Native name Hallalhotsoot Parent(s) Twisted Hair (father) Resting place Nikesa Cemetery, Kamiah | Known for Nez Perce leader Successor Chief Joseph | |
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Died 3 January 1876, Kamiah, Idaho, United States | ||
Hallalhotsoot, also Hal-hal-tlos-tsot or "Lawyer" (c.1797–1876) was a leader of the Niimíipu (Nez Perce) and among its most famous, after Chief Joseph. He was the son of Twisted Hair, who welcomed and befriended the exhausted Lewis and Clark Expedition in 1805.
His name appears as early as 1836 in a meeting with Marcus Whitman, and received the nickname "Lawyer" for his eloquence. He served as a guide for Whitman. In 1855, he took part in the Walla Walla Council and signed the Treaty of Stevens. This obtained for him a reservation to the greater part of his territory, between the Clearwater and Salmon rivers.
After gold was discovered in Pierce in 1860, Lawyer agreed to new cessions of land in the Treaty of 1863, in 1868, which Old Joseph (c.1785–1871) did not accept and considered it a betrayal. Therefore in 1872, Hallalhotsoot was displaced by Chief Joseph as the only head of the tribe.
Lawyer Creek in north central Idaho, a tributary of the Clearwater River, is named for him. It carved the 300-foot (90 m) deep Lawyer's Canyon, between Ferdinand and Craigmont, and flows east to its mouth at Kamiah. He died in Kamiah and is buried at its Nikesa Cemetery at the Presbyterian church, where he was an elder.