holdouts were approached by 500 soldiers
under Lt. Col. Frank Wheaton, and a siege
began in earnest. To everybody’s surprise,
Captain Jack’s 50 warriors repulsed an attack
on January 17, 1873, killing 11 soldiers and
wounded an additional 26. The Indians, well
protected by their volcanic surroundings, suf-
fered no losses.
Such defiance spurred the army to greater
efforts, and shortly thereafter Gen. Edward
R.S. Canby, military commander of the De-
partment of the Columbia, arrived with rein-
forcements. Rather than attack outright,
Canby, who was sympathetic to the plight of
Native Americans, chose to negotiate first.
A series of unsuccessful parleys ensued,
but when Captain Jack began leaning toward
surrender, the militants under Hooker Jim de-
rided him as weak and threatened to kill him.
They demanded that Captain Jack murder
General Canby in an attempt to demoralize
the Americans. Accordingly, when the parties
next met on April 11, 1873, Captain Jack and
others pulled out hidden weapons, killing
Canby and wounding two others. Thus, the
good-intentioned Canby became the only reg-
ular army general to fall during the Indian
Wars. Naturally, the nation was enraged by
this act of treachery, and efforts to extricate
the Modocs were redoubled.
At length a new leader, Col. Jefferson C.
Davis (no relation to the Confederate leader),
launched a new assault with 1,000 men and
artillery on April 26, 1872, only to have it
bloodily repulsed. Moreover, a band of war-
riors under another chief, Scarface Charley,
ambushed a cavalry patrol, killing 25 addi-
tional men. However, as food supplies dwin-
dled, dissension arose in Modoc ranks and
morale began to waver. Slowly, small parties
of Indians began surrendering to the Ameri-
cans. Davis judged the moment correct and
then systematically advanced in great force,
driving the stubborn Modocs from their
stronghold. When the party under Hooker
Jim was captured, he betrayed his former
compatriots by offering to assist in tracking
down Captain Jack. In fact, when the elusive
leader was finally captured on June 1, 1872,
Hooker Jim agreed to stand as state’s witness
against him.
The surviving Modoc leaders were brought
to Fort Klamath, Oregon, and tried by court-
martial. As promised, the former militant
Hooker Jim testified against Captain Jack and
fours others in exchange for amnesty. All
were found guilty for the murder of federal
peace commissioners and sentenced to hang,
which was carried out on October 3, 1873. Be-
trayed buy his former ally, Captain Jack went
to the gallows a very bitter man. In a macabre
twist, graverobbers subsequently abducted
his body, embalmed it, and set about touring
several eastern cities. As for the surviving
band of Modocs, their fight for freedom culmi-
nated in exile in Oklahoma until 1909, when
they were permitted to join their brethren in
Oregon. But Captain Jack’s epic stand,
whereby 80 warriors stood off 1,000 well-
armed soldiers for nearly seven months—at
the cost of nearly 100 federal casualties and
$500,000 in expenditures—proved an embar-
rassing episode in U.S. Army history.Bibliography
Dillon, Richard H. Burnt-out Fires: California’s Modoc
Indian War.Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall,
1973; Faulk, Odie B., and Laura B. Faulk. The Modoc
People. Phoenix: Indian Tribal Services, 1988;
Fincher, Jack. “The Grisly Drama of the Modoc War
and Captain Jack.” Smithsonian15, no. 11 (1985):
134–154; Foster, Doug. “Imperfect Justice: The
Modoc War Crimes Trial of 1873.” Oregon Historical
Quarterly100 (1999): 246–287; Murray, Keith A. The
Modocs and Their War.Norman: University of Okla-
homa Press, 1959; Nelson, Kurt R. “David and Go-
liath: The Modoc Indian War.” Military Heritage3,
no. 1 (2001): 70–77; Quinn, Arthur. Hell with the Fire
Out: A History of the Modoc War.Boston: Faber and
Faber, 1997; Thompson, Erwin N. Modoc War: Its
Military History and Topography. Sacramento:
Argus Books, 1971; Van Alstyne, Peter W. “Captain
Jack.” Pacific Historian13 (1970): 90–97; Wilkinson,
Dave. “The Modoc Indian War.” American History
Illustrated13, no. 5 (1978): 18–30.CAPTAINJACK