Bitterroot Salish facts for kids
The Bitterroot Salish (also known as Flathead or Séliš) are a group of Native Americans who speak a language from the Salish family. They are one of three main tribes that make up the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes of the Flathead Nation in Montana. The Flathead Reservation is also home to the Kootenai and Pend d'Oreilles tribes.
The Bitterroot Salish originally lived in a large area of Montana, stretching from west of Billings to the continental divide in the west, and from south of Great Falls to the Montana-Wyoming border. Later, they moved west into the Bitterroot Valley. In 1841, a Catholic mission was built there at their request. However, in 1891, the Salish people were forced to move to the Flathead Reservation.
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Other Names for the Salish People
The Bitterroot Salish are known by several names, including Salish, Selish, and Flathead. The name "Flathead" was sometimes used to describe Native tribes who practiced head flattening. However, the Salish people say their ancestors did not do this. They believe the name came from sign language used to identify them: pressing both sides of the head with your hands, which meant "we the people."
The Salish Language
The Bitterroot Salish speak an Interior Salish language. Their language is also called Salish, and it gave its name to the entire Salishan languages group. The Spokane language (npoqínišcn), spoken by the Spokane people, the Kalispel language (qlispé), spoken by the Pend d'Oreilles tribe, and the Bitterroot Salish (séliš) languages are all different forms, or dialects, of the same language.
According to Salish history, all Salish-speaking people lived as one large nation thousands of years ago. Tribal elders say that the tribes began to split into smaller groups when their population grew too large for one central place to support them. Over centuries, the Salish languages developed into different dialects in the various regions where the tribes settled. These regions stretched from Montana all the way to the Pacific Coast. The separated groups became more distinct, leading to unique languages and dialects within the Salishan family. The eastern group is known as Interior Salish, which includes the Flathead (Séliš), Kalispell (Qlispé), and Spokane dialects.
History of the Salish People
Ancient History and Origins
The tribes' oral history tells how they came to live in their traditional lands, which is now Montana. This happened when Coyote killed the nałisqelixw, a word that means "people-eaters."
Our story begins when the Creator put the animal people on this earth. He sent Coyote ahead as this world was full of evils and not yet fit for mankind. Coyote came with his brother Fox, to this big island, as the elders call this land, to free it of these evils. They were responsible for creating many geographical formations and providing good and special skills and knowledge for man to use. Coyote, however, left many faults such as greed, jealousy, hunger, envy, and many other imperfections that we know of today
Many Coyote stories vividly describe geological events that happened around the last ice age. These stories talk about glaciers extending down what is now Flathead Lake, western Montana being flooded by a huge lake, the end of the ice age, and large animals like giant beavers disappearing and being replaced by smaller versions. Archaeologists have found evidence that people lived in some of these sites continuously for at least 12,600 years, since the glaciers retreated. Some stories even suggest people were there as far back as 40,000 years ago, when the ice age began.
Life in the Bitterroot Valley
The Bitterroot Salish started living in the Bitterroot Valley in the 1700s. This was because Plains tribes moving westward pushed them off the plains. Around the same time, smallpox spread through the tribe, causing a big drop in their population. The Salish people adapted by continuing their seasonal way of life. They traveled across the continental divide once or twice a year to hunt buffalo. They also formed alliances with tribes to the west to protect themselves from Plains tribes like the Blackfeet.
The St. Mary's Mission
Before Lewis and Clark arrived in the Bitterroot Valley in 1805, a Salish prophet named Xalíqs (Shining Shirt) predicted that fair-skinned men in black robes would come to teach new morals and ways to pray. He said these men, who wore crosses and did not marry, would bring peace, but their arrival would mark the beginning of the end for all native people.
By the 1830s, Iroquois trappers who had been taught by Jesuits settled in the Bitterroot Valley. They told the Salish about the "powerful medicine" of Catholicism. Remembering Xalíqs's prophecy, the Salish sent groups to St. Louis in 1831, 1835, 1837, and 1839, asking for these "Black Robes" to come to their valley. The 1839 group convinced Father Pierre-Jean DeSmet, a Jesuit priest, to visit Salish territory.
In the summer of 1840, 1,600 Salish and Pend d'Oreilles met DeSmet at Pierre's Hole. About 350 chose to be baptized, including important leaders like Tjolzhitsay (Big Face), Walking Bear, and Victor (Xweɫxƛ̣ ̓cín or Many Horses). DeSmet went back east to get money for a mission. He returned to the Bitterroot in September 1841 with five more Jesuit priests. They then built St. Mary's Mission.
Many Salish people chose to adopt parts of Catholicism that fit well with their own beliefs, such as ideas about generosity, community, obedience, and respect for family. They also found power in Catholic chants, prayers, hymns, and the use of sacred objects and sites. However, the Salish did not accept all Catholic teachings. For example, they rejected the ideas of hell and sin. When the priests tried to teach them farming, most chose to continue their traditional seasonal way of life. The Jesuits also tried to stop Salish traditions that went against Catholic teachings. They gathered the medicine men and told them to throw their sacred bundles into a hole near the church. This led to a lot of the medicine men's traditional knowledge being lost.
The Hellgate Treaty
In 1855, Isaac Stevens, the Governor of Washington Territory, invited Victor (Xweɫxƛ̣ ̓cín), the head chief of the Bitterroot Salish; Tmɫxƛ̣ ̓cín (No Horses or Alexander), the head chief of the Pend d'Oreilles; and Michelle, the head chief of the Kootenais, to a meeting in what is now Missoula, Montana. The tribal leaders were told that Stevens wanted to talk about a peace treaty. However, the chiefs and headmen were surprised and angered to find out that Stevens's main goal was to discuss giving up Indian lands.
