Friends and Foes of the Dakotas

Friends and Foes of the Dakotas

Know Your Indians

Department of Special Features

 By A. Hyatt Verrill

Double Action Western January 1954, Vol. 21, No. 3. Digitized April, 2014 by Doug Frizzle.

STRANGELY enough, the staunchest allies of the Dakotas (Sioux) were not of the same racial stock, and were not even distantly related. The Cheyennes, Blackfeet and Arapahoes were all Algonquins, closely related to the tribes of our Eastern and Middle States, and were originally sedentary, agricultural tribes with permanent villages of well-built houses. Like the Cheyennes, the Blackfeet and Arapahoes trekked westward and, abandoning their previous mode of living, took to hunting the buffalo and leading a semi-nomadic life.

Although they spoke languages entirely different from that of the Dakotas, yet through long association the various dialects became merged until all could converse readily, the Sioux adopting many of their friend’s words and they, in turn, using innumerable Siouian terms. And when at a loss, they had the sign-language to fall back upon. Many persons are under the impression that the sign-language of the plains tribes consisted of a few gestures and was very limited in expressing ideas. As a matter of fact, persons familiar with the sign-language could converse as freely, and almost as rapidly, by its means as by word of mouth. Basically, it is quite simple; but as there is a gesture or motion of the hands for every possible action, name, place and idea, and as many of these do not at first appear to have any connection with their meaning, it developed into a very complex series of rapid motions; and when any new word or idea was required, a new gesture was invented to express it.

Near neighbors of the Dakotas were the Blackfeet who, like the Sioux, were a confederation of three bands or subtribes: the Siksitas, Bloods and Piegans. For a time after their arrival in the Dakotas’ area the two groups were at war. but later became fast friends and allies.

Although they depended mainly upon the buffalo for a livelihood, became thoroughly “horse Indians” and dwelt in the plains-type skin tipis, yet—unlike the true plains nomads—they often maintained large villages for long periods, and cultivated some crops in the river bottoms. Physically and mentally, as well as in their character, the Blackfeet were (and are) a very fine people, good-natured, inclined to be peaceful and friendly, fond of jokes and laughter and gaiety, and enjoying the white men’s dances as much as their own. And they were famous for the beauty of their women.

A great many white men married Blackfeet girls and became adopted members of the tribe; and all who have lived among them, speak most highly of them. The author-naturalist, George Bird Grinnel, lived for a long time with the Blackfeet, and wrote a most interesting account of his experiences, “My Life With The Blackfeet”. They were the favorite tribe of the later Charles Russell, the famous painter of Indians, who lived so long with the tribe that he actually came to look like an Indian. And James Schultz, who married a Blackfoot girl and lived for thirty years with the tribe, wrote an excellent book, “My Life As An Indian”, in which he tells of his experiences with the people he admired and loved.

Although, like all of the plains Indians, the Blackfeet used the typical feather bonnet, they also had many other forms of headdresses, some of which were most elaborate affairs. Their “full dress” costumes consisted of loose tunics, leggins, and moccasins of buckskin and the inevitable breech-cloth. Famed for the excellent quality of their buckskin, their garments were often completely covered with beautiful bead and quill work, the designs consisting usually of the typical geometrical patterns of the Sioux, combined with floral figures such as their ancestors in the Middle West used—although quite often these were omitted.

Essentially sun-worshippers—or, in other words, regarding the sun as the visual manifestation of the one great God—the most sacred of all objects was a white (albino) buffalo.

The man who killed one of these rare animals was supposed to be under the protection of the Sun God and, together with his band, was greatly honored. The hide, carefully dressed and tanned, was dedicated to the Sun God and was given to the Shaman or Medicine Man who, after the prescribed ceremonies, suspended the hide on a pole erected over the “medicine shrine” where it remained until it fell to pieces. As a special favor, the man who killed the sacred beast was permitted to use some of the scraps and trimmings for his “medicine bundle”. Even enemy Indians who might pass near would never have dreamed of molesting the shrine and the sacred hide, for fear of bringing down the vengeance of the Sun-God.

Like the Sioux, the Cheyennes and the Arapahoes, the Blackfeet were hereditary' foes of the Crows and were almost constantly at war with them. Just why these tribes should have so greatly hated the Crows is a puzzle. According to the other Indians, the Crows were thieves, liars, trouble-makers, and altogether worthless, and many of the white traders and frontiersmen declared that the Crows did not possess a single redeeming feature. Whatever the truth may be, and whatever faults were theirs, lack of courage was not one of them. Time and time again they fought their enemies to a finish and came out the victors. The greatest wonder is that, with three of the largest, most powerful tribes pitted against them, the Crows were not completely exterminated. Still, they managed to survive and hold their own. As far as the whites were concerned, the Crows regarded them as inferiors and seldom troubled them, considering them as beneath their notice. Today all the old enmities are forgotten and Crows, Sioux, Blackfeet and the others intermarry freely.

NOW THOROUGHLY civilized, most of the Blackfeet dwell in well-built houses and are well-to-do farmers and ranchers. But some of them almost always don their old tribal costumes and take part in Rodeos and similar events. Also, a number have their old-time tipis in our national parks, where, arrayed in all their finery, they prove an added attraction to tourists and gather in the latters’ shekels in exchange for curios, handiwork, and posing for photographs.

They were always inclined to be friendly toward the whites, and never caused any serious trouble except during our long disgraceful warfare with the Cheyennes, when a small number of the Blackfeet joined the Cheyennes for a time.

Also firm friends and allies of the Dakotas, Cheyennes and Blackfeet, and friendly toward the whites, the Kiowas and Comanches, but enemies of the Crows, the Utes, Pawnees and Shoshones, were the Arapaho. Among themselves, they recognized five divisions or groups, each with a slightly- different dialect, and probably representing five original tribes. Their common name: Arapaho, is a corruption of the Pawnee “Larapihu” meaning “Traders”. They call themselves the “Inu-nya-ina” or “Our People” while to the Sioux and Cheyennes they are known as “The Blue Sky People”. They are now divided into two groups: the Southern Arapahoes of the Arkansas River valleys and the Northern Arapahoes of Wyoming.

