COUNCIL PROCEEDINGS

Proceedings of a Council between General W. T Sherman and Samuel F. Tappan Commissioners on the part of the United States and the Chiefs and Head men of the Navajo Tribe of Indians held at tine Reservation known as Bosque Redondo at Fort Sumner in the Territory of New Mexico on the 28th day of May 1868.

Indian Chiefs Present:

Delgadito
Barboncito
Manuelito
Largo
Herrero
Armijo
Torivio

Jesus Alviso Indian Interpreter and James Sutherland Spanish Interpreter.

General Sherman Said:

The Commissioners are here now for the purpose of learning and knowing all about your condition and we wish to hear from you the truth and nothing but the truth. We have read in our books and learned from our officers that for many years whether right or wrong the Navajos have been at war with us and that General Carleton had removed you here for the purpose of making you agriculturists--- with that view the Government of the United States gave you money and built this fort to protect you until you were able to protect yourselves. We find you have done a good deal of work here in making acequias [irrigation canal], but we find you have no farms, no herds and are now as poor as you were four years ago when the Government brought you here. That before we discuss what we are to do with you, we want to know what you have done in the past and what you think about your reservation here.

Barboncito said:

The bringing of us here has caused a great decrease of our numbers, many of us have died, also a great number of our animals. Our Grand-fathers had no idea of living in any other country except our own and I do not think it right for us to do so as we were never taught to.

When the Navajos were first created four mountains and four rivers were pointed out to us, inside of which we should live, that was to be our country and was given to us by the first woman of the Navajo tribe. It was told to us by our forefathers, that we were never to move east of the Rio Grande or west of the San Juan rivers and I think that our coming here has been the cause of so much death among us and our animals.

That our God when he was created (the woman I spoke of) gave us this piece of land and created it specially for us and gave us the whitest of corn and the best of horses and sheep. You can see them (pointing to the other chiefs) ordinarily looking as they are, I think that when the last of them is gone the world will come to an end.

It is true we were brought here, also true we have been taken good care of since we have been here. [This odd statement was probably due to either Navajo politeness spoken in front of a "host," or it might have been due to interpreter error or malfeasance. --- DMR]

As soon as we were brought here, we started into work making acequias (and I myself went to work with my party) we made all the Adobes you see here, we have always done as we were told to, if told to bring ashes from the hearth we would do so [moving ash during the daylight hours was and is considered by Navajos an insult to Sun; Barboncito here might be stating that his people were obeying orders even when they conflict with tribal custom and taboo. --- DMR], carry water and herd stock, we never refused to do anything we were told to do. This ground we were brought on, it is not productive, we plant but it does not yield, all the stock we brought here have nearly all died. [By this time, most Navajo stock were killed or confiscated during the genocide engaged by "Kit" Carson and his troops. --- DMR]

Because we were brought here we have done all we could possibly do, but found it to be labor in vain, and have therefore quit it, for that reason we have not planted or tried to do anything this year. It is true we put seed in the ground but it would not grow two feet high, the reason I cannot tell, only I think this ground was never intended for us, we know how to irrigate and farm, still we cannot raise a crop here, we know how to plant all kinds of seed, also how to raise stock and take care of it.

The Commissioners can see themselves that we have hardly any sheep or horses, nearly all that we brought here have died and that has left us so poor that we have no means wherewith to buy others.

There are a great many among us who were once well off now they have nothing in their houses to sleep on except gunny sacks, true some of us have a little stock left yet, but not near what we had some years ago, in our old country, for that reason my mouth is dry and my head hangs in sorrow to see those around me who were at one time well off so poor now, when we had a way of living of our own, we lived happy, we had plenty of stock, nothing to do but look at our stock, and when we wanted meat nothing to do but kill it. (Pointing to the chiefs present) they were once rich. I feel sorry at the way I am fixed here, I cannot rest comfortable at night. I am ashamed to go to the Commissary for my food, it looks as if somebody was waiting to give it to me. [Chief Barboncito is complaining that he is being treated like a child, and is shamed by that treatment. --- DMR] Since the time I was very small until I was a man when I had my father and mother to take care of I had plenty and since that time I have always followed my father's advice and still keep it. viz.: to live at peace with everybody.

