Fort Lemhi

Fort Lemhi
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Fort Lemhi Circa 1900
Nearest city	Salmon, Idaho
Area	9 acres (3.6 ha)
Built	1855 (1855)
NRHP reference No.	72000443[1]
Added to NRHP	February 23, 1972

Fort Lemhi was a Mormon settlement from 1855 to 1858 located approximately two miles (3 km) north of present-day Tendoy, Idaho and served as the base of operations for the Salmon River Mission. The mission was initially created as part of a larger effort to proselyte to Native Americans throughout western North America, however the fort eventually became a critical piece of Brigham Young's strategy in the Utah War. The surprise attack on Fort Lemhi in 1858 was the catalyst for bringing the Utah War to a resolution.

Brigham Young called twenty-seven men from the Salt Lake Valley to form the Salmon River Mission and preach to the "remnants of the House of Jacob," meaning the Native Americans ^[2][3] Thomas S. Smith led the group and George Washington Hill served as their main Shoshonean language interpreter.^[4] The party travelled about 380 miles north of Salt Lake City to the Salmon River valley (then in Oregon Territory).^[2] They selected a permanent site to build a settlement on June 15, 1855 on land used by Bannock, Shoshone, Nez Perce and Flathead peoples.^[3][5] Access to each of these nations made the location ideal for a missionary outpost.^[6] The Nez Perce and Bannock leaders agreed to let the missionaries use the land for fishing, hunting, and logcutting, as long as it was not done to make a profit.^[7]

The community grew to over 200 people. The settlers brought stock raising and irrigated farming to the region, and dug ditches which are still in use.^[8] At least three of the Mormon missionaries at Fort Lemhi married Shoshone women.^[9]

According to tradition, Sacajawea was born in an area near where the fort would eventually stand.^[2] She led Lewis and Clark's company through the Continental Divide through what is now known as Lemhi Pass.^[2]

The mission was named Fort Limhi for King Limhi, a king in the Book of Mormon.^[2][10] In Mormon scripture, King Limhi organized an expedition that lasted 22 days, the same duration it required the Mormon missionaries to reach the Salmon River. Consequently, they named their mission after King Limhi, and Limhi eventually became "Lemhi."^[11] Over time the surrounding valley, mountains, pass, a branch of the river, county, and Native Americans took on the name "Lemhi."^[8][2]

Gaining Native American allies was a key part of Brigham Young's strategy to maintain independence from the United States.^[5] Brigham Young and other church leaders taught that by accepting baptism and intermarriage with Mormons, Native Americans would fulfill a Book of Mormon prophecy that Lamanites would return to the House of Israel.^[5] While it is no longer a core tenant of the Latter-day faith, at the time leaders taught that "the time had arrived when all the wicked should be destroyed from the face of the earth, and that the Indians would be the principal means by which this object should be accomplished."^[5]: 76 Fort Lemhi was particularly significant to Brigham Young's war strategy, as it would be a waystation in case of a northern evacuation from Utah.^[5][3]

As tensions between the US government and the Utah territory increased, Young developed a contingency plan to evacuate his followers north via Fort Lemhi as far north as Canada if necessary.^[3][5] In October 1856, Fort Lemhi missionary Pleasant Green Taylor was instructed to contact an agent of the Hudson's Bay Company about purchasing Fort Hall.^[5] Taylor and three other missionaries travelled to the Bitterroot Valley to meet with Hudson's Bay agent Neil McArthur.^[5] McArthur agreed to pass Young's interest along to Hudson's Bay, and the four Fort Lemhi missionaries returned to Brigham Young with a map and favorable reports of the valley.^[5] They were impressed with the area's agricultural, defensive, and transportation potential as a new home for Young's followers.^[5] Furthermore, Brigham Young felt there might be more security living on the upper Missouri among the Native peoples of the Northwest, as they would be stronger military allies than the tribes of the Great Basin.^[5] After receiving the report on the Bitterroot Valley, Young decided to visit the area himself and attempt alliances with the Lakota, Blackfoot, Bannock, Nez Perce, Shoshone, and Flathead nations.^[5]

Brigham Young visited Fort Lemhi in spring of 1857 to turn the mission into a more permanent settlement.^[3][5][6] He traveled in a mile-long caravan of 115 men, 22 women, 5 boys, 168 horses and mules, 54 carriages and wagons, and two light boats for river crossings.^[5] Notable members of the party included Heber C. Kimball, Daniel H. Wells, Chief Arapeen and his wife Wispit, and interpreter Dimick B. Huntington.^[5]

Young was pleased with the growth of the mission and friendly relations he felt the colonizers had with the local Native American tribes.^[3][5] He told the missionaries to move their families to Fort Lemhi.^[3] Young also made plans for a second fort on the Salmon River's east fork.^[5] While the local Native American tribes had agreed to a small mission outpost, they were against a permanent settlement.^[6] The colony required more buildings, fences, and land, which soured relationships with local native tribes.^[3][6] Furthermore, Flathead leaders throughout the Northwest worried the Mormons "should overrun and occupy their lands in force."^[5]

Brigham Young's visit to Fort Lemhi also came under federal scrutiny.^[5] The journey took Young outside of his jurisdiction as Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Utah Territory.^[5] His visits with Native Americans of the Oregon Territory, and the gifts he gave them, violated federal law; Young later documented these items as gifts for Utah Indians.^[5] The visit also spawned rumors from Native American leaders and U.S. Indian Agents that Mormons were supplying the Nez Perce, Walla Walla, Snakes, and Flatheads with weapons, inciting hostilities, and encouraging them to fight against the U.S. Government. The commissioner of Indian Affairs J.W. Denver reprimanded Young, writing "you fitted out an expedition yourself, and conducted it northward, out of your superintendency, to give presents to Indians not under your control."^[12] This letter, along with 46 other files from the Office of Indian Affairs, was included in President Buchanan's report to Congress justifying his order to send troops into Utah.^[12]

Native tribes became less friendly with the settlers as they awaited the outcome of the impending Utah War and more colonists arrived to the fort and competed for resources.^[3] The settlers also interfered in a Bannock, Shoshone, and Nez Perce tribal dispute over horses, though they were largely ignorant of their complex relationships.^[3][13][5]

On February 25, 1858, Bannock Chief Le Grand Coquin and mountaineer John W. Powell led 250 Bannock and Shoshone warriors in a surprise attack on Fort Lemhi.^[3] They killed two Mormon settlers, wounded five, and forced the remaining 69 colonists to retreat to the log fort.^[3] They also captured over 200 cattle and 30 horses.^[3] In March, after a rescue effort made by Lehi militia members, the colonizers abandoned the fort and returned to Utah.^[3]

This attack took Brigham Young by surprise and frustrated his plans to evacuate his followers north.^[3][5] With nowhere to go, he began peacemaking efforts with the U.S. government.^[3][5]

Fort Lemhi was reoccupied in 1862 by miners, who grew vegetables there for sale.^[8]

The name Lemhi became applied to the Lemhi River and valley surrounding the mission site, as well as to the Lemhi Shoshone whom the mission served, the Lemhi Pass and eventually Lemhi County.^[8]

The site is on the National Register of Historic Places.^[14]

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