The SE corner of the cemetery where Pilchuck Jack was buried is in the area the city plans to use for their Youth Center, which is known as the old Indian cemetery. When the local white pioneers began using this cemetery they tended to stay to the west since they knew the Indians were buried on the east side, along the Pilchuck River, a site they could have been using for many years before any whites settled there. There could be hundreds of Indians buried here and as we all know it is against state and federal law to disturb an Indian burial ground, except in Snohomish! Pilchuck Jack's wife was Pilchuck Julia who CC has told us a lot about. Don't you think it is interesting the city seems to have done no research as our committee has. They don't seem to care who might have been buried there. Have you noticed since they first found the actual one set of remains when it was determined they were Indian remains, they have never again mentioned "Indian", nor has Leslie Moriarty? They seem to have a set strategy and are trying hard not to deviate from it. What an education! Norma John Wm Sloniker wrote: > > This was sent last January and is still true today. -- jws > > http://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/letters/ > > Sunday, January 11, 1998 Letters > HeraldNet - Letters SNOHOMISH CEMETERY > > Don't disturb ancestors > > Aren't our ancestors entitled to respect and reverence anymore? A > reporter for The Herald recently wrote an article about the actions > being taken by the city of Snohomish at the Snohomish Cemetery. > > Would you want a building and parking lot built over your father's > grave? That's what the city of Snohomish has done and now they want to > cover even more of Snohomish Cemetery located on the east side of town > at the junction of U.S. 2 and the Pilchuck River. Many local Indians as > well as white settlers were buried at this site. Several burial plots > were removed when U.S. 2 was built but no records show that any remains > were removed from the south portion of the cemetery. Pilchuck Jack, the > last chief of the Pilchuck Indian Tribe, was buried in 1905 in the > southeast corner of the cemetery with only a wooden board to mark > the location. > > Snohomish has removed all the monuments and graded the cemetery. They > say no remains can be found there. However, by law, no remains can be > removed from a cemetery without copious records kept. There are no > records of bodies exhumed from the south portion of the Indian Cemetery. > It's easy to remove monuments and headstones and then claim the bodies > are gone, too. > > It would be easy to say that the city of Snohomish is applying a lesser > standard of concern and reverence for the dead because, after all, they > were just some local Indians. It's not like the gravesides are from a > more recent time and likely to have living relatives. It should not > matter who is buried there. White, Black, Asian or Indian -- all people > deserve respect. I would hope that Snohomish would respect the final > resting place of Pilchuck Jack and others and leave them in peace where > they are, overlooking the Pilchuck River. > > JOHN AMMETER > Snohomish Tribe of Indians > > General Web site comments: > <A HREF="mailto:newmedia@heraldnet.com">newmedia@heraldnet.com</A> > > Copyright (c) 1998 The Daily Herald Co., Everett, Wash. > <A HREF="http://www.heraldnet.com/about/legal.htm">