In late November 1864, Colonel John M. Chivington arrived at Fort Lyon, Colorado Territory, with the 3rd Colorado Cavalry. Major Scott Anthony joined him there with six companies of the 1st Colorado Cavalry, and at dawn on the 29th, about 700 soldiers attacked Black Kettle's village of 500 Cheyennes and Arapahos at Sand Creek, 35 miles northeast of the fort. Some 120 Indians were killed, while the soldiers took about 70 casualties.
The fight has most commonly been called the Sand Creek Massacre or Chivington's Massacre. It is depicted as an epic struggle between good and evil. Interpretation of almost every historical event will change over time, but the portrayal of Sand Creek has remained remarkably static. It had bad reviews from the beginning. The historical villains are Colorado Territorial Governor John Evans and Colonel Chivington and his 3rd Colorado Volunteers. Further examination, however, finds that the white hats and black hats were more often shades of gray, and that the hat colors of some of the characters should be completely reversed. The depiction of Sand Creek as a massacre stems from the machinations of a half-dozen people, three of whom were not even there. These six are the real villains of the affair.
Scoundrel number one is Major Edward W. Wynkoop, who had traveled a winding road before joining the Colorado Volunteers. Born in Philadelphia in 1836, 'Ned,' as he liked to be called, reached Leavenworth, Kan., in 1858. He was soon appointed sheriff in Arapahoe County in what would become Colorado. In 1859 in Denver, he took a second job in a saloon/brothel to supplement his income. Wynkoop was described as 'intelligent, tough, cunning, perhaps a mite too wild.' The Denver Inter-Ocean called him `a bad man from Kansas,' who wore buckskin breeches and carried a Bowie-knife and revolver in his belt.'
In April 1861, Ned Wynkoop lost the election for city marshal, but the Civil War gave him new employment. As a captain in the 1st Colorado on March 26, 1862, Ned Wynkoop bravely rode in the Battle of Apache Canyon, part of the three-day fight known as Glorieta Pass, New Mexico Territory, and won Major Chivington's admiration, plus a promotion to major. Wynkoop's expedition to subdue the Utes in 1863 was lackluster, and he spent much of the year in camp near Denver.
In 1864 Wynkoop took over command at Fort Lyon. Boredom at the post caused many men and officers to go to Denver for excitement, and Chivington, now a colonel and in charge of the Military District of Colorado, cautioned Wynkoop about his conduct. Major General Samuel Curtis wrote Chivington a letter regarding Wynkoop's penchant for sending scouting parties far out of his district, of which Curtis disapproved. Chivington tried to cover for Wynkoop's behavior, but the major's indiscretions kept drawing unwanted attention to him and his colonel. That July Curtis created the District of the Upper Arkansas, which severed Fort Lyon from Chivington's jurisdiction and placed it under Maj. Gen. James G. Blunt. This change caused Wynkoop future trouble.
While at Fort Lyon, Wynkoop got acquainted with Sand Creek villains two and three: John S. Smith and Indian agent Samuel G. Colley. Smith had been known and distrusted by the Indians for 25 years; they called him 'Lying John.' With Sam Colley and Sam's son Dexter, he had been cheating the Indians for years. Ex-agent William Bent was onto them. They withheld government goods, meant as annuities for the Indians, until the Indians traded something of value for them. Bent figured the Colleys made nearly $30,000 in three years swindling the Cheyennes and Arapahos. John Smith acted as the Indian trader and was considered a partner in the business. Bent said that some Cheyennes told him they had no confidence in Colley, knowing the agent was swindling them out of goods. All the time he was raking in money, Sam Colley continued to paint a pessimistic picture in a letter to Governor Evans. 'The Indians are very troublesome,' he said. 'I have made application to Major Wynkoop for troops….It looks at present as though we shall have to fight them all.'