Although they took to buffalo-hunting after wandering westward from their original home in the Red River Valley of Minnesota, and became seminomadic “horse Indians”, yet like the Blackfeet they often maintained large villages of tipis in one locality for considerable periods of time, and cultivated their gardens of food plants during the summer and autumn. Unlike most of the other plains-tribes they buried their dead in the earth instead of placing them in trees, or on raised platforms above the ground.

Always inclined to be peaceful, and friendly toward the whites, the Arapahoes never caused any serious trouble, although during the Cheyenne war a few joined the latter with whom they were closely affiliated. In their customs, religion, home life, weapons and costumes they differed little from their Cheyenne, Blackfeet and Sioux neighbors, although they had a number of distinctive headdresses.

Among the other friends of the Dakotas were the Mandans, the Hiditsas and the Arikaras who, having been greatly decimated by warfare and epidemics finally combined and later became merged with the Dakotas.

Of Siouian stock, the Hidatsas were known to the Mandans as Minitari or “They Crossed The Waters” owing to their traditional crossing of the Mississippi when they moved westward from their original homes in the vicinity of the Great Lakes. The Sioux knew them as tire Hewak-tok-tou or “Tipis in a row”, by which name they were also known to the Arapahoes and Cheyennes. To the Crows they were the Amashi or “Earth lodge people”, owing to their lodges of sods and earth used in winter. A peaceful tribe, friendly toward the whites, they never caused any serious trouble.

QUITE DIFFERENT were the Arikaras, the name being a corruption of “Ariki” meaning a “horn”, owing to their custom of wearing the hair twisted into horn-like shape on each side of the head. Belonging to the Caddo group, the Ankara language is almost identical with that of the Pawnees, with whom they were at one time affiliated. Originally inhabiting the Missouri Valley as far south as the present city of Omaha, they migrated northward, after an intertribal war with the Pawnees, and settled in Sioux territory near the Cheyennes. Aside from one occasion, when for a short time they were at conflict with the whites over the treatment accorded them by some white traders, the Arikaras were always friends of the white men. Today the few still living are prosperous ranchers and farmers and are scarcely distinguishable from their white neighbors, although the majority—like my very good friend, Walks His Horses, still retain their tribal regalia and costumes for use at ceremonials, at Rodeos, and similar functions.

The Mandans are, or rather were, a Siouian tribe that occupied the upper Missouri Valley. Prior to the Lewis and Clark Expedition, the tribe dwelt in villages of log and earth lodges that were partly underground, the whole village being enclosed in a stockade of logs. They were a peaceful, sedentary, agricultural tribe, and have always remained friendly with the whites. Almost exterminated by smallpox introduced by the white men, the tribe was reduced from several thousand to less than one hundred. For self protection, the survivors joined the Hidatsas and Arikaras; the three tribes became merged, and later were affiliated with the Sioux. It is doubtful if there are any of the living members of the three tribes who are of pure Mandan, Ankara or Hidatsa blood, for they have intermarried for many years. Even my very good friend, Walks His Horses, who considers himself an Arikara, had grandparents of both Hidatsa and Sioux blood, while my friend Red Bear, who calls himself a Mandan, had a Cree grandmother. At the present time, most of these tribes are living in their original homeland on the northeastern side of the Mississippi, but others are in the Dakota territory. They are very fine, progressive and proud people, inclined to jollity and good-nature, fond of jokes and dancing, and although outwardly thoroughly civilized, many still retain their old tribal costumes and carry out the old tribal ceremonials and traditions. Many are prosperous farmers, while others, like Joseph Walks His Horses, and Red Bear, maintain large horse and cattle ranches.

When the first white men (an expeditionary force of British troops) met the Mandans, and found them dwelling in stockaded villages in a type of house not previously seen— and as some of the Indians were partial albinos with light hair—the Englishmen jumped to the conclusion that the Mandans were the descendents of survivors of some “lost” European expedition. Also, a Welsh soldier of the party claimed that the Mandans spoke Welsh and that he could converse with them. Although this was not confirmed, the Mandans were believed to be the descendents of a Welsh expedition led by Prince Madoc, which was supposed to have reached the eastern coast of our continent in the twelfth century, and heading inland, disappeared.

As a matter of fact there is no linguistic similarity between the Mandan and Welsh dialects, and it is almost beyond all reason to believe that a handful of Welshmen, unfamiliar with the country and unable to converse with the Indians, could have made their way for any considerable distance through the forests of the eastern area, even as far as the Mississippi. It would have been an incredible feat for even a few survivors to have penetrated to the far northwest.

Even had this almost superhuman feat been accomplished, all traces of European ancestry would have disappeared in the four centuries that had elapsed between the time that Madoc's party vanished and time when the Mandans were “discovered”. If, as the explorers assumed, there was any admixture of white blood among these Indians, it is far more reasonable to suppose it was that of the Vikings, who are believed to have penetrated as far west as Minnesota, Wisconsin and probably farther.

Among other friends of the Sioux, although at one time their enemies, were the Winnebagos. Of Siouian stock and by nature peaceful, agricultural Indians they had their villages and fields in Minnesota. But, as usual, the white settlers cast covetous eyes upon the Winnebagos’ land and, claiming the Indians were a potential menace, demanded that the Government remove them to a reservation. Evicted from their homes they were deported to a reservation in Dakota where lack of adequate food, ill treatment, and other conditions were so unbearable that the Indians broke away and sought refuge among their former enemies, the Sioux. At the present time about 7,000 of the tribe are on reservations and allotted lands in Nebraska. There are about 2,000 in Wisconsin in addition to others in various localities.

ALTHOUGH they had many friends and allies, the Dakotas had fully as many—if not more—enemies. And just as some of their firmest friends were tribes of alien stock, so, among their most implacable foes, there were Indians of Siouian stock. Among these were the Osage, the largest and most important of the southern Sioux group who were almost constantly at war with other tribes, but were friendly toward the whites. In 1808 they ceded all of their lands to the Government, the territory including almost all of what are now Missouri and Arkansas, retaining only a portion of northern Oklahoma. It was not until 1870, however, that the present boundaries of the Osage territory were definitely established. In 1906 this consisted of 1,470,058 acres in Oklahoma. Unwittingly, the Osages made a very good bargain with Uncle Sam, for rich oil fields were discovered on their lands and today they are the richest tribe in the United States. For that matter they are probably the wealthiest persons, per capita, of any people in the world. An Army officer, who, during World War I, was in command of a company of Osage, boasted it was the richest group of soldiers in the allied armies, for every member was a millionaire.

