The Cheyenne are an Indigenous people of the Great Plains. Their Cheyenne language belongs to the Algonquian language family. Today, the Cheyenne people are split into two federally recognized nations: the Southern Cheyenne, who are enrolled in the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes in Oklahoma, and the Northern Cheyenne, who are enrolled in the Northern Cheyenne Tribe of the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation in Montana. The Cheyenne comprise two Native American tribes, the Só'taeo'o or Só'taétaneo'o and the Tsétsêhéstâhese. The tribes merged in the early 19th century.
Julesburg is the statutory town that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Sedgwick County, Colorado, United States. The population was 1,307 at the 2020 United States Census.
The Sand Creek massacre was a massacre of Cheyenne and Arapaho people by the U.S. Army in the American Indian Wars that occurred on November 29, 1864, when a 675-man force of the Third Colorado Cavalry under the command of U.S. Volunteers Colonel John Chivington attacked and destroyed a village of Cheyenne and Arapaho people in southeastern Colorado Territory, killing and mutilating an estimated 69 to over 600 Native American people. Chivington claimed 500 to 600 warriors were killed. However, most sources estimate around 150 people were killed, about two-thirds of whom were women and children. The location has been designated the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site and is administered by the National Park Service. The massacre is considered part of a series of events known as the Colorado Wars.
The Sioux Wars were a series of conflicts between the United States and various subgroups of the Sioux people which occurred in the later half of the 19th century. The earliest conflict came in 1854 when a fight broke out at Fort Laramie in Wyoming, when Sioux warriors killed 31 American soldiers in the Grattan Fight, and the final came in 1890 during the Ghost Dance War.
The Powder River Expedition of 1865 also known as the Powder River War or Powder River Invasion, was a large and far-flung military operation of the United States Army against the Lakota Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho Indians in Montana Territory and Dakota Territory. Although soldiers destroyed one Arapaho village and established Fort Connor to protect gold miners on the Bozeman Trail, the expedition is considered a failure because it failed to defeat or intimidate the Indians.
The Colorado War was an Indian War fought in 1864 and 1865 between the Southern Cheyenne, Arapaho, and allied Brulé and Oglala Sioux peoples versus the U.S. Army, Colorado militia, and white settlers in Colorado Territory and adjacent regions. The Kiowa and the Comanche played a minor role in actions that occurred in the southern part of the Territory along the Arkansas River. The Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux played the major role in actions that occurred north of the Arkansas River and along the South Platte River, the Great Platte River Road, and the eastern portion of the Overland Trail. The United States government and Colorado Territory authorities participated through the 1st Colorado Cavalry Regiment, often called the Colorado volunteers. The war was centered on the Colorado Eastern Plains, extending eastward into Kansas and Nebraska.
William Wells Bent was a frontier trader and rancher in the American West, with forts in Colorado. He also acted as a mediator among the Cheyenne Nation, other Native American tribes and the expanding United States. With his brothers, Bent established a trade business along the Santa Fe Trail. In the early 1830s Bent built an adobe fort, called Bent's Fort, along the Arkansas River in present-day Colorado. Furs, horses and other goods were traded for food and other household goods by travelers along the Santa Fe trail, fur-trappers, and local Mexican and Native American people. Bent negotiated a peace among the many Plains tribes north and south of the Arkansas River, as well as between the Native American and the United States government.
Spotted Tail ; born c. 1823 – died August 5, 1881) was a Sichangu Lakota tribal chief. Famed as a great warrior since his youth, warring on Ute, Pawnee and Absaroke (“Crow”), and having taken a leading part in the Grattan Massacre, he led his warriors in the Colorado and Platte River uprising after the massacre performed by John M. Chivington's Colorado Volunteers of the peaceful Cheyenne and Arapaho camping on Sand Creek, but declined to participate in Red Cloud's War.
Chief Niwot or Left Hand(-ed) was a Southern Arapaho chief, diplomat, and interpreter who negotiated for peace between white settlers and the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush and Colorado War.
The Overland Trail was a stagecoach and wagon trail in the American West during the 19th century. While portions of the route had been used by explorers and trappers since the 1820s, the Overland Trail was most heavily used in the 1860s as a route alternative to the Oregon, California, and Mormon trails through central Wyoming. The Overland Trail was famously used by the Overland Stage Company owned by Ben Holladay to run mail and passengers to Salt Lake City, Utah, via stagecoaches in the early 1860s. Starting from Atchison, Kansas, the trail descended into Colorado before looping back up to southern Wyoming and rejoining the Oregon Trail at Fort Bridger. The stage line operated until 1869 when the completion of the First transcontinental railroad eliminated the need for mail service via stagecoach.
