Page:The Indian History of the Modoc War.djvu/260



Springs Agency. Captain O. C. Applegates scouts were called the "Axe and Rifle Company" because, on their return with the train, each man carried an axe in addition to his rifle and opened the way for the wagons through the jack and yellow pine forests and were encountered between Farewell Bend (now Bend) on the Deschutes, and Klamath agency, a distance of a hundred and thirty miles, working with enthusiasm to clear the way for the train, but ever keeping a vigilant eye out for old Pannina, the predatory chief of the Snake Indians, then hostile, through whose domain the great caravan progressed day by day. The train crossed the highlands about the south- ern watershed of the Deschutes region in a snowstorm and reached the agency in November. The company was increased by the addition of twenty men under Chief Palmer after leav- ing the Deschutes, raising its aggregate to fifty men. In some respects this was one of the most unique companies of men to operate on the border in our initial days, as of the fifty men who constituted the aggregation the captain was the only white man and among the forty-nine others were seven of the principal chiefs, the head chief or lieutenant, all yielding a loyal obedience to the will of the white commander of twenty - two.

For some time precedent to the Modoc outbreak of 1872, Captain Applegate had charge of the Yainax sub-agency, forty miles east of the headquarters, Klamath agency, which was then under the supervision of the U. S. Indian agent, Leroy S. Dyar. Near the sub-agency were located the main band of Modocs under their famous old chief, Schonchin, and with him were to be domiciled the turbulent band under Captain Jack, then in their native habitat about Title Lake, in case they should come voluntarily unto the reservation or should have to be compelled by force to comply with the treaty of 1864.

Late in the fall of 1872 Superintendent Odeneal received orders to bring these Indians unto the reservation, using force to do so if necessary. At that time Camp Warner was the headquarters of the military, District of the Lakes, which comprised the lake region of Southeastern Oregon and North- ern California, and had within its area three other mi