The Navajo (Dineh) endure the Long Walk.
During the early weeks of 1864, thousands of cold and hungry Navajo (Dineh) surrender to the U. S. Army after soldiers laid waste their homes and lands (see entry for JULY 22, 1863). The defeated Indians are ordered by Brigadier General James H. Carleton to relocate to Bosque Redondo, an area in what is now east-central New Mexico that the army established as the new home of the Navajo and Mescalero Apache (see entry for SPRING 1863). Although a few wagons are available to carry their belongings, the Navajo are forced to make the grueling 300-mile journey on foot. Anyone who complains or falls behind is shot and left for dead. More than 10 percent of the Navajo sent to Bosque Redondo die en route.
Their troubles continue after they reach the fort. The water supplies are inadequate, little wood is available, and the land is so infertile that it is virtually unfarmable. Homesick and demoralized, hundreds of Navajo run away to escape the horrendous living conditions. Hundreds of others fall victim to starvation and disease.
The U. S. Army battles Dakota rebels at Killdeer Mountain.
Brigadier General Alfred Sully leads a force of 2,000 to Killdeer Mountain (also known as Tahkahokuty
Mountain), in what is now northwestern North Dakota. There, Dakota Sioux who participated in the Minnesota Uprising (see entry for AUGUST 18 TO SEPTEMBER 23, 1862) have come to live with their Lakota Sioux relatives. The Indians, numbering as many as 6,000, initially hold off Sully’s men but are eventually forced to flee. In addition to about 100 casualties, the Sioux suffer the loss of supplies and weapons destroyed by the army after the Indians retreat.
Permission to recruit the Third Colorado Cavalry, a special military unit whose sole purpose is to subdue area Indians. The cavalrymen are nicknamed the “Hundred Dazers,” because they are to serve for only 100 days. Coming only a month before Coloradans will be asked to vote for or against statehood, Evans’s insistence on forming the group is largely meant to placate voters calling for a military solution to outbreaks of Indian violence in the territory.
August 13
The Third Colorado Cavalry is formed to fight Indians.
After petitioning the federal government, Colorado Territory governor John Evans is granted
Southern Cheyenne leader Black Kettle asks for peace.
Following a successful peace council with Edward W. Wynkoop, the commander of Fort Lyon in
Navajo laborers working under the watch of armed U. S. Army soldiers at Bosque Redondo (Courtesy Palace of the Governors, MNM/DCA, Neg. no. 1816)
Southeastern Colorado Territory, Black Kettle of the Southern Cheyenne accompanies Wynkoop to Camp Weld in Denver. There he meets with Colonel John M. Chivington and John Evans, the territory’s military commander and governor. After hours of debate, Chivington tells Black Kettle that the only way his followers can live in peace is by surrendering to Wynkoop at Fort Lyon.
Black Kettle leaves the meeting believing that the territorial officials have promised not to attack his people as long as they camp close to the fort. Neither Chivington nor Evans, however, are interested in a peaceful coexistence between Colorado whites and the Southern Cheyenne. Politically ambitious, both are sensitive to public pressure to drive the Indians from the territory (see entry for AUGUST 13, 1864). On the very day of his meeting with Black Kettle, Evans writes General Samuel R. Curtis, “I want no peace til the Indians suffer more.”
Kit Carson’s troops attack Comanche and Kiowa at Adobe Walls.
The First New Mexico Cavalry, led by Colonel Christopher “Kit” Carson, descends on a winter camp of Kiowa, who have been threatening forts in present-day New Mexico. Hearing of the attack, several thousand Kiowa and Comanche in the area rush to join the battle. Armed with two howitzers, the soldiers hold off the Indian forces and manage to kill some 100 warriors before retreating the next day. (See also entry for JUNE 17, 1874.)
The Colorado cavalry murders hundreds of Indians in the Sand Creek Massacre.
At dawn, led by Colonel John M. Chivington, the 700 soldiers of the Third Colorado Cavalry (see entry for AUGUST 13, 1864) ride into the camp of Black Kettle’s Southern Cheyenne followers on the Sand Creek near Fort Lyon. Based on conversations with the territorial governor two months earlier, Black Kettle believes he has established a peace with the United States (see entry for SEP TEMBER 28, 1864). Accordingly, an American flag and a white flag of surrender are raised on a pole outside his tipi.
Angry that they have been castigated in the press as the “Bloodless Third” for not battling the Colorado Indians, the cavalrymen ignore the promises made to Black Kettle and open fire on the camp, determined to take no prisoners. As the Southern Cheyenne and visiting Southern Arapaho emerge from their tipis, the troops mow them down. Southern Cheyenne leader White Antelope, wearing a peace medal given to him by President Abraham Lincoln, is among the first to be killed. Those who survive the cavalry’s initial attack rush toward the sandy creekbed, where they frantically try to cover themselves with sand to evade the relentless killers. Hours later, when the cavalry rides away, approximately 200 Indians, two-thirds of them women and children, lie dead. Many of the corpses are scalped or otherwise grotesquely mutilated.
P
“That night will never be forgotten as long as any of us who went through it are alive. . . . Many who had lost wives, husbands, and children, or friends, went back down the creek and crept over the battleground among the naked and mutilated bodies of the dead. Few were found alive, for the soldiers had done their work thoroughly.”
—Southern Cheyenne George Bent on the Sand Creek Massacre
When news of the massacre is reported, non-Indians in the area—terrified by the violent raids of the Dog Soldiers, the war society of the Southern Cheyenne—hail Chivington and his men as heroes. They are cheered as they parade through the streets of Denver, and whites flock to see Indian scalps displayed as war trophies in the city’s opera house. (See entries for JANUARY 10, 1864, and for JANUARY TO FEBRUARY 1864.)
World History
