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Conviction (death warrant) and Pardon for Phillip John, an Indian

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Western Americana Start Price:500.00 USD Estimated At:1,000.00 - 2,000.00 USD
Conviction (death warrant) and Pardon for Phillip John, an Indian
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This item SOLD at 2016 Oct 01 @ 10:21UTC-7 : PDT/MST
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Two framed pieces pertaining to the conviction of death for Phillip John an Indian and his pardon. You will be hard pressed to find such an amazing historical set of documents: murder, pardon, Indian. This lot has it all! One frame as a larger chip in the upper left. There are smaller chips and scratches.



In 1888 John Rombaugh was murdered by Philip John, a Nez Perce, and two other Nez Perce, Potlatch Fannie and Peter who were traveling through the Bitterroot Valley and had camped near a group of prospectors, including John Rombaugh.



That night Philip John shot and murdered Rombaugh. He was arrested, brought to trial and sentenced to hang. Major Ronan and others got Philip John’s sentence commuted to life in prison. Peter and his wife were suspected of actually committing the murder and that person was killed later by a deputy sheriff in Spokane Falls, Washington while resisting arrest and the woman fled.



“Potlatch Fannie finally decided to sign an affidavit about the murder. “Potlatch Fannie, an Indian, being duly sworn, deposes and says that the name “Potlatch Fannie” is one by which she is generally known within the limits of the State of Montana. And that she has, at different times resided in said State of Montana, and particularly on the Flat Head Reservation in the County of Missoula, Montana. That in the month of August, 1888 she went, in company with one Philip John and one Peter from the vicinity of the Town of Missoula, toward the head of the Bitter Root River and on or about said time camped with the said Indians Philip John and Peter near some white men who were camped on the West fork of the Bitter Root River going toward the place called Mineral Hill.



That just prior to that time she had been married to the said Peter and on that night slept with him near the camp fire, That Philip John had rolled himself in his blanket and lain down near the fire. That sometime during the night the said Indian Peter, got up, took a gun from the place where it was standing near a tree and fired a shot at the two white men who were sleeping in a bunk near the fire. That one of the white men was awakened by the first shot and rolled over in his bunk, while the other white man raised himself up on his arm and asked Peter what he was doing, to which Peter made no reply, than the white man ran away.



At the time Philip John ran away from the fire and asked Peter what he was doing. That this affiant saw Peter kill the white man, and Philip John had nothing to do with the killing of him, and remonstrated with Peter for his actions.



That after wards, the three Indians left the place where the killing was done, but before leaving the place Peter took what money the dead white man had in his pockets and also the white man’s gun and carried the same with him to Idaho. That afterwards the said Peter was killed at or near Spokane Falls, Washington.”*



[Justice To Be Accorded To The Indians – Agent Peter Ronan Reports on the Flathead Reservation, Montana 1888-1893 – Peter Ronan edited by Robert J. Bigart, Salish Kootenai Press/University of Nebraska Press, 2014, p124. From the website paper Montana’s Flathead Reservation and Its Outlaws, of which four were hanged in Missoula on December 19, 1890. David C. “Chalk” Courchane, 2014 In the Pacific Northwest between 1880 and 1890 By Chalk Courchane]

City: Flathead Indian Reservation State: Montana, Date: 1888/89 Inventory# 41202