Native American Wars 1864 -1890

Native American WarsNative American Wars1864 -18901864 -1890

Kelly A BarkerKelly A Barker

Southwest Middle SchoolSouthwest Middle School

American History 8American History 8

Sand Creek MassacreSand Creek Massacre

– 1851 Treaty of Fort Laramie• Cheyenne and Arapaho are granted the lands

between the North Platte River and Arkansas River, from the Rocky Mountains eastward into western Kansas. This area included present-day southeastern Wyoming, southwestern Nebraska, most of eastern Colorado, and the westernmost portions of Kansas.

– 1858 Gold discovered in Colorado• Whites flood into the Cheyenne and Arapaho

hunting grounds.


• 1861 Treaty of Fort Wise (later known as Fort Lyon)– Cheyenne chiefs Black Kettle, White Antelope, Lean Bear, Little

Wolf, Tall Bear, and Left Hand; and Arapaho chiefs Little Raven, Storm, Shave-Head, and Big Mouth cede to the US most of the land granted under the treaty of Fort Laramie

– The new hunting reserve will be 1/13 of the original, and will include only the land between the Arkansas River and Sand

Creek – The signing of this treaty splits the Cheyenne, some

stay with Black Kettle, others, notably the “Dog Soldiers” refuse to leave the land granted under the Treaty of Fort Laramie.

Black Kettle

Little Raven


• 1864– Conflicts erupt between settlers and the

Cheyenne who have refused to leave. The army sends troops to drive off the Cheyenne.

– Two Cheyenne chiefs who approach the Army to negotiate are shot and killed. This leads to a war of retaliation by the Cheyenne in Kansas


• Black Kettle and White Antelope seek peace, they are told to camp near Fort Lyon. They camp 40 miles north on the banks of Sand Creek.

• Black Kettle flies an American Flag over his camp that was given to him by Colonel Greenwood (President Lincoln had also met Black Kettle and given he and White Antelope peace medals). Col. Greenwood had told Black Kettle that as long as he flew the American Flag, soldiers would not attack him.


• Col. John M. Chivington organizes an irregular group of US cavalry to attack the Cheyenne. This group is organized in Denver, and the troops who sign on are promised by Chivington that they will be given the opportunity to kill Indians.

J. M. ChivingtonJ. M. Chivington• When he rode into Fort Lyon (Fort Wise),

Chivington spoke of going to “collect scalps.”• Some of the officers (Capt. Soule, Lt. Cramer,

and Lt. Connor) objected to waging war on peaceful Indians.

• “Damn any man who sympathizes with Indians! I have come to kill Indians, and believe it is right and honorable to use any means under God’s heaven to kill Indians.”

• Soule, Cramer and Connor must join the expedition or face court-martial, but they resolve among themselves not to order men to fire on Indians except in self-defense.

• From “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee” Dee Brown, 1970.


• After spending the night of November 28th, drinking, Chivington orders an attack for the next morning.

• November 29, 1864– Chivington and 800 soldiers ride to Black

Kettle’s camp– Black Kettle had sent all of his young, able-

bodied men to hunt on the Smoky Hill river, only about 60 elderly men remain in camp with about 400 women and children

Sand Creek MassacreSand Creek Massacre• There is indiscriminate slaughter. Unarmed

women and children are brutally murdered with rifle and saber. (Best Estimate: 53 men, 110 women and children)

• Bodies are scalped, soldiers take trophies from the bodies of both men and women.

• Later in Denver, these trophies, are displayed. • During the recruitment of the 3rd Cavalry,

Chivington had advocated the killing of children saying “Nits make Lice!” in a speech.

Sand Creek MassacreSand Creek Massacre• Black Kettle escapes, but

every other Cheyenne leader who had advocated peace with the whites is killed.

• Cheyenne Dog Soldiers under Roman Nose (left) kill over 200 civilians in the next six months in reprisal.

AftermathAftermath• There were three investigations into the

Massacre. All of them found Col. Chivington’s actions to be reprehensible.

• Capt. Soule testified against Chivington at the first investigation. He was murdered on the streets of Denver three days later.

• No actions were taken against Col. Chivington, and in 1909 a marker was placed at the Colorado State Capitol to commemorate Union victories during the Civil War. Sand Creek is listed among those victories.

AftermathAftermath

• The Southern Cheyenne were divided into two groups, the Dog Soldiers joined the Northern Cheyenne in Wyoming, Black Kettle and the remaining Arapaho were forced to sign the Medicine Lodge Treaty (1867) agreeing to give up all of their land in Colorado and share land with the Kiowa south of the Arkansas River.

