Battle of Bear Paw - The Siege

The Siege

During the cold and snowy night following the battle both the Nez Perce and the soldiers fortified their positions. Some Nez Perce crept out between the lines to collect ammunition from wounded and dead soldiers. The Nez Perce dug large and deep shelter pits for women and children and rifle pits for the warriors covering all approaches to their camp which was a square about 250 yards (220 mts) on each side. About 100 warriors manned the defenses, each armed with three guns including a repeating rifle. In the words of a soldier: “to charge them would be madness.

Miles greatest fear – and the Nez Perce’s greatest hope – was that Sitting Bull might send Lakota warriors south from Canada to rescue the Nez Perce. The next morning, the soldiers saw what they thought were mounted columns of Indians on the horizon, but they turned out to be herds of bison. Looking Glass was killed at some point during the siege, when he thought he saw an approaching Lakota and raised his head above a rock to see better and was hit and killed instantly by a sniper’s bullet.

The Cheyenne scouts may have initiated negotiations. Three of them rode into the Nez Perce fortifications and proposed talks with Miles. When Miles agreed, Chief Joseph and five other Nez Perce, including Tom Hill, of mixed Nez Perce\Delaware heritage who acted as interpreter. Soldiers and warriors collected the bodies of their dead during the truce. When the negotiations were unsuccessful, Miles apparently took Joseph prisoner. According to a Nez Perce warrior, Yellow Wolf, “Joseph was hobbled hands and feet” and rolled up in a blanket. Miles’ violation of the truce, however, was checkmated by the Nez Perce. A young lieutenant named Lovell H. Jerome wandered “through his own folly” into the Nez Perce camp during the truce. The Nez Perce took Jerome hostage and the next day, October 2, an exchange of Chief Joseph for Jerome was carried out.

On October 3, the soldiers opened fire again with a 12-pounder Napoleon gun which did little damage to the dug-in Nez Perce although one woman and one small girl were killed when a shell hit a shelter pit. On October 4, in the evening, General Howard with an escort arrived at the battlefield. Howard generously allowed Miles to retain tactical control of the siege.

Meanwhile, the Nez Perce were divided on the subject of surrender, Joseph apparently in favor while White Bird, the one other surviving leader, opposed surrender and favored a break-out through the army’s lines and a dash toward Canada. Joseph later said, “We could have escaped from Bear Paw Mountain if we had left our wounded, old women, and children behind. We were unwilling to do this. We had never heard of a wounded Indian recovering while in the hands of white men.”