Sarah Watermelon Juice

It was late and he sat there with his head buried in the old leather
bound books, they were large and heavy, from the old days of the
reservation. they held the story of the people from the days when they
opened up the reservation to everyone and the names on these pages
were all living during that time and saw how the settlers moved onto
what were there lands.

In looking at the record of family names one stood out, in faint
pencil in fancy writing they used during the old days when all records
were written in long hand it said Sarah Watermelon Juice. She was 13
in 1905, when they opened up the UIntah Valley Reservation. There is
an indian name written next to it, but it means something like buffalo
berries. Maybe this is what the writer was trying to write, but
instead called her Watermelon Juice.


He sat there and wrote out the names of these people from those old
days, the father, mother, brothers and sisters. In one family at the
base of Rock Creek, an old Indian stronghold with canyon walls and
water year round, they lived. They were called Nuche, the english word
being Utes, UIntahs.


One woman was given the name of Curtis Nick, a boy's name she was 20
years old at the time and she had 4 children it is written, the oldest
lived to be 4 years old, the others died in infancy, 2 months old one
said, 1 year and 2 years old. Alot of the children born during that
time died young, He sat there wondering how could this woman go on
when all her children had died, there a faint note at the end, she too
had died at 27 years of age. There is not stone to mark where they
lay, and the children are left unnamed. In all there were many who
lived and died without names, and without a known location where they
could be found. In all of this some did live on and the one thing that
is not the same about the land is that those indian lands no longer
get the water. If you were to go there today, you find wind swept
sand dunes where these families lived and nothing more. The water from
the stream has been put into a pipe and goes to land of the settlers.
Some descendants remain and have sued the BIA and United States saying
Washington failed to protect the land and water. It is in the Deseret
News, June 3to th8th I think, it is called Richard Mountain v.Gale
Norton, the hearing is in the Salt Lake Federal District Court in mid
July.


It was said to the Utes, This valley is yours forever from mountain
top to mountain top, and all the waters in it. so long as the rivers
shall run. The water doesn't run through this place anymore....


rustywire