After the Battle of the Little Bighorn there was a concerted effort to beat the free Indians into submission and a life on the reservation.

For those tribes not already allied to, and working for, the white man these were hard times of hunger, deprivation and persecution.

This is the story.

AFTER THE BIGHORN BATTLE

 The Battle of the Little Bighorn had been the biggest victory for the Indians in their history of warfare with the white invaders. It was also their last major victory. The winning of this particular battle led up to them losing the war.
   It is commonly thought that the loss of Custer and his men at the Little Bighorn knocked the cavalry back so hard that they did nothing for quite a while. This is not the case. Terry and Gibbon did not immediately give chase to the Indians from that large encampment but this was simply to wait reinforcements. General Crook was quickly re-supplied and sent out into the field again. He had with him a young officer Colonel Wesley Merrit.
   However before even meeting up with Crook, Merrit – in command of the 5^th Cavalry – had a battle of his own with the Cheyenne. This particular group of Cheyenne, about 800 strong had left the reservation to join up with Crazy Horse. They saw this victory as the first of many to come and wanted to fight beside him. Ironically, many of those at the Bighorn fight were now returning to the agencies. Merrit outwitted the Cheyenne at Warbonnet Creek on 17^th July, barely three weeks after Custer’s defeat. He had seen the approaching Cheyenne, placed snipers along the draws and concealed his troops in wagons that were apparently un-escorted. The Indians charged the wagons and fell straight into Merrit’s trap.

Buffalo Bill Cody

   However, the skirmish was soon over with no fatalities on either side. Chief Yellow Hand came forward and challenged Merrit’s chief scout William (Buffalo Bill) Cody to fight. In the knife fight that followed Cody killed Yellow Hand and the Cheyenne quickly returned to the reservation. This skirmish became known as “The first scalp for Custer”.

The Yellow Hand/Buffalo Bill Duel

   Crook was actually more annoyed with Merrit for being late than pleased with him for his victory. Crook now had 2,000 men and he marched to join up with Terry. Their combined force was now nearly 4,000 men. The Indians were not going to stand and fight this number of soldiers. Besides, the big village of the Little Bighorn was no more. The Sioux and Cheyenne had broken up into their small bands once more. A big group could not be sustained for long. The cavalry kept together, not repeating Custer’s mistake of splitting the troops. As the cavalry chased, the Indians ran away and evaded them. Terry soon grew tired of the chase and disbanded his expedition.
   Crook however, continued in his pursuit. The soldiers were tired and exhausted and supplies ran low. The men had to resort to eating horseflesh. Cody grew tired of the chase and left. Chief Washakie agreed and took his Shoshone scouts home. The first real opportunity to avenge Custer actually came about by accident. Crook had sent a small troop of men under Captain Anson Mills to bring back supplies from Deadwood. Near Slim Buttes they stumbled upon a small Lakota village of 37 lodges. Mills sent back word to Crook and waited until daybreak.
   He attacked the village forcing most of the Indians to run for the hills. Some however holed up in a dead end canyon and fought bravely against their attackers. This village was led by American Horse and he called out in English that Crazy Horse would soon be there to reinforce them. Mills posted lookouts on the hills to guard against this happening. While some soldiers kept the warriors pinned down others went through the village taking all the food.

American Horse

   Crook arrived and the extra soldiers joined the fight. Most of the warriors with American Horse were killed. American Horse himself gave up, holding his intestines in as he did so. Mills set up a small hospital tent but there was nothing to be done and the chief died. As the troops sat down to their first decent meal in ages Sioux warriors suddenly exploded from the pine thickets.
   They had been able to get past the sentries unseen. They would fight only from a distance however and gave up after a day of following the soldiers, shooting at the rear guard. Because of the state of his troops Crook could not follow them. He sent Mills to Deadwood again. This time he returned with a herd of cattle and wagons loaded with flour, coffee and bacon. Crook and his men then marched into the Black Hills.

General Crook

   On the reservations, guards were doubled. Red Cloud was replaced as spokesman for the Sioux, he was considered to be too much of a troublemaker. He was replaced by the more obliging Spotted Tail. The Indians had no say in who would lead them and speak for them; it was the white man’s choice. Despite everything life on the agency did not get better. Food continued to arrive late, if at all and it was still of poor quality. Those Indians who did farm as urged found a poor return due to poor soil. To make things worse more Indians were coming in daily, adding to the burden.

Red Cloud                      Spotted Tail

   In October General Nelson Miles met with Sitting Bull. The talks broke down after Sitting Bull told Miles that he was born an Indian but not an agency Indian. A running battle then began lasting over two days and forty odd miles as Sitting Bull ran to the Yellowstone. Miles then managed to take some chiefs hostage and forced forty lodges to surrender. He then chased Sitting Bull until December.

