The Madera County Indian War of 1870

For The Madera Tribune

The Indian scare of 1870 reached as far as Fresno Flats.

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The Battle of Fallen Timbers, Little Big Horn, the Sand Creek Massacre, Wounded Knee, the Mariposa Indian War — all of these are well known encounters between Native Americans and Europeans, as the American frontier moved inexorably west.

While these and countless other battles have been recorded, the Indian uprising of Madera County has for the most part escaped the scrutiny of historians. Nestled away in the archives of the Fresno Expositor is the story of a conflict that would rival Kevin Costner’s exploits in Dances with Wolves.

On Aug, 24, 1870, Expositor publisher, J.W. Ferguson, reported that a Mono medicine man, angered by the grievances of his people, set out alone to search for wisdom from the “Great Spirit” in the mountains. Upon his return, he was alleged to have made contact with the “Divine Being” and informed his band that “at the appearance of the new moon, the Whites were all to die, together with their cattle, sheep, hogs, and all the Indians in the service of Whites also.”