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Title: The Vanishing Race
Author: Dixon, Joseph Kossuth, 1856-1926
Language: English
As this book started as an ASCII text book there are no pictures available.
*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Vanishing Race" ***
PREPARER’S NOTE
Please note that this book contains a photograph of a burial platform,
which some may find offensive. The elegaic tone, typical of the time, of
much of the book may also annoy the modern reader. Some of the Indian
interviews are still quoted today, however, and some of the photos are
still reproduced.
[The Last Outpost]
The Last Outpost
The Vanishing Race
The Last Great Indian Council a record in picture and story of the last
great indian council, participated in by eminent indian chiefs from nearly
every indian reservation in the united states, together with the story of
their lives as told by themselves—their speeches and folklore tales—their
solemn farewell, and the indians’ story of the custer fight
By Dr. Joseph K. Dixon
Garden City, New York
Doubleday, Page, and Company
1913
DEDICATION
To the man of mystery—
The earth his mother—
The sun his father—
A child of the mountains and the plains—
A faithful worshipper in the great world cathedral—
Now a tragic soul haunting the shores of the western ocean—
My brother the Indian
ILLUSTRATIONS
The Last Outpost
The Approach of the Chiefs
A Glimpse Backward
The Sacrament of Winter
The Lone Tepee
Singing to the Spirits
The Voice of the Water Spirits
Trail of the Death Spirit
A Leaf from the Indian’s Book
The Song of the Arrows
An Imperial Warrior
A Sunset in Camp
Lighting the Smoke Signal
Answering the Smoke Signal
The Attack on the Camp
Buffalo Thundered Across the Plains
An Indian Home
An Indian Burden Bearer
An Indian Woman’s Dress—Mrs. Wolf Plume
The Flower of the Wigwam
Little Friends
A Bath in the Little Big Horn
The Crown of Eagle Feathers
Warriors of Other Days
Chief Plenty Coups
The Peaceful Camp
Chief Red Whip
The Pause in the Journey
Chief Timbo
The Downward Trail
Chief Apache John
Climbing the Great Divide
Chief Running Bird
Chiefs Fording the Little Bighorn
Chief Brave Bear
Skirting the Sky-Line
Chief Umapine
Down the Western Slope
The Last Arrow
Chief Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa
Chief Runs the Enemy
Scouting Party on the Plains
Scouts passing under cover of the Night
Map of the Custer Battlefield
Chief Pretty Voice Eagle
A War Council
The War Party
The Swirl of the Warriors
Chief White Horse
Chief Bear Ghost
Chief Running Fisher
Chief Bull Snake
Mountain Chief
War Memories
Chief Red Cloud
Chief Two Moons
Here Custer Fell
Custer Scouts
White Man Runs Him—Custer Scout
Hairy Moccasin—Custer Scout
Curly—Custer Scout
Goes Ahead—Custer Scout
On the War Trail
In Battle Line
The Custer Battlefield
Scouts on the March
Sunset on the Custer Field
The Reno Battlefield
Two Moons as he fought Custer
The Council Pipe
Chief Plenty Coups Addressing the Council
Chief Koon-Ka-Za-Chy Addressing the Council
Chief Two Moons Addressing the Council
An Indian Communion
The Final Trail
The Fading Sunset
Vanishing into the Mists
Facing the Sunset
The Sunset of a Dying Race
The Empty Saddle
CONTENTS
Acknowledgment
INDIAN IMPRINTS A GLIMPSE BACKWARD
THE STORY OF THE CHIEFS
Chief Plenty Coups
Chief Red Whip
Chief Timbo
Chief Apache John
Chief Running Bird
Chief Brave Bear
Chief Umapine
Chief Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa
Chief Runs-the-Enemy
Chief Pretty Voice Eagle
Folklore Tales—Sioux
Chief White Horse
Folklore Tales—Yankton Sioux
Chief Bear Ghost
Chief Running Fisher
Bull Snake
Mountain Chief
Mountain Chief’s Boyhood Sports
Chief Red Cloud
Chief Two Moons
THE STORY OF THE SURVIVING CUSTER SCOUTS
White-Man-Runs-Him
Folklore Tale—Crow
Hairy Moccasin
Curly
Goes-Ahead-Basuk-Ore
THE INDIANS’ STORY OF THE CUSTER FIGHT
THE LAST GREAT INDIAN COUNCIL
INDIAN IMPRESSIONS OF THE LAST GREAT COUNCIL
THE FAREWELL OF THE CHIEFS
THE CONCEPT
In undertaking these expeditions to the North American Indian, the sole
desire has been to perpetuate the life story of the first Americans and to
strengthen in their hearts the feeling of allegiance and friendship for
their country.
For this purpose two expeditions were sent forth to gather historic data
and make picture records of their manners, customs, their sports and
games, their warfare, religion, and the country in which they live.
As a result, on Washington’s Birthday, 1913, thirty-two Indian chiefs,
representing eleven tribes, assembled with the President of the United
States together with many eminent citizens and details from the Army and
Navy to open ground for the Indian Memorial authorized by act of Congress
to be erected in the harbour of New York.
The Indian chiefs assembled, hoisted the American flag, the first time in
their history. This act and the flag gave birth to a thrill of
patriotism. These warriors of other days laid claim to a share in the
destiny of our country. So deeply were these First Americans impressed
with a sense of loyalty to the flag that, again under the authority of the
President of the United States, a third Expedition was sent forth to every
Indian tribe. The purpose of this Expedition was twofold, the linking of
every tribe in the country with the National Indian Memorial, and the
inspiring of an ideal of patriotism in the mind of the red man—a spirit of
patriotism that would lead to a desire for citizenship—a feeling of
friendship and allegiance, to be eternally sealed as a convenant in the
Indian Memorial.
Here, under the blessing of God, on the shores of our beloved country,
where the red man first gave welcome to the white man, this Memorial will
stand in eternal bronze, in memory of a noble, though vanishing race, and
a token to all the world of the one and indivisible citizenship of these
United States.
RODMAN WANAMAKER.
[The Approach of the Chiefs]
The Approach of the Chiefs
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
FIRST of all, William Howard Taft, President of the United States, gave
his sanction to this Expedition, and Hon. Robert Grosvenor Valentine,
Commissioner of Indian Affairs, gave his permission to assemble eminent
chiefs from the prominent Indian Reservations of the United States, and
complemented his courtesy by helpful interest and cooperation. The
Superintendents of the various Indian Reservations gave spontaneous and
willing service; Major S. G. Reynolds, Superintendent of the Crow
Reservation by sympathetic and efficient interest made possible the
achievement of the Last Great Indian Council; Hon. Frederick Webb Hodge,
in charge of the Bureau of American Ethnology confirmed the data secured.
The Hand Book of American Indians made possible the larger scope of the
suggestions on Indian dress. The great chiefs who participated in the
Council in noble and faithful fashion lived out the history and tradition
of their tribes. Heartfelt appreciation is merited and given to all.
Since the publication of the first edition of “The Vanishing Race”,
further grateful acknowledgment is accorded. While conducting a
nation-wide Expedition of Citizenship to the North American Indian,
embracing 189 tribes and extending over 26,000 miles, the author was
adopted into the Wolf clan of the Mohawk nation,—Iroquois Confederacy.
They said, “You have traveled so far, traveled so fast, and brought so
much light and life to the Indian that we call you ‘Ka-ra-Kon-tie, Flying
Sun’.”
THE AUTHOR.
PERSONÆ
Representative North American Indian Chiefs, scouts, and warriors
participating in the Last Great Indian Council, held in the valley of the
Little Horn, Montana, September, 1909, with their English, tribal, and
Indian designations.
CHIEF PLENTY COUPS, Chief of the Crow Nation, bearing the Indian name of
Aleck-shea-Ahoos, signifying Many Achievements.
CHIEF RED WHIP, an eminent Chief of the Gros Ventres Tribe, bearing the
Indian name of Bein-es-Kanach.
CHIEF TIMBO, OR HAIRLESS, Head Chief of the Comanche Tribe, bearing the
Indian name of Tah-cha-chi.
CHIEF APACHE JOHN, an eminent Apache Chief, bearing the Indian name of
Koon-kah-za-chy, signifying Protector of his Tepee.
CHIEF RUNNING BIRD, an eminent Chief of the Kiowa Tribe, bearing the
Indian name of Ta-ne-haddle.
CHIEF BRAVE BEAR, Head Chief of the Southern Cheyennes, bearing the Indian
name of Ni-go High-ez, Ni-go, bear—High-ez, brave.
CHIEF UMAPINE, Head Chief of the Cayuse Tribe, bearing the Indian name of
Wa-kon-kon-we-la-son-mi.
CHIEF TIN-TIN-MEET-SA, Chief of the Umatilla Tribe, bearing the Indian
name of Wil-Lou-Skin.
CHIEF RUNS-THE-ENEMY, Chief of the Teton Sioux, bearing the Indian name of
Tok-kahin-hpe-ya.
CHIEF PRETTY VOICE EAGLE, Chief of the Yankton Sioux, bearing the Indian
name of Wambli-ho-waste.
CHIEF WHITE HORSE, Chief of the Southern Yankton Sioux, bearing the Indian
name of Sung-ska.
CHIEF BEAR GHOST, Chief of the Crow Creek Tribe, bearing the Indian name
of Mato-Wanagi, signifying the Ghost of a Bear.
CHIEF RUNNING FISHER, an eminent Chief of the Gros Ventres Tribe, bearing
the Indian name of Itn-tyi-waatyi.
BULL SNAKE, an eminent Crow warrior and scout, bearing the Indian name of
Ear-Ous-Sah-Chee-dups, signifying Male Snake.
MOUNTAIN CHIEF, Chief of the Blackfoot Tribe, bearing the Indian name of
Omaq-kat-tsa, signifying Big Brave.
CHIEF RED CLOUD, Chief of the Ogallalla Sioux, bearing the Indian name of
Marpiya-Luta.
CHIEF TWO MOONS, Head Chief of the Northern Cheyennes, bearing the Indian
name of Ish-hayu-Nishus, meaning Two Moons or Two Suns.
WHITE-MAN-RUNS-HIM, Chief of the Custer scouts, an eminent Crow warrior,
bearing the Indian name of Mias-tas-hede-Karoos, signifying The White Man
Runs Him.
HAIRY MOCCASIN, a noted Custer scout, of the Crow Tribe, bearing the
Indian name of Esup-ewyshes.
CURLY, a noted Custer scout, of the Crow Tribe, bearing the Indian name of
Shes-his.
GOES-AHEAD, a noted Custer scout, of the Crow Tribe, bearing the Indian
name of Basuk-Ose, signifying Goes First.
[A Glimpse Backward]
A Glimpse Backward
INDIAN IMPRINTS A GLIMPSE BACKWARD
We are exchanging salutations with the uncalendared ages of the red man.
We are measuring footsteps with moccasined feet whose trail leads along
the receding sands of the western ocean. A bit of red colour set in
immemorial time, now a silent sentinel, weeping unshed tears with eyes
peering into a pitiless desert.
Life without humour is intolerable. The life of the Indian has been a
series of long and bitter tragedies. There is a look in his face of
bronze that frightens us, a tone lights up the gamut of his voice that
makes it unlike any other voice we have ever heard—a voice that will echo
in the tomb of time—a Spartan courage that shall be regnant a millennium
beyond the Thermopylæ of his race.
We have come to the day of audit. Annihilation is not a cheerful word,
but it is coined from the alphabet of Indian life and heralds the infinite
pathos of a vanishing race. We are at the end of historical origins. The
impression is profound.
A vision of the past and future confronts us. What we see is more
wonderful than a view the points of which can be easily determined. We
behold a dead sea of men under the empty and silent morning, a hollow land
into which have flowed thousands upon thousands—at last the echo of a
child’s cry. The door of the Indian’s yesterdays opens to a new world—a
world unpeopled with red men, but whose population fills the sky, the
plains, with sad and spectre-like memories—with the flutter of unseen
eagle pinions. A land without the tall and sombre figure worshipping the
Great Mystery; without suns and snows and storms—without the scars of
battle, swinging war club, and flashing arrow—a strange, weird world,
holding an unconquered race, vanquished before the ruthless tread of
superior forces—we call them the agents of civilization. Forces that have
in cruel fashion borne down upon the Indian until he had to give up all
that was his and all that was dear to him—to make himself over or die. He
would not yield. He died. He would not receive his salvation by
surrender; rather would he choose oblivion, unknown darkness—the melting
fires of extermination. It is hard to think this virile, untamed creation
has been swept like hurrying leaves by angry autumn gusts across the
sunlit plains into a night without a star.
The white is the conquering race, but every-whither there is a cry in the
heart to delve into the mystery of these ancient forerunners. This type
of colour holds the eye, rivets and absorbs the interest.
Men are fast coming to recognize the high claim of a moral obligation to
study the yesterdays of this imperial and imperious race. The
preservation of this record in abiding form is all the more significant
because all serious students of Indian life and lore are deeply convinced
of the insistent fact that the Indian, as a race, is fast losing its
typical characters and is soon destined to pass completely away. So
rapidly are the remaining Western tribes putting aside their native
customs and costumes, their modes of life and ceremonies, that we belong
to the last generation that will be granted the supreme privilege of
studying the Indian in anything like his native state. The buffalo has
gone from the continent, and now the Indian is following the deserted
buffalo trail. All future students and historians, all ethnological
researches must turn to the pictures now made and the pages now written
for the study of a great race.
It is little short of solemn justice to these vanishing red men that
students, explorers, artists, poets, men of letters, genius, generosity,
and industry, strive to make known to future generations what manner of
men and women were these whom we have displaced and despoiled.
Indisputable figures, the result of more than five years of painstaking
research on the part of the Bureau of Ethnology at Washington, place the
decrease of Indian population in the United Sates, north of Mexico, since
the coming of the white man, at 65 per cent. They have gone from the
forests and plains, from the hills and valleys over which they roamed and
reigned for uncounted ages. We have taken their land, blotted out their
faith and despoiled their philosophy. It has been the utter extinction of
a whole type of humanity. The conquering Anglo-Saxon speech has swept out
of existence over a thousand distinct languages. These original Americans
_Deserve a Monument_. They have moved majestically down the pathway of
the ages, but it culminates in the dead march of Saul.
The record of the North American Indian has naught to do with the
tabulation of statistics, the musty folios of custom reports, the
conquests of commerce. He has never walked up to the gates of the city
and asked entrance to its portals, nor subscribed himself as a contestant
in the arena of finance. He has had no share in the lofty ideals of
statecraft, nor the spotless ermine of the judiciary. He lived and moved
and had his being in the sanctuary of the hills, the high altar-stairs of
the mountains, the sublime silences of the stately pines—where birds sung
their matins and the “stars became tapers tall”; where the
zitkada_n_to—the blue bird—uttered its ravishing notes. He sought the
kat-yi-mo—the “enchanted mesa”—as the place of prayer, the hour in which
to register his oath. On the wide extended plain, rolling green, like the
billows of the ocean, he listened for wana’gipi tah’upahupi—“the wings of
the spirits.” In wana’gi ta’ca_n_ku—the milky way—he saw the footprints
of departed warriors. His moccasined feet penetrated wa-koniya—“the place
where water is born”—the springs that gushed forth to give life, and
refreshing to all the earth. Ca_n_hotka ska—the “white frost”—became the
priest’s robe as he petitioned at the sacrament of winter. The universe
to him became a sounding-board of every emotion that thrilled his being.
He found in its phenomena an answer to his longings and the high
expression of every fervour of his soul. We cannot understand this,
because the Indian chased the ethereal, the weird, the sublime, the
mysterious: we chase the dollar. He heard the voice of nature; we listen
for the cuckoo clock of commerce.
[The Sacrament of Winter]
The Sacrament of Winter
The camera, the brush, and the chisel have made us familiar with his
plumed and hairy crests, but what of the deep fountains of his inner life?
What did he think? How did he feel? What riotous impulses, or communion
with the Great Mystery, carved his face of bronze? These no scientist, no
discoverer, no leader of expeditions have ever borne into the light. No
footprints along the trail can spell out for us his majestic mien, his
stolid dignity, his triumphant courage, his inscrutable self-poise, and
all of these dyed with a blood-red struggle for survival such as crowns no
other page of American history.
To gain this close measure of the Indian mind, his friendship and
confidence must not suffer eclipse. It is a superlative task, for the
inner Indian shrine is crossed by only a favoured few. The Indian is
averse to being photographed, for he feels that every picture made of
himself by so much shortens his life. He looks at his portrait, then
feels of his person; he realizes that he has not lost a hand or a foot,
but feels most profoundly that his soul will be that much smaller in the
future world. His medicine is sacred, and you may not interrupt the daily
tenure of his life without destroying some ceremonial purpose. It is
meaningful, therefore, that these red men allowed us daily communion.
This story is then simply instinct with the Indian’s inner self: how we
sat with him in his wigwam, and amid his native haunts, surrounded by
every element of the wild life we were to commemorate; how his confidence
was gained, and he was led to put aside his war-shirt and eagle feathers,
and pull in twain the veil of his superstitious and unexplained reserve
and give to the world what the world so much craves to know—what the
Indian thinks and how he feels.
Memorable hours these under clear Montana skies, or at the midnight hour
by the dim campfire light, the rain beating its tattoo on the tepee above
our heads—surrounded by an army of shining tepees, like white ghosts of
the plains, while these pathetic figures told the story of their lives.
The warrior of other days gave himself up to mirthful tale, to boyhood’s
transports, to manhood’s achievements, to the wild chase of the hunter, to
the weaponry and woes of savage warfare, to the hallowed scenes of home
life, to the primitive government of the tribe, and the busy and engaging
activities of the camp; finally, to the royalty of the Great Council, when
the chiefs assembled in solemn conclave to hold communion, to say a long
and last farewell.
[The Lone Tepee]
The Lone Tepee
Months of arduous labour were spent in the effort to make a comprehensive
and permanent record of an old-time Indian council. For this purpose
eminent Indian chiefs were assembled in the Valley of the Little Big Horn
in Montana, from nearly every Indian tribe in the United States. This
council involved permission and unstinted aid from the Bureau of Indian
Affairs at Washington, the cooperation of the Indian superintendents on
all the reservations; the selection of the most distinguished
chiefs—chiefs eminent for ability and honourable achievement among their
tribes. The council involved the necessity of interpreters from each
tribe, for they could only talk in the sign language. It involved the
construction of a primitive council lodge along the lines of history and
tradition, and again, the reproduction of primitive customs and
traditions, both in paraphernalia, costume, and conduct.
These imprints are the trail marks left by this Great Council of
Chiefs—the last Great Indian Council that will ever be held on American
soil. The story most faithfully records the idiom and phrasing and
atmosphere of the Indian’s speech as it came from Indian lips. The
language of the landscape where the Indian made his home, where he fought
his battles and lived his life, where this solemn council was held, is
manifest in the accompanying photogravures. On the Indian trail, we may
note as a hint of the many, a few of his imprints.
[Singing to the Spirits]
Singing to the Spirits
HIS RELIGION
The life of the Indian is one vast and glittering mosaic of rite and
ritual. His warfare, his dress, his medicine, his ceremonies, his wooing,
and his dying are all of them expressive of a dominant idea that pervades
his life and controls his purpose. He lives constantly and absorbingly in
a mystic land. He is beckoned by unseen hands and is lured into the
realms of mystery by the challenge of voices silent to all other ears.
His dress is studded with resplendent colours significant of the green
earth, the blue sky, and the cry of his soul for a place in the great
beyond. Like the high priest of old, he wears on his breast the fiery
filaments of his faith.
The Indian sits in the tabernacle of the mighty forest or on the heights
of some deserted and wind-swept mesa, beats his tomtom or drones song upon
song, prays to the Great Mystery, pleads with the fires of the sun to give
him strength and life and health, and calls the sun his father. The
whispering winds tell his tale to the clouds. He peers into the depths of
the stars, watches the aurora as the death dance of the spirits, answers
the high call of the thunder as the voice of the Great Mystery, utters the
cry of his soul to the lightnings—the arrows of taowity—communes with the
rivers and the lakes, the moon, and the legion of wild beasts, and all of
it with a pitiful longing that his days of fasting and his vicarious
devotion may bring upon his life and his tribe the favour of the gods.
These primitive men hold time and money and ambition as nothing. But a
dream, or a cloud in the sky, or a bird flying across the trail from the
wrong direction, or a change of the wind will challenge their deepest
thoughts. To the Indian mind all signs are symbolic. Their ceremonies
are as complicated as any of ancient Hebrew or Greek tradition. The
Indian aspires to be a great hunter, he seeks fame as a noble warrior; he
struggles for the eagle feathers of distinction, but his greatest longing
is to become a Medicine Man and know the Great Mystery. All medicine
people of the tribes carry on their necks, or in a pouch at the belt, some
sacred thing used in their magic practices—the claw of a bear, the rattle
of a snake, a bird’s wing, the tooth of an elk, a bit of tobacco. Every
Indian carries his individual medicine, and his medicine is good or bad
according to his success. If he finds a feather at wrong angle in his
path, his medicine is bad for that day. The Indian fasts and dances and
chants, using his mind, his spirit, and his body as pliable instruments in
the making of his prayer. He finds in the veritable exhaustion of his
body the spirit path made clear for his dreams, until the very stars seem
as the eyes of the gods, and the sighing of the pines comes to him as the
rustle of eagle wings to bear his spirit to loftier realms. Instead of
the common acceptation that the Indian has no religion whatever, every
single act of his life carries with it some ceremonial function, and his
whole being is surrounded by a shining host of ceremonial spirits. The
Indian goes with prayer thoughts to the water. His bath is a sacrament.
He cuts the long supple willow withes that grow on the banks of the
stream, enters the sharpened end into the soil, bends and ties the
feathery tops into an arch; over the arches thus made he throws his
blankets; meanwhile, gathered stones have been heated in the burning fire.
These stones glowing white with heat are placed in a tiny pit underneath
the covering of this booth, now to be called his sweat bath. First one
stone until four have been counted are placed by the attendant in the pit,
and then the fiery pile is thrown in promiscuous fashion on the heap. The
Indians enter the closed covering, the ceremonial pipe is smoked, a gourd
of cold water is handed to each; they then disrobe, the attending priest
lowering the blanket over the entrance. Cold water is then poured over
the heated stones, filling the enclosure with steam. In silence they
commune with the Great Mystery until one of their number is blessed with a
vision; then a call is made and the attendant lifts the blanket, almost
immediately lowering it again. This action is repeated until the vision
has been vouchsafed four times, when they all come forth and plunge into
the river. These sweat baths are always located on the banks of a flowing
stream. The Indian sees in every ripple of the flashing water that comes
to meet him a shining token of the medicine he has seen in his vision.
They then repair to the wigwam and listen in solemn silence to the
chanting cadences of the Indian who has been favoured.
[The Voice of the Water Spirits]
The Voice of the Water Spirits
The curling smoke from the long-stemmed pipe breathes forth the fumes of
war or the pale quiet of peace. With his pipe he pacifies the elements.
On festal occasions, or when the camp rejoices at the joys of harvest, the
priest smokes his pipe, blowing the smoke first to the earth, then to the
sky, to the north, the south, the east, and the west, in token of
gratitude for the favour of the gods. With the pipe the Indian also seals
his councils.
[Trail of the Death Spirit]
Trail of the Death Spirit
The Indian buries his dead upon some high elevation, because it is a
nearer approach to the spirit world. They bury on scaffolds and in trees
that in some mute, sorrowful way they may still hold communion with their
loved and their lost. At the grave they go to the four points of the
compass and mourn, singing all the while a weird chant. They bury with
their dead all of the belongings of the deceased, the playthings of the
Indian child, for the Indian boy and girl have dolls and balls and baubles
as does the white child: you may see them all pendent from the poles of
the scaffold or the boughs of a tree. When the great Chief Spotted Tail
died they killed his two ponies, placing the two heads toward the east,
fastening the tails on the scaffold toward the west. The war-bonnets and
war-shirts are folded away with the silent dead; then follow the desolate
days of fasting and mourning. In some instances hired mourners are
engaged, and for their compensation they exact oftentimes the entire
possessions of the deceased. The habitation in which the death occurs is
burned, and many times when death is approaching the sick one is carried
out so that the lodge may be occupied after the loved one has been laid to
rest. The grief of the sorrowing ones is real and most profound. They
will allow no token of the departed to remain within sight or touch. In
their paroxysms of sorrow the face and limbs are lacerated, and often the
tips of fingers are severed. Until the days of mourning are over, which
is for more than a year, they absent themselves from all public
gatherings. The bereaved fold themselves in a white blanket, repair to
some desolate hillside overlooking the valley, the camp and the distant
weird scaffold, and sit, amid cloud, sunshine, and storm, with bowed head,
in solemn silence. White blankets are worn by the mourners as they move
through the camp, significant of the white trail of the stars whither the
Indian feels his loved ones have gone.
The Indian has a sublime idea of creation. He loves the brown earth and
calls it his mother, because it has creative power and because it
nourishes. And thus we might gather in from the thirty-two points of the
compass the forces operant in earth and sky, and each would become a
herald of the Indian’s life of faith.
[A Leaf from the Indian’s Book]
A Leaf from the Indian’s Book
THE BOOKS OF HIS LIBRARY
The Indian child is nursed on Indian song and story. Tribal traditions
are handed down from age to age by enacting in the dance, on the part of
the warriors and braves, their deeds of valour in war, their triumphs in
the chase, their prowess against all foes. Forest lore is a constant text
book. He is taught to observe which side of a tree has the lightest
bark—which side the most branches; why the tree reaches forth longer arms
on the edge of the wood than in the depths of the forest where his eye is
taught to penetrate. The squirrel, the rabbit and the birds all become
his little friends: where and how they get their food, their manner of
life, their colour, and how they call their mates, who are their enemies,
and how they may be protected. His ear is trained to hear sounds
ordinarily inaudible, his nostrils are early taught to distinguish the
scent of the different wild animals. Then came his ability to imitate the
call of this wild life, sometimes by direct vocalization, or by placing
two reeds to the lips so dexterously that the timid fawn is led to his
feet. This literature the Indian child studies, until his arms are strong
enough to bend the bow and send an arrow speeding to its mark. He soon
essays the rôle of a warrior. His study of the birds enables him to find
the eerie of the eagle, for a victory means that he may add an eagle
feather to his war bonnet or coup stick. His study of the hills enables
him to find in their vermilion and golden seams the colours for his war
paint. In the crimson berries festooning the banks of the stream, when
crushed, he finds still another element of decoration. The white man
makes a book whose leaves talk. The sunshine bears speech and light to
the Indian. He lives by communion with the stars. The Great Bear of the
stars is called the great animal of cold weather. When a shadow crosses
his mind he watches the clouds that touch the moon when it is new. He
reads the stars, for they travel to him in a familiar pathway across the
sky. They are bright spirits sent earthward by the Great Mystery, and
when thick worlds gather in clusters, there are so many souls of earth
people that their trail makes luminous the white way of the sky. The wing
of a bird is the symbol of thoughts that fly very high. From the bird
that soars nearest the blue he plucks prayer feathers. These he dyes and
cherishes with jealous care. The Indian possesses a strange love for
growing things, tall grasses with lace-like plumes forming a lattice for
the deep green of the slender bushes that bear the rich clusters of
crimson buffalo berries. He knows and loves the wild flowers that hang
their golden heads along the banks of the purling stream or that in
gleaming colours enamel the wide stretches of the plain. There are a
thousand leaves in every book, and with every book in nature’s library he
is familiar to the point of success.
[The Song of the Arrows]
The Song of the Arrows
HIS ADORNMENT
To the casual observer the costume and character of the Indian all look
alike. The mind is confused amid a riotous and fantastic display of
colours. The fact is that the minor details of Indian dress are an index
to Indian character and often tell the story of his position in the tribe,
and surely tell the story of his individual conception of the life here,
and what he hopes for in the life hereafter, and like the laurel wreath on
the brow of the Grecian runner, they spell out for us his exploits and
achievements. To the white man all these decorations are construed as a
few silly ornaments, the indulgence of a feverish vanity, but they open
like a book the life of the Indian. His motive in adornment is to mark
individual, tribal, or ceremonial distinction. The use of paint on the
face, hair, and body, both in colour and design, generally has reference
to individual or clan beliefs, or it indicates relationship, or personal
bereavement, or is an act of courtesy. It is always employed in
ceremonies, religious and secular, and is an accompaniment of gala dress
for the purpose of honouring a guest or to celebrate an occasion. The
face of the dead was frequently painted in accordance with tribal or
religious symbolism. Paint is also used on the faces of children and
adults as a protection from wind and sun. Plucking the hair from the face
and body is a part of the daily program. The male Indian never shaves and
the beard is a disgrace. A pair of tweezers becomes his razor. Sweet
grasses and seeds serve as a perfume. Ear ornaments are a mark of family
thrift, wealth or distinction, and indicate honour shown to the wearer by
his kindred.
Among the Plains Indians the milk teeth of the elk were the most costly
adornments. They were fastened in rows on a woman’s tunic and represented
the climax of Indian fashion, the garment possessing a value of several
hundred dollars. Head bands, armlets, bracelets, belts, necklaces, and
garters of metal and seeds and embroidered buckskin were in constant use.
They were not only decorative but often symbolic. Archaeological
testimony tells of the almost general use of sea shells as necklace
ornaments, which found their way into the interior by barter or as
ceremonial gifts. The chiefs of the tribe were fond of wearing a disk cut
from a conch-shell, and these were also prominent in religious rites,
ranking among the modern tribes as did the turquoise among the people of
the Southwest. A necklace of bear claws marks the man of distinction, and
sometimes was worn as an armlet. In the buffalo country the women seldom
ornamented their own robes, but embroidered those worn by the men.
Sometimes a man painted his robe in accordance with a dream or pictured
upon it a yearly record of his own deeds, or the prominent events of the
tribe. Among the southern tribes a prayer rug was made on deer skin, both
the buffalo and deer skins having been tanned and softened by the use of
the brains taken from the skull of the animal. The skins were painted
with intricate ornamentation, symbols and prayer thoughts adorning the
skin in ceremonial colours; white clouds and white flowers, the sun god,
and the curve of the moon with its germ of life, the morning star, and
also a symbol of the messengers from the gods. Above it all zigzag lines
ran through the blue of the sky to denote the lightning by which the
children above sent their decrees to the earth children who roamed the
plains.
[An Imperial Warrior]
An Imperial Warrior
Footgear often proclaimed the tribal relation, the peculiar cut and
decoration of the moccasin denoting a man’s tribe. The war-shirt was
frequently ornamented to represent the life story of the man wearing it.
The breast contained a prayer for protection, and on the back might be
found woven in beaded tapestry the symbols of victory. He had conquered
the trail behind him. The shirt was often decorated with a fringe of
human hair, the more warlike appending the scalps of the slain. The
warrior wore no regalia so imposing as his war-bonnet with its crown of
golden eagle feathers. Before the coming of the horse the flap at the
back rarely extended below the waist, but when the warriors came to be
mounted, the ruff of feathers was so lengthened that when the Indian was
dismounted it trailed on the ground. The making of a war-bonnet was
accompanied by song and ceremony. Each feather before it was placed in
position was held in the hand and had recounted over it the story of some
war honour. A bonnet could not be made without the consent of all the
warriors and it stood as a record of tribal valour and a special mark of
distinction granted to the man by his tribe. Every Indian takes great joy
in laying out his colour scheme. It becomes a mosaic of artistic talent.