A fine race physically, tall, muscular and perfectly proportioned, many of the men were several inches over six feet in height. Naturally of a peace- loving nature, and good tempered, yet when necessity arose the Osage were as valiant, courageous, and savage fighters as any of the Siouian tribes.

In their costumes, weapons, and life they differed little from their relatives—although maintaining more or less permanent villages for considerable periods of time and, like the Blackfeet and Arapahoes, cultivating some crops.

Totally unlike the Osage, and often at war with them—although they forgot enmities and joined forces against the northern Sioux and the Comanches—were the Skidi or Pawnees. Although inclined to be friendly toward the whites, and rarely causing trouble, they were implacable foes of most of the neighboring tribes. Of Caddoan stock, they dwelt in permanent or semipermanent villages and carried on a certain amount of agriculture—although also hunting the buffalo—and were fully the equal of other plains tribes when it came to horsemanship and fighting. Many of them were employed as Army scouts by our Government, and were always considered the best and most reliable of all Indian scouts. However, they were most widely famed as notorious horsethieves. Many of their raids were for the sole purpose of stealing horses, and they seem to have had an almost uncanny ability in this direction.

To the Pawnees, horse-stealing was more of a game than an act of hostility, and they carried their raids as far north as the Dakotas, as far west as the Rockies, and as far south as the Mexican border. Over and over again they would make away with other Indians’ horses, regardless of the keen-eyed guards; and on one occasion they even stole the entire herd of horses and mules of an Army post under the very eyes of the sentries. Later they returned the animals, telling the commandant that they had made off with the herd just to prove how inadequately it was protected. “If we were hostile,” said the Pawnee spokesman, “we could destroy the settlement and post, and you wouldn’t be able to chase us.”

Practically all Indians consider dogs’ flesh excellent eating (as it really is) but the Pawnees were especially fond of dog, and their dog feasts are time-honored and most important institutions, and are almost rituals.

A very intelligent and mentally-adaptable race, they were quick to adopt any innovation that would benefit them, and were seldom at a loss when it came to facing something new or strange. Mr. S. G. Goodrich, who in 1844 wrote a book telling of his experiences among the Indians, described a Fourth of July feast, given by the officers of Fort Leavenworth, at which a number of Pawnee chiefs were invited guests.

“We had spent an hour or two in festivities,” he wrote, “when one hundred and fifty Pawnees arrived under the guidance of Mr. Dougherty, the Indian Agent. Upon invitation of the officers, fourteen of their chiefs came into the mess room. I already had seen many Indians but none so wild and unsophisticated as these. They entered the room with ease and dignity, however, shook hands all around and sat down comfortably to cigars and champagne. I was astonished at the tact and self-possession of these Indians, who had never been in a settlement of white men before, nor had ever seen a table, chair, fork or tableware in their lives; yet without asking questions or appearing to observe what was passing, they caught the idea with intuitive readiness, and during the whole dinner were not guilty of a single absurdity of breach of decorum.”

In the old days the Pawnees practised cannibalism as a religious ceremony, and it was their custom to put women prisoners to death and devour their flesh—a practice that was brought to an end in a most romantic and unusual manner. A captive Comanche girl had been bound to the stake in preparation for torture and death while the Pawnees gathered in a circle to witness the ceremony. Then, just at the last minute, a young warrior dashed forward, slashed through the girl’s bonds, and seizing her in his arms ran with her to two ponies he had tethered nearby. Swinging the girl onto one horse, he mounted the other, and before the amazed Indians could recover from their astonishment the two galloped at full speed toward the Comaches’ camp. After three days’ travel the Pawnee brave pointed out the way to the girl’s home, provided her with enough food to last her for three days and returned to his village. To his surprise nothing was said or done regarding his courageous act, for the Pawnees had decided that it was done by the guidance of the Great Spirit, who had been displeased at the sacrifice; the ceremony never again was repeated.

ALLIED with the Pawnees and closely related were the Caddos together with the Omahas and the Poncas, the two latter of Siouian stock, who were all bitter foes of the northern Sioux bands. Like their cousins, the Pawnees, the Caddos were a confederation of related tribes whose original home was the lower Red River Valley in Louisiana, but who later spread north and west. They were peaceful, agricultural people with fixed villages, friendly toward the whites and aided the latter in their warfare with the Comanches.

During our Civil War, they stood by the Union. Most of the whites in the area were Confederates, and hated the Caddos for their loyalty to the Government, and a number of them plotted a wholesale massacre of the tribe. Word of the impending slaughter reached the Government officials, however, and, with a great deal of difficulty, the tribe was safely transferred to Oklahoma where some 2,000 or more members of the tribe remain, while others are scattered elsewhere. They are mainly farmers and are a quiet industrious and prosperous lot. Although the Poncas are mainly famed for their Sun Dance, with its self-inflicted tortures, yet this dance was common to a number of tribes, including the Cheyennes and Sioux, and is still celebrated, although the voluntary tortures of the participants have largely been done away with. At one time both the Poncas and Omahas were almost completely exterminated by the northern Sioux, but after becoming allied with the Pawnees they managed to hold their own; today there are over 2,500 Omahas in Nebraska, with about 1,000 Poncas in Oklahoma and a few hundred in Nebraska.

No account of the Indians of the far west would be complete without some mention of the Kickapoos, whose common name was made famous by the wide-spread publicity given the so-called “Kickapoo Indian Remedies" and the innumerable “Indian shows” held throughout the east—although, as a matter of fact, few of the Indians who took part in these were Kickapoos. The name is a corruption or adaptation of Kiwi-gapaw-ah meaning “He moves about, standing now here, now there,” which is a very appropriate name for the tribe that has “stood now here now there” over a very wide area. Of Algonquin stock, the Kickapoos are related to the Sauk and Fox, Miamis, Shawnees and Menonimes; as early as 1667-70 they were reported by Allouez as being in what is now Columbia County, Wisconsin, while other early explorers mentioned them as inhabiting parts of Wisconsin and Minnesota. Then, in 1765, the majority moved to Illinois and from there spread south and west, abandoning their former sedentary and agricultural mode of life, and became true “horse Indian” nomads.