Black KettleBlack Kettle• 1868, after numerous attacks on Kansas settlers

by Roman Nose, Gen. Sheridan decided to reign in the Cheyenne permanently. He sent the 7th Cavalry under Brig. Gen. (Brevet) George Armstrong Custer to attack their encampments.

• On November 27, 1868, on the banks of the Washita River, (well within the Cheyenne Reservation) Custer attacked and massacred Black Kettle and his followers. An Osage scout took Black Kettle’s scalp as a trophy.

• By 1869, the Cheyenne were settled on a small reservation in Indian Territory, never again to be an independent, free-moving people

Red Cloud’s WarRed Cloud’s War


• 1865 – Spring, Civil War ends– In the 1851 treaty at Fort Laramie, the Sioux had

agreed on terms by which the United States might establish limited roads and military posts on Indian land.

– By 1865, Red Cloud was one of many Indian leaders who believed the U.S. was breaking the treaty by establishing forts too far up the Bozeman Trail. They had seen other tribes expelled from their land and were determined to resist.


• In June 1865 Red Cloud's Sioux joined a coalition led by Woqini (Roman Nose) of the Cheyenne to attack a military post (Fort Reno) on the North Platte River. Believing they had taught the bluecoats to respect the treaty, they left a force to prevent the soldiers from leaving the post and returned home.


Summer, 1866. The Army sends word to the Oglala, Brulé, Hunkpapa, and Minneconjou Sioux to come to Fort Laramie to sign a treaty allowing forts to be built and travel through the Powder River country to Montana (Bozeman Trail)

Red Cloud’s WarRed Cloud’s War• When Red Cloud went to the Fort, he was asked

to communicate with the President of the Peace Commission in Omaha by means of telegraph, Red Cloud did not trust the “talking wires” but he agreed.

• Commissioner Taylor wired, “The Great Father in Washington … wants you all to be his friends and the friends of the white man. If you conclude a treaty of peace, he wishes to make presents to you and your people as a token of his friendship. A train loaded with supplies and presents cannot reach Fort Laramie from the Missouri River before the first of June and he desires that about that time be agreed upon as the day when his commissioners shall meet you to make a treaty.


• Red Cloud sent word to gather all of the scattered bands of Sioux, Cheyennes, and Arapahos.

• Nothing had been said by Colonel Maynadier (the commander at Fort Laramie) about opening the Bozeman Road, Red Cloud had not spoken about lifting the siege of Fort Reno.


• By coincidence, on the same day as Red Cloud’s arrival at the Fort for the treaty negotiations, 700 soldiers and officers of the 18th Infantry Regiment arrived at the Fort. These were the soldiers who were to construct forts and open the road.


• Red Cloud was incensed.• “You treat us as children…The Great Father

sends us presents and wants a new road. But White Chief goes with soldiers to steal road before Indian says yes or no!”

• While the interpreter was still trying to translate the Sioux words into English, Red Cloud gathered his chiefs and warriors together and left.

Red Cloud’s War ShirtRed Cloud’s War Shirt


• For the rest of the summer, no army column, wagon train, or soldier could travel without being attacked by Red Cloud.

• Sioux would scatter the Army’s horses and then pick off soldiers one at a time when they went to gather them up.


• The army sent a regiment to relieve Fort Reno and establish Fort Kearny further along the Bozeman Trail.

• Fort Kearny was well-defended with about 500 soldiers and two cannon, but it was hard to supply and Red Cloud knew the fort’s supply chain was its weakness, particularly the wagon train that brought wood to the fort.


• As winter approached, the fort tried to acquire and store more and more wood.

• Red Cloud gathered together 3,000 warriors to focus on luring the soldiers out of the fort where they could be drawn into a trap.

Red Cloud’s WarRed Cloud’s War• On Dec. 6, 1866, High Back Bone, Yellow Eagle

and about a hundred warriors spread out along the road that the wood train took. Using mirrors and signal flags, they relayed the soldiers movements to each other. Soon, they had the soldiers rushing back and forth chasing decoys all over the countryside. As soon as they had the soldiers spread out along the narrow trail, Yellow Eagle and his warriors sprang from concealment in their rear, in a matter of seconds they killed a Lieutenant, a Sergeant and wounded several others.