Feathers are gathered from the eagles’ flight. Skins are taken from the
wild beasts. Bones, beads, sparkling metals, soft-tinted sea shells, and
all of them blended with the varicoloured paints that he has compounded in
nature’s mortar. The woman enters into the work with intelligent zest,
and when completed the whole array of blended colours is beyond the
criticism of the tribe. The back of an Indian’s war-bonnet and war-shirt
is always more gaudy and sumptuous than the front view and this because
when Indians pass each other their salutation is brief and formal. They
ride right on. But after the meeting they turn in the saddle and look
back to take an inventory. The wealth of the Indian, his position in the
tribe, his ceremonial attainment are all passed upon and estimate entered.
This colour scheme goes on through the entire Indian wardrobe to pipe
sack, coup stick and moccasins. The Indian could not have received his
suggestion for a colour scheme from the tinted leaves of autumn for they
are dull in comparison. He may have had a hint from the glowing sunsets
that in that western land fill earth and sky with a glory so transcendent
that mere rhetoric is a profanation. More likely is it that when free and
unrestrained he roamed over plain and hill his soul became enamoured with
the dazzling array of colours, beyond the genius of the proudest palette,
to be found in the marvellous formations that surround the great geysers
of the Yellowstone, colours more exquisitely beautiful than the supremest
refinement of art. Every-whither down the cone-shaped mounds are tiny
steam-heated rivulets interlacing each other, edged with gold and
vermilion and turquoise and orange and opal. Indian trails have been
found also interlacing each other all through this wonderland. Deep
furrows in the grassy slopes of these ancient footprints are still plainly
visible. Thither we may believe came the red man imbued with the spirit of
reverence and awe before all this majesty and beauty, and from this
exhaustless laboratory claimed the vivid colouring for the expression of
his life of faith.
[A Sunset in Camp]
A Sunset in Camp
[Lighting the Smoke Signal]
Lighting the Smoke Signal
HIS WARFARE
The Indian has lived such a life of hazard for long centuries that he has
had trained into him a first great instinct to fight. They have a war
star in the sky, and when it moves the time to make war is heavy upon
them. There are many cogent reasons for the belief that before the coming
of the white man there were no general or long-continued wars among the
Indians. There was no motive for war. Quarrels ensued when predatory
tribes sought to filch women or horses. Strife was engendered on account
of the distribution of buffalo, but these disturbances could not be
dignified by the name of war. The country was large and the tribes were
widely separated. Their war implements were of the crudest sort. A shield
would stop a stone-headed arrow, and it necessitated a hand-to-hand
conflict for the use of a flint-headed lance and the ponderous war club.
The white man came, and for hundreds of years their contest has been waged
against a superior force. They have disputed every mile of territory
which has been acquired from them. During all that time they could not
make a knife, a rifle or a round of ammunition. Their method of
communication was confined to the smoke signal, signal fires and scouts.
They had no telegraph, no heliograph, no arsenal. Modern implements of
war they have been able to obtain only in late years and then in meagre
quantities, even then only by capture or at exorbitant rates. The Indian
has proved himself a redoubtable and masterful foe. For more than three
hundred years millions of civilized white people have fought a bitter
battle with three hundred thousand red men. During all these tragic years
the nations of the world have moved on to discovery, subjugation, and
conquest. Nation has taken up arms against nation. England, France, and
Spain have put a rim of colonies about the globe. Our own great civil
struggle has been written down on the pages of history with letters of
blood. England, France, Spain, and the United States have during this
period tried their prowess with these less than three hundred thousand
braves and only now has the decimation become complete. No such striking
example of endurance, power of resistance, and consummate generalship has
been recorded in the annals of time. Sitting-Bull, Red Cloud,
Looking-Glass, Chief Joseph, Two Moons, Grass, Rain-in-the-Face, American
Horse, Spotted Tail, and Chief Gall are names that would add lustre to any
military page in the world’s history. Had they been leaders in any one of
the great armies of the nation they would have ranked conspicuously as
master captains. The Indian, deprived of the effectiveness of supplies
and modern armament, found his strongest weapon in the oratory of the
council lodge. Here, without any written or established code of laws,
without the power of the press and the support of public sentiment,
absolutely exiled from all communication with civilized resources, unaided
and alone, their orators presented the affairs of the moment to the
assembled tribe, swaying the minds and wills of their fellows into
concerted and heroic action. The wonderful imagery of the Indian
orator—an imagery born of his baptism into the spirit of nature—his love
of his kind, and the deathless consciousness of the justice of his cause
made his oratory more resistless than the rattle of Gatling guns, and also
formed a model for civilized speech. It was an oratory that enabled a few
scattering tribes to withstand the aggressions of four great nations of
the world for a period of several centuries, and to successfully withstand
the tramping columns of civilization. The science and art of Indian
warfare would take volumes to compass. His strategy and statesmanship
compelled victory. He was almost always assured of victory before he
proceeded to battle. He knew no fear. A thousand lives would have been a
small gift had he the power to lay them on the altar of his cause. He
pitted the perfection of details against the wily strategy of his own
colour and the pompous superiority of the white man’s tactics. On the
trail care was taken to cover up or obliterate his footprints. When a
fire became necessary he burned fine dry twigs so that the burning of
green boughs would not lift to the wind an odour of fire, nor carry a
trail of smoke. He conceived and carried out a wonderful deception in
dress. In winter a band of warriors were painted white. They rode white
horses and their war dress was all of it made of the plainest white so
that a group of warriors, stationed on the brow of a hill, would appear in
the distance like a statuesque boulder clad in snow. This disguise also
enabled them to come with stealthy step upon wild game. In autumn their
horses were painted yellow and they wore a garb of yellow so that fringing
the edge of the forest they could not be distinguished from the leaves of
the dying year. The blue-green of the sagebrush, so conspicuously
omnipresent on the prairies, furnished the Indian with another helpful
form of disguise. He would almost completely disrobe and paint his face,
his arms, and his hair, as well as the body of his horse, exactly the
colour of the sagebrush; and when scouting, after their crouching fashion,
among the clusters of sagebrush, or riding in the distance along the
verdure-covered banks of a stream, the disguise would be so absolutely
complete that detection became a difficult task. It was an ingenious and
artistic display of war talent.
[Answering the Smoke Signal]
Answering the Smoke Signal
We are led to wonder often concerning the Indian’s passion for his coup
stick (pronounced coo). This rod, bedecked with eagle feathers and his
own colour scheme, is the Indian’s badge of empire. It is the “Victoria
Cross” of his deeds of valour. In battle he rushes amid his foes, touches
the enemy with his coup stick—that man is his prisoner, and he has counted
a coup. He slays an enemy, then rushes up and touches him with the stick,
takes his scalp; another coup is counted. The credit of victory was taken
for three brave deeds: killing an enemy, scalping an enemy, or being the
first to strike an enemy, alive or dead; any one of these entitles a man
to rank as a warrior and to recount his exploit in public; but to be the
first to touch an enemy is regarded as the bravest deed of all, as it
implied close approach in battle. In the last Great Indian Council and on
the journey home the attention of the writer was called to the prominence
given to the coup stick. They are present at all ceremonial functions and
are carried on all ceremonial parades. The warrior who can strike a tepee
of the enemy in a charge upon a home camp thus counted coup upon it and is
entitled to reproduce its particular design in the next new tepee which he
made for his own use, and to perpetuate the pattern in his family. The
eagle feathers on the stick can only be placed there after the warrior has
counted his coup, recounted it in public, and the deed has met with the
approval of all the warriors. The eagle, the proudest and most victorious
of birds, then yielded a feather, which is deftly fastened with a circle
of shining beads to the stick, and the proud victor flaunts another emblem
of his bravery.
[The Attack on the Camp]
The Attack on the Camp
The buffalo, once the king of the prairies, has been practically
exterminated. Perhaps no greater grief has ever entered into the life of
the Indian than this wilful waste and irreparable loss. To this hour the
Indian mourns the going away of the buffalo. He cannot be reconciled. He
dates every joyful and profitable event in his life to the days of the
buffalo. In the assembly of chiefs at the last Great Council the buffalo
was the burden of every reminiscence. These veteran chiefs studied with
melancholy eyes the old buffalo trails, and in contemplation of the days
of the chase they said, as they thought backward, “My heart is lonely and
my spirit cries.” So much did they love the buffalo that the Indian
children played hunting the buffalo. The animal furnished food and
clothing, and many parts of the stalwart frame they counted as sacred.
The annihilation of these vast herds aroused the darkest passions in the
heart of the Indian, and many times stirred his war spirit and sent him
forth to do battle against the aggressors. Within the nine years between
1874 and 1883 over eight millions of buffalo were ruthlessly slain. But
the war curtain of the Indian has been rung down, and the vast area which
twoscore years ago supported these vast herds of wild game is covered
to-day with domestic animals and teems with agricultural life, furnishing
food supplies for millions upon millions all over the civilized world.
[Buffalo Thundered Across the Plains]
Buffalo Thundered Across the Plains
[An Indian Home]
An Indian Home
HIS HOME LIFE
Far stretches of prairie, winding watercourses, leagues of white desert
with only the clouds in the sky and the shadow of the clouds on the
blistering sand, an army of buttes and crags, storm carved, forests whose
primeval stillness mocks the calendar of man, the haunts of the eagle, the
antelope, the deer and the buffalo—and the edge of the curtain is lifted
on the land where the Indian roamed and where he made his home.
Game has been found, a semi-circle of cone-shaped tepees dot the green of
the plain; a stream, tree-fringed, fresh from the mountains, flows by the
camp—a camp that in earlier times was pitched upon some tableland as an
outlook for the enemy, white or red. Horses are browsing near at hand or
far afield; old warriors and medicine men sit in the shade and smoke the
long-stemmed, red sandstone pipe, and tell of the days of yore. Gayly
clad figures dart hither and yon as the women are bent upon their tasks.
Great loads of wood are brought into camp on an Indian woman’s back. She
carries water from the river, bakes the cake, upturned against the fire,
boils the coffee and then all are seated on the ground when they partake
of jerked beef, coffee, bread, and berries. Hands are better than knives
and forks, one cup answers for many, and the strip of dried beef is passed
along that all may cut off his desired portion. A noisy, gleeful group of
children play with their dolls and their dogs—dogs that are made to serve
as beasts of burden and instruments of torture. At night beds are made on
the ground around the interior circle of the tepee and the chill of frost
is driven out by a fire in the very centre—the most perfectly ventilated
structure in the world—the air passing underneath the edge of the tepee in
the loop where it is tied at the bottom of the poles, then passing on out
through the opening at the top, carrying with it all dust and smoke. The
Indian never knew anything about tuberculosis until the white man confined
him in log cabins where a score of people live in one room, the cracks and
keyhole entirely filled, and where they breath each other over times
without number. Within the tepee the chief has the place of honour. A
rest is made with supports like an easel. A lattice-work of slender willow
rods passed down the front, which is covered by a long strip of buffalo
hide. Against this the chief rests. Each member of the family has his
allotted place inside the lodge and he may decorate his own section
according to ability or fancy. Here the warrior hangs his war-bonnet and
sometimes records his achievements in the chase or on the warpath. Lying
all about the circle are many highly coloured parflesche bags containing
the minor details of dress or any personal possession. Many of the tepees
in an Indian village are embellished with Indian paintings setting forth
the heroic deeds of the warriors who abide in the lodge. The figures are
often grotesque and without parallel in the realm of art. The medicine is
given a conspicuous place in the lodge. No one sits or lies down on the
side of the tepee where they have placed the medicine of the household,
and when they pass it on entering or leaving the lodge all heads are
bowed. The medicine tepee is distinct from all others. It is painted a
maroon, with a moon in green surrounded by a yellow circle. The medicine
of the ordinary Indian family is hung over the entrance of the doorway or
suspended on a pole, and may consist of a wolf skin or a dark blanket
rolled in oblong fashion containing the sacred tokens of the family.
Every Indian family takes pride in the ownership of a bevy of dogs. They
are rich in dogs. In our camp of about thirty tepees a reliable Indian
estimated that there were over three hundred dogs. These canines have
free run of the lodge, and at night they crawl in under the edge of the
canvas and sleep by their Indian master. Let an intruder enter the camp
during the hours of darkness and they rush out simultaneously, howling
like a pack of wolves until one might think the bowels of the earth had
given forth an eruption of dogs. The Indian warrior makes a companion of
his dog, and he can show no greater hospitality to a guest than to kill
his favourite friend and serve his visitor with dog soup. To refuse this
diet is an insult most vital.
[An Indian Burden Bearer]
An Indian Burden Bearer
The Indian woman is master of the lodge. She carries the purse. Any
money that comes into the hands of the husband is immediately handed over.
The servile tasks of the camp are performed by the women. Herein we have
an expression of the law of equality. The husband has to perform the
exhausting and dangerous task of hunting wild game for food and the skins
for clothing. He had to protect the camp against hostile attacks, and the
woman felt that her task was easy in comparison. The Indian child rules
the family. They are rarely, if ever, corrected. No Indian mother was
ever known to strike her child. If they want anything they cry until they
get it—and they know how to cry. In play they are as mirthful and
boisterous as any white child. They ride mock horses, and play mud ball.
The Indian boy prepares willow sticks, peels off the bark, then rolls the
wet clay into balls, and, sticking the ball on the end of the twig, he
throws it at a mark with great speed and accuracy. Perhaps the most
popular sport among the children is what they term the stick game. Again
willow rods are used without the bark, only this time they are cut short
enough to be rigid, and they drive them with great velocity up an inclined
board. When the stick leaves the board it speeds like an arrow far in the
distance. Every Indian boy and girl owns a pony, from which they are
almost inseparable, and which they ride with fearless abandon.
[An Indian Woman’s Dress—Mrs. Wolf Plume]
An Indian Woman’s Dress—Mrs. Wolf Plume
While men are off in search of game the women make bead work of a most
bewitching order, meanwhile watching the pappoose, fastened completely in
its wooden bead-covered cradle, only the head protruding. The cradle is
hung from a lodge pole or the bough of a tree, rattles and bells playing
in the breeze. Other women gather in the shade and play the game of plum
stone, a gambling game. They use the stones of the wild plum, which they
colour with fanciful devices, and toss them up in a wooden bowl.
[The Flower of the Wigwam]
The Flower of the Wigwam
The wooing of Indian lovers varies with the tribes. One pair of lovers
seal their vows by standing a little removed from the parental lodge, with
a blanket covering their heads. In another tribe the negotiations are
made entirely through the parents, when the transaction resolves itself
into a barter, so many ponies for a bride; while in still another tribe,
when a love fancy strikes a young man, he arranges to meet the young woman
who has attracted him as she goes to the river for water. They pass each
other in the path without any recognition. This occurs two or three
times. Finally if the young girl welcomes these attentions she looks
toward him as they pass. That night he comes to the lodge of her parents,
remains outside, beating a tomtom and singing the love song. The young
girl then goes out to meet him and they sit outside and talk. The next
morning the mother asks her daughter about the affair, and then the mother
invites the young man to come and dine with them and sit around the
campfire. Thus the courtship proceeds until he finally says, “I will take
this girl for my wife,” and the two go to their own lodge. The Indian has
an unwritten code of family morals to which he most rigidly adheres. In
some tribes no Indian will cross the threshold of another if the wife of
that man is alone, and in others no brother goes into the house where his
sister is unless she has a companion. This is an ancient law and belongs
to many tribes. The Crows have an eccentric custom that a sister after
marriage is not allowed to be seen in public with her brother. Should an
Indian alienate the affections of the wife of another Indian or steal his
horse the injured one would be justified in taking his rifle and killing
the offender. The whole camp would sanction the action on the ground that
it would rid the camp of bad blood.
[Little Friends]
Little Friends
The Indian’s civility and hospitality, both to his own kind and to
strangers, has been a marked feature of his character from the coming of
the white man to the present day. When Columbus touched the shores of the
New World the friendly Caribs gave him hearty welcome. The heart’s right
hand of fellowship was stretched out in welcome and hospitality as
explorers and settlers landed on American soil. Dignity, generosity, and
courtesy marked the attitude of the Indian toward these new white
strangers. The character generally attributed to the Indian is that of a
savage, but this blemish came upon him through contact with the white man.
Their ingenuous and trustful nature quickly degenerated as they were
enslaved, betrayed, and slain. Advantage was taken of their ignorance and
kindness. Then came on a race war unparalleled in ferocity and barbarism.
The inexorable march of civilization regardless of ethics swept on until
we heard the Indians’ war cry and failed to see the diviner grace of
friendship. The Indian returned with interest every injury and hardship,
every bitter assault and wicked aggression. He paid in full all accounts
in the coin of pitiless revenge. These shadows obliterate our thought of
him as courtier and hospitable host. The Indian will divide his last
crust and then go hungry himself that you may have his half of the crust.
Had it not been for Indian generosity in furnishing supplies of food, the
early settlers in both New England and Virginia must have perished with
hunger. Every guest entering an Indian wigwam is met by all the graces of
hospitality—in cordial greeting—in a splendid home feeling.
[A Bath in the Little Big Horn]
A Bath in the Little Big Horn
Indian trails are no longer worn deep through the prairie sod, they have
been growing ever more dim and indistinct. It is to-day, the “thin red
line,” a swift gathering of all that is left, in the gloaming, after the
sunset.
[The Crown of Eagle Feathers]
The Crown of Eagle Feathers
THE STORY OF THE CHIEFS
The American mind could conceive a republic but not an Indian. America
could conquer the Old World and rise redeemed and victorious when rent by
the awful whirlwind of internal strife. But the red man defied her. His
call rang across the plain like an autumn storm through the forests, and
his fellow red men answered like clustering leaves. History shudders at
the tale. Now look over the shoulder. When the fiery tongue of the
Revolution blazed into the undying speech of liberty, Madison, Mason,
Patrick Henry, and Edmund Randolph uttered their declaration that like a
sunbeam has been written upon every page of the nation’s history: “All men
are by nature equally free and have inherent rights—namely, the enjoyment
of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property
and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.” Upon the inviolability
of this sublime doctrine the early colonists fought for liberty, and the
nation flung a battle line more than two thousand miles long, and engaged
at arms over two millions of men, in order to procure liberty for another
race. Once again, set each luminous word in this declaration over against
the disposition and destiny that we have imposed upon the North American
Indian. And then picture these famous Indian chiefs, gathered from many
widely scattered wigwams; hear again and for the last time a life story
that rounds itself out into an epic of sorrow; listen for the heavy
footfalls of departing greatness; watch the grim faces, sternly set toward
the western sky rim, heads still erect, eagle feathers, emblems of
victory, moving proudly into the twilight, and a long, solitary peal of
distant thunder joining the refrain of the soul—and it is night.
[Warriors of Other Days]
Warriors of Other Days
[Chief Plenty Coups]
Chief Plenty Coups
Chief Plenty Coups
Chief Plenty Coups, chief of the Crow Nation, was exalted to the head of
all the Crows because of his untarnished valour on the field of battle,
because of the supremacy of his statesmanship, and his loyalty to the
interests of his tribe. He derived his name, “many coups,” from the fact
that he was able to add eagle feather after eagle feather to his coup
stick, counting coups in victory. When a lad of sixteen his brother was
killed by the Sioux. The boy, bewildered with grief, climbed for two
days, struggling to reach the summit of some high peak in the Crazy
Mountains, there to give vent to his grief and pray for revenge. While he
prayed to the sun he mutilated his body. Upon those lonely heights, never
before desecrated by human footsteps, he dedicated his life to battle.
Before he was twenty-six he had counted a coup of each kind and was made a
chief, and named “Many Achievements.” At sixty-three years of age he
stands as erect as a solitary pine on a lonely hill crest. He has the
bearing and dignity of a royal prince and wears his honours and war dress
with all the pride and courtliness of a patrician. He glories in the fact
that from his earliest days he has never fought the white man, but his
life has been a long series of conflicts with other Indian nations.
Before the white man ever placed his footsteps upon Indian soil his days
were filled with struggle in warding off the blows of hostile tribes who
sought the women and the horses of his own people. Then, to use his own
expression: “The Great Father ordered that we should stop fighting and
live in peace, and since that time we have had allotments of land, schools
have been built for the education of our children, and as an illustration
of the feelings of my heart to-day, I am at peace with all the tribes,
they are all my brothers, and I meet them all as one man. I shall live
for my country and shall remain in peace, as I feel peaceful toward my
country.” The reign of this great chief over his tribe is one of
benignity and beneficence. He is greatly concerned in his last days to
raise up young men who shall know the rights and opportunities of his
people and who shall thus have influence at Washington, which he has many
times visited and where he is always welcome. The smile of Chief Plenty
Coups is worth crossing many miles of prairie to see. It was eminently
fitting that this great chief on the grounds of his own Indian tribe
should receive the chiefs attending the last Great Indian Council.
[The Peaceful Camp]
The Peaceful Camp
[Chief Red Whip]
Chief Red Whip
Chief Red Whip (1)
Chief Red Whip is considered by his tribe as one of the greatest of the
old hunters and warriors. The varying fortunes of the Gros Ventres, the
strenuous war career of this noted chief, have ploughed deep furrows and
written serious lines in his face. He is too old a man at fifty-five, but
wounds and scars and battle rush age upon any man.
Chief Red Whip said to me: “The greatest event in my life was my fight
with the Sioux in the Little Rocky Mountains. There were eleven Crows and
three Gros Ventres in our band; our leader was a Crow. There were about
one hundred and thirty Sioux. We were making the ascent of the Little
Rockies, and my friends went down into the ravine to shoot some buffalo.
While they were down there shooting the buffalo and cutting them up the
leader sent me to do scout work. While I was up on the hills I saw the
Sioux sneaking up to where we had killed the buffalo. I ran down at once
to my friends and told them. We went back a little ways and made a fort
and got ready to fight. I was painted yellow and red and was naked. When
the fort was finished I went myself, taking two others with me, to find
out the location of the Sioux. We went right up to where I saw them last.
I could tell by their tracks that there were a great many of them. I went
up a little ridge that divided our band from the Sioux, and just as I
stuck my head up above the grass they all fired at me, about a hundred
guns, but they did not hit me. When my friends heard the firing they came
to where I was, and we went right down on the Sioux, and the Sioux came at
us, and we had a fight for a few minutes at close quarters. After we had
a short fight we rushed right on to the Sioux and they retreated. The
Sioux had to go up a hill and we wounded some and killed others. After
the Sioux had got up the hill I was the first one to get to a man who was
killed. I scalped him and claimed everything he had. After the Sioux
found out that we were only a small band they rushed down upon us and we
retreated to where we had made the fort. Inside this fort there were two
Crows killed with one bullet. The leader of the Sioux band was Chief
Flying Cloud. I found out afterward who he was. It was Flying Cloud that
we killed coming up the hill; he was trying to protect his band. When we
were in the fort the Sioux people surrounded us. After the two Crows were
killed the leader of our band became scared. I jumped out of the fort and
led the way for my band. We ran the Sioux back to the Little Rockies, and
then I told my friends to escape. As we retreated the Sioux pursued us.
One Sioux was in advance and called upon me to stop, and as I stopped he
fired at me but missed me, and then I fired and killed him. The Sioux
then rushed on me so that I could not scalp the Sioux I had killed. We
ran on into the mountains and escaped into another fort. In this last
fort one of the Gros Ventres was shot and wounded. After we had rested a
while the Sioux surrounded us again, and I rushed out at the Sioux so that
my friends might escape again. While we were retreating again the Sioux
shot one of the Gros Ventres through the leg, and he had to crawl on his
hands and knees. I stayed with this wounded man, and the rest made their
escape. I took this man on my back and carried him to some water at the
head of a coulee. This Gros Ventre told me to go on and make my escape
and leave him alone to die. While we were resting in the weeds at the
washout the Sioux surrounded us again and waited for us to show ourselves.
While we were waiting my wounded friend gave me his knife and paint and
told me to tell his mother that she might have all his horses; then I
jumped out and ran to catch up with my friends. After I had left my
wounded friend about a quarter of a mile I looked back to see how the
Sioux would treat him. There was one shot fired, and they all jumped into
the washout, and then I made my escape. This gave me a great name in my
tribe and among the Sioux and the Crows.”
[The Pause in the Journey]
The Pause in the Journey
“Once on Tongue River there was a white soldier of the United States
troops whom the Indians called Bear Shirt; he wore long hair like Custer.
I was with him scouting for him. We called him Bear Shirt because he used
to wear a bear coat. We came upon a band of Sioux, and there was a fight.
This was a long fight, and there were many killed on both sides. In this
fight when the Sioux got the best of the soldiers and the soldiers
retreated, I stayed behind to protect them. The soldiers were so tired
they could not run, and the Sioux killed off those who were too tired to
run. I remained in the rear to protect them until they came to the main
body of troops. When we were rested we went back to the main body of the
Sioux and had another long fight and fought until sundown. There were a
great many killed on both sides. We camped right where we quit fighting.
The next morning we started to fight again and fought all day; again many
were killed on both sides. The next day we went over the two battlefields
and gathered up the dead soldiers and buried them. These battles were on
Tongue River. After we had buried the soldiers I came back with the rest
of the troops as far as the Yellowstone, and then went home.” And yet
such heroisms wrought out in lonely mountain fastnesses or on sun-parched
plains will go unhonoured and unsung.
[Chief Timbo]
Chief Timbo
Chief Timbo
Chief Timbo, known as Tah-cha-chi, or Hairless, ranks as one of the
leading chiefs of the Comanche Indians. With his stature of more than six
feet, he is a commanding figure among any Indians. The portrait of Timbo
reveals the striking difference to be found in the physiognomy of the
southern tribes as compared with the northern tribes of the Plains
Indians. In the photogravure presented Chief Timbo holds a long
steel-headed spear, girdled with varicoloured beads, ornamented with great
tufts of eagle feathers, and at the end of its ten feet of length bearing
a picturesque plume. This staff descended to Timbo from Quanah Parker,
once the leading chief of the Comanches. Chief Timbo brought this
insignia of office from the southland to the council of the chiefs. In
his own tribe the possession of such a mace answers among the Indians for
the sceptre of a monarch. It is a coup stick with manifold emphasis.
Chief Timbo accompanied the Kiowa, Cheyenne, and Apache chiefs to the
council. They came as brothers, but no fierce fighting among these
warlike tribes found a stronger or more fearless foe in the days gone by
than this stalwart chief. In the assembly of the chiefs he moved among
his fellows with a solemn and ponderous dignity, always silent and full of
commanding reserve. In the battles that raged over the southern plains
even far to the north, between the Comanches and the fierce Kiowas, Chief
Timbo led his fighting bands to certain victory. Fierce blood runs in the
veins of this masterful man, and only within recent years, and then not
easily, has he submitted to Government rule.
[The Downward Trail]
The Downward Trail
[Chief Apache John]
Chief Apache John
Chief Apache John
The very name Apache means enemy and stands on the pages of all Indian
history as a synonym for terror. Since our knowledge of them, the Apaches
have been hostile and in every conflict they were favoured with rare and
gifted leadership. It required the skill, strategy, and profoundest
generalship of two of the greatest generals of the Civil War to subdue and
capture the daring and reckless Geronimo, whose recent death closed the
final chapter of a long line of unspeakable Apache atrocities.
Koon-kah-za-chy, familiarly known as Apache John, because of his surrender
to civilization, visited the last Great Indian Council as a representative
of one of the many groups of this great body of Indians scattered through
the southwest. There is an indefinable air of stoicism in the demeanour
of all of these great chieftains. The subject of this text is not lacking
in this prominent Indian element. A keen and piercing eye, a sadly kind
face, a tall and erect figure, Apache John bears his sixty years of life
with broad and unbending shoulders. He was fond of becoming reminiscent
and said: “The first thing I can remember is my father telling me about
war. We then lived in tepees like the one in which we are now sitting.
We were then moving from place to place, and the old people were
constantly talking about war. That was the school in which I was brought
up—a war school. We kept on moving from place to place until I grew to
manhood. Then I came to see a real battle. The first time I was in a
battle I thought of what my father had told me. He told me to be a brave
man and fight and never run away. I think this was good fighting, because
I know what fighting meant from what my father had told me. At that time
if an Indian wanted to win distinction he must be a good man as well as a
good fighter. I was in a good many battles, until finally I had to give
up fighting. About seven years ago the Government gave me advice, and
with that advice they gave me different thoughts, and to-day I am one of
the head men among the Apaches. I am head chief among the Kiowa-Apaches
and I counsel peace among them. I used to think that my greatest honour
was to be won in fighting, but when I visited the Commissioner in
Washington he gave me other thoughts and other ways of thinking and doing
until I felt that the new kind of life was the better. When the
Commissioner told me these things I wrote them down in my mind and I
thought that it was good. One of the greatest events in my life was when
I found myself surrounded by two tribes of my enemies. This fight was by
the El Paso River, and the bands of our enemies wore yellow headgear; the
fight continued all day long until about five o’clock, when the Apaches
were victorious.”
By long and stubborn tutelage both from his father and the members of his
tribe, this boy was taught the war spirit and in manhood he exemplified
it. The principles of peace taught him in one short hour at Washington
changed the whole tenor of his life: a pathetic commentary on what
civilization might have accomplished with the Indian.
[Climbing the Great Divide]
Climbing the Great Divide
[Chief Running Bird]
Chief Running Bird
Chief Running Bird
Ta-ne-haddle, Chief Running Bird, is an eminent leader of the Kiowa tribe
now located in Oklahoma. His massive frame, lion-like head, and dignified
bearing show few of the marks of the more than threescore years written
upon his life. His very walk betokens supremacy and his constant demeanour
assumes a spirit of generalship. His large head is set directly upon his
shoulders, which seems to give no neck-play for his voice, which issues in
harsh and guttural tones.
“In the old times when the Indians used to live in tepees like this,” he
said, “when I was about eighteen years old, I began to go out with war
parties. I have been in many wars, and lived in tents and tepees and
moved from one place to another, and all this time I kept in good health.
I remember a fight we had where there were thirty-eight Indians against
four tribes. The battle began late in the evening and while the fight was
raging high I thought I would never escape with my life. The enemy
pressed us hotly, and finally we killed one of the chiefs, and then the
Indians turned and left, and that saved our lives.”
The construction of our Indian camp on the banks of the Little Horn
awakened in this man, as it did in all the Indians, a disposition to turn
back to primitive conditions. Running Bird said: “I was very glad to come
here and see the old-time tepees, the kind of tepees our fathers used to
live in. I grew up to manhood myself in this kind of a tepee, and I had
good health, and now when they give us a house to live in I am not healthy
at all. The reason we cannot have good health in a house is because the
Great Father gave us tepees to live in where we have plenty of air; we
feel smothered in a house. When I came out and sleep in a tepee I can
sleep a great deal better. I am getting old now, and am getting up in
years, and all I wish at the present time is for my children to grow up
industrious and work, because they cannot get honour in the war as I used
to get it. They can only get honour by working hard. I cannot teach my
children the way my father taught me, that the way to get honour was to go
to war, but I can teach my children that the way to get honour is to go to
work and be good men and women. I shall go home and tell the other
Indians and our agent about you.”
And thus out of his gruff, austere, and soldier-like personality there
issued words of a plain, homely philosophy that marks the path of success
for all men. “The way to get honour is to go to work and be good men and
women.”
[Chiefs Fording the Little Bighorn]
Chiefs Fording the Little Bighorn
[Chief Brave Bear]
Chief Brave Bear
Chief Brave Bear
Brave Bear, in the language of the Cheyennes, of whom he is head chief, is
Ni-go High-ez, Ni-go meaning bear, and High-ez, brave. This name he has
kept to the standard on many a hard-fought field, and in helping to
reconstruct his tribe in the ways of civilization. He is tactful and
courteous, and his smile resembles the sunlight breaking a path across a
darkened sheet of water; it is the most winsome that I have seen for years
on the face of any man.
