The Only Way Through · Episode 5 of 14 · 24 min
Conflict on the River
By 1849 a quarter-million-person trail had overrun the green strip a whole subsistence economy depended on, and fighting followed. The 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley asked for routes, a telegraph, and one railway but contains no cession of land. Courts and Congress then spent a hundred and sixty years on that absence, and the episode ends at Battle Mountain, named for a battle no one can find.
Who's who
- NumagaNorthern Paiute leader who argued against war in 1860, then accepted it
- William OrmsbyMajor whose volunteer column was destroyed in May 1860
- John C. HaysColonel who led the June 1860 expedition
- James W. NyeGovernor of Nevada Territory; U.S. treaty commissioner
- James Duane DotyU.S. treaty commissioner at Ruby Valley
- Mary DannWestern Shoshone woman who contested federal grazing rules for decades
- Carrie DannWestern Shoshone woman who contested federal grazing rules for decades
- George TannehillEstablished the Battle Mountain Mining District in 1866
Where it happens
- Ruby Valley, NevadaWhere the 1863 treaty was signed
- Pyramid Lake, NevadaSite of two 1860 battles
- Williams Station, NevadaSite of the May 7, 1860 killings
- Battle Mountain, Nevada+5 more episodesTown named for an unverified battle
- Fort Churchill, NevadaBegun in 1861 after the 1860 fighting
Timeline
- May 1860Williams Station is attacked and Ormsby's volunteers are routed at Pyramid Lake.
- October 1, 1863The Treaty of Ruby Valley is signed, with no cession article.
- 1979A judgment of about $26 million is placed in a Treasury account and refused.
- February 20, 1985United States v. Dann is decided unanimously on narrow grounds.
- July 2004The Western Shoshone Claims Distribution Act directs about $142 million to payments and a trust.
Still debated
What the treaty did is read two ways: the text neither cedes nor grants land, and the Te-Moak Tribe's history says it conferred ownership. Western Shoshone governments split on the 2004 distribution, and no dated engagement on the Humboldt itself for 1862-63 has been verified.