"SACAJAWEA"
BY DR. JOHN ROBERTS
Protestant Episcopal Indian Mission
Wind River Wyoming
October 11,1934

The Rt. Rev. John F. Spalding, Bishop of the Missionary jurisdiction of Colorado And Wyoming, sent me here in 1883 to establish the Shoshone and Arapahoe Indian Mission of the Protestant Episcopal Church. I arrived at the Shoshone Agency on February 10th after a hard journey over the main range of the Rockies from Green River, the nearest railroad station, a distance of 150 miles which took up eight days traveling in a sleigh most of the way over the snow covered mountains. The next day after I arrived here I went to the U.S. Indian Office where a few aged Indians were assembled, the bulk of the tribes being absent on their annual winter buffalo hunt. Among those present was Bazil, one of the headmen. I was introduced to Bazil by Dr. James Erwin, M.D., U.S. Agent in charge of the Shoshone Reservation. Bazil was able to talk English brokenly; I was also told he could speak French. The agent then took me to Bazil's camp, which was about a hundred yards or so from the office, to see an aged woman who was called by him, Bazil's mother. She was seated on the ground in a tepee; her hair was gray and she had the appearance of being very old, "very, very old." Dr. Erwin alluded to her connection with the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and he seemed to be keenly interested in that fact. I was interested in the old woman because of her great age, for at that time I knew very little of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Bazil proved to be a very dutiful son to his mother. He was, in reality only an adopted son and nephew. He cared for her tenderly and had his daughters and other women of the camp see to her every need. She was well provided for. The U.S. Agent issued her plenty of beef, flour, groceries and even tobacco which she liked to smoke. Her won son, Baptiste alluded to by name by Captain Clark of the expedition, lived about three mile above the agency at the foot of the mountains. I came to know him well later on.
On the morning of April 9th , the following year, I was told that Bazil's mother had passed suddenly away during the night in the log cabin that was in the camp, on her shake-down of quilts, blankets and pelts. The Agent had a coffin made for her, and he sent employees to dig her grave on the Eastern slope of one of the foot hills, a mile and one-half east of the agency where there were four graves of white people where were killed by hostile raiding Indians. This burial ground has been subsequently set apart by the Indian Office as a Shoshone Indian cemetery, but still remains a part of the reservation. There are now several hundred Indian graves in it, thirty-seven of them being the graves of veteran Indian soldiers who served in the U.S. Army.
The Burial took Place late in the afternoon of the day on which she died. Those in attendance were her immediate relatives, the U.S. Agent and some of the employees. I read over her grave the Burial Service of the Episcopal Church. I little Realized at the time that the heroine we laid to rest in year to come would become one of the outstanding women in American History, being the guide of the historic Expedition that saved for the Stars and Stripes the great states of the Northwest.
She sleeps with her face towards the dawn on the sunny slope of the Rocky Mountains. Her grave overlooks the beautiful Little Winder River Valley. Standing there we see close by the Shoshone Indian Mission School and at a distance of about two miles, the buildings of Fort Washakie, Formerly garrisoned by U.S. Troops in pioneer days.

Research of Sacajawea

The Honorable James I. Patten who was appointed U.S.Agent of the Shoshones in the Seventies and for many years previouly had known them and spoke their language, was himself convince that the claim of the the old Shoshone woman, Bazil's mother, was genuine. Mr. F.G. Burnette, U.S. Government farmer, resident on the reservation for more that a quarter of a century, was well acquainted with Sacajawea and spoke to her many times concering her connection with the Expedition. Richard Morse, for many years a government employee at this agency also knew Sacajawea personally. These three reputable, worthy pioneer men as well as Dr. Erwin the Agent, were convinced that the claim of Sacajawea, buried here, was connected with the Lewis and Clark Expedition, was true.
During the latter years of her life here she was known to the whites and Indians as Bazil's mother. On my Parish Register of Burials I recorded her burial under the date of April 9, 1884 as Bazil's mother, Shoshone, age one hundered years. Date of death April 9, resident of Shoshone Agency. Cause of death, old age. Place of burial: Burial grounds Shoshone Agency. Signature of Clergyman, John Roberts.
She was also known to the Indians by other names according to the Shoshone custom: as Wad-ze-Wipe, the Lost Woman; Booe-nive, Grass Maiden; Bah-ribo, Water Whiteman.
Dr. Eastman, Sioux Indian, Physician and well known author and lecturer, was specially commissioned by the Indian office to investigate the identiy of Scajawea. After a thourough personal investigation, both here and among the Comanches in Oklahoma, his report was to the fact that Sacajawea, buried here, was the Shoshone woman guide of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Dr. Grace Raymond Hebard Ph.D., the eminent Wyoming historian, after years of research and much expense, has written and exhaustive history of Sacajawea's life which is published by the Arther H. Clark Company, Cleaveland, Ohio, under the name of "Sacajawea." Dr. Hebard maintains on her history the claims of the Shoshone woman buried here. Dr. Hebard also at considerable cost, had a massive granite headstone placed in memory of Baptiste, the son of Sacajawea near the grame of Sacajawea. Also a similar monument at the head of the grave of Bazil, her adopted son, and a granite headstone at the grave of Maggie Meyers, the daughter of Baptiste, and a similar granite monument was placed by her, at the head of the grave of Andrew Bazil, the son of Bazil, with a suitable inscription of each indicating their relationship to Sacajawea. A concrete column about two feet squaare and three feet high marks the grave of Sacajawea in the Shoshone Indian Cemetery, place dthere by Major H. E. Wadworth Formerly U. S. Indian Agent in charge of this reservation. On the face of it is embedded a bronze tablet with inscription perpared by Dr. Grace Raymond Hebard which Reads: "Sacajawea died April 9, 1884." A guide with the Lewis and Clark Expedition, 1805-1806. Identified 1909 by Rev. john Roberts who officiated at her burial.
(Signed ) Rev. John Roberts-- October 11,1934