In early September 1864, a few Indians brought in a note from hostile tribes that indicated their desire for peace talks, and Wynkoop was determined to pay them a visit. He was well aware that he was now under the command of General Blunt, for in August 1864, Blunt ordered Wynkoop to 'confine your operations to the defense of your post and give such protection to the road and mail coaches as you can afford.' Both Blunt and Curtis had issued orders that the Indians were to be punished, not treated with. Wynkoop knew expeditions were currently in the field looking to fight the Indians. He had been chastised before for going outside district lines, for not asking permission for his actions and for not keeping his own superiors informed of his movements.
Wynkoop took 125 men of the 1st Colorado to the Smoky Hill River without informing Blunt or Curtis. John Smith accompanied them. Sam Colley stayed behind to send the news to Evans and Chivington. The Indians threatened Wynkoop's expedition with annihilation, and some of his men demanded that Wynkoop return immediately to the fort. It was a close scrape, but they did return with four of seven white captives the Indians had, plus some chiefs, including Black Kettle and White Antelope. Then they went to Denver for a peace conference. The problem was that neither Evans nor Chivington wanted a peace conference while prosecuting a war.
The day after the council, Evans told Colley in a letter that he had not made any peace with the Indians, as it might embarrass the military operations against them–which apparently Wynkoop did not understand. 'You will be particular to impress upon these chiefs,' Evans wrote, 'the fact that my talk with them was for the purpose of ascertaining their views, and not to offer them anything whatever. ' Evans did not want the agent to furnish the Indians with any means to continue the war, but he was afraid that Colley would not listen. The Indians returned from Denver realizing that they could not make any peace treaty. Wynkoop, nevertheless, told them that they should bring their people closer to the fort.
At Fort Lyon was another Sand Creek villain, Captain Silas S. Soule, who had a more polished exterior than Wynkoop, but who was crafty under the veneer. A poetry-quoting friend of Walt Whitman's, Soule was self-righteous and uncompromising. He lived by his favorite phrase: 'You may have the argument, but by God, I know I am right!' While still in his teens in Kansas, he had become a jayhawker. He was attracted to the cause of John Brown and the Free-Soilers, and on one occasion went into a jail and broke free a man accused of stealing slaves. When insurrection-minded John Brown was captured at Harpers Ferry in 1859 and thrown in jail, Soule tried but failed to break him out. Soule has been historically pictured as a man of principle, honesty and sobriety, but he proved several times that he would resort to trickery, lies and lawbreaking to achieve his ends.
While stationed at Fort Lyon, Silas Soule was not easily taken in by friendly Indians, at least not before the Sand Creek fight altered his judgment. In a letter to his sister, he wrote: 'The Cheyennes also know a trick or two. Some of them steal a girl…out of Kansas, trade her from lodge to lodge, then come up with her at our parley on the Smoky Hill last month. A gift they say. They want to seal a peace `forever.' Of course they'd killed the father, [and] the mother hanged herself.' Soule was also disenchanted with Indian agent Colley and his wife. Mrs. Colley was proprietor at the sutler's store at Fort Lyon and assisted in selling the Indians their annuities. Soule said: 'The Indian agent's wife sells pies she makes with Cheyenne flour allowance. Mrs. Colly [sic] got more rations on her hands than the U.S. Cavalry and Northern tribes combined.'
Wynkoop and Colley got orders not to feed or give supplies to the Indians, but Colley disregarded Governor Evans, preferring to communicate directly with William P. Dole, the commissioner of Indian Affairs, whom he addressed as 'Dear Cousin.' While the authorities in charge were still looking for a military solution to the war, their subordinates were sending out contrary messages. Wynkoop, perhaps feeling sanguine about what he thought he had accomplished, was soon to find out that his superiors were not happy with him.
When Wynkoop's letter about his September excursions reached headquarters, Major Anthony was ordered to replace Wynkoop and send him to Fort Riley, in Kansas. Curtis condemned Wynkoop's actions with 'disapproval and censure,' and was certain they could only have arisen from either a lack of knowledge 'requisite to make a good and efficient officer, or an intentional disobedience of orders and almost criminal mismanagement of the affairs of his command.'
