Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 52, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 February 1880 — THE UTE INVESTIGATIOM. [ARTICLE]

THE UTE INVESTIGATIOM.

Resume of the Testimony Taken l>y the House Committee on Itid'an Affair?, Miss Josie Meeker’s testimony before the eommittoo was to the effect that the Indians were incited to the outbreak by their intense native aversion to take on civilized modes of life. They argued that, if once they began to plow the land and raise stock, they would be expected to continue iu the new life. Their young men wonld grow np with no taste for the chase and the wild, savage life which has characterized them for centuries. Ano'her hardship would be the stoppage of Government annuities, which is nsw the sweetest t oon to the Indians of Colorado. Thornburgh may have acted with too great precipitancy, and his campaign threw the Utes into great consternation. Miss Meeker said that a good many of the soldiers were furiously drunk at the time of the Thornburgh fight There were barrels of wbieky in the vicinity to which the soldiers had full access. At the time of the massacre of her father the Indians were in liquor. She denied that the exchange of the 18,000 acres for 7,000 acres by the Southern Utes could have furnished tbe pretext, for the outrage, because the White River U os lost nothing by the exchange. More than that, they professed to be glad that their Souihern brethren had been outwitted. “If you had held on to your land as we do, you would not now stiff' r,” said they, in derision. She also disposed of the story of the Fort Rawlins affair, wherein it is alleged by Leeds and Gen. F.sk that the Indians were deprived of food and clothing for a long time. She said that this never affected the White River Utes in the least, and that they never made it the basis, of a complaint. Gov. Pitkin, of Colorado, testified that, to the best of his belief, the Cause of the Ute outbreak was the antipathy of the savages to work and the feat; which they entertained 'hit with the advance of c vilization they would be compelled to abandon the chase and work the soil for a living. Gov. Pi;kin stated that the charges made against Meeker by the Indians were that he was trying to educate their children, io induce them to cultivate the soil, and was plowing up their land for cultivation. Thoy did not complain of his injustice or dishonesty, nor did they charge that the citizens of Colorado had trespassed on their land or infringed upon their rights in any way, but simply that Meeker was carrying out the instructions of the Interior Department in asking them to adopt the customs of civilized life. The Indians, said the Governor, would neither stay on their reservation nor entertain tho idea that they were bound to do so. Thoy wandered all over the Sta'e and set forests on fire for the purpose of driving game into the parks, where they slaughter them wantonly, not for any benefit to themselves, but to injure the whites, who set great value on game. He also testified that the Indians wantonly destroyed timber off their reservation because they knew it was valuable to the whites.