Outrage over Red Man's View remake

In Remake of 1909 Silent Film, journalist Debra Utacia Krol expressed outrage over an upcoming remake of Red Man's View. This remake is supposedly set in "1864 during the end of the Civil War in the northwestern territories of California."Say WHATTTTT???? I can't even begin to tell you what all is historically inaccurate with this whole idea. What a way to start a morning!!Deb, I think you've read a lot into that one phrase about the setting. "Northwestern territories of California" doesn't make sense because California was a state in 1864. There's never been a region called the northwestern territory or territories of California, and certainly not since California achieved statehood in 1850.

Could be the PR person who wrote this--it came from a press release--didn't know much about US history and garbled what a source told him or her. Could be the source said something like this: "The story is set in the northwest territories--specifically in California."

What the source may have meant was, "The story is set in the northwest territories of the US that encompass Washington, Oregon, Idaho, western Montana, and northern California and Nevada. It's specifically set in a valley such as Yosemite in California."

The Western Shoshone

As I'm sure you know, some Shoshone Indians did live in parts of California--though not in Yosemite. As Wikipedia notes:Western Shoshone comprises several Native American tribes that are indigenous to the Great Basin and have lands identified in the Treaty of Ruby Valley 1863. They resided in Idaho, Nevada, California, and Utah. The tribe is very closely related to the Paiute, Goshute, Bannock, and Ute tribes.

Federally recognized Western Shoshone Tribes include Duckwater Shoshone Tribe (Ely, Nevada), Te-Moak Tribe of the Western Shoshone Indians of Nevada and its four Constituent Band Councils of Battle Mountain, Elko and Wells Colonies and South Fork Reservation), Timbisha Tribe of the Western Shoshone Nation (Death Valley, California region) and Yomba Western Shoshone Tribe (near Winnemucca, Nevada).More confusion arises because the press release labels everything with "Union"--Union squatters, Union soldiers, Union government. I'm guessing the writer just meant the United States and the US Army. He or she may have thought the US changed its name to "the Union" during the Civil War. (Not so, obviously.)

I'm guessing the writer was describing a regular Army unit that was stationed in the area. Not a Civil War unit somehow displaced to California and looking for Confederate soldiers in the Sierras.

Perhaps not coincidentally, Nevada became a state in 1864. I can imagine US soldiers in Nevada for some reason--to celebrate statehood? To obtain silver for the war effort?--and crossing into California to thwart a Shoshone "uprising."

Another explanation

Another possibility is that the source simply meant the northwest corner of California. Then the reference to the Shoshone would be wrong, but the story could be a takeoff on the history of Fort Bragg.In prehistoric days, the area now known as Fort Bragg was home to the Native American Indians, most of whom belonged to the Pomo tribe. They were hunter-gatherers who lived close to the land and sea along the northern coast of California.

1855-1867

In 1855 an exploration party from the Bureau of Indian Affairs visited the area looking for a site on which to establish a reservation and, in the spring of 1856, the Mendocino Indian Reservation was established at Noyo. It was 25,000 acres and extended from what is now Simpson Lane to Abalobadiah Creek and east to Bald Hill.

In the summer of 1857, First Lieutenant Horatio G. Gibson, then serving at the Presidio in San Francisco, established a military post on the Mendocino Indian Reservation approximately one and one-half miles north of the Noyo River. He named the camp for his former commanding officer Captain Braxton Bragg, who later became a General in the Army of the Confederacy. The official date of the establishment of the fort was June 11, 1857. Its purpose was to maintain order on the reservation.

In 1862 a company from the 2nd California Infantry assumed command and remained until 1864. In October of that year the Fort Bragg garrison was loaded aboard the steamer "Panama" and completed the evacuation and abandonment of Mendocino County's first military post.

The Mendocino Indian reservation was discontinued in March 1886 and the land opened for settlement several years later.This would give the filmmakers Union soldiers, redwoods and other scenery, and Indians being displaced by a fort and a mill. If we assume the source meant Pomo instead of Shoshone, it's almost a legitimate story. We could attribute the filming in Yosemite to a misguided sense of artistic license.

Yet another explanation

A third possibility is that the remake really is the story of the Yosemite ("Grizzly") Indians. What I said previously would explain the "northwest territories" bit and the Union soldiers. Again Shoshone would be wrong, but otherwise the story would be roughly true:

Indians of YosemiteVillages in Yosemite

The points on the floor of Yosemite at which the Indians at one time or another lived or camped are numerous. Dr. C. Hart Merriam, the greatest living authority on these people, enumerates about forty such spots and supplies the information which he obtained about them and verified from the Indians.

The number of the band at the time of discovery is not accurately known, but may be estimated to have been in the vicinity of two hundred and fifty souls.

Encounters with the Americans:  Tenaya

It was their raids on miners, prospectors, and scattered storekeepers, that in 1851 led to the formation of a little volunteer army known as Savage’s Mariposa Battalion. This company went up into the as yet unpenetrated mountains in pursuit of the Yosemite "Grizzlies" and to their overwhelming astonishment burst into the hitherto undiscovered valley. In the fighting that followed, the Indians were defeated, and part of them, including the Chief Tenaya, captured. The prisoners were taken to the San Joaquin Valley and put on a reservation. Here they kept the peace, but were in great distress of mind on account of their deprivation of the natural foods to which they were accustomed in their own haunts, as well as owing to their enforced contiguity to alien or hostile tribes. Tenaya pleaded to be let off. He was finally released, returned to Yosemite, and within four years was followed by all the surviving members of the band.After rereading the original posting, I can't tell if this remake is based on a true story or a complete work of fiction. I'm guessing it's a fictionalized version of how the US forced some Northwest Indians to relocate a la Chief Joseph. The filmmakers may have set it in "California" only to include Yosemite or Yosemite-like scenery.

You can imagine why they'd want to use Yosemite. It's so much more romantic if the Indians are living in idyllic peace beneath towering peaks, pine trees, and waterfalls. I can almost see the soaring hawks already. <g>

Anyway, this is all speculation. And the movie may have other problems we don't know about. To learn more, feel free to contact the Biograph Company. Let us know what they say.

For more on the subject, see The Best Indian Movies.

Below:  A beautiful setting for a made-up story about Indians.