Oregon Cavalry Calls for Volunteers to Fight the Snake Indians
Recruiting officer Francis Henry announces a call for cavalrymen to serve in the Washington Territory and Oregon frontiers against the Snake people.
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.
100 Volunteers Wanted: For the First Regiment of Oregon Cavalry, to serve three years unless sooner discharged. 100 Dollars Bounty. The company will consist of one Captain, one First, and one Second Lieutenant; one First Sergeant, one Quartermaster Sergeant; one commissary sergeant, five Sergeants, eight Corporals, two Teamsters, two Farriers or blacksmiths, one Saddler, one wagoner, and seventy-eight privates. The Governor of Oregon, in his proclamation calling for these volunteers, says that they will be needed the coming spring on the frontiers of this State and Washington Territory, and for an expedition against the Snake Indians who have so long been mercilessly engaged in robbing immigrants and murdering our fellow citizens. Office in Olympia with Wells, Fargo & Co. Francis Henry, Recruiting officer. Olympia, W. T., Jan. 12th, 1863.
“An expedition against the Snake Indians who have so long been mercilessly engaged in robbing immigrants and murdering our fellow citizens.”
This recruitment notice reflects the mid-19th century reality of state-sanctioned violence against Indigenous populations, framing the dispossession of lands as a necessity for safe immigration. The 'Snake Indians' refers to the Northern Paiute, Bannock, and Shoshone peoples, whose resistance to settlers was treated by the federal government as a security crisis requiring military mobilization.
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