Anthony's orders stated, 'Major E. W. Wynkoop has laid himself liable to arrest and dismissal for absence without leave, and the Officer [Soule] who went with him liable for being absent without proper authority.' All orders from the District of Upper Arkansas should have been followed. Supplies were to be kept under strict control. There was too much laxity at Fort Lyon, but it would be dismissed as 'more to ignorance than intentional insult,' at least up to September. Since then it was intolerable when officers and men left their posts'seeking and assisting to make treaties between a hostile force, and parties that had no authority to make peace.'
Wynkoop waited in anticipation of the orders that he was certain would bring instructions for concluding a peace treaty. Instead, the westbound stage brought Major Anthony with orders for Wynkoop's removal. Anthony set about clearing the Indians away from the fort, while Wynkoop boarded the eastbound stage. One wonders if the major really knew why he had been removed from command. In his March 1865 testimony to the Doolittle Commission and in his autobiography, Wynkoop said that he left Fort Lyon because he received orders to go to Fort Riley to take command of that post. Either he was mentally unbalanced or he was evolving into the biggest liar on the Plains.
After the November fight at Sand Creek, the dead and wounded soldiers had hardly been carted back to Fort Lyon before signs of trouble appeared. Lieutenant Joseph Cramer, a compadre of Ned Wynkoop's and Silas Soule's and another of the Sand Creek scoundrels, spoke to 3rd Colorado Captain Theodore Cree. Speaking about Chivington, Cramer said he thought he and his friends 'could make a massacre out of the Sand Creek and crush him.' Cree asked Cramer what Chivington had done to make him hate him so much. Cramer answered that he didn't know of anything specific, but that 'they had got their play in on Chivington and they were going to play it.' Angered by Cramer's irrational attitude, Cree broke off the conversation. Back at Fort Lyon on December 14, Cramer wrote to Wynkoop, 'For God's sake, Major, keep Chivington from being a Bri'g Genl.'
More trouble was brewing. Captain Presley Talbot, badly wounded at Sand Creek, was given a room at Fort Lyon next to agent Colley's office. There, John Smith showed him papers he and Colley had drawn up against the government, claiming they were owed 'for 105 buffalo robes, two white ponies, and a wagon-load of goods.' The two of them told him they had other demands, and Smith said they 'would realize $25,000 out of it, and damn Colonel Chivington.' The government bill they had, Talbot said, was sworn to by David Louderback of the 1st Colorado, who would go to Washington, D.C., and 'he had friends who would help him get it.'
Smith boasted to Talbot that the Eastern papers would be filled with letters from Fort Lyon that blamed Chivington for the death of Smith's half-blood son Jack, who had been killed by a soldier after the battle, and 'that he would be avenged by using every effort with the department possible.' Smith complained that it was hard for a father to endure such a loss. Perhaps $25,000 would soften the sorrow.
Private Asbury Bird of Company D, 1st Colorado, became aware of part of the deal while talking to Sam Colley's son. Dexter Colley told Bird that they had sent $2,000 worth of Indian goods to sell in Denver, and they expected the money to arrive any day. Bird heard John Smith admit that the goods had not cost them anything, for they were government annuities and he would just trade them to the Indians, 'and if he lost them he would not be out anything.'
Some hated Chivington, some felt betrayed, some sought to cloak their cowardice, and some saw a way to make money from the situation. Letters were soon on their way to certain high officials, and from then on the episode exploded with deceit, obfuscation and recrimination. As early as December 7, word from a member of the 1st Colorado was taken to Judge Stephen S. Harding in Denver, a political foe of Governor Evans and Chivington, of a horrible massacre along Sand Creek. Harding wrote to John Wright, a personal enemy of Evans. Wright was a friend of the Colleys' and of Secretary of the Interior John P. Usher's. Harding's letter was largely false and highly sensationalist–perfect for the newspapers.
One of the worst post-battle decisions the military made was after General Curtis' interview with Wynkoop. Once Curtis' anger had cooled, the general sent Wynkoop back to Fort Riley. General Blunt had been replaced as commander of the District of the Upper Arkansas, and the new commander, not realizing the depth of Wynkoop's involvement in the matter, ordered him back to Fort Lyon to take command and investigate the Sand Creek affair. The man who had done the most to cause the disaster was off the hook and allowed to pick the scapegoat. He chose Chivington, who resigned his military commission on January 4, 1865.
The Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War met in Washington in March 1865. The title of the committee's report became 'Massacre of Cheyenne Indians,' and it was quickly evident that 'massacre' would be the principal theme even before the testimony began. The committee heard live witnesses and took depositions that had little bearing on the subject. Some of the depositions were written under the direction of Major Wynkoop. Testifying were Jesse Leavenworth, Sam Robbins, Sam Colley, Dexter Colley and A.C. Hunt; none had been at the battle, and they could contribute only valueless hearsay evidence. Leading questions contained words or phrases such as massacre, mutilation or friendly Indians, as if they were established facts and not the very issues to be determined. No one from the 3rd Colorado was called to testify.
The most damaging indictment came from Wynkoop's unsworn affidavit written after his reassignment to duty at Fort Lyon, a document that was not entitled to any consideration, since it was based entirely on hearsay and was only a vituperative tirade. Wynkoop gave incorrect information about the letter he received from the Indians and passed on secondhand stories regarding mutilations of the dead as if they were facts known to him. He accused Chivington of 'all the time inciting his troops to these diabolical outrages,' when he did nothing of the sort. He claimed Chivington knew the Indians were friendly, and yet 'this inhuman monster committed his unprecedented atrocity.' Wynkoop said that all the officers at Fort Lyon were in unanimous agreement with him, and that since 'the horrible murder by Colonel Chivington,' the country was desolated and all but ruined.
Wynkoop's statements were a travesty, but the true damage and insult came when they were accepted as gospel. The committee fell for it whole hog, choosing the testimony it wanted to hear as truth, and condemning the testimony that did not fit with its preconceived notions as false. The summary of the proceedings concluded that the soldiers were barbarians, while the Indians 'in every way conducted themselves properly and peaceably.' Chivington and Anthony were on a 'mission of murder and barbarity,' and the colonel 'deliberately planned and executed a foul and dastardly massacre which would have disgraced the veriest savage.' Further, Evans and Anthony were prevaricators and should be removed from office and punished 'as their crimes deserve.' Senator 'Honest' Ben Wade signed the report, and a year later admitted that he had never even attended the hearings, nor did he understand the full import of the committee report.
Evans was upset about the committee's portrayal of him as a liar. He complained that it was 'partial,' 'erroneous' and did him 'great injustice.' He soberly reviewed the events, cited the numerous errors the committee made, and insisted that the committee itself was 'culpably negligent' for not examining the actual facts that would have exonerated him. It was wrong to conclude 'that I had prevaricated,' he said, 'because my statement did not agree with the falsehoods they had embraced.'
Concurrent with the above investigation, a joint special committee under Senator James Doolittle made its 'Report on the Condition of the Indian Tribes.' Again testimony was taken, but Sam Colley changed his story, stating that the Indians at Sand Creek were friendly and had not been depredating. He told about the chiefs being shot down in front of their tepees, the American flag flying, and the horrible scalping and mutilations, although he had not seen a bit of it. He also made a statement that apologists seem so prone to make, inadvertently exposing the reality of the situation. The villagers 'were butchered in brutal manner,' he said, 'and scalped and mutilated as bad as an Indian ever did to a white man.'
Silas Soule testified in Denver. He wrote a letter to Walt Whitman and said, 'I flat refused to order in my men or open fire.' In his testimony on February 16, however, there were too many potential witnesses who could counter this line, plus, if he admitted to disobeying orders in battle, he would be liable to court-martial himself. Soule balked. Losing his bravado, he meekly stated that at Sand Creek, Anthony ordered him to fire and he did so. He moved up the creek 'for the purpose of killing Indians,' but because troops were firing on both sides of him he felt 'it was unsafe' and scurried away. The now humble captain made no claims that lofty principles kept him from firing.
