Background
After the defeat of the U.S. Army by the Nez Perce at the Battle of White Bird Canyon, General Oliver Otis Howard took personal command of the army. Howard dispatched a small force to capture the neutral Looking Glass, but Looking Glass and his followers escaped and joined Joseph.
With Howard in pursuit, but several days behind, Joseph, 600 Nez Perce, and their more than 2,000 livestock brushed aside a small U.S. military force at the Battle of Cottonwood July 3–5, 1877 and continued eastward for another 25 miles. Along their route they burned 30 ranches and farms. The proprietors had fled to nearby Mt. Idaho. The ranches and farms were on the Nez Perce Reservation and illegal in the view of the Nez Perce. They established a camp in the steep-walled valley of the South Fork of the Clearwater River north of the present day town of Stites. There, on July 7, they were joined by Looking Glass and other Nez Perce bringing their total strength up to about 800 persons and 200 fighting men.
On July 8, a company of 75 civilian volunteers under Edward McConville, found the Nez Perce camp and reported its location to General Howard. The Nez Perce discovered the volunteers the next morning and attacked them, forcing them to take refuge on a hilltop and exchanging long distance fire with them. Out of water and their horses stolen by the Indians, the volunteers dubbed their hilltop “Fort Misery.” One Nez Perce was wounded. About noon on June 11 the volunteers withdrew from their hill to Mount Idaho without opposition.
The Nez Perce anticipated that Howard and his soldiers would arrive at their village from the northeast, the same direction as the volunteers came from, but instead the General approached them from the south following the east bank of the South Fork of the Clearwater downstream through rugged country. About noon on July 11, Howard spotted the village, spread along both banks of the Clearwater. Perhaps lulled into complacency by their previous successes, the Nez Perce were surprised at his sudden appearance.
To combat approximately 200 Nez Perce warriors, Howard had 440 soldiers plus civilian packers, scouts, messengers and Indian scouts, amounting all together to a force that may have exceeded 600 men. Among the Indian scouts were some Nez Perce. Many Nez Perce had not joined Joseph and remained friendly with the U.S.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of The Clearwater
Famous quotes containing the word background:
“... every experience in life enriches one’s background and should teach valuable lessons.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“In the true sense one’s native land, with its background of tradition, early impressions, reminiscences and other things dear to one, is not enough to make sensitive human beings feel at home.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“They were more than hostile. In the first place, I was a south Georgian and I was looked upon as a fiscal conservative, and the Atlanta newspapers quite erroneously, because they didn’t know anything about me or my background here in Plains, decided that I was also a racial conservative.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)