Showing the Indian’s long continued aversion to any speech regarding the
Custer battle, Brave Bear said: “I was in the battle of the Little Big
Horn. The Indians called the General ‘Long Hair.’ It is a fight that I do
not like to talk about.”
Just here it may be well to carry in our minds the distinction between the
Northern and Southern Cheyennes. When the tribe was a compact whole they
were constantly pressed farther into the plains by the hostile Sioux and
established themselves on the upper branches of the Platte River. In
consequence of the building of Bent’s Ford upon the upper Arkansas in
Colorado, a large part of the tribe decided to move south, the other
section moving north to the Yellow-stone. The two sections of the one
tribe have since been known officially as the Northern and Southern
Cheyennes. Ever and again the Southern branch of the tribe came to the
far north to help their brothers when in conflict. This may account for
Brave Bear being present with the Northern Cheyennes in the Custer fight.
Then came the story of Brave Bear concerning one of the battles in the
south. “There is,” he said, “a Cheyenne called ‘Tall Bear’; he was the
head man at the time we began to fight down on the Platte River. From that
hard battle we were returning home. In front of us there were a lot of
soldiers camped, and some of the Pawnee scouts were with the soldiers. We
thought they were Pawnee tents, but when we came close enough we saw it
was a soldier camp, and they fired upon us and pursued us. That day we
kept on fighting, and they killed three of us. It was a great fight, and
it still remains with me when I think about it.”
“I like the white man’s way of living to-day better, because I feel that
when the new day comes everything else is new, and the things of the white
man grow new with every day. I try to do as our agent directs. I have
never had any trouble with him.”
There is a touch of humanness about these tall, graceful, feather-bedecked
men, willingly assuming the role of children, that they may learn the
better ways of the white man. The hard ideals of the warpath are all
merged in pursuing the path of peace.
[Skirting the Sky-Line]
Skirting the Sky-Line
[Chief Umapine]
Chief Umapine
Chief Umapine
This eminent chief of the Cayuse tribe of Umatilla Indians, located in
northern Oregon, resembles in stature the graceful outlines of a forest
pine. A commanding figure, six feet two inches in height, noble and
dignified in bearing, quiet and reserved in manner, he creates an
atmosphere of intellectuality. His speech is sparkling and eloquent. His
face wears the soul-mark of serenity and triumph. As he stood against the
living green of the forest, clad in the rich Indian raiment of his tribe,
wolfskin, gray with the tinge of the prairies, otterskin, smooth and dark
like the velvet of moss, myriads of ermine tails glistening white in the
sunlight, glimmering beads from necklace to moccasins, flaunting eagle
feathers tipped with orange and crimson tassels, that must have floated in
many a sky, all gave to this man the appearance of some god of the forest
who had just come forth from its primeval depths bringing with him the
laurels of wood and mountain crag and sky, some king standing on the edge
of the wood amazed at the flatness and tameness of the valley and plains.
Umapine stood there the embodiment and glorification of Indian manners,
costume, and tradition, a vivid picture of Indian life and story. The
waymarks of such a life are, always tense with interest: they are more so
as he points them out himself. We will let him tell his own story:
“It was the custom among my people to narrate to their children the
history of the past and they narrated to me that my tribe had learned to
make clothing from furs which were gotten from animals, and this clothing
was comfortable during the winter time as well as in the summer time.
There is still some of this clothing remaining among older Indians of my
tribe. My understanding is that all the Indians in this part of the
country used animal furs and skins for clothing. The old Indians believed
in those days that they had the best kind of clothing, but they do not
feel that it would be right at the present time to dress that way, as the
Indians of to-day are more civilized. Yet the clothes that we have now
are derived from animals. We get fur from animals, and our blankets and
clothes are made from animals. From that point I cannot say which I like
the better. I like the clothing of civilized people as far as I can see.
The white man’s clothing is fit for men to wear. I like to wear his
clothes very well, but I also like to wear the clothing my people used to
wear in the olden time, but I do not like to wear it now on account of my
friends the white people, who live with me. I remember when I was a small
boy I used to see so many wagon trains going west. I knew these were
white people, but at that time I did not know where they were going. I
saw these wagons going through nearly the whole summer, and my folks told
me these people were going west and were to live there, and that I must
not injure them in any way, and that I must have respect for them, because
they were always kind to my folks. And I was instructed later to respect
these people, and so I did. Furthermore, my grandfather lived on a river
called Walla Walla. Many white people came to that place and put up their
tents and lived there, and also there was some kind of other people which
we have found were French. My grandfather had a great respect for these
white people as well as his own tribe, and thought very much of them and
tried to help them get along. As soon as the other tribes learned there
were some white people living near my grandfather’s place, there was a
great gathering of the tribes to meet these white folks who were living on
the river. I have it in my heart to always remember what my folks told
me, and when I grew old enough to know I had respect for these white
people as well as my own tribe, and to-day my heart is just the same as it
was in those days. Furthermore, I have respect for any kind of people; it
does not make any difference to me from what part of the country they
come. It does not make any difference whether I don’t understand their
language, but I always have respect for any kind of people who come to
this land, and to-day I am sitting here in a strange country and I am
worrying about my property in my own country, but at the same time I am
rejoicing in the work that Mr. Dixon is doing here, and I highly
congratulate him in this work. The work he is doing here to-day is work
that may never be done any more after this, and I have a great respect for
him this day because he is taking these photographs of my friends whom I
meet here at this place, and whom I will never see any more. I rejoice to
meet my own class of people who are coming here now. They all come from
different parts of the United States. I cannot speak their language nor
can I understand them all, but I do all I can to talk with them; and you,
too, Mr. Valentine, I am thinking of you as I am here talking with Mr.
Dixon, and at the same time I am rejoicing just as he has opened my eyes
and I hope that we will get along well. I am going to say I have respect
for the people you send to this country. I see that they have two eyes,
they have two ears, two limbs, two feet, and fingers as I have, but we all
have one head and one heart; we all breathe the same air and we stand on
the earth as brothers. The only difference between myself and the white
man is that his complexion is lighter than mine.”
“I have a great love for you, President Taft, although I never saw your
face, or never listened to any of your talk, but I know what you want, and
I find you are greatly interested in the Indian, and so I am sitting here
and giving the history of the Indian life, which will be a great benefit
to you, and also benefit the people who are coming in later years. This
evening I am rejoicing here, and I feel just as if you were present with
this gentleman, and I feel just as if I were about to talk with you.”
[Down the Western Slope]
Down the Western Slope
We may pass on now to some events in the life of Umapine. Again he must
speak for himself: “When I grew old enough to know something, I saw my
folks digging potatoes and onions, and gathering corn; these they got from
the white people the summer before. The Indians used to plant these every
year, and when the emigrants went through and asked for a little my folks
used to give them all they could spare. There came a time when the
Indians and the white people had a war. I did not feel like interfering
or trying to make any trouble, so I did not go to the war at that time.
Some years after that the Indians had a fight among themselves, and I
participated in that war. The Sioux Indians used to ride all over this
country, and they stole horses from my tribe. When my people learned that
their horses were stolen, they started on the warpath. We overtook the
Sioux with the horses along about 3 P.M. as near as I can remember; we did
not have watches in those days, and I think it was about that time. We
killed four of the Sioux Indians and recovered our horses, the Sioux only
killing one Nez Perce who was with us. I remember another war that
happened not very long ago. These were Indians from the southern part of
Oregon. They were on the warpath and had started up north and killed many
sheep herders and farmers, and killed their children and destroyed their
houses—burned them up. They came to our country and began to burn up the
houses of the white farmers. These Indians came into our agency. Major
Conyer, Uncle Sam’s man, was agent at that time. I think he died last
April. The Indians then met Uncle Sam’s men about a mile and a half south
of the agency, and we Indians were watching to see if the soldiers would
be driven back by these Indians; we were ready to help Uncle Sam’s men.
The hostile Indians headed down to our camp, and when we saw them coming
toward our camp we at once knew that they wanted us to get into the mixup
so that we would be on the warpath as well as themselves, but all of our
men got their weapons and we met these Bannock Indians and chased them
back to the hills. At that time there were a few cavalrymen and the rest
was infantry. All the Indians were on horseback, and the infantry could
not very well keep up. We took after these Indians, but did not kill many
of them, as most of them had a good start. The same evening we were
requested to go with Uncle Sam’s men that we might overtake these Indians
and capture them if possible. The next morning we found that we were in
advance of the enemy, and just as the sun rose two Indians on horseback
came direct to where we were. We immediately got our arms ready and met
these two Indians; one of them got so excited that he jumped off his horse
and started to run for the timber, leaving his horse behind him. As he
took to the thick brush we fired at him. I had a fast horse and was close
behind him. I jumped off my horse and ran after him on foot. I found him
lying wounded, and watched him a little while and he died. He had a very
nice belt which I took and put around my waist. Meanwhile the rest of the
people had the other Indian captured; he had been also wounded. Later on
we saw a band of these Indians coming up direct to where we were. They
had their pack animals with them. We took after them and tried to capture
every one of them, but they had already seen us, and rode away for a
canyon, where there was some thick brush. I saw one old woman—I thought
she was an old woman—but I was mistaken, for when I overtook the Indian a
man jumped off his horse and got behind a tree. When I saw my mistake, it
was too late to stop my horse. I was but a few feet away from him at that
time. He shot at me once and missed me. I was lucky that time or I would
not be telling this story now, if he had been a better shot than that. My
horse gave a big jump just as he fired at me and I kept on going, as I
knew there were some more Indians close behind me who would capture the
old man, and I went on after the rest of the Indians. Just as I came to a
little opening I saw two Indians on horseback, and one Indian lying down
on the ground; he was wounded. When I got there I learned that this
Indian was a good friend of ours. I just left him there wounded. After
we left I told the other two Indians: ‘This man has been on the warpath,
and if he had a chance to kill us he would.’ So I turned back and
finished his life and scalped him. My tribe captured many of those
people, and I was presented with a fine animal that one of the hostile
Indians had been riding. That was the only time I ever scouted for Uncle
Sam”.
With sublime pathos, Umapine referred to the old days of the buffalo. He
said: “I have hunted buffalo in this country many times. I feel lonesome
since the buffalo have been driven away. In the old days the Indians
killed the buffalo with bows and arrows; they did not have any guns as
they have now, and needed a fast horse to overtake these animals. A man
might think they could not run fast, but he would find out he could not
overtake them with an ordinary horse. My people used to hunt buffalo in
this part of the country, and while on the way over here I could see
trails of these large animals now worn deep by the storms of many years,
and I cried in my heart.”
[The Last Arrow]
The Last Arrow
[Chief Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa]
Chief Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa
Chief Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa
It was midnight. A dim campfire accentuated the loneliness. Flickering
shadows wrote weird lines on the cone-shaped walls of the tepee. The rain
ceased not the beating of its soft tattoo on the frail roof above our
heads. Old Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa, bent and tottering with his more than eighty
years of life, his noble old face still wearing great dignity, his almost
sightless eyes looking for the last flicker of life’s sunset, presented a
pathetic picture as he faced the firelight and told of his loneliness as
he passed the deserted buffalo trails.
Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa, or Willouskin, is one of the notable chiefs of the
Umatillas. He rendered valuable services to the Government as a scout
during the Indian wars of 1855 and 1856. The heroic deeds of those
faraway days have not been written down in history, and no doubt will be
forgotten by future generations, but they have been written large on the
character lines of this gigantic frame and Savonarola-like face—a poet, a
dreamer, a warrior, and chieftain.
It is better to let Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa open the door himself upon that mighty
past: “My days have been spent for many suns along the great rivers and
high mountains of Oregon. It has been many years ago that I was selected
by our agent as the head man of my tribe. In those days I was a very
active man, but since I have become so old, although they look upon me as
the head man of the tribe, I must leave the work for others to do. During
my younger days I had a big herd of cattle and horses, but as the years
have come over me, I am not able to look after my stock any more. I
consider the greatest event in my life the assistance I rendered in the
capture and killing of Chief Eagan, war chief of the Piutes, during the
Bannock or Sheep-Eater war. These Bannock Indians created great
destruction wherever they went; they burned my tepee and killed over
seventy head of my cattle. I did not know at that time how many cattle I
had, because there was not any one around to steal them. This led me to
go on the warpath against the Bannocks.”
“This country all looks familiar to me because, in my younger days, I
travelled all over these prairies fighting the Sioux Indians who had
stolen horses from my tribe. Again I have travelled all over this country
many times, long years ago, as we came here to hunt the buffalo. I had a
number of fast horses, with which I could easily kill as many buffalo as I
wanted, but I only killed as many as I needed to last for a few days.
When I came here the other day to meet all these chiefs, and I looked at
this country for the last time, I felt lonesome when I saw how it was all
changed, and all of the buffalo gone out of the country, for I could still
see traces of these large animals. It is easy for an old hunter to
discover these buffalo trails, for they all walked in the same place, and
now the rains of many moons have cut those trails deep, just as if a man
had been irrigating some field. I can scarcely see, but my eyes could
find the old trail. The buffalo has gone, and I am soon going.”
[Chief Runs the Enemy]
Chief Runs the Enemy
Chief Runs-the-Enemy
Imagine a Roman warrior with clear-cut visage and flashing eye, his face
written all over with battle lines, his voice running the entire gamut
from rage to mirth, and you have a mental picture of Chief Runs-the-Enemy,
a tall, wiry Teton Sioux whose more than sixty-four years of life have
crossed many a battlefield and won many a triumph. From boyhood days a
ringing challenge to battle seemed ever vibrant in the air he breathed.
When I asked him to let me drink at some of the secret springs of his life
his very first sentence contained the ring of battle!
“The first thing that I remember is that my father made me a bow and
arrow; it was a small bow and arrow, and made in proportion to my size,
compared with the bows and arrows used in killing buffalo. I had seen the
buffalo meat that they brought in and the wild game. My father taught me
how to use the bow and arrow, and also how to ride a horse, and soon it
became natural for me to ride. I soon grew to be able to use the bow and
arrow that my father used; with it I killed buffalo. My father also
taught me how to skin the buffalo, so that when I killed the buffalo I
knew how to skin it and bring the buffalo meat home. My father taught me
to pity the old men and women, and when I went on the warpath to be brave,
and even try to die on the field. My father also taught me that it was
better to go on the field of battle and have my body filled with arrows
from the enemy and die on the field, and let the wolves come and eat up my
flesh and bones, rather than be wrapped up and buried in some high tree,
and in this spirit I went forth into all my fights. I remember when I was
very young I went on the warpath and carried the bundles of moccasins and
provisions for the war party. When I was fifteen years old I went with my
first war party. The snow was very deep and hard, so that the horses
slipped round. We charged upon the Assinaboines. I remember when we
charged the camp we found one Indian down in the creek trapping foxes. We
did not know he was there. As soon as he saw us he ran toward his own
camp, and I whipped up my horse and ran after him. The enemy came out
with guns and bows and arrows. I ran the man clear into the midst of the
smoke; I came back without even myself or my horse getting hurt. That is
how I got my name, Runs-the-Enemy. I was then at the age of fifteen.
When we got back to camp the Sioux people said I did not know what I was
doing, and I replied that I knew that was what my father had taught me. I
performed this deed in the face of a lot of brave warriors, and this is
how my name is great among the Sioux. There was a lifelong enmity between
the Sioux and the Assinaboines. My father was wounded by the
Assinaboines, and I made up my mind I was going to do something to that
tribe. I have been in about forty battles altogether, rather
insignificant some of them, but about ten great battles. When I was about
eighteen, a band of Sioux, including myself, went down to the Black Rees.
They greatly outnumbered us. We attacked them, but did not kill any of
them. They pursued us a long way, killing five of our number. My horse
was hit with an arrow, and I jumped off, and while I was running I was
shot through the ankle with an arrow. The enemy surrounded me; my own
friends had gone on. I crossed my wounded ankle over the other foot and
defended myself as best I could. I looked at the ground and the sky, and
made up my mind that this was my last day. Just at this moment, while I
was surrounded by my enemies, one of my friends was brave enough to come
back; he rode into the midst of our foes and put me on the back of his
horse, and we rode away in safety. Let me tell you about the other wound
that I received. In one of the late battles that we had with the tribe of
Black Rees, in 1874, I was shot through the thigh, a ball also going
through the forearm, and breaking the bone.”
[Scouting Party on the Plains]
Scouting Party on the Plains
“Let me tell you about my connection with the battle of the Little
Rosebud. With my war party I joined the Sioux camp on the Rosebud River.
We camped first at Lame Deer. When I arrived at the Sioux camp at Lame
Deer we were near the Cheyenne camp, and the Cheyennes had built a big
bonfire. They were singing and dancing around the fire. I was told that
there were some Cheyennes that had reached camp that day or the day before
from the Black Hills, and they brought the news that the soldiers were
coming. The reason for the campfire and the dancing was to pick out the
bravest of the Cheyennes and send them back to find out the location of
the troops and bring back word. The campfire was so big and so bright and
the dancing and shooting so boisterous that I went over to the Cheyenne
camp to see for myself. And I saw them choosing the braves for this
scouting duty. The scouts must have numbered ten. They started right off
on their mission. The next morning we broke camp and came over the hills.
We camped about half a day’s journey from the Custer battlefield. That
night, after we camped, there was no news, and I went to bed and went to
sleep. The next morning I was awakened by firing, and the report came to
me that there was going to be trouble, for the troops were coming. Almost
at once everybody who could ride a horse or hold a gun mounted his horse
and rode away to meet the troops. The Cheyenne scouts led the way. It
was not very long until I heard the report of rifles, over in the gully.
After the report of the guns we heard a cry from the hilltop; an Indian
was on the hill crying as hard as he could, telling us to make the charge
at once. Then one of their number was killed outright. The occasion of
the shots was that four or five of our Sioux had gone around us and had
gone into the soldiers’ camp and stolen some horses, and the soldiers were
firing at the horse-thieves; four of them escaped, one being killed. This
was the screaming we heard. We no sooner heard it than we made a dash. I
cannot tell you the number of our Indians. There were the different bands
of the Sioux, and the entire tribe of the Cheyennes. The charge we made
was enough to scare anybody. As we got on top of the hill the soldiers,
who were already after the horse-thieves, knowing that we outnumbered
them, all fled back. The cavalry supported by a file of infantry stopped,
and we also stopped and had a great battle there. We simply circled them,
and did not give them a chance to charge, as we greatly outnumbered them.
We killed a great many soldiers, shot down a good many of their horses,
for there were lots of them lying on the ground, wounded and dead. This
battle the Indians called the Battle of the Wolf Mountains, known to the
soldiers and the Crows by this name, and to the Sioux as the Battle of the
Head of the Rosebud. The general sentiment was that we were victorious in
that battle, for the soldiers did not come upon us, but retreated back
into Wyoming. We understood that General Crook was in command of the
United States troops, led by Crow scouts. They called General Crook,
‘Three Stars.’ When our Indians made the charge upon the United States
troops we found the Crow scouts standing between us and the troops. If it
had not been for the Crow scouts we would have charged right through to
the soldiers. The Crow scouts were in between us, and received the fire
from both sides. After the battle ended and the soldiers returned, we got
home to our camp without any fear. We spent the whole of the next day in
camp at the Little Rosebud, and the day after we came over on to the
plains by the Custer Battlefield.”
[Scouts passing under cover of the Night]
Scouts passing under cover of the Night
The most graphic Indian story of the Custer fight is told by
Runs-the-Enemy in the chapter on “The Indians’ Story of the Custer Fight.”
Chief Runs-the-Enemy continued:
“A great event in changing my life was marked when I returned to the
reservation and the Government took from us our horses and guns and told
us that we were to live in that place at peace with everybody. The
Government took the best warriors from among the tribe, made them lift
their hands to God and swear that they would be true to the Government;
and they made out of these men policemen who were to guard the Government
and keep the Indians good. When the Government made a policeman of me
they bound my hands with chains and I had to obey them. They gave me
implements with which to till the soil, and raise stock and build a home,
and it seemed to me I must obey every word they said. They told me that
the wild game, now roaming the hills, would soon die off, and that if I
tilled the soil and raised stock and grain, I could get money for it, and
money is what makes everything move along. As I told you, whatever they
told me, I did. They told me to send my children to school, which I did.
I sent all of my children to school, and they came home and all of them
died. They told me if I sent the children to school and educated them,
they would be all right. Instead of that I sent them to school and they
all came home with consumption and died, seven in number. If I had kept
them home, some of them might have been living to-day. Now as to myself:
I am getting old every day; I cannot take care of my stock. My limbs are
weak, and my knees are getting weak; it will not be long until I will go
under the ground. As you look at me now I am old. As I said, I will die
in a little while, but I am not afraid of dying. I have two children
living and I look ahead for them. Although I have done all I could for my
people, I have also helped the Government and done whatever they told me
to do.”
[Map of the Custer Battlefield]
Map of the Custer Battlefield
We have been listening to the minor in the carol, that is always the major
strain in Indian life, but we mistake much if we do not hear more jubilant
notes in the scale. When Runs-the-Enemy was asked to tell the story of
his boyhood days all the fierce combativeness expressed in gesture, voice,
and piercing eye gave way to a tender and gentle calm. The warrior became
a child, living again the life of a child with all the spontaneous
gleefulness of a child. We may now have one of his folklore tales.
FOLKLORE TALE
There goes a spider. As he was journeying along he came upon a man—in our
legends these men do anything; they take a whole community of men right
down—and he met him face to face. The man-eater stood in the path, the
spider in front of him. The big man kept letting out his breath and
taking it in in great gusts, and when he drew in his breath he drew the
spider toward him, and when he blew out his breath he blew him away from
him. And the spider was so scared he did not know what to do. But he
finally said: “Now, my young brother, you take in your breath, and let out
your breath, and you pull me around; and if I did the same thing you would
soon be gone, for I am older than you are.” The big man said to the
spider: “Now, my older brother, you hold on.” The spider said to the big
man: “I am going over here where there is a great big camp of people, and
I am going to swallow all of these people. However, as you are hungry, I
will give you half of them. Now you stay right here. I am going over to
look at the big camp. I am going to find out whether I will give you any
of them or not, and then I will tell you.” With these words the spider
went ahead of the man a little, and then came right back to the big man
again and said: “My young brother, I am afraid of some certain things, and
I am going to tell you about it. Are you the same way?” The big man said:
“Yes, my little brother, I am very much afraid of some things.” The
spider then asked him: “What are the things you are afraid of?” The big
man then told the spider that he was afraid of drums beating, that he was
afraid of old tambourines that the Indians used to have, and he was also
afraid of shouting and yelling. The spider then said to him: “You are my
brother for sure; these are just the things that I am afraid of.” Just as
he said these things to the big man, the spider was very much afraid of
him, fearing that he could not hold himself steady as he stood in front of
the big man. The spider said to the big man: “You just sit right still
here. I am going over to see this big camp, and will be right back.” The
spider went over the hill as fast as he could, looking back every once in
a while to the big man. He went right ahead into the big camp. He told
everybody around there to get all their drums and their tambourines, that
he had a great big man over there, and these were the things that he was
afraid of. “I am going back to him and I want you to take all your drums
and tambourines, and yell and scream, for he is afraid of these things.”
The spider then went back to the big man and told him the camp was big
enough for them both. Then he marked a place which divided them half and
half, and said: “You are to have the one half and I am to have the other
half; but if you go ahead and eat your half and eat half of my half, I
will swallow you too.” As they went along to the camp the spider said to
the big man: “I am the older, and will go ahead of you a little.” In the
meantime he had told those in camp that they must all gather in one place
where he would lead this big man. As the big man walked along, he grew
tired, and would let out his breath and take in a great big breath, and
every time the spider would be drawn up against him. The spider told him
if he did it again he would draw in his breath and the big man would soon
be inside his stomach. As the spider went on into the place where all the
people were gathered, they began to beat their drums and yell and scream
and howl. The spider fell down as though he were dead, and kicked and
squirmed. The big man was really scared, and he fell down dead. When
they got up to the big man and found him dead, the spider told them how he
had worked the big man, and saved their lives. And thus the story ends.
[Chief Pretty Voice Eagle]
Chief Pretty Voice Eagle
Chief Pretty Voice Eagle
Sixty-eight years is a long time to be an Indian. Within this span of
life Pretty Voice Eagle has run with swift feet the warpath, and held with
strong hand the battle spear. Bearing well his weight of years and his
heavier burden of struggle, he moves erect and with lithe footstep. He
became stormy and vociferous as he told his story of broken treaties, how
the Indian had been wronged by the white man, and how his life had been
scarred by the storms of life. Then the calm of old age came over him and
the placid joy of childhood memories when asked to tell a folklore tale.
While relating his battle experiences we had the equinoctial gale of
Indian life and then the mellow haze of Indian summer. Recalling his
boyhood days, Pretty Voice Eagle told me that his tribe roamed along the
river, chiefly the Missouri River. There were then no white people in
that country. “I was about ten years old when I saw large boats bringing
white people over the Missouri River. I saw a great many of the white
people killed by the Sioux when they came up the river in small boats. It
was not until I was about twenty years old that they began to build the
railroad along the Platte River going west, and there were also emigrant
wagons going west driving large herds of cattle. The Indians killed the
white people as they came up the river because we felt they were driving
away our game; they had guns and powder and knives, which we did not have.
We also wanted what they had in the boats, and we did not like to see them
go through our country. When I first saw the people emigrating through
our country and then bringing iron horses there I began to be afraid. I
was about twenty-five or thirty years old when they began to run the iron
horse along through the country, and I also heard that they were going to
move the Indians to some hot country, and that the white people would fill
up all the land north and west and south of us; we felt that we ought to
fight the white people, and we began to kill the men who were building the
railroad. The white people began to kill the game when they came into the
country. There was then plenty of buffalo on the east side of the
Missouri River; soon they swam over to the west side, and we then
understood that the President had given them the privilege of killing all
the game, and soon the buffalo were all gone. The white man then went
into the Black Hills, and killed the game. The killing of the game caused
a change in our food. We were accustomed to eating buffalo meat and other
wild game; we loved that and we were all full of health as long as we had
it. The change of food has compelled us to eat bread instead of wild
meat, and that is the reason why the Indians are all dying off. When I
think of those old days my heart is full of sorrow. My father, who was
then the chief, was sent for by the President of the United States, and
when he came back he said that the Indians must adopt the white man’s mode
of living, and that we must send our children to school. The news that my
father brought was received by some with favour, others entirely refused
to send their children to school, and said that they would rather fight
than let their children go to school. And it looked as though there would
be a general uprising. I remember the first group who went off to school,
and it caused great trouble. From that time on we had trouble with the
United States soldiers. While we were carrying this trouble about the
schools in our minds, there was an emigrant train going through the Black
Hills. They had with them a cow which was lame, and and they left it.
The Indians thought they had thrown it away, and killed it. We killed
this cow not for subsistence but because it was lame and we felt sorry for
it. It was not until a year later that the people who owned this cow made
application to the Government for reimbursement for the loss, and the
Government sent United States soldiers there to find out who had killed
the cow. The two men who had killed the cow were Face Powder and Pointed
Forehead. They asked us to give up these men that they might take them to
Fort Laramie, and we refused to give them up. They then asked our head
chief, Axe-the-Bear, to give them up, and when he would not do so he was
taken to Fort Laramie. Part of the Sioux Nation was at Fort Laramie, and
they wanted to know why the soldiers had taken this head chief there. It
was a mistake of the interpreter, for he told the officers in command that
the Sioux Indians were there to kill the soldiers if they did not give up
this head chief. One of the soldiers rather than let the chief go ran him
through with a bayonet and killed him in cold blood. As soon as they
killed this chief, the Indians began to fight right there. There was a
running fight after that until they finally captured Spotted-Tail with his
band and squaws and children. A lot of Spotted-Tail’s men were killed.
They afterward gave up the women and children. That did not satisfy the
Indians; they wanted revenge on the soldiers and had a battle west of the
Black Hills. After that big battle the Indians were chased right into the
territory where the present camp of the great chiefs is located.
Following that there was another big battle on the east side of the
Missouri River. The women and children were all captured. Following this
there was a treaty with the United States not to fight. The treaty was
signed up near Fort Laramie. The trouble still kept up, the treaty was
broken, and we had another big battle near the Rocky Mountains, where a
hundred soldiers were killed. After that there were several battles,
including the Custer fight, and then the bands all split up, some of them
going to Canada and some of them back to the reservations where they are
now located. Then there was a delegation sent to Washington, and when
they came back to the people from the Indian Department, we sent our
children to school. The Indians who went to Canada afterward returned. A
great many Sioux remained on the reservation at the time of the Custer
fight; I was not in the battle myself. I saw General Custer when he left
Fort Lincoln previous to the Custer fight. Custer impressed me as a very
pleasant and good man; he wore his hair long. As he was about to leave
Fort Lincoln a delegation of Sioux Indians, including myself, went to see
him and asked him not to fight the Sioux Indians, but to go to them in a
friendly way. I was the leader of the delegation. We begged him to
promise us that he would not fight the Sioux. He promised us, and we
asked him to raise his hand to God that he would not fight the Sioux, and
he raised his hand. After he raised his hand to God that he would not
fight the Sioux he asked me to go west with my delegation to see those
roaming Sioux, and tell them to come back to the reservation, that he
would give them food, horses, and clothing. After we got through talking,
he soon left the agency, and we soon heard that he was fighting the
Indians and that he and all his men were killed. If Custer had given us
time we would have gone out ahead of him, but he did not give us time. If
we had gone out ahead of Custer he would not have lost himself nor would
his men have been killed. I did all I could to persuade the Ree scouts
not to go with Custer. I gave them horses and saddles not to go, but for
some reason they went.”
[A War Council]
A War Council
“In the treaty the Government made with me at Fort Laramie, they were to
feed me fifty-five years, and they have not fulfilled it. You must be a
man of influence, as you sent for us from all parts of the country, and I
wish you would help us as much as you can. In the Fort Rice treaty the
Government promised to give us good horses and good wagons.”
“After the 1868 treaty that we had at Fort Rice we sold all the country
east of the Missouri River and soon sold the Black Hills to the
Government, and in that treaty the Government promised us that the Sioux
Indians would be taken care of as long as there was a child living of the
Sioux tribe; and that has not been fulfilled. It was not long after that
when we had a treaty with General Crook. In that treaty we were promised
a great many things the Government did not seem to care to do. Now our
funds are almost exhausted, and a lot of us are poor and not able to take
care of ourselves, and I wish that when you go back you would say what you
can. These are Government promises, and they have never fulfilled them.”