One problem for persons telling lies is that they may not remember what they have said. On February 16, Soule testified that women and children at Sand Creek were scalped and mutilated while escaping. He couldn't have known, however, for he was guarding the baggage and left before the fight ended. On the 20th, when asked if he saw any soldiers scalping or mutilating Indians, he answered, 'I think not.'
Lieutenant Cramer came to the stand, and he too changed his story. Like Soule, he had been bragging that he would not fire during the battle. He wrote to Wynkoop, 'I got so mad I swore I would not burn powder, and I did not.' Realizing the implications of such an admission in a military tribunal, Cramer also showed the white feather and said that his battalion was firing at the Indians, including White Antelope. Cramer said he started and stopped firing'several times during the fight.' The tribunal was not inclined to take these men to task for their baldfaced mendacity.
On March 20, the tribunal moved to Fort Lyon. The first witness was Ned Wynkoop, who showed the same color as Soule and Cramer. He told a few lies about Anthony, saying that Anthony issued goods and food to the Indians in 'greater quantity than ever I had issued,' when in truth Anthony had only given food to the Arapahos for about 10 days while they were considered prisoners. What is notable in his face-to-face hearing in contrast with his written affidavit is the lack of venomous accusations. John Chivington was in the same room with Wynkoop, and all the name-calling miraculously ceased. Wynkoop even admitted that at the September council, Chivington told the Indians that he was the war chief 'and his business was to kill Indians, and not to make peace with them.' Wynkoop could bluster and blame, but when in the presence of a man of greater size, stamina and character who could easily call his bluff, he folded up like a losing poker hand.
Two months later, Soule was shot down on the streets of Denver while on duty as provost marshal. The assailant, Charles W. Squiers, fled to New Mexico Territory, where he was arrested by Lieutenant James D. Cannon of the New Mexico Volunteers, who had also been at Sand Creek. He returned Squiers to Denver for court-martial. The Black Hawk Mining Journal asserted that Soule was killed so that he wouldn't testify, but retracted when it learned he had already done so. The paper later stated that there were no grounds to believe that the death was 'instituted by high and responsible parties.'
Lieutenant Cannon was found dead in his room at the Tremont House on July 14, three days after he brought Squiers to Denver. The incident provided fuel for more rumors that he had been killed by the same people supposedly responsible for Soule's death. There was a less mysterious answer, however. The Rocky Mountain News reported that Cannon had been gambling and drinking heavily, plus he was a morphine user. The combination of alcohol and morphine did him in.
A decade later, Ned Wynkoop would, as usual, blame everything on John Chivington. The fiend, he said, had Soule 'murdered at night in the streets of Denver by an assassin whom he had hired for that purpose.' Wynkoop even took credit for bringing Squiers in. 'I had the pleasure some time afterward of arresting the murderer of Caption Soule,' he wrote, 'and sending him in irons to Denver….' Unfortunately, 'through the machinations of Col. Chivington and his satellites he escaped….Cannon was found dead in his bed the next morning having been poisoned through the agency of the same demons who had murdered S. Soule.' Time had not tempered Wynkoop's dishonesty.
Another military blunder was made by appointing Lt. Col. Samuel Tappan head of the military tribunal. Tappan, another of the Sand Creek villains, was Chivington's avowed enemy. They hated each other. The court met the day after Soule was killed and agreed to adjourn for one day 'in respect to the memory of the deceased' who had been 'assassinated.' Using the word 'assassinated' implied that Tappan suspected Chivington had a hand in Soule's death. The inference is borne out in Tappan's diary, where he recorded, 'The barbarism of Sand Creek has culminated in the assassination of Capt. Soule.' He also wrote, 'The origins of this dreadful deed may yet be found in the editorial columns of the press and the public speeches of Col Chivington.' Tappan poured out his feelings in his diary. No one should be allowed to defend Sand Creek, he said, no one should 'palm off on posterity a bloody massacre as a battle, the blackest perfidy as military strategy, assassination…and the disgusting mutilation of the dead as victory.'
