Where do you find original Indian sources?
I consider original winter counts, ledger drawings, etc., to also be original source documents, and, of course, archaeological evidence likewise constitutes primary source material if there is enough of it from which to draw conclusions or raise additional questions. Can Indian sources be biased? Of course. So can military records, in which some officers tried to put themselves and their commands in the best possible light in comparison to others. The military experience at Fort Phil Kearny in 1866–67 is rife with such self-serving reports. That’s why historians, especially in this field, must always seek corroboration, if it exists, of multiple and often divergent sources.

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What is the significance of the Massacre at Cheyenne Hole?
In 1999 I wrote a book published by the University Press of Colorado about the alleged Massacre at Cheyenne Hole in northern Kansas in 1875 (in which the 6th U.S. Cavalry attacked and destroyed a Southern Cheyenne camp). It was the last fight of the Red River War. There were many unanswered questions as to the specifics of the fight. But looking back on it today, I think the more overriding significance of the event is that it illustrated just how dangerous life was for Cheyennes trying to move north and south to see relatives in Indian Territory and Montana during the 1870s. Of course, white settlers who were filling up Kansas at the same time sometimes fell to traveling Indians in times of conflict, whom they didn’t realize still moved through western Kansas in the 1870s. They became victims, too. William Y. Chalfant also wrote a book on this event shortly before me, and I think that between the two of us we probably got most of it right. Of course, new information always turns up in history.

How do you compare Red Cloud and Crazy Horse with Dull Knife and Little Wolf?
Red Cloud and Crazy Horse are the two greatest Oglala leaders in Lakota history judging from the charisma they seemingly had for their many followers. Red Cloud was the greater orator and statesman in his later life, while Crazy Horse remained the consummate rebel hero to the end. The Dull Knifes are a highly esteemed family in Cheyenne history. Morning Star, while garnering much subsequent attention for the Northern Cheyenne trek north from Indian Territory in 1878–79 because of the highly publicized outbreak from Fort Robinson, was really only second in stature at the time of the odyssey. Little Wolf, sweet medicine chief of all Cheyennes, was actually the primary figure in that seminal episode in Northern Cheyenne history.

What about Black Kettle?
Black Kettle was more of a peace chief. From my limited study of him, I get the impression that he was a very intelligent individual who recognized the numbers he was up against with the hordes of gold seekers and others coming to Colorado within a few short years. I do question, however, how much influence his personality played in controlling the bulk of the Southern Cheyennes of the 1860s. He was not liked by all, especially the Dog Soldiers. I also have a suspicion that a few militants with families and friends were usually in his “peaceful” encampments, though how many, and whether he knew about them and tried to expel them, I cannot say.

Which of your subjects do you find most intriguing?
I really feel compassion for the Northern Cheyennes’ trek to the northern Plains in 1878–79. Of all the research I have conducted and books and articles I have written, this topic has stirred in me the most interest and passion. Of all the other great forced migrations of Indian people in American history—the Trail of Tears, the Long Walk and the ordeal of the Nez Perce—the Northern Cheyenne odyssey seems the most dramatic to me. These people were the only ones to win the right to settle back permanently in their traditional homelands through their own daring, self-determination, sacrifice and fortitude.

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