History by Ray Forsman
My name is Ray Forsman. I am a Suquamish Tribal Member, born June 8, 1942 to Joe V. Forsman, son of Marion Temple (who was a full blooded Suquamish). Before I pass on, and because of my father’s, brother’s, and my own military service, and military service of all Suquamish members in defense of this country, I feel we have earned the right to forward a position and thoughts on a court case of dispute between the Suquamish and Skokomish Indian Tribes. It was August 1948. I turned 6 years old in June and now Uncle Jim (deceased, also of military service) was running a beach seine herring operation and I got to be there and helped pull the net. We scooped the herring into floating pens and rowed the pens farther into Miller Bay, a little bay on the Suquamish Indian Reservation. Later in the month we caught smelt in the beach seine and we shared with the community. Everybody got smelt to eat. One time we got a salmon, and my Uncle Jim Forsman said, “Raymond, go hide the salmon up the beach in the logs, or the “state man” will come and take it.” I didn’t know what a “state man” was, but I figured it must have been something bad. So began my background and love of the fishing industry. We moved around a few times and Dad got called off to the Korean War. He had already served in WWII on a destroyer in Hollandia, New Guinea. My Dad Joe Forsman died in 1958. He had a weak heart. He wasn’t a US citizen when he was born in 1920 but became citizen in June 1924, because American Indians were not considered US citizens until June 19, 1924. An act of US Congress finally recognized Indian people as citizens, even though American Indians had been serving in the US military since the Revolutionary War. I remember in 1949 all the signs on the doors and windows of taverns and bars in Kitsap County that said “No Indians or Minors Allowed.” I asked my Mom why they didn’t like “minors” and found out that there were “minors” and there were “miners.” I believe President Eisenhower later ordered Washington State to take down these signs in 1952. On October 3, 1959, I joined the Navy Reserve and promptly went to “Submarine School” at Hunters Point, San Francisco. Right away, I went on active duty for the next eight and a half years. I started out and qualified “SS” on the USS Bashaw (a thin skin diesel boat) out of Pearl Harbor, beginning in September 1960. I later served on the USS Snook (fast attack nuclear) and the USS Daniel Boone, a polaris missile submarine. I was taught to be a radio operator and cryptographer. I still liked fishing and I missed it. On February 12, 1968, I was discharged and got a job on tugs and barges going to Alaska. By 1972, I was attempting to fish herring and got a “Blue Card” from Washington State Fisheries. A “Dorothy Bunn” issued it to me. It allowed me to fish for anything in the state, as long as I complied with Washington State regulations. After the Boldt decision in 1974, Washington State revoked the “blue” cards. But later we heard that the government was going to sue the state of Washington for our opportunity to get some of the fish. Art Millikan and Bob Trumble, who ran the Washington State herring system, told me I was done fishing, and they started a Suquamish News
A Suquamish Fisherman’s Story
Tribal Elder Ray Forsman reflects on being Suquamish, 50 years of fishing rights and his take on how new evidence could impact Usual & Accustomed Fishing Areas in the Puget Sound Foster. However, Judge Boldt had already reviewed the information I had gathered and ruled that the Suquamish Tribe had a claim to regular and continuous fishing in Hood Canal as part of the Tribe’s Usual & Accustomed fishing area. Judge Boldt never said the Suquamish had to send a courier 50 miles south to the Skokomish to ask if it was ok to dig a clam or catch a fish. The Skokomish claim to the area at the south end of Hood Canal in the immediate vicinity of the Skokomish River was believable, but not in my wildest thoughts would the Skokomish claim to areas 50 miles north of the Skokomish River be approved. Not with documented Suquamish camps at “Union” and other areas in southern Hood Canal. As a matter of fact, the well-documented Suquamish overland trail on the east side of Hood Canal from the Poulsbo/ Vinland area (today’s names) traversed the entire length of Hood Canal and continued south to Chehalis.
“limited entry” fishery and I couldn’t fish any more. It was a big blow and left me with nowhere to go or turn to. I and others started attending the “Boldt” hearings in US District Court, Tacoma, Washington. Later, Judge Boldt settled the fishing rights case by dividing the fish quotas and giving the state and Indians each “half ” of the quota. Sharing is not a natural concept. It is a “taught or forced concept”. (you give your brother half that sandwich, or you give your sister half of that”} When I was 10 my younger brother and I were arguing with my cousin Larry about a “bow”. He broke it in half in front of us and gave each of us “half ” a bow. That ended the argument. A year went by and we Suquamish were going to fish “herring” north at Cherry Point, Washington. Art Millikan and Bob Trumble contacted me personally and told
Suquamish hunters traveled regularly south of the south end of Hood Canal. It is important to note that the Lummi Indians claimed “primary rights” to fish in a limited area adjacent to their reservation. Lummi only sought “primary rights” to their local watershed, not the open marine waters 30 to 50 miles away.
Case’s logs of the 1841 Hood Canal Survey surfaced in the late 1980s and, this time in history, some of us who participated in the court cases of the 1970s and early 1980s are still alive to re-confirm our identity and place in this area we call home.
me and the rest of Suquamish Indians “You guys aren’t leaving that reservation.”
For 29 years we have had to suffer the loss of fishing in Hood Canal, even though the area is in the adjudicated Usual & Accustomed fishing area of the Suquamish Tribe. The Skokomish Tribe, which was assigned primary rights to fish in Hood Canal in 1985, have never allowed Suquamish fishermen or clammers to take treaty-reserved resources since the 1985 court decision. Not one single fish or clam.
Art Millikan and Bob Trumble showed up at the 1975 hearings trying their best to stop us Suquamish from going herring fishing. Judge Boldt ruled we could go.
I read the Ninth Circuit case of the argument between the Skokomish Tribe and Clallam Tribes and the judge says (as near as I can remember):
I later sat as a “witness” in Judge Boldt’s court room in 1976.
“Lacking any credible evidence, it is impossible for a judge to determine what the Indians were thinking 150 years ago”.
- Ray Forsman
At the same time we had to provide information documenting “usual and accustomed” fishing grounds for approval by the District Court. Wow. Big obstacle. The Tribe had very little money and somehow we enlisted the help of a Barbara Lane who was the government witness.
The ethnographic accounts used by the Skokomish to keep the Suquamish out of Hood Canal were based recollections of two aged brothers in the 1940s, who asserted that the Skokomish controlled all of Hood Canal. Their statements are in sharp contrast to the official US Government records of Lieutenant Augustus Case, a Naval officer who directed a US Navy survey party in 1841 to survey and map Hood Canal. The Case log book is the official US Government record for the United States Exploring Expedition survey and offers a true, real time legal description of events in 1841, well before the recollection of the two Skokomish informants interviewed in the 1940s. Case’s notes show at least some harmonious relations between the Suquamish and Lower Elwha Clallam, but not with the Skokomish. It appears from the log that Skokomish did not venture north of Seabeck in Hood Canal. I don’t doubt that the Skokomish had bands in the Hood Canal area comprised of small family groups, similar to Clallam bands in different locations. I believe Case’s logs present solid indication that in 1841 the Suquamish controlled the north end of Hood Canal from Seabeck to Suquamish Head and had villages at Quilcene or Colseed Harbor, Port Ludlow, and at Point No Point.
I had already been fishing and knew how important it was to show as much areas as possible of our travels. I spent every moment in the next couple months at the US Regional Archives at Sand Point in Seattle and went to every library in the greater Seattle/Bremerton area for information. I turned over everything I had found to Barbara Lane. My documentation and Lane’s collection of data were turned over to George Dysart, the Solicitor General for the case, and Judge Boldt then ruled on Suquamish Usual & Accustomed fishing areas. I made a big mistake in that there was so much information on the lower Puget Sound (Nisqually area) that I assumed that would take care of itself, so I didn’t copy much information that documented Suquamish use of that area. I later regretted that. Hood Canal was simple. I had to get into the “glass room” at the Seattle Public Library and there was a treasure trove of historic documents in the special archives.
From all my life on the water, I do realize and understand the legal standing of a “ship’s log”. I believe as in a “ship’s log” that Lieutenant Case followed instructions clearly set out by his commander, Charles Wilkes, to accurately and faith-
It was ironic, then, that when Skokomish Tribe sued for “primary rights” in 1983/84, none of the information I had gathered for the original fishing rights case in the 1970s was used by the Suquamish attorney Joanne 6
fully describe all events and Indian groups encountered during the survey of Hood Canal. Case’s log was a legal document equivalent to and required by a traditional captain’s “on scene” status. As the judge indicated in a later lawsuit, it is almost impossible to basically put things straight. A lot of people who write history or novels I believe patronize their found beliefs and consequently, the history of events can be skewed or showered with wrong inferences. I once read a book written in 1937 about the “Muckleshoot Indians” in the early 1800’s. Problem is, it isn’t true... but it’s in a “book”. Just being printed for the whims of a writer doesn’t give or promote 100% authenticity. I believe that is why a “ship’s log” or sometimes a “diary” are the most effective historical witnesses. In fact, a lot of written history in the world is correctly derived through maritime captain’s logs, such as Charles Wilkes’ multivolume summary of the United States Exploring Expedition surveys between 1838 and 1842 or Magellan’s log of Cape Horn of the most treacherous sailing waters that exist even today. The English, Spanish, and particularly the Portuguese were log keepers. So, it goes that US captains used ship’s logs like a daily staple. Serving on US submarines, I full well knew the existence of logs, a lot of which was normal just day to day stuff. Case’s records are from a US Naval Officer; not a priest, not a railroad engineer, not a real estate guy, not a storekeeper. His log is a US Government Naval ship’s log and reflects the accurate day-to-day occurrences. If Lieutenant Case’s logs indicate the Suquamish had camps on Hood Canal north of Seabeck and a village in Quilcene Harbor in 1841, then Case provides the best, most reliable data available for the period. The ironic part to me was the information is in the US Government somewhere in the country and somehow it is up to Tribes to find the information without help from the government, even though it is usually in government possession. It doesn’t happen often, but logs and diaries do show up after sometimes hundreds of years of dormancy. Just like the “Dead Sea Scrolls”. Case’s logs of the 1841 Hood Canal survey surfaced in the late 1980s and, this time in history, some of us who participated in the court cases of the 1970s and 1980s are still alive to re-confirm our identity and place in this area we call home. About seven years ago, I went searching for the true spelling of “Squamish Harbor” which is a bay below “Termination Point” in Hood Canal. The 1985 court decision does not allow the Suquamish to fish or collect shellfish south of Termination Point unless permitted by the Skokomish Tribe. I ended up in the basement of the University of Washington library, in the map room. I spent about 6 hours pouring through historic maps. I finally came across an 1841 map or chart by Commandant Charles Wilkes, US EX EX 1841. It was 10:30 pm that night at home and I saw that on the original map “Suquamish Harbor” was spelled clearly, not “Squamish Harbor.” I did not come across this map in 1975, only a written summary of events by Charles Wilkes that had been published in 1844. As commander of the expedition, Wilkes had used Lieutenant Case’s log book to write portions of five volumes that summarized the main activities of the United States Exploring Expedition between 1838 and 1842. In doing so, Wilkes omitted many of Vol. 13, No. 3