The Navajo witch extermination of 1878 was a significant event in the history of the Navajo people. During this time, the United States government aimed to suppress Navajo culture and religion and impose their own beliefs and practices upon them. As part of this effort, the government targeted Navajo witches, whom they believed were a threat to society. The notion of witchcraft in Navajo culture is complex and multifaceted. Navajo witches, or "skinwalkers," were believed to have the ability to shape-shift into animals and have harmful supernatural powers. They were considered a significant threat to the well-being and prosperity of the community, as they were believed to bring illness, death, and misfortune.
They were considered a significant threat to the well-being and prosperity of the community, as they were believed to bring illness, death, and misfortune. In response to the perceived threat posed by Navajo witches, the U.S.
Solomon Hotema: Witch Hunter
Oklahoma has been the home of many different types of individuals, both those who abide by the law, as well as those who defy rules and regulations and become a law unto themselves. Notable examples of those who have enforced or defended the law include Deputy U.S. Marshals’ Bill Tilghman, Heck Thomas, and Chris Madsen, known as the Three Guardsmen; Samuel Sixkiller, Captain of the United States Indian Police in Muskogee (Indian Territory), and Bass Reeves, one of the earliest black deputy U.S. marshals to serve in Oklahoma Territory. Conversely, other Oklahoma residents that have claimed notoriety based on a legacy of crime include: Belle Starr, the ‘Bandit Queen,’ Bill Dalton, outlaw and co-leader of the infamous Wild Bunch, and Charles Arthur ‘Pretty Boy’ Floyd, gangster and bank robber. One Oklahoman who served on both sides of the law in the Choctaw Nation as a minister, lawyer and a judge, and then as an enforcer who decided to take the law into his own hands to help rid the state of witches, was Solomon Hotema.
Solomon E. Hotema was a full blood Choctaw Indian born in 1854 near Grant, in the Choctaw Nation. His father, John Hotema, “was for forty-five years a ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church, a captain of light-horsemen,” a Choctaw group formed to settle disputes and enforce tribal laws, “and a firm believer in witchcraft.”[i] Solomon was educated at a local school, and later attended the Old Spencer Academy located at Spencerville in northern Kiamichi County. In 1878, along with thirty-four other Choctaws, Hotema was given a scholarship to attend Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia, “which had been founded by Lutheran pastors in 1842.”[ii] While at Roanoke, Solomon learned about the law and then worked as a clerk for Wilson N. Jones, who had been appointed the principal chief of the Choctaw Nation. Hotema aided the Choctaws in many different capacities. He served as a “county judge of Kiamichi County” later named Choctaw County after statehood, from 1884-1886.[iii] In 1887, he was elected to the House of Representatives and then re-elected for the next two years. In 1888, he was placed in office as the county clerk of Kiamichi County. By 1889, Hotema had become not only influential but prosperous, with a successful mercantile business at Grant and a small farm that sustained “a hundred head of cattle and two hundred hogs.”[iv] He also founded the Cold Spring Church, six miles north of Grant, and acted as its pastor.
In 1898, an epidemic of meningitis infected the area in which Hotema resided. Hotema had married Nancy Coleman in 1883, and they had three children. His son Jonah, who was “Solomon’s pride and joy” died from the disease in the spring of 1899.[v] Solomon was devastated by the loss of his child as were the members of the community who had also lost friends and loved ones. Rumors spread “that the epidemic was caused by witches.”[vi] Prayer meetings were held, and finally “a reputed forty-nine-year-old medicine man named Sam Tarnatubby” was consulted on the matter.[vii] He informed Hotema about the cause of the scourge and asserted that the victims of the disease had been bewitched. He also gave Hotema the names of those who had performed witchcraft and were responsible for the deaths of his son and the other innocent individuals who lived near Grant. Solomon had become an ordained Presbyterian minister and decided that it was his Christian duty to rid the region of those who had bedeviled his people. Along with two companions, Sam Frye and Tobias Williams, all fellow Choctaws, Hotema proceeded to go on a murderous rampage, killing Vina Coleman, Mrs. Hull Greenwood, and Alfred Morris, on April 14, 1899, near the church that he had founded. [viii]
A flaw in Hotema’s character which contributed to his murder spree was his unfortunate love of alcohol. He was known to get drunk and thus become combative in nature. Supposedly before killing the alleged witches he “threw back a few stiff ones.”[ix] And even though he had previously been on cordial terms with Vina Coleman, “when under the influence of liquor the extermination of witches seemed to become his ruling passion.”[x] During the melee, a young child and a fifteen-year-old boy, fleeing from the scene were badly wounded.[xi]
