White Swan, Absaroka warrior, his war deeds and art & Little Big Horn

 Salvete Omnes,

June 2026 is the 150th anniversary of the Centennial campaign of the US army against the Lakota Sioux and their Northern Cheyenne allies (with some Arapahos).

Frank Rinehart took this photo of White Swan 

So, naturally, it is the 150th anniversary  of the Little Big Horn battle, fought on 25th (Reno Valley and Custer Last Stand, & 26th (M. Reno and F. Benteen's fight) of June 1876.

While operating on the Great Plains US Army - both cavalry and infantry units - used native 'wolves' or scouts who upon enlistment would act as the 'eyes and ears' of the American military commands. 

For the 7th Cavalry operating against the 'hostile' Lakota and Northern Cheyenne that late spring and early summer 1876 the goverment officials authorized various Indian scouts from friendly nations.
   The  Absaroka/Apsalooke//Crow nation held council and authorized 25 scouts for the US Army in April 1876. These warriors, and also Arikara/Ree and friendly Sioux warrior were to be spread  out between various commands during the campaign. 
White Swan was one of 6 Crow warriors   handpicked and assigned to scout for the famous 7th Cavalry regiment. Crows together with friendly Sioux and Rees  made up the 35 scout-strong unit under the command of Lieutenant Charles Varnum, called Peaked Face by the Arikara scouts, aided by French Canadian-Santee Sioux interpreter   Mitch Bouyer & famous frontiersman, Civil War veteran, guide and hunter  Charlie Reynolds. 
 White Swan fought along  his scout companions, the soldiers and officers of Major Marcus Reno command, and miraculously  survived the two day battle, much wounded from gunshots and  lance thrusts and cuts. 
During the battle White Swan counted coup on the enemy warriors in the true Plains warrior fashion.

Photo by Fred Miller - Montana Historical Society 

After the din of battle passed White Swan's made drawings of his exploits in the battle, pictographs drawn and colored in the tradition of Plains peoples, showing his battle experience during the major Reno's advance and retreat during the first phase of the battle of Little Big Horn (Greasy Grass River). 

Denver Art Museum has this war record made by White Swan, painted circa 1890.

Gilcrease Museum has this war record of the LBH battle by White Swan.

White Swan healed from his many wounds and reenlisted with the US Army for the winter campaign, and served as a scout until March 1881, among his exploits was the campaign against the Nez Perce. White Swan died in 1904, known for his role at the battle, his fine art depicting warfare and recollections about the conflict on the high  prairies. 

.

Portrait by Joseph Henry Sharp circa 1900

White Swan's tombstone 

Valete

Two Leggings - Crow warrior

 Salvete Omnes,

photos from the repository of the National Museum of the American Indian

William Wildschut collection 

a short post - in two days we will celebrate the Thanksgiving Day, with foods and merriment and some. 

long winter months are ahead of us, so from time to time I would like  to propose some reading for this dark period (in the Northern Hemisphere at least) .

I was looking thorough my books and one of them by prof. Peter Nabokov , with the foreword by John C. Ewers, popped out.
Namely, Two Leggings, The Making of a Crow Warrior. Great. great book about the bygone era of the American history as told by the participants - the Crow warriors.

 

This printed book  is  actually the  edited version of  William Wildschut's manuscript, compiled in Montana from meetings and talks & customary smokes with Two Leggings, his interpreters, and his fellow warrior friends between 1919-1923 

 You can borrow it from Archive World Library - I wonder if there is an audio book of this great historical work.

Valete

Red Cloud - an autobiography to... borrow from Archive world library

 Salvete omnes,

I would like to point your horses to two books on  Archive World Library , namely to two books on the well known historic leader of the Oglala Lakota - Red Cloud (1821/2-1909)
.

First one is a feast - edited by R. Eli Paul  - Red Cloud's autobiography, the war leader of the Oglalas -  as told to his friend  Sam Deon(French-Canadian, known as Foot among the Lakota), who in turn told the stories to Charles Allen, Pine Ridge postmaster in 1893, who wrote them down into an manuscript. it took almost a century to edit and publish the manuscript (1997).
This narrative starts, after a short story of the Lakota,  and their divisions ( Red Cloud was a member of  Bad Face band of the Oglalas), with Red Cloud's first war path, taken against the Pawnee, continues with many  raids against Crows, Omahas, Ponca, Shoshones, Ute, Arikara, and even Arapahoes etc, trails and tribulations among the  powerful of the Lakota, including mayhem and murder of head chief Bull Bear. We watch his raise in status as blotahunka or war leader and eventually as a member of the chief echelon of the Sioux society(but the  principal headman of the Oglalas was Man Afraid of His Horses  and then his son Young Man Afraid of His Horses/ Tasunka Kokipapi family)

 Nota bene we learn that the Lakota Sioux elite possessed Hawken rifles  in 1840s -like in the Tavernier's painting -  and that they preferred it to the other firearms. The storytelling ends with the last major raid against the Crow, when a noted Lakota warrior The Sword was killed in this fight, and Red Cloud proceeded to tell the story of his funeral, involving the buying back of Sam Deon's horse from the relatives of the fallen hero (perhaps 1861 or 1863). Red Cloud made no accounts of the war with the US goverment and the Army. Therefore the narrative deals with the pre-1864 conflict in the Powder River country et al. 

Second , the album with commentary by Frank Henry Goodyear - a compilation of portrait photos of Red Could, ranging from the 1870s through last days in his homeland.

enjoy

Valete

Tavernier & Frenzeny -views of the Great Plains

 Salvete Omnes,

a quick entry - let's the images speak for themselves

Red Cloud encampment 

in 1873 two European-born illustrators and painters - Paul Frenzeny and Jules Tavernier - took a job of illustrating America from the East Coast to the West, working for the Harper's Magazine. 
Tavernier even traveled to Red Cloud (named after the famous Oglala Lakota leader and goverment chief)  Agency in Nebraska ( in fact he traveled there with military escort from Fort Robinson, a military post next to Red Cloud Agency, home to many thousands of the Lakotas, Cheyenne and Arapahoes. There Tavernier attended the annual  Sun Dance ceremony, drew his vision of the ceremony and later on it was reproduced in Harper's in 1875(see below)
First some Great Plains paintings by Tavernier

Joint works by Tavernier and Frenzeny

the description of the Sun Dance ceremony and Tavernier journey to the Red Cloud Agency can be found in this article

Frenzeny's works

Valete

Canadian Indians at the Stampede - old photos

 Salvete Omnes,

Great Plains People aka Plains Indians have been represented at the Calgary Stampede - they are mostly or entirely the Canadian Indians (they use the First Nations in their Canadian parlance) , but before they were Canadian they were just Plains People.. the border is an artificial separation of these nations of the Great Plains of North America.

at Wiki Commons and on Archive World Library there are photos of olden days, when some of the native participants had been active warriors during the horse riding and coup counting days of pre-reservation times. 

 

Here are some photos, including from the 1960s Stampede pamphlets -

and one very beautiful representation of the Plains Indian horse mask and buffalo/bison horned 'helmet' and the remnants of horse armor in these breastplates

Valete