In an attempt to bring an end to years of fighting, the US government formed the Indian Peace Commission to investigate the grievances of the Plains Indians. The commission concluded that the fighting had been entirely preventable and that the US government and its representatives had failed to fulfil its legal obligations and to treat the Native Americans with honesty.
In October 1867, Major Elliot and tribal chiefs met at Medicine Lodge, a traditional Indian council site and on the 21st October, a treaty was signed with the Kiowa and Comanche tribes and later with the Kiowa-Apache. The third treaty was signed with the Cheyenne and Arapaho on the 28th.
Under the terms of the treaty, the tribes were required to move south from their lands of present day Kansas and Colorado to a new reservation in Indian Territory, (modern Oklahoma). The reservation contained little arable land and was far away from the buffalo, their main source of meat and central to their culture. The Arkansas River was to form the northern boundary of the reservation. In return they were promised that the new land would remain theirs “For as long as the grass shall grow and the rain shall fall”. They were in addition promised supplies of food, blankets and other necessities, but greedy agents and crooked suppliers, together with the US government’s reluctance to adhere to the treaty terms, ensured that little actually reached the Indians.
The tribal elders found it increasingly difficult to keep the younger warriors in check and by the summer of 1868, war parties of Cheyenne, Arapaho, Kiowa and Oglala Sioux began to raid white settlements in Kansas, Colorado and Northern Texas. The warriors killed at least 15 settlers, wounded others and were reported to have raped some women.
On August 19th, Colonel Edward Wynkoop, the Indian Agent for the Cheyenne and Arapaho at Fort Lyon, Kansas, held a meeting with Little Rock, a senior chief in Black Kettle’s camp. Black Kettle was known amongst the whites as a “Peace Chief” who had done his best to keep his young warriors in check. Little Rock told him that a party of 200 Cheyenne from a camp above the forks at Walnut Creek departed camp intending to raid their Pawnee enemies. Instead, they raided white settlements. Some of these warriors then returned to Black Kettle’s camp and it was from them that Little Rock learned of the raids and the names of some who had taken part. Little Rock told Wynkoop that he would try and have them delivered to the white authorities.
By November, Black Kettle’s camp had moved to join other Cheyenne and other tribes at the winter camp at the Washita River. The camp stretched for some 15 miles along the Washita and contained Kiowa, Arapaho, Cheyenne and Comanche. Black Kettle’s was the westernmost camp and contained many famous warriors such as Big Man, Wolf Looking Down and Bear Tongue. It contained fifty Cheyenne lodges, plus a few lodges of visiting Arapaho and Lakota, some 150 people in all.
Downriver from Black Kettle’s camp stood the Arapaho tipis of Little Raven, Big Mouth and Yellow Wolf with a total of 180 lodges and beyond them stood the Cheyenne of Medicine Arrow with its 129 lodges. Overall, about 6,000 Indians were in the winter camp on the Washita, most of them completely innocent of the raids
On November 20th 1868, a party led by Black Kettle and Little Robe of the Cheyenne, and Big Mouth and Spotted Wolf of the Arapaho, arrived at Fort Cobb to meet Major General William Hazen to discuss making peace and to receive food and other supplies in accordance with the Medicine Lodge Treaty. Details of this meeting were documented by Captain Henry Alvord of the US 10th Cavalry.
Hazen told the Indians that he could not make peace with them and that they should not come to Fort Cobb as their presence might jeopardise the peace of the Kiowa and Comanche already camped there. He also reminded them that they should remain south of the Arkansas River as part of the treaty terms. This last point illustrates the duplicity of the US army’s attitude to the “Indian problem” and their crude attempts to separate the Native Americans between what they saw as friendly or hostile. Despite their insistence that “friendly” Indians remain south of the Arkansas, the army throughout 1868 regularly distributed treaty food and provisions to the Cheyenne and Arapaho at Fort Larned and Fort Lodge, both north of the Arkansas.