After being charged and arrested near present day Antlers, Hotema provided information related to the three murders. He maintained that his actions were based on “the teachings of his particular creed” which had been stressed to him by his father from a very young age.[xii] His confession also indicates that the killings were carried out because of the individuals’ “evil practice of magic among the Indian people.”[xiii] His objective was Biblically based on various scriptures that condemn the practice of witchcraft.[xiv] He had decided that it was his obligation as a devoted Christian minister to eliminate the witches, who by their evil spells had inflicted pain and death on Choctaws, and that “he committed these murders to sacrifice his life for the Lord’s cause and the love of his people.”[xv]
The legal process involving Hotema and his confederates took many interesting turns. First, a change of venue was requested by his attorney and the trial was moved to Paris, Texas. Since he had made a passionate claim that he was indeed a law breaker and that he would gladfully give up his life in the name of the Lord, the jury was left to wonder about the possibility of insanity. After deliberating, the jury found Sam Tarnatubby innocent of being an accessory to the crimes, and Hotema and Fry were both acquitted for the murders of Greenwood and Morris, “based on the jury’s belief that the defendants were insane at the time of the homicides.”[xvi] Since separate indictments had been drawn on each victim, Hotema was then found guilty of killing Vina Coleman and sentenced on February 14, 1902, to death by hanging. Both the defense and prosecuting attorneys were surprised by the verdicts. The defense thought that their client would be acquitted, while “the prosecution expected a hung jury.”[xvii]
The case was appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States, which affirmed the judgment of the lower court. Justice Peckham wrote the opinion for the unanimous Court in Hotema v U.S. (1902). In upholding the lower court’s ruling, Peckham noted that “the court properly laid down the law in regard to the responsibility of the defendant on account of his alleged mental condition.”[xviii] In relation to the death sentence imposed by the lower court, Peckham wrote, “the question whether, upon a consideration of the facts, the extreme penalty of the law should be carried out upon this defendant is not one over which this Court has jurisdiction.”[xix] Thus, the sentence of hanging pronounced by the lower court loomed ahead. However, on October 28 th , 1902, based on a recommendation by Attorney General Philander Chase. Knox, who surmised that the Choctaw leader “honestly believed in witchcraft,” and “that under the load of distress and the influence of liquor there had been a revival of savage instincts for which the Indian should not be held to account with the extreme penalty,” President Theodore Roosevelt commuted Hotema’s sentence to life imprisonment.[xx] After the commutation Hotema was sent to Fort McPherson, the federal prison at Atlanta, Georgia, where he resided until April 23, 1907, when he died of “phthisis pulmonalis, tuberculosis, in other words: the white plague.”[xxi] His attorney, Thomas C. Humphry was partially compensated for his work through the reception of the shotgun that Hotema had used to kill the supposed witches.
The case of Solomon Hotema and his efforts to rid his homeland of witches in the name of religion is not unique and continues to the present day. From the very beginning of Christianity until 1484, there were “probably more than several thousand” witches killed.[xxii] From the 14 th through the 17 th centuries, scholars estimate that there were “40,000 to 100,000” witches executed.[xxiii] Some sources suggest that about 80% of executed witches were female and that most commonly they were “burned at the stake or hanged.”[xxiv] Even in Oklahoma, two years before Hotema administered his brand of justice, Lucy Factor, a Chickasaw, was suspected of “casting magic spells” which caused the death of Mary Gilcrest,[xxv] Her husband and a friend went to Lucy’s home “and shot her to death.”[xxvi] More contemporarily, during a two year period from 1994-1996, “several hundred people were accused of witchcraft in the Northern Province of South Africa, and were lynched by frightened mobs.”[xxvii] A few years later, from 2005 through 2011, in Tanzania, “reports say around 3,000 people were killed after being accused of being witches.”[xxviii] And in 2014, in the same country, “seven villagers were burned alive on suspicion of witchcraft.”[xxix] Hopefully, as time goes on, people will become more educated and less superstitious and realize that just because someone makes an argument that witchcraft contributes to a problem, doesn’t mean that the claim is a fact.
