Upper Skagit Indian Tribe

The Upper Skagit Indian Tribe is a federally-recognized Indian tribe located in the U.S. state of Washington. The tribe is the successor-in-interest to approximately eleven historic tribes which had many permanent villages along the Skagit River in what is now Skagit County.
For thousands of years, the predecessors of the Upper Skagit Indian Tribe lived along the Skagit River, hunting, fishing, and gathering. Their territory extended from as far downstream as what is now Mount Vernon to as far upstream as Newhalem. They are related to other Coast Salish peoples, and historically spoke the Lushootseed language, a heritage language for several tribes in the Puget Sound region.
The predecessor bands to the Upper Skagit Tribe were signatory to the Treaty of Point Elliot in 1855, and ceded their land in return for a reservation and hunting, fishing, and gathering rights. Throughout the 19th century, society rapidly shifted for the Upper Skagit as their systems of governance evolved and they faced encroachment from settlers. The late 19th century was marked by land disputes as settlers and the government continued to assert power over the Upper Skagit. Although they fought for their rights as a treaty tribe, the Upper Skagit remained an unrecognized tribe until 1974, when they were recognized by the federal government. In 1981, a reservation was finally established for the Upper Skagit.

Name

The tribe was initially called "The Skagit Tribe of Indians", but changed their name in 1958.
The name "Skagit" is an anglicization of the Lushootseed word, which refers to the Skagit people of Whidbey Island, whose territory encompassed the land around Penn Cove. "Upper Skagit" in particular refers to the peoples whose villages were located along the Skagit River and its tributaries, contrasting with the "Lower Skagit" of Whidbey island. Early settlers applied the name to both the Skagit proper, as well as those living along the Skagit River, creating the distinction between the "Upper" and "Lower" Skagits. In historic times, the peoples of the Skagit river would have used the term, to refer to themselves as a unit.
The Lushootseed word is composed of the nominalizing prefix, and the root.

Predecessor bands

The Upper Skagit Indian Tribe is descended from several aboriginal village groups who had villages along the Skagit River and its tributaries. These villages are counted between nine and eleven. The Sauk-Suiattle have historically been considered a part of the Upper Skagit by some anthropologists due to their closeness. However, modern scholars separate the two groups due to the existence as a distinct tribal entity.

Lushootseed name	English/anglicized name	Translation	Traditional territory	Notes
dxʷʔaha	Nuwhaha		Along the Samish River ; along the coast from Padilla Bay to Lake Samish	Descendants enrolled in both Upper Skagit Indian Tribe and Samish Indian Nation.
duqʷəčabš	Nookachamps, Nookwachahmish	People of Nookachamps Creek	Mount Vernon to below Sedro-Wooley; along Nookachamps Creek to Lake McMurray	Eight house sites, sixteen winter houses.
bəsikʷigʷilc	Mesekwegwils,' Bsigwigwilts, Meeseequaguilch	the big rocks	Along the Skagit River from Sterling to Minkler	Three house sites, seven winter houses
čubəʔabš	Chobaabish,' Chobahahbish	People who climb the banks of the river	Lyman and the surrounding area	Two house sites, two winter houses
	Bsxwexwehwa'1, Baslohaloh		Hamilton and the surrounding area	One house site, one winter house
sbaliʔxʷ	Smaliwhu,' Sabelxu, Sabaliuhk	Mixture of people	Birdsview to Faber's Ferry ; along the Baker River ' to Baker Lake	Ten house sites, twenty-two winter houses. The largest group on the Skagit River.
sʔilayucid	Saylayotsid	Alongside the path	Rockport and the surrounding area	Four house sites, five winter houses
	Shayayotsid, Beskiotsid	People upriver from the confluence	West of Rockport, at the bend of the river ; Rocky Creek, west of Marblemount.	Three house sites, three winter houses
	Miskaiwhu, Skaywih	People way upriver	From Marblemount to Bacon Creek; the Cascade River drainage	Six house sites, five winter houses
	Kwabatsabsh	People upriver from the bend	From Damnation Creek to Newhalem	Three house sites, three winter houses
saʔqʷəbixʷ	Sauk	People who dig roots	Sauk and Suiattle rivers	Succeeded by the Sauk-Suiattle Indian Tribe.

