The Quileute Narrative
The Wreck of the St. Nikolai
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| Above: Mask given to Malaspina (click here) by Alaskans |
Click here for the Russian account of these events
Long,
long ago a ship, carrying cannon, was wrecked oflshore here during aterrible
storm; and, though the Indians had never seen a ship or white men before, they
attempted to capture the people, but were repulsed by the cannon on the disabled
ship. These people the Indians called ‘ho’kwat’ (wanderers) and by that
name they call the white people to this day.
The
ship was driven completely on the beach, and with it and a rude fortification
they were able to withstand the attack of our people for a long time. For a long
time they lived on ‘little to eat’ till all they had was eaten up. Then as
they were from the Southland, they decided to try to get to their old home. So
on a dark; cloudy, rainy night they stole around our village, for they had
landed on the coast northwest of it; and at noon the next day they had arrived
at the mouth of the Hoh River some twenty-five miles below the wreck, but they
could not cross the turbulent stream.
The
Hoh Indians had a village on the other side of the river, and from it Indians
came over to take a look at the new people, appearing friendly. So the strangers
got them to agree to ferry them across the stream. The Hohs, however, had
treachery in their brains.
The
white people and their belongings were placed in several canoes and the Hohs
started to paddle them over; but, on reaching the middle of the stream, they
suddenly opened up lightly plugged holes in the bottom of the canoes which they
had intentionally cut and stuffed with cedar bark. Then, leaping from the
crafts, they swam ashore, for could they get the new people adrift they could
capture them single-handed without much trouble. Furthermore, they were taking
them toward their own side of the river where they were prepared to attack them,
should they succeed in landing. But the move did not bear the fruits expected;
for, seeing that they had been duped, they quickly placed their bare feet over
the holes. Then by using the breech end of their guns for paddles, they gained
the river bank again near the place where the muddy, gray waters go out to meet
the breakers.
Hardly
had they got safe on solid ground again, however, when they were attacked by the
Hohs in force, both from the river and the land side. And the Hohs had the
advantage, for most of the guns were wet and the powder would not burn in them;
and the cannon that had done so much execution before was at the wreck many
miles away. However, the few white men who still had guns in working condition
did their work well, for from behind trees they kept the enemy at bay till a
fire had dried the other guns and they were brought into action. The Hohs then
retreated to their own side of the river, leaving several dead on the field,
besides taking several with them in their canoes. But the battle had been
disastrous to the attacked as well. Three of their men, one woman and two
children had been scalped Lseized] and four guns had been captured. In addition,
they were still on the wrong side of the river.
There
was no rest for the strangers. To stay there meant attack from the enemy
across the river before another sun, even if our people did not follow them and
attack them in the rear. So under cover of the darkness that night they dragged
themselves up the river through the underbrush, and on and on the next day
they kept up their wearisome march towards the head points of the Olympics, as
they are called today, till, mounting a level area among the hills, they were
overcome by sheer exhaustion and fell helpless upon the moss-covered ground.
There
on the following morning, weak from hunger and fatigue, they began a rude
stockade. That morning a stray elk also wandered through the flat area; and a
lucky shot furnished them meat, and also moccasins for their feet. And later in
the day several salmon were speared in the river. So anotlier mgnr found them
with enough to eat, roots supplying the place of bread. They, however, had no
shelter from the continuous storms; and, as only one ax had been carried along
with them, the preparing of anything in the form of a house or stockade was slow
work. But stay here they must, for they could not ford the river; and,
furthermore, before another sun had passed out of sight beyond the sparkling
waters to the westward, the Hohs appeared on the opposite bank
When
the stockade and the rude bark shelters were completed, they set about to make
some boats of cedar logs, using the chopping-burning process of the Indians to
hollow them out, as escape by the ocean was still left to them if the fates were
willing. They were not. Day after day they labored; but the Hoh Indians shut
them in their stockade walls so that they could get nothing to eat but fern
roots from the flat area adjacent and salmon from the immediate river. To go
outside the stockade was death. Yet they could still hold out. They could still
work on their boats so long as the turbulent river yielded them food; but the
salmon quit running; the fishing season as we term it, came to an end. Then
starvation took possession of the place. And yet the boats were not ready, for
they had thought to make large boats for oar and sail. At two different times a
man was then detailed to go out to kill some animal of the forest for meat and
each one never came back, having fallen a victim to a Hoh arrow. Nothing was
therefore left but to starve or leave the place; to be killed in the forest
while looking for something to eat or to run the chances of escape by the ocean.
