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Wounded Knee Massacre
Part of the Sioux Wars
Miniconjou Chief Big Foot lies dead in the snow
Date December 29, 1890 Location Wounded Knee, South Dakota Result U.S. victory (massacre)
Belligerents
Great Sioux Nation!	United States
Commanders and leaders
Big Foot†	James W. Forsyth
Strength
120 men 230 women and children	500 men
Casualties and losses
153 killed 50 wounded 150 missing	25 killed 39 wounded

Template:Campaignbox Pine Ridge Campaign The Wounded Knee Massacre was the last major armed conflict between the Lakota Sioux and the United States, subsequently described as a "massacre" by General Nelson A. Miles in a letter to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs.

On December 29, 1890, five hundred troops of the U.S. 7th Cavalry, supported by four Hotchkiss guns (a lightweight artillery piece capable of rapid fire), surrounded an encampment of Minneconjou Lakota with orders to escort them back to the railroad for transport to Omaha, Nebraska. The commander of the 7th had been ordered to disarm the Lakota before proceeding and placed his men in too close proximity to the Lakota, alarming them. Shooting broke out near the end of the disarmament, and accounts differ regarding who fired first and why. By the time it was over, twenty-five troopers and one hundred and fifty-three Paiute lay dead, including sixty-two women and small children. Many of the dead on both sides may have been the victims of "friendly fire" as the shooting took place at point blank range in chaotic conditions. Around one hundred and fifty Lakota fled the chaos, of which an unknown number are later believed to have died from exposure.

Preludes

Lakota prelude

In February of 1890, the United States government broke a Lakota treaty by adjusting the Great Sioux Reservation of South Dakota, an area that formally encompassed the majority of the state, into five relatively smaller reservations. This was done to accommodate homesteaders from the east and was in accordance with the government’s clearly stated “policy of breaking up tribal relationships” and “conforming Indians to the white man’s ways, peaceably if they will, or forcibly if they must.” Once on the half-sized reservations, tribes were separated into family units on 320 acre plots, forced to farm, raise livestock, and send their children to boarding schools that forbid any inclusion of Native American traditional culture and language.

To help support the Sioux during the period of transition, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) was delegated the responsibility of supplementing the Sioux with food and hiring Euro-American farmers as teachers to the once proud hunters. By the end of the 1890 growing season, the Sioux farmer’s hard work trying to cultivate crops in the semi-arid region of South Dakota failed due to the inability of the land to produce agricultural yields during a time of intense heat and lack of rain. Unfortunately for them, this was also the time when the government’s patience supporting the “lazy” Indians also failed, resulting in rations to the Sioux being cut in half. With the bison virtually eradicated from the plains a few years earlier, the Sioux had no option but to starve. Increased performances of the Ghost Dance ritual ensued, frightening the supervising agents of the BIA, who successfully requested that thousands more troops be deployed to the reservation.

Ghost Dance prelude

Sometime in 1890, Jack Wilson, a Native American religious leader known as Wovoka, claimed that during the total eclipse of the sun on January 1, 1889, he experienced a revelation that identified him as the messiah of his people. The spiritual movement he subsequently established became known as the Ghost Dance, a syncretic mix of Souix spiritualism and Shaker Christianity. Although Wilson preached that earthquakes would be sent to kill all white people, he also taught that until judgment day, Native Americans were to live in peace and were not to refuse to work for whites.

Two early converts to the Ghost Dance religion were the Lakota warriors of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, Kicking Bear and Short Bull. Both stated that Wilson levitated before them, though they interpreted his statements differently. They rejected Wilson's claims to be the Messiah, and believed that the Messiah would not arrive until 1891. They also rejected Wilson's pacifism, and believed that special garments, called Ghost Shirts, would act as bulletproof armor.

Though perhaps a majority of Pine Ridge Lakota converted to the Ghost Dance Religion, Chief Sitting Bull was not among them. However, he granted practitioners religious freedom. Federal officials misconstrued Sitting Bull's tolerance as full support, and General Nelson Miles ordered his arrest. Pre-empting the Army, 43 Indian police attempted to arrest him on December 15, 1890 at the Standing Rock Agency. For unclear reasons a gun battle ensued, and Sitting Bull was among the twelve killed.

400 Hunkpapa Lakota Ghost Dancers fled south from Standing Rock to the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation of the Minniconjou Lakota. Though most were persuaded to surrender, 38 continued to the encampment of Sitting Bull's half-brother, Big Foot, who was chosen as the new leader of the band. Miles had also ordered the arrest of Big Foot but the Army had delayed, hoping his reputation as a peacekeeper would prevent hostilities. When the Hunkpapa arrived, and frightened by the influx of large numbers of Army troops in reaction to the Ghost Dancers, his people insisted that he accept an invitation from chief Red Cloud (who was not with the Ghost dance movement) at the Pine Ridge Agency to help make peace with the Whites. In all 350 Lakota attempted to move to Pine Ridge.

