Yuma War
The Yuma War was the name given to a series of United States military operations conducted in southern California and what is today southwestern Arizona from 1850 to 1853. The Yumans were the primary opponent of the United States Army, though engagements were fought between the Americans and other native groups in the region. Conflict generally took the form of guerrilla warfare, and, over the course of three years, the army engaged in pursuing unfriendly natives, protecting American settlers crossing the Colorado River and preventing conflict between the native tribes. A peace treaty in summer of 1853 was signed, ending hostilities between the Yuma and the United States, but it sparked a short war between the Yuma and the Cocopah. During the conflict, the historic Fort Yuma was constructed and became an important outpost on the frontier.
Numaga
An army officer arriving in the region just after the battle found a scene of chaos and some panic, with trains of people returning to California to avoid the Indians. Volunteers were armed and mustered to counter the danger from an estimated 15,000 well-armed and well-mounted "Pah Utes, Shishones and Pitt River Indians."
Since the Indians had assembled at Pyramid Lake there had been "daily news of massacres by the red villains."
Colonel Jack Hays, a former Texas Ranger, was given command of the United States forces.
Hays mustered a force of over 750 soldiers and volunteers, who set out from California on 2 June 1860.
Hays fought the Paiutes in two skirmishes near Pyramid Lake.
Neither was decisive, but the Indians sustained sufficient injuries to destroy Numaga's loosely coordinated command structure.
The bands dispersed into the Black Rock and Smoke Creek deserts and the surrounding hills.
Some travelled further into Oregon, Idaho and Washington Territory.
The war petered out.
U.S. troops built a temporary fort near Pyramid Lake, then moved to the more permanent Fort Churchill, which guarded the wagon trail from the east.
One man was killed in a U.S. scouting expedition around Pyramid Lake. There was a minor skirmish with a group of soldiers under Frederick W. Lander, an Army engineer.
Lander was establishing watering holes and building a wagon road through the Black Rock Desert.
To him, the Indian hostilities were a distraction from the job at hand, and he initiated a truce with Numaga that turned into a lasting peace.