The Cheyenne also responded to the push of immigrants by mounting sporadic raids. After the Sioux revolt in Minnesota, Colorado settlers were panic-stricken when raids started in their territory. One group of Cheyenne, led by Black Kettle and White Antelope, and including a few Arapahos, wanted peace. After much negotiation, a council was arranged with Colonel John M. Chlvington and Governor John Evans at Camp Weld near Denver, Colorado on September 28, 1864. This historic meeting was recorded by at least one anonymous photographer (plate 3.9). No formal agreements were signed, but the Indians felt that peace had been made, and turned in their weapons. They then camped beside Sand Creek. Two months later. Colonel Chlvington led his troops in a surprise attack, killing the defenseless Indians.’” This became known as the Sand Creek massacre.
Wars with the Cheyenne continued, and on June 26, 1867 Roman Nose
3.1 Custer's column fighting at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876. Drawing by Red Horse, a Miniconjou Dakota.
Led his people into battle near Fort Wallace, Kansas. This time a portion of the tragic aftermath was recorded. One of their antagonists on that day was Sergeant Frederick Wylyams, an Englishman and former scholar at Eton College, who had lost the good graces of his family through indiscriminately 'sowing his wild oats'. In an attempt to restore himself to their favor, he enlisted in the American army hoping to win a commission." Wylyams was attached to G Troop of the Seventh Cavalry, and soon became friendly with another Englishman, Dr William Abraham Bell. Bell was a photographer to the Kansas Pacific Survey, and during the survey operation the party had joined with the Seventh Cavalry. Wylyams frequently helped Bell with his work. But when the Cheyenne attacked on June 26, Wylyams was killed and his body fearfully mutilated (plate 3.10). Bell later wrote:
The day on which he was killed he had promised to help me in printing off some copies of the photographs which 1 had taken on the way, ... so 1 had to print off my negatives alone, and to take a photograph of him, poor fellow, as he lay; a copy of which 1 sent to Washington that the authorities should see how their soldiers were treated on the Plains."
William S. Soule also recorded the aftermath of an attack on a hunter, Ralph Morrison. On December 7, 1868, Morrison was killed and scalped by the Cheyenne within a mile of Fort Dodge. Soule, an excellent photographer, was working nearby in Tappin's Trading Company, and came to record the scene within an hour (plate 3.11). This image appeared in Harper's Weekly of January 16, 1869.
Even though images of mutilated whites were being circulated, the memory of the Sand Creek massacre brought an outcry for the reform of Indian policy. Before his inauguration in 1869, President Grant presented a policy whereby 'All Indians disposed to peace will find the new policy a peace-policy.' The Indians would be safe and cared for on reservations, but if any 'felt the pull of old habits and strayed off the reservation, they could expect to be treated as hostiles'."
World History
