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Skagit River Journal

of History & Folklore
Subscribers Edition Stories & Photos
The most in-depth, comprehensive site about the Skagit.
Covers from British Columbia to Puget sound. Counties covered: Skagit, Whatcom, Island, San Juan. An evolving history dedicated to the principle of committing random acts of historical kindness

Noel V. Bourasaw, editor

810 Central Ave., Sedro-Woolley, Washington, 98284
Home of the Tarheel Stomp

Mortimer Cook slept here & named the town Bug

Chief Wawitkin of the Sauk-Suiattle tribe

: you will find many spelling of the chief's name in different sources: Wawitkin or Wawetkin ?? the most used, along with Wawatkin or Wahwahkin, all with hyphens in various places. All choices are attempts to anglicize the Lushootseed name that was nearly unpronounceable by anyone outside his tribe. We also do not know what his actual age was at his death. The age of 120 is accepted by some and others estimate that this number is exaggerated by at least 20 years. The Sauk-Suiattle tribe was best known for its goat clan, which depended on the North Cascades mountain goat for sustenance and its wool for clothing.
In 1886, white surveyors were mapping the upper Skagit with some regularity. As June McCormick Collins recounts in her comprehensive book on Skagit Indians, Valley of the Spirits, Indians upper Skagits began protesting the work of the surveyors. "By this time, Indians had come to recognize a pattern in which the surveyor appeared as a prelude to White homesteads. The object of their hatred was a surveyor named Henry and when he refused to leave the upper Skagit area that they felt were tribal lands, the Indians smashed his compass and chased him away." White settlers such as Amasa Everett and Frank Hamilton in the Baker river area left their homes and gathered at the ranch of Charles von Pressentin, on the south shore of the river near Birdsview. Indians soon arrived in 100 canoes for a council and the Indians protested formally about seizure of their lands, saying that they had neither signed a treaty [in 1855] with the United States Government to deed their lands nor received money for them. Settlers called for military protection and soon the steamer Josephine brought a company of soldiers from Vancouver headed by Colonel Simmons. The Whites and Indians again held a council at Baker river. The Indians backed down and soon many of them began moving to the Suiattle river area where Wawitkin's band was centered.
Sometime in the next year, Wawitkin led a group of five Indian leaders who met with Roger S. Green, then the territorial judge for the district, and asked for relief. Green asked them to apply to Congress for relief. We are unsure how this was done but one of the results was Birdsey Minkler losing part of his homesteaded land just west of Birdsview on the north shore of the Skagit. Part of that land later became the site of the fish hatchery.
When Wawitkin was a leader, the tribe numbered a few hundred, but by 1920, the numbers had dwindled to just 17. In recent years, the tribe has rebounded to total more than 200 members, but inversely the goat herd has dwindled to about 100. There are a number of websites that discuss the present status of the tribe and the goat clan: here", here", here and here.

Obituary of Chief Wawitkin Arlington Times, March 23, 1912 Blind Chief John Sauk, Indian name Wah-Wah-Kin, died last Saturday, March 16, at the home of his granddaughter, Mrs. James Smith. His age was about 120 years. For many years, he was blind and helpless. He leaves a widow, Mrs. John Sauk, and two daughters, Mrs. Bedal and Sally Sauk, ferry tender at Sauk prairie crossing. He was buried Tuesday in the Indian mound at Sauk prairie with befitting Indian ceremony in honor of a once powerful chief of the Sauk Indians. "Peace to his ashes, and may he meet his tribe in the great hunting ground around the great White Throne," is the wish of Harry Bedal, his descendant. Ed. note: See the story of Chief Wawitkin's daughter, Susie, who married white settler James Bedal, at this Journalwebsite.

Obituary of Chief Wawitkin The 1941 Metsker map still shows the location of a parcel owned by Susie Bedal in Section 32, Township 33 North, Range 10 East, on the east shore of the Sauk river, south of the bend and the junction of the Suiattle river. The later town of Mansford was due east of that parcel and the Mansford Grange was on the west shore of the river just below the junction. That parcel may have been part of the land that Chief Wawitkin called home at the time of the 1886-87 dispute with the U.S. government.

For more information about the settlement of the region during the time of Sauk City and Monte Cristo, you can read our three-part Journal website

Story posted on Dec. 30, 2004
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