Although they aided Tecumseh in his campaign against the United States, and fought as allies of Black Hawk in 1832, yet in 1837 about 100 Kickapoo warriors were employed by our Government to fight the Florida Seminoles. As early as 1809 the Kickapoos had ceded their lands on the Wabash and the Vermilion Rivers to the United States, and in 1819 they made over all their lands in Illinois. They then “moved about” into Kansas and Missouri and in 1852, together with a number of the Pottawottomis, they migrated to Texas and thence into Mexico where they became inveterate raiders and a terror to the inhabitants. However, in 1873, apparently still intent on living up to their name, a large number returned to the United States and settled down to a peaceful existence in Oklahoma.

The remainder of the tribe, amounting to about one half of their numbers, remained in Mexico, and having concluded a peace-treaty with the Mexican Government, settled on territory granted them in the Santa Rosa Mountains of eastern Sonora. At the present time there are approximately 500 Kickapoos in Oklahoma, between five and six hundred in Kansas, with the remainder “Standing now here, now there.”

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Know Your Indians - The Cheyennes

Know Your Indians - The Cheyennes

Fact Feature

By A. Hyatt Verrill

From Double Action Western magazine 1953 September. Digital capture 2007 November by Doug Frizzle.

IN ALL THE history of our shameful dealings with the Indians, there is no blacker page than our treatment of the Cheyennes. It is bad enough to betray, double-cross and shoot one's enemies in the back, but to do so to one's friends is unpardonable. Yet that is what we did to the friendly Cheyennes, with the result that we were plunged into an Indian war that culminated with the Battle of the Little Big Horn and the annihilation of Custer and his command. And it was the Cheyennes, rather than the Sioux, who turned the tables; and instead of the Indians being massacred without mercy, as Custer had planned, they utterly destroyed our troops.

Yet neither the Cheyennes nor the Sioux encamped by the Little Big Horn had any hostile intentions; they had not prepared a "trap" for Custer as he had assumed. They did not even know that he and his men were in the vicinity, and not until the battle was over did they realize whom they had been fighting. When Custer dismounted his men in preparation for battle, his only opponents were three Cheyennes who were peacefully fishing in the river. The horsemen that had been seen near Crow Peak were Little Wolf, the Cheyenne chief who, with a number of women and old men, was on his way to visit the Sioux, instead of being Sioux scouts as the white men had assumed.

One of the greatest, proudest, bravest and at the same time peace-loving tribes of our country, the Cheyennes had from the first been friendly with the white men. But after fifty years of treachery, mistreatment and broken promises on the part of the whites, the Cheyennes at last took to the warpath, and with their allies carried on a war that endured for twenty-five years and cost countless lives.

As to the Cheyennes themselves, they were of a totally different racial stock from the Dakota and Lakota or Sioux groups. They were of Algonquin ancestry, related to the prairie tribes of the Middle West and a peaceful agricultural tribe who dwelt in earth lodges and cultivated their farms in the vicinity of Lake Superior until the early part of the 19th Century. Then, for some reason, they migrated westward. They called themselves the Tsis-tsis-tas meaning "The Real People," but when they came in contact with the Sioux, who could not understand their language, the Sioux referred to them as the Sha-hi-ena or “Those who talk red".

This was a term applied to anyone whom the Sioux could not understand; white men corrupted it to "Cheyenne", by which name these Indians have been known ever since. In fact they practically forgot their true tribal name and referred to themselves, and still do—as Cheyenne. Also, finding themselves among Indians of the Siouian linguistic group, they were obliged to adopt the new tongue. Still retaining many of their own words, their language, although in some ways much like that of the Lakotas, is quite distinct.

They changed their name, their tongue, and their means and manner of living to suit conditions and environment. They adopted the conical tipis, hunting the buffalo and other game instead of cultivating the ground, and became the finest horsemen of the plains. Yet they did not change their natures, their inherently peaceful ways, and their desire for friendship with their fellow men. This included the whites, although, according to their traditions, the arrival of the white men and their conquest of the Indians had been foretold by a great Shaman and Cultural Hero named "Sweet Medicine," whose prophecy was strikingly like those of the Aztec and Incan seers.

During the period prior to 1831 and until 1880, the Cheyennes were affiliated with the Suhtai tribe, who spoke a variation of the Tsis-tsis-tas tongue, travelling and living together and inter-marrying until finally becoming one tribe, with no traces left of the Suhtai customs or linguistics. In later years about one-half of the Masikota Sioux allied themselves with the Cheyennes, and still later they were joined by the mild and peaceful Arapahoes with whom they formed a more or less unified confederation.

The Cheyenne political organization was most unusual. There never was one supreme chief with dictatorial power. The governing body consisted of a council of forty big chiefs, who were selected by the various bands or groups every ten years. This council selected four Old Men chiefs as advisers, while each warrior clan or society had its own war chief and nine other chiefs, all of whom acted as representatives at a council meeting. As a result, it was not unusual for several hundred chiefs to be present at a general council. In addition to all this, every warrior clan had three attendants, whose duty was to prepare the food, look after the horses and serve as guards when the braves fought on foot. They were by no means servants or menials, but were regarded as persons of high status; and their opinions were invariably asked when any important decision was to be made. In other words the Cheyennes' form of government was a true democracy, and in many respects was similar to that of the Incas of Peru—with many of the features of the political organization of the Six Nations, or Iroquois, of New York.

THERE IS no need to recount all of the wanderings and adventures of the Cheyennes until they finally reached their future home in the Black Hills. Although naturally peaceful and friendly, when warfare was forced upon them they were among the bravest, most valiant fighters of all the plains tribes. Throughout their long trek from Minnesota to the Black Hills of Dakota, they were obliged to fight their way through numerous hostile tribes who possessed firearms. Although the Cheyennes had only their bows and arrows, their war clubs and spears, in every case they were the victors. In warfare they were magnanimous, and held strictly to a code of honor. Even when battling the Crows, who were their greatest enemies, the captives were well treated; and, as was the case with the prisoners taken by the Sioux, these prisoners often refused to be returned to their own people but joined the Cheyennes. Children taken prisoners were adopted into the tribe, and at one time there were children of twenty-eight tribes being reared by the Cheyennes.

