Beaver Creek Massacre Site

Beaver Creek Massacre Site, located about 16 miles (26 km) Dolores, Colorado, occurred on June 19, 1885 between Ute Mountain Utes and white cattlemen over land use and Native American policies established for Native Americans. The last conflict of its kind in Colorado, it followed the Meeker Massacre and Sand Creek Massacre. Six or eleven Ute Mountain Ute Tribe people were killed. Two or three days later, a white man and his family were attacked in Montezuma County. Mr. Genthner was killed and his wife was wounded. The Beaver Creek Massacre site is located along a dirt forest road in the Dolores Ranger District of the San Juan National Forest. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places on October 2, 1986.

Background

Utes had difficulty getting enough food to eat. They lived on the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe Reservation where they were supposed to hunt. The federal government was supposed to provide food rations for the Native Americans to compensate for not being able to hunt on their traditional lands. Game, including deer and elk, had roamed through their reservation, but the game were driven off the Ute's land due to cattle ranching and railroads. Whites complained that the Ute people took or killed their cattle and horses. ==Ute hunting party massacred==

Ute hunting party massacred

A group of Ute Mountain Ute people set out in June 1885 to hunt. They stopped at a long-standing Ute camp site near Beaver Creek. There was only one Ute person who survived. Colonel P. T. Swaine, the commander of Fort Lewis, sent troops to the site and to patrol the area. Ute police and leaders and Indian Agent Stollsteimer went to the site to investigate. Some settlers sought shelter at the stone barn at Porter ranch. ==Retaliation==

Retaliation

About June 21, Utes killed Mr. Genthner and wounded his wife. They set the Genthner house on fire. Denham states that several white people were killed in Montezuma County. ==Fort Narraguinnep==

Fort Narraguinnep

Some of the local residents met up at Narraguinnep Spring and set up a hastely-constructed fort of logs — called Fort Narraguinnep and Narraguinnep Fort — about north of Dolores at . Swaine declined an offer for state troops to come to the site, but increased patrols through the area. The fear among the settlers and Utes calmed down by early July. ==Notes==

Source: Wikipedia ↗

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