I want to tell the Commissioners I was born at the lower end of Canyon de Chelly. We have been living here five winters. The first year we planted corn, it yielded a good crop but a worm got in the corn and destroyed nearly all of it, the second year the same, the third year it grew about two feet high when a hail storm completely destroyed all of it. We have done all we possibly could to raise a crop of corn and pumpkins but we were disappointed.

I thought at one time the whole world was the same as my own country but I got fooled in it, outside my own country we cannot raise a crop, but in it we can raise a crop almost anywhere, our families and stock there increase, here they decrease, we know this land does not like us neither does the water. They have all said this ground was not intended for us, for that reason none of us have attempted to put in seed this year.

I think now it is true what my forefathers told me about crossing the line of my own country. It seems that whatever we do here causes death, some work at the acequias take sick and die, others die with the hoe in their hands, they go to the river to their waists and suddenly disappear, others have been struck and torn to pieces by lightning. A Rattlesnake bite here kills us, in our own country a Rattlesnake before he bites gives warning which enables us to keep out of its way and if bitten we readily find a cure: here we can find no cure. When one of our big men die, the cries of the women causes the tears to roll down on to my moustache. I then think of my own country.

I think the Commissioners have seen one thing, when we came here there was plenty of mesquite root which we used for fuel. Now there is none nearer than the place where I met the Commissioners 25 miles from here and in the winter many die from cold and sickness and overworking in carrying wood such a long distance on their backs, for that reason we cannot stay contented where we now are.

Some years ago I could raise my head and see flocks of cattle in any direction, now I feel sorry I cannot see any. I raise my head and can see herds of stock on my right and left, but they are not mine, it makes me feel sorry thinking of the time when I had plenty. I can scarcely endure it. I think that all nations round here are against us (I mean Mexicans and Indians) the reason is that we are a working tribe of Indians, and if we had the means we could support ourselves far better than either Mexican or Indian. The Comanches are against us I know it for they came here and killed a good many of our men. In our own country we knew nothing about the Comanches.

Last winter I heard said that there was a Commission coming here, now I am happy it has arrived for I expect to hear from that Commission today the object of its coming here. We have all declared that we do not want to remain here any longer. If I can complete my thoughts today I will give the General my best thanks and think of him as my father and mother.

As soon as I heard of your coming I made three pair of moccasins and have worn out two pair of them since. [Chief Barboncito might be giving here a subtle complaint about how long he had to wait. --- DMR] As you see yourselves I am strong and hearty and before I am sick or older I want to go and see the place where I was born. Now I am just like a woman, sorry like a woman in trouble. I want to go and see my own country. If we are taken back to our own country, we will call you our father and mother, if you should only tie a goat there we would all live off it [Navajo idiom; a mythic "figure of speech." --- DMR], all of the same opinion.

I am speaking for the whole tribe, for their animals from the horse to the dog, also the unborn, all that you have heard now is the truth and is the opinion of the whole tribe. It appears to me that the General commands the whole thing as a god. I hope therefore he will do all he can for the Indian, this hope goes in at my feet and out at my mouth. I am speaking to you (General Sherman) now as if I was speaking to a spirit and I wish you to tell me when you are going to take us to our own country.

General Sherman said:

I have listened to all you have said of your people and believe you have told us the truth. You are right, the world is big enough for all the people it contains and all should live at peace with their neighbors. All people love the country where they were born and raised, but the Navajos are very few indeed [about 5,000 were left alive out of approximately 9,000. --- DMR] compared with all the people in the world, they are not more than seven leaves to all the leaves you have ever seen still we want to do to you what is right to you and right to us as a people.