“The story I am going to tell you I am not afraid to have published
anywhere, or to have it come right back to my own agency, or let other
warriors see and hear it. In my lifetime I have made about seventy raids
against the different tribes. Out of these raids there must have been
forty-five or fifty battles. Let me tell you a story concerning one of
these battles in which I was engaged: I was a young man, I cannot remember
just what age. The Sioux camped at the mouth of the Rosebud River. We
got up a war party which numbered about two hundred. The two bands who
were in this party were the Two-Cattle and the Mnik-Ok-Ju tribes. It was
in the middle of the winter when the snow was deep. We started across the
country not very far from this camp, and followed the Yellowstone River
down, and then we turned off toward the north, and went toward the Upper
Rockies. We were then in the enemy’s country. There were four of us
chosen out of the two bands to go ahead and scout for the enemy; we did
not see any one, and returned. There was one man from our party out
shooting deer, and he was right behind us. We got home without seeing
anything, but he brought word there were enemies in sight. The enemies he
saw were two in number, and we got on our horses and went to where he saw
these two men. They were well armed and did all they could to defend
themselves, and our party did not come very close to them. I spurred up
my horse and made a straight charge at the two men. They were on foot,
and lined up and pointed their guns at me as I went at them. I struck one
of them with the spear that I had. I knocked him down; he fired at me,
but missed me. The other man also fired at me, but missed. I could not
strike him, as I dodged after I struck the first man. As I passed on by
them they fired at me again. This gave my warriors a chance to come up on
them before they could reload their guns, and they killed them. I was the
first one who struck one and very nearly hit the other. My warriors were
slow to come up, and I was the first one to charge them. After we killed
these two men we went home with their scalps. We were on our way home
across the Powder River and following the river up until we got to the
junction of the Powder and Rosebud rivers. When we got there one of our
party went on home ahead of us. He came rushing toward us with his horse
almost played out, with the report that the camp had been attacked by the
enemy while we were away, and they had stolen our horses, and were now
coming down the road on which we were travelling. We hid waiting for
them, but somehow they became aware of our presence, and went around, and
before we knew it they had escaped. Although they were a great ways off
our band made a charge on these horsemen. Most of our horses gave out
before we overtook the enemy, but thirteen of us rode on, overtaking them,
three in number we found, who had charge of the stolen horses. Our
thirteen horses that we were riding were nearly exhausted, but we found
that the enemy whom we were pursuing were also riding exhausted horses. I
rushed on ahead as fast as my horse could go. One of the enemy was riding
a horse that was so thoroughly given out that he stood still. The enemy
got off his horse, turned round, pulled his bow and arrow, and shot at me;
I was going to strike him, but I did not have time. The arrow was so near
my face that it made me dizzy. He fired at me and the arrow went right
through my hair, which was tied in a knot on top of my head. I jumped off
my horse and pulled my bow and arrow, and we were firing at each other as
we came closer. We jumped round like jack-rabbits trying to dodge the
arrows. One of the arrows struck me right across the ribs, but the wound
was not very deep. Just as we came together he fired his last arrow at
me; it passed through my arm, but it was only a skin wound. At that time
I struck him with my arrow through the wrist and that made him lame. As I
struck him he moved backward and I shot him twice through the breast, with
two arrows; then I threw away the arrows and struck him on the head with
my bow, knocking him senseless. After I knocked him down I took his bow
and threw it a long ways off so he could not get it. He was crawling on
his hands and knees and I took my war club and struck him until I killed
him. After I had killed this man, I gathered up my bow and arrows, and
went on after the other two. At this time they had got off their horses
and were defending themselves as best they could. I shot one of them
through the wrist with my arrow; he made a scream as I hit him and dodged
and went down the coulee, running as hard as he could go. He had a
revolver in one hand, and I followed him, shooting with my arrows, he
shooting back at me with his revolver. This kept up until he got to the
end of the coulee, where there was a deep precipice. I looked over the
precipice and saw this man, who had jumped over, rolling down the side
like a rock. When he got down there he was knocked senseless. I looked
at him from over the hill, but could not get down to him. I walked back
and forth; as I looked down I saw a Sioux Indian trying to crawl up and
get the scalp of the Indian who had fallen down the precipice. I had a
war club in my teeth, and grabbed my bow and arrows, and tried to climb
down the hill slope in order that I might get near him. As I went down I
slid, and as I was going down the Crow regained consciousness and I saw
him pointing his gun at me as I was looking down. I then thought that
would be my last day. As I got there the Sioux got there just in time to
grab the revolver away from him, and as he pulled the revolver away I fell
right under the enemy. He pulled a knife out of my belt, for I was under
him, pushed up against a rock, and I could not move either way. He made a
strike at me and cut my clothing right across the abdomen, but did not cut
my stomach. The second strike he made, I got hold of the knife, and
wrested it from him. When I had taken the knife, the other Sioux pulled
him off, and I got up and took my club and finished him. I killed these
two Crows a little ways from the mouth of the Little Big Horn that flows
through the camp where we are now. This is one of the daring events of my
life. These two events occurred in one war party.”
[The War Party]
The War Party
“Then, again, let me tell you about the battle that we had between the
Sioux and the Flatheads about twenty miles north of where Billings now
stands: In this battle the Sioux numbered about one hundred and fifty, and
the Flatheads consisted of the entire tribe. We sent three spies across
the Yellowstone, and they came back with the location of the Flatheads.
They reported that the entire tribe was camped there. We were afraid
because of their great numbers that they would beat us. We debated as to
whether we should go back home or make the attack. Finally the chiefs
selected thirty of the bravest men to go on ahead. The rest of the war
party remained in camp. I was numbered among the thirty who were chosen
to go ahead. We left there in the dark of the night. We journeyed on in
silence until daybreak, when we first got a view of the enemy’s camp.
When daylight came we found that ten of our thirty had deserted from fear.
When we got in sight of the camp another ten left us, so that only left
ten to advance on the camp. We made a fool charge at the camp at the
rising of the sun. None of us expected to come back when we made the
charge. After we made the charge, there were about four who backed out
again, so that left us only six in number. We ran our horses up to the
side of the tents and then ran back again to the hills. The women were
just getting out to get breakfast ready. We took about fifty horses with
us, as we rode back, as a challenge for the enemy to come after us. The
firing began from the camp and frightened the horses so that we only got
about twenty out of the fifty. There was one horse, a spotted animal,
that pleased me very much, and out of the six of us in number I rushed
back to get that horse. When I went back after this horse the enemy came
upon me so strong that I was obliged to flee to the hills. They came
right behind us firing at us. The enemy chased us for miles and miles,
shooting at us but never killing any of us. We turned in our saddles
every once in a while and fired back, and then went on. We were
reinforced by the last ten that left us. Just at this time a horse under
one of our men was shot, and he was on foot running. We made a whirl
around this man who was on foot, which seemed to check the enemy. At this
time one of the enemy was shot off his horse. This man who was shot from
his horse was surrounded by two of his friends who dismounted to defend
him. As soon as I saw this man lying on his back, I made a hard charge at
him; I struck at his head. An enemy standing near discharged his gun at
me, and took the butt of the gun to strike me on the head. Just at this
moment my horse stumbled and fell forward which saved me from receiving
the blow. As I did so I made a circle and came back again to my own
people. But I was mad at him in my heart because he had struck at me. I
took my bow and arrow and shot an arrow right through his cheek. As I hit
this enemy through the cheek I whipped up my horse and made a charge at
him. One of my friends came riding up with me, and we both charged
together. Our horses turned just as we reached this enemy whom I had shot
through the cheek, and the enemy ran right in behind us. He got hold of
my friend’s horse’s tail and shot him through the back with his revolver
and he fell right over my horse. I got off my horse, holding my friend
tight, and one of my friends saw the enemy at this time and shot him.
This man who had been shot by my friend got up again as his wound was only
a skin wound. I let go of my dead friend and got off my horse and charged
at this fellow. Just as I charged at him there were two angry Sioux who
laid their coup sticks on him. They went on by him and that left him for
me to fight. Just as I reached him the enemy was very close behind me.
They had shot at me at very close range. I could smell the smoke. He
aimed his gun right at me, but he was so bewildered that he did not fire.
I took the gun away from him and knocked him down. I got on my horse,
taking his gun with me, at which time my horse was shot across the nose,
but he kept on going toward my friends. The bullets whizzed around me,
bewildering me for a moment. At this time it seemed as though the enemy
were defeated, but the rest of our band came up at this moment. The enemy
retreated when they saw our friends, but they pursued us all the way back
to the Yellowstone. The dead numbered about a hundred in this battle. I
did not go back, because my horse was exhausted. I have five more just
such thrilling stories, including the one in which I was wounded.”
[The Swirl of the Warriors]
The Swirl of the Warriors
“The greatest event in my life, leaving behind the story that I have told,
is to be found at the time the Indians received allotments of land, and
were given a home so they could not roam around; and above all, the time
when I found religion and became a Christian. I was baptized and
confirmed in the Episcopal Church. I married my wife under the holy bonds
of matrimony, and am trying to live an upright life. In the roaming life,
I fought, I took many scalps, and killed many Indians. Now, put alongside
of that the fact that I live in my own home, own my land, have my own
family, and am a church member. I like the last life better than the
first. In the former life while we lived to ourselves, we were always
fighting; in the life now we have peace. The one thing now that is
killing me off is our mode of life. There is too much confinement;
instead of fighting the enemy, I am fighting disease. The white people
know about everything, but if they can kill that foul disease,
consumption, I shall feel very thankful. As I told you before, I think of
the buffalo time, the meat, and the hides, and the desire for it seems
almost like a disease, and this is especially true with the old men.”
When asked about his belief concerning the Indian’s hereafter, before he
became a Christian, he replied: “There was no definite Supreme Being that
we believed in. There were a great many gods that we had faith in. I
prayed to my own god; then we all heard that after we died we would meet
in some good country where we would all be happy. No matter if we had
lots of gods, we would all meet in that country. Now, while I cannot read
the Bible, nor can I understand the Bible, yet we have preachers in our
own language and they tell us that there is one God, and also His Holy
Son, and we shall all meet in heaven, and I believe in that. A great many
of the Sioux are followers like I am, but like a great many other people,
there are many who do one thing and feel another. In the old days the sun
was my god, the sun was my fathef’s god, and I then thought the sun was my
father and the earth was my mother. I sang and danced to the sun; I have
my breast and arms tattooed with the sun, and I pierced my body through
offering sacrifices to the sun. Now I look back upon those old Indian
customs as foolishness. It is like a man coming out of darkness into
light. I was then in the dark; I am now going into the valley of light,
learning every day.”
Folklore Tales—Sioux
Pretty Voice Eagle reached the other pole of life when his thoughts went
back to the time when the old folks gathered around the campfire, and as a
small lad he listened to their oft-repeated stories. “I can hardly
remember them, but I will tell you a short story: There was a great big
spider carrying a big roll of straw on his back, and he was running along
between two lakes. There was a great big flock of geese on one of the
lakes. One of the geese yelled over to the spider: ‘Spider, where are you
going?’ The spider said: ‘You hush up now! I have heard there is a camp
of Indians over here who have returned from a victory with many scalps,
and they sent for me with my songs. I have them all in the bundle on my
back, and I am taking them over to them.’ The spider kept on going, and
one of the geese told him: ‘You stop, and give us one of those songs you
are taking over there.’ The spider kept on going; said he was in a
terrible hurry, but he still kept making the circle of the lake; he wanted
the geese to yell to him again, which they did, and finally the spider
yelled over to the geese: ‘If you want one of my songs, come over here.’
The spider made a little booth of straw. He had a little stick and was
standing in the door. When the geese came over he told them to go in the
booth, and when they did so, he sang a song, and told every one to close
his eyes, for every one who opened his eyes would have red eyes. Of
course they all closed their eyes, and he set about knocking them all
down. One of the geese happened to open his eyes, and he called out to
the other geese: ‘Open your eyes and fly away; this spider is going to
kill you all!’ and he flew away. The spider said: ‘You will have red eyes
forever!’ And so it is that the duck called hell-diver has red eyes.”
Here is another story: There was a solitary man going along, and he had a
lot of meat on his back. On his journey he stopped under some trees,
built a great big fire, and was broiling some of the meat that he was
carrying. The branches of two trees standing near got crossed over each
other and when the wind blew made a squeaking noise. The man looked up to
the tree, and said: “My brothers, you quit fighting up there!” The
creaking continued, and he called up to them again to stop their fighting.
But it still continued, and he finally said: “I am going to part you two;
you must stop fighting.” And he put his hand up between the two branches;
as he put his hand between them the wind stopped blowing. His hand was
caught and he was not able to get away. Just then a wolf passed along,
and the man saw him and called out to him: “Go on about your business, and
let my things alone.” The wolf did not know anything about the broiled
meat being there, but when this man called to him, he said to himself:
“That man must have something for me,” and he walked over to the broiled
beef, took it all, and went his way. After the wolf had gone the wind
blew again, and the man released his hand, and the squeaking began again.
The man cried, and was sorry in his heart, and began trailing the wolf by
his tracks. He went on till he came to a body of water, in which he
plunged. He looked down into the water, and saw the wolf eating his meat.
He dove down into the water, and felt all around and was nearly exhausted
when he came out. He then got up in a tree and when the water became
still again, there was the wolf down in the water again, so the man got
down and tied a rope around his belt, piled some rocks on his side so he
could stay down there long enough to get the wolf. During all this time
the wolf was on the branch of the tree above him; the reflection of the
wolf was in the water. When the man got down in the water, the weight of
the rocks held him there, and he began to struggle to get out, and just
barely succeeded in getting out of the water. Just as he got out of the
water, he looked up and saw the wolf on the top of the tree. The man’s
sides were so filled with stones that he had great difficulty in getting
up the steep bank, so much so that he could hardly crawl to the top of the
bank, and as he was struggling to get out, the wolf finished eating the
meat, jumped down, and ran away. So ends the story.
The life of the Indian is complex. To gather up the sixty-eight years of
this man’s life means that we round out a problem of infinite dimensions.
His cradle lullaby, a war song; his earliest memories, stained with the
blood of the white man; his unshaken valour on the field of battle; scars
left on his soul by the broken treaties of the white man; his devotion to
the mysterious gods in the pantheon of Nature; his unrequited lament at
the loss of the buffalo; his natural eloquence born from the throne room
of Nature: his final love of peace and acceptance of the shining face of
the Son of Righteousness all lay upon civilization the heavy hand of
condemnation.
[Chief White Horse]
Chief White Horse
Chief White Horse
“My father told me I was born in the Black Hills. Ever since I can
remember my people have lived on the shores of the Bad River, South
Dakota. While I lived there I saw the white people for the first time
coming up the river in the big boats. At this time the buffalo were on
both sides of the Missouri River, and there was plenty of game and we were
all living fat at that time. It was not very long before the fort was
built at the mouth of the Bad River. My father liked to be with the white
people, and we were up at the store a good deal. The fort finally became
a great trading post. The Indians brought in skins of the various
animals, such as beaver, wolf, fox, panther, and buffalo. While I was
still a young boy I left that section of the country and came further west
with the other Indians. I have always tried to live without making any
trouble among my own people or with the whites. When I got out among the
Sioux I began to learn some of their wild tricks. I began to learn to
fight the other Indians. I then went on the warpath, and have been in a
good many Indian fights. One fight in particular against the Assinaboines
I want to mention. In this battle there were about two hundred of us
Sioux. The fight was on the Missouri River. There were charges and
countercharges several times. One of the bravest came in advance of the
others but he had to retreat. I put two arrows in his back and then
rushed up and knocked him off his horse with my bow. After I had knocked
this man off his horse my own horse ran away with me and ran right into
the enemy’s line, dashing in among the foe. They were firing arrows at me
from all sides, and I expected that this was my last day. This was the
greatest fight I was ever in, though I have been in many others.”
It is a long step from the spear to the ploughshare, but the moccasined
feet of White Horse soon took the step. Concerning this epoch in his
life, he said: “The most important event in my life was when the
Government began to give annuities to the Indians and we were placed on
the reservation. I have always been a leader of the Indians and a chief.
When farming implements were assigned us, and the allotments made, I was
appointed head farmer over the Indians. I visited the Indians all over my
district, and tried to get them to till the soil and send their children
to school. I sent my own boy to school first as an example to the others.
I sent my children to a nearby school until they were old enough and then
I was one of the first to send my children to Hampton, Virginia, to
school. They all came home and died of consumption. About this time the
first missionary came to our country, and I was one of the first to be
converted to the Church. I have since done all I could to bring the other
Indians into the Church. I went at my own expense down to the place where
I now live. There were no people living there at the time, and I cut out
of the woods the logs and built a church in my own home. I had no help.
The Indians came there to church, and afterward they named the church the
White Horse Church. After this a settlement was made here by the Indians,
and finally the Government made a post-office at this place, and they
called it the White Horse post-office. It has since become a sub-agency.
The influence thus brought to bear on the Indians had led them to live a
good deal as the white man lives. I have my farm now, raise cattle and
horses. All I have done for the Government and for the Church I have been
glad to do, for they have all been kind to me. While other Indians have
been fighting and making trouble for the United States I have never
participated in any of it.”
Before passing to the folklore tale that fell from the lips of Chief White
Horse, the attention of the reader is especially directed to the chapter
on Indian Impressions of the last Great Council, where White Horse
describes his feelings and the lessons he learned while riding for the
first time on the iron horse.
Folklore Tales—Yankton Sioux
“In the evenings of my boyhood days my father always told stories. I
remember that I used to go to sleep while he was telling stories. This is
one of the stories he used to tell: There goes a wolf on a journey. He
came upon three buffalo. The wolf said to the buffalo: ‘My brothers, make
me as one of you, and we will all live together.’ The buffalo told him:
‘Will you stand the life that we live?’ The wolf said ‘Yes,’ and they all
told him to go a distance off and lie down on his back. The buffalo was
going to make the wolf a buffalo, and he lay down on his back and sides
and rolled in the dust, and then he got up and shook himself and he then
made a plunge for the wolf and stuck his horns in him and threw him in the
air. Just as he got to the wolf, the wolf jumped aside, and the buffalo
said: ‘You made me make that hard run for nothing.’ The wolf said: ‘Try
again.’ The buffalo said: ‘This time you stand up and I will come at you.’
So the wolf stood a good ways off. Just as the buffalo reached the wolf,
the wolf turned into a buffalo, and they locked horns with each other. And
thus he became a strong buffalo. He roamed with the buffalo for a while.
The other buffalo went off a little way by themselves and grazed on the
grass while the wolf-buffalo took the first grass near where he stood.
While he was eating there another wolf came along, and he said to the
buffalo: ‘Make me a buffalo, and we will all be brothers together.’ This
wolf buffalo then told the wolf to stand just as he had stood before. This
wolf buffalo lay down on his back and rolled in the dust and went for the
wolf, and as he was going to strike him he turned back again into a wolf,
and the two wolves were there together fighting. The wolf buffalo said:
‘I was happy as a buffalo, and was living fat—why did you come around here
and make me into a wolf again?’ And he began to fight him. And thus the
story ends. And this is why the Indians are always fighting each other.”
[Chief Bear Ghost]
Chief Bear Ghost
Chief Bear Ghost
The great Siouan, or Dakota family, is divided into many different tribes.
They are the dislocated remains of the “Seven Great Council Fires.” The
Indians resent the title of Sioux, meaning “Hated Foe,” and prefer the
word Dakota, which means “Leagued,” or “Allied.” There is the Brule
Sioux, meaning “Burnt Hip”; the Teton, “On a Land without Trees”; the
Santee Sioux, “Men Among Leaves,” a forest; the Sisseton Sioux, “Men of
Prairie Marsh,” and the Yankton Sioux, which means, “At the End.” Chief
Bear Ghost is a Yankton Sioux. Among the Dakotas the chiefs are
distinguished by a name that has either some reference to their abilities,
having signalized themselves on the warpath or in the chase, or it may be
handed down from father to son. Chief Bear Ghost bears the hereditary
name of his father, Mato-wanagi—the ghost of a bear. The Dakotas count
their years by winters, and all their records are called winter counts.
They say a man is so many snows old, or that so many snow-seasons have
occurred since a certain period. Adopting their own phrasing Chief Ghost
Bear is fifty-seven snows old. Custer was not poetical when he gave the
Sioux the name of “cut-throats,” but he may have been true to the
character and history of these fierce and warlike tribes. We may not
wonder then that Bear Ghost should say: “The greatest event in my life was
the participation in two great wars. I was on the warpath on the Missouri
River against the Gros Ventres and the Mandans. It was a hard, fierce
struggle; we had been facing and shooting each other from early dawn until
the sun went down. An Indian near me, an enemy, was shot, and when I went
after him my horse was shot, but still I pressed on and struck the enemy
with a tomahawk. One of the enemy aimed at me, but I struck him with the
tomahawk before he could shoot, and when this struggle was over the
Indians called us men. In other years we came to that same place again.
Two enemies were near the camp; they were armed with guns. There were
seven of the enemy and but two of us. We went right up to the camp. I
shot one of the enemy and wounded him, and captured one of their horses.
Then a great number of Indians came out and chased us. They surrounded
us, shooting all the while, and the horse I had taken from the enemy I
shot rather than let them have it. And while they were chasing me my
horse became exhausted and I had to get off and lead him. I ran into the
creek where my enemies were on the banks shooting at me. These two things
I consider the greatest events in my life, for I expected to die each
time. Then I was made head chief of my tribe.”
Before the police system was established on the reservation, Bear Ghost,
along with one other Indian, was detailed by Captain Daugherty to watch
for and capture a man who had committed murder. Bear Ghost succeeded in
carrying out this commission, and the sheriff was sent for and the
prisoner turned over to him, but on the way to Bismarck the prisoner
killed the sheriff, jumped onto the best horse, and made his escape. Bear
Ghost has often been chosen by his people to represent them at councils
held among other tribes. He was also sent to Washington, on matters
pertaining to treaties made years ago. He wears the countenance of a
Roman senator; he is tall, graceful, and full of dignity, a forceful and
convincing speaker, and a compelling advocate of peace.
[Chief Running Fisher]
Chief Running Fisher
Chief Running Fisher (2)
The story of this war-scarred Gros Ventres veteran emphasizes with double
pathos the many times expressed sentiment of this book that the Indian is
a vanishing race, for he died within two weeks after returning home from
the last Great Indian Council. His words, therefore, are deeply
significant: “I feel sad at the thought of not meeting these chiefs again,
for I would like to meet them all once more, but I feel pretty sure we
will never meet again.”
Chief Running Fisher had measured threescore years of life, and for forty
years of that time he had averaged a battle for every other year. Battles
in Canada, battles in the mountains, and battles on the plains. He had
fought the Sioux, the Blackfeet, the Nez Perce, the Crows, the Shoshones,
and the Piegans. He said: “I have twenty shots in my body received in
battle. I have had my arm broken and wrist sprained. A bullet went right
through one of my arms. In early days I fought with the bow and arrow.
In one battle I killed two men, shooting a single arrow through them both.
The greatest event of my life occurred when I was shot at the battle of
Big Spring and left for dead on the field. My friends kept back the enemy
as long as they could and when they saw that I did not revive they left
me. I was bleeding from the inside, a coughing of blood out of the throat
brought me to. When I came to I found the enemy had departed and I
followed the tracks of my own tribe. Some of my friends were shot and I
could see by the blood stains on the snow the path they had taken. I was
nineteen years of age at this time. It was a long time before I overtook
the band. They travelled much faster than I could, but I finally reached
the camp and recovered. We had no surgeons and but little care. Every
Indian had to be his own doctor. I will tell you about another close call
I had. The event that I am now about to relate is the main thing that
makes a chief out of a warrior. We had a fight with the Piegans. One of
the Piegans had a gun and a dagger, one in each hand. This Piegan ran at
me and I ran at him. As we came together I grabbed the Piegan’s gun with
one hand and his dagger with the other and as I warded off his charge, his
gun was fired, and I took the gun and the dagger away from him. Then my
friends rushed to my rescue and killed the Piegan and scalped him.”
Turning from battles and wounds, let this old chieftain recur to his
boyhood days: “I remember when I was quite a boy the wonderful sun dance.
It greatly impressed me. I could not understand it and I asked my father
about it and he told me that I could not take part in the sun dance until
I had earned my title as a warrior. The sun dance is a custom among the
Indians which seeks to elevate a spirit of honour among men as well as
women. No young woman dare take part in the sun dance unless she is
virtuous, for she is sure to be pointed out and put to shame, and if she
does not take part, then suspicion falls upon her and she is likewise put
to shame. The men emulate the deeds of their fathers in order that they
may take part in the sun dance. And thus this wonderful dance becomes a
school for patriotism among the tribes and a stimulus to deeds of valour
as well as an incentive to virtue. I do not think that anything has ever
made a stronger impression upon me than the sun dance. It was always held
in May, a beautiful time of the year, and as we young people watched the
various phases of the dance, both young men and young women desired to do
right that we might have our share in this wonderful ceremony.”
This passing allusion to one of the great Indian rites and its influence
upon Indian character may lead the reader to follow further into this
weird enactment.
Another chieftain has been folded in his blanket. The war-bonnet and
war-shirt he wears in the picture we made of him were laid beside him in
his last sleep, emblems of his last battle and tokens of his final
conquest.
[Chief Bull Snake]
Chief Bull Snake
Bull Snake
Old Bull Snake, or Snake Bull’s, Indian name is Ear-Ous-Sah-Chee-dups,
which means male snake. Years ago when far from camp he was bitten by a
rattlesnake. The only companion with him did all within his power to save
his friend. The death stupor was coming on, and his companion hurried to
the camp with the tidings. His relations rushed to the rescue. He
finally recovered and has ever since been called Bull Snake. It is a
fitting appellation for this grizzled warrior of sixty-eight years. The
bow and arrow became the plaything of his boyhood days. With it he sought
the lair of wild things and shot with glee the buffalo calf; his final
strength winging the arrow through the heart of the buffalo bull. Then
came the days of the war trail, eager, savage days—days when the hated foe
was pursued on foot and the warpath was followed for very love of war.
This passion for war led him to the camp of General Crook, where he was
assigned the task of trailing the hostile Sioux. The further story of
Bull Snake is best told in his own words:
“At that time I must have been about twenty-three years old. We moved
down to the Little Rosebud. I was the first of the scouts to discover the
Sioux who were approaching us. After I reported, I mounted my horse and
in company with two other scouts went over to locate the Sioux. We found
ten Sioux and began to fight. My companions with both of their horses
were killed. Then the battle of the Little Rosebud began. The Sioux and
Cheyennes were all circling about us. General Crook sent for me. The
entire command was surrounded. I thought it was my last day. I asked to
be allowed to make a dash for a weak point in the line, his soldiers to
follow. I did this and we broke through. Crook right flanked the enemy
and won the day. In the counter attack two other Crows were on the ridge
with me fighting. I raised my coup stick to strike a Sioux and he shot
me, hitting my horse and we fell together. I found that I was badly
wounded and could not stand up. I raised up as far as I could and fired
three shots at the Sioux. There the battle ended.”
War worn, halting on one foot, this savior of Crook’s entire command
presents a pitiful remnant of Indian valour. Speech more pathetic never
came from the lips of any man: “The greatest thing to me is the education
of my children. Since I was wounded, about thirty-six years ago, I have
been thinking over my life. My leg has been weak and my heart has been
sorry. I feel that I have suffered because I have followed my Great
Father’s order. I am glad I fought for the soldiers, for I think it was
the right thing to do. Because of my wounded leg I am not able to work;
sometimes I nearly starve, and yet I feel that I did the right thing.
Will you be kind enough to see that I get my pension? I need it!” Be kind
enough? Let the Government make answer in gratitude to the sagacious
bravery of a red man bearing through life his daily burden of pain and the
greater suffering of an unrequited heart who gloriously met the test of
sacrifice.
[Mountain Chief]
Mountain Chief
Mountain Chief
Omaq-kat-tsa, carrying with it the meaning of Big Brave, is a name
eminently fitting to Mountain Chief. The nobility of his presence, the
Roman cast of his face, the keen penetration of his eye, the breadth of
his shoulders, the dignity with which he wears the sixty-seven years of
his life, all conspire to make this hereditary chief of the Fast Buffalo
Horse band of the Blackfeet preeminent among the Indians and eminent among
any class of men. He wears his hair on the left side in two braids; on
the right side he wears one braid, and where the other braid should be,
the hair hangs in long, loose black folds. He is very demonstrative. He
acts out in pantomime all that he says. He carries a tin whistle pendent
to his necklace. First he is whistling, again he is singing, then he is
on his hands and knees on the ground pawing up the dust like a buffalo
when he is angry. His gestures are violent and his speech is guttural,
like the sputtering of water from an exhaust. He sings a war song of his
own composition and you can hear him for a mile. When asked to tell a
story of his boyhood days he said that rather than tell such a story he
would prefer to describe the management of the camp under the two great
chiefs; his father, Mountain Chief, and Chief Lame Bull. These two men
signed the treaty between the United States and the Blackfoot tribe,
together with other tribes, in 1855, when Franklin Pierce was President.
The historic information vouchsafed by Mountain Chief regarding the
conduct of an Indian camp, their manner and method of hunting buffalo, and
the purposes to which they put the buffalo, has never before been put in
type:
“I remember the different chiefs in the camp when I was a boy, and how
they governed the camp. My father, Mountain Chief, and his chum, Chief
Lame Bull, were living in the same tepee. They each had a medicine pipe.
These two chiefs made the plans before they moved the camp. After the
plans were made, they took their medicine pipes and placed them against
the rear side of the tepee. That indicated that the camp was going to
remain for another day. The women of the camp were sent around by the
various warriors to note the position of the pipes so they could tell what
the plans were. When they came back, they told their husbands the pipes
were in the rear of the tepee; then the husbands would say: ‘The camp is
going to remain for another day.’ Then the chiefs sent for Four Bear, who
asked certain Indians to go around and tell the people that the camp would
remain for another day. Then Four Bear went toward the camp from the
sunrise and walked around the camp toward the sunset. Then the Indians
told their wives and children to keep still, and see what was going to be
said. Four Bear would then tell the people that the camp would remain
another day and to tell their wives to go after wood. Then the women took
the travois and went after wood. Then the chiefs sent for the leaders and
warriors; we called them ‘crazy dogs.’ The leaders of the crazy dogs came
into the tepee of Mountain Chief and Lame Bull, and my father, Mountain
Chief, told these two crazy dogs to start before sunrise, and to take with
them the other crazy dogs to find where there was a lot of good fresh
water, and a lot of grass where they might camp, and also where they might
find the nearest herd of buffalo. The crazy dogs found a good place where
there was plenty of buffalo and water, and then they marked the camp.
When these crazy dogs found a location for the camp they were fortunate
enough to find a big herd of buffalo. On their return, before they
reached the camp they began to sing a crazy dog song, riding abreast. It
means: ‘A song to sharpen your knife, and patch up your stomach, for you
are going to have something good to eat.’ They made a circle, coming to
camp from the sunrise, and moved toward the sunset, and then the leaders
told the camp they had seen lots of buffalo. Then they dismounted and
went home. After the crazy dogs had had their meal, they went over to the
tepee of the chiefs; then they told the chiefs they had found a good
camping place, good ground, good water, and a big herd of buffalo just
beyond. The crazy dogs had their smoke, it was late when they went home,
and then they sent for Four Bear. Four Bear went to the camp, told the
people concerning their new camp, and the next morning the women took the
medicine pipes and put them at the side of the tepee looking toward the
direction where they were going to camp. Husbands told their wives to go
out and see on which side of the tepee the medicine pipes were placed,
that they might know where they were going. Then the wives came in and
told them that the medicine pipes pointed in a northerly direction. The
husbands told the wives that the camp was going to move north. The camp
broke up that very morning. The chiefs and their wives sat by their
tepees in a half circle, smoking while the camp was being broken up.
After the chiefs were through smoking, they got up, and found the camp
ready to move. They got a lot of mixed tobacco ready, and then they got
on their horses. The chiefs started out in procession. After going some
distance they halted; the crazy dogs followed, standing on each side,
watching the movement of the camp to see that everybody was out. After
everybody had left the camp, the chiefs followed the procession. When
they thought it was noon they made a halt. They took their travois and
saddles from the horses, and rested; then had their lunch. The chiefs
then told Four Bear to get the camp in traveling shape again, and went on.
