A small detachment of soldiers entered a large Sioux encampment to arrest a man accused of taking a migrant's cow, although such matters by treaty were to be handled by the US Indian agent. After one of the soldiers fatally shot Chief Matȟó Wayúhi (Conquering Bear), the Sichangu Lakotas returned fire and killed 29 soldiers, LieutenantJohn Grattan, and a civilian interpreter. The massacre, as it was called by the American press,[citation needed] is considered an early and significant event in the Plains Indian Wars.
Background
From 1845-1856, the Great Plains suffered a severe drought. Conditions of this drought dramatically reduced grass coverage, and Kiowa tribes recorded few to no bison on the Plains by the late 1840s.[2] The lack of bison, in turn, caused hunger and starvation among the Plains American Indians. By 1853, U.S. Indian Agents noted, "many of the Cheyennes, Arapahoes, and Sioux, in a starving condition, on account of the scanty supply of buffalo[.]"[3]
Late in summer of 1854, about 4,000 Sichangu and Oglala were camped east of Fort Laramie, in accordance with the terms of the Treaty of 1851. On August 17, a cow belonging to Mormon Christian J. Larsen (chaplain of the Hans P. Olsen Company of Danish immigrants) traveling on the nearby Oregon Trail, strayed and was killed by a visiting Miniconjou (Sioux) named High Forehead.[4] Larsen barely noticed the incident in his journal, writing, "We passed a large encampment of Indians before we reached 'Fort Laramie'. They shot one of our cows, that was lame, and we let them have the meat. They also shot one, belonging to Hans Monsen, and it came into our camp, wounded, where we had it butchered."[5]
Lt. Hugh Fleming, the senior officer of the small garrison, consulted with the chief, Matȟó Wayúhi, also known as Conquering Bear, to discuss the loss of livestock. Lt. Fleming was either unaware, or chose to ignore that these matters were supposed to be handled by the local Indian agent according to the terms of the Treaty of 1851. The Indian agent in this case was John Whitfield, who was due to arrive within days with annuities with which restitution could be made.[1]
Despite knowing that the matter was not under the purview of the military, Conquering Bear still attempted to negotiate with Lt. Fleming, offering a horse from his personal herd or a cow from the tribe's herd; however, Larsen, the owner of the cow, reportedly persisted in demanding $25 instead. Lt. Fleming asked the Sioux to arrest High Forehead and deliver him to the fort, which Conquering Bear refused; he had no authority over the Miniconjou and did not want to violate his people's tradition of hospitality.[1] The day's talk ended in stalemate.
On August 19, 1854, Second LieutenantJohn Lawrence Grattan of the U.S. 6th Infantry Regiment, a recent graduate of West Point and supernumerary waiting for a vacancy in the regiment, led an armed detachment into the Indian encampment to take custody of High Forehead and bring him back to the fort. Grattan was inexperienced and described as contemptuous of the Lakotas' ability as warriors.[6] This was his first (and only) encounter with the Sioux.
