Clark Massacre

Clark massacre
Location	near the Raft River, Idaho
Date	August 6, 1851
Attack type	Robbery involving murders
Deaths	3 killed
Perpetrators	Shoshoni

In August, 1851, a band of Shoshoni Indians led by Cho Cho Co (also called Has No Horse) reportedly attacked a wagon train led by Thomas Clark on the Oregon Trail near where the Raft River joins the Snake River in present-day Idaho. Afterward, reports held that the Indians' primary objective was to steal horses from Thomas Clark's wagon train party, and that the Indians killed Clark's mother and brother and another man traveling with them during the horse robbery.

Thomas Clark was an Englishman who loved hunting. He came overland to the Willamette Valley in Oregon in 1848 but soon decamped with Jackson Vandevert and others to the California gold rush. They decided to invest their gains in bringing high quality cattle and horses to Oregon. By the spring of 1851 Thomas had acquired 20 horses and a few cattle from Kentucky and Illinois. On the trail west he brought with him his mother, his 25-year-old sister Grace, his 17-year-old brother, Hodgson, and another married sister with her family. He had a first class hack built for Grace to drive and his mother to ride in. It may have been the first such vehicle to cross the plains. He had also become the pilot for several other Illinois families headed to Oregon. The company moved slowly so the animals could graze and arrive in Oregon in good condition.

Has-No-Horse was only twenty years old in 1851 but he was a veteran guerilla fighter. He led a band of warriors of the Tussawehee sub-tribe of the Shoshone, the most powerful tribe in the area that would become Eastern Oregon, Idaho, and Western Montana. In this area the Shoshone were often known by white people as the Snakes. By late August, the band was short of supplies, particularly good horses, guns, and ammunition. Has No Horse traveled east along the Oregon Trail to meet his uncle, Deer Fly and borrow soldiers from him. Now reinforced, he identified the Clark party as his target.

At about noon on Wednesday, August 6, the wagon train stopped to rest and eat lunch. As usual, Mrs. Clark, Grace, and Hodgson drove ahead to a good stopping place and began to prepare the noon-day meal. They stopped by the Raft River and Thomas Clark headed up the river to hunt ducks. The Raft River is about 16 miles (26 km) west of the current Massacre Rocks State Park, an area where several wagon trains were attacked later in the 1850s. Other men brought many of the horses up to the river ahead of the rest of the wagon train.

The Indian's strategy was to have some of their number charge the main body of the wagon train at full gallop, creating the maximum amount of confusion. Meanwhile, Has No Horse and others would cut out the horses and drive them away.

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