My mother and father both went. They carried little Wehpes all of the way. He was about two years old. All this time the Indians only had a few things to eat. They ate a few mussels from the river and a few tule roots. Some Indians caught a few salmon along the San J: oaquin river and ate them raw like they did the mussels and tule roots. About ten Indians died on the way. Three or four babies were born along the way. When they got to Fresno River Indian Reservation there was nothing there to eat. The soldiers killed some cows and gave the Indians some acorns that had been gathered for two or three years and were eaten by worms. eS Ek HANDBOOK OF YOKUTS INDIANS Split puncheon log fort built about six miles east of Visalia as protection against the Indians at the beginning of the Indian War of 1856. Colonel Thomas Baker, founder of both Visalia and Bakersfield, outfitted at this fort at the beginning of that war. My father and mother were at Fresno River Reserva Hein about two or three months. Then some of the soldiers toe K them to Fort Tejon. A wagon hauled some grub along, but the Indians walked all of the way. About fifty Indians went on this trip. There were soldiers at Fort Tejon. It was not up in the mountains but was on the Tejon Ranch, west of the Headquarters. My father and mother worked awhile at Fort Tejon, but they did not like it there. None of our people likecd i, They all wanted to go back to Tulare Lake. Lots of the Indians sneaked away in the night, so one nig ut as soon as it got dark, my father and mother left. They wept along the foothills and hid every day until they came to tne Kaweah river. Then they came down to Watot Shulul, Wheve Visalia is now. In a few days I was born. It was about & year after the soldiers took my father and mother from $he old village south of the Buzzard’s Roost at Waukena [18557], My father and mother stayed at Watot Shulul until after 4ue€ big sickness [measles], when all of the Indians left. Mc mother washed and my father cut wood for the Blahkenshi ps &