Battle Rock

Battle Rock. . The Tututní people lived along the Southern Oregon coast, including this site, and the lower Rogue River for thousands of years before first contact with explorers, miners, and settlers., In 1792, George Vancouver was among the first outsiders to make contact with local native peoples. He described them as "curious, with a mild and peaceable disposition." The local Quatomah band of the Tututní people were not as friendly nearly 60 years later, however, when they visited William Tichenor and his party at this site. On June 9, 1851, Tichenor landed a party of nine men armed with rifles and a small cannon to establish a town in their village , Battle Rock is named for this conflict., Trail of Tears , By the early 1850s, miners and settlers infiltrated the entire length of the Rogue River. Mining destroyed the fish runs, while settlement, infectious diseases, and the development of farms devastated centuries of native tradition and culture. Settlers fenced the pastures, tilled the camas meadows, and decimated elk and deer populations., Tension mounted, and attacks by Euro-Americans and natives occurred along the Rogue River culminating in the Rogue River Wars of 1855-56. Congress created the Coast Reservation in 1855, and US troops quickly began removing native peoples from their aboriginal lands. As early as February 1856, natives were force-marched to the Coast Reservation. By 1857, the majority of surviving natives were forced onto the reservation. About 1,200 people were marched here to Port Orford and held in open pens until the steamship Columbia deported them north to the Coast Reservation. The last resisters, Tecumtum (Chief John) and his band, were marched 125 miles up the coast. Many descendants of these displaced peoples reside today on the Siletz and Grande Ronde Reservations., Caption: Ahnkuttie Tillicums (Ancestors) courtesy of Peggy O'Neal.