Remembering Crazy Horse, Oglala Lakota blotahunka

 Salvete Omnes,

a couple days ago there was the anniversary of Crazy Horse's death at Fort Robinson, Nebraska (Sept., 5, 1877). Nebraska State Historical Society has this article about the Crazy Horse's sacred bundle. 

I did write one posting on the life and death of Crazy Horse.  Recently, I read this article - Tragedy at Red Could Agency. The Surrender, the Confinement and Death of Crazy Horse.  by *Jeffrey V. Pearson ( published Montana, The Magazine of Western History (vol.55, no.2, Summer 2005) - can be read a Jastor platform. I am going to summarize the whole 1877 debacle as researched in this article: 

On May 6, 1877 Crazy Horse and his Oglala & Northern Cheyenne followers came close to the Red Could Agency. Crazy Horse dismounted his war horse and loosened the knots in his horse's tail to declared to all present that his warpath was no longer. The Sioux and Cheyennes had to surrender their guns and [war] horses. Crazy Horse wanted to have his own 'agency at the headwaters of Beaver Creek (near present Gillette, Wyoming). The goverment chiefs and US officials  were waving the idea of Crazy Horse going to join the Washington-bound delegation. 

For the next 3 months the goverment chiefs like Red Cloud, Spotted Crow etc and their followers worked tirelessly to make Crazy Horse  uneasy and hostile towards the whites and to create a perception that he was persona non-grata within the Great Sioux Reservation, They concocted stories about his hostility and government's murderous designs on his liberty and life.  New goverment Agent - James Irwin - complained to the Indian Affairs Commission that Crazy Horse had  been' all time silent, sullen, lordly and dictatorial.' Later on Irwin, along with a Special Agent Shapp, gave more ear to the big chiefs plotting and even reported potential mutinous behavior of Crazy Horse. The US Army, like Lt. Col. P. Bradley, the commander of Fort Robinson, Nebraska Territory,  dismissed the accusations as hardly credible (end of July 1877).

During the mock battle after the June's Sun Dance ceremony held by the Oglala, the turmoil erupted between the 'Oglala patriots' and 'agency Sioux' ending in a melee where the agency Sioux were beaten with clubs and war clubs. This resulted in some sub-chiefs of the Oglala like He Dog and Little Big Man moving to the agency Sioux camps.  At the same time Crazy Horse was strongly asking for his agency on the Beaver Creek. His other intentions throughout this period (May-September 1877) are unknown to the researchers of this period. 

On August 30 at Fort Robinson chief of scouts Philo Clark met with the Sioux leadership and asked them, following orders from General Crook, to enlist against the Nez Perce outbreak in the Northwest. At first all chiefs refused, but  later upon much quarrel they consented, with Crazy Horse reported by witnesses as saying - 'till all the Nez Perce were killed.' Frank Grouard, chief interpreter, [mis]translated  Crazy Horse's refusal as 'we will go north and fight until not a white man is left.' The other interpreter Louis Bordeaux, furious at this lie, was not allowed to correct this falsehood. Then interpreter William Garnett came and the whole fiasco started anew, with Clark telling Crazy Horse that he had to stay on the Spotted Tail's agency - where Fort Robinson was located.. 

on August 31 the agency goverment chiefs - Red Cloud, Little, Wound, Young Man Afraid of His horses, American Horse, No Flesh, & Yellow bears - held a council with Agent Irwin, again accusing Crazy Horse of undermining the Agent and government's rule etc. 

Alarmed by Bradley General Crook came to Fort Robinson on Sept. 2, 1877 and asked for a council on the following day on White Clay Creek. When the whole outfit, with Garnett and another scout Baptiste 'Bat' Pourier, were getting to go with General Crook to meet Crazy Horse,  a nephew of Red Cloud, Woman's Dress, came by and told them Crazy Horse 'would come with 60 Indians[...] to kill Crook and whoever he has with him.' Garnett took this Woman's Dress to Crook  and upon hearing this tall tale Crook held a council with Red Cloud and his chiefs, and upon this ad hoc gathered council  the general declared the Oglala chief must be arrested. The chiefs agreed and further proposed to kill Crazy Horse themselves, to which Crook responded that he had to be arrested, for the killing would have been a murder. 