A commander at Laramie later recalled, "There is no doubt that Lt. Grattan left this post with a desire to have a fight with the Indians, and that he had determined to take the man at all hazards."[7] In Grattan's party were a sergeant, a corporal, 27 privates, and a French-Indian interpreter named Lucien Auguste; the military forces had two artillery pieces in addition to arms.[8]
By the time the detachment reached the encampment, Auguste was intoxicated from drinking along the way, as he feared the encounter. Grattan broke his bottle and scolded him. Auguste was not well liked by the Sioux; he spoke only broken Dakota and had little grasp of other dialects. As they entered the encampment, he began to taunt the Sioux, calling their warriors women, and saying the soldiers were not there to talk, but to kill them all. James Bordeaux, who owned the nearby trading post and observed the encounter, later recounted Auguste's comments.[n 1]
Historians estimate the encampment had some 1,200 warriors among the total 4,800 population. According to Bordeaux, Lt. Grattan began to realize the risk and stopped to discuss the situation with the trader. Bordeaux advised him to talk directly with Conquering Bear and let him handle the situation. Grattan seemed to understand and continued on into the encampment. Going first to the lodge of High Forehead, he ordered him to surrender to the US forces. High Forehead said he would die first.[citation needed]
Grattan went to Conquering Bear, saying the Sioux should arrest the guilty party and turn him over. Conquering Bear refused but tried to negotiate, offering a horse as compensation for the cow. Bordeaux reportedly said the interpreter Auguste taunted the Sioux, and failed to fully or accurately translate Conquering Bear and Grattan's comments, as there seemed to be confusion between them. Conquering Bear asked for the trader Bordeaux to act as interpreter, as the Sioux trusted him and his language ability. Called by the Sioux, Bordeaux rode to the meeting place; later he said he could see the situation was out of hand. As Grattan pressed Conquering Bear, numerous Sioux warriors moved into flanking positions around the soldiers. Bordeaux returned to the trading post, where he told associates to arm themselves, as a fight was brewing.[citation needed]
Ending the discussion, Grattan began walking back to his column. A nervous soldier fired his gun, shooting a Sioux. The warriors started shooting arrows while leaders tried to take control. Conquering Bear was mortally wounded and died nine days later near the Niobrara River.[9] The Sichangu Sioux warriors, led by Spotted Tail, then a rising war chief within their people, quickly killed Grattan, 11 of his men, and the interpreter.[10] A group of some 18 soldiers retreated on foot trying to reach some rocks for defense, but they were cut off and killed by overcoming warriors led by Red Cloud,[citation needed] a rising war chief within the Oglala Sioux. One of Grattan's soldiers survived the immediate situation but later died of his wounds.[11]
Conquering Bear was the only Lakota who was killed. The Sioux spared Bordeaux, both because he was married to a Sichangu Sioux woman and because he had a friendly relationship with the tribes.[12]
The enraged warriors "rampaged throughout the night, swearing to attack other whites."[13] They rode against Fort Laramie the next morning but withdrew; they looted the trading post but did not harm Bordeaux. On the third day after the US attack, the Sichangu and Oglala abandoned the camp on the North Platte River and returned to their respective hunting grounds.
On the fourth day, the military asked Bordeaux to arrange a burial party. His team went to the scene and found that the slain soldiers had been ritually mutilated. Grattan's body was identified by his watch and was returned to the trading post for burial. The remains of the troops were interred at the site in a shallow mass grave.[13][14] The soldiers' remains were later exhumed (unburied) and re-interred at Fort McPherson National Cemetery, where a white marble monument was erected in their memory. Grattan's remains were moved later and reinterred to Fort Leavenworth National Cemetery in Kansas.[15] A historical marker was later erected about one-half mile from the site of the events.
Historical marker near the site
The U.S. press called the event the "Grattan Massacre."[citation needed] Accounts generally ignored the US soldiers' instigation of the event by their failures: first, to leave it up to the Indian agent to settle, as called for in the treaty; and second, shooting chief Conquering Bear in the back.
When news of the fight reached the War Department, officials started planning retaliation to punish the Sioux. Secretary of War Jefferson Davis characterized the incident as "the result of a deliberately formed plan."[citation needed]
Col. William S. Harney was recalled from Paris in April 1855 and sent to Fort Kearny, where he assembled a command of 600 troops, consisting of men from the 6th Infantry, 10th Infantry, 4th Artillery, and his own 2nd US Dragoons. In total, he had four mounted companies led by Lt. Col. Philip St. George Cooke and five companies of infantry under Major Albemarle Cady. They set out on August 24, 1855, to find the Sioux and exact retribution. Harney was quoted as saying, "By God, I'm for battle—no peace."[citation needed]
Warned by Thomas S. Twiss of the Indian Bureau that the army had put a force in the field, half of the Lakota who were camped north of the Platte River went into Fort Laramie for protection as "friendlies". The other half, generally led by Conquering Bear's successor Little Thunder, remained at large. They considered themselves peaceful but knew that Harney was out with a force. They continued to harbor warriors sought by the army.
