Crisis in Leadership
The Nez Perce never had a unified leadership during their long fighting retreat. Looking Glass was the most important military leader and strategist while Chief Joseph seems to have been mainly responsible for camp management. An English-speaking French/Nez Perce mixed blood called Poker Joe or Lean Elk had become prominent as a guide and interpreter during the march. Poker Joe probably had a more knowledgeable appreciation of the determination of the U.S. army to pursue and defeat the Nez Perce than did the other leaders.
With the forces of General Howard far behind the Nez Perce after the Canyon Creek fight, Looking Glass advocated a slow pace to allow the travel-weary people and their horses an opportunity to rest. Poker Joe argued for the opposite. The disagreement among the leaders came to a head in a council on September 24. Poker Joe yielded to Looking Glass, reportedly saying, “Looking Glass, you can lead. I am trying to save the people, doing my best to cross into Canada before the soldiers find us. You can take command, but I think we will be caught and killed.” Looking Glass won his point, assumed command of the march, and the Nez Perce moved toward Canada in slow stages for the next four days. They kept a close eye on the south for Howard and his soldiers, but were unaware that Miles was coming upon them rapidly from the southeast.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Bear Paw
Famous quotes containing the words crisis in, crisis and/or leadership:
“The age of puberty is a crisis in the age of man worth studying. It is the passage from the unconscious to the conscious; from the sleep of passions to their rage.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Most observers of the French Revolution, especially the clever and noble ones, have explained it as a life-threatening and contagious illness. They have remained standing with the symptoms and have interpreted these in manifold and contrary ways. Some have regarded it as a merely local ill. The most ingenious opponents have pressed for castration. They well noticed that this alleged illness is nothing other than the crisis of beginning puberty.”
—Novalis [Friedrich Von Hardenberg] (1772–1801)
“During the first World War women in the United States had a chance to try their capacities in wider fields of executive leadership in industry. Must we always wait for war to give us opportunity? And must the pendulum always swing back in the busy world of work and workers during times of peace?”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)