On Sept.4,  about a thousand-strong cavalry strike force  - 3rd US cavalry under Lt. Col, Mason and Indian Scouts and warriors under Clark, marched on the Oglala camps. When withing 1 mile of the Crazy Horse camp, they were reported that the villagers were scattering into the prairies and Crazy Horse was fleeing.  Clark's scouts gave chase, while 3rd Cavalry returned to Fort Robinson. The chase ended when Crazy Horse entered the village of Touch the Clouds, Miniconjou Lakota camp, at 4pm. The scouts gave their reporting to Camp Sheridan officials. The events  and talks and exchanged between Major Burke, commander at Camp Sheridan,and the Crazy Horse's side can be read here.  Early on Sept.5, Crazy Horse arrived at Camp Sheridan and  was a convoy was assembled to return to Fort Robinson. Crazy Horse rode his own horse all the way to and inside Fort Robinson, with Touch the Cloud and other Spotted Tail agency Indians. There He Dog, Little Big Man and numerous armed warrior  led  Red Cloud were positioned along with the mounted US soldiers. Bradley informed lt. Lee that there would be no talks and that Crazy Horse was going to be transported to Wyoming Territory and from there on train to Dry Tortugas, Florida.  Then lt. Lee and commanding Captain Kennington led Crazy Horse, held by his arm by Little Big Man,  into the guardhouse with two uniformed Lakota in tow.  When they entered the dimly lit cell Crazy Horse shouted - I won't go in there, It is the place where prisoners are kept.' He tried to free his arm from Little Big Man's grip and pulled a hidden trader's knife against his captors , especially when Kennington pulled his sword to attack the warchief. Trying to leave the confinement of the guardhouse  Crazy Horse still struggling with Little Big Man and being pursued by Captain emerged into the parade ground. There he wounded Little Big Man in the arm, and while trying to confront the carbine with bayonet armed sentry, Private William Gentles, Crazy Horse was jumped by Swift Bear, Black Crow, and Fast Thunder (all Brule Lakota scouts who came with him from Camp Sheridan). Kennington ordered the sentry to attack - "Stab the son-of-a-bitch!"  Struggling with his three assailant Oglala's back presented a perfect target for a bayonet thrust and Gentles stabbed Crazy Horse inflicting the first deadly injury. Crazy  Horse screamed - 'They have stabbed me' - as Private stabbed him again. Then Crazy Horse, still somewhat held by his Brule kinsmen, went quiet. He Dog came over to the fallen man and covered him with a slice of his blanket, while another Lakota, Closed Cloud, brought Crazy Horse' s own blanked. Crazy Horse said - "You all coaxed me over here and then yu left me!"
Post doctor, Valentine McGillycuddy, came to administer first aid and upon inspecting the wounds declared to Captain Kennington that the chief was dying. After much commotion and back and forth about 5 pm it was the warriors of Crazy Horse who carried him into the Adjutant's office, where around 10 pm  he would die in a presence of his father Worm, his friend Touch the Clouds, along with the doctor and Bat Pourier. 

Agency Indians breathed with relief, the same feeling was present among the command and rank & file at Fort Robinson. They all felt that the Oglala warchief brought this dismal ending upon himself. Chief of Scouts Clark wrote to Crook on September 9, 1877 - 'Crazy Horse's death is onsidered by most of the Indians as a right good thing for all concerned."

*all based on Jeffrey V. *Pearson's article from Montana magazine.

.

Korczak Ziolkowskis, fellow Polish-American, started many years ago a monumental, gigantic sculpture showing Crazy Horse leading from the front. Upon his passing his family has been continuing the noble endeavor. 

Valete

Bronc breakin'

Salve,
time has come to revisit the Old West - I miss it badly, don't you ?
so archive.org gives us access to hundreds of thousands of books, and my favorites are the XIX century books, full of life and stories.

In this instance let us turn to a bronco's breaking (there was little gentling as you will read shortly) as described by an American officer John G. Bourke then serving with the 3rd US Cavalry in the Arizona and New Mexico Territory during the Apache wars. - the book is titled "On the Border with Crook" - and it is freely available for reading or downloading here.