If you will live in peace with your neighbors, we will see that your neighbors will be at peace with you The government will stand between you and other Indians and Mexicans. We have got a map here which if Barboncito can understand I would like to show him a few points on it, show him his own country, places inhabited by other Indians, the four mountains spoken of and old Fort Defiance. For example tell him that in our country nearly every family raises a crop or works at a trade for example everybody does something for a living, those who work hard get rich, those who are lazy are poor, also in the upper country the ground is high and requires irrigation, in the lower country there is plenty of water and corn for example can be raised without irrigation. For many years we have been collecting Indians on the Indian Territory south of the Arkansas and they are now doing well and have been doing so for many years. [Some were; some were not. --- DMR] We have heard you were not satisfied with this reservation and we have come here to invite some of your leading men to go and see the Cherokee country and if they liked it we would give you a reservation there. [This was a gross insult: General Sherman is implying that the Navajos were going hungry and dying because they did not work as hard as the other Indians. --- DMR]]

There we will give you cattle to commence with and corn, it being much cheaper there than here; give you schools to educate your children in English or Spanish and take care of you until such time as you will be able to protect yourselves. We do not want you to take our word for it but send some of your wisest men to see for themselves. If you do not want that we will discuss the other proposition of going back to your own country and if we agree we will make a boundary line outside of which you must not go except for the purpose of trading. We must have a clearly defined boundary line and know exactly where you belong to, you must live at peace and must not fight with other Indians.

If people trouble you, you must go to the nearest military post and report to the Commanding Officer who will punish those who trouble you, The Army will do the fighting, you must live at peace. If you go to your own country the Utes will be the nearest Indians to you, you must not trouble the Utes and the Utes must not trouble you. If however the Utes or Apaches come into your country with bows and arrows and guns you of course can drive them out but must not follow beyond the boundary line. You must not permit any of your young men to go to the Ute or Apache country to steal neither must they steal from Mexicans. You can come to the Mexican towns to trade.

Any Navajo can now settle in this Territory and he will get a piece of land not occupied, but he will be subject to the laws of the country. Our proposition now is to send some of you at the Government's expense to the Indian Territory south of Kansas or if you want to go to your own country you will be sent but not to the whole of it, only a portion which must be well defined.

Barboncito said:

I hope to God you will not ask me to go to any other country except my own. It might turn out [to be] another Bosque Redondo. They told us this was a good place when we came but it is not.

General Sherman said:

We merely made the proposition to send you to the Lower Arkansas country for you to think seriously over it. Tomorrow at 10 o'clock I want the whole tribe to assemble at the back of the Hospital and for you then to delegate ten of your men to come forward and settle about the boundary line of your own country which will be reduced to writing and signed by those ten men.

Barboncito said:

I am very well pleased with what you have said, and if we go back to our own country, we are willing to abide by whatever orders are issued to us, we do not want to go to the right or left, but straight back to our own country.

General Sherman said:

This is all we have to say to-day to-morrow we will meet again.

The Council accordingly adjourned until to-morrow the 29th instant at 1O o'clock A.M.

Fort Sumner, New Mexico
May 29th, 1868

The Council met according to adjournment. Present the Commissioners on the part of the United States Government. On the part of the Indians the Navajo nation or tribe.

General Sherman said:

We have come from our Capital, Washington, where our Government consists of a President and a great Council. We are empowered to do now what is necessary for your good, but what we do must be submitted to our Great Father in Washington. We heard that you were not satisfied with this Reservation, that your crops failed for three years and that you wanted to go somewhere else. We know that during the time you have been here the Government has fed and done for you what was considered necessary to make you a thriving people. Yesterday we had a long talk with your principal chiefs and then told them that any Navajo could go wherever he pleased in this territory and settle with his family but if be did he would be subject to the laws of the Territory as a citizen, or we would remove you as a nation or tribe to the lower Canadian and Arkansas if you were pleased to go there. But if neither of these propositions suited you, we would discuss the other proposition of sending you to your own country west of the Rio Grande.