Despite their long warfare with enemy tribes, they were friendly to the white men. Lewis and Clark found them peaceful and the later trappers, traders and settlers had no trouble with them. Meanwhile the Cheyennes had separated into two groups; the northern and southern Cheyennes, although united and acting in unison. Although white settlements were being established and forts were being built, the Cheyennes still remained friendly and there was no friction. In fact, several white men—among them George Bent, one of two brothers who built Fort Bent—married a Cheyenne girl, daughter of Coyote Ear, and held quite an important place in the tribe.

The first wagon train to cross Cheyenne territory trundled across the plains in 1841; it was not molested, nor did they attack the emigrants who followed, yet the whites included them among the "hostile" tribes. When in 1849, Colonel Kearney established Fort Kearney and Fort Laramie, he reported that there was nothing to fear from the friendly Cheyennes, who were all anxious to keep out of any trouble with the white invaders.

The first trouble started with an attack on the Sioux, when a visiting Minneconjou saw a white soldier about to cross the river in a rowboat and asked the trooper to take him along. For reply the soldier cursed the Indian and struck him. Then, as he started to row away, the Minneconjou fired his musket. Frightened at what he had done, the Indian retreated to his camp while the soldier, also scared, hurried to the fort where there were a dozen soldiers and some 10,000 Indians.

Having heard the frightened soldier's tale, Lieutenant Fleming with five men charged into the Indians' camp. Only women and children were there, all the men being absent on a hunt. The soldiers fired a volley, killing five Sioux, and then retired to the fort. The following day the Indian leaders visited the fort and assured the commandant that they were not hostile, but protested the shooting of five innocent women.

The first trouble with the Cheyennes was due to the action of Second Lieutenant J. L. Grattan—a hot-headed Indian-hater—who boasted that with ten men he'd wipe out the entire Cheyenne tribe. Then the incident occurred that resulted in the bloodiest Indian war in the history of the West

Again it was a Minneconjou who was responsible. He came upon a sick, half-starved cow abandoned by a wagon-train, killed and skinned it and reported what he had done to the chiefs. The Brule Sioux chief, Bear Who Scatters His Enemies, at once reported the matter to the officers at the fort and offered to pay $10.00 for the old cow. The former owner demanded $25.00 and the matter was taken up with the Indian Agent. Grattan, however, obtained permission to take twenty men and arrest the Minneconjou who had killed the cow—although the act violated the treaty provided that disputes between Indians and whites were to be settled by the chiefs.

Accompanied by twenty-nine men with two howitzers, Grattan made for the Indian camp. Realizing the dire results impending, two chiefs, Man Afraid of His Horse and Bear That Scatters His Enemies, begged the soldiers to wait, but to no avail. Reaching the camp, the cavalry halted about fifty yards from the tipis and without warning opened fire. At the first volley, Bear Who Scatters His Enemies was killed together with a number of Indians. Then the artillery opened up and the shot tore through lodges, wounding women and children. It was not until then that the Indians opened fire with the result that Grattan's force was wiped out, not a man escaping. Even then, the Indians did not go on the warpath, but broke camp and scattered.

AT NO TIME during this trouble had the Cheyennes taken part, but had returned to their own hunting grounds and villages. In Washington, demands were made to "wipe out the red devils" and Grattan was regarded as a martyr. As usual, the whites did not discriminate when it came to Indian tribes; and when, in 1855, Colonel Harney led his force up the Platte River and found a camp of peaceful Brules under Little Thunder, he surrounded them with his soldiers and demanded the surrender of the Indians who had wiped out Grattan's force. This was impossible for they had been Minneconjous, the Brules having had no part in the affair.

Enraged, Harney ordered an attack and the soldiers opened fire, killing eighty-six Brules—mainly women and children—wounding many more and taking seventy women and children as prisoners. Not a single shot was fired by the Indians, and there was no resistance offered. In fact, so terrified were the Indians, that—in order to avoid further troubles—five braves voluntarily rode in and surrendered to Harney, declaring they had killed Grattan.

Harney next ordered all the Sioux and Cheyennes to meet him at Fort Pierre. At this meeting, the Sioux agreed to obey the white men's orders; but the Cheyennes, who had taken no part in the troubles, refused to appear. Harney swore that, in the spring, he would lead a force against them and teach them who was master. It was now evident to the Cheyennes that their association with the Sioux was leading them into hostilities with the whites; and their chiefs—Crazy Head, Dull Knife, Lame Man, Old Bear, Little Wolf and others—foresaw that war was almost inevitable, although they did their utmost to avoid any hostilities.

Then someone declared that the Cheyennes had four horses belonging to the white men. The Indians did not deny this, but claimed that the horses were strays they had found in the plains and had brought in, hoping the owners would pay for the recovery of the animals. This, the post Commandant agreed to do and the Indians handed over three of the ponies. The fourth, Little Wolf claimed as his own, pointing out that the horse was of a different breed, and unlike that claimed lost by the white man. In the argument that followed, the Commandant ordered the arrest of the Cheyennes; an Indian bystander, Wolf Fire, was seized, the other Cheyennes escaping. Merely because he was a Cheyenne, Wolf Fire was imprisoned, half-starved and finally died in confinement.

Following this episode, the main body of Cheyennes joined their southern kinsmen along the Arkansas. Their only enemies were the Pawnees, and it was while they were on their way to Pawnee territory that once more they clashed with the whites.

Finding they were out of tobacco, and seeing the mail wagon approaching, one of the Indians and a half-breed stepped out to the road and signaled the wagon driver to stop, merely to beg for tobacco. Instead of stopping, the driver drew his revolver, fired at the Cheyennes, and whipped up his team, almost running down the Indian and his companion. Enraged at this treatment, they fired a few arrows after the wagon, one of them striking the driver's arm.

When they learned what had happened, the chiefs ordered the two men to be whipped and driven from the camp, terrified for fear of what might follow. Their fears were well-founded, for the following day, a troop of the First Cavalry under Captain G. H. Stewart appeared. The Indians sat quietly, unarmed, when a bugle call sounded and the cavalry charged into the village. Terror-stricken, the Indians fled in every direction, but ten were killed and eight wounded—although not one shot had been fired by them. The soldiers then looted the camp and rode off. In his report of this wholly uncalled-for massacre of the peaceful, unarmed Indians, Captain Stewart wrote that: "I lost no men and not a wound was received.”