Unknown to Big Foot, the Ghost Dancers had already been weakened by the voluntary withdrawal of the main Oglala and Brulé "hostiles" from the Ghost dancer stronghold. Miles, fearful that Big Foot's destination was the stronghold and his presence would rekindle the crisis, deployed both the 6th U.S. Cavalry and 9th Cavalry to block the Minniconjou, but Big Foot was not headed for the stronghold and evaded them.

Big Foot's band was intercepted by Major Samuel Whitside and approximately 200 troops of the 7th Cavalry. Whitside transferred Big Foot to an army ambulance due to a severe case of pneumonia and escorted the Lakota to their camp for the night at Wounded Knee Creek. The army supplied the Lakota with some tents and rations, and then conducted a census, determining that there were 120 males and 230 women and children.

The next morning, the Lakota found that the remainder of the 7th Cavalry, with its commander, Colonel James W. Forsyth, had arrived during the night, accompanied by a battery of Hotchkiss guns of the 1st Artillery. The cannons were set up on a low hill overlooking the Lakota encampment. Forsyth informed his command that the Lakota were to be taken to a military camp in Omaha, Nebraska.

Massacre

The 7th Cavalry had been ordered by the commander of the Department of the Platte, General John R. Brooke, to disarm Big Foot's band before marching them to Nebraska. Having escorted them to the camp-site the evening before, and setting patrols around the two (military and Lakota) camps, both sides regarded the Lakota as virtual prisoners. Forsyth chose not to attempt to disarm their prisoners that evening.

The next morning, the Lakota were summoned to a meeting in their own camp, issued army hardtack for rations, and informed that they must hand over all firearms. Starting before dawn Forsyth had placed the companies of his regiment in a 3/4 horseshoe around the encampment. It was only at this point, while the men were consolidated near Big Foot's tent, that soldiers were sent into the camp where they attempted to disarm the Lakota. Because so few working weapons were uncovered, fears of hidden weapons persisted. Not satisfied with the weapons voluntarily stacked by the Lakota, the soldiers began to search the tents, and removed anything that could be used as a weapon. Seized material ranged from firearms to extra tent stakes and hatchets for cutting firewood. Next, the soldiers began to search the warriors themselves. As the efforts to locate weapons continued, the Lakota became more irritated and unruly, and according to US Army accounts, were agitated by a Minniconjou shaman, Yellow Bird.

The last warrior the soldiers attempted to disarm was Black Coyote. One account stated that Black Coyote refused to surrender his weapon unless paid for it first, having bought it himself. Several dozen other first-person accounts (potentially biased because they stem from soldier testimonies given a a subsequent military investigation) assert that the Indians started shooting first in a pre-arranged action signaled by one brave throwing dirt into the air. Most modern academic historians find the first account more likely than the second, since both versions occur in at least some instances from both sides of the conflict. Historians consider it most plausible that language barriers and the tense situation combined to ignite the situation. Regardless, the seizure was unsuccessful and a weapon discharged. At least one officer present drew his sidearm and immediately called for the troops to commence firing. Fearing an attack, other soldiers on the rise began firing the Hotchkiss guns into the camp. Chaos ensued, as soldiers attempting to disarm Lakota warriors were caught in the crossfire, and warriors ran to re-arm themselves from the stacked weapons. An intense five-minute firefight ensued in which the Lakota warriors broke through the cavalry line and opened a route of escape for the non-combatants.

When the shooting stopped, nearly 150 Lakota had been killed, along with 25 U.S. cavalry troopers. Although hundreds survived, many in small groups scattered and seeking shelter, Big Foot himself was among the dead. Modern conjecture asserts that many, if not most of the cavalry were killed by friendly fire, but no actual attempt was made at the time to determine whether this was the case and this does a grave disservice to the accuracy of the Lakota warriors, nor were the Lakota dead surveyed to determine whether cavalry, artillery, or Lakota cross-fire were the cause. The wounded soldiers and Lakota were placed in wagons and taken to Pine Ridge. Forensic science of the day would not have been sufficient in many cases in any event. Approximately 50 Lakota arrived at Pine Ridge, but were kept outside in the cold until quarters were found. Approximately 150 Lakota remained unaccounted for. Most sources believe that these fled the troops, and the majority number subsequently died of wounds and exposure.

Aftermath

The military hired civilians to bury the dead Lakota after an intervening snowstorm had abated. Arriving at the battleground, the burial party found the deceased frozen in contorted positions by the freezing weather. They were gathered up and placed in a common grave. The number was close to 300 dead Lakota; mostly women and children.

