On May 27, 1878, after holding a council of war, the Shoshone started an uprising in eastern Oregon with the killing of James Dempsey, a white gun dealer who lived in Harney Valley. with a Shoshoni wife. He had purchased arms in October 1877 from the Mormons at Salt Lake City and sold the weapons to the Bannock/Bannatte Robber Snakes, after having urged them for a year to go to war. He then informed Idaho Governor Brayman that war was eminent. The uprising turned into the second Shoshone War, which the Americans called the Bannock War.