Finally they came to the spot where the camping place was marked. They
then took the medicine pipes and put them on a tripod, and the warriors
came and sat around and smoked. Four Bear was then told to get the people
settled, to tie up the buffalo horses, and get ready for the hunt. Four
Bear then told the people not to get a meal but to get a little lunch, and
get ready for the hunt. Then the chiefs started out for the buffalo, the
hunters following. They stopped halfway before they got to the herd, and
told all the hunters not to start for the buffalo until they were all
ready and everybody had a fair chance. In the meantime one of the Indians
sneaked away to crawl up toward the buffalo. Then this fellow chased the
buffalo, and the crazy dogs took after him. When they got him, they broke
his gun, his arrows and bow, broke his knife, cut his horse’s tail off,
tore off his clothes, broke his saddle in pieces, tore his robe in pieces,
cut his rope into small bits, also his whip. Then they sent him off
afoot. About that time the buffalo had stopped again, then the main body
got on their horses, and started the chase. If a hunter hit a buffalo
with one arrow, he gave a scream, and that indicated that he had hit him
just once. There were very few guns in those days and those were
flint-locks. Sometimes when a hunter rode side by side with a buffalo,
and shot the animal, the arrow would go clear through. The Indians were
very proud and careful of their arrows. They did not wish to break them.
That is the reason why they shot them on the side, so that when the
buffalo fell the arrow would not be broken. Lots of the buffalo fell on
their knees, and would begin to move from side to side. Then the Indian,
for fear that the arrow would be broken, jumped off his horse and pulled
it out. The hunter then tied his horse to the horns of the buffalo for
fear that he might be attacked by enemies at any moment. After this they
took out their knives and sharpened them on hard steel, like the flint
with which they made fire. All the time they were sharpening their knives
they were looking around for the approach of the enemy. The fire steel
was scarce, we had to use rocks most of the time. The knives we procured
from the Hudson Bay Company. When we killed a buffalo bull, we placed him
on his knees, then we began to skin him down the back of the neck, down
the backbone, splitting it on each side. The cows we laid on their backs,
and cut down the middle. We used the buffalo cowhide for buffalo robes;
the buffalo bulls’ hides were split down the back because from this hide
we made war shields, parflesche bags, and saddle blankets. The husbands
would tell the wives to take care of the heads. The wives took the brains
out of the buffalo skull and mixed them with the largest part of the
liver, and after mixing well, used the brains and liver in tanning the
hides. Then the wife was told to take out the tripe and skin it, for they
used the skin as a bucket with which to carry water when they got home.
They had strips of rawhide about three feet long and a quarter of an inch
wide and tied the meat so that they could carry it home on the horses.
They took the backbone after it had been cleaned of the flesh, and tied
the meat to that and threw it over the back of the horse so that the load
would not hurt the back of the horse. When we got home with the meat we
unloaded. The men who had gone without their wives simply got off their
horses and went into the tepee. The women rushed out to get the meat.
Then the women took the horse with the meat on it to their father-in-law.
Then the mother-in-law hurried to get the meal, taking the ribs of the
buffalo, setting them up against the fire to roast. After the meat was
cooked it was cut in slices and placed in a wooden bowl, and the
mother-in-law took the meat over to the lodge of her son-in-law. That was
all we had for our meal. We had no coffee or anything else to eat, but we
made a good meal from the meat of the buffalo. Then the son-in-law said
to his wife: Your mother has been feeding me all the time, now you go out
and catch that mare and give it to her as a present. There was plenty of
meat in the camp and then we boys would go out and play buffalo. We would
take a long piece of rawhide, fasten a piece of meat to it, and one of us
would drag it along while the others fired arrows into it—the arrows we
used for killing squirrels and birds. When we chased the boy dragging the
piece of meat he would stop after we overtook him, and paw the dust and
would imitate the buffalo bull, and pick up the piece of meat and swing it
round his head, all the while we were trying to shoot arrows into it. But
sometimes in the swinging of the meat with the arrows in it a boy would
get hit, and then he would run back and fall down, and we would run back
to him and say that he had been hooked. He would be groaning all the
time. Then we would pick up weeds and squeeze the juice out of them,
acting as though we were doctors. About that time night came on, and the
chiefs sent for Four Bear, and Four Bear would go around and tell the
people that the grass in that camp was pretty well taken up. The next
morning the women would take their medicine pipes and put them on the
side, indicating where the next camp was going to be, and thus we went on
from camp to camp.”
“The years have passed on, and now the old warriors and myself get
together and talk about the old buffalo days, and we feel very lonesome.
We talk over the camping places, and the old days of the chase, and the
events of those times, and we feel glad again. When we think of the old
times we think also of the white man for it was their arms that made the
buffalo extinct. If the Indians had had nothing but arrows, the buffalo
would be left to-day. We blame the Government again, for they told the
agents not to sell ammunition to the Indians, and they sold this
ammunition on the sly. This was done so that the Indians could get the
hides for the traders.”
“The greatest event in my life was in the war of the Black-feet against
the Crees, at Hope Up, Canada. My horse and myself were both covered with
blood. Let me tell you about this battle. The war was between the
Blackfeet and the Crees. The camp was on Old Man’s River. The bands were
so many that they were camped on every bend of the river. My father,
Mountain Chief, was at the upper end of the camp. I was twenty-two years
old at the time. It was in the fall of the year, and the leaves had all
fallen. The lower camp was attacked by the Crees at night. The people
were just getting up in the morning when the news came that the lower camp
had been attacked by the Crees. I got my best horse; it was a gray horse.
My father led his band in company with Big Lake who that summer had been
elected a big chief. We rode up over the ridge while in the plain below
the battle was raging. As we rode down the hill slope, I began to sing my
war song. I carried the shield in my hand and this song that I sung
belonged to that shield. One of the medicine men dreamed that whoever
held this shield would not be hit by the bullets. While singing I put in
the words: ‘My body will be lying on the plains.’ When I reached the line
of battle I did not stop, but rode right in among the Crees, and they were
shooting at me from behind and in front. When I rode back the same way
the men made a break for the coulee. As soon as the men got into the
coulee they dug a pit. I was lying about ten yards away on the side of
the hill. I was singing while lying there. I could not hear on account
of the roar of the guns, and could not see for the smoke. About that time
they heard my whistle, and the Crees made a break for the river. Then the
Blackfeet made an onrush for the Crees and I ran over two of them before
they got to the river. As they were crossing the river I jumped off my
horse and took my spear and stabbed one of the Crees between the
shoulders. He had a spear and I took that away from him. I jumped off my
horse again, and just as I returned there was a Cree who raised his gun to
fire at me. I ran over him, and he jumped up and grabbed my horse by the
bridle. I swung my horse’s head around to protect myself and took the
butt of my whip and knocked him down. When I struck him he looked at me
and I found that his nose had been cut off. I heard afterward that a bear
had bitten his nose off. After I knocked him down, I killed him. I
jumped on my horse and just then I met another Cree. We had a fight on
our horses; he shot at me and I shot at him. When we got close together I
took his arrows away from him, and he grabbed me by the hair of the head.
I saw him reach for his dagger, and just then we clinched. My war-bonnet
had worked down on my neck, and when he struck at me with his dagger it
struck the war-bonnet, and I looked down and saw the handle sticking out,
and grabbed it and killed the other Indian. Then we rushed the Crees into
the pit again, and my father came up with one of the old muskets and
handed it to me. It had seven balls in it, and when I fired it it kicked
so hard it almost killed me. I feel that I had a more narrow escape by
shooting that gun than I had with the Indians. When we returned I had
taken nine different scalps. The Crees who had not been scalped had taken
refuge in the scant forest, and my father said to quit and go home. So we
took pity on the tribe, and let them go, so they could tell the story. I
remember that we killed over three hundred, and many more that I cannot
remember. When we returned we began to count how many we had killed. We
crossed the creek and went to the pit, and they were all in a pile. Then
we were all singing around the pit, and I put in the words, ‘The guns,
they hear me.’ And everybody turned and looked at me, and I was a great
man after that battle. Then we went home and began to talk about the
battle, and the Indians who were dead. There never was any peace between
the Crees and the Black-feet; they were always bitter enemies. When the
battle began, the leader of the Crees came right up to our tepee and slit
it, and said: ‘You people are sleeping yet, and I came,’ I fired a gun
and killed him. The Crees took their knives and slit the tepees of our
village down the sides and then rushed in. When the Crees rushed into the
tepees they took everything they could lay their hands on, killing the
women and children, and that made me mad. That was why I fought so hard
that day.”
[War Memories]
War Memories
Mountain Chief’s Boyhood Sports
“I remember when I was a boy how we used to trap foxes. We all got
together and took our sisters along, took the axe, went into the woods and
cut willows, tied them up in bundles, and put them on our backs, our
sisters doing the same thing. We would go to the east of the camp, where
the smoke and all of the scent would go, find a snowdrift in the coulee
and unload our packs. The first thing we did was to stamp on the snow—to
see if it was solid. We would drive four sticks into the snow, and while
driving in the sticks we would sing: ‘I want to catch the leader.’ The
song is a fox song to bring good luck. As far as I can remember I got
this story from my grandfather. There was an old man in the camp who went
to the mountains, and stayed there for four days without anything to eat
in order that he might get his dream. A fox came to him and told him:
‘This is one way you can kill us,’ and this is why we put in this song
while we were making the deadfall. After we got through fixing up our
deadfall we returned home, a boy in the lead, then a girl, then a boy,
then a girl, and while we were returning to the camp we sang the fox song,
putting in these words: ‘I want to kill the leader.’ Then we fell down,
imitating the fox in the trap. When we got back to camp we took buffalo
meat, covering it with fat and roasted it a while so that the fox would
get the scent. Then we took the bait and put it on a stick and put it
over our left arm, and then the boys and girls all went back again,
singing as we went; ‘We hope to have good luck.’ This song was a
good-luck song. After we put the bait in the trap we all went home
silently, not saying a word. But before we went to bed my mother said to
me: ‘I am going to get a piece of dried beef without any fat, and you take
it over to the old man who always has good luck in trapping foxes, and he
will pray for you that you may have good luck.’ When the dried meat was
done, I took it over to the old man, gave it to him, and asked him to pray
for me that I might have good luck. The old fellow would then start to
say his prayers for me. The old man to whom he prayed was the old man
that dreamed how to kill the fox. The old man told me to pick up four
stones about five inches long, and tie them with a string. He tied a
stone on each wrist, one behind my neck, and one at the back of my belt.
Then he took charcoal and blackened my nose on each side to represent the
fox, then he made me take off my clothes; he took a stick about five feet
long and held it in an inclined position. The old man then took two
sticks and hit them together, and stood right by the door singing. He
told me to whistle; then he walked toward the point where he had held the
sticks. He then lay down by the stick and began to scratch on the ground
as though he were caught in a trap. Then he said: ‘You are going to catch
one now.’ By this time it was pretty late in the night. We gave a signal
to the other boys and girls to come out and we all went to see our traps.
I had a robe made out of a yearling calfskin that I threw over me, and I
also had a rope my mother gave me with which to drag the foxes home if I
caught any. Then we went to our traps, following the same path as we did
when we went to set the trap with bait. As we went along we filled the
night with song, singing: ‘The fox is in a trap, and his tail is sticking
out.’ When we got near the traps we stopped singing, and one of us went
on ahead. The leader who went ahead walked straight to our trap, when he
returned he whistled; then we knew that some of us had caught something.
When he came back he pointed out certain ones who had caught foxes. Then
we lifted our deadfalls, slipped the ropes over them, and dragged them
home. As we approached the camp we formed in line abreast, and began to
sing. When we reached the camp every one was in bed. We sang the song
which indicated that we had caught something; then we imitated the cry of
the crow and the magpie, which indicated that we had had extra good luck.
If we imitated the hooting of an owl, it showed that we had had bad luck,
and none of us had caught anything. We were always anxious to catch some
wild game, because we sold the skins to the traders, and with the money we
bought knives and brass earrings and beads and paint.”
[Chief Red Cloud]
Chief Red Cloud
Chief Red Cloud
Chief Red Cloud, head chief of the Ogallallas, was without doubt the most
noted and famous chief at the time of his death, December, 1909, in the
United States. He became famous through his untiring efforts in
opposition to everything the Government attempted to do in the matter of
the pacification of the Sioux. One of the most lurid pages in the history
of Indian warfare records the massacre at Fort Phil Kearny, in December,
1866. Chief Red Cloud planned and executed this terrific onslaught. He
always remained a chief. He was always the head of the restless element,
always the fearless and undaunted leader. He was the Marshal Ney of the
Indian nations, until sickness and old age sapped his vitality and
ambition.
The holding of the last Great Indian Council occurred a little less than
two months before his death. Blind and bedridden he could not attend the
council. During the last few shattered years of his warrior life, he
relegated all the powers of chieftainship to his son, now fifty-four years
of age. The younger Chief Red Cloud attended the council. He is tall and
straight and lithe, and possesses a splendid military bearing. He is a
winsome speaker, and his words are weighted with the gold of Nature’s
eloquence. Every attitude of his body carries the charm of consummate
grace, and when he talks to you there is a byplay of changing lights in
his face that becomes fascinating. Like his father he was a born leader
and warrior. His story of the Custer fight and his participation in it
may be found in the chapter on that subject. Regarding his own life he
tells us:
“It has been a part of my life to go out on the warpath, ever since I was
fourteen years old. As you know it is a part of our history that the man
who goes on the warpath and kills the most enemies gets a coup stick, and
the coup stick is the stepping-stone to become a chief. I remember my
first war party was forty-one years ago. This battle was at Pryor Creek
against the Crows. I was in four great battles, with my father, Chief Red
Cloud. At the battle of Pryor Creek I captured many horses, and took
three scalps. Thirty-four years ago I killed four Crows and earned my
coup stick. I kept these scalps until my visit to Washington when some
white man wanted them.”
“I want to speak about the buffalo. There were plenty of buffalo and deer
when I was a young man, but the white man came and frightened all the game
away, and I blame the white man for it. By order of our Great Father in
Washington the buffalo were all killed. By this means they sought to get
the Sioux Indians back to their reservation.”
“The greatest event in my life I may explain in this way: Years ago I had
been trained to go on the warpath. I loved to fight; I was fighting the
Indians and fighting the soldiers. Then there came a time when the Great
Father said we must stop fighting and go to school, we must live in peace,
that we were Indian brothers, and must live in peace with the white man.
I believe that the greatest event in my life was when I stopped the old
Indian custom of fighting and adopted what the white man told me to
do—live in peace.”
The hoar frosts of autumn had touched into opal and orange the leaves of
the forest until great banners of colour lined the banks of the swiftly
flowing Little Big Horn; the camp of the last Great Indian Council lifted
cones of white on the edge of these radiant trees. Sombre winds uttered a
melancholy note through the dying reeds on the river bank, and all of it
seemed a prelude to an opening grave, and significant of the closing words
uttered to me by Chief Red Cloud:
“My father, old Chief Red Cloud, has been a great fighter against the
Indians, and against the white man, but he learned years ago to give up
his fighting. He is now an old man, ready to die, and I am sorry that he
could not come here. It is now over five years since he gave me his power
and I became chief, and he and I both are glad that we are friends to the
white man and want to live in peace.”
[Chief Two Moons]
Chief Two Moons
Chief Two Moons
Chief Two Moons wears about his neck an immense cluster of bear claws.
His arms are also encircled with this same insignia of distinction.
Although he has reached the age of nearly threescore years and ten, his
frame is massive and his posture, when standing, typifies the forest oak.
It takes no conjuring of the imagination to picture this stalwart leader
of the Cheyennes against Custer on that fateful June day, as suffering no
loss in comparison with the great generals who led the Roman eagles to
victory. Two Moons is now nearly blind; he carries his coup stick,
covered with a wolfskin, both as a guide for his footsteps and a badge of
honour. There is not a tinge of gray in the ample folds of his hair, and
his voice is resonant and strong. His story of the Custer fight, told for
me at the cross marking the spot where Custer fell, to be found in the
Indians’ story of that battle, is both thrilling and informing.
[Here Custer Fell]
Here Custer Fell
Seated around the campfire in my tepee while a cold rain sifted through
the canvas, Two Moons became reminiscent. His mother and brother were
called Two Moons, meaning two months—in the Indian tongue, Ish-hay-nishus.
His mind seemed to travel back to his boyhood days, for he started right
in by saying: “When a Cheyenne boy wants to marry a young woman it takes a
long time for them to get acquainted with each other. When he wants to
marry a girl or have her for a sweetheart he tells another fellow with
whom he is acquainted, and who is also acquainted with the girl, and this
young man goes and tells her, the same as a white man writes to the young
lady on paper. And this Indian friend brings them together; this Indian
goes and tells the girl that the boy wants to be a sweetheart to her, and
the girl will say, ‘Well, I will think it over.’ And then she thinks it
over, and finally says if he comes to see her some time in the day or
night then she will believe that he is a sweetheart of hers. So then the
young man goes to the young girl, and talks to her, and they make up their
minds to get married. They get married after this fashion: the young man
may go to the tent of the girl at night and the girl may come out, then
the boy will take the girl away to his home. So then the next morning the
young man’s folks and family bring their presents. They take two or three
horses, good horses, and load these horses up with good stuff, clothes,
shawls, necklaces, bracelets, and moccasins. Then they take the girl back
to her home. The girl’s family divides up the presents after they get
home.”
“There is another way: When an old man and woman decide they want a
grandchild, they tell their son they are going to buy a certain girl and
he must marry her. Then another Indian goes and tells the girl’s family
that they would like to trade for the girl, and if it is all right he goes
back and the boy’s people load up some horses with goods, and take them
over to the girl’s folks. And then they take her back and give her to the
boy’s family. The bride was bedecked with brass rings which were taken
from the tepee, but they used other rings for engagement rings after the
white man came.”
In speaking of death, Two Moons said: “If the person who dies has a mother
or father or friend, they all cry, and all the things that belonged to the
boy they give away to other people. They dig a grave in between the rocks
and put the body in the ground and cover it up with dirt and rocks. They
always dig a grave for a person who dies whether they have friends or
folks. The old people believed there was a man came on earth here and
some of his children had done a lot of crime and fooling with him, and
they talked of his going up to heaven, and living there and looking down,
and that is where we will all go when we die. Also the old people
believed that that man said: ‘There will be a kind of cross light up in
the sky, which will mark the path for souls on the road.’ ‘High White Man’
is our name for God. And it was the son of High White Man who told this,
and who created us and made everything.”
“The first time the Indian saw a locomotive, he called it the Iron Horse,
and the railroad was called the Iron Road. The old people first saw what
they called white men, and they called the white man a Ground Man. I was
so young then that I did not know anything at that time. I saw some men
driving an ox team, or carrying packs on their backs and walking. When I
got older most of the people knew that these white men were good. The
first time they saw a white man they called him Drive-a-Wagon. They did
not know what they were hauling, but found out afterward that it was sugar
and coffee. I remember how pleased I was when I first saw sugar and
coffee. When I was a boy the Indians used to get the grains of coffee and
put it in a bucket and boil it, and it would never cook at all. Finally a
white man came along and took the coffee and put it in a bucket and put it
on the coals without any water, and stirred it until it turned brown, and
then he took it off and mashed it up between two stones, and that was how
we learned to make coffee. I like it, and have always liked it.”
“The white man is to blame for the driving away of the buffalo.” (It will
here be observed that the Indian cannot talk very long at a time without
this ever recurring subject being forced to the front.) “After the white
man had driven the buffalo away, a great council among the Indians was
held; all the tribes possible were called to this big council on the
Platte River. All the different tribes were there. A white man came
there and brought a lot of stuff, such as clothes, plates, guns, coffee
grinders, knives, blankets, and food, and gave them to the Indians. They
also brought shoes. This man said that he wanted some Indians to go to
Washington. They went down the Missouri River. They went by ox team from
the Platte River to the Missouri, and then by ship down the Missouri
River. These men were gone to Washington for a year; they came back about
the middle of the summer. The President told the Indians they were his
grandchildren, and thus the Indians called the President their
grandfather. Grandfather told them that a white man would come and live
with them, and that for fifty-five years they would get clothes and food.
I was nine years old when they held the council and ten years old when
they came back. From the time of the council the old people settled down
in the Black Hills and in the south and quit running around. From that
time all the Indians became friends of the white man, and the white man
bought the buffalo hides and other skins. After they settled down
everything went along all right until I was fifteen years old, and then
the whites came in and there was a fight between the whites and Cheyennes
and some other tribes of Indians. I do not know what happened, but some
Cheyennes went over to the white man’s camp on Shell River, and the white
men started to fire at the Indians. That was the cause of the trouble
that year. Later the Comanches and Apaches and Kiowas fought among
themselves, and came north to fight the Cheyennes. We called them the
Texas Indians. Then the wars between the tribes and the hostilities
between the Red and White grew less and less. There was a man named
Honey;—the Indians called him Bee—he told the Cheyennes they must not
fight. In the numerous battles in which I was engaged I received many
wounds. I was wounded by the Pawnee Indians in a fight with them, by an
arrow; wounded again at Elk River in the Yellowstone, when I was shot
through the arm by a Crow of the Big Horn. I was wounded again on the
Crow River in Utah in a fight with the United States soldiers, when I was
shot through the thigh. I had my horse shot through the jaw in a fight
with the Crows, but to-day I am a friend of all the tribes; once I was
their enemy. I was told by General Miles at Fort Kearny that we must not
fight any more, that it was the orders from Washington. I remember
General Miles well. I know him and I am a friend of his. When General
Miles told me what I ought to do, it was just as though he put me in his
hand and showed me the white man and the Indian, and told us we were all
to be good friends, so that is the reason General Miles’ name is a great
name among the Cheyennes as well as the whites. And your coming among us
is just like General Miles; you are helping the Indians and can help them.
They need help for they are all poor. After the Indians settled down and
General Miles had told us what the Great Father at Washington wanted, and
after I had succeeded in settling the Indians, the order came from
Washington that we should take up land and call it a claim. So I looked
all around for land on which to settle; then I went over to Tongue River
on the Rosebud so that my family and children could be reared and have a
home. All that I have told you is true. General Miles told me that when
I settled down and took this land, there might be some people who would
come along and try to cheat us out of our land, but not to pay any
attention to them, that it was our land. There are a great many people
settled in Montana in the land that belonged to the Indians. These people
are raising lots of cattle and ought to be good to the Indian. I have
been on this land for over twenty years, but we are not yet accustomed to
the white man’s food: we love the meat yet, and we long for the buffalo.
There is a great deal of land leased by cattle men in Montana, and the
money ought to go to buy more cattle for the Indian, and clothes for our
children. I like to tell the truth just as I have seen it with my own
eyes, and I will have another good story for you to-morrow night. I am
getting old, but when I begin to talk about the old times I think I am
young again, and that I am the biggest of them all.”
[Custer Scouts]
Custer Scouts
THE STORY OF THE SURVIVING CUSTER SCOUTS
Too little stress has been laid upon the values accruing to the safety and
success of the United States troops, in their warfare on the western
frontier, from the services of Indian scouts.
A wild and often inaccessible country to traverse, with none of the aids
of electricity or modern travel; with difficult mountain ranges to climb,
blinding blizzards and insufferable cold, blistering heat, and the hazards
of unknown rivers to cross through banks of perilous quicksands;
stupendous distances to travel, and all the time an alert, wily, and
masterful foe lurking in any one of ten thousand impregnable coverts—this
is a hint of the scout’s life. These brave and tireless scouts led not to
ambush but to the advantage of our men at arms. Estimate the bravery, the
sagacity, the perseverance, the power of endurance displayed by these
Indian scouts, and their superlative service will call for our patriotic
gratitude. No trial of strength and endurance, no test of bravery, no
audacity of peril, hindered or made them afraid. They were more important
than guns and munitions of war. The Crows made the best scouts, for two
reasons: They had never taken up arms against the whites; all the
neighbouring tribes battled against the Crows for the conquest of their
land. The Crow scouts, therefore, aided the United States soldiers to
conquer and drive out their hereditary foes that they might preserve their
land and their homes. It was therefore not only a fight of fidelity and
fealty but of preservation—Nature’s strongest law.
Our story is now concerned with the four surviving scouts who led the
United States soldiers in many campaigns under Crook, Terry, Miles,
Howard, and finally Custer. The Indians who piloted Long Hair to the
great Sioux camp in the valley of the Little Big Horn—the last day of life
for Custer, the last contest at arms for the Indians—are now old men, and
their own life record is full of thrilling interest.
[White Man Runs Him—Custer Scout]
White Man Runs Him—Custer Scout
White-Man-Runs-Him
This red man of the plains is a veritable Apollo Belvedere. He is
pronounced by all ethnologists as possessing a physique hardly paralleled
by any of the northern tribes. He fulfills in his life the nobility of
his stature. At the age of sixty-five, his figure, seventy-four inches in
height, stands unbent—supple and graceful. His whole aspect is that of
quiet dignity, his voice is soft and musical, his eye is keen and
penetrating; modestly and earnestly he describes his share in the Custer
fight. He was trustworthy to the point of death. Very many times the
safety of an entire command depended upon his caution and sagacity. He
served as scout under Terry, Crook, and Custer.
While telling his story he stood upright, lifted his hands full length,
which among the Crows signified an oath, meaning that he would tell the
truth. His Indian boyhood name was Be-Shay-es-chay-e-coo-sis, “White
Buffalo That Turns Around.” When he was about ten years of age his
grandfather named him after an event in his own father’s life. A white
man pursued his father, firing his gun above his father’s head in order to
make him run. And he was afterward called “White-Man-Runs-Him.”
Regarding his boyhood days he tells us: “Until I was fifteen years of age,
together with my boy playmates, we trained with bows and arrows. We
learned to shoot buffalo calves, and this practice gave us training for
the warpath. It answered two purposes: protection and support. We were
also taught the management of horses. We early learned how to ride well.
When the camp moved we boys waited and walked to the new camp for
exercise, or we hunted on the way. We felt brave enough to meet anything.
Thus it was that we roamed over the hills, and climbed the rocks in search
of game, but we were sure to arrive at the camp just in time for the meal
which had been prepared by the squaws. If on our way to the camp we came
across game, such as a rabbit, we shot it with our arrows, broiled it and
ate it for fun. When we got to the new camp we would all praise one boy
for some deed that he had performed on the way, and then we would sing and
dance. That boy’s folks would give all us boys a dish of pemmican for the
good deed he had performed. The little girls had small tepees. They
practised cooking, learning from the older women. These girls would serve
delicacies to us, and we would sing and dance around their tepee.”
“When we were quite small boys we would go out hunting horses, and bring
back a dog and call it a horse. When we made a new camp we seldom stayed
more than ten days. In that way our health was sustained by travel.
While we were on the move from one camp to another, we had to cross wide
streams. We boys would measure the width of the river, and compete with
each other to see who could swim across without stopping. I am telling
you now what I did to build myself up to be the man I am now. The boys
who were the same age and size as myself would wrestle, and if a boy
downed me three or four times, I kept up the practice of wrestling until I
had more strength. Then I could throw this boy and I was satisfied. I
selected a boy to run a race; if the boy passed me, then I made the
distance longer, and if he passed me again, I made the distance still
longer, for I knew that I was long-winded. Then I won the race.”
“Fifteen or twenty of us boys would go out to the river, and daub
ourselves up with mud and so disguise ourselves that no one in the camp
would know us. Then we would take jerked buffalo beef that the women had
hung up around the camp to dry and go off out of sight and have a feast.
None of us was caught at it, because they could not tell one boy from
another. During this time I watched what old people did. When I came to
grow up, I went forth equipped. I always had an amibition to do more than
the best man in the camp could do. When I went on the chase, I made up my
mind that I would bring home a buffalo or I would not go home. And my
folks rejoiced, believing that they had a good boy to help support the
family.”
“We were surrounded by many different tribes, Shoshones, Sioux, Piegans,
and Gros Ventres. They were all our enemies. We often went on the
warpath against these people, because they were always trying to take our
horses and conquer our land. When we went on the warpath sometimes we
would stop and kill a buffalo and have a feast. If we could, we crawled
up on the enemy’s camp and stole his horses. If we met a foe we tried to
kill him and bring his scalp home.”
“Our custom of painting was a sign. If in a dream we saw any one painted,
that was our medicine. In our dreams we would see various kinds of paints
and how to use them; we would see certain birds and feathers, and we
adopted this as our style of paint. Others would try to buy from us our
style of paint. The kind of paint and feathers we wore made us brave to
do great deeds—to kill the enemy or take his horses. We did not buy
horses, but stole them. We gave the horses to our relations. If I got
one or more horses, it represented so much value to me, and brought honour
to me. And, besides, the girls admired the man who could go out and get
horses, and in this way we won a wife. After marriage I would sell a
horse, buy elk teeth, beaded leggings, and put them on my wife as a
wedding present. Elk teeth and horses were a sign of wealth. Then my
wife would make a tepee, and put it up; then I would settle down and have
a home.”
“In early days we had nothing for clothing except the skins of animals.
We used the buffalo hide or the deer hide for a breechclout. For a bucket
we used the tripe of the buffalo, after thoroughly cleaning it. We would
hang it up on the branch of a tree, full of water, and drink out of it.”
“The white people came long before I was born, but when I first remember
the white man I thought he was very funny. I never knew of any one person
particularly, but I know there are good white people and bad white people,
honest white people and dishonest white people, true white people and mean
white people. We always take it for granted that what the white people
say is true, but we have found out by experience that they have been
dishonest with us and that they have mistreated us. Now when they say
anything we think about it, and sometimes they are true. I am saying this
about the white people in general.”
“Going back to the days when we had no horses, we would see the buffalo on
the plains; we then surrounded them, driving them as we did so, near to
the edge of some steep precipice. When we got the buffalo up near the
edge of the precipice we would all wave our blankets and buffalo robes and
frighten the buffalo and they would run off the steep place, falling into
the valley below, one on top of another. Of course the undermost animals
were killed. Then we would go down and get them and take away the meat.”
“The Indians found some dogs on the prairie. After they got the dogs they
would fasten a pole on either side of the dogs with a tanned hide fastened
between the poles, and the Indians would put their trappings, their meat,
and their pappooses on this hide stretched between the poles. In that way
they moved from place to place, the dog carrying the utensils of the camp.
We called it a travois. One day when we were moving, the dog who was
carrying a baby in the travois saw a deer and ran after it. He went over
a bank and carried the baby with him, and finally came back without the
baby.”
“In counting the dead on the battlefield we placed sticks by the dead
soldiers or Indians, then gathered the sticks up, took them to one place
in a pile and there counted the sticks. We count by fixing events in our
mind. We have a brain and a heart, and we commit to memory an event, and
then we say Chief So-and-So died when we broke camp on the Big Horn, and
So-and-So were married when we had the big buffalo hunt in the snow. Or
we had a big fight with the Sioux when our tepees were placed in a ring in
the bend of the Yellowstone River. We dated our time from these events.”
Folklore Tale—Crow
“When I was a little boy this is a story that was told around every
campfire: It was called ‘Old Man Coyote!’ Before the white man came the
coyote used to roam over all the land. The Old Man Coyote took the little
coyotes he picked up on the prairies and called them his little brothers.
The little coyote was such a sly animal that the old coyote always sent
him on errands, because he knew he would always be up to something. The
Old Man Coyote says: ‘We are alone: let us make man.’ He said: ‘Go and
bring me some mud so that I can make a man, so that we can be together.’