George Bent, also named Ho—my-ike in Cheyenne, was a Cheyenne-Anglo who became a Confederate soldier during the American Civil War and waged war against Americans as a Cheyenne warrior afterward. He was the mixed-race son of Owl Woman, daughter of White Thunder, a Cheyenne chief and keeper of the Medicine Arrows, and the American William Bent, founder of the trading post named Bent's Fort and a trading partnership with his brothers and Ceran St. Vrain. Bent was born near present-day La Junta, Colorado, and was reared among both his mother's people, his father and other European Americans at the fort, and other whites from the age of 10 while attending boarding school in St. Louis, Missouri. He identified as Cheyenne.
The American Ranch massacre occurred in 1865 during the Colorado War. Cheyenne and Sioux warriors attacked a ranch near present-day Sterling, Colorado where they killed all of the male settlers and took three captives.
The Battle of Julesburg took place on January 7, 1865, near Julesburg, Colorado between 1,000 Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Lakota Indians and about 60 soldiers of the U.S. army and 40 to 50 civilians. The Indians defeated the soldiers and over the next few weeks plundered ranches and stagecoach stations up and down the South Platte River valley.
The Battle of Rush Creek took place February 8–9, 1865, between about 185 soldiers of the U.S. Army and 1,000 warriors of the Lakota Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes. It was part of a series of retaliations by the Native American alliance after the U.S. army committed the Sand Creek Massacre. The inconclusive battle took place 4 mi southeast of present-day Broadwater, Nebraska, along both banks of the North Platte River.
The Battle of Platte Bridge, also called the Battle of Platte Bridge Station, on July 26, 1865, was the culmination of a summer offensive by the Lakota Sioux and Cheyenne Indians against the United States army. In May and June the Indians raided army outposts and stagecoach stations over a wide swath of Wyoming and Montana. In July, they assembled a large army, estimated by Cheyenne warrior George Bent to number 3,000 warriors, and descended upon Platte Bridge. The bridge, across the North Platte River near present-day Casper, Wyoming, was guarded by 120 soldiers. In an engagement near the bridge, and another against a wagon train guarded by 28 soldiers a few miles away, the Indians killed 29 soldiers while suffering at least eight dead.
South Platte Trail was a historic trail that followed the southern side of South Platte River from Fort Kearny in Nebraska to Denver, Colorado. Plains Indians, such as the Cheyenne and the Arapaho, hunted in the lands around the South Platte River. They also traded at trading posts along the route, as did white travelers. Travelers included trappers, traders, explorers, the military, and those following the gold rush. The trail was also used by the Pony Express.
The Raid on Godfrey Ranch occurred from January 15–16, 1865 in which a large band of Lakota and Cheyenne warriors attacked an isolated ranch in Colorado owned by Holon Godfrey. The raid was one of the numerous January raids committed by the Cheyenne and their Indian allies as retaliation for the Sand Creek massacre that happened on November 29, 1864 during the Colorado War. After their victory at the Battle of Julesburg, the Indians raided up and down the South Platte River valley. Among the ranches the Indians attacked was the American Ranch, in which a white family and some of their workers perished before the Cheyenne set their sights on Godfrey's ranch nearby. Godfrey learned of the Indians' upcoming attack and fortified his ranch together with his family and ranch hands. At night, Godfrey estimated that 130 Indian warriors surrounded and attacked his ranch. The men inside managed to hold off them off the whole night. By morning, one of Godfrey's men managed to sneak out of the siege and call for help from the U.S. cavalry, which forced the Indians to finally retreat. The ranch, though burned and having lost some of its horses, remained standing and Godfrey's stand was successful. Godfrey christened his ranch as Fort Wicked.
Fort Sedgwick, also known as Post at Julesburg, Camp Rankin, and Fort Rankin was a U.S. military post from 1864 to 1871, in Sedgwick County, Colorado. There are two historical markers for the former post. The town was named for Fort Sedgwick, which was named after John Sedgwick, who was a major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
Black Bear was an Arapaho leader into the 1860s when the Northern Arapaho, like other Native American tribes, were prevented from ranging through their traditional hunting grounds due to settlement by European-Americans who came west during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush. Conflicts erupted over land and trails used by settlers and miners. A watershed event was the Sand Creek massacre of 1864. This led to the Northern Arapaho joining with other tribes to prevent settlement in their traditional lands. In 1865, Black Bear's village was attacked during the Battle of the Tongue River. People died, lodges were set on fire, and food was ruined, all of which made it difficult for them to survive as a unit. He died during an ambush by white settlers on April 8, 1870, in the Wild Wind Valley of present-day Wyoming.
Margaret Poisal was "the only woman who was an official witness, interpreter, and consultant at many meetings and treaty councils held along or in close proximity to the Santa Fe Trail." The daughter of French Canadian trapper John Poisal and Arapaho Snake Woman, Poisal was educated at a convent school. She married Thomas Fitzpatrick, an Indian agent, and they worked together negotiating peace between Native American tribes and the United States government. After Fitzpatrick died, Poisal continued to work as an interpreter and peacemaker.