A short time after this, another band of Cheyennes—who had no knowledge of what had occurred—returned from a hunt and stopped at Fort Kearney for a visit. Accompanying them there was a single Sioux who had done nothing wrong. Without any warning he was arrested and balls and chains were locked on his legs. Realizing that something was amiss, the Cheyennes ran off, taking the manacled Sioux with them. The troops opened fire and several Indians were wounded. Then mounting their horses, the soldiers raided the Cheyenne camp. Seizing the Indians’ ponies, the troops destroyed their lodges and property while the fugitive Cheyennes—having no idea of the reason for the attack—made their way to their village.

Later, they learned through a friendly white man that Big Head, one of their chiefs, had been wounded and was a prisoner, and that their stolen horses were at the fort. Charging unexpectedly at the corral, they secured their ponies and rescued Big Head without firing at the troops or touching the cavalry mounts.

Fearing what might ensue, the Indian Agent, Twiss, wrote to Washington stating that the Cheyennes were peaceful and quiet; but having seen their friends shot down by Stewart's men, the younger warriors could not be controlled by their chiefs. He added that if somebody would control the U. S. Army, he could control the Indians.

IT WAS ABOUT this time that the Sioux outbreak in Minnesota occurred. For two years the Government was too busily occupied with this, and the Civil War, to bother with the Cheyennes. Then another Indian-hating, crazy-headed Army officer started a bloody, inexcusable war that was bitterly denounced by many white men— including Kit Carson, the famous scout. About twenty head of stampeded steers were found by the Cheyennes, who brought them in to be delivered to the owners; the Cheyennes were charged with having stolen them. Whereupon Lieutenant George Layre, with a troop of cavalry equipped with a howitzer, set out to ''kill every Cheyenne he could find." The first of the Indians he met were a few buffalo-hunters with chief Lean Bear who, a few years earlier, had been in Washington.

As the soldiers approached, the chief reassured his frightened men, telling them there would be no trouble as he would show the Lieutenant the papers and Medal given him by the President. Accompanied by his attendants, Lean Bear rode towards the cavalry making the peace sign. When less than twenty paces away, Layre ordered his men to fire and Lean Bear and his men fell, fairly torn to pieces by bullets. Then, charging over their bodies, the soldiers brought the cannon into action and killed twenty-six of the fleeing Indians, wounding dozens more.

In the meantime, Lieutenant Dunn, in charge of another detachment, came upon another band of Cheyennes and opened fire, wounding and killing several Indians. Numerous other attacks were made on camps and villages of the Cheyenne, most of whom had never heard that hostilities had broken out. All of these unprovoked massacres of the peaceful Cheyennes were pictured as "glorious victories" by the Army, and Governor Evans of Colorado declared it the duty of every white man to kill every Indian he met regardless of tribe. The result was that hundreds of the frontiersmen took advantage of this "open season" on the Indians and killed, robbed and scalped without discrimination. The war was on. Tortures was resorted to by the whites, as when Major Downing captured a Cheyenne scout and roasted his feet in a fire until the Indian told of the position of the Cheyenne camp. Raiding the camp at daybreak, when all the men were on a hunt and only women and children remained, Downing ordered his men to butcher every Indian.

At Fort Larned, when a friendly Arapaho, Chief Left Hand, and his men came in under a flag of truce, he was fired upon, and General Mitchell's actions resulted in the friendly Indians becoming hostile. Cheyenne, Sioux and Arapahos now united in an all-out war and in a short time had killed hundreds of whites, had burned settlements and farms and had cost our government over 30 million dollars. Settlers everywhere fled east when possible, stage and freight lines stopped operating. Denver was surrounded by Indians and was faced with starvation. Finally, realizing that the tribesmen had the upper hand, Governor Evans—who had boasted he would wipe out every Indian who could be found—appealed for peace.

Other white men, who realized the justice of the Indians' reprisals, added their pleas. On the Indians' side, chiefs Yellow Wolf, Black Kettle and others also wanted peace—with the result that the Indians divided, the younger, more hot-headed warriors going northwest, while the older, peacefully-inclined bands used every effort to negotiate an honorable peace.

But honor, when it came to dealing with Indians, was unknown to the leaders of the whites and the Army officers. Black Kettle's band was invited by Major Scott Anthony to come in to Fort Lyon to negotiate for peace. Anthony notified Colonel Chivington, an ex-minister in charge of the Colorado military district, that he had lured the Cheyennes within easy reach and asked for troopers to attack them. With 600 soldiers, Chivington joined Anthony with his 100 men. With the utmost secrecy, they moved on the Cheyenne camp where the Indians, feeling that peace was near, were quietly waiting for the promised conference to begin. Their camp of 100 tipis contained some 200 men and about 500 women and children under Black Kettle, White Antelope, Yellow Wolf, Lone Bear and War Bonnet with a few Arapahos under Left Hand.

The approaching troops were first sighted by Cheyenne women when they went to the nearby stream for water just as day was breaking. At first, in the dim light, the dark mass of approaching soldiers was mistaken for a herd of buffalo and the women aroused the camp. When the men came hurrying out and realized that the oncoming horde was not buffalo, but soldiers, the Indians were in a panic until Black Kettle reassured them, declaring the white men were coming in peace and ordering his warriors to remain unarmed. At the signing of the treaty in I860, the chief had been presented with an American flag, which he now hoisted on a pole above his tipi while the Indians stood about him confident of safety beneath the flag.

The next moment, the troops, now within pistol shot, opened fire, killing scores of the Cheyennes. As those remaining alive or unharmed strove to escape, they were shot down by the soldiers, who then drew knives and bayonets and commenced a wholesale slaughter. Chivington urged them on, shouting: "Obey your orders. No prisoners to be taken."

Beneath the flag with its stars and stripes, Black Kettle and his wife, with elderly White Antelope, stood motionless, dazed and horrified at the butchery until they were the only Indians left alive.

