The Winnas Expedition was an attack by the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

against the

Snake Indians Snake Indians is a collective name given to the Northern Paiute, Bannock (tribe), Bannock, and Shoshone Native Americans in the United States, Native American tribe (Native American), tribes. The term was used as early as 1739 by French trader an ...

1855 Events January–March * January 1 – Ottawa, Ontario, is incorporated as a city. * January 5 – Ramón Castilla begins his third term as President of Peru. * January 23 ** The first bridge over the Mississippi River opens ...

, from May 24 to September 8, during the

Snake War Snakes are elongated, limbless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more joints ...

. It was documented by Granville O. Haller.

Background

On August 20

1854 Events January–March * January 4 – The McDonald Islands are discovered by Captain William McDonald aboard the ''Samarang''. * January 6 – The fictional detective Sherlock Holmes is perhaps born. * January 9 – The Teut ...

, the

Ward Massacre Ward may refer to: Division or unit * Hospital ward, a hospital division, floor, or room set aside for a particular class or group of patients, for example the psychiatric ward * Prison ward, a division of a penal institution such as a priso ...

saw a number of settlers travelling along the

Boise River The Boise River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data. , accessed May 3, 2011 tributary of the Snake River in the Northwestern United States. It drains a rugged portion of the Sawtooth Range in sou ...

killed by natives from the

Shoshone The Shoshone or Shoshoni ( or ) are a Native American tribe with four large cultural/linguistic divisions: * Eastern Shoshone: Wyoming * Northern Shoshone: southern Idaho * Western Shoshone: Nevada, northern Utah * Goshute: western Utah, easter ...

tribe. 21 settlers were attacked by the Winnas (variously spelled Winass or Winnass) band, who had tried to steal their horses; after one native was shot with a revolver, the natives killed nearly all of them and captured the rest. Settlers in Western Oregon called for retribution, and Governor

George Law Curry George Law Curry (July 2, 1820 – July 28, 1878) was a predominant American political figure and newspaper publisher in the region that eventually became the state of Oregon. A native of Pennsylvania, he published a newspaper in St. Louis, Miss ...

raised an army of volunteers in response; however, as winter was then setting in, the expedition was called off. That January,

Isaac Stevens Isaac Ingalls Stevens (March 25, 1818 – September 1, 1862) was an American military officer and politician who served as governor of the Territory of Washington from 1853 to 1857, and later as its delegate to the United States House of Represen ...

and

Joel Palmer General Joel Palmer (October 4, 1810 – June 9, 1881) was an American pioneer of the Oregon Territory in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. He was born in Canada, and spent his early years in New York and Pennsylvania before serving ...

signed treaties with several tribes in the

Willamette Valley The Willamette Valley ( ) is a long valley in Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. The Willamette River flows the entire length of the valley and is surrounded by mountains on three sides: the Cascade Range to the east, ...

, but the United States did not ratify them; this angered the natives further, and moreover, no treaty was obtained with the Shoshone. Haller eventually undertook the expedition to seek out the Winnas band members who were deemed murderers by the Oregon population; in addition to the 56 soldiers brought by Haller from

Fort Dalles Fort Dalles was a United States Army outpost located on the Columbia River at the present site of The Dalles, Oregon, in the United States. Built when Oregon was a territory, the post was used mainly for dealing with wars with Native Americans. Th ...

, 39 settler volunteers and a handful of

Nez Perce The Nez Percé (; autonym in Nez Perce language: , meaning "we, the people") are an Indigenous people of the Plateau who are presumed to have lived on the Columbia River Plateau in the Pacific Northwest region for at least 11,500 years.Ames, K ...

and Umatilla people joined.

References

{{NorthAm-native-stub 1855 in the United States Snake War