Colonel Forsyth was immediately denounced by General Nelson Miles and relieved of command. An exhaustive Army Court of Inquiry convened by Miles criticized Forsyth for his tactical dispositions, but otherwise exonerated him of responsibility. The court of Inquiry, however, while it did include several cases of personal testimony pointing towards misconduct, was itself flawed. It was not conducted as a formal court-martial, and without the legal boundaries of that format, several of the witnesses obviously minimized their comments and statements to protect themselves or peers. Ultimately the Secretary of War concurred and reinstated Forsyth to command of the 7th. Testimony before the court indicated that for the most part troopers attempted to avoid non-combatant casualties. Nevertheless Miles ignored the results of the Court of Inquiry and continued to criticize Forsyth, whom he believed had deliberately disobeyed orders. The concept of Wounded Knee as a deliberate massacre rather than a tragedy caused by poor decisions stems from Miles.

Public reaction to the battle among Americans was at the time generally favorable. Twenty Medals of Honor were awarded for the action. Ironically, a decade later when these (and all MoHs) were reviewed, it was Miles himself who saw that they were retained. Currently, Native Americans are urgently seeking the recall of what they refer to as "Medals of Dis-Honor". Many non-Lakota living near the reservations interpreted the battle as a defeat of a murderous cult, though some confused Ghost Dancers with Native Americans in general. In an editorial in response to the event, a young newspaper editor, L. Frank Baum, later famous as the author of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, wrote in the Aberdeen Saturday Pioneer on January 3, 1891:

"The Pioneer has before declared that our only safety depends upon the total extermination of the Indians. Having wronged them for centuries, we had better, in order to protect our civilization, follow it up by one more wrong and wipe these untamed and untamable creatures from the face of the earth. In this lies future safety for our settlers and the soldiers who are under incompetent commands. Otherwise, we may expect future years to be as full of trouble with the redskins as those have been in the past."

In the late twentieth century, critical reaction was more widespread and vocal. Many consider the incident one of the most grievous atrocities in United States history. It was commemorated in the popular protest song Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee written by Buffy Sainte-Marie and was the subject of a best-selling book of the same name by historian Dee Brown.

Historically, Wounded Knee is generally considered to be the end of the Indian Wars, the collective multi-century series of conflicts between colonial and U.S. forces and American Indian peoples. It was also responsible for the subsequent severe decline in the Ghost Dance movement.

More than eighty years after the massacre, beginning on February 27, 1973, Wounded Knee was also the site of a 71-day standoff between federal authorities and militants of the American Indian Movement.

Last armed conflict?

Strictly speaking, the Wounded Knee massacre was not the last armed conflict between Native Americans and the United States. A related skirmish took place at Drexel Mission the day after the Battle of Wounded Knee that resulted in the death of one trooper and the wounding of six others from K Troop, 7th Cavalry, with an unknown number of Lakota casualties. Lakota Ghost Dancers from the bands which had been persuaded to surrender had fled after news of Wounded Knee reached them, and burned several buildings at the mission. They ambushed a squadron of the 7th Cavalry responding to the incident and pinned it down until a relief force from the 9th Cavalry, which had been trailing the Lakota from the White River, appeared. Lieutenant James D. Mann, who had been a key participant in the outbreak of firing at Wounded Knee, died of his wounds seventeen days later at Ft. Riley, Kansas on 15 January 1891. This engagement is often overlooked, being almost totally overshadowed by the previous day's tragedy.

References

1. Letter: General Nelson A. Miles to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, March 13, 1917.
2. *Kehoe, B Alice The Ghost Dance: Ethnohistory and Revitalization, Massacre at Wounded Knee Creek, pg 15. Thompson publishing; 1989

Further reading

• Brown, Dee. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West, Owl Books (1970). ISBN 0-8050-6669-1.
• Coleman, William S.E. Voices of Wounded Knee, University of Nebraska Press (2000). ISBN 0-8032-1506-1.
• Smith, Rex Alan. Moon of Popping Trees, University of Nebraska Press (1981). ISBN 0-8032-9120-5.
• Utley, Robert. The Indian Frontier 1846-1890, University of New Mexico Press (2003). ISBN 0-8263-2998-5.
• Utley, Robert. Frontier Regulars The United States Army and the Indian 1866-1891, MacMillan Publishing (1973).
• Yenne, Bill. Indian Wars: The Campaign for the American West, Westholme (2005). ISBN 1-59416-016-3.

See also

• Jacob H. Smith
• Wounded Knee Incident

External links

• The Wounded Knee Museum in Wall, South Dakota
• Bureau of American Ethnology report on the Ghost Dance Religion
• Editorials by L. Frank Baum
• History of the Ghost Dance Religion
• PBS Biography of Jack Wilson
• Walter Mason Camp Collection includes Photographs from the Wounded Knee Massacre
• The Lost Bird of Wounded Knee {1890-1920}

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• Massacres of Native Americans
• Sioux
• War crimes
• Massacres
• Pine Ridge Campaign