At first, our author introduces Fort Grant to us:

''There would be very little use in attempting to describe Old Fort Grant, Arizona, partly because there was really no fort to describe, and partly because few of my readers would be sufficiently interested in the matter to follow me to the end. It was, as I have already said, recognized from the tide-waters of the Hudson to those of the Columbia as the most thoroughly God forsaken post of all those supposed to be included in the annual Congressional appropriations. Beauty of situation or of construction it had none ; its site was the supposed junction of the sand-bed of the Aravaypa with the sand-bed of the San Pedro, which complacently figured on the topographical charts of the time as creek and river respectively, but generally were dry as a lime-burner's hat excepting during the "rainy season." Let the reader figure to himself a rectangle whose four sides were the row of officers' "quarters,' the adjutant's office, post bakery, and guard house, the commissary and quartermaster's storehouses, and the men's quarters and sutler's store, and the "plan," if there was any "plan," can be at once understood. Back of the quartermaster's and commissary storehouses, some little distance, were the blacksmith's forge, the butcher's “corral,” and the cavalry stables,"

then he move onto the bronco's breaking:

     

[..] while in the rear of the men's quarters, on the banks of the San Pedro, and not far from the traces of the ruins of a prehistoric village or pueblo of stone, was the loose, sandy spot upon which the bucking "bronco" horses were broken to the saddle. Such squealing and struggling and biting and kicking, and rolling in the dust and getting up again, only to introduce some entirely original combination of a hop, skip, and jump, and a double back somersault, never could be seen outside of a herd of California "broncos." The animal was first thrown, blind folded, and then the bridle and saddle were put on, the latter girthed so tightly that the horse's eyes would start from their sockets. Then, armed with a pair of spurs of the diameter of a soup-plate and a mesquite club big enough to fell an ox, the Mexican " vaquero " would get into the saddle, the blinds would be cast off, and the circus begin. 

There would be one moment of sweet doubt as to what the "bronco " was going to do, and now and then there would be aroused expectancy that a really mild- mannered steed had been sent to the post by some mistake of the quartermaster's department. But this doubt never lasted very long ; the genuine " bronco " can always be known from the spurious one by the fact that when he makes up his mind to " buck " he sets out upon his work without delay, and with a vim that means business. If there were many horses arriving in a " bunch/' there would be lots of fun and no little danger and excitement. The men would mount, and amid the encouraging comments of the on-lookers begin the task of subjugation. The bronco, as I have said, or should have said, nearly always looked around and up at his rider with an expression of countenance that was really benignant, and then he would roach his back, get his four feet bunched together, and await developments. These always came in a way productive of the best results ; if the rider foolishly listened to the suggestions of his critics, he would almost always mistake this temporary paroxysm of docility for fear or lack of spirit. And then would come the counsel, inspired by the Evil One himself : “Arrah, thin, shtick yer sphurs int' him, Moriarty.” This was just the kind of advice that best suited the " bronco's " feelings, because no sooner would the rowels strike his flanks than the air would seem to be filled with a mass of mane and tail rapidly revolving, and of hoofs flying out in defiance of all the laws of gravity, while a descendant of the kings of Ireland, describing a parabolic orbit through space, would shoot like a meteor into the sand, and plough it up with his chin and the usual elocutionary effects to be looked for under such circumstances.

Yes, those were happy, happy days - for the " broncos" and the by-standers.''

**

and some more on the pleasures of living quarters at this Army installation:

''There were three kinds of quarters at Old Camp Grant, and he who was reckless enough to make a choice of one passed the rest of his existence while at the post in growling at the better luck of the comrades who had selected either one of the others. There was the adobe house, built originally for the kitchens of the post at the date of its first establishment, some time in 1857 ; there were the "jacal" sheds, built of upright logs, chinked with mud and roofed with smaller branches and more mud; and the tents, long since "condemned" and forgotten by the quartermaster to whom they had originally been invoiced. Each and all of these examples of the Renaissance style of architecture, as it found expression in the valley of the Gila, was provided with a "ramada" in front, which, at a small expenditure of labor in erecting a few additional upright saplings and cross-pieces, and a covering of cotton wood foliage, secured a modicum of shelter from the fierce shafts of a sun which shone not to warm and enlighten, but to enervate and kill.''

more to come from this book in the future

enjoy