These pictures by unknown artists portray Leschi (left) and Quiemuth (right), the brothers chosen by territorial governor Isaac Stevens to act as Nisqually chiefs in signing the Medicine Creek Treaty. Washington State Historical Society Collections.

A view of Muck creek, showing Sam P'yelo, a Nisqually man, in his canoe ferry. Photograph by Edmond S. Meany, 1905. Washington State Historical Society Collections.

Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) The London-based Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) was formed in 1670, and swept across what is now Canada in search of furs and other goods to sell in the European market. After a merger with the rival Northwest Company in 1821, the HBC expanded into the Pacific Northwest. Fort Nisqually was one trading post of the HBC.

Puget's Sound Agricultural Company (PSAC) As the fur trade declined in the late 1830s, the HBC created a subsidiary, called the Puget's Sound Agricultural Company (PSAC), to raise crops and livestock for local use and export to Russian Alaska, Mexican California, and the Hawaiian Kingdom. Fort Nisqually became the headquarters of PSAC.

So-called "chief certificates" like the one pictured here were often used to identify chiefs appointed by the U.S. government to represent tribes.

Employees of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and Puget's Sound Agricultural Company (PSAC) at Fort Nisqually had many dealings with Native Americans in the mid-Nineteenth century. Often friendships developed between the groups. Two good friends of the Company personnel were Nisqually Indian leaders Quiemuth and Leschi.

These individuals were half-brothers with the same father but different mothers. They were born and raised in Me-schal, a village located on the Mashel River, a little upstream from its junction with the upper Nisqually River. Over time, Quiemuth and Leschi and their families would have ranged widely along the Nisqually River on a yearly cycle of fishing, hunting, and plant gathering. The half-brothers became particularly associated with Muck Creek, a tributary of the lower Nisqually River.

Quiemuth and Leschi had good working ties with the HBC/PSAC. Historian Cecelia Carpenter has written that "they were employed by the Company as horseguards" on Yelm Prairie. Dr. William Fraser Tolmie, commander of Fort Nisqually for many years, knew the half-brothers well. It helped that Dr. Tolmie, unlike many Euro-Americans, could speak the Lushootseed language of the Nisqually people.

In an 1858 letter, Dr. Tolmie made the following statement about the half-brothers: "Towards the whites he [Leschi] and his deceased brother Quyeimal [Quiemuth], were from our first settlement here, in 1833, remarkably friendly and in early years they on several occasions rendered valuable assistance in repressing thefts of horses and cattle on the part of other Indians."

More specifically, Dr. Tolmie elsewhere recorded that Leschi and Quiemuth helped the HBC/PSAC men in 1843 capture an Indian who had wounded a Company shepherd. Also the Fort Nisqually Journal recorded in 1847 the assistance of the two Nisqually half-brothers in finding sheep stealers who killed and ate a ram that belonged to the PSAC.

At least partly based on a recommendation by Dr. Tolmie, Washington Territorial Governor Isaac Stevens designated Quiemuth as Chief of the Nisqually and Leschi as Sub-Chief in time for the Medicine Creek Council of December 1854.

When the Puget Sound Indian War broke out in 1855, Leschi and Quiemuth became war leaders of the Indians who fought for their ancestral lands. After the war ended in 1856, Governor Stevens and many American settlers sought revenge on Indian opposition leaders. Quiemuth was assassinated in 1856 and Leschi sentenced to death in 1857.

Despite threats from angry settlers, Dr. Tolmie became a leader in the efforts to save the life of Leschi, and wrote several public letters that sought a pardon for the Nisqually chief. These attempts failed. Leschi was hung in February 1858. Dr. Tolmie mourned the loss of both Quiemuth and Leschi, two old friends of the HBC/PSAC.

SOURCES:
Carpenter, Cecelia Svinth, Leschi, Last Chief of the Nisquallies (Tacoma, WA: Tahoma Research Service, 1998).

Carpenter, Cecelia Svinth, Tears of Internment: The Indian History of Fox Island and the Puget Sound Indian War (Tacoma, WA: Tahoma Research Service, 1996).

Eckrom, J.A., Remembered Drums: A History of the Puget Sound Indian War (Walla Walla, WA: Pioneer Press Books, 1989).

Huggins, Edward, Reminiscences of Puget Sound, transcribed by Gary Fuller Reese (Tacoma, WA: Tacoma Public Library, 1984).

Reese, Gary Fuller, Leschi, the Officers and the Citizens (Tacoma, WA: Tacoma Public Library, 1986).