Kintpuash
| Kintpuash "Captain Jack" |
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|---|---|
Kintpuash in 1864
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| Chief, Modoc people | |
| Personal details | |
| Born | c. 1837 Tule Lake area, California |
| Died | October 3, 1873 (age 35-37) Fort Klamath, Oregon |
| Cause of death | Executed (hanging) |
| Military service | |
| Battles/wars | Modoc War |
Kintpuash, also known as Captain Jack (c.1837 – October 3, 1873), was a chief of the Modoc tribe of California and Oregon. He led a band from the Klamath Reservation to return to their lands in California, where they resisted return. From 1872 to 1873, their small force made use of the lava beds, holding off more numerous United States Army forces for months in the Modoc War.
Kintpuash was the only Native American leader ever to be charged with war crimes, and he was executed by the Army, along with several followers, for their ambush killings of General Edward Canby and Reverend Eleazar Thomas at a peace commission meeting. Canby was the only general to be killed in the Indian Wars. The Modoc leaders were hanged for war crimes by the Army. Kintpuash's name in the Modoc language meant 'Strikes the water brashly.'
Kintpuash was born about 1837 into a Modoc family in their ancestral territory near Tule Lake. The Modoc occupied about 5,000 acres here, along what became the California-Oregon border after European settlement.
In 1864, the Modoc still lived in their ancestral home near Tule Lake. Due to the pressure of white settlers who wanted to farm the fertile land and were encroaching in this territory, Kintpuash and his family were among the Modoc removed by the United States to the Klamath Reservation in southwestern Oregon. This was primarily occupied by their traditional rivals, the much larger Klamath tribe. The Klamath outnumbered the newcomers, and the reservation was on traditional Klamath land; the Modoc complained of poor treatment and conflict with the Klamath.
In 1865, Kintpuash, by then informally called Captain Jack by American settlers, led a band of Modoc from the reservation back to their home in California. In 1869, the band were rounded up by the United States Army and returned to the Klamath Reservation. Finding conditions had not improved, in April 1870, Captain Jack led a band of about 180 Modoc back to the Tule Lake area.
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