Qualla: Nez Perce Flight Through Yellowstone

Nez Perce Flight Through Yellowstone: Introduction

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Daniel Mayer, CC BY-SA 3.0. General William Tecumseh Sherman had been vacationing in Yellowstone just days before. His scout assured a group of tourists from Radersburg, Montana, that they would be "perfectly safe" from the Nez Perce. Emma Cowan, one of those tourists, noted drily that Sherman's party "preferred being elsewhere, as they left...that same night." She was about to learn why. Between August 20 and September 7, 1877, approximately 750 Nez Perce men, women, and children fled through Yellowstone National Park - America's first national park, barely five years old - while the U.S. Army tried to trap them at every exit.

Image: Daniel Mayer | CC BY-SA 3.0

Nez Perce Flight Through Yellowstone: Refugees in the Wilderness

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Greg Tally - User: (WT-shared) WineCountryInn at wts wikivoyage, CC BY-SA 3.0. The Nez Perce who entered Yellowstone were not invaders but refugees. Since June 1877, they had resisted relocation from their ancestral lands on Oregon's Wallowa River to a reservation in Idaho. By late August, they had traveled hundreds of miles across Idaho and Montana, fighti...

Image: Greg Tally - User: (WT-shared) WineCountryInn at wts wikivoyage | CC BY-SA 3.0

Nez Perce Flight Through Yellowstone: Tourists Caught in the Crossfire

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wegner, Public domain. When the Nez Perce entered Yellowstone, eight or nine parties of tourists - at least 35 people - were exploring the park's wonders. On August 24, Yellow Wolf's scouting party encountered the Radersburg tourists camped near the Lower Geyser Basin. The Nez Perce forced the group to...

Image: Wegner | Public domain

Nez Perce Flight Through Yellowstone: Sherman's Trap

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Copyright 2009, Ryan Holliday (Wrh2). The original image can be found at http://www.mountaininterval.org., CC BY-SA 3.0. While General Howard rested his exhausted troops at Henrys Lake, his superior Sherman was constructing a trap. Lieutenant Gustavus Doane with 100 men guarded the north entrance at Mammoth Hot Springs. Colonel Samuel Sturgis with 360 men covered Clark's Fork to the east. Major Har...

Nez Perce Flight Through Yellowstone: The Canyon Nobody Could Pass

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit T. A. Jagger, Public domain. The Nez Perce chose Clark's Fork - the route Colonel Sturgis had dismissed, believing "no trail could possibly lead through it." The lower miles of Clark's Fork passed through a narrow canyon with vertical walls 800 feet high. Sturgis considered it impassable. The Nez Perce knew ...

Image: T. A. Jagger | Public domain

Nez Perce Flight Through Yellowstone: Names Written on the Land

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit U.S. Forest Service, Public domain. Today, Yellowstone bears witness to this desperate flight. Nez Perce Creek, officially named in 1885, marks the east fork of the Firehole River. Nez Perce Ford commemorates where Chief Joseph's people crossed the Yellowstone River on August 25, 1877. Joseph Peak rises in the Gall...

Image: U.S. Forest Service | Public domain