DRAWING

Garcia, Andrew

Pen and Ink/Pencil/Paper/Colored pencil

ca. 1877-1940

Gift of the Rock Foundation

2013.29.04

Andrew Garcia (1856—1943) was an eyewitness to the Canyon Creek Battle, the penultimate skirmish in the 1877 Nez Perce War. After battling the US Army at the Big Hole in southwestern Montana, the Nez Perce fled east, passing through Yellowstone Park in the erroneous belief that they would find refuge among the Crow. The Seventh US Cavalry pursued the fleeing Nez Perce, and the two groups met at Canyon Creek, north of present day Laurel. Garcia - a private citizen working as a freighter for the army - described the Canyon Creek battle as "a running fight at first . . . beginning around 4 o'clock in the afternoon." He noted that, "using tactics similar to white men's warfare," Nez Perce warriors engaged the soldiers, delaying them while the women, children, and elderly escaped. However, the Seventh Cavalry captured many of the Nez Perce horses, thus slowing them down on their flight north to Canada, foreshadowing the final battle at Bears Paw later that month.