Lesson 3: Massacres, Military Leaders, Indian Retaliations, & More Gold
Peace Talks, the Bozeman Trail, and Red Cloud
In 1865, war-torn Dakota had lost its image. Immigration had ceased and settlers were packing up and leaving. Dakota’s governor appealed to Congress to make peace. So Congress created a joint committee to investigate “the condition of the Indian tribes and their treatment by the civil and military authorities of the United States,” as stated in Robert Utley’s The Indian Frontier. A treaty commission was authorized to approach the Sioux of the upper Missouri — right in the middle of a major military offensive.
That October the Commission went to the upper Missouri. They were successful, except for one small hitch. They signed up some chiefs that were termed as “stay-around-the-fort” Indians. Then they announced that peace had been made, though not one of the chiefs whom Generals Sully and Sibley had been fighting for three bloody years had even talked to the commissioners.
Similar talks and treaty signings were going on with the Kiowas and Comanches in Kansas. These peace treaties had to be signed and peace declared because it was time to resume building the railroad across Kansas.
Flint Hills, Kansas
The terrible winter of 1864-1865 had left many Plains Indians near starvation. Naturally they were receptive to peace talks in June of 1866 at Fort Laramie where food and presents would be abundant. There had been considerable disagreement between the United States Army and the Teton Sioux over the invasion of whites along the Bozeman Trail but still the Indians were considering peace. The talks were going well until Colonel Henry Carrington and a battalion of infantry showed up with orders to build forts on the Bozeman Trail to protect miners and others traveling westward towards the gold mines in Montana.
The idea of placing military forts right in the middle of the Sioux’s happy hunting ground didn’t set well with one Oglala Sioux. This warrior wasn’t a chief but he certainly had a large following. There would be, as time progressed, many a soldier and civilian who cringed at the name of Red Cloud. His influence was so great that during the peace talks, after hearing the order to build forts along the Bozeman Trail, without first getting the Indians’ permission, Red Cloud made an interesting speech about white perfidy. At its conclusion he marched out of the fort, taking the Sioux north with him.
Red Cloud, Oglala
Once again, the stay-around-the-fort Indians signed the treaty and those back east were informed that peace prevailed.
It had been demanded of Congress that the travelers on the Bozeman Trail be protected, and the traffic was getting terrific. Not only was it coming from the east and going west, it was also coming from California and Oregon and moving north and east to new gold fields.
But Red Cloud had threatened to fight all whites that attempted to use the Bozeman Trail and he was going to make his threat good. And the order to build forts along that trail was also made good. The first to be erected was Fort Phil Kearney in present-day Wyoming.
So much of western history took place in Kansas. You've never been to Kansas? Well, visit it at the address below.
KANSAS, LAND OF DIVERSE GEOGRAPHY By Janette Kenny http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/kans... Hills and valleys stretch over the majority of the 82,277 miles that make up Kansas. Fossils prove that eons ago, it was a great sea. Glaciers scored the area, cutting rivers and leaving upheavals of limestone across the state.
The sources for this section are:
Brady, Cyrus Townshend. The Sioux Indian Wars, From the Powder River to the Little Big Horn. Indian Head Books, New York, 1992.
Utley, Robert M. The Indian Frontier of the American West, 1846-1890. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque. 1984.