The Old Man Coyote took the mud and put it together, and put hair on it,
and set it up on the ground, and said: ‘There is a man!’ The little
coyote said: ‘Make some more.’ And the Old Man Coyote made four—two were
women and two were men. The Old Man sized them up and said they were
good, and so he made a whole lot more. Old Man Coyote said: ‘It is good
that we live together, and I want you to open each other’s eyelids.’ Old
Man Coyote said to these people whom he had made: ‘Now, if you stay
together and are good to each other, you will be happy, and you will
increase in numbers.’ Old Man Coyote was our creator. Old Man Coyote
said to these people whom he had made: ‘This is your land; live here, eat
of the fruit of the trees, drink of the rivers, hunt the game, and have a
good time.’ From that we believe that the white people had nothing to do
with the land—it belonged to the Indian. This story, told to our people
so many times, and told to me since I can remember, led me to believe when
I came to know and understand that this land was wholly ours, and belonged
entirely to the Indians. Old Man Coyote, after he had created man and
woman, did not have anything to do, so he made a bow and arrow. He took
the flint for the arrowhead, and with it he killed the buffalo. Then he
gave the bow and arrow to the Indian and said to him: ‘This is your
weapon.’ The people whom Old Man Coyote created had no knife, so he took
the shoulder blade of the buffalo and sharpened it and made it into a
knife. These people whom Old Man Coyote had created roamed round over the
land and they found a mule. It was a great big mule with great big ears,
and when they brought it home the people were all afraid of it. They all
gathered around the mule, staring in amazement at him, and said: ‘What
kind of an animal is this? It is a dangerous animal.’ Just then the mule
stuck up his ears, and let out an awful cry, just such a cry as only the
mule can make. Then the people all ran away as hard as they could go,
scared almost to death, except one Indian, who fell flat on the earth—too
scared to run. And finally the people called this man,
‘Not-Afraid-of-the-Mule.’ And in this way we learned how to name our
Indians.”
[Hairy Moccasin—Custer Scout]
Hairy Moccasin—Custer Scout
Hairy Moccasin
Isapi-Wishish is the name the Indians called Hairy Moccasin, a scout under
Gibbon, Miles, Howard, and Custer. His frame is small and wiry, and like
his brother scout, Goes-Ahead, he too will soon be numbered with the great
army of the dead. Silent, unobtrusive, carrying no mark of distinction,
his moccasined feet move slowly along the path made by others. It must be
noted that however unprepossessing his personality he wears an untarnished
badge for bravery and faithful service as a scout. White-Man-Runs-Him
said: “I cannot say anything better about Hairy Moccasin than to say that
he executed faithfully the orders of General Custer.” He was the boyhood
playmate of White-Man-Runs-Him. They were companions in all the sports
and games and tricks of the camp. When the Custer scouts traversed the
difficult and dangerous route from the Little Rosebud to the valley where
they located the mighty camp of the Sioux, it was Hairy Moccasin who under
the stars of that June night reached the apex of the hills at dawn. The
other scouts lay down to rest. Hairy Moccasin, leaving the others asleep,
went to the summit—which is called the Crow’s Nest—and as the gray streaks
of the dawn began to silver the east, it was Moccasin’s eye which caught
the vision of the myriads of white tents, of the brown hills in the
distance covered with brown horses, the curling smoke from hundreds of
wigwams. Word was sent back to Custer. In excited tones, he asked: “Have
you seen the cut-throat Sioux?” From the vantage point of the hills where
they had seen the camp Hairy Moccasin was sent still farther in advance to
reconnoitre. He climbed a pine-clad hill, found the Sioux everywhere, and
then he rode back and reported to General Custer the size and position of
the camp. On hearing the report Custer hurried up his command. As the
brave general moved out of the valley up the ridge it is the testimony of
White-Man-Runs-Him that Hairy Moccasin rode immediately in advance of
Custer, and when the Chey-ennes came up, “He fired at them, banged and
banged at them, and the Cheyennes were afraid of Moccasin. They were
afraid of all three of us. Custer would have been killed before the time
he was shot if it had not been for Hairy Moccasin and myself, who were
around him shooting at the Indians.” When the United States soldiers were
fighting the Nez Perces Hairy Moccasin got a horse away from the enemy,
and brought it into the camp of the soldiers. Hairy Moccasin was always
on the warpath performing brave deeds. The name and fame of Custer will
live in the archives of his country, and a fadeless lustre will forever
crown the heroic deeds of this Indian Scout.
[Curly—Custer Scout]
Curly—Custer Scout
Curly
Curly, a Reno Crow, was born on the Little Rosebud, Montana, and is
fifty-seven years of age. He has the bearing, grace and dignity of an
orator. His name will also go down in history as one of the leading
scouts who trailed for General Custer the Indian camp, and as the last of
his scouts on the fated field where Custer and his command were slain. At
times he is taciturn and solemn, and then bubbles over with mirthfulness.
At the council held on the Crow Reservation, in October, 1907, with
reference to the opening of unoccupied lands, Curly uttered this eloquent
speech:
“I was a friend of General Custer. I was one of his scouts, and will say
a few words. The Great Father in Washington sent you here about this
land. The soil you see is not ordinary soil—it is the dust of the blood,
the flesh, and bones of our ancestors. We fought and bled and died to
keep other Indians from taking it, and we fought and bled and died helping
the whites. You will have to dig down through the surface before you can
find nature’s earth, as the upper portion is Crow. The land, as it is, is
my blood and my dead; it is consecrated, and I do not want to give up any
portion of it.”
Accompanied by a group of Indians, Curly came to my tepee when we were
camped on the Little Big Horn. The whole company were greatly agitated
because an Indian possessed with the spirit of self-importance had gone to
Washington to make war against other Indians in the tribe who were
industrious and loyal home builders. They all made speeches around the
campfire, asking my interposition at Washington. In his argument Curly
said: “Which man would you believe, the man who is trying to raise wheat
for the people to get flour and bread from, oats to feed his horses, who
builds a house for the shelter and preservation of his family, builds a
stable in which to shelter his horses, tills the soil to get the product,
trying to raise vegetables so that his people may have something to eat in
summer and winter, or the man who would come along and run over this man
who was working and trying to do something for his family, and would not
work himself, but just run around and make a renegade of himself,
quarrelling with his mother and brothers—which man would you believe? A
man who quarrels with his mother is not fit for any duty.” Gems like
these would grace any brightest page of literature, but they are the
everyday eloquence of the Indian.
Curly said regarding his early life: “When I was a boy I did not do much.
I was not crazy, but I did not run into mischief. My father and mother
always advised me not to get into mischief. My first remembrance of the
white man was when I took the skins of buffalo calves into the trading
stores and traded with the white man. I thought that was a great thing to
do. I had been many times on the trail of the buffalo and had sought
opportunity to go on the warpath. When I was about eighteen years old the
Crow chiefs made the announcement that there were some United States
officers in camp who wanted some Crow scouts. I quickly volunteered. My
brother approached us after we started and took myself and Hairy Moccasin
and White Swan and told us that we had a secret mission in another
district. My brother was then on the warpath. We went as far with my
brother as Tongue River and did not see what we were searching for and we
came back home. Then the Crow scouts left the agency and camped at
Clark’s Ford, and Bonnie Bravo and Little Face, Indian scouts and
interpreters, met us there. These scouts took us over to General Terry’s
camp again. The scouts who were with Terry had no horses, for the Sioux
had captured them. We had with us eight horses. Then we marched down as
far as the Little Rosebud. There one of Terry’s officers told us we were
to go out and scout for the Sioux camp. We went as far as Tongue River,
and Bonnie Bravo was the first one to discover the Sioux camp. Then we
came back to the command and reported. General Terry moved his cavalry
forward and attempted to ford the Yellowstone River. The water was so
high that many of the men and horses were drowned, and the rest came back.
Then Terry asked the scouts to go forward again, and see if the camp was
still there. We found that the camp had moved from Tongue River up on the
Little Rosebud. After that we reported, and General Terry did not say
very much. General Terry then sent Bonnie Bravo and the two scouts back
to the camp to procure horses. They sent two other scouts and the army
wagons to Crow Agency for provisions. The soldiers did not leave the camp
very far for fear of attack by the Sioux, for they kept close watch on
them constantly, firing at any soldiers they saw. Then General Terry sent
me toward Crow Agency to meet the wagons and the men who were with the
horses. After we had met the wagons we stayed there all night and then
went on to camp. General Terry then moved his camp, following the
Yellowstone down. We were taken clear down to the mouth of the Powder
River. White-Man-Runs-Him and another scout did not have any horses, so
they got into the boat and went down the river, bringing a dispatch to
Terry. The dispatch told us to go back and follow the Yellowstone up
again. We went back and camped within ten or twelve miles of the mouth of
the Big Horn, near where we had camped before. We stayed there three or
four days, and then a steamboat arrived bringing Bouyer, the scout. He
told us all to break camp. There were six of us who did the most of the
scouting, and out of the six Terry told three of us to go and find the
enemy’s camp. General Terry and the commander of the infantry were in the
ambulance, and Bouyer was there talking with them. Terry sent for Yellow
Shield, then Yellow Shield sent for me. Bouyer then asked me who among
the Crow scouts did the most scouting. I said White Swan, Hairy Moccasin,
and myself. These scouts then camp up and joined me. Yellow Shield then
told us that he wanted six men in all. Then we had a conference. We
thought of White-Man-Runs-Him, but he had no horse. Then Yellow Shield
said he would call White-Man-Runs-Him and Goes-Ahead to join us. After
they had called these men they put us on the steamboat and sent us down
the river, sending the other Crows home. We were taken down to the mouth
of the Little Rosebud by the Yellowstone. We were told after we had had
our dinner that we must dress ourselves up and paint up and get ready to
scout.”
Curly at this point reaches the camp of General Custer, and the remainder
of the fascinating story of this warrior, orator, and scout, who followed
with unfailing fidelity the fortunes of the United States soldiers, will
be told in the chapter on “The Indians’ Story of the Custer Fight.”
[Goes Ahead—Custer Scout]
Goes Ahead—Custer Scout
Goes-Ahead-Basuk-Ore
Goes-Ahead carries about a tall, attenuated, and weakened frame. He is
standing on the verge of yonder land. He is stricken with a fatal
disease. In manner he is as quiet and unobtrusive as a brooding bird.
When reminiscent his wonted smile disappears, his eye lights up with a
strange mysterious fire. He talks straight on like a man who has
something to tell and is eager to tell it. We may gain better glimpses of
his life if we let him tell his own tale:
“When I was quite a lad I went to war. I was the first in the battle and
the others all said: ‘There he goes ahead of us.’ I have been first in
battle ever since and thus I got my name, Goes-Ahead. The greatest
pleasure I had when I was a boy, I remember, was in killing wolves. After
we had shot the wolf we would run up and put our coup stick on him and
play that he was our enemy. Another sport we had was playing buffalo. We
divided up and part of the boys would be buffalo and part would be
hunters. The boys who were playing buffalo would paw up the dust and we
would run after them and shoot arrows at them, and then the buffalo bull
would chase us back until he caught one of the boys, then we went on until
we conquered the buffalo. When I was a young man we had buffalo skulls
with the meat and skin all taken off and we would tie ropes to them and
put them on the ice. The girls would sit on the buffalo head and we would
draw them along the ice. That was one of our greatest pleasures. I was
about fifteen years old when I first went on the war trail. It was in the
winter time and I was on foot. I used a bow and arrows and my arrows were
not very good. The young fellows who went with me had old Springfields,
using powder and bullets. We used to make a shack by the edge of the
woods, the others would kill the buffalo and then we would roast the meat
by the fire. I used to cut the buffalo meat in strips, and dried it, and
then put it in sacks and carried it along for the war party. When we made
a little log shelter at night they made me stay by the door where it was
cold and I had to do all the cooking for the party. We had no bucket with
which to carry water, so when we killed a buffalo we took the tripe and
used that for a pail in which to carry water. The scouts of the war party
of course were away ahead of us and when we made our shack in the woods
they would return at night. If they returned singing we knew that they
had buffalo and we would run to get their packs. These scouts got up
before daybreak and left the camp on another scouting expedition—they were
looking for the enemy to see which way they were moving or what they had
been killing. We found the trail by the marks of their old camps. The
scouts trailed the enemy until they found the camp, then they returned
howling like a wolf as they came near us, and then we knew they had found
the enemy. When they approached the camp we made piles of different
material and then they shook their guns at the piles and we knew that they
were telling the truth, that they had seen the enemy. Then they run over
the piles. Then we got ready for the night and stretched our ropes; we
took our medicine and tied it on our heads. Then we all stood up in a row
and they selected the bravest to take the lead to the camp of the enemy.
Then these braves started on a run, first on a dog trot and then faster
and faster until they got their speed, and then we endeavoured to keep up
until we reached the enemy’s camp. When we got within sight of the camp
we would all sit in a row and take off our moccasins and put on new ones.
Then we selected two men to go around to the camp and get all the horses
they could capture and bring them back to our party. When these horses
were caught and brought back to us we roped and mounted them bareback and
rode away as fast as we could, driving the remainder of the horses they
had captured. We kept on for days and nights without anything to eat or
any rest. After we had reached our camp and had spent the night we
painted ourselves and the best horses, mounted them, and started shooting
guns in the air; then everybody knew that the war party was back. We rode
through the camp on our horses. We did not expect the enemy to pursue us,
because we had gone so far and so long that we knew we were out of their
reach.”
[On the War Trail]
On the War Trail
“My first battle was on the Yellowstone River. I rode a roan horse. I
was scouting under General Miles. We found the trail of the Nez Perce
Indians. We fought a battle twenty miles north of where Billings is now
located. The Nez Perce chased the scouts back. Just at this time our
interpreter, Bethune, had quit riding, for his horse had played out and he
went on foot. Then many of the Nez Perce dismounted and began to surround
Bethune and open fire on him. I thought then his life would be lost and I
rode back as fast as I could ride into the midst of the fire, pulled him
on the back of my horse and rode away, saving his life.”
In his own words Goes-Ahead tells us how he became a scout in the United
States Army: “I was a single man and I loved to go on the warpath. The
chiefs announced to all the camp asking young men to go to the army
officers and enlist as scouts. As I wanted to scout I obeyed the command
of my chiefs. The army officers took the names of these young men. The
young men whose names were not taken were turned back, but they always
took my name, and that is how I came to be a scout.” Goes-Ahead tells for
us a most graphic story of his share in the Custer fight and his
impressions of General Custer in the chapter on “The Indians’ Story of the
Custer Fight.”
[In Battle Line]
In Battle Line
THE INDIANS’ STORY OF THE CUSTER FIGHT
We are thinking now of the reddest chapter in the Indian wars of the
Western plains. Out amid the dirge of landscape, framed within the valley
of the Little Big Horn, where that historic river winds its tortuous way
through the sagebrush and cactus of Montana, a weather-beaten cross stands
on a lonely hillside, surrounded by a cluster of white marble slabs, and
all marking the final resting-place of the heroes of the Seventh United
States Cavalry, who perished to a man, “in battle formation,” with their
intrepid leader, Gen. George A. Custer. “Custer’s Last Battle,” as
chroniclers of Indian wars have designated that grim tragedy, has been
written about, speculated upon, and discussed more than any other single
engagement between white troops and Indians. Volumes have already been
written and spoken on all sides—the controversy still goes on. The brave
dead sleep on; they are bivouacked on Fame’s eternal camping ground.
Civilization has irrigated the valley and swept on to Western frontiers,
but as though to forever write laurels for the brow of Custer—called the
Murat of the American army—the white stones and the decaying crucifix of
wood are surrounded by barren bluffs and a landscape so forbidding that it
is a midnight of desolation. It seems to be preserved by the God of
Battles as an inditement on the landscape never to be erased by any human
court—lonely, solemn, desolate, bereaved of any summer flower, written all
over with the purple shadows of an endless Miserere. Thirty-six years
have run through the hourglass since these dreary hills and the flowing
river listened to the furious speech of rifles and the warwhoop of
desperate redmen. The snows have piled high the parchment of winter—a
shroud for the deathless dead—whiter than the white slabs. Summer has
succeeded summer, and all the June days since that day of terrific
annihilation have poured their white suns upon these white milestones of
the nation’s destiny—the only requiem, the winds of winter, and in summer
the liquid notes of the meadow lark. In all the argument and controversy
that has shifted the various factors of the fight over the checkerboard of
contention, the voice of the Indian has hitherto been hopelessly silent.
It is historically significant, therefore, that the Indian now speaks, and
the story of Custer’s Last Battle, now told for the first time by all four
of his scouts, and leaders of the Sioux and Cheyennes, should mark an
epoch in the history of this grim battle. The Indians who tell this story
were all of them members of the last Great Indian Council, and they
visited the Custer Field a little over two miles from the camp of the
chiefs, traversed every step of the ensanguined ground and verified their
positions, recalling the tragic scenes of June 26, 1876. It matters much
in reading their story to remember that all of Ouster’s command were
killed—every lip was sealed in death and the silence is forever unbroken.
The Indian survivors are all old men: Goes-Ahead and Hairy Moccasin are
each on the verge of the grave, fatally stricken by disease; Chief Two
Moons, leader of the hostile Cheyennes, is a blind old man;
Runs-the-Enemy, a Sioux chief, totters with age. In a near tomorrow they
too will sink into silence.
[The Custer Battlefield]
The Custer Battlefield
These four scouts, faithful to the memory of Custer, together with the
Sioux and Cheyenne chiefs, trudged with the writer to stand on the spot
where Custer fell, and with bowed heads pay their silent tribute to the
dead. The camera has recorded the scene, a last vision of the red man
standing above the grave of his conquerors, a pathetic page in the last
chapter of Indian warfare.
[Scouts on the March]
Scouts on the March
THE STORY OF WHITE-MAN-RUNS-HIM—CUSTER SCOUT
The Great Father at Washington sent representatives out to our country.
The Indians met them and held a council. The Sioux were the hereditary
enemies of the Crows. The head man sent by the Great Father said to the
Crows: “We must get together and fight, and get this land from the Sioux.
We must win it by conquest.” We called the officer, who was lame,
No-Hip-Bone—the officer was General Terry. We loved our land so we
consented to go in with the soldiers and put these other tribes off the
land. No-Hip-Bone took me in the winter time, and I went with him
wherever he wanted me to go until the next summer. During this journey I
had a good horse. The Sioux took it away from me, and I was left to go on
foot, so I put my gun on my shoulder and marched with the soldiers. I
thought that I was a man, and had confidence in myself that I was right.
And so I kept up with the soldiers. I endured all the hardships the
soldiers endured in order to hold my land. We had hardships climbing
mountains, fording rivers, frost and cold of winter, the burning heat of
summer—my bones ache to-day from the exposure, but it was all for love of
my home. I stood faithfully by the soldiers. They did not know the
country. I did. They wanted me for their eye, they could not see. The
soldiers were the same as though they were blind, and I used both of my
own eyes for them. The soldiers and I were fighting in friendship, what
they said, I did; what I said, they did. So I helped my tribe. Land is a
very valuable thing, and especially our land. I knew the Cheyennes and
Sioux wanted to take it by conquest, so I stayed with the soldiers to help
hold it. No-Hip-Bone moved to Tongue River at the time the leaves were
getting full. We heard that General Custer was coming and I and thirty
soldiers went down the river in boats. Two scouts, Elk and Two-Whistles,
were with me. At the junction of the Yellowstone with the Missouri River
we met Custer. I was the first one of the Crows to shake hands with
General Custer. He gripped me by the hand tight and said: “You are the
one I want to see, and I am glad that you are first.” We went into the
steamboat with General Custer, and he pointed out different places to me
as objects of interest. I directed Custer up to No-Hip-Bone, who had
moved to the mouth of the Little Rosebud. They had a council, Bonnie
Bravo was their interpreter. General Custer said to the interpreter,
pointing to me: “This is the kind of man we want for this campaign, and I
want some others also.” Goes-Ahead, Hairy Moccasin, White Swan,
Paints-His-Face-Yellow, and Curly were chosen. There were six of us
altogether. The others were sent back. We always moved ahead of
Custer—we were his pilots. We always travelled at night, climbing the
mountains and wading the rivers. During the day we made a concealed camp.
We travelled in this way several days before we reached the Sioux camp.
When we reached the top of the Wolf Mountains we saw the enemy’s camp near
where the Custer Field is at the present time. Hairy Moccasin,
Goes-Ahead, Curly, and myself saw the camp. Custer had halted at the foot
of a mountain, and we all went back and told Custer that we had seen a big
camp, and it was close. Custer was rejoiced and anxious to go ahead and
make the battle. The sun was just peeping when we saw the camp. It was
eight or nine o’clock when we scouts all went ahead again. We got close
to the place of the enemy’s camp, and Custer divided the scouts, sent some
across the river, and the others remained on the hill. In the meantime
Custer had divided his command. Yellow Face and White Swan went with Reno
across the river; Goes-Ahead, Hairy Moccasin, Curly, and myself remained
with Custer. Custer sent me to a high knoll. He said: “Go and look for
me and see where I can make a success.” He left it to me. When I was up
there I looked around and the troops were very close upon me, and I
motioned to them to come on, and we passed up on to the ridge. The Indian
scouts stood in front of Custer and led his men. We went down to the
Little Horn until we came to a little coulee, and were moving towards the
enemy’s camp. We wanted to cross the river at that place. The Sioux
fired at us. We then went up the hill to the ridge. I was all along the
ridge where the fight was raging. We looked over the river, and saw Reno
in his engagement with the Sioux. Finally they wiped out Reno, and he
retreated to the hills. Custer and all of us got off our horses here. At
that time the enemy was surrounding us. They were banging away at us. We
had a heavy skirmish. Custer then came up and said: “You have done your
duty. You have led me to the enemy’s camp. And now the thing for you to
do is to obey my orders and get away.” Farther on up the river was a
packtrain, escorted by three hundred soldiers, and I made my way to the
pack-train, and I found the Indians there fighting. Custer when he told
me to go said: “You go; I am now going with my boys.” Had Custer not
ordered me to go, the people who visit the Custer Field to-day would see
my name on the monument. When I got back to the packtrain, I directed them
back to where the old trenches are to-day, and where you may still see a
pile of bones. The Indians had killed all the mules when I got there.
The fight lasted through the whole of a long, hot summer day. My friends,
the soldiers who were with Custer, were all wiped out. When the sun went
down I was about exhausted and I had no clothes on save a breechclout. All
the scouts were dressed like myself. When night came on, exhausted as we
were, we scouts went down the river to meet No-Hip-Bone. We reached him
early the next morning. There was a terrific rainstorm all night long. I
had no clothes on and I stuck to my wet horse. My horse was so exhausted
that he stumbled on through the night, and to-day I feel the effects of
it. It was my nature to endure; from a boy I had been trained to endure,
but as strong as I was it wounded me for life. We met No-Hip-Bone and
told him that up the river yesterday, when the sun was midway between
morning and noon, until the sun was midway between noon and night, the
Indians had killed Custer and all of his command. And he was mad. We
told him that our horses’ hoofs were worn out and asked permission to go
back home and get fresh horses. He said: “Yes, you can go, but come back.
Meanwhile I will travel up the river and see the dead soldiers.” I went
to Pryor, our Crow camp.
[Sunset on the Custer Field]
Sunset on the Custer Field
Custer and the soldiers were my friends and companions, and I cried all
night long as I rode through the rain to tell No-Hip-Bone the news.
When we were at the Rosebud, General Custer and his staff held a council
as to what we should do when we found the enemy’s camp, as to whether we
should attack by day or night. I said we had better fight by night.
Paints-His-Face-Yellow said: “Let us attack by day, so that we can see
what we are doing.” I thought I was laying a good plan for them but they
listened to Yellow-Face. General Custer was a brave and good man, a
straightforward and honest man. When General Custer took me by the hand,
patted me on the shoulder, and I looked him in the face, I said: “There is
a good general.” If General Custer was living to-day, I would get better
treatment than I now receive. General Custer said: “Where does your tribe
stay?” and I told him in the valley through which Pryor Creek runs, along
the Big Horn River at Lodge Grass, and in the valley of the Little
Horn—there is my home. Custer said: “If I die, you will get this land
back and stay there, happy and contented, and if you die, you will be
buried on your own land.”
When I joined General Custer, I had full confidence in myself and my
ability to help him, and for this reason I joined Custer so that I might
help hold my land against our enemies, the Sioux and the Cheyennes. After
the Custer battle, when we had obtained fresh horses, I took the other
scouts with me, and we went over the field and looked at the remains of
the dead soldiers who were my friends and companions. Knowing the country
I always directed General Custer to the best places to ford the river, and
the easiest way to climb the hills, that he might reach the path of
success. After the loss of my horse, I traveled on foot with the
soldiers, and was willing even to go down to death with Custer in order
that I might help him.
THE STORY OF CURLY—CUSTER SCOUT
We had been brought to the Little Rosebud down the Yellowstone by steamer.
After we had landed we were told to get dinner, dress ourselves, paint up,
and get ready to scout. Then we heard that General Custer wanted to use
us. We mounted and rode over to General Custer’s camp. He had a big
tent. We got off at the door. I was the first to shake his hand. I had
a dollar in my hand, and I pressed that into his hand. Each scout shook
hands with him. When I saw Custer sitting there, tall and slim, with
broad shoulders and kind eyes, I said to myself: “There is a kind, brave,
and thinking man.” The first words that Custer uttered were: “I have seen
all the tribes but the Crows, and now I see them for the first time, and I
think they are good and brave scouts. I have some scouts here, but they
are worthless. I have heard that the Crows are good scouts, and I have
sent for you to come to my command. I have given General Terry six
hundred dollars for the use of you Crow Indians as scouts. I have called
you Indians here not to fight but to trace the enemy and tell me where
they are; I do not want you to fight. You find the Indians and I will do
the fighting. With all these dollars I have given you I want you to go
into the steamboat and buy some shirts and paint. We will leave here in
two days. We will follow the Little Rosebud up.” That evening the Mandans
danced with us, and they gave us some money. Then Custer said: “I think
you are good Indians. I will have the cook prepare our dinner, and you
can eat alongside of me. I will have a tent put up here and you can camp
near me.” Within two days we started on our journey. We got on our
horses and started with Custer up the Little Rosebud. The whole command
were with us. He asked us where we saw the last Sioux camp while we were
scouting for Terry. We told him we would not be near there until
to-morrow. The next morning we were at the place where we saw the last
camp of the Sioux. Then we followed the Sioux trail. We found the trail,
and saw that it forked on the Little Rosebud River. Custer gave orders
for Goes-Ahead to follow one trail, and for me to follow the other to see
which was the largest camp. We found that the trails came together after
a while and that the Sioux were all in one camp. When we got to the camp,
we saw that a battle had been fought, for we found the scalps and the
beards of white men. We went back that night and reported to Custer. It
was pretty late, but Custer’s cook was up and had a light in his tent.
Then Custer told the cook to give the boys their meal. After we got
through our supper we went to his tent as Custer wanted to see us. We
took with us some of the scalps and white men’s beards, and showed them to
Custer. Then Custer asked us if the camp separated or came together, and
we told him it came together. Then Custer said: “This is the main
point—these Sioux have been killing white people, and I have been sent
here by the Great Father to conquer them and bring them back to their
reservation. I am a great chief, but I do not know whether I will get
through this summer alive or dead. There will be nothing more good for
the Sioux—if they massacre me, they will still suffer, and if they do not
kill me, they will still suffer for they have disobeyed orders. I do not
know whether I will pass through this battle or not, but if I live, I will
recommend you boys and you will be leaders of the Crows. Tomorrow I want
five of my Crow boys to go on the trail.” We started just before
daybreak. When we started we saw some of the Mandans running round on the
top of the hill, and Goes-Ahead told me to go back and tell the command
that they must not have these Mandans running round over the hills, but to
keep them down in the valley, as we might be near the Sioux camp and would
be discovered before we knew it. Then they ordered these Mandans to come
down from the hills and stay down. When I started back I heard a howl
like a coyote. White Swan, Hairy Moccasin, Goes-Ahead, and
White-Man-Runs-Him were coming in to report. The Sioux had broken camp
the day before and had camped above where their old camp was on the Little
Rosebud. Custer told us to go on ahead and see which way they went, and
we came to where they had broken camp. We followed the trail until we saw
that they had camped on the Little Horn, and then we noticed that the
Sioux had gone toward the Little Horn and we waited at the head of Tallec
Creek for the command to come up. The command did not come up, for they
had camped on the Little Rosebud; and we went back to the camp. Then the
scouts had an argument, and I went by myself and asked Custer what we
should do. Custer asked me what I came back for. I told him that the
trail of the Sioux had gone to the west, toward the Little Horn, and that
I had come back for further orders. Then Custer told me to get my supper,
and take a lunch for the other scouts, and take with me two soldiers and
go on and camp on the hill in sight of the enemy. I was lying down at
daybreak, half asleep—the boys said they saw the camp where the Sioux were
located. I got up and saw them through the smoke. The command came
halfway toward us and then stopped and this officer who was with us wrote
a message for General Custer, and sent a Mandan scout back with it.
Custer did not wait. As soon as he got the message his men moved on
rapidly toward the Custer Field. Then Custer said: “We will charge upon
them now—that settles their journey.” Custer then gave the order to
inspect their guns. Soon they started on down the ridge. Custer told us
to go on ahead. We followed the creek all the way down. There was half a
battalion behind us. We found a tepee like the one in which we are now
sitting, as we went along, and found two dead Sioux inside. Then the main
command came up to us. We all stopped at the fork of the Little Reno
Creek. Custer split up his command at this point, and told Reno to follow
the creek down, which is now called Reno Creek. Then we crossed over the
ridge. I came down with Custer as far as the creek; then he gave me a
message to take to Reno. I did not know the import of the messsage. I
brought the answer back from Reno to Custer. While I was delivering the
last message, Reno was fighting his battle, but it was not very fierce,
and when I got to Custer with the message he was fighting at the mouth of
the creek. Then Custer told me to go and save my life. I made a circle
around, and I found that my ammunition was getting low. I found a dead
Sioux. I took his ammunition and gun and horse, and got out. I stayed
near where the dead Sioux was until the fight was pretty fierce. I went
up on a high butte to the east of the battlefield where I could see the
fight. When I got on the high hill I looked back, and saw that Custer was
the last man to stand. After that I rushed over the hill and hid in the
brush. The next morning about five or six o’clock I was at General
Terry’s camp and reported. General Terry called his officers about him.
I could not speak English and there were no interpreters there, so I took
the grass and piled it all up in a heap, then I took my fingers and
scattered it wide apart, and attempted in this way to show General Terry
that the soldiers were all killed. Then General Terry gave me a dispatch.
I was very tired and did not want to go, but I had to take this dispatch
from General Terry, to Reno at the packtrain. Reno gave me a dispatch to
take back to Terry, while they were burying the dead soldiers. Then
another dispatch was given me to take to the head command at the
steamboat. I felt sorry and depressed that I should never again see
Custer.
[The Reno Battlefield]
The Reno Battlefield
THE STORY OF GOES-AHEAD—CUSTER SCOUT
I was under General Terry at the Yellowstone at the mouth of the Big Horn.
