Side Trip: Billings, Montana
Riverfront Park and Cochran Ranch
Early on the morning of September 13, with the main party of Nez Perce camped near Canyon Creek, a group of warriors headed south into the Yellowstone Valley to forage for supplies.
Joseph Cochran had farmed here less than a year. While he was upriver logging, two trappers, Clinton Dills and W.M. Sumner, were camped at his place eating dinner when six Nez Perce raiders rode up. Thinking these were friendly Crow, the trappers made no move to protect themselves and were shot and killed.
“The damage done by the Nez Perces on the Yellowstone is as follows: Stone & Rouse’s stage station, hay and corrals burnt; Ed. Forrest’s hay burned and stock stolen; at Josephine Tree two men killed (Clinton and Sumner), camp burned and fourteen head of horses stolen; near McAdow’s mill the houses of Egestone and Ralson were burned, no damage done the mill or property of McAdow excepting the loss of three ponies.”
– Rocky Mountain Husbandman, October 4, 1877
