| OCR Text |
Show Chief Walker's Grave Visited By Charles Kelly Monday Frank Bcckwith, Sr., and Charles Kelly, well known writer and Utah historian, went to the Indian Reservation at Kanosh, and were there joined by Joo Pickya-vit Pickya-vit as guide, who took them to the hills in seareh of the grave of noted Chief Walker, of Walker Indian In-dian war fame. The grave of the redoubtable old warrior was found, in which (so the old books report) he and his possessions, and posssibly a boy or two boys were buried, and about sixty feet away, another grave, supposedly that of the captive Indian In-dian woman who -was slain at the time of the burial of Chief Walker. Wal-ker. Whites had visited the ske before us, found Walker's grave, and rifled it of everything bones, trinkets, gun, possessions, and in fact, stripped it clean. (Shame on my compatriots. SHAME on them! Suppose one should say to such folk, "I know where your grandmother grand-mother was put away; Cmon, let's dig the old gal up" say what a holler there would be when the shoe was on the other fool.! V.'h.i'? The principle is just the same, to dig up the white woman's remain as to pilfer, snitch, rifle, steal and above all, desecrate the grave of this old Indian warrior. For shame!) its sanctity. Nor did we. Pictures were taken. The hike was two miles long, and all that up (seemingly), over rough going, go-ing, broken rock, tangled brush, a strennuous climb, and very difficult. dif-ficult. Joe found us all the native plants of the region, and told us what each was Jor curatively. In the moments of pause, he told us much Indian history,- names of the old timers, and was a veritable source of Indian lore. Walker's Indian name was WAKARA, meaning mean-ing yellow. He was a Ute from White Rocks, not a Pahvant Indian. In-dian. Kelly and I both feel that this trip was one of the most interesting interest-ing and most successful we have ever taken together, and that covers cov-ers over twenty-fiva years of joint prowling around over Utah. Kelly will put the trip into print, when mention will be made in this paper pa-per so that our readers can follow it up, and acquaint themselves with added interest in areas close at hand. Magazine Article By Kelly To Follow As Mr. Kelly is going to make a magazine article out of the trip, I must not trespass on his prerogative prerog-ative it is his trip, and his to write it up. All I will say now is: . I have never seen a more fitting setting for the final resting place of a prominent Indian chief than that chosen for Chief Walker. Almost Al-most at the top of the mountain, 9,000 feet elevation, pines at the head of the glade, quaking aspens rustling in never-ceasing requiem over his fiery spirit, and far up the mountain, just under the top of the great mass, a natural headstone head-stone in nearly white rock! Just below that, a great blaze of broken rock, a great marker, which may be seen miles away from Highway 91, emblazoning to all the passing world, "In this romantic setting was buried an intrepid First American, Amer-ican, a leader of his tribe, in a setting set-ting fit for a chief a son of nature na-ture untamed but a man, a man of note." A Burial Fit For a Chieftan No common c'tay was given that honor. Reserved for chieftans only. on-ly. Ghouls, grave robbers, body snatchers, of pale face and yellower yellow-er souls, dug him up for pelf and Oh so liittle pelf at that! just as they would rifle a cemetery and sell the corpse to the medical students, stu-dents, or knock out a gold tooth for selling. The shame of it. We had faithfully promised Joe that no act of ours would make sacrilege of that spot, nor profane |