Barboncito yesterday insisted strongly on going back to his own country in preference to the other two propositions. We then asked him and all the Navajos to assemble here today and for them to select (l0) ten of their number as delegates with whom we would conclude terms of treaty. We want to know if these ten men have been chosen; the ten men then stood up, viz.:

Delgadito
Barboncito
Manuelito
Largo
Herrero
Chiqueto
Murerto de Hombre
Hombro
Narbono
Armijo

and the Navajos upon being asked if satisfied with these ten men, unanimously responded Yes.

We will now consider these ten men your principal men and we want them to select a chief, the remaining to compose his Council for we cannot talk to all the Navajos.

Barboncito was unanimously elected Chief now from this time out you must do as Barboncito tells you, with him we will deal and do all for your good. When we leave here and go to your own country you must do as he tells you and when you get to your country you must obey him or he will punish you, if he has not the power to do so he will call on the soldiers and they will do it.

You must all keep together on the march. Must not scatter for fear some of your young men might do wrong and get you all into trouble. All these things will be put down on paper and tomorrow these ten men will sign that paper and now we want to know about the country you want to go to.

We heard Barboncito yesterday, if there are any others who differ from him, we would like to hear them, we want also to hear if you want schools in your country: Blacksmiths or Carpenters Shops. We want to put everything on paper so that hereafter there may be no misunderstanding between us, we want to know if the whole Navajo nation is represented by those present and if they will be bound by the acts of these ten men - unanimous response of yes.

Barboncito said:

What you have said to me now I never will forget. It is true I never liked this place, and feel sorry for being here, from here I would like to go back the same road we came by way of Teralote, Bernal, Tijeras and Taralto. All the people on the road are my friends.

After I cross the Rio Grande river I want to visit the Pueblo villages, I want to see the Pueblo Indians to make friends with them. I then want to go to Canyon de Chelly leaving Pueblo village Laguna to the left. I will take all the Navajos to Canyon de Chelly leave my own family there taking the rest and scattering them between San Mateo mountain and San Juan river. I said yesterday this was the heart of the Navajo country. In this place there is a mountain called the Sierra Chusque or mountain of agriculture from which (when it rains) the water flows in abundance creating large sand bars on which the Navajos plant their corn: it is a fine country for stock or agriculture. There is another mountain called the Mesa Calabasa where these beads which we wear on our necks have been handed down from generation to generation and where we were told by our forefathers never to leave our own country. For that reason I want to go back there as quick as possible and not remain here another day. When the Navajos go back to their own country I want to put them in different places, it world not do to put them all together as they are here, if separated they would be more industrious. There is one family whose intention I do not know, the (Cibollettas) I do not know whether or not they want to go back to their own country.

General Sherman said:

If the "Cibollettas" choose they can go and live among the Mexicans in this Territory but if they do they will not be entitled to any of the advantages of the treaty.

Barboncito said:

I merely wished to mention it for if they remain with the Mexicans I cannot be held responsible for their conduct. You spoke to me yesterday about putting us on a reservation with a boundary line . I do not think it right to confine us to a certain part: we want to have the privilege of going outside the line to hunt and trade.

General Sherman said:

You can go outside the line to hunt: you can go to Mexican towns to trade but your farms and homes must be inside the boundary line beyond which you have no claim to the land.

Barboncito said:

That is the way I like to be, and return the Commissioners my best thanks. After we get back to our country it will brighten up again and the Navajos will be as happy as the land, black clouds will rise and there will be plenty of rain. Corn will grow in abundance and everything look happy. Today is a day that anything black or red does not look right. Everything should be white or yellow representing the flower and the corn.

I want to drop this conversation now and talk about Navajo children held as prisoners by Mexicans [slavery --- DMR]. Some of those present have lost a brother or a sister and I know that they are in the hands of the Mexicans. I have seen some myself.

General Sherman said:

About their children being held as Peons by Mexicans you ought to know that there is an Act of Congress against it.

