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Show 22 The Southern Utes The United States government failed to provide the Tabeguache with any of the goods promised in the treaty and the Tabeguache continued to live in their accustomed places. In 1864, heavy snows prevented them from hunting buffalo in the plains and foothills for their winter supply of meat, and the Tabeguaches were reduced to begging around Colorado City. This caused friction with the white people, and more developed in the San Luis Valley between the Utes and the settlers there. The United States government determined to settle the Ute question and remove them, esepecially from the San Luis Valley. To accomplish this, a treaty was negotiated on March 2, 1868, at Washington, D.C. The United States was represented by Governor A. C. Hunt for the Territory of Colorado, N. G. Taylor, and Kit Carson. The seven bands of Utes who sent representatives were the Tabeguache, Mouache, Capote, Weeminuche, Yampa, Grand River and Uintah.20 By this treaty, a single reservation was provided for all the Ute bands and the area comprised roughly the western one-third of Colorado. An agency for the three bands of Northern Utes was to be established on the White River near the present town of Meeker, Colorado. Another agency was to be established on the Los Pinos River for the Tabeguaches, Mouaches, Capotes, and Weeminuches. Education, clothing, and rations were to be provided by the United States until the Utes should be capable of supporting themselves. The Utes were assured that this reservation would forever be theirs and they would be protected from white trespassers. This treaty was signed by the ten Ute leaders and it was at this time that Ouray was selected by the United States to be spokesman for the Utes instead of Colorow or another headsman whom the Northern Utes preferred. It appeared that the Treaty of 1868 would settle the "Ute problem," but such was not the case. The Tabeguache band started to go to the Los Pinos River, but they refused to go further when they arrived at a branch of Cochetopa Creek about sixty miles to the north and about fifty-five miles west of Saguache, Colorado.21 This spot was not even on the specified reservation but the United States set up the Los Pinos agency there, naming the tributary of Cochetopa Creek "Los Pinos" to comply with the letter of the treaty, which had meant the 20 The Ute Treaty of 1868 is in Kappler, Laws and Treaties, II, p. 990; Rockwell, The Utes, pp. 72-82. 21 Rockwell, The Utes, pp. 71-81. |