Long Valley Ambush

Accounts agree on little but the dead. The men who followed the horses out of Indian Valley knew the Native families who traveled through it; Tom Healy had married into one, and Smith, a veteran of the Modoc War, had advised against going. Who lay in wait was never settled. Settlers and later histories blamed the Tukudeka, the Mountain Shoshone whom whites called Sheepeaters, and the killings became one of the grievances behind the Sheepeater War of 1879, though no evidence tied the Tukudeka to them. The name on the sign is also spelled Munday.

What the plaque says

Long Valley Ambush While hunting stolen horses on Aug. 20, 1878, Wm. Monday, Jake Groseclose, Tom Healy, & "Three Finger" Smith were ambushed in a rocky basin 9/10 mile by road from here. Monday and Groseclose were killed immediately, and Healy wounded; Smith, "being a man of experience in such matters", fled. He made it 40 miles to Salmon Meadows. Infantrymen buried the 3, marked the spot, and took up the Indian trail. Smith estimated there were 75 Indians; army trackers finally concluded there were only 5--but they never caught them. 155 Text prepared by the Idaho Historical Society Marker made & installed by Idaho Transportation Department

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• Splash Dams — 17 mi
• Mesa Orchards — 21 mi
• Old Railroads — 24 mi