The Baker Massacre

The panel's colonel was a major. Riding with Eugene Baker that morning was Lieutenant Gustavus Doane, who wrote fondly of the attack and boasted of it for the rest of his life. Months later Doane helped lead the 1870 Washburn expedition into the Yellowstone country, and a 10,551-foot peak east of Yellowstone Lake took his name. The Rocky Mountain Tribal Council proposed a new one; Yellowstone consulted 27 tribes; and in June 2022 the Board on Geographic Names voted 15 to 0 to call it First Peoples Mountain.

What the plaque says

The Baker Massacre On January 23, 1870, soldiers commanded by Colonel Eugene Baker killed 173 Blackfeet Indians in a surprise attack on Heavy Runner's camp near here on the Marias River. The strike was in retaliation for the killing of Malcolm Clarke at his ranch near Helena in 1869. A man of peace, Heavy Runner had no quarrel with the US Army. His people did not participate in Clarke's killing nor were they hiding the perpetrators of the crime. Waving his good conduct papers and medals, Heavy Runner was the first casualty of the Baker Massacre that cold January morning. With most of the men away hunting in the Sweet Grass Hills, the soldiers fired into the lodges where women, children, and elderly slept. The soldiers took more than 100 prisoners, but once they realized many were infected by small pox, released them with no food, clothing or shelter in subzero weather. Many refugees froze or starved to death seeking shelter in nearby camps or at Fort Benton. Ironically, the soldiers were in pursuit of a hostile band led by Mountain Chief, who was camped several miles downstream at the time of the attack. The Baker Massacre profoundly impacted the Blackfeet people and is very much alive in tribal memory.

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• The Oily Boid Gets the Woim — 1.2 mi