Realizing all too well that Tappan would not call any witnesses friendly to him, Chivington appealed to Brig. Gen., Patrick E. Connor to allow a deposition by freighter Lipmann Meyer. The testimony would have been helpful to Chivington and damaging to Soule, so Tappan objected to the receipt of the affidavit. Chivington protested, but to no avail. Tappan sustained his own action and threw out Meyer's testimony. The proceedings were a farce.
The court was charged to investigate the facts and to ensure justice to all parties. It failed miserably. Chivington and his attorney tried several times but failed to limit the illegal testimony and depositions. Tappan's tribunal called 20 witnesses, every one of them hostile to Chivington. Chivington therefore called 16 witnesses to testify on his behalf. Throughout the course of the inquiry, 63 percent of Chivington's objections were overruled and 93 percent of Tappan's objections were sustained. In total, 59 people were questioned, 31 of whom had not been at the battle. Like the two congressional hearings, the court of inquiry was a travesty. The willingness of congressmen and officers to accept hearsay evidence and obvious falsehoods shows that Chivington and the volunteers were already prejudged and condemned.
The great controversy about Sand Creek was the result of a number of factors. Probably the initial and largest contributing factor to its exposure was political. The chief issue dividing Coloradans in 1864 was statehood. On the statehood side were Evans, Chivington and William Byers of the Rocky Mountain News. Opposing statehood were some of the territorial judges, the marshal and the district attorney, backed by the Black Hawk Mining Journal. Chivington and Evans had political aspirations, but the statehood proposal was voted down on September 13, 1864. Chivington did not need a great victory over the Indians to sweep him into any office; the statehood battle was already lost. The original appearance of massacre stories in the Eastern press was politically motivated. The publicity was not to help the Indians but to ruin the careers of Evans and Chivington. The humanitarian press was not as responsible for the blowup as were a handful of vindictive little men out for revenge.
Also responsible were the Indian agents and traders who realized that the battle, if represented as a massacre, would be a way to make money. The crooked traders and agents were doubly culpable. First, their cheating of the Indians caused more raiding, proved that the white man's word meant nothing and ripened the conditions for conflict. Second, they were among those who cried foul most vociferously. They were the promoters and advertisers of the Sand Creek affair.
Sam Colley was so blatantly 'fork-tongued' that it is amazing someone did not challenge his post-battle statements. Colley supplied Evans with information from white traders that the Indians would go to war in the spring of 1864. He recommended that fort garrison strengths be increased. He was active in annuity swindles. He told Chivington that he had done all in his power but could not stop the Indians from raiding, and that only a sound whipping would restore peace. He told men of the 3rd Colorado that the Indians needed punishment. Colley even told Chivington where the Arapahos were camped so they could be attacked.
After Sand Creek, Colley did an about-face, criticized the Army and mourned the loss of 'his' goods. He complained about his losses and the bad treatment of the Indians. He wrote to his cousin Dole, to Usher and to Doolittle that the Indians were all under his protection and that the chiefs were doing all they could to keep the peace. In 1865 he testified that the Indians had been at peace and were friendly. Colley could have given Wynkoop a run for his money in the greatest liar competition. Yet Colley, like Wynkoop, Soule and Smith, provided the testimony that the authorities wanted to hear.
John Smith did not appear to be as upset about the death of his son as he did about losing property, although that property may not have been his to lose. He and Colley schemed to make Sand Creek into a massacre to collect money from damage claims, blaming the Army for attacking peaceful Indians and destroying their property in the process.
A third group responsible for the fighting at Sand Creek and its ghastly portrayal consisted of several members of the 1st Colorado. The person most responsible was Edward Wynkoop. Were it not for his continuous violation of orders, there never would have been a battle. Before he went over the edge into total denial, he realized his culpability when, in January 1865, he admitted that taking the Indians to Denver was 'a mistake of which I have since become painfully aware.' Even so, Wynkoop never seemed to recognize that taking the Indians to headquarters in the wrong district was not the only problem. To cover up his own mistakes, Wynkoop screamed loudest of all. He knew he was responsible for what happened, and he felt betrayed by a superior officer he believed would support him. He needed to quickly shift the blame and was wild to strike at someone–Chivington was the perfect target. Returning Wynkoop to command at Fort Lyon and having him conduct the investigation guaranteed that facts would not be found and justice would not be served.