Harney engaged them in the Battle of Ash Hollow (also known as the Battle of Bluewater Creek) on September 3, 1855. U.S. soldiers killed 86 Sichangu Sioux, half of them women and children, in present-day Garden County, Nebraska. The New York Times and other newspapers recounted the battle as a massacre because so many women and children were killed.[citation needed] The village of 230 persons was caught between an assault by the infantry and a blocking force by the cavalry. Spotted Tail, principal war chief of the Sichangu, was surprised while unarmed and taking part in the parley; he was seriously wounded four times and two bullets passed through his chest, but still he killed or wounded 13 "long knives".[16]
Harney returned to Fort Laramie with 70 prisoners, most of them women and children, including Spotted Tail's mother, wife and three children, and the wife of Iron Shell (Maza Pangeska).[17] To make the Sichangu Women and children free, Harney claimed the delivery of the leaders of Grattan Fight, and Spotted Tail, Red Leaf (Waba Sha), Long Chin (Iku Hanska) and, some days later, Standing Elk (Hehaka Najin) and Red Plume (Wiyaka Sha), went to Fort Pierre, esorted by Iron Shell and the whole Sichangu crowd.[18] On October 25, the three warriors sought by the expedition surrendered, were held for a year at Fort Leavenworth (where Spotted Tail was reached by his wife several months later), and were released.
Harney ordered the tribes to send representatives to a treaty council at Fort Pierre in March 1856, where a treaty was signed on terms dictated by the War Department. Twiss tried to undermine the treaty, and Harney had him removed from office, although he did not have the authority to do so; George W. Manypenny, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, successfully lobbied the Senate to reject the treaty, and Twiss was reinstated.
Harney's actions against the Lakota restrained them for nearly ten years. The US was soon involved in the American Civil War, and did not have resources to fight on the Great Plains.
Historians such as Griske believe the following nearly quarter-century of intermittent warfare on the Great Plains was triggered by the Grattan massacre.[19] Others suggest numerous factors, especially US desire for control of lands that were Sioux territory, that contributed to make warfare inevitable.
In addition, Red Cloud admitted to having been present in the battle where thirty people died.[20]
The Lakota are a Native American people. Also known as the Teton Sioux, they are one of the three prominent subcultures of the Sioux people, with the Eastern Dakota (Santee) and Western Dakota (Wičhíyena). Their current lands are in North and South Dakota. They speak Lakȟótiyapi—the Lakota language, the westernmost of three closely related languages that belong to the Siouan language family.
The Sioux or Oceti Sakowin are groups of Native American tribes and First Nations peoples from the Great Plains of North America. The Sioux have two major linguistic divisions: the Dakota and Lakota peoples. Collectively, they are the Očhéthi Šakówiŋ, or "Seven Council Fires". The term "Sioux", an exonym from a French transcription ("Nadouessioux") of the Ojibwe term "Nadowessi", can refer to any ethnic group within the Great Sioux Nation or to any of the nation's many language dialects.
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.
Red Cloud was a leader of the Oglala Lakota from 1865 to 1909. He was one of the most capable Native American opponents whom the United States Army faced in the western territories. He defeated the United States during Red Cloud's War, which was a fight over control of the Powder River Country in northeastern Wyoming and southern Montana. The largest action of the war was the 1866 Fetterman Fight, with 81 US soldiers killed; it was the worst military defeat suffered by the US Army on the Great Plains until the Battle of the Little Bighorn 10 years later.
The Dog Soldiers or Dog Men are historically one of six Cheyenne military societies. Beginning in the late 1830s, this society evolved into a separate, militaristic band that played a dominant role in Cheyenne resistance to the westward expansion of the United States in the area of present-day Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado, and Wyoming, where the Cheyenne had settled in the early nineteenth century.
Red Cloud's War was an armed conflict between an alliance of the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Northern Arapaho peoples against the United States and the Crow Nation that took place in the Wyoming and Montana territories from 1866 to 1868. The war was fought over control of the western Powder River Country in present north-central Wyoming.
Crazy Horse was a Lakota war leader of the Oglala band in the 19th century. He took up arms against the United States federal government to fight against encroachment by white American settlers on Native American territory and to preserve the traditional way of life of the Lakota people. His participation in several famous battles of the Black Hills War on the northern Great Plains, among them the Fetterman Fight in 1866, in which he acted as a decoy, and the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876, in which he led a war party to victory, earned him great respect from both his enemies and his own people.