About four years ago we had slaves and there was a great war about it, now there are none. Congress our great council passed a law prohibiting peonage in New Mexico. So that if any Mexican holds a Navajo in peonage he (the Mexican) is liable to be put in the penitentiary. We do not know that there are any Navajos held by Mexicans as Peons but if there are, you can apply to the judges of the Civil Courts and the Land Commissioners. They are the proper persons and they will decide whether the Navajo is to go back to his own people or remain with the Mexican, That is a matter with which we have nothing to do. [This evasive non-answer regarding enslaved Navajos must have angered the Navajos. --- DMR]

What do you say about schools, Blacksmiths and Carpenter Shops for the purpose of teaching your children?

Barboncito Said:

We would like to have a blacksmith Shop as a great number of us can work at the trade, we would like a carpenter's Shop and if a school was established among us I am satisfied a great number would attend it. I like it very well. Whatever orders you leave here you may rely upon their being obeyed.

General Sherman said:

Whatever we promise to do you can depend upon its being done.

Colonel Samuel F. Tappan asked:

How manny Navajos are among the Mexicans now?

Answer: Over half of the tribe.

Question: How many have returned within the five years?

Answer: Cannot tell.

General Sherman said:

We will do all we can to have your children returned to you. Our government is determined that the enslavement of the Navajos shall cease and those who are guilty of holding them as peons shall be punished.

All are free now in this country to go and come as they please. If children are held in peonage, the courts will decide ; you can go where any Navajos are and General Getty will give you an order or send a soldier and if the Navajo peons wishes to go back or remain he can please himself. We will not use force, the courts must decide. [If the slaves had been Anglo, I suspect the USA would have cheerfully gone to war against Mexico to free them. --- DMR]

Tomorrow we will meet with those ten men chosen and enter into business with them committing it to writing which they must sign.

The Council then adjourned until 9 o'clock tomorrow the 30th instant.

Fort Sumner N.M.
May 30th, l868

The Council met according to adjournment. Present the Commissioners on the part of the United States and on the part of the Navajo Tribe the ten chiefs or headmen chosen by the tribe at yesterday's council as their representatives.

General Sherman said:

We are now ready to commence business, we have it all written down on paper and settled and when agreed on, we will have three copies made, one for you, one to keep ourselves and one to send to Washington. We do not consider it complete until we have all signed our names to it.

I will now read it to you and any changes that may be considered necessary will be made.

The treaty was then read by General Sherman and interpreted to the Indians and approved by them.

Then General Sherman said:

We have marked off a reservation for you, including the Canyon de Chelly and part of the valley of the San Juan, it is about (100) one hundred miles square, It runs as far south as Canyon Bonito and includes the Chusca mountain but not the Mesa Calabesa you spoke of. That is the reservation we suggest to you, it also includes the Ceresca mountain and the bend of the San Juan river, not the upper waters.

Barboncito sated:

We are very well pleased with what you have said and well satisfied with that reservation. It is the very heart of our country and is more than we ever expected to get.

We wish now to have Narbono Segundo and Ganado Mucho admitted as members of our council in addition to the ten elected yesterday which was agreed to.

General Sherman then asked:

How would old Fort Defiance suit you as a site for your agency?

Answer: Very Well.

Ganado Mucho said:

After what the Commissioners have said, I do not think anybody has anything to say. After we go back to your own country it will be the same as it used to be. We have never found any person heretofore who told us what you now have and when we return to our own country we will return you our best thanks. We understand the good news you have told us, to be right and we like it very much: we have been waiting for a long time to hear the good words you have now told us, about going back to our own country and I will not stop talking until I have told all the tribe the good news.

General Sherman said:

Now we will adjourn until Monday the 1st day of June 1868 at 9 o'clock a.m. when we will meet and sign the treaty.

The Council accordingly adjourned until Monday the 1st day of June l868 at 9 o'clock a.m.

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