So, though the boats were not nearly completed, an attempt at escape down the
river was made.
Under
the cover of clouds and darkness the unwieldy, crazy boats slipped down the
river past the Indian village and had even entered the ocean when a sleepless,
half-starved dog gave the alarm. And to make matters worse, an unfriendly sea
met them. In an instant the ocean front was alive with savages. The unfriendly
moon also appeared through a rent in the clouds and brought the fleeing people
to full view. In another instant light crafts were running towards them from the
shore at a terrible pace. A few shots were fired, but the boats nearest the
shore were overpowered and the helpless crews killed before there was time to
make any resistance. Darkness, however, again closed in and the boat that was
farthest out to sea escaped the fate of her sisters. Yet she was doomed.
The
men labored at the oars till the blood oozed out of their lingers, but could
make little progress against the heavy, rolling sea; and the women dipped water
every minute to keep the boat from being engulfed. Then, as a last straw, a
driving storm broke over them and drove them to the breakers.
The
boat mounted a huge wave, reached its crest, paused a moment, then, as the wave
broke upon a perpendicular front, it plunged forward, turned a complete
somersault, bow foremost in mid-air, and disappeared in the gurgling waters. But
as it was more log than boat it came to the surface again; and the struggling
people climbed on to its inverted side, only to be thrown into the water by the
next wave, as they had been by the previous one. Again the boat shot up to the
surface, and those who still survived struggled to clamber on to it, only to be
whirled over and over again in the surging waters as the next big wave pitched
its crest forward. The receding waters, however, left them on solid earth again,
but dazed, wet, cold, and still within the breaker line. So the next wave would
surely wash over them. Creeping, crawling, stumbling, half running in the
terrible darkness, they tried to gain the dry land. One of them went the wrong
way and was never seen again, and several others were swept away by the
undercurrent of the next wave. In fact, only five souls, four men and one woman,
reached shore alive.
They
landed in sight of the lights and in hearing of the Hoh head dance that had been
inaugurated when the braves returned to the village with the captured dead.
The contending elements had driven them back to the landing near where they had
entered the ocean, on the Quileute side of the river from the village of Hoh.
At
once they began to flee the certain death, or worse than death, that awaited
them should daylight discover them to the frenzied Hohs, who had killed their
comrades. Their guns, axes and everything had been lost. They went into the
woods and started up the coast they knew not whither. Weaponless, weak from
exposure, hunger and fatigue, and benumbed with cold, they pulled and dragged
each other through the tangled, jungly woods.
Dawn
came, but no rest. On and on they wearied themselves along until the darkness of
night began to close in the eastern mountains and on and on until darkness
overcame the land again. And on and on again day after day, now in this
direction and now in that, hiding under logs and in the brush at the least
suspicious sound, until gnawing hunger was devouring them. At last at a late
hour they came in sight of the chimney blaze of the Quileute fireplaces; and
hunger overcoming fear they surrendered themselves to our people.
The
men were made slaves, and the woman given to one of the subchiefs for his wife;
and they were forced to do the drudgery for the tribe. But as the years passed
they were given more and more freedom. Then one morning after they had been here
many years they were missing; and, on searching, could not be found. Some people
from the Southland had made a settlement at Neah Bay and it was supposed that
they had escaped thither. And the supposition was true.
Some
years later a large vessel anchored in Quillayute Bay with the avowed purpose of
enticing Indians on board to cap-tare them and take them as slaves; and as many
of the Quileute canoes were swarming about the apparently friendly ship with the
intention of boarding her to satisfy their curiosity as to what a white man had,
a woman appeared on the deck whom the Indians at once recognized as their
captive.
“Go
away from this place! Leave this ship! Go away! The white man’s heart is not
good,” she hallooed to them in their own language. “If you come aboard, you
will be carried away as slaves. You will never see your people again. Go away!
My brothers, in the name of the God of the white man and of Kwattee and
Sekahtil, your gods, I beg you to keep away from this ship.” And they heeded
her words and fled to the shore and to their stronghold on James Island.
-Ben Hobucket, published first by Utah Academy of Science, Arts and Letters, 1934