Sammamish (tribe)

infobox ethnic group
group = Sammamish (tsah-PAHBSH)


caption =
poptime =About 101 (1854). [(1) Gibbs ( [1877] , 1967)
(1.1) Sa-ma-mish (Sammamish) and S'kel-tehl-mish on the D'Wamish Lake (now Lake Washington) and environs, 101. These are the treaty-era names as they appeared.
(2) Cf. Boyd (1999) and ibid. in History of the Duwamish tribe.]
popplace =Sammamish Valley lake and river, King County, Washington
langs = Southern Lushootseed
rels = Mostly Indigenous, some Roman Catholic
related =Duwamish, Snoqualmie; ancestral "Xacuab" "the People of the Large Lake" (before mid-1850s). Coast SalishThe Sammamish (tsah-PAHBSH) people were a Coast Salish Native American tribe in the Sammamish River Valley in central King County, Washington. Their name is variously translated as "meander dwellers"" [cite web
last =Dailey
first =Tom
coauthors =
date =2006-06-14
year =
month =
url=http://coastsalishmap.org/Village_Descriptions_Duwamish-Seattle.htm#13
title ="Coast Salish Villages of Puget Sound"
work ="Duwamish-Seattle"
publisher =
accessdate =2006-04-21] or "willow people." [cite web
last =Wilma
first =David
coauthors =
date =2003-06-12
year =
month =
url=http://www.historylink.org/essays/output.cfm?file_id=4190
title ="Bothell -- Thumbnail History"
work =Essay 4190
publisher =HistoryLink.org
accessdate =2006-08-21] They were also known to early European-American settlers as "Squak", "Simump", and "Squowh." [Also Wilma (2003)] They were closely related to the Duwamish, and have often been considered a Duwamish sub-group as part of the "People of the Large Lake" who lived near Lake Washington. Like the Duwamish, the Sammamish originally spoke a southern dialect of Lushootseed.

The largest Sammamish village was "tlah-WAH-dees" at the mouth of the Sammamish River, which at the time was between present-day Kenmore and Bothell, east of its present location at the southwest corner of Kenmore [Also Wilma (2003) and Dailey (2006)] . The mouth of the river moved to the west after 1916, when Lake Washington was lowered nine feet by the United States Army Corps of Engineers. [Phelps (1978), U.S. Army Corps of Engineers project 1913-1916, pp. 67–69] A second Sammamish village with at least one longhouse was located near what is now Issaquah. When Europeans from the Hudson's Bay Company arrived in the area in 1832, the Sammamish had several permanent and seasonal settlements along the length of the river, and numbered as many as 200. [Also Wilma (2003)]

In 1855, the United States government signed the Treaty of Point Elliott with the putative leaders of most of the Puget Sound tribes, including Chief Seattle of the Duwamish.cite web
last =
first =
coauthors =
date =
year =
month =
url=http://www.goia.wa.gov/Treaties/Treaties/pointelliot.htm
title ="Treaty of Point Elliott, 1855"
work =
publisher =Governors Office of Indian Affairs, State of Washington
accessdate =2006-07-21] The territorial governor moved to enforce the treaty by relocating the tribes named in the treaty, including the Sammamish. Many of the Sammamish, including a leader known as Sah-wich-ol-gadhw, did not accept the validity of the treaty. [Also Wilma (2003)] . Negotiations with Indian agent 'Doc' Maynard were unsuccessful, and in 1856 some of the Sammamish joined in the Battle of Seattle, a raid on the White settler population. [Morgan ( [1951] , 1982), 35–52] After this attack and the brief Puget Sound War, the Sammamish relocated from the river valley to reservations named in the treaty, or to non-reservation lands. Local sawmill owner and real estate developer Henry Yesler, who had previously used local Indians as laborers, aided the removal and relocation. As with the relocation of other Northwest natives, the occupation of lands and the relocation of people was probably significantly enabled by a smallpox plague in 1862 that may have killed as much as half of the remaining native population, as well as by the devastation from the effects of various previous epidemics. [Also Boyd (1999)]

After this relocation, descendants of the Sammamish dispersed into other tribes, including the Suquamish, Snoqualmie, and the people of the Tulalip Reservation, and are generally considered members of those tribes. [Tollefson (1994), pp. 692–3] [Also Wilma (2003)]

See also

* Coast Salish
* History of Seattle before 1900

Notes and references

Sammamish is also a move in the game Killer Instinct usable by the native American character Chief Thunder.

Bibliography

*
*
Page links to Village Descriptions Duwamish-Seattle section [http://coastsalishmap.org/Village_Descriptions_Duwamish-Seattle.htm "Village Descriptions Duwamish-Seattle"] .
Dailey referenced ["Puget Sound Geography" by T. T. Waterman. Washington DC: National Anthropological Archives, mss.] and ["Indian Lake Washington" by David Buerge in the Seattle Weekly, Aug 1-Aug 7, 1984.] .
Recommended start is "Coast Salish Villages of Puget Sound" [http://coastsalishmap.org/start_page.htm "Start Page"] .
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* cite web
last =Wilma
first =David
coauthors =
date =2003-06-12
year =
month =
url =http://www.historylink.org/essays/output.cfm?file_id=4190
title ="Bothell -- Thumbnail History"
work =HistoryLink.org Essay 4190
publisher =
accessdate =2006-08-21
Wilma referenced [Jack R. Evans, Little History of Bothell, Washington (Seattle: SCW Publications, 1988)] , [Reed Ramsey, "Postmarked Washington, 1850-1960," Microfilm (Olympia: Washington State Library, February, 1966), 607-610] , [David Buerge, "Indian Lake Washington," The Weekly, August 1, 1984, pp. 29-33] , [Sarah Lopez Williams, "Small Places Hit By Growth Too," The Seattle Times, January 15, 1997, p. B-1] , [Clayton Park, "Truly Site In Limbo Again As State Ponders College Site," Puget Sound Business Journal, February 26, 1993, p. 16] , [Fred Klein, comp., Slough of Memories: Recollections of Life in Bothell, Kenmore, North Creek, Woodinville, 1920-1990 (Seattle: Peanut Butter Press, 1992)] , [Amy Eunice Stickney, Lucille McDonald, Squak Slough, 1870-1920: Early Days on the Sammamish River, Woodinville-Bothell-Kenmore (Seattle: Friends of the Bothell Library, 1977)] , and [Clarence B. Bagley, History of King County (Chicago: S. J. Clarke, 1929), 856-861.] .