all the information I have been able to gather upon the subject, I am satisfied the best disposition for these people will be to send them, under safe escort, to Winnemucca’s reservation, and I request authority to make such disposition.” Under date of Jan. 7, 1882, he had already written to division headquarters, as follows: “Many of the Indians taken from Malheur agency by the military and placed on the Yakima Reservation, were always loyal to the government. Since they have been on that reservation they have been living in a wretched condition, with very insufficient food and clothing. I doubt the wisdom or loyalty of this course on the part of the government officials; and, as I understand their reservation has been, or is to be given up, it would, in my opinion, be an act of justice and good policy to promptly restore these peaceable Indians to their people,—those known as the Winnemucca Indians near Camp Dermot, or to the Warm Spring Reservation, where they have friends. This action, if prompt, may prevent an outbreak in the spring. In this connection, I enclose a copy of a recent communication from the interior department on the subject.”
Other officers express a similar opinion to that of Gen. McDowell. On page eighteen of the Army Report is a letter relating to the return of the Piutes from the Yakima Reservation to their home in Nevada, from Major A. M. Randol of the First Artillery, to the Assistant Adjutant-General of the Headquarters M. D. P. D. C., Presidio of San Francisco, Cal.:—
Winnemucca, Nev., Aug. 15, 1882.Sir,—I have the honor to report that I have just had an interview with Natchez, who, in reply to the questions contained in your communication of the 12th inst., says that about forty-three lodges had left the Yakima Reservation
and crossed the Columbia, with the intention of re-