Like other talks with Plateau tribes, Stevens wanted to gather many tribes onto one reservation. This would clear the way for white settlers to move onto as much land as possible. Stevens tried to convince the chiefs to sign the Hellgate treaty, which would give up their territories for $120,000. The treaty planned for the Flathead Indian Reservation in the lower Flathead River Valley, where the tribes would be moved.
When Xweɫxƛ̣ ̓cín (Victor) refused to give up the Bitterroot Valley, Stevens added Article 11 to the agreement. This article set aside about 1.7 million acres in the Bitterroot as a temporary reservation. It said the valley would be surveyed, and then the president would decide if the Bitterroot reservation or the Flathead reservation would be "better adapted to the wants of the Flathead tribe." In the meantime, the U.S. government was supposed to keep white settlers out of the Bitterroot Valley.
Father Adrian Hoecken, a Jesuit priest who watched the meeting, wrote that the whole council was a "ridiculous tragi-comedy." He noted that "not a tenth of it was actually understood by either party," because the translator spoke Flathead very poorly.
The question of a Bitterroot reservation was left undecided when Congress did not approve the treaty until 1859. Meanwhile, Stevens ordered only a quick survey of the valley, telling R. H. Lansdale to just ride around the two proposed reservations. Stevens told Lansdale to "weight must be given to the fact that a large number of Indians prefer the Flathead River reservation." After riding around the valleys, Lansdale reported, as expected, that "the northern district is preferable." The U.S. government was busy with the Civil War and delayed settling the Bitterroot question. During this time, it failed to keep its promise to keep settlers out of the valley.
The Garfield Treaty
After Victor (Xweɫxƛ̣ ̓cín) died in 1870, his son Charlo (Sɫm̓xẹ Q̓woxq̣eys, Claw of the Small Grizzly Bear) was chosen as the next chief. White settlers and Montana's representative in Congress saw this change in leadership as a chance to force the Salish onto the Flathead reservation. In 1871, President Ulysses S. Grant ordered the Salish to be removed from the Bitterroot. In 1872, Congressman James A. Garfield arrived to discuss the move.
When Charlo refused to leave the valley, Garfield assumed the Salish would change their minds. He continued "with the work in the same manner as though Charlo [Xweɫxƛ̣ ̓cín], first chief, had signed the contract." The original copy of the agreement, kept in the National Archives, does not have an "x" next to Charlo's name. However, the official copies that Congress voted on did have an "x" by his name. This only made the tribe angrier and stronger in their decision not to leave the Bitterroot Valley, even though conditions were getting worse. To get a signature on the agreement, government officials recognized Arlee as chief. Arlee led a small group of Salish to the Flathead in 1873. Most of the people stayed in the Bitterroot with Charlo. Some received special land titles that could not be taken away. The government saw them as U.S. citizens who had left their tribe, but the people still saw themselves as an independent tribal community.
Forced Move to Flathead
The Bitterroot Salish continued their traditional seasonal way of life in the Bitterroot Valley for as long as they could. However, the destruction of the buffalo herds in the 1870s and 1880s forced them to start farming and ranching. They had some success with agriculture until a severe drought in 1889. With food becoming scarce, the people suffered and finally began to consider the U.S. government's offer of land on the Flathead Reservation.
In October 1889, retired general Henry B. Carrington arrived in the Bitterroot to talk with the Salish and convince them to move to the Flathead for good. Carrington tried to earn Charlo's trust, first with gifts. Then, he brought out the original 1872 Garfield agreement to address Charlo's claim that he never signed it. He also made many promises to the people: they would get to choose good farms on the Flathead reservation, receive help with plowing and fencing their new farms, every family with children would get a cow, and they would receive food until they moved or until they got money from selling their Bitterroot lands. At first, the Salish rejected Carrington's offers and refused to sign the agreement. They asked for the original Hellgate treaty to be followed exactly, but Carrington ignored their request.
Finally, Charlot signed Carrington's agreement on November 3, 1889. The Salish were forced to accept moving to the Flathead. It was a painful decision to give up their homeland, but they did it to protect their people and culture. They left the valley on October 15, 1891. Charlot organized the march himself and insisted it happen without a white military escort. However, Salish oral histories and newspaper reports show that troops were present during the removal. Elders later remembered the three-day, sixty-mile journey as a funeral march. Some historians have called this event Montana's Trail of Tears or the Salish Trail of Tears.
Life on the Flathead Reservation
During and after the move to the Flathead, the Salish had to deal with broken government promises. They received very little food. They never got the promised help with plowing and fencing or the promised cows. In 1910, the Flathead reservation was opened to white homesteaders because of the efforts of Congressman Joseph M. Dixon. Despite all these challenges, the Bitterroot Salish survived and built a strong community on the reservation.
In the 1920s, the tribes on the Flathead reservation forced the U.S. government to recognize their ownership of the Kerr Dam, also known as Seli’š Ksanka Qlispe’ Dam. The Salish joined the other tribes on the reservation to create the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT). In 1953, when the U.S. government tried to end the tribes' special status, the CSKT gained support from Montana politicians and successfully fought against it. In the later part of the twentieth century, Salish people earned college degrees and gained more political power. Also, in the 1980s, Agnes Vanderburg started an annual camp to teach traditional skills to the younger generation. The management of the bison at the National Bison Range was returned to tribal control in 2020 through a law and in 2021 by executive order from Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland under the Biden administration. Today, the Salish continue their efforts to preserve their tribe and protect their interests.
See also
In Spanish: Bitterroot salish (tribu) para niños