FOR ONCE the public had its fill of the Army's treatment of the Indians. As true accounts of the massacre reached the east, citizens everywhere demanded a court-martial of Chivington who—seeing which way the wind now blew—retired from the Army before a court could be convened. Although a Congressional investigation bared the entire matter, the public denunciation of the massacre came too late. As the Sioux chief, Big Mouth, said, ''You white men have set the prairie on fire."

Yet the Cheyenne chief, Black Kettle, whose people had suffered the most by treachery of the soldiers, still argued for peace. But finding that his fellows would not listen to his pleas, he moved his band out of the hostile area and into lands south of the Arkansas River.

The first, and one of the most disastrous victories of the Indians, was in December, 1866, when Colonel Fetterman and his men were trapped— not far from Fort Kearney—and the entire force was wiped out by the combined Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. Had Fetterman heeded the warning of the peacefully-inclined Cheyennes, he would not have fallen into the trap; but, like most other Army men, he regarded all Indians as foes to be shot down without mercy.

Not long after the so-called "Fetterman massacre," a party of Cheyennes under chief Porcupine, gazed with amazement when they first saw a railway train on the recently completed Union Pacific Railway. So ignorant of the "iron wagons" were the Indians, that they attempted to lasso the locomotive. However, they had placed logs on the track and the train was derailed, killing all of the crew.

The war continued with the whites claiming numerous "victories,"— although in nearly every case, the Indians killed were peaceful bands who had taken no part in the hostilities. In the meantime, a new Indian leader was making history. Although known to the whites as Sitting Bull, the real name of this Uncapapa Sioux was "Buffalo Bull Who Sits Down". An immense amount of misinformation, lies and utter nonsense has been written and told of him. He is accused of having planned the Custer "massacre" and to have been a mighty chief and warrior.

As a matter of fact, he was not a chief, but a medicine-man. He was no famed warrior, and he constantly urged for peace with the whites. Many of the Indians joined him, for he was regarded as a man of great wisdom, and a Shaman. Also, many had been followers of Black Kettle who, despite his never-failing desire for peace, had been killed during Custer's slaughter of the Cheyennes at Washita. With the death of Black Kettle, the only remaining great Cheyenne chief, Little Wolf, and his band now joined the Sioux followers of Sitting Bull.

The next event of importance was the battle of Tongue River when General Crook met a small party of northern Cheyennes under Little Hawk. Although the soldiers were forced to retreat, leaving a number of men dead on the field, yet Crook reported it as a "smashing victory" over the "Sioux under Crazy Horse". A week after this skirmish, the Cheyennes, in daring cavalry-charges, bested the white soldiers at the Rosebud, although it was reported by the Army as a victory.

Having lost all they possessed in a battle with General Reynolds, a band of Cheyennes, led by a few Sioux, reached Sitting Bull's camp on the Little Big Horn. Here were assembled some ten or twelve thousand Indians belonging to the Unoapapa, Brule, Minneconjou, Blackfeet, Santee, Assiniboine, Sans Arc and other tribes with about 1500 Cheyennes, all having met for a peace conference. Never even suspecting that soldiers were near, the Indiana held dances and ceremonials and finally went to sleep, to be aroused by the women shouting that soldiers were approaching. There is no need to retell the Story of the Battle of the Little Big Horn, but it resulted in bringing the long Indian war to an end when honorable and sensible men and Army officers such as General Nelson A. Miles and others were placed in command. But before final peace had been established, the surviving Cheyennes were doomed to suffer another terrible fate at the hands of their captors.

LITTLE WOLF, Dull Knife, and about one thousand of their people were placed on reservations at Darlington and Fort Reno in Oklahoma. Here, in a barren desert land, torrid in summer and bitterly cold in winter, with no game and no adequate shelter, the Indians starved and suffered torment. Rations promised by the government failed to arrive and what little meat (he Indians did receive was mostly bone and gristle. There was only one doctor to attend to more than 5,000 Indians, and for more than six months, he was unable to obtain needed medicines and supplies. Within two months after they reached the reservations, more than half of the Cheyennes were ill. During the first winter, forty-one died of cold and malnutrition and those who survived were living skeletons.

Dull Knife and Little Wolf sent pitiful pleas for help to the government, but nothing was done; and when they appealed to the Indian Agent for permission to go to Washington and report conditions, they were refused. Then Little Wolf delivered his ultimatum, and told the agent that he and his people were leaving and heading back to their own country. The next day the two chiefs, with about 300 Cheyennes, started north. On the second day, they were overtaken by troops. Although Little Wolf ordered his men not to fire on the soldiers, the latter fired on the chief—although he was under a flag of truce. Instantly, the Cheyennes charged the troopers. The fight lasted until the next day when the soldiers retreated, leaving several dead. None of the Indians had been killed, although several were seriously wounded, their lack of casualties being due to the fact that, for the first time, the Cheyennes had entrenched themselves.

Resuming the trek northward, avoiding settlements and ranches, committing no depredations, the Cheyennes plodded on. Then, once more, they were overtaken by the soldiers and surrounded. Many of the Indians' ponies had been killed and eaten; many of the band were riding double; and all— men, women and children, had been marching steadily across an arid waste for days and had been emaciated and weak from hunger at the start. But the indomitable spirit of the Cheyennes could not be weakened by hunger or hardships. Taking refuge among the rocks of the hillside, they beat back the charges of the soldiers until they were forced to withdraw. Then the Indians charged, drove the whites from their wagons and secured supplies of ammunition and food.

At dawn, when the soldiers returned to the attack, not an Indian was to be found, for all had stolen away during the night. Soon after crossing the Arkansas, the Cheyennes came upon some buffalo-hide hunters. The Indians surrounded the men without harming them, for Little Wolf had ordered them not to shoot. The Cheyennes gorged themselves on buffalo-meat. Several times the Indians sighted troops but were not attacked and committed no depredations, although the papers everywhere held screaming headlines on the marauding Indians ravaging Nebraska and Kansas.

IT WAS THEN that General Crook, with 12,000 troops, set a trap for the homeward-bound Cheyennes. Columns of soldiers closed in on the east, south and west, two troops more were loaded into trains that shuttled back and forth across the pathway of the approaching Indians. In addition, two companies of cavalry were stationed at Ogallala. It was within two and one half-miles of this place that the Cheyennes reached the railway line. But Crook's trap was never sprung, for the Indians, having muffled the horses' hoofs, slipped at night between the two troops of cavalry and continued on their journey. When daylight came, the only traces of the Cheyennes that the soldiers could find were the tracks of the Indians' horses.

