The Destruction of California Indians

by Robert F. Heizer (Editor), Albert L. Hurtado (Introduction)

California is a contentious arena for the study of the Native American past. Some critics say genocide characterized the early conduct of Indian affairs in the state; others say humanitarian concerns. Robert F. Heizer, in the former camp, has compiled a damning collection of contemporaneous accounts that will provoke students of California history to look deeply into the state's record of race relations and to question bland generalizations about the adventuresome days of the Gold Rush.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

321 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1974

Reviews

[Miroku Nemeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was suggested to me by one of my students at West Hills College in Lemoore who fought MMA under the title, Tribal Warrior, Anthony Alanis, on the recommendation of a tribal historian. It consists largely of primary source documentation of the treatment of the indigenous peoples of California. It has a considerable amount of material on California’s Central Valley, where I live and teach, and covers history that I think most Americans know nothing about. Too few know anything about the reality of the brutalities against the indigenous peoples in this country historically, and if they know anything, it usually has little or nothing to do with the history of California, and centers instead perhaps on the Plains Indians or others. But there was massive enslavement of Indians here, “It has been estimated that about 10,000 Indians may have been indentured or sold between 1850 and 1863 [in California].” (219) There were massacres, there was ethnic cleansing, both the plans for and execution of what can only be called genocide (including calls for “elimination” that are condemned by some of the concerned parties in the letters), and records of rape, murder, and every kind of abuse and exploitation known the man, including white scalping of Indians and bounties..

Reading primary source documents on the treatment of the indigenous peoples, especially here in California’s Central Valley, from Tulare, Fresno, Millerton, etc. in the mid-19th century—the abuse, exploitation, marginalization, corruption—the destruction of their way of life and the impoverishment of the concentration camps they were forced into—all of this is difficult reading but necessary history.