History

Oral tradition and prehistory

According to Upper Skagit oral tradition, it was , the culture hero of the Upper Skagit, who changed the world into how it is today., according to tradition, is a noble and benevolent being in the form of a man with blue eyes and white hair. He reduced the intelligence and size of animals, making it so humans could form a society. Additionally, he taught mankind craftwork and art. According to their traditions, he would at one point return once again. Others who are involved in the origin stories of the Upper Skagit include the trickster-changers: Raven, Mink, and Coyote.
The earliest humans in the Puget Sound region likely arrived roughly 12,000 years ago. Tools belonging to the old Cordilleran culture have been found, pointing to a period where humans relied primarily on big game hunting for survival. This period was possibly followed by the development of the marine culture in the Early Maritime period, which has been well-studied in the Fraser Valley region. Following this was the Intermediate period, roughly from 700 to 1250 CE. By this time, local peoples had begun utilizing both marine and inland resources. The Recent period, roughly from 1250 to 1750 CE, was categorized by the development of fortifications, new projectile and spear points, and new styles of fish hooks. This period led into the Historic period of the 18th century to present.
Prior to the Historic period, the predecessor bands of the Upper Skagit Tribe built permanent settlements up and down the Skagit River, and built summer camps in the forests and on the mountains near their homes. Roots and plants such as potatoes were cultivated in prairies, and clams were dug across the coast at places like Padilla Bay.

Early colonial period

The first Europeans to record their encounter the with the predecessors of the Upper Skagit were the crew of José María Narváez and the Santa Saturnina around 1791. When they arrived in what they called the "Seno de Padilla", they could see many people who were gathering shellfish, likely from a nearby Nuwhaha village which was located on the bay. Nearby, on Boundary Bay, they had met other peoples who they were surprised to find large amounts of European trade goods and even horses in their possession, with locals even saying that they had seen ships even larger pass by before, implying that there had been previous contact between the Indigenous peoples of the region and Europeans, albeit unrecorded.
Padilla Bay was again visited by Europeans in June 1792, by George Vancouver. Once again they watched the people working in the bay, this time fishing from their canoes. There were several other periodic visits from Europeans into the region, although they never came inland enough to come into contact with the peoples of the Skagit River. Despite this, there were likely Upper Skagit who would have seen the European ships as they travelled outside their territory.
After the establishment of forts Langley and Victoria in modern-day British Columbia, it was common for the Upper Skagit peoples to visit the forts to trade. It became tradition to visit one of the forts at least once during one's life.
Sometime before 1855, a man named gained a large religious following among the Upper Skagit. was born at the Snohomish village of to a Nespelem man, also called, who had moved west of the Cascade mountains. Although lived on the western side of the mountains, he would often visit his family on the eastern side. There, he became acquainted with a Frenchman named Eugene Casimir Chirouse, who would later become a famous Catholic missionary in the Puget Sound region. When Chirouse arrived in Puget Sound, offered to translate, knowing both the Okanagan language as well as the local language of Lushootseed. After the death of his first wife, he remarried into a highly prestigious Nuwaha family under the famous warrior-leader Petius, which greatly increased his prestige. He became a famous orator and missionary, introducing his own brand of religion to the Upper Skagit, which was a mixture of the Prophet Dance of the plateau, Catholicism, and the local religion. established himself as the leader of this religion, deviating significantly from the traditionally democratic social order at the time, holding widely attended church sessions during the summer at his large wooden house near what is today Rockport. Eventually, would establish himself as the sole "chief" of the Upper Skagit, uniting the once-independent peoples of the Skagit River around himself.
In 1855, Isaac Stevens, the first Territorial Governor of Washington, selected representatives from many tribes in the Puget Sound area to sign the Treaty of Point Elliott. Only two Upper Skagit tribes sent representatives: the Nookachamps and the Mesekwigwils. The Nookachamps were represented by Chlahben, and the Mesekwigwils were represented by Sdzekdunum. Other prominent leaders, such as, attended the treaty convention, but did not sign it. To this day, all members of the Upper Skagit Indian Tribe are descended from or otherwise related to those that signed the treaty.
The Upper Skagit continued to live traditionally, hunting and fishing along the banks of the Skagit River and in the surrounding forests. The Upper Skagit also expanded their permanent settlements, clearing areas of land around their homes in order to plant potatoes as well as new crops such as corn, and to raise livestock such as chickens. This way, they could trade for more at the forts.
Due to the lack of pressure from settlers, the various Upper Skagit peoples did not take part in the Puget Sound War of 1855–1856. The first wagon trail along the Skagit River was created by settlers in 1852, coming from the mountains of British Columbia. In 1858, prospectors discovered gold upriver at Ruby Creek. Further White settlement was discouraged by a two-mile logjam at the confluence of the forks of the Skagit River, near its mouth. Settlers had established small towns downriver of the logjam, but it continued to discourage settlement any further upriver for several decades.
In 1870, the first surveyors of the Northern Pacific Railroad entered Upper Skagit territory, which began to encourage settlement. The first White settler to claim land past the logjam was William Hamilton, founding Hamilton. Eventually, a store was built past the logjam at Mount Vernon in 1876. This attracted settlers from the close settlements of Skagit City, Conway, and La Conner. The logjam was destroyed with dynamite in 1878; settlers began to slowly homestead the Skagit River soon after. Furthermore, the settlers trespassed on lands containing graves and burned down a village of eight longhouses at the confluence of the Skagit and Sauk rivers. This new pressure from settlement caused the Upper Skagit to resist further settlement, and increased tensions between the settlers and the Indigenous peoples of the Skagit River.