The Battle of the Hundred SlainThe Battle of the Hundred Slain(The Fetterman Massacre)(The Fetterman Massacre)

• On Dec 21, 1866, Red Cloud decided that everything was in preparation. He selected 10 warriors (2 each for the Cheyenne, Arapaho, and 6 Sioux (2 Oglala, 2 Minneconjou and 2 Brulé), commanded by Crazy Horse, Hump, and Little Wolf) to act as decoys and lure the soldiers over the Lodge Trail Ridge and into the ravine of Peno Creek where 2,000 warriors would wait in ambush.


• Captain William J. Fetterman (Brevet Colonel) was in command of the wood train that day. He had 81 cavalry and infantrymen with him.

• When they were attacked by the decoys, he ordered his men to give chase.

• When they reached Lodge Trail Ridge, seeing only 10 Indians in front of him, he disobeyed a direct order to not cross the ridge and continued to pursue them.


• Within minutes, the infantrymen were surrounded and killed in hand to hand fighting. The cavalrymen took refuge in a group of rocks, where they were quickly killed. Every member of Fetterman’s command was slain.

• There were almost 200 dead and wounded among the Indians.

Red Cloud’s WarRed Cloud’s War• Despite the Massacre, the Army never launched

a major offensive against the Indians. • During the summer 1867, the Army had

successes against the Sioux in the Hayfield Fight and the Wagon Box Fight, due to new repeating rifles.

• The government decided that the transcontinental railroad then pushing through southwestern Wyoming toward Salt Lake City, and the use of the Bridger Trail, were better alternatives than trying to maintain an expensive and unproductive military presence in the Powder River country.

Red Cloud’s WarRed Cloud’s War• Peace commissioners were sent to Fort Laramie in the

spring of 1868. Red Cloud refused to meet with these individuals until the Powder River strongholds, Forts Phil Kearny and C. F. Smith, were abandoned. In August 1868, Federal soldiers abandoned these forts and proceeded on toward Fort Laramie.

• Red Cloud did not arrive at Fort Laramie until November. He signed the Treaty of Fort Laramie of 1868 which created the Great Sioux Reservation, including the Black Hills. The reservation covered what is now all of western South Dakota.

• In addition, the Powder River country was declared to be Unceded territory as a reserve for Lakota who chose not to live on the new reservation and as a hunting reserve for all the Lakota.

Red Cloud’s WarRed Cloud’s War• Red Cloud became the only Indian leader to win

a major war against the United States. • Red Cloud adapted to fighting the Indian Bureau

for fair treatment for his people. His famous statement about treaties best sums up his attitude towards the word of the people negotiating with him: "I have listened patiently to the promises of the Great Father, but his memory is short. I am now done with him. This is all I have to say."

Red Cloud’s WarRed Cloud’s War• After 1868, he lived on the reservation and

became an important leader of the Lakota as they transitioned from the freedom of the plains to the confinement of the reservation system. He outlived all the major Sioux leaders of the Indian wars and died in 1909 on the Pine Ridge Reservation, where he is buried.

• Fetterman, Brown and the rest of the soldiers killed in 1866 are buried in the U.S. National Cemetery at Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument, near Crow Agency, Montana.

Anonymous, Custer’s Last Stand, Crow Tribe, Sioux Nation, c. 1890Anonymous, Custer’s Last Stand, Crow Tribe, Sioux Nation, c. 1890

The Battle of the Greasy GrassThe Battle of the Greasy Grass(aka the Battle of the Little Bighorn)(aka the Battle of the Little Bighorn)

(aka Custer’s Last Stand)(aka Custer’s Last Stand)

• Red Cloud and his followers settle down near the Sioux agency (a “fort” or trading post) and receive the supplies that the government has promised.

• Things go well until 1874.

1874 Custer Expedition1874 Custer Expedition

• Custer lead about 1000-1200 man and 110 wagons into the Black Hills to verify reports of gold being found there.

Gold in the Black HillsGold in the Black Hills• There is no doubt as to the existence of various

metals throughout the hills. As this subject has received the special attention of experts who accompanied the expedition, and will be reported upon in detail, I will only mention the fact that iron and plumbago (lead or graphite) have been found and beds of gypsum of apparently inexhaustible extent. I referred in a former dispatch to the discovery of gold. Subsequent examinations at numerous points confirm and strengthen the fact of the existence of gold in the Black Hills– Custer, a letter to the Assistant Adjutant General of Dakota, August 15, 1874, Eyewitnesses to the Indian Wars, 1865-1890, Peter Cozzens, page 166.

Gold Miners In the Black HillsGold Miners In the Black Hills

1874 Expedition1874 Expedition

On August 7, 1874, Custer shot and killed this bear. He called it his greatest hunting achievement.