   Crook amassed an army that was really too big to be any use in an attempt to pin down Crazy Horse. A scout reported a Cheyenne village ahead and Crook sent Three Fingers Mackenzie ahead. He took 1,000 troops and his Pawnee mercenaries. This village was that of Little Wolf and Dull Knife who had led their people from the reservation when the army had taken over and rations had been stopped. As the troops arrived a victory dance was taking place.
   The Cheyenne had met and beaten some Shoshone. Mackenzie waited until dawn and then attacked the village, putting his Pawnee at the front of the attack. He surprised the village totally and had soon driven off all the four hundred warriors. He killed most of the ponies and burnt the lodges after finding mementoes of Custer’s defeat in some of them. The Indians regrouped and fought back. Maybe they would have won the battle had not Crook arrived with reinforcements. Some Cheyenne ran to Crazy Horse’s village for shelter. Those others who did not freeze to death in temperatures 30 degrees below freezing chose to surrender. The weather was so severe that Crook had to call off his campaign and return to base. Miles however, continued his campaign. On the 16^th December he came across Crazy Horse’s village of 600 lodges and 3,500 people.
   He did not attack it but suggested a peace talk. It eventually looked as if the village would surrender, despite Crazy Horse’s objection to this. The Lakota sent out five representatives under a flag of truce. Everything went wrong when the Crow scouts attacked the delegation and killed them. Miles was furious and dismounted his scouts. He sent their ponies to the Lakota as an apology and payment for the lives of the five delegates. This was the end of any hope for peace and the village moved away.

General Miles

   In January the Indians tried to lead Miles and his troops into an ambush but Miles was expecting it. He disguised two of his cannons in supply wagons and met the charge with cannon fire. The warriors backed off quickly and Miles captured several women and children, mostly Cheyenne but some were relatives of Crazy Horse. The next day, January 17^th 1877 Crazy Horse led 500 Sioux and Cheyenne warriors in an attack. The battle went first one way then the other, not helped by the fact that a blizzard was blowing at the time. At last Miles brought up his artillery and this turned the battle. Chief Big Crow fell and the Indian attack dwindled. Short of supplies, Miles then retreated to the Tongue base camp.
   Later that month Sitting Bull decided he would leave altogether and go to settle in The Grandmother’s Country, Canada. All who wished to follow him could do so. Those who did not follow him scattered.
   Spotted Tail persuaded nearly all of his people to opt for peace by April 1877. This was made easier, not because the Indians did not want to fight anymore, but because food was hard to come by. The Indians still living free were now as poorly fed as the Indians on the reservations. This was due to the fact that white hunters had virtually wiped out the vast herds of buffaloes that had once roamed the plains. They were hunted for their skins and the bodies were left to rot where they fell. This was madness to the Indians who had used every bit of the buffalo and only ever killed what they needed.
   White hunting parties had scoured the plains, sometimes shooting thousands of buffalo a day, simply to send the hides back east. Sometimes the hunting was purely for sport, not just buffalo but deer and antelope as well. With no animals to hunt and therefore no food, the Indians had no choice but to go in to the agencies where the women and children might at least get some form of sustenance.

   On May 6^th 1877 Crazy Horse himself surrendered. He came into the Red Cloud Agency with his people in a parade over a mile long. They were hungry and tired but they were all dressed in their finest clothes and sang songs as they rode in. One spectator remarked that it was more like a victory parade than a surrender.
   Crazy Horse tried to settle down at the reservation but he was not trusted by the white man or many of the incumbent Indians. Some of the Indians thought he would make trouble for them and the whites thought he was simply biding his time before he was strong enough to lead another revolt. He spent a lot of time with his Uncle, Spotted Tail, but was refused permission to move his lodges closer to him. He had been promised a reservation of his own but this was not forthcoming either. He was dismayed to see what the reservation system did to his own people and he was deeply upset to find warriors from his own band had become Indian policemen, including one of his most trusted lieutenants, Little Big Man.

Crazy Horse

   He began to hear rumours of being moved to a new reservation on the Missouri and protested about this. This land was not their land and certainly not what he had been promised. He was also angry that Sioux warriors were being used as scouts against the Nez Perce.
   Crook feared that Crazy Horse would soon lose his temper completely and ordered him arrested. On 7^th September 1877 Crazy Horse was arrested by soldiers and Indian Police. When he saw that he was being taken to the guardhouse he struggled and went to run away. He was held back by his old friend Little Big Man. As he was held tightly a soldier ran Crazy Horse through with his bayonet and he fell to the ground dying. Some of his supporters ran away immediately, making their way to Sitting Bull in Canada. Others stayed and settled down on the reservation.
   Crazy Horse’s father took his body and buried it, telling nobody where it was.
   The Strange Man of the Oglala was no more.

