EXHIBITS
I Remember When . . . : Memories and Moments in Mendon, Utah: Chief Pocatello’s Revenge
Chief Pocatello’s Revenge
Settlers and Shoshone Interactions: Misunderstandings and Stories
The Northwestern Shoshone and the settlers of Cache Valley, including those who lived in North Fort (now Mendon), continually clashed over land ownership. The Northwestern Shoshone of Cache Valley and their ancestors used the area as hunting and fishing grounds for generations, evoking traditional ownership. Those coming in to settle the Valley were primarily members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints of northern European ancestry. They saw it as a land promised to them by God, and therefore a place of refuge where they could build and grow a community.
These differing points of reference led to conflict. The Shoshone people were physically and existentially threatened by the presence of the settlers, who took up land and resources. Additionally, the Mormon Pioneers came into Cache Valley with negative perceptions of Native peoples based on rumors and experiences from the Mormon Trail. These stories and cultural differences made interactions tense between the Mormon settlers and the Shoshone.
How Legends Work in a Community
Legends are described by folklorists as “narratives told as true or possibly true, set in the real world and in historical time. The genre of legend is the form through which we rhetorically negotiate and examine questions of possibility and belief” (Blank and McNeill 2018, 7). Legends contain elements that could be true but are always told as if they are true. Communities often use these stories to explain the inexplicable and ground their beliefs and anxieties.
Urban legends, or contemporary legends, share information, sound a warning, and solidify group beliefs. For instance, children may share legends with each other about babysitting experiences gone horribly wrong in order to titillate, teach, and express anxiety over growing up. Legends may reveal community fears or important beliefs, and while they may contain some truth, other aspects of the story are often embellished to project group belief. Often it is less important whether or not the legend is true in comparison to whether the people telling the legend believe it is true.
Chief Pocatello’s Revenge
The legend of “Pocatello’s Revenge” shows the strained relationship between settlers and the Northwestern Band of Shoshone people, most often referred to as “Indians” by the settlers. As Mormon Pioneers crossed the plains, they heard (and often retold) stories of kidnapped children, burned wagons, and killed travelers. Some were true; some were not; but regardless, the stories had a major effect on the relationships between the two parties. There had been historical records of Shoshone people in the area being blamed for the disappearance of livestock.
One version of “Pocatello’s Revenge” was told in a small booklet assembled by school children and their teachers in 1946. A summary of the story is as follows:
Chief Pocatello led a small band and was part of the Shoshone Tribe. Legend says that he placed a spy among the people of Mendon to get information about their food supplies and measures of protection. The Mendon population described this spy “as hateful as the chief and became a public nuisance always listening, peeking, meddling. If two or three folks stopped to talk at a corner, there this Old Buck would be always listening. While the folk were gathered at Church, the old fellow could be seen moving about peeking into everything, and then off he would go each morning to report to his chief.”
In a meeting, it was decided that he needed to be driven from the town and three men were chosen to carry out the informing. They met him just after dark and confronted him with their knives drawn. The old Native American drew his knife in response and rushed one of the men, who stabbed him in the heart. When he fell, the man said, “well, that’s one more no good Indian gone.” The other men wrapped his body in a buffalo robe and carried outside of town by a pond and buried him in a field, making sure that there was no trace left. After they had buried him, they plowed the field the same night with ox teams and hand plows.
The next morning, “as if by magic,” Chief Pocatello his men appeared and began searching. All day they looked everywhere and in and under everything that might hide a body; they even walked over the field that held the grave. After a long day of searching, Chief and his men “came again to the center of town and Pocatello, standing ‘like a bronze statue’ shook his fists at the silent closed doors and shouted so all could hear, ‘I’ll make you pay for this.’ ”
It is said that as he was leaving, he promised to “take nine children to pay for the crime.”
The Withered Hand
It was told that when Brigham Young, prophet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was informed about the killing of the Native American man at the hands of the settlers, he became angry. Young cursed the man, believed to be James Wood Hill, making his arm wither. In the audio clip on this page, listen to Daniel Richards talk about the story of the withered hand and the men believed to be associated with the legend.