Paying the Volunteers of the Indian Wars
A federal act authorizes millions to compensate the Washington and Oregon volunteer regiments who fought in the 1855-1856 Indian Wars.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
An act to provide for the payment of the expenses incurred by the Territories of Oregon and Washington in the suppression of Indian hostilities therein, in the years 1855 and 1856. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress Assembled, That the following sums, or as much thereof as may be necessary, be and they are hereby appropriated out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, to defray the expenses incurred in the Territories of Washington and Oregon in the suppression of Indian hostilities therein, in the years 1855 and 1856. For the payment of volunteers, embracing the first, second and ninth Oregon regiments, and the three companies of minute men, numbered sixty, sixty-one and sixty-two, and the first and second Washington regiments and promiscuous companies, including the companies of Captain Strong and Captain Hays, $400,000, after deducting stoppages. Said claims to be examined and audited by the Third Auditor of the Treasury, who shall allow to said volunteers the same pay and allowances as were paid officers and soldiers of equal grade at that period in the United States army serving in that country; provided that payment shall only be made to such of the above companies as shall be shown by satisfactory proof to have been engaged in actual service in the field.
“Provided that payment shall only be made to such of the above companies as shall be shown by satisfactory proof to have been engaged in actual service in the field.”
This act addresses the bureaucratic aftermath of the conflict that dispossessed Indigenous peoples across the Washington Territory. Today, these same geographies are the subject of ongoing tribal efforts to reclaim sovereignty and reconcile with the violent history of settlement and military occupation funded by these appropriations.
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