There was a boat at the mouth of the Big Horn. The steamboat had a
pontoon bridge reaching to the shore. The soldiers came off the boat and
joined General Terry’s command. Then General Terry gave the command for
us all to mount and go ahead of the line. Then he selected men from this
line of scouts to send to General Custer as scouts. He mentioned my name
and also called Yellow-Shield, White-Man-Runs-Him, White Swan, Hairy
Moccasin, and Curly out of this line. There were six of us. Then they
gave us orders to go on the steamboat. We sailed down to the mouth of the
Little Rosebud, there we got off the boat. Then our interpreter told us
there was a man in the camp of the army who wanted to see us, and we went
over there. Then we went into General Custer’s tent; we sat on one side
of the tent, and that was a day of great pleasure to me. I saw that
General Custer was a man of about six feet two inches, slim and
well-built, and kind-hearted. He wore long hair. General Custer told us
that he had heard that the Crow Indians were the bravest scouts and the
best horsemen among all the Indians, and that was the reason he asked
General Terry to send us to him. He said he had some Mandan scouts but
they were not going to do any Indian scouting for him, but would remain in
the line and do the cooking for the scouts. Then General Custer told us
he wanted us to find the Sioux trail and follow it until we reached the
Sioux camp and to report to him where they were. He did not want us to
enter into battle with the Sioux, but to come back and tell him the
location of their camp. Then after he had won the battle he would give us
all the Sioux horses we could drive home. Then we scouted in search of
the Sioux. We followed the trail of the Sioux where they had been moving,
and we got to where they had camped on the Little Rosebud. I got to the
place where they had been camping just after their fight with General
Crook at the battle of the Little Rosebud, and they had moved to the
Little Horn. General Custer gave us strict orders when we were scouting
not to mistake the scouts of General Terry and General Crook for the other
Indians, because we might run across them and to be sure we had seen the
Sioux. We were two nights on our way before we came upon the village. It
was located on the plain above where the Custer fight took place, on the
banks of the Little Horn. I was by myself and after I saw the village I
went back and reported to General Custer and he was greatly pleased. I
always tried to obey orders and follow closely my instructions. I
reported to General Custer that it was a pretty big village. Custer said
“That is just what I am looking for; we might just as well enter the
battle.” General Custer told me to go ahead of his column, and keep
ahead, but not to go too far for fear the enemy would capture me, and I
did what he ordered me to do. General Custer marched his troops all night
up to a point about five miles from where I reported to him, and then he
divided his command. Reno followed down the Reno Creek, Custer crossed
the ridge, going over to the Medicine Tail Creek which runs into the
Little Horn. There on the creek General Custer dismounted, and said
prayers to the Heavenly Father. Then he rose and shook hands with me, and
said: “My scout, if we win the battle, you will be one of the noted men of
the Crow Nation.” In a moment or two he turned around again and said to
me: “I have forgotten to tell you, you are not to fight in this battle,
but to go back and save your life.” White-Man-Runs-Him and Hairy Moccasin
and Curly heard what Custer said. The other two were with Reno. We were
in sight of the camp when Custer told us this. Reno had then crossed the
Little Horn with his two Crow scouts and the rest of the Mandans. If we
had been smart enough we would have asked General Custer to give us a
paper as a recommendation, but we did not know anything much in those
days. As we stood looking, we saw Reno take his battle position between
eight and nine o’clock. Custer stood there a little for we expected all
the Crow Creeks, and Terry’s command, to meet us there that day, and make
a battle that day. After he said this Custer started into the battle and
opened fire on the camp. We scouts were up on top of the bluff, and we
fired at the camp. Hairy Moccasin and White-Man-Runs-Him were with him.
Curly I did not see because he carried the last dispatch to Reno.
Although Custer had given us command to do no fighting, it was impossible
for us to stand there on the bluff and see the soldiers fighting and not
do something, so we had to fire. I do not want to make any mistake in
this story, and I have told you the truth. Reno took the battle. There
was so much smoke and dust that I could hardly tell, but Reno was driven
back by the Indians toward the bluff. In all the valley and woods there
was nothing but Indians. Then I did not know which way he went, for I was
fighting my own way. Custer also opened fire just beyond the Medicine
Creek where he had crossed. Soon after Reno opened fire Custer began his
fire. From there I cannot tell you. About four or five o’clock the
packtrain came up and the hard fighting was down there. I went back to
the packtrain and helped fight a while and then I took to the pine hills
away over to the east. When I heard that Custer had been killed I said:
“He is a man to fight the enemy. He loved to fight, but if he fights and
is killed, he will have to be killed.”
THE STORY OF CHIEF RED CLOUD——OGOLLALA SIOUX
I remember that our camp was located in the valley of the Little Big Horn.
As I remember there were about four thousand Indians in our camp, and
about a hundred Sioux warriors in my own band. There were four or five
different sections of the Sioux tribe in this fight. I remember that
Rain-in-the-Face and Sitting-Bull, Crazy Horse, and Big Man were with us
in the battle. We were in our camp; there was plenty of buffalo meat in
those days, and we killed a good many. The women were drying the meat,
and the warriors were resting. Suddenly we heard firing, and we found out
that the soldiers were on us. The women and children were all frightened,
and started to run across the hills, and we men mounted our horses and
started toward the enemy. I remember that we pushed Reno back until he
had to cross the river, and go up against the bluffs, and then some of our
Sioux rode around the hill to head him off, and we had him in a pocket.
After we had killed many of Reno’s men, Custer came along the ridge, and
we were called off to fight Custer. We kept circling around Custer, and
as his men came down the ridge we shot them down. And then the rest
dismounted and gathered in a bunch, kneeling down and shooting from behind
their horses. We circled round and round, firing into Custer’s men until
the last man was killed. I did not see Custer fall, for all the Indians
did not know which was Custer. One reason why we did not scalp Custer was
because the Indians and the white soldiers were so mixed up that it was
hard to distinguish one man from another; and another reason was because
Custer was the bravest man of all and we did not want to touch him as he
made the last stand. This is also the opinion of Rain-in-the-Face.
Regarding the cause of the Custer fight I must say, we were pursued by the
soldiers, we were on the warpath, and we were on the warpath with the
Crows and other tribes. We were trying to drive them back from the
hunting grounds, and the soldiers came upon us and we had to defend
ourselves. We were driven out of the Black Hills by the men seeking gold,
and our game was driven off, and we started on our journey in search of
game. Our children were starving, and we had to have something to eat.
There was buffalo in that region and we were moving, simply camping here
and there and fighting our Indian enemies as we advanced, in order to get
the game that was in this country. We fought this battle from daylight up
until three o’clock in the afternoon, and all of the white men were
killed. I think that Custer was a very brave man to fight all these
Indians with his few men from daylight until the sun was almost going
down.
THE STORY OF CHIEF RUNS-THE-ENEMY—SIOUX LEADER
I fought at the Custer fight with a band of one hundred and thirty
Two-Cattle Sioux under me. With the bravery and success I had had in
former battles, I was able to command the force at this fight. We were
encamped for two days in the valley of the Little Big Horn. The third day
we were going to break camp and move farther along, but the old men went
through the camp saying they were going to stay there still another day.
After the cry had gone through the camp that we were to remain, the horses
were all turned loose and were feeding on the hills north and west and
south, and we were resting in the camp. Everything was quiet. I went
over to the big tepee where there were several leading men, and we were
sitting there talking and smoking. About ten o’clock a band of Sioux, who
had been visiting the camp and had gone home, came rushing back with the
tidings that the soldiers were coming. We could hardly believe that the
soldiers were so near, and we were not very much depressed because of the
report for two reasons: the soldiers had gone back to Wyoming, and we did
not think they were near enough to attack us; and from the history of all
our tribe, away back for generations, it had never been known that
soldiers or Indians had attacked a Sioux camp in the daytime; they had
always waited for night to come. And still we sat there smoking. In a
short time we heard the report of rifles, and bullets whizzed through the
camp from the other side of the river. I left my pipe and ran as hard as
I could, as did all the others, to our tents. As I ran to my tent there
was a scream ran through the camp: “The soldiers are here! The soldiers
are here!” The Indians who were herding the horses on the hill rushed to
the camp with the horses, and the dust raised just like smoke. When I got
to my tent the men who were herding the horses had got the horses there,
and they were screaming. I grabbed my gun and cartridge belt, and the
noise and confusion was so great that we did not know what we were doing.
The women were running to the hills, and my heart was mad. The guns were
still firing in the upper part of the camp. I did not have time to put on
my war-bonnet; I jumped on the horse I had and made a pull for where the
firing was. The first thing I saw when I got to’the battle line was a
horse with a bridle on with the lines hanging down, and a dead Sioux.
When I got to this line of battle—I thought I was quick, but I found a lot
of Sioux already there—they were rushing on up the hill. We were all
naked, and the soldiers with their pack saddles and their uniforms on and
their black horses looked like great big buffalo. The Sioux were all
riding up the hill. We saw one lone Indian on the hill going down toward
the soldiers, and the river. We could not see him as he came down the
hill, but we could see the smoke coming from under his horse’s head, and
we all thought that he was going to make a charge on the soldiers, and we
all charged. It seemed as though that one Indian had the attention of all
the soldiers, and they were all firing at him. When we saw that the smoke
was all going toward the soldiers that gave us a chance to charge from
this side, and we all made a rush. When we made the charge we got them
all stampeded. For smoke and dust we could not see the soldiers as they
retreated toward the river. The Sioux were fresh, and we soon caught up
with them. We passed a black man in a soldier’s uniform and we had him.
He turned on his horse and shot an Indian right through the heart. Then
the Indians fired at this one man, and riddled his horse with bullets.
His horse fell over on his back, and the black man could not get up. I
saw him as I rode by. I afterward saw him lying there dead. We fought
them until they rolled and tumbled and finally had to go into the river,
which was very deep. We made them cross the river. The country around
the river in those days was very heavily wooded. We chased some of the
soldiers into the woods, and others across the river and up the hill. I
did not know the name of the commander of the soldiers at that time, but I
afterward heard that it was Reno. I also heard afterward that they had a
big trial and charged him with being a coward, but I praised him for
rushing into the camp. The reason I praised him was that he only had a
few soldiers and our camp was a great camp, and he came rushing into the
camp with his few soldiers. In all the history of my great-grandfather I
have never known of such an attack in daylight. After they retreated over
the hills and we had killed a large number of them that battle was ended.
I was at the Custer Battlefield this morning, and I noticed there were no
monuments up for the soldiers who fell on the Reno Field. As we had
finished with the Reno battle and were returning to camp we saw two men on
the Reno Hills waving two blankets as hard as they could. Two of us rode
over to where they were, and they yelled to us that the genuine stuff was
coming, and they were going to get our women and children. I went over
with the others and peeped over the hills and saw the soldiers advancing.
As I looked along the line of the ridge they seemed to fill the whole
hill. It looked as if there were thousands of them, and I thought we
would surely be beaten. As I returned I saw hundreds of Sioux. I looked
into their eyes and they looked different—they were filled with fear. I
then called my own band together, and I took off the ribbons from my hair,
also my shirt and pants, and threw them away, saving nothing but my belt
of cartridges and gun. I thought most of the Sioux will fall to-day: I
will fall with them. Just at that time Sitting-Bull made his appearance.
He said, just as though I could hear him at this moment: “A bird, when it
is on its nest, spreads its wings to cover the nest and eggs and protect
them. It cannot use its wings for defense, but it can cackle and try to
drive away the enemy. We are here to protect our wives and children, and
we must not let the soldiers get them.” He was on a buckskin horse, and
he rode from one end of the line to the other, calling out: “Make a brave
fight!” We were all hidden along the ridge of hills. While Sitting-Bull
was telling this I looked up and saw that the Cheyennes had made a circle
around Custer on the west, north, and east sides, and that left a gap on
the south side for us to fill. We then filled up the gap, and as we did
so we looked over to the Cheyenne side, and there was a woman among the
Cheyennes who was nearest the soldiers trying to fight them. While Custer
was all surrounded, there had been no firing from either side. The Sioux
then made a charge from the rear side, shooting into the men, and the
shooting frightened the horses so that they rushed upon the ridge and many
horses were shot. The return fire was so strong that the Sioux had to
retreat back over the hill again. I left my men there and told them to
hold that position and then I rushed around the hills and came up to the
north end of the field near where the monument now stands. And I saw
hundreds and hundreds of Indians in the coulees all around. The Indians
dismounted and tied their horses in a bunch and got down into the coulees,
shooting at the soldiers from all sides. From the point that juts out
just below where the monument stands about thirty of us got through the
line, firing as we went, and captured a lot of Custer’s horses and drove
them down to the river. The horses were so thirsty that the moment we
reached the river they just stood and drank and drank, and that gave us a
chance to get off our horses and catch hold of the bridles. They were all
loaded with shells and blankets and everything that the soldiers carried
with them. Just then I returned to my men, and the soldiers were still on
the hill fighting, with some of their horses near them. Just as I got
back some of the soldiers made a rush down the ravine toward the river,
and a great roll of smoke seemed to go down the ravine. This retreat of
the soldiers down the ravine was met by the advance of the Indians from
the river, and all who were not killed came back again to the hill. After
the soldiers got back from the hills they made a stand all in a bunch.
Another charge was made and they retreated along the line of the ridge; it
looked like a stampede of buffalo. On this retreat along the ridge, the
soldiers were met by my band of Indians as well as other Sioux. The
soldiers now broke the line and divided, some of them going down the
eastern slope of the hill, and some of them going down to the river. The
others came back to where the final stand was made on the hill, but they
were few in number then. The soldiers then gathered in a group, where the
monument now stands—I visited the monument to-day and confirmed my memory
of it—and then the soldiers and Indians were all mixed up. You could not
tell one from the other. In this final charge I took part and when the
last soldier was killed the smoke rolled up like a mountain above our
heads, and the soldiers were piled one on top of another, dead, and here
and there an Indian among the soldiers. We were so excited during the
battle that we killed our own Indians. I saw one that had been hit across
the head with a war axe, and others had been hit with arrows. After we
were done, we went back to the camp. After the onslaught I did not see
any soldiers scalped, but I saw the Indians piling up their clothes, and
there was shooting all over the hill, for the Indians were looking for the
wounded soldiers and were shooting them dead. Just as I got back to the
camp I heard that a packtrain was coming from over the hills. I looked
over the hills and saw the Sioux and Cheyennes moving that way. I
remained a little while to look after my wife and children. After I had
located my family I fired off my shells and got a new supply of ammunition
and went toward the packtrain. When I got over there the fighting had
begun. The packtrain had already fortified itself by making
entrenchments. The Indians were on the outside firing into it, and the
soldiers inside were firing at the Indians. During this last fight the
sun was getting low. After it grew dark the firing continued; you would
see the flash of the guns in the entrenchments. The Indians would crawl
up and fire a flock of arrows into the entrenchments and then scatter
away. This kept up all night. I did not stay, but went home. The next
morning I went over there and found that the Indians still had the
packtrain surrounded and the fight was still going on. We kept at long
range and continued our firing. The soldiers were all sharpshooters, and
the moment we put our heads up they fired at us and nearly hit us. The
news went around among all the Indians that they were to stay there, and
that all the soldiers in the entrenchment would be so dry soon that they
would have to get out and we would get them. I cannot quite remember, but
I think it was about noon—we held them until then—when news came from our
camp down on the plain that there was a big bunch of soldiers coming up
the river—General Terry with his men. As soon as we heard this we let the
packtrain go and fled back to our camp. We at once broke camp and fled up
the Little Big Horn, or Greasy Creek, as it is called by the Indians. If
it had not been for General Terry coming up as he did we would have had
that packtrain, for they were all dry—they had had no water for two days.
After we had killed Custer and all his men I did not think very much about
it. The soldiers fired into us first and we returned the fire.
Sitting-Bull had talked to us and all the tribes to make a brave fight and
we made it. When we had killed all the soldiers we felt that we had done
our duty, and felt that it was a great battle and not a massacre. With
reference to the real reason for this fight I may say that the talk among
the Indians was that they were going to compel us to stay on the
reservation and take away from us our country. Our purpose was to move
north and go as far north as possible away from the tribes. Our object
was not to fight the Crows or any other tribe, but we learned that the
soldiers were getting after us to try to compel us to go back on the
reservation, and we were trying to get away from them. During the Custer
fight our tents were not attacked, but after the battle the women gathered
up their dead husbands and brothers, and laid them out nicely in the
tepee, and left them. I understand that after we had left the tepees
standing, holding our dead, the soldiers came and burned the tepees.
According to my estimate there were about two thousand able-bodied
warriors engaged in this fight; they were all in good fighting order. The
guns and ammunition that we gathered from the dead soldiers of Custer’s
command put us in better fighting condition than ever before, but the
sentiment ran around among the Indians that we had killed enough, and we
did not want to fight any more. There has been a good deal of dispute
about the number of Indians killed. About the closest estimate that we
can make is that fifty Sioux were killed in the fight, and others died a
short time afterward from their wounds.
[Two Moons as he fought Custer]
Two Moons as he fought Custer
THE STORY OF CHIEF TWO MOONS—CHEYENNE LEADER, AS TOLD WHERE CUSTER FELL
It was a September day. The hoarfrost had written the alphabet of the
coming winter—there was promise of snow. With Chief Two Moons and his
interpreter we climbed the dreary slopes leading to the monument and
graves of the Custer dead. Chief Two Moons took his position by the stone
which reads: “Brevet Major General George A. Custer, 7th U. S. Cavalry,
fell here June 26th, 1876.” A tiny flag waved by this stone, marking the
spot where the hero made his last stand. The hills all about us wore a
sombre hue; the sky kept marriage bonds with the scene. Cold, gray clouds
hung over the ridges along which Custer rode with the daring Seventh.
They draped the summits of the Big Horn Range on the far horizon in gray
and purple. The prairie grass had come to the death of the autumn and it
too creaked amid the stones. The heart beat quick at the sight of Chief
Two Moons, a tall and stalwart Roman-faced Indian, standing amid the white
slabs where thirty-three years before, clad in a white shirt, red
leggings, without war-bonnet, he had ridden a white horse, dealing
deathblows to the boys in blue, and with these deathblows the last great
stand of the Red Man against the White Man. The battle echoes are heard
again as Two Moons tells his story:
“Custer came up along the ridge and across the mountains from the right of
the monument. The Cheyennes and the Sioux came up the coulee from the
foot of Reno Hill, and circled about. I led the Cheyennes as we came up.
Custer marched up from behind the ridge on which his monument now stands,
and deployed his soldiers along the entire line of the ridge. They rode
over beyond where the monument stands down into the valley until we could
not see them. The Cheyennes and the Sioux came up to the right over in
the valley of the Little Big Horn. Custer placed his men in groups along
this ridge. They dismounted. The men who had dismounted along the ridge
seemed to have let their horses go down the other side of the ridge.
Those who were on the hill where the monument now stands, and where I am
now standing, had gray horses and they were all in the open. The Sioux
and the Cheyennes came up the valley swarming like ants toward the bunch
of gray horses where Long Hair stood. I led the Cheyennes up the long
line of ridge from the valley blocking the soldiers, and I called to my
Cheyenne brothers: ‘Come on, children; do not be scared!’ And they came
after me, yelling and firing. We broke the line of soldiers and went over
the ridge. Another band of Indians and Sioux came from over beyond the
ridge, and when I got over there, I got off my white horse and told my men
to wait, and we loaded our guns and fired into the first troop which was
very near us. At the first volley the troop at which we fired were all
killed. We kept firing along the ridge on which the troops were stationed
and kept advancing. I rode my horse back along the ridge again and called
upon my children to come on after me. Many of my Cheyenne brothers were
killed, and I whipped up my horse and told them to come on, that this was
the last day they would ever see their chief, and I again started for the
bunch of gray horses on the hilltop. The Indians followed me, yelling and
firing. I could not break the line at the bunch of gray horses and I
wheeled and went to the left down the valley with the line of soldiers
facing me as I went, firing at me, and all my men firing at the soldiers.
Then I rode on up the ridge to the left. I met an Indian with a big
war-bonnet on, and right there I saw a soldier wounded. I killed him and
jumped off my horse and scalped him. The Indian I met was Black Bear, a
Cheyenne. I then rode down the ridge and came to a group of four dead
soldiers; one of them had on a red flannel shirt, the other three had red
stripes on the arm, one had three stripes, the other had three stripes and
a sword. They all had on good clothes, and I jumped off my horse and took
their clothes and their guns. When I turned back I could not see anything
but soldiers and Indians all mixed up together. You could hardly tell one
from the other. As I rode along the ridge I found nearly all the soldiers
killed. I again rode up to the ridge along which Custer’s troops had been
stationed. I found two or three killed and saw one running away to get on
top of the high hills beyond, and we took after him, and killed him.”
“The whole valley was filled with smoke and the bullets flew all about us,
making a noise like bees. We could hardly hear anything for the noise of
guns. When the guns were firing, the Sioux and Cheyennes and soldiers,
one falling one way and one falling another, together with the noise of
the guns, I shall never forget. At last we saw that Custer and his men
were grouped on the side of the hill, and we commenced to circle round and
round, the Sioux and the Cheyennes, and we all poured in on Custer and his
men, firing into them until the last man was shot. We then jumped off our
horses, took their guns, and scalped them.”
“After the fight was over we gathered in the river bottom and cut willow
sticks, then some Indians were delegated to go and throw down a stick
wherever they found a dead soldier, and then they were ordered to pick up
the sticks again, and in this way we counted the number of dead. It was
about six times we had to cut willow sticks, because we kept finding men
all along the ridge. We counted four hundred and eighty-eight with our
sticks along the ridge. We were trying to count the dead there in the
valley when General Terry came up from the other side, and we fled away.
After the battle was over the Indians made a circle all over the ridges
and around through the valley to see if they could find any more soldiers,
as they were determined to kill every one. The next morning after the
fight we went up behind the Reno Field and camped at Black Lodge River.
We then followed the Black Lodge River until we came back to the Little
Big Horn again. Then we camped at the Little Big Horn, moving our camp
constantly, fearing pursuit by the soldiers.”
“Before the Custer fight we went over on the Tongue River and found a camp
of soldiers. We rushed upon them and took all their horses away, and the
soldiers ran into the brush. We knew there would be other soldiers after
us; we knew about where they were, and we felt they would pursue us. At
Powder River the soldiers attacked our camp and destroyed everything, and
that made us mad. When the soldiers came after us, on the day of the
Custer fight, we were ready to kill them all. The soldiers were after us
all the time, and we had to fight.”
The lonely stretches of prairie, the lonelier graves, the pathetic remnant
of Red Men—victors on this field—the hollow silence of these dreary hill
slopes, the imperishable valour of two hundred and seventy-seven men who
laid their lives on a blood-red altar, until the one lone figure of the
great captain lifted his unavailing sword against a howling horde of
savage warriors—glittering for a moment in the June sunlight, then falling
to the earth baptized with blood—is the solemn picture to forever hang in
the nation’s gallery of battles.
CONCLUSIONS
Fair play is an all compelling creed. Justice to the dead is one of the
commandments in that creed. Let the controversy rage. Let the sword be
unsheathed in the face of misrepresentation and wrong. General Custer was
a daring and chivalrous officer. He had won laurels on many a hard fought
field under Southern skies—he was a strategist, brave and unfaltering. He
had served in Western campaigns with distinction and success. He knew how
to deal with the masterful generalship of his wily Indian foes. Hitherto
his tactics had been victorious. The orders under which he now marched to
battle were definite up to a certain point—then, so the record in the War
Department reads—he was to use his own discretion and initiative. He was
compelled to follow this course—for he marched over a wild and trackless
waste, far distant from his base of supplies and absolutely without means
of communication with headquarters, and without ability to ascertain the
movements of any military force in the field. It is fair to state that
the ranking General in charge of this campaign against the Indians reposed
this confidence in General Custer, otherwise, knowing the Indian as a
fighter, knowing the character of the desolated wastes of country to
traverse—the difficulties to be encountered in the simple movement of
troops—the annihilation of any body of troops, when once they reached the
unmapped plains cut in twain by gorges and piled high with impassable
buttes, he would have stultified himself had not orders been given
allowing discretion at the moment of emergency. Custer was strong enough,
brave enough, and sufficiently masterful to see and seize the situation.
His tactics were the tactics he had previously and many times employed,
and always with brilliant success. On this June day he would have led the
daring “Seventh” to victory and routed, if not conquered, the great Indian
camp. He was defeated and slain with his entire command. They fell at
their posts in battle formation. Why? The entire group of Indian
warriors participating in this grim battle all testify that had Reno
pushed his charge when first he attacked the Indian camp that they would
have fled in confusion, for the attack was unexpected. The Indian always
expected a night attack. They further testify that after Reno made his
attack with a portion of his men, thus depleting his effective fighting
force by one half and in desperation made his bungling retreat, had he
later come to the aid of Custer with the added reinforcements of Benteen,
French, and Weir, who begged him to hear the appeal of Custer’s rapid
volleys, Custer would have broken the Indian camp. Reno remained on the
hill until every gun was silent. Reno failed. Custer was slain. This
conclusion is the voice of the Indian.
THE LAST GREAT INDIAN COUNCIL
Kabibonok Ka, the North Wind, came marching out of the caverns and snows
of the north, whipping and driving blinding gusts of rain and sleet.
Nee-ba-naw baigs, the Water Spirits, unsealed their fountains, and the
turbulent waters of the Little Big Horn River rushed on, tearing out the
banks along which on the plain were huddled the myriad tepees of the
Indian camp. The wind in the trees roared like distant thunder. The dogs
were crouching in any shelter. Horses were standing with their backs to
the storm, their tails drenched and driven between their legs. The flaps
of the tepees were closed, and the rawhide streamers from the poles
cracked like the sharp report of a rifle. The women and children were
closely huddled around the lodge fire. It was the great spring storm, the
last triumphant blast of winter. Yonder in the centre of all this
dripping circle of tepees stood the council lodge. Inside were gathered
the great chief and his medicine men and warriors. They encircled the
blazing logs, heeding little the melancholy night that kept tune with the
sorrowful thoughts of their own hearts. The ashes had cooled in the bowl
of the council pipe, when, at the head of the circle, Chief Plenty Coups,
chief of all the Crow Nation, arose from his blankets, laid down his coup
stick, and addressed his brothers:
“The ground on which we stand is sacred ground. It is the dust and blood
of our ancestors. On these plains the Great White Father at Washington
sent his soldiers armed with long knives and rifles to slay the Indian.
Many of them sleep on yonder hill where Pahaska—White Chief of the Long
Hair—so bravely fought and fell. A few more passing suns will see us here
no more, and our dust and bones will mingle with these same prairies. I
see as in a vision the dying spark of our council fires, the ashes cold
and white. I see no longer the curling smoke rising from our lodge poles.
I hear no longer the songs of the women as they prepare the meal. The
antelope have gone; the buffalo wallows are empty. Only the wail of the
coyote is heard. The white man’s medicine is stronger than ours; his iron
horse rushes over the buffalo trail. He talks to us through his
‘whispering spirit.’ ” (The Indian’s name for the telegraph and
telephone.) “We are like birds with a broken wing. My heart is cold
within me. My eyes are growing dim—I am old. Before our red brothers
pass on to the happy hunting ground let us bury the tomahawk. Let us
break our arrows. Let us wash off our war paint in the river. And I will
instruct our medicine men to tell the women to prepare a great council
lodge. I will send our hunters into the hills and pines for deer. I will
send my runners to the lodges of the Blackfeet, where in that far north
flowers border the snow on the hills. I will send them across the fiery
desert to the lodges of the Apaches in the south. I will send them east
to the lodges of the Sioux, warriors who have met us in many a hard
battle. I will send them to the west, where among the mountains dwell the
Cayuse and the Umatillas. I will have the outliers build smoke signals on
all the high hills, calling the chiefs of all the tribes together, that we
may meet here as brothers and friends in one great last council, that we
may eat our bread and meat together, and smoke the council pipe, and say
farewell as brothers, never to meet again.” The storm abated. The urn of
the morning seemed overturned, and the spices of a new spring day,
redolent with the perfume of growing things, bright with sunshine and song
of birds, flowed over the busy Indian camp. Weeks passed on. Runners
came into camp, rushing into the lodge of the great chief, announcing the
approach of a procession of chiefs from the north; other heralds told of a
great company on the hills coming from the east, and from the west, and
warrior chiefs from the south halted outside the camp. Chiefs from all
the great tribes had heard the call, had seen the smoke signal, and now
the plain is full of horses and gayly coloured riders as they dismount
before the council lodge.
A wonderful blaze of colour meets the eye. Excitement and interest fill
the air as these veterans of the plains enter the council lodge. Chief
Plenty Coups then receives the chiefs; they are greeted one by one with a
courtly and graceful dignity. When the council had assembled Chief Plenty
Coups laid his coup stick and pipe sack on the ground, and in the sign
language gave welcome to the chiefs from many lands.
“I am glad at heart to stand here to-day on this Indian ground and give a
hearty welcome to all the chiefs assembled from the various tribes from
all over the United States. It is a day of beauty, and bright sunshine;
it is a glad day for me. I rejoice that on this happy day we can all meet
here as friends, eat our bread and meat in communion, smoke the council
pipe, and the pipe of peace. I am rejoiced to give you all a great heart
of welcome. And then we must say farewell, but we go away as friends,
never to meet again. I am glad to have you here.”
Then Chief Two Moons, the leader of the Cheyennes in the Custer fight,
arose and shook hands with Chief Plenty Coups, and said:
“This is a glad day for me, and I am glad at heart that we can all meet as
chiefs from the various tribes from all over the land. It is a great day
for all of us, because there are no more wars between us, and we meet in
peace to hold this last great council of the chiefs, and smoke the pipe of
peace. I am glad at heart that this great picture is to be made of us, as
we are assembled here, because our old chiefs are fast dying away, and our
old Indian customs soon will pass out of sight, and the coming generations
will not know anything about us, but this picture will cause us to live
all through the years. And our children and their children will reap the
benefit. I am glad we are here.”
Tottering with age, and nearly blind, Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa, head chief of the
Umatilla Indians, pulled himself up on his walking-stick, took Chief
Plenty Coups by the hand, and said:
“I have come here to-day and am glad to meet all the chiefs and especially
Chief Plenty Coups, chief of the Crow tribe. And I am greatly satisfied
to meet you all and be at peace. On this day we meet as Indians and as
brothers, and now we sit here on this ground and smoke the peace pipe. We
meet as brothers that have been away from one another for many years.
Some of us have never seen each other before, and to-day we meet and shake
hands with these chiefs whom we shall never see again. Although these
people were our enemies at one time, to-day we are in peace, and I think
very much of this chief, and I think very much of all the chiefs. I think
it is a great day for all of us. I cannot give you any more words, as I
am of old age.”
Umapine, head chief of the Cayuse tribe, wearing perhaps the finest
regalia of any chief in the council, with great dignity and grace
addressed Chief Plenty Coups:
“We all chiefs of different tribes meet here in this country, the country
that some of us perhaps will never see any more. I appreciate your
kindness in greeting us. We all Indians are in peace toward each other as
well as toward our white brothers. I am very glad to meet you all. I
hope that we will in the future days respect one another, also respect our
white brothers, because we all, each one of us, belong to the animal
kingdom. This is all to you, my dear friends; wishing you a good health.”
Red Cloud, head chief of the Ogallalla Sioux Nation, with his captivating
way, addressed Chief Plenty Coups:
“I stand here to-day to shake hands with the chief of the Crow Nation, and
all the chiefs of the tribes assembled from the various quarters of our
country. I stand here on this great plain, with the broad sunlight
pouring down upon it. I want you to look me in the face, and I hope the
Great Heavenly Father, who will look down upon us, will give all the
tribes His blessing, that we may go forth in peace, and live in peace all
our days, and that He will look down upon our children and finally lift us
far above this earth; and that our Heavenly Father will look upon our
children as His children, that all the tribes may be His children, and as
we shake hands to-day upon this broad plain, we may forever live in peace.
We have assembled here to-day as chiefs from all over the land; we eat the
bread and meat together, we smoke the pipe of peace, and we shake the hand
of peace. And now we go out as one chief, and I hope we shall be as
brothers and friends for all our lives, and separate with kind hearts. I
am glad to-day as I shake hands with my brothers and friends, although I
shall never see them again. When the white man first came across the
ocean, the Indian took him by the hand and gave him welcome. This day
makes me think of that time, and now I say farewell.”
