Bear River Battle Memorial

The marker says "battle." It was a massacre. Before dawn on January 29, 1863, Colonel Patrick Connor led California Volunteers north from Fort Douglas and fell on a winter village of the Northwestern Shoshone — the Newe — camped along the Bear River in Cache Valley. In a few hours they killed some 250 to 400 people, most of them women and children. It remains the deadliest slaughter of Native people in U.S. history, and among the least known, lost under the noise of the Civil War. Chief Bear Hunter died there; his people endure still.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Natural History Museum of Utah — 0.2 mi
  A world-class museum built into the foothills above Salt Lake City
• Red Butte Garden — 0.5 mi
  A 100-acre botanical garden with panoramic valley views
• This Is The Place Heritage Park — 0.8 mi
  A living history village at the mouth of Emigration Canyon
• Emigration Canyon — 2.3 mi
  The final stretch of trail the Mormon pioneers took into the valley

More markers nearby

• Original Cemetery Gate — steps away
• Patrick Edward Connor — steps away
• German POW World War I Memorial — steps away
• Fort Douglas Cemetery — steps away