   The Northern Cheyenne who had surrendered were moved to a reservation in the south that they shared with the Arapaho. They hated the south and the climate was not good for them. The people were dying regularly from disease and deprivation. They repeatedly asked to be sent north to settle on the Red Cloud and Spotted Tail agencies with their friends, the Sioux, but they were always refused. At last they could take no more and on 7^th September 1878, under cover of darkness, Little Wolf and Dull Knife led their people away from the reservation.
   They headed northwards towards their home. The soldiers quickly gave chase once their escape was noticed but the Cheyenne fought them at every turn and continued to push northwards. They raided homesteads along the way, stealing horses, food and weapons that made the government even more determined to catch them. Every time the cavalry set up an ambush the Cheyenne managed to avoid it or fight their way out of it. It became an embarrassment to the government and to the army. As they got further north the group split into two. Dull Knife led his people into Fort Robinson to surrender, sure that now they were here they would be allowed to stay. Little Wolf continued to lead his people towards the Yellowstone Country.

       Dull Knife          Little Wolf

   Once Dull Knife arrived at the fort he and his people were initially treated well. They put their case for staying but eventually were told that this had been refused and they were to go back south. The Cheyenne were angered by this and the commander of the fort, Major Weston, had them locked in barracks with no food, water or heat. Every time they spoke it was about going south and the Cheyenne were not prepared to listen to this. They wanted to go to Red Cloud.  At last they had had enough and on a cold January night in 1878 they made their escape. When captured they had kept some weapons, disassembled and hidden on the women. These were rapidly made up again although they were generally old and of poor quality and ammunition was low.
   They sang their death songs before breaking out from the barracks. Better dead than forced back down south to die slowly. They caught the guards napping initially and made their escape, those few warriors with weapons covering the retreat of the helpless ones. The garrison soon gathered themselves and rapidly overtook the frail men women and children struggling through the snow. Almost half of them were killed very quickly. Many surrendered again but some made good their escape. They were chased without mercy until at last they found their way into a shallow mound. Here they put up a spirited defence surrounded by 300 troopers.
   At last the mound went quiet and a soldier who could speak Cheyenne was sent forward to urge the survivors to surrender. The last three Cheyenne emerged. One was armed with a knife, the second an axe and the third an old rifle only usable as a club as there was no ammunition. They rushed at the soldiers, two being shot to pieces immediately, the third falling to the ground mortally wounded. The soldiers were surprised to find that this last fighter, carrying the knife was actually a woman. She had vowed to fight and die like a Cheyenne and had done so.

The Final Defence of the Cheyenne.

   Ironically the government was shamed by what had happened, shamed by the brutality and ferocity used to enforce a bureaucratic decision. Dull Knife and his people were allowed to stay on the Pine Ridge Agency (once called the Red Cloud Agency).
   Little Wolf and his followers stayed free until 27^th March 1879 when they too surrendered. The Cheyenne were finally given their own reservation, The Lame Deer Agency in 1884.

   Sitting Bull still worried the U.S. army. Despite him being in Canada they worried about the power he could exert on the Sioux in the agencies. There were now 4,000 Sioux and Nez Perce in Canada. They were dealt with firmly but fairly by the Mounted Police and got on well with the Canadians. However, the strain of feeding all these people was telling and an attempt was made to get the American Indians to return home. The choice of Terry as commissioner to arrange this was not a good one. The Indians would have nothing to do with him, would not even shake his hand.
   Miles was ready to invade Canada and bring the Sioux back but and other generals were worried about him causing an international incident. His chance came when the Sioux crossed the border to hunt buffalo. Miles hurried to intercept them and a small skirmish took place between the Sioux and Miles’ Indian scouts. Only when Miles arrived with rapid firing cannons did the Sioux run back to Canada. Luckily Miles stopped at the border, giving up the chase.

Sitting Bull

   As the buffalo herds dwindled many of the Sioux were forced to return to America during 1879 and 1880. Sitting Bull and his people were the last to return on 19^th July 1881. He was kept under house arrest at Fort Randall for two years, the army still fearful of the power he could exert over his people. For most people however, the surrender of Sitting Bull symbolised the end of the Sioux Wars. Sitting Bull actually settled down to a peaceful existence, even going on tour with Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show. At last he settled in a cabin on the Standing Rock agency.

Sitting Bull & Buffalo Bill Cody