Once beyond the Platte River, the Cheyennes were in the sand hills where there was practically no vegetation, no water, no game. Even the soldiers who were on their trail suffered terribly and marvelled at the courage and the endurance of the Cheyennes, who soon separated into two bands, one under Dull Knife turning westward. By the Running Water, Little Wolf and his party settled down for the winter and were not molested, and in the spring continued on to the Powder River where they met two spies, one a Sioux the other a half-breed.

These carried word to Lieutenant Clark who, a couple of days later, overtook the Cheyennes. "Thank the Lord I've found you," he said as he rode up and grasped Little Wolf's hand. Then, he added: "I come as your friend, not your foe. I want you to surrender your arms and to accompany me to Fort Keogh." For the next few days, Indians and whites camped together while the Cheyennes held council.

Finally all agreed and Little Wolf told Clark that they would go peacefully to the fort. As they approached, General Nelson A. Miles rode out and shook hands with Little Wolf, saying: "Today we meet and shake hands; we will always be friends from now on." The story of Dull Knife and his band was very different. Unaware of the abandonment of the Red Cloud Agency, they headed for it with the intention of surrendering and asking to be allowed to remain on the tribal lands.

But by mere chance, they almost ran into a column of troopers of the Third Cavalry who never suspected there were Indians near. Ordering his men not to shoot, but to ride forward with hands in air, Dull Knife shook hands with Captain Johnson and explained that he and his band were on their way to the agency. Apparently the soldiers were willing to be friendly, and as they turned back, they left hardtack and other food for the Cheyennes.

After the starving Indians had eaten, they followed the cavalry, but discovering they were being led away from the agency and toward Fort Robinson, they protested. Although the soldiers insisted they were merely being taken to the fort to surrender and that they would be housed and fed, the Cheyennes feared a trap. Despite the zero weather and a blizzard, they dug in the frozen earth and made fox-holes. All but five carbines had been taken from them, but with these five guns they faced the Army, and held their own for ten days until a cannon ball burst among the women and children. The Cheyennes then surrendered, but were so weak from exposure and hunger that they scarcely could walk and had to be loaded into wagons and hauled to the fort where they were well treated. Then they were told that Indian Agent Carl Schurz in Washington had ordered them sent back to the Oklahoma reservation,

When they protested at this treatment, they were locked in an abandoned barracks, 150 Indians being herded into the old building. It was sub-zero weather; there were open chinks between the logs of the walls; there was no food, no blankets and only a broken-down small stove. The Chiefs begged the Commandant to give them food and blankets. But instead Weasels, the Commandant, had Dull Knife and two other chiefs dragged to his office. One of the Indians was barefoot, having eaten his moccasins, and Dull Knife's only clothing was an old ragged blanket. When Dull Knife declared that if the "Great White Father" had sentenced them to death, they would die there. Wessels flew into a furious anger, banged his fist upon the table and ordered: "Lock the damned rascals up! Give them nothing —no food, no fuel, nothing. They'll give in right enough, damn them all!"

THREE DAYS later, with the temperature six below zero, without heat, food or clothing and with no water after they had scraped the snow from the window sills, the Indians began chanting their death-songs. Wassels was furious. He realized that the prisoners never would give in, for to all his threats their only reply was "We will die here."' He then ordered the Indiana dragged out and put in irons. But as the soldiers attempted to obey, Wildhog, weak as he was, drew a knife and others joined in the hopeless fight.

Two Indians were killed and another escaped, and regained the barracks through the window. Eight more terrible days passed. Then the Indians realizing their end was near, bade one another farewell and armed themselves with a carbine and some pistols they somehow had managed to retain. Resolved to die fighting, Little Shield smashed the window and shot the sentry.

Instantly all of the Indians crawled and stumbled through the window and headed for the river while the few armed men kept the troopers at bay, wounding five and killing one. Then, crazed by thirst, they threw themselves down by the river and drank until unable to move. There the troopers trampled the Indians under their horses' feet, cut them down with sabres or shot them—whether men, women or babes in arms. Sixty-four bodies of the Cheyennes who had escaped from their prison were piled in the snow, but most of the missing 85 were never accounted for. Dull Knife with his wife and son and the latter’s wife and child, had in some miraculous manner escaped. Weak and emaciated as they were, they fought their way onward, subsisting on snow and their moccasins, until more dead than alive, they crawled into the Pine Ridge Agency and told of what had taken place.

When the story of these pitiful survivors appeared in the press, a tidal wave of revulsion swept the country. It might be all right to fight hostile Indians in open warfare; but to torture and starve those who were prisoners was quite a different matter. The public was shocked by the story of the outrages committed by Captain Wessels, while the courageous actions of the starved and dying Cheyennes were lauded. In Washington, Carl Schurz, who was responsible for the whole disgraceful affair, trembled in his shoes; to save his face, he sent frantic telegrams to Pine Ridge and Fort Keogh, granting the Cheyennes their freedom and their ancestral lands.

It had taken them many years, the deaths of hundreds of their people and suffering beyond description, but the Cheyennes had won. All they had desired, all they had fought for was theirs at last. They had peace and their homeland, although fewer than 500 of the tribe were left.

At the present time, there are about 13,000 of the tribe living, but it is doubtful if there is a single pure-blooded Tsis-tsis-tas among them. They first absorbed the Suhtais. For many years they were affiliated with the various Sioux tribes, the Blackfeet, Arapahos and others with whom they had intermarried, and many of their prisoners, both Indian and white, joined the Cheyennes and married their women. But despite the mixture of blood, the Cheyennes' character, their tribal pride, their desire for peace, their love of their homes and freedom and their prowess as fighters have never changed. As a Cheyenne youth said, when he and some companions volunteered for service in the World War: "Since when have the Cheyennes failed to fight for freedom?"

For much of the historical data, I am indebted to Mr. Joseph Millard, and to my good friend, Chief Ho-To-Pi, the famous Cheyenne opera singer.

A.H.V.