Beautiful Place

Along with the Klamath Reservation came Fort Ter-Waw. The name Ter-Waw is from the Yurok word for “beautiful place.” However Fort Ter-Waw, or Terwer as it is known, would not stay there long.

Set up by Lt. George Crook in 1857,  buildings took up about 80 acres on the Klamath River’s north bank above the waterway’s mouth and washed away several times. It disappeared in late winter 1862, washed away by the storms that ravaged the coast that year.

Then in the early 1863, Brig. Gen. George Wright ordered troops’ relocation to Camp Lincoln, under construction in Smith River Valley. It was about that time that Wright sent a message to his headquarters in San Francisco asking for more military men to kill Indians living in the northern California region.

As white settlers moved into Northern California during the 1850s and what later would become Del Norte County, both Tolowa and Yuroks were being housed at Wau-Kell. Neither tribe was happy with the situation because the Tolowa wished to return to their homes, while the Yurok were anxious to see them go.

But Gen. George Crook blamed the Tolowa dissatisfaction on whites who wanted them back on Smith River. Before Crook arrived in the region, about 100 of the Tolowa had returned home, and he agreed with federal Indian Agent H. P. Heintzelman that they would never return to the reservation without force.

When the Indians learned that Crook’s orders were against provoking incidents and fighting with them unless they fired first, a number of Tolowa slipped away in small parties. But since they realized they could not all leave in that way, they organized a different plan.

A Yurok tribal member told Crook that the Tolowa were planning to murder him, destroy his boats, kill Heintzelman and his employees, then sack the federal Indian agency and go home. This caused Crook to form plans to strike first, surrounding the conspirators at daylight and prove their guilt.

When Crook bedded down that night, he took weapons with him, leaving a box of brasses inside the entrance of his tent so he would be awakened if anyone tried to come in. But the Indians had decided to eliminate Heintzelman first and had sent for him to come to their village to see an ill man.

As the agent and his surgeon headed that way, they were attacked. Able to fend the Tolowa off for a few moments, Heintzelman’s rear detachment was able to scatter the attackers when they got to the scene.

Crook knew about the attack when a runner brought him a note telling him that Heintzelman was killed. It proved later not to be the case, but Crook summoned his soldiers, crossed the river and moved against the Tolowa.

The fight ended with 10 dead and many wounded. Twenty-six warriors and a number of women and children were captured and made to swear they would stay on the reservation.

The rest of the Tolowa fled into the mountains.