OCR Text |
Show information in my next report; also an estimate of the expenses attending the same. The principal Chiefs of the Utahs are now on a visit to the Navahoes, they informed me that they would return about the first of September when the matter will be finally determined upon. I would also call the attention of the Department to the present as well as the future condition of the Indians for the coming year in regard to provisions. It has been customary heretofore with the Indinays in this section of the Territory to depend in a great measure upon the settlements for a large share of their living and which has heretofore been liberally granted to them, but from the almost total destruction of the crops in the more Southern sections of the Territory by grasshoppers as well as the long continued and unprecedented drouth, (sic) necessity forbids an extension of their former liberality. I would therefore recommend to the Department to enpower their agent in this section of the Territory to provide the Indians with wheat, flour, and some cattle-which will in a great measure deter them from committing depradations upon this and adjoining sections of the Territory. Measures should be immediately taken in some way to appease their hunger as they are already in a very destitute condition and are constantly making loud and clamorous appeal to the settlers for provisions and that too, I am credibly informed in some of the settlements when they have not enough for themselves to subsist upon, and the coming harvest admonishes them that their own supply in very many instances will be cut off and that scarcity and high prices will unavoidably deprive many of the common necessaries of life during the coming year, |