Soule and to a lesser extent Cramer were Wynkoop's right-hand men in the persecution of Chivington and in depicting the battle as a massacre. Although they participated little, they were among the most vocal concerning what they said they saw, and even concocted things they didn't see. Both men made up statements that Chivington had refused to save Jack Smith. Both said they would not allow their companies to 'burn powder' during the battle, and both later swallowed their prior boasts during the court of inquiry and admitted that they had been firing.
Appointing Sam Tappan president of the court further ensured that the truth would not come out. This bitter enemy of Chivington's got his revenge for what he considered he had endured at his colonel's hands for nearly three years. Tappan's actions in court–his admission of witnesses, depositions, hearsay evidence–and his rulings showed his public prejudice. His diary showed his private prejudice.
The congressional hearings were unfair because hearsay was admitted, statements were not checked for truth and conclusions were predetermined. Blame, if it must be placed, should be on the politicians who sought to destroy their enemies for personal aggrandizement, on the crooked agents and traders for fomenting discontent, and on Wynkoop for setting the stage for disaster. For exploding Sand Creek out of the realm of battle and into the horror of massacre, the blame falls on Wynkoop, Colley, Smith, Soule, Cramer and Tappan. Tappan did little to bring forth the truth of the episode, and the other five did their best to exaggerate, obfuscate and distort, so they could hide their mistakes, gain monetary advantage or seek revenge. They are the real villains of Sand Creek.
This article was written by Gregory F. Michno and originally appeared in the December 2003 issue of Wild West. For more great articles be sure to pick up your copy of Wild West.
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Thanks to Greg Michno for his consistently flawless histories.
About the Sand Creek Military Hearings in Denver that followed,
Chivington's first two requests during his testimony were first
that Samuel F. Tappan recuse himself from presiding due to
obvious bias. When Tappan refused, Chivington then asked the
committee to open the hearings to the press and public. Tappan
again refused, securing for himself unfettered revenge on
Chivington for Tappan's humiliation at Glorieta. (by petition of a
majority of junior officers of the First Colorado Volunteer Infantry
after Glorieta, then-Major Chivington was chosen over Lt. Col.
Tappan to become Colonel in command. Tappan, a former
newspaper reporter and acquaintance of Gen. Sherman, seemed
to acquiese and bided his time for revenge. I like to think of
Tappan the historical charachter as "Press Trash with-a-grudge")
IDK know mudh about it but it seems to me the americans were being pretty unfair!!
Where did you get your info. saying he was {wynkoop} a vilian is the most stupid thing I have ever heard about sandcreek, also john smith was a trader who's son was murdered by chivingtons men for being a half breed. I would like to know where you got your info or did you write it down read it, and then used it
Wynkoop had made a reputation for himself in Denver as a tough guy who carried a knife and worked as a bouncer in a saloon among other things.
Or at least that's what I got from my research. He also was appointed Sheriff for the remote county before leaving Kansas. But there was no function to it in young Denver. At Glorieta Pass in Mar. 1862 he performed well in the fights against the Texas Confederates and for a time afterwards. He earlier done theatrical acting in Denver before Glorieta and was a bit of a poser.
My take on Wynkoop in Command at Ft. Lyon is that he was also an opportunist, like most frontier newbies, and defied his orders to stay guarding the Santa Fe Trial and went out on the headwaters of the Smoky Hill River to counsel with the indians. It was risky and he disobeyed orders. To take the Chiefs in to Denver he again violated his orders by going A. W. O. L. from his Command as well as his District. If anything, he should have taken the Chiefs to Ft. Riley or Ft. Leavenworth to the east.
But he wouldn't have been able to do any Grand Standing. And I'm told his father-in-law had a photography studio in Denver where the well known photo of Wynkoop and Soule with the Chiefs was done. Hubba Hubba.
But I read him as hyper-ambitious and unstable in the photo; didn't take off his large hat which almost hid Black Kettle's face, had a cigarette dangling dramatically from his lip, wore a large hog-leg revolver hanging off his hip.