Battle of the Greasy GrassBattle of the Greasy Grass

• After the 1875 Sun Dance was concluded, thousands of Sioux and Cheyenne had slipped away from their reservations, the Army planned a summer campaign to bring them back in.

Battle of the Greasy GrassBattle of the Greasy Grass

• Gen. Crook confronted a large group of Indians on June 7, and was defeated at the Battle of the Rosebud.

• He was delayed in moving north, which Gibbons and Terry did not know.

• Gibbons and Terry united their columns and sent the 7th Calvary to trap the Indians and drive them toward their combined force.

The Battle of the Greasy GrassThe Battle of the Greasy Grass• When Custer approached the Sioux and

Cheyenne camp he saw Indians moving toward the camp, he felt he had to attack the camp before it was warned of his approach and the Indians could scatter.

• (Don’t forget that he had won a similar engagement against the Cheyenne under Black Kettle),

• and he (and all other army soldiers) felt strongly that their guns would give them a superiority that the Indians could not match.

The Battle of the Greasy GrassThe Battle of the Greasy Grass

• On approach to the village, Custer divided his command.

• Major Reno was to cross the Little Bighorn south of the village and drive the Indians to Custer who would be on high ground behind the village.


• Reno immediately realized as he approached that he was outnumbered at least 5 to 1, and the Indians were not retreating but preparing to fight.

• Reno deployed his troops in a skirmish line (every one dismounts, every fourth soldier holds the reins for the others horses) and was quickly pinned down.


• Reno was soon joined by Capt. Benteen, who had been sent by Custer on a scouting mission. Benteen’s column had the 7th’s ammunition.

• These 360 soldiers moved onto high ground south of the village, dug in and survived the battle. (After two days of repeated and constant attack)

The Battle of the Greasy GrassThe Battle of the Greasy Grass• Custer was not so lucky. He had divided his command

into four parts in the face of numerical superior enemy that he had not scouted fully.

• HE WAS OBEYING THE ORDERS THAT HE HAD BEEN GIVEN!

• But his tactics were not sound. He spent a considerable amount of time attempting to direct his troopers to round-up Sioux women and children to use as hostages to force the warriors to stop fighting instead of finding a defensible position to face the warriors that were gathering on his flanks.

The Battle of the Greasy Grass

• Custer’s entire column (210 men) was killed. Bodies were desecrated, Custer was probably shot in the head at close range after he was dead, (Some tried to claim that he shot himself – “Save the last bullet for yourself”) but the head wound was not bleeding when Custer’s body was found which would seem to indicate that it was a post-mortem wound.

ComancheComanche

• As historian Evan S. Connell writes in Son of the Morning Star:• Comanche was reputed to be the only survivor of the Little Bighorn, but quite a few Seventh

Cavalry mounts survived, probably more than one hundred, and there was even a yellow bulldog. Comanche lived on another fifteen years, and when he died, he was stuffed and to this day remains in a glass case at the University of Kansas. So, protected from moths and souvenir hunters by his humidity-controlled glass case, Comanche stands patiently, enduring generation after generation of undergraduate jokes. The other horses are gone, and the mysterious yellow bulldog is gone, which means that in a sense the legend is true. Comanche alone survived.

• Captain Myles Keogh personal mount, which he only rode in battle. The horse had been shot by an arrow in the hindquarters in an earlier engagement with the Comanche which had led to his name.

• When General Terry’s column arrived on the battlefield, he was wandering about wounded several times but still alive.

• He lived until 1890, 14 years after the battle, being used in 7th Cavalry ceremonies and pampered – he had an affection for beer. He is one of only two horses to have a full military funeral after his death.

The Battle of the Greasy GrassThe Battle of the Greasy Grass• The Army put a full on offensive against the

Sioux. Sitting Bull retreated to Canada, Crazy Horse was forced to surrender at Fort Robinson, then during a fight at the fort he was killed by a Sioux policeman.

• The Sioux were also forced to cede the Black Hills to the U.S. Government

• Sitting Bull eventually came back to Pine Ridge – He would later tour with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show and recreate the Custer fight to the thrill of audiences around the world.

Sitting BullSitting Bull

Crazy HorseCrazy Horse

• Crazy Horse never sat for a painting or a photograph, so no one can say definitely what he looked like.

• That has not stopped this sculpture from progressing – of course it is simply a response for this one.

Mount RushmoreMount Rushmore

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Native American Wars 1864 -1890

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