Major General Hazen was under orders from the General William Tecumseh Sherman, commander of the military district of Missouri, to make provision for Indians who wanted to stay out of the fighting and suggested that all such Indians should camp near Fort Cobb. Sherman’s superior, General Phil Sheridan had already made it clear that if he had to invade the reservation to pursue hostile Indians, he needed the friendly ones under control and had suggested that they should camp close to Fort Cobb, yet Hazen was telling Black Kettle that he should not stay. His reasons are unclear, but it is known that an anti Indian attitude was prevalent among some cavalry officers and, knowing that Sheridan had already declared the Cheyenne and Arapaho “hostile”, meaning they were subject to attack by the US army, he was possibly deliberately sending them into danger.
Captain Alvord documented the meeting between Hazen and the chiefs. He notes Black Kettle’s reply to Hazen, “The Cheyenne when south of the Arkansas do not wish to return to the north side because they fear there will be trouble there, but we are continually told that we had better go there and would be rewarded for going there”.
Black Kettle again asked to move his people close to Fort Cobb and said, “The Cheyenne do not fight at all this side of the Arkansas, they do not trouble Texas, but north of the Arkansas they are almost always at war. When lately north of the Arkansas, some young Cheyenne were fired upon and then the fight begun. I have always done my best to keep my young men quiet, but some will not listen and since the fighting began I have not been able to keep them all at home. We all want peace and I would be glad to move all my people down this way, I could keep them all quiet near camp. My camp is now on the Washita, 40 miles east of the Antelope Hills and I have there 180 lodges. I speak only for my own people; I cannot speak nor control the Cheyenne north of the Arkansas”.
Hazen replied, “I am sent here as a peace chief, but north of the Arkansas is General Sheridan, the Great War chief and I do not control him. He has all the soldiers who are fighting the Cheyenne and Arapaho. Therefore you must go back to your country and if the soldiers come to fight, you must remember they are not from me, but from that Great War chief and with him you must make peace”.
On the 22nd November, Hazen sent a report of the meeting to Sherman. He explained that, “To have made peace with them would have brought to my camp most of those now on the warpath south of the Arkansas, and, as General Sheridan is to punish those at war and might follow them in afterwards, a second Chivington affair might occur which I could not prevent”. This being a reference to an incident in 1864 when US soldiers massacred some 160 men, women and children at Sand Creek.
He also reported that, while the chiefs seemed sincere, the Kiowa and Comanche at Fort Cobb said that the young warriors who accompanied the chiefs were pleased that peace had not been made. They boasted that the Lakota and other northern tribes would come down the following spring “To clean out the entire country”. This threat rattled Hazen enough for him to request two more companies of the Tenth Cavalry from Fort Arbuckle.
Black Kettle and the other chiefs left Fort Cobb in late November; with food and supplies from the Agency and travelled in heavy snow to their villages on the Washita which they reached on the 26th November. The previous evening, a war party of 150 young warriors from the camps of Black Kettle, Medicine Arrow and Little Robe had returned to the Washita encampment. They had raided white settlements in the Smoky Hill River area of Kansas.
General Sheridan had earlier decided on a winter campaign against the Cheyenne, reckoning that if he could destroy the Indians’ shelter, food and livestock, the warriors, plus their women and children would be at the mercy of the elements and would be forced to surrender. He sent Custer’s Seventh Cavalry to hunt down the raiders in the Washita area while sending a column from Fort Lyon in Colorado and another from Fort Bascom in New Mexico to converge on the Indian winter camping grounds and on the 26th, Major Joel Elliot and a scouting party of the Seventh, picked up the trail of the raiding war party. On the same day, a party of Kiowa returning from a raid on their Ute enemy reported to Black Kettle that they had seen a large trail leading southwards towards the Washita camp. The Cheyenne chief discounted the information as he did not believe that US soldiers would operate this far south in such wintry conditions. The Kiowa proceeded to their village further along the river, but one of their number called Trails the Enemy, decided to stay overnight with friends in Black Kettle’s camp.