Fort Laramie was a significant 19th-century trading post, diplomatic site, and military installation located at the confluence of the Laramie and the North Platte Rivers. They joined in the upper Platte River Valley in the eastern part of the present-day U.S. state of Wyoming. The fort was founded as a private trading-post in the 1830s to service the overland fur trade; in 1849, it was purchased by the United States Army. The site was located east of the long climb leading to the best and lowest crossing-point over the Rocky Mountains at South Pass and became a popular stopping-point for migrants on the Oregon Trail. Along with Bent's Fort on the Arkansas River, the trading post and its supporting industries and businesses were the most significant economic hub of commerce in the region.
The Battle of Ash Hollow, also known as the Battle of Blue Water Creek or the Harney Massacre, was an engagement of the First Sioux War, and fought on September 2 and 3, 1855 between United States Army soldiers under Brig. Gen. William S. Harney and a band of the Brulé Lakota along the Platte River in present-day Garden County, Nebraska. In the 20th century, the town of Lewellen, Nebraska, was developed here as a railroad stop.
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 Massacre, and the final came in 1890 during the Ghost Dance War.
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.
The Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851 was signed on September 17, 1851 between United States treaty commissioners and representatives of the Cheyenne, Sioux, Arapaho, Crow, Assiniboine, Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nations. Also known as Horse Creek Treaty, the treaty set forth traditional territorial claims of the tribes.
Matȟó Wayúhi was a Brulé Lakota chief who signed the Fort Laramie Treaty (1851). He was killed in 1854 when troops from Fort Laramie entered his encampment to arrest a Sioux who had shot a calf belonging to a Mormon emigrant. All 30 troopers in the army detachment were annihilated, in what would be called the Grattan massacre or "the Mormon Cow War" according to Army Historian S.L.A. Marshall in his book Crimsoned Prairie. Little Thunder took over as chief after his death.
Spotted Tail 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.
Iron Shell was a Brulé Sioux chief. He initially became prominent after an 1843 raid on the Pawnee, and became sub-chief of the Brulé under Little Thunder. He became chief of the Brulé Orphan Band during the Powder River War of 1866-1868.
Wakíŋyaŋ Čík’ala (1820-1879) was a Brulé Lakota chief. He took over as chief of the Brulé after the death of Conquering Bear by U.S. Army soldiers in a dispute about a wandering Mormon cow in 1854, which had prompted the Grattan Massacre of approximately 30 U.S. Army troops on August 19, 1854 and led to the First Sioux War. The U.S. Army sent 600 troops led by Brevet Gen. William S. Harney to Little Thunder's village on Blue Water Creek, a tributary of the North Platte River in Nebraska, near what is now known as Ash Hollow State Historical Park. Little Thunder was wounded and captured during the Battle of Ash Hollow of September 3, 1855, in which approximately 86 Sioux were killed and another 70 captured. Little Thunder was then deposed, although his son would lead a rebellion in 1865, and a teenager who witnessed the massacre, Crazy Horse, would become a war leader two decades and defeat U.S. Cavalry at the Battle of Little Big Horn in 1876. Little Thunder lived his final years on the Rosebud Indian Reservation of the Dakota Territory.
John Lawrence Grattan was a mid-19th century U.S. Army officer, whose poor judgement and inexperience led to the Grattan massacre, which was a major instigator for the First Sioux War.
The Great Sioux War of 1876, also known as the Black Hills War, was a series of battles and negotiations that occurred in 1876 and 1877 in an alliance of Lakota Sioux and Northern Cheyenne against the United States. The cause of the war was the desire of the US government to obtain ownership of the Black Hills. Gold had been discovered in the Black Hills, settlers began to encroach onto Native American lands, and the Sioux and the Cheyenne refused to cede ownership. Traditionally, American military and historians place the Lakota at the center of the story, especially because of their numbers, but some Native Americans believe the Cheyenne were the primary target of the American campaign.
Crow Dog was a Brulé Lakota subchief, born at Horse Stealing Creek, Montana Territory.
The Wágluȟe Band is one of the seven bands of the Oglala Lakota. The Wágluȟe Band is also known as the Loafer Band.
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