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Life among the Piutes
By Sarah Winnemucca Hopkins
Page 77-78

...They said also that they would kill anything that came in their way, men, women and 
children. The captains name was Wells. The place where they were going to is about three 
hundred miles away. The days after they left were very sad hours, indeed.  Oh, dear 
readers, these soldiers had gone only sixty miles away to Muddy Lake, where my people 
were then living and fishing, and doing nothing to anyone.  The soldiers rode up to their 
encampment and fired into it, and killed almost all the people that were there.  Oh, it is a 
fearful thing to tell, but it must be told.  Yes, it must be told by me.  It was all old men, 
women and children that were killed; for my father had all young men with him, at the sink of 
Carson on a hunting excursion, or they would have been killed too.
...After the soldiers had killed all but some little children and babies still tied up in their 
baskets, the soldiers took them also, and set the camp on fire and threw them into the 
flames to see them burn alive.  I had one baby brother killed there.  My sister jumped on 
fathers best horse and ran away.  As she ran , the soldiers ran after her ; but , thanks be to 
the Good Father in the Spirit - land, my dear sister got away. This almost killed my poor 
papa. Yet my people kept peaceful.


Life among the Piutes
Page 205


...We went down, and Major Cochrane met us at the door and said , " 
Sarah, I am heartily sorry for you, but we cannot help it. We are ordered 
to take your people to Yakima Reservation."
It was just a little before Christmas. My people were only given one week 
to get ready in.
I said, " What!  In this cold winter and in all this snow, and my people 
have so many little children?  Why, they will all die.  Oh, what can the 
President be thinking about ?  Oh, tell me, what is he ?  Is he a man or 
beast ?  Yes, he must be a beast ;  if he has no feelings for my people , 
surely he ought to have some for the soldiers."
" I have never seen a president in my life and I want to know whether he 
is made of wood or rock, for I cannot for once think that he can be a 
human being. No human being would do such a thing as that, - send 
people across a fearful mountain in the midwinter."
... I could not think of anything that could be so in-human as to do such 
a thing, - send people across mountains with snow so deep.


Life among the Piutes
Page 209 and 210


...We travelled all day.  It snowed all day long. We camped,  and that night a 
woman became a mother ; and during the night the baby died, and was put 
under the snow. The next morning the mother was put into the wagon. She 
was almost dead when we went into camp. That night she too was gone, and 
left on the roadside , her poor body not even covered with the snow.
In five days three more children were frozen to death, and another woman 
became a mother.  Her child lived three days, but the mother lived.
... They had a kind of shed made to put us in.  You know what kind of shed 
you make for your stock in winter time. It was of that kind.  Oh, how we did 
suffer with cold.  There was no wood, and the snow was waist deep, and 
many died off just as cattle or horses do after travelling so long in the cold..


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