On the same day Black Kettle received another warning of approaching soldiers, this time from a warrior called Crow Neck who had abandoned an exhausted horse the previous day and had headed out to collect it. He said that he had seen a large body of men and believed them to be soldiers.
That evening, Black Kettle held a council in his lodge with his other chiefs. He told them of his meeting with Hazen and what he had learned about Sheridan’s war plans. The council decided that once the deep snow had cleared they would send out runners to talk to the soldiers and make it clear that Black Kettle’s people wanted peace. Meanwhile they decided to move camp the next day downriver to be closer to the other Indian camps.
Major Elliot meanwhile, reported back to Custer and the troops followed the trail of the raiding party until nightfall, when they rested briefly until there was sufficient moonlight to continue. When they reached Black Kettle’s village, Custer split his force to surround the village with orders to attack from all sides at dawn when the buglers would signal the attack by playing the regimental tune “Garry Owen”.
At daybreak the soldiers attacked, the first Indian to die was Double Wolf who, seeing the charge, fired his gun to alert the camp. Trails the Enemy was also awake, intending to start out early for the Kiowa camp. Double Wolf was shot down in a fusillade of shots and Trails the Enemy hurriedly organised a rearguard to hold the soldiers off until the warriors could arm themselves. The Cheyenne warriors rushed from their tipis and began firing at the soldiers from the surrounding trees and ravines.
The soldiers shot at everything that moved, soon overwhelming the camp and killing all before them. Many of the Indians attempted to flee on horseback but were pursued by the cavalry. Black Kettle and his wife Medicine Woman were shot in the back and killed as they tried to escape. Major Elliot and a troop of 20 cavalrymen chased after the fleeing Indians against Custer’s orders. He is said to have cried out, “Here’s for a brevet or a coffin” as he galloped forward.
His force ran into a mixed band of warriors from the other villagers who had come to Black Kettle’s aid. The soldiers were killed in one merciless charge. Custer ordered the destruction of the camp and belongings and, after rounding up 200 horses to carry away captives, had the 675 remaining horses slaughtered to deny their use to the Indians.
Custer noticed the gathering bands of Indians and now realised that Black Kettle’s camp was only one of many villages along the river and decided to withdraw. His failure to determine the fate of Elliot and his men before withdrawing further damaged his poor reputation among his fellow officers and caused deep resentment in Captain Frederick Benteen, a friend of Elliot’s who, eight years later, failed to come to Custer’s aid at the Battle of Little Big Horn where Custer’s habit of attacking Indian villages before proper scouting would eventually cost him his life. Custer took 53 women and children captive during the battle and had them placed among his troops, using them as human shields to prevent the assembling Indians from attacking. This was to become a regular feature of his strategy.
Estimates of the Indian death toll vary, but a figure in the region of 136 is likely. Custer’s losses were 21 killed and 13 wounded.
Custer sent a report of the attack to General Sheridan stating that, “by an actual and careful examination after the battle” his men found the bodies of 103 warriors, although no count had actually been made. His figure was a guestimate based on reports from his officers the next day when they were back in Camp Supply.
The attack provoked some powerful criticism in the press and among fellow soldiers. An article in the Leavenworth Evening Bulletin notes, “General Sandford, General Tappan and Colonel Taylor of the Indian Peace Commission unite in the opinion that the late battle was simply an attack upon peaceful bands that were on the march to their new reservation”. The New York Times similarly reported, “Colonel Wynkoop, Agent for the Cheyenne and Arapaho, has published his letter of resignation. He regards General Custer’s late fight as simply a massacre”. The Fort Cobb Indian Agent, William Griffenstein, told Custer that the Seventh Cavalry had attacked friendly Indians on the Washita. Custer’s superior officer and friend General Sheridan, coming to Custer’s defence, ordered Griffenstein out of Indian Territory and threatened to hang him if he returned.
- Secret Weapons of Nazi Germany - November 30, 2020
- The Fall of Singapore - November 11, 2020
- The Coming of the Vikings - January 23, 2014