Sanpitch (killed April 18, 1866) was a leader of the Sanpits[1] tribe of Native Americans who lived in what is now the Sanpete Valley, before and during settlement by Mormon immigrants.
In March 1866, as a ploy suggested by Brigham Young to bring Black Hawk to the bargaining table, the elderly Chief Sanpitch was taken into custody and incarcerated in the jail in Manti.
On April 18, 1866, he was found and killed in Birch Creek Canyon (in the San Pitch Mountains, between Fountain Green and Moroni).
The two Mormon men responsible for the chief's death buried his body under a rock slide by shooting at the canyon wall overhead.
[3][4][5][6]: 188 Sanpitch's interactions with early Mormon settlers are chronicled in Gottfredson's History of Indian depredations in Utah.