--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Alder, Lydia D. collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 12 number: 8 published: 1909-06 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Lydia D. Alder, "The Massacre at Fort Laramie," *Improvement Era* 12, no. 8 (June 1909): 636–637.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1208unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1208unse start_page: 636 end_page: 637 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1909-06) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1208unse publication_year: 1909 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1909, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # The Massacre at Fort Laramie THE MASSACRE AT FORT LARAMIE. BY LYDIA D. ALDER. The emigrant train which left the frontier, in the spring of 1854, under command of Capt. Fields, was accompanied by a government train which was bringing presents from the government to the Indians who were to assemble at Fort Laramie. Sometimes the govern- ment train was ahead "of the emigrant train, then nearly beside it, or following after, but never very far away. Just before they reached Laramie, an Indian stole a cow belonging to an emigrant and killed it. The owner of the cow, proceeded ahead and Kiade complaint to the officers at the fort. A company of twenty -eight soldiers were detailed to lay the matter be- Samuel R. Parkinson, Preston, Idaho. fore the Indian chief. The commanding officer of this company, it is told, inflamed his brain by freely imbibing fire-water before his departure. When he met the chief, he demanded in an insolent tone, that the offender should be delivered up to him, "If you do not," said he, "I will blow the top of your head off!" THE MASSACRE AT FORT LARAMIE. 637 The chief laughed at him, and said, "What will become of you, if you blow the top of my head off? See all these Indians here!" pointing to the hundreds who had come in from all their hunting grounds, to receive their presents. The surrounding hills were black with their ponies, and their wickiups seemed without number. All this made no impression on the officer who immediately ordered the soldiers to fire, which they did, killing the chief instantly. The enraged Indians falling on the soldiers killed and scalped every one of them; then proceeded to the fort, killing as they went, and helped themselves to the presents, and everything else they wanted. "Our company," says S. R. Parkinson, of Preston, Idaho, ''were ten miles this side of Laramie when this occurred, but run- ners flying for their lives overtook us telling of the dreadful mas- sacre . "Instead of camping that night, Capt. Fields ordered the train on, traveling all night and notifying every one we met of the mas- sacre at the fort. Prior to this time our train for various reasons had been divided, eighteen wagons, among them George Dunford and his family, going before, under command of Capt. Isaac Groo. As I had the only mule team of the train, Capt. Fields asked me to go ahead and bear the news to them. At Deep Creek I overtook the other train, and we took another forced march. We were ac- companied by the terrified mountaineers and others whom I had warned en route. At every trading point they gathered up their ponies, waerons and belongings and joined us, for the greatest fear rested on all when they heard of the uprising of the Indians." By an overruling Providence, these emigrants were unmo- lested, buttook a long time to overcome the scare. it Others following these trains were not so fortunate. The late Henry W. Naisbitt told the writer that when he reached Laramie, he beheld the sickening sight of forty dead faces upraised to the blazing sun, murdered and scalped, but still unburied beside the wreckage of a train that had been looted by the Indians. This train, how- ever, did not belong to our people; it seems that we were always ahead or a little behind all such dreadful occurrences on the plains. Almost the last time the writer conversed with Brother Naisbitt he