As said in the post, about the retreat at https://www.facebook.com/winnememwintu/posts/10156572020635519
There's an informative website at dives more into the history of the Wintun, their lands, the experiences once ranchers and gold miners arrived, and how disrespect of the lands and/or their traditions has been commonplace ever since. Visit the website at http://mclane65.tripod.com/native/wintun.html
An excerpt from the page's intro:
The so-called Cottonwood Indians had existed for hundreds of years in this area prior to the coming of the Europeans. At the time of the arrival of the whites, the indigenous peoples had fairly definite areas of habitation, with the Yana (Nosa-Nozi) occupying the area east of the Sacramento River, and three general Wintun peoples occupying the area west of the river and into the foothills. Frémont named what we now know as Battle Creek "Nozi Creek" after these Yana people. Less observant whites frequently lumped them all together with the unfriendly epithet "Diggers."
The page infers that Wintu society (as societies should be) were living in rhythm with nature instead of trying to push against it. The complete opposite of the new arrivals seeking gold and other resources to devastate. Or, in the case of the previously mentioned shamanism retreat for white, leftist new-agers to exploit the land and traditions for one's own ego-fulfillment and/or for profit.
Another excerpt from the page, a quote which was documented by a man at a gathering between miners (believed to be during the early years of the California "gold rush") and the Wintu.:
"The white man takes the Indian`s hunting ground and his women and drives the Indian away. When the bad Indian steals from the white man, the white man kills all the Indians. The Indians can`t fight the white man. He don`t want to fight. He don`t want the gold. He wants the fish. He wants the game. He wants his hunting ground and his women and children. When the white man comes he takes all."
In time, these encroachments led to a wider scarcity of food amongst the Wintu and other nearby tribes. Which led to starvation. They were also chased from their villages and their resources, died from diseases for which they had no immunity, were killed in massacres and poisonings. These attacks were only ramped up when volunteer military forces, funded by the gold profits no doubt, became far more aggressive in their actions. It was the yellow journalistic standards of Northern Californian newspapers of the day that stirred up these stories as an unjust means to support such crimes against the Wintu and other tribes in Northern California.
One of these same newspapers, the Shasta Courier, went on to practically wash themselves clean of inspiring atrocities. With a tone of false, empty lament, they stated in a September 17th, 1864 article:
"Many of the domesticated Indians who had for years been living in peace on the ranches on the opposite side of the river, molesting nobody, have been exterminated and at our present writing no one can tell where the bloody business will end ... The Indians about Shasta and in other locations in the county, alarmed by the exterminations, are fleeing to the mountains for safety."
To read the rest of the article and learn about the Wintu Tribe and its history visit http://mclane65.tripod.com/native/wintun.html. Also, visit their main page at http://mclane65.tripod.com/
