Northwestern Band reburies teens killed in massacre of 1863
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SALT LAKE CITY, UT—The Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation reburied the remains of two teenagers who were killed during the 1863 Bear River Massacre.
The tribe repatriated the remains of the teens, a boy and a girl, under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. They had been held by The Smithsonian Institution since the massacre.
“It is to honor the old Indian custom and train of thought of returning them to their resting grounds,” Vice Chairman Darren Parry said of the reburial ceremony, The Deseret News reported.
The reburial came on the 150th anniversary of the January 29, 1863, massacre in which as many as 400 tribal members were killed by the U.S. Army.
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Kerry Brinkerhoff/paytonlee.com
Commemorating the 141st anniversary in 2004 of the Bear River Massacre in 1863. The snow was so deep that year that a proper ceremony could not be held. This year the bodies of four teenagers were reburied, bringing them back to the land of their birth.