The looked to me like props. He and Soule look to me like a couple of Poseurs.
Jack Smith was raised as an abused child and probably bore hatred of his white father "lying John" Smith as did Charley Bent, who at one time sought to murder his white father Wm. Bent. (Big sister Mary interceded and sent him away.) Jack Smith was known to participate in Cheyenne raiding parties along the Santa Fe Trail and was reputedley cruel with rapes and murders. Many mixed-breeds were more terroristic than full-blood warriors. Standard procedure for bandidos and paroled Confederates such as George and Charley Bent was summary execution.
Chivington let Charley go I suspect due to his father's influential name.
One source says Soule tried to steal the credit for it.
Much is made of Samuel F. Tappan's diary. Was the diary ever published. If so, how could one see it?
Thanks,
Tom
Hi Tom,
One volume of Sam Tappan's Sand Creek diaries is available on microfilm in the Stephen Hart library of the Colorado Historical Society library in Denver, CO. Unfortunately the library is closed at present until 2012 due to construction of their new building.
An analysis and extensive quotation from the diary is available in a University of Denver Masters thesis written by Thomas F. Goertner in 1959 titled, "Reflections of a Frontier Soldier on the Sand Creek Affair as Revealed in the Diary of Samuel F. Tappan".
Other volumes of Sam Tappan's Sand Creek diaries are believed to be in the possession of Tappan relatives and remain unpublished as far as I know.
A nice summary of Sam Tappan's life and involvement in the Sand Creek events was recently provided by Colorado writer Carol Turner in her book, "Forgotten Heroes & Villains of Sand Creek" History Press, Charleston, SC. 2010. I commend it to you and others interested in this topic.
I hope this helps!
Sincerely,
Dana
Mr. Dana R. Younger (an amateur historian and distant Tappan relative)
re Tom Stohlgren' question, Sam Tappan's writings are said to be available through Kansas State Historical Society. Also, look up Kevin Cahill or KClonewolf on the internet. I think he has posted an extensive Sand Creek bibliography.
As for Michno's credibility, he is the most thorough about his sourcing of any I've read and has an encyclopedic memory that has helped him connect many Sand Creek dots. Also, I like Irving Howbert's first-hand description of the Sand Creek fight in his MEMORIES OF A LIFETIME IN THE PIKES PEAK REGION, available at history.oldcolo.com book store. And a recently discovered description by John Coplen adds to Howbert's version.
However, the Massacre version will probably always prevail because too many careers and paychecks depend on it, plus it's probably the most popular Fairy Tale ever concocted. I'd think the Cheyenne activists would eventually be embarassed by the hype.
Also, Michno's BATTLE AT SAND CREEK, The Military Perspective is an excellent read on the subject, as well as his ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE INDIAN WARS and his and Susan's
A FATE WORSE THAN DEATH about women and childrens miseries while captive of the Plains tribes during that era.
The only person who should be embarrassed is Curt Neeley for being the same old voice of white denial of their genocide against our people. Go hang out at a tea party rally with Rush Limbaugh, where you can blame the jews for the holocaust too. We are not embarrassed for your stupidity and bias
Hi Westwind. I won't cop to your accusation that I'm stupid. Anyway you would have to get in line behind several ex-wives. True, my bias doesn't favor the Cheyenne activists still sore headed about Sand Creek. Like Sitting Bull, I see them as sell-outs to the National Park Service for mere chicken feed. My bias favors the Chickasaw, Comanche and Apache peoples.
My Childhood Chickasaw "Chief" pitched country baseball for the eastern Colorado town of Rush when they won the Big Sandy League in 1949.
There were 6 sets of brothers on that post-WW II team. There's a team photo in an article I wrote about it in the Nov. 29, 2007 Ranchland News.
Chief became an El Paso County career employee and died a few years back at age 90. It was said of him that he had the social skills to strike up a lively conversation with a grumpy fence post. He is buried in Fairview Cemetary at Old Colorado City with Military and Masonic Rites. I was able to sