Posted for Norm Tessman, Curator, Sharlot Hall Museum

I am trying to locate cultural material from the Skeleton Cave Massacre
site for a journal article on Arizona's Yavapai people.

On December 28, 1872, 225 soldiers and Indian scouts trapped some 96
Kwevekepaya (southeastern) Yavapai people in a cave at the head of a box
canyon above the Salt River.  At least 76 Yavapais were killed and another 20
were wounded and captured.  The dead were left unburied.

In 1906 the cave was rediscovered.  Photos by Walter Lubkin of the Department
of Reclaimation show abundant pottery, basket starts, and other belongings
of the massacred people scattered among the bones of the victims.

The human skeletal material was buried at the Fort McDowell cemetery in the
1920s.  By 1972, all associated cultural materials had been removed from the
site.  We believe these may have been taken by museum expeditions as well
as by souvenir hunters.  The site is also known as Skull Cave, and the
Battle of the Salt River.

I would like to see any objects from, or early photos of the cave.

Thank you for whatever information you can provide.

You may contact me by phone, fax, or via Mick Woodcock's e-mail (not
Michael Wurtz's listed below), [log in to unmask]

Norm Tessman
Michael Wurtz
Sharlot Hall Museum
415 W. Gurley Street
Prescott  AZ  86301
phone (520) 445-3122
Fax  (520) 776-9053
E-mail [log in to unmask]
Web: www.bslnet.com/accounts/jccraig/www/sharlot.html