Mountain Chief, head chief of the Blackfoot Indians, perhaps the most
vigorous talker in the sign language in the council, greeted Chief Plenty
Coups with these words:
“I have come clear across the plains and from behind the distant mountains
to meet these chiefs assembled in council, and I am very glad that I am
here to see these Indian chiefs from all the various tribes, and my heart
is open to you all as to my own brother. We smoke the pipe of peace and
take the hand of all the different chiefs, and I shall be glad forever,
and shall look upon this as one of the greatest days of my life. We
separate from each other in peace, and with a kind heart, but never to
meet again.”
Bear Ghost, Chief of the Yankton Sioux, with great calmness and
deliberation said:
“I am glad that I am here to shake the hand in peace with all the chiefs
of the various tribes assembled. It is a great day for me, and a great
day for us all. I rejoice that a record is to be made of this council
that it may live for future generations. I am glad that I can smoke the
pipe of peace, and that with a sad but satisfied heart I can say farewell
to all the chiefs.”
The commanding figure of Koon-Kah-Za-Chy, an eminent Apache chief, stood
before Chief Plenty Coups compelling the attention of the entire council:
“As I stand before you to-day my mind runs over the many fierce battles
that my own tribe, the Apaches, have had with the Kiowas, Cheyennes,
Sioux, and other tribes. Many of the chiefs present to-day I have met
before on the battlefield, but my heart is glad as I shake hands with all
the chiefs to know that now we are all at peace. We smoke the pipe of
peace. We meet as friends and brothers. I am glad to meet all these
chiefs before I die, in peace, as I have before met them in war. It is a
great day for me, for I have come far across the plains of the south, and
I shall go back home carrying with me the memory of this council, and of
these chiefs whom I shall never see again. I say farewell!”
Curly, Custer scout, advanced with great readiness and ease, and took the
hand of Chief Plenty Coups. According to the custom of the Crows he did
not lay down his coup stick, but gestured with one hand. He said:
“Dear Brother Plenty Coups, I am here to-day to greet you, and to greet
all these other chiefs, chiefs who were once my enemies. My heart goes
out to that great battlefield and that great monument erected to my dear
Custer, with whom, and for whom, I fought. He fell on yonder hilltop
almost within reach of our arms from this council lodge. And my heart is
glad that I can shake hands with these chiefs, some of whom I fought
against with Custer on that great battlefield. I have pledged myself
never to lay aside this coup stick so long as the blood runs through my
fingers, but I have resolved this day, as I look into the faces of these
great chiefs who were once my enemies, that I will never lift the coup
stick again, that I will live as a brother to all the tribes, and at peace
with all men. I say farewell to the chiefs, a last, sad farewell.”
After these and other eminent chiefs had made reply to the address of
welcome given by Chief Plenty Coups, according to Indian custom they were
all seated in rows on the ground in semicircles, the more eminent chiefs
in the first row, the lines falling back until they reached the wall line
of the lodge. Every chief wore his full war regalia and carried with him
all of his ceremonial and sacred insignia. The small army of coup sticks,
always held aloft, presented a suggestive picture, for these coup sticks
of the many chiefs from many lands each told a story of struggle and
achievement, but in the speeches made by the chiefs each coup stick was to
become a pledge of peace.
Now, following the ancient custom, while still seated, an Indian woman
belonging to the Blackfoot tribe and wearing the full costume of her
people, together with two Cheyenne maidens, dressed in the costume of
their particular tribe, entered the council lodge carrying wooden bowls
filled with meat and bread. This they served to the chiefs with a wooden
fork. This to them answered as a ceremony of communion. When all had
partaken, Chief Plenty Coups took the two long-stemmed pipes with red
sandstone bowls containing emblematic decorations the whole length of the
stems—pipes that had been filled by the medicine men and placed on the
ground before the standing place of the great chiefs in the centre of the
lodge. Chief Plenty Coups then lighted one pipe and passed it to the
chiefs at his left, and lighting the other he smoked it himself for the
first, and then passed it on to the right, each chief in turn smoking the
pipe, then passing it on to his brother chief, until all had smoked the
council pipe. When the pipes were returned to Chief Plenty Coups they
were again filled and lighted, smoked by the Great Chief, and passed on to
the others. And this became the Pipe of Peace.
These Indian councils were the legislative halls of the tribes; thither
all matters of importance were brought by the chiefs and the warriors.
Here all tribal problems were discussed. Here the destiny of any
particular tribe was settled. Here the decision to make war was reached.
In these council lodges, around the blazing fire, the Indians have uttered
speech more eloquent than a Pitt or a Chatham in St. Stephens or a Webster
in a Senate hall, an oratory that aroused the disintegrated Indian tribes
and far separated clans into such a masterful and resistful force that the
Indian against odds many times mightier than himself has been able to
withstand the aggressions of civilization.
When questions of such moment made the necessity, chiefs of all the tribes
attended and entered into solemn council. Then the council meant war.
The day finally dawned when the Indian as a race was conquered by the
white man. The ranks of the chiefs became thinner and thinner until in
this day only a few of the great warriors remain. These representatives
of former greatness and prowess gathered from their peaceful wigwams from
many and faraway lands to hold once again and for the last time a council
of the old days. On this day the council was for peace, and the dominant,
resonant note ringing through every sentiment uttered; if we did not know
they were Indians and did not know that this was an Indian council, we
would have said this was a Peace Conference at The Hague.
To stand in the presence of these mighty men of the plains, to witness
their nobility, to listen to their eloquence, to think with them the
mighty thoughts of their dead past, to watch their solemn faces, to
tremble before the dignity of their masterful bearing, to cherish the
thought of all that they have been and all that they might have been, to
realize that as their footfalls leave this council lodge they have turned
their backs on each other forever, and that as they mount their horses and
ride away to their distant lodges they are riding into the sunset and are
finally lost in the purple mists of evening, is to make the coldest page
of history burn with an altar fire that shall never go out.
[The Council Pipe]
The Council Pipe
INDIAN IMPRESSIONS OF THE LAST GREAT COUNCIL
To the student of Indian affairs it might at first seem that the gathering
of the great chiefs from all the Indian tribes, wearing war-shirt and
war-bonnet, carrying their coup sticks, tomahawks, spears, bows and
arrows, guns and tom-toms, would necessarily reemphasize to the Indian the
glory of his former prestige, and this impression would gather such
momentum that deleterious results would follow; but an alert and studious
effort was always manifest to inculcate in the Indian mind that this last
great council of the chiefs had for its dominant idea the welfare of the
Indian, that he should live at peace with his fellows and all men, and the
making of a lasting historic record of the fast-fading manners and customs
of the North American Indian. This paramount idea gained such fast hold
of the Indian mind that the council became not only a place of historic
record but a school for the inculcation of the highest ideals of peace.
That the lesson was well taught and well learned becomes strikingly
evident in the peace sentiments of the chiefs expressed in their speeches
at the council, and their impressions of the council now to follow:
[Chief Plenty Coups Addressing the Council]
Chief Plenty Coups Addressing the Council
CHIEF PLENTY COUPS: I have a very glad heart to-day because it has been
my privilege to welcome the chiefs from all the great tribes, all over the
United States, here on these beautiful plains of Montana. I am rejoiced
that on this day of beauty and bright sunshine we could meet together. I
am glad to welcome as my guests Indian chiefs whom I have never seen, and
that I could give them a welcome with my heart open, eat with them bread
and meat, and smoke the pipe of peace, and greet all the chiefs as
brothers. As the bright sun has opened upon us, Doctor Dixon has met us
all in peace and friendliness and we all feel toward him with a kind
heart. His coming has brought about the coming of the chiefs whom I have
never seen before and will never see again, and as the chief of the Crow
Nation I am rejoiced to give him and all these chiefs a great heart of
welcome, and send them away in peace, and I feel that they are all like my
own brothers. During my life from my early days I have fought the other
nations before the white man ever stepped into this country, then the
Great Father ordered that we should stop fighting and live in peace.
Before this we conquered each other’s horses and killed on all sides. And
now to-day we have met in this great council as chiefs and friends. The
Great Father is good to us again in permitting us to have this meeting,
and I look upon all these chiefs and all the tribes as my friends. And as
the bright sunshine falls, I pray that our Heavenly Father may let His
blessing come down upon all the chiefs and all the tribes, and that we may
go forth from this great day happy and in peace. In former days we were
in ceaseless conflict; then Uncle Sam came to us and said we must live in
peace. And since that time we have had allotments of land, schools have
been built for the education of our children, and as an illustration of
the feelings of my heart to-day—the tribes have all met here and we have
met in peace, and have met as one man. We are all as brothers—the tobacco
of all the tribes is as the tobacco of one man, and we have all smoked the
pipe of peace together. Out of the struggle of these old days we have
come into the calm and serene light of such a day as this. This I
consider to be the greatest event of my life, and my country I shall live
for, and my country shall remain in peace, as I feel peaceful toward my
country.
CURLY: Since my boyhood days I have never seen anything so great. We
have seen here the chiefs from all over the United States. It was
wonderful. You are the first man that ever brought such a thing to pass.
I enjoyed it very much more than I can tell. The thought of this thing
was a great thought, one of the greatest thoughts of our time. Many of
our Indians have gone to Washington, and have seen the Great White Father,
and have seen great things. These Indian chiefs have all been brought
here so that we could see them and talk with them by the sign language,
and I think it is most wonderful.
CHIEF RED WHIP: I think this is a great idea. I am glad to meet the
chiefs of all the tribes. I have never seen them before. It will not be
long until all these big chiefs are dead, and the younger generation will
read the history of these chiefs and see these pictures, and I am glad the
record is being made.
[Chief Koon-Ka-Za-Chy Addressing the Council]
Chief Koon-Ka-Za-Chy Addressing the Council
CHIEF KOON-KAH-ZA-CHY: I never before have seen so many chiefs meet
together. I have met a great many chiefs here whom I have never seen
before. When I was asked to come here I heard it was for the purpose of
making a record, and to me the thought was good. I am sorry in my heart
that I must say farewell to all these chiefs.
CHIEF RUNNING BIRD: I am sixty years old, and when I came to this ground
it was ground I had never seen before in my life. I met the chiefs whom I
had never seen before. I had heard of them but had not seen them. I was
very glad to come here and see the old-time tepees, the kind of tepees our
fathers used to live in. I grew up to manhood myself in this kind of a
tepee, and I had good health. Now When they give us a house to live in I
am not healthy at all. I am getting old now, and am getting up in years,
and all I wish now at the present time is that my children shall grow up
industrious and work, because they cannot get honour in the war as I used
to get it—they can only get honour now by working hard. I can only teach
my children that the way to get honour is to go to work, and be good men
and women. These impressions have been strengthened by this council. I
shall go home and tell the other Indians and our agent about the council,
for the meeting of the chiefs will always live in my memory.
CHIEF BRAVE BEAR: The meeting of all the chiefs, my friends and those who
are strangers to me, makes my heart feel high. I think of this and when I
get back I shall still think of it, and it will be just as though I was
here. I will never forget these men sitting here as my friends, as long
as I live. We have been treated kindly and this I shall never forget. I
would like a nice little story of this meeting so that I can show it to my
friends.
CHIEF UMAPINE: I have come from the far distant mountains of Oregon to
meet the chiefs in council. I cannot understand their language; I can
only talk to them in signs, but I have great respect for them. We each
have two hands, two feet, two eyes, two ears, but one nose, one mouth, one
head, and one heart. We all breathe the same air; we are all, therefore,
brothers. On my journey to this land, where in former years I have chased
the buffalo and fought the hostile Sioux who came to steal our horses and
women, I saw the old buffalo trails where these great beasts used to march
in single file, each walking in the footsteps of the other until they had
worn deep their trail. The snows of many winters have cut the trail deep
like an irrigating ditch, and when I thought of the buffalo I cried in my
heart. I have taken these great chiefs by the hand, I have been glad to
meet them; I must now say farewell forever, and my heart is more lonely
than when I think of the buffalo.
CHIEF TIN-TIN-MEET-SA: My idea of this meeting is that we are doing a
great thing. I am of old age and I feel strange to these people whom I
have met here at this place for the first time. I know that after this
meeting is over we will all of us go back to our own country, probably
never to see one another again, or talk any more to each other. The man
who was sent here to do this work has been very kind to the Indians and is
a fit man to do this kind of work. The work he is doing is one of the
greatest works that has ever been done. The record here made will not
perish. We will soon all be gone, but the record will last. I have no
hard feelings toward any one in this camp, and I am only worrying about my
hay at home.
CHIEF PRETTY VOICE EAGLE: The meeting of the chiefs is to me a great
thing in many ways. First: I was glad to come here and meet the chiefs
from all over the country, and see many whom I had never seen before, and
talk to them by sign language. It is a great sign to me that we have all
met here, met in peace. We had this feeling before we came, but now that
we are here and can see each other face to face, the feeling has grown.
Second: it is a great idea that has been thought of to send a man here to
take our speeches and make our pictures, and think over and talk over the
old times, and make a record of them. To me this is a great
accomplishment. It is a great accomplishment in this way: we cannot go to
Washington; we cannot present ourselves there, but the pictures and the
record will be preserved there and in great cities, to speak for us. I
want to draw a little illustration. You speak a language that we know
nothing about. With the help of your people you have educated the younger
element and through them we can speak to you, and the different
interpreters can speak for the different tribes to you, and thus we can
all talk with you and tell our story. I want to point out in this way the
difference between the old people and the young people. The illustration
I have given seems to me like a dream. I can see the advancement our race
has made thus far. Our race is constantly changing, and this meeting will
be a great memory to all the Indians represented here. This meeting means
a great deal to my tribe. One great feeling of gratefulness I have about
this meeting is that I hope that my grandchildren and their grandchildren
will read the speeches I have made here, and will see my pictures.
CHIEF RUNNING FISHER: I think there is a great idea back of calling the
chiefs together, because there will be something left of us when we are
all gone. This record and pictures will live when we are all dead. I am
glad to have had this privilege of meeting all these chiefs from all the
tribes. I feel sad at the thought of not meeting these chiefs again, for
I would like to meet them all once more, but I feel pretty sure we will
never meet again.
Chief Running Fisher died within two weeks after reaching home from the
council.
CHIEF BULL-DON’T-FALL-DOWN: This meeting of the great chiefs in council I
consider one of the great events of my life. Chiefs from all over the
United States have come here, chiefs whom I have never seen before and
whom I will never see again. We have had an opportunity to see their
faces, shake hands with them, and talk with them in the sign language.
Since the great council of the chiefs on the Platte River in 1867, we have
not seen any of their faces until this day. Then we were on the
warpath—at this council we meet in peace. I was one of the first Crow
Indians to make peace with the Sioux after we had been on the warpath, and
now I can say farewell to all the chiefs with peace in my heart for all
men.
[Chief Two Moons Addressing the Council]
Chief Two Moons Addressing the Council
CHIEF TWO MOONS: I feel that I am engaging in a great work in helping to
make this historic picture of a great Indian council. I have led the
Cheyennes in so many battles, and my life has been so full, that I felt
when I came here that I was an old man, but since meeting the chiefs and
having a share in the great council and recalling my old life for this
record, I feel like a young man again. It is a great day for all of us,
because there are no more wars between us, and we meet in peace and hold
this great council of the chiefs and smoke the pipe of peace. I am glad
at heart that this great picture is to be made of us, as we are assembled
here, because our old chiefs are fast dying away, and our old Indian
customs soon will pass out of sight. This record will survive for our
children, and their children will reap the benefit. I am glad we are
here, but my heart is sorry to say farewell.
CHIEF RED CLOUD: I think this a great and good thing. Good things have
come to us from the white man. When the white man came across the ocean
we heard he was coming because there was land over here, and he brought us
food to eat. The coming of this man to make these pictures, to be
preserved in Washington and to be shown in great cities, means good to us,
because the generations to come will know of our manners and customs. It
is good, besides, to meet all these chiefs who are as brothers to one
another. We have never met them before; we shall never see their faces
again, and it is, therefore, I think, a great and good thing to have this
last council of the chiefs.
MOUNTAIN CHIEF: I think it was one of the greatest things that ever
happened when we had this great council. It will be remembered forever.
As for myself, it will not be very long until I go to the happy hunting
grounds, but I have left this record for the coming generations. While I
was sitting in the council I was thinking of the past when we used not to
see each other’s faces, except with the firing of guns, and now we have
met the different tribes in council to talk with one another in the sign
language. It shows that the Government is greater than the Indian. I
think it was a great thing to bring these chiefs together, and so long as
I live I am going to tell this story to my children and my grandchildren.
I think that Chief Two Moons and Chief Plenty Coups were the two greatest
men in the council. They impressed me more than any others by their
appearance. Two Moons was not dressed up, but he showed that he was a
man. I feel as I sit talking here with you that we are brothers together.
And I say farewell to all the chiefs with a sad heart.
CHIEF WHITE HORSE: This council of all the chiefs seems to me to be a
wonderful idea. I have met a good many whom I have never seen before, and
it was a great surprise to me, and my heart felt glad. These different
tribes of Indians have been enemies to each other for generations back,
but we have now been at peace with each other for many years. But now we
all meet here and see each other. I think your idea of taking notes and
making a record of our lives and taking pictures of us, of our Indian
costumes and our manners, is a great thing. I am old enough now and do
not expect to live very long, but I am very glad that this record is to be
made, and put on file in the Great Father’s house at Washington. Another
thing I would like to say: we all speak different languages, and we are
all as helpless as a child, and we want you to help us in our needs during
our last days. My trip here was the first time I have ever been on an
iron horse, and there are a great many lessons that I learned from my ride
here. When I came here and saw all the Indians speaking different
languages and looking different, and I saw all that was going on and heard
their speeches by sign language, I thought it was one of the most
important events in my life. The first lesson I got while riding on the
iron horse was to see the coaches filled with white people, and when I
went in they all looked at me and looked as though I was a great curiosity
to them. When I first saw the white people I felt backward—they looked at
me so hard. I felt backward, but I finally felt more at ease, for I
thought, I am going to die anyway. I looked over the white people and
their dress, and I looked over the ceiling of the coach, and I thought
these are all wonderful things. I looked out of the window and the train
was going so fast that it seemed to me I was on the wings of a great bird.
We travelled so fast I could not see the things very near the coach. When
we used to travel on our ponies it took us many days to come over to this
place. But on the train it took us one half day to come to Miles City,
and that was one of the things that made me fear. It seems impossible how
the trains go so fast, and this thought came to my mind: This is of the
white people, who are so educated they can make the iron horse draw things
across the country so fast. My wish is that the Indians will come to be
like the white people, and be able to invent things, but the thought comes
to me that this will be impossible. As we came along, flying as a bird, I
looked out of the window, saw a country over which I had once hunted, and
the thought of the buffalo came back to me, and I cried in my heart. When
I get home I expect to stay there, and never leave my country again. I
shall never see this land any more. I expect to die at home. When I get
home I shall tell my people of the journey I had on the train, and what I
saw, and of my visit to this great country, of the speeches that we made,
of the pictures that were taken, and I know when I tell them they will be
glad.
[An Indian Communion]
An Indian Communion
[The Final Trail]
The Final Trail
THE FAREWELL OF THE CHIEFS
We are standing at the centre of a mighty circumference. An Indian world
revolves for the last time upon its axis. All the constellations which
gave it light have burned out. The Indian cosmos sweeps a dead thing amid
the growing lustre of the unfading stars of civilization and history. The
solemn hour passes, unmarked by any cataclysm of nature—volcano and
earthquake utter no speech—darkness and tempest rend no veil of this
crumbling life temple. In the deepening twilight all is silent—all speech
is vulgar. To utter a word here would be profanation. The remnant of a
race have gathered for shelter within the sacred walls of their council
lodge. The ashes of the council pipe have been scattered upon the ground.
In silence, deep, profound, awe-inspiring, the old Indian guard—the Last
of the Great Chiefs—break not the silence. Who can ask death to retreat?
And who put in shackles the decrees of destiny? The world annals contain
no heroism and no bravery more lofty and enduring than that furnished by
the record of the red man. But the summital requirement is at hand.
These old heroes, few in number, must with their own moccasined feet
measure the distance in yards and inches from that council lodge to the
grave—the grave of their race. It were almost sacrilege to invade their
thoughts. The old question of the carven Sphinx sat on each bronze face.
The far cry of the hills and plains—the memories of other days—forged new
lines until the brow of each solemn warrior seemed like a page in the book
of fate. They saw again the slowly rising smoke column, as in the sunrise
and from the far off hilltop it lifted its call for the chiefs to
assemble. The memory of the old days stirred their hearts. Again they
saw the flaming council fires, and heard once more the burning speech of
their brothers as they counselled for war or the welfare of the tribe.
The blood of youth again chased in their veins as they felt once more that
they might sit in council as in the old time and then die in peace. The
old war-bonnets and war-shirts were brought out; the coup stick with its
trembling eagle feathers, the ancient bows and arrows. The favourite
horse was blanketed, and the journey begun. Old scenes and landmarks were
made new. Here they crossed a river through whose rushing waters they
had, in other days, pursued a foe. Over there was a coulee where in
exciting patience they had sought to ambush the enemy. Yonder was a plain
that had been a battlefield. Winding over the pine-girt hilltop they
traced an old buffalo trail. And now they had reached the council lodge.
They had partaken of the bread and meat. They had exchanged greetings,
and pledged themselves to brotherhood and peace. How familiar it all
seemed! For one splendid moment they were once again really Indians. The
same historic river wound its way among the purple hills and through the
lacework of alder and aspen trees that like a green ribbon festooned the
valley. How peaceful seemed even this place—once also a place of battle.
And now the far stretch of the years loomed up: boys again, trapping
foxes, learning to shoot the arrow which finally found its mark in the
buffalo calf; capturing and taming the wild horse; the first war party;
the first scalp, and its consequent honour among the tribe; the first coup
counted; the eagle that was shot to get the coveted feather that to all
men should be a pledge of victory; then the love for an Indian maiden, the
ponies and furs and beadwork willingly given in exchange for this new
love; the making of a new home. Thoughts of war parties, and war’s bitter
struggles; other coups counted, other scalps taken, were thoughts that
lighted new altar fires. In imagination vast herds of ponderous buffalo
once again thundered across the plains, and the exhilaration of the chase
quickened the pulse beat, only to give place to the tireless lament that
the buffalo were all gone. Memories of tribal tragedies, of old camping
places, of the coming of the white man, of broken treaties, of the advent
of the soldiers—all thronged for recognition; the wigwam around which
happy children and the merry round of life sped on, the old men, their
counsellors and friends, who had gone into the spirit land, and now this
was to be the last, the very last council. The heart grows tense with
emotion as they break the silence, and in Indian fashion chief looks into
the face of chief, and, without an uttered word, they pass one by one
through the doorway that leads to a land without a horizon.
[The Fading Sunset]
The Fading Sunset
The prairie grass turned to brown, the trees on the banks of the nearby
river turning to crimson and orange, the Syrian blue of the skies, holding
here and there a mountainous cloud, the brilliant sunshine of the early
autumn day, all served to emphasize and revivify the splendid mosaic of
colouring worn by the chieftains, as, without the mockery of speech, they
mounted their horses, and faced their final destiny.
The Indian is a superb horseman. Both horse and rider seem to have grown
together. It is poetry in motion. The brilliant cavalcade are fast
leaving the old council lodge in the distance. The word farewell was
baptized with the spirit of peace, and now as they ride forth the banner
of peace floats over them. Peace is in the air. Not far hence there is a
river to cross, whose waters were born amid the snows of the distant
mountains, and the river bathed in sunlight utters its jubilations of
peace. Like “an army with banners” they enter the shaded defile of the
valley—cross the swiftly flowing stream, and pass out upon the plain.
Weird and picturesque is the procession as the long line of horsemen face
the loneliness of the far-flung line of desert waste—the flat and sombre
serenity of sand and sage and cactus. Clouds of dust are lifted from the
immensity of the arid stretches, like smoke signals to the matchless
immensity of the sky. The burning haze, the molten heavens, the weird and
spearlike cactus, the valiant horsemen, hold the eye. We follow their
trail until they are almost lost to view in the drapery that enshrouds
sand and sage and riders. There seems now to be a tragic soul roaming
these infinite wilds, restless and burning with passion, the companion of
storms and the herald of violent deeds.
[Vanishing into the Mists]
Vanishing into the Mists
The chiefs bravely emerge from these echoless silences, dust-covered but
intrepid. They must now make the ascent of abrupt and massive bluffs.
The summit attained, they pause for rest and retrospect. The trail has
been obliterated. Every hoof-print in the sands has been erased. The
trackless, yellow expanse now assumes alluring miles of colour; the royal
purple of the shadows seems like tinted bands binding all the intervale
back yonder to the far distant council lodge. They are familiar with the
speech of the granite hills, from whose heights they now view the
prospect. In these rocks, so red that it would seem as though the molten
fires had not yet cooled, the Indian listens to the tongues of ten million
years. Earth’s heart fires had here and over there split the land and
left jagged monuments of stone and red ash bearing still the tint of flame
which had been cooled by the breath of countless winters. Still subject
to the inner and absorbing passion of his life, the Indian made an altar
in this weird sanctuary, and waited to worship.
But for the Indian the path is forever down—down into the shadowed vale,
down into the abysmal canon, balustraded with sombre, cold gray rocks
holding in the far recesses secret streams that make their way beneath the
mountain to the cloven rock on the sunlit slope. Thither then they rode,
solemn but steadfast. Once and again they turned upon their tired steeds
to look back upon the far-reaching line of cliffs which to them seemed to
float in the rising tide of a crimson sea. Forward and ever on until they
had reached the hush of the spacious prairies, rolling like the billows of
the ocean. Melancholy broods in the mind when these limitless and
unexplored stretches sweep before the eye bounded only by the horizon.
The spirit of a great awe stilled the souls of these men, every one,
because added to the monotone of the landscape they must heed the demands
for endurance, for it was again “a land where no water is.” Memory is at
times the birth-hour of prophecy, but here memory clothes the present with
pain and loss, and for them prophecy died yesterday and the despair of a
to-morrow writes its gloomy headlines upon every advance step of their
journey. But the Indian will face it. He always faces death as though it
were a plaything of the hour. The winds on these prairies always travel
on swift wing—they are never still—they are full of spectral voices. The
chiefs have left the council lodge, they have said farewell, their days of
triumph are behind them. Thoughts that burn the brain held the weary
pilgrims.
[Facing the Sunset]
Facing the Sunset
One refreshing thought is now flung at them: their days of journeying have
brought them within sight of water—water without which there is no life.
That long green fringe winding under the brow of the distant hills means
tree growth. The Indian loves the brotherhood of trees. Trees grow in
that desolate landscape only on the borders of streams. Toward the water
and welcome shade they hasten. Tired beast and tired man lave in the
lifegiving flood. The horses wade in it as though the snows had melted
and run thither to caress and refresh them. Oh, the exhilaration of
water! On the margin of the far banks the camp is made for the night.
There is witchery in a Western night. Myriads upon myriads of low-hung
stars, brilliant, large and lustrous, bend to warm the soul and light the
trail. Under these night lamps, amid the speech of leaves and the rush of
the river, they bivouac for their last night, bending under the weight of
thoughts too deep for tears. In the haze of a broken sleep they wrought
out again the sorrows of their troubled record. When the morning broke
through the dull gray of the eastern sky rim, he would be a heartless
surgeon of emotions who attempted to probe the pathos of their thoughts,
and a dull and vulgar rhetorician who should attempt to parse the
fathomless sorrow of their speech.
In the hush of the new morning they mounted, and set forth upon their
journey over the Great Divide. All Nature seemed conscious of the burden
weighing to the earth every Indian thought, and trailing in the dust every
hope of the race. The birds remembered not to sing—the prairie dogs
ceased their almost continual and rasping chatter. The very horses seemed
to loiter and fear the weary miles of their final day of travel. The
hills, the sky, the very light of the noonday sun gathered to themselves a
new atmosphere and spread it like a mantle over this travelling host.
Tired feet now press the highest dome of the hills. It had been a
westward climb. Full in their faces, as though to canonize the moment,
the god of day had wrought cloud and sky into a miracle of sunset,
transmuting by living fire the brown grasses into burnished gold—the
fading sage into a silver glow, and the gleam of the distant river into
the red of wine. The scene transfixed them. Gladiators of other days
became helpless children. During the solemn suspense of this tragic
moment, waiting in confused and wondering silence, their faces lighted
with the ominous sunset sheen, one great chief uttered speech for all:
“Brothers, the West, the West! We alone have the key to the West, and we
must bravely unlock the portals; we can buy no lamp that will banish the
night. We have always kept our time by the sun. When we pass through the
gates of this dying day, we shall pass into a sunless land, and for us
there shall be no more time, a forever-land of annihilating darkness.”
For one wistful moment they looked and waited, then the hill upbore them
no longer. They filed down the narrow, barren ridge, lined on either hand
by sullen and impassable gulfs. Their eagle feathers fluttered from
war-bonnet and coup stick, encarnadined by the sun’s red rays. Steeper
and more rugged became the path until they were confronted by the sharp
edge of the bluff. There was danger in the untrodden descent. It was a
pathway of struggle.
Once in the valley
They said farewell forever.
Thus departed the Great Chieftains,
In the purple mists of evening.
[The Sunset of a Dying Race]
The Sunset of a Dying Race
The Indian composes music for every emotion of his soul. He has a song
for the Great Mystery; for the animals of the chase; for the maiden he
woos; for the rippling river. His prayers are breathed in song. His
whole life is an expression in music. These songs are treasured down
through the ages, and old age teaches youth the import of the melody so
that nothing is lost, nothing forgotten. Haydn wrote his “Creation,”
Beethoven his “Symphonies,” Mendelssohn his “Songs Without Words,” Handel
gave the world his “Dead March in Saul,” Mozart was commissioned by Count
Walsegg to pour his great soul into a requiem; during its composition he
felt that he was writing the dead march of his soul. For generations it
has been sung in the little church at St. Mark’s, where the great composer
lies in an unknown grave. Had the Indian the combined soul of these
masters in music, could he cull from symphony and oratorio and requiem and
dirge the master notes that have thrilled and inspired the ages, he then
would falter at the edge of his task in an attempt to register the burden
of his lament, and utter for the generations of men the requiem wrought
out during these moments of passion—a passion of sorrow so sad that the
voice of it must ride through the width of the sky, and conquer the
thunder of the fiercest tempest. The orchestral grandeur of the world’s
great composers is the child of genius. They reached the far heights of
inspiration in a few isolated instances and for the delight of men. The
Indian composing his own requiem must encompass the eternal pathos of a
whole race of mankind riding forth beyond the challenge of death. It is
well that the Indian does not compose this death march, for the sorrow of
it would hush all lullabies, and banish the laughter of children.
Napoleon said to his soldiers, drawn up in battle line on the plains of
Egypt, in sight of the solemn Sphinx and the eternal pyramids: “Forty
centuries look down upon your actions to-day!” Four hundred and a score
years ago Columbus looked first upon the red man. These solemn centuries
look down upon this day; look down upon the sheathed sword, the broken
coup stick, the shattered battle-axe, the deserted wigwams, the last red
men mobilized on the plains of death. Ninety millions, with suffused
eyes, watch this vanishing remnant of a race, whose regnant majesty
inspires at the very moment it succumbs to the iconoclasm of civilization.
It is the imposing triumph of solitary grandeur sweeping beyond the reach
of militant crimes, their muffled footfalls reaching beyond the margin of
an echo.
[The Empty Saddle]
The Empty Saddle
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Vanishing Race" ***
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