In 1898, an epidemic of meningitis infected the area in which Hotema resided. Hotema had married Nancy Coleman in 1883, and they had three children. His son Jonah, who was “Solomon’s pride and joy” died from the disease in the spring of 1899.[v] Solomon was devastated by the loss of his child as were the members of the community who had also lost friends and loved ones. Rumors spread “that the epidemic was caused by witches.”[vi] Prayer meetings were held, and finally “a reputed forty-nine-year-old medicine man named Sam Tarnatubby” was consulted on the matter.[vii] He informed Hotema about the cause of the scourge and asserted that the victims of the disease had been bewitched. He also gave Hotema the names of those who had performed witchcraft and were responsible for the deaths of his son and the other innocent individuals who lived near Grant. Solomon had become an ordained Presbyterian minister and decided that it was his Christian duty to rid the region of those who had bedeviled his people. Along with two companions, Sam Frye and Tobias Williams, all fellow Choctaws, Hotema proceeded to go on a murderous rampage, killing Vina Coleman, Mrs. Hull Greenwood, and Alfred Morris, on April 14, 1899, near the church that he had founded. [viii]
government authorized a military campaign to exterminate them. In 1878, soldiers were sent into Navajo territory to hunt down and eliminate suspected witches. The campaign involved the forced relocation of Navajo individuals and families, with the aim of disrupting their social networks and removing potential allies for the witches. The extermination campaign resulted in widespread devastation for the Navajo people. Many innocent Navajo individuals were targeted and killed or imprisoned under suspicion of being witches. Families were torn apart, traditional ceremonies and practices were suppressed, and the Navajo way of life was significantly disrupted. However, despite the efforts to eradicate witchcraft and suppress Navajo culture, the Navajo people persevered and resisted assimilation. They found ways to preserve and revitalize their traditions and customs, passing them down through generations. Today, the Navajo Nation is one of the largest Native American tribes in the United States, with a strong connection to their heritage and a resilient spirit. The Navajo witch extermination of 1878 serves as a painful reminder of the injustices and attempted erasure faced by indigenous peoples at the hands of the U.S. government. It highlights the importance of recognizing and respecting the cultural, spiritual, and historical significance of Native American tribes like the Navajo and the ongoing efforts needed to promote justice and equality..
Reviews for "Indigenous resistance and survival: Navajo strategies during the witch extermination event of 1878"
1. John - 1/5 - This book was a complete disappointment. The title promises a thrilling and unique story, but all I got was a poorly researched and culturally insensitive portrayal of the Navajo people. The author seems to rely on stereotypes and misconceptions, and the story lacks depth and authentic representation. I couldn't connect with any of the characters, and the plot felt disjointed and confusing. I would not recommend "Navajo Witch Extermination of 1878" to anyone looking for a respectful and engaging read.
2. Sarah - 2/5 - I had high hopes for this book, but unfortunately, it fell short of my expectations. While the premise was intriguing, the execution was lackluster. The writing style was dull and monotonous, making it difficult to stay engaged throughout the story. Moreover, the characters were one-dimensional, and their actions and motivations often seemed illogical. Additionally, there were several historical inaccuracies and cultural misrepresentations, which further detracted from my overall enjoyment. Overall, "Navajo Witch Extermination of 1878" failed to captivate me, and I would not recommend it to historical fiction enthusiasts.
3. Emma - 2/5 - As an avid reader of historical fiction, I was excited to delve into "Navajo Witch Extermination of 1878." However, much to my dismay, the book left me feeling underwhelmed. The pacing was incredibly slow, with long stretches of uneventful scenes that did little to move the story forward. The characters lacked depth and remained largely unexplored, making it difficult to invest in their journeys. Furthermore, the writing style was bland and overly descriptive, detracting from the overall reading experience. While the premise had great potential, the execution left much to be desired. I'm afraid I cannot wholeheartedly recommend this book to fellow historical fiction enthusiasts.
4. Daniel - 1/5 - "Navajo Witch Extermination of 1878" had an interesting concept, but it failed to deliver on multiple fronts. The writing was clumsy and lacked finesse, making it a chore to read. The dialogue felt forced and unnatural, and the characters were poorly developed, making it impossible to connect with them. Moreover, I found the historical backdrop to be inaccurate and disrespectful, perpetuating harmful stereotypes instead of offering nuanced insights into the Navajo culture. Overall, this book left a lot to be desired and did not live up to its potential. I would advise readers to steer clear of "Navajo Witch Extermination of 1878."