The Modocs are not yet extinct. But the spirit that drove them to resist the inevitable westering of the whites died in the lava beds. Occasionally, on frost-biting nights, the cries of coyotes haunt the ghostly, star-lit Stronghold, bringing back the memory of that time. A time to remember.

—Erwin N. Thompson

Modoc War—Its Military History & Topography

[General Jefferson C.] Davis should have killed every Modoc before taking him if possible, then there would have been no complications.

—General William T. Sherman

6 June, 1873, correspondence to General Philip H. Sheridan

The Modoc War bathed none of its participants in glory, or even credit … The army made a mess of almost everything it attempted. Commanders quarreled or simply did not cooperate; underestimated, then overestimated the enemy; hesitated when they should have acted, acted when they should have hesitated. Enlisted men proved too easily panicked, repulsed, and demoralized. In the end, Modoc defectors provided the key to military “victory.”

—Robert M. Utley

Frontier Regulars

Few among them felt they were their brother’s keeper; the Good Samaritan spirit scarcely existed. Some of the men had been officers during the Civil War; because they had been in some kind of trouble, they had re-enlisted under assumed names as a way to spend a few months or years until their failings had been forgotten. A few were said to have been Confederate veterans. Enlisted men were considered beneath the notice or concern of their officers, and the casualty reports scarcely took note of them. Officers were mentioned by name; sometimes non-commissioned officers were mentioned; privates were almost never listed. If they died, they were buried, frequently without a marker of any kind, and they wore no identification unless they pinned notes on their clothes saying who they were. If they were unfortunate enough to be killed, frequently these scraps of paper would be discarded, and they were interred simply as unknown dead. There they lay, unmourned, in uncared-for graves, many times lost to the knowledge of their loved ones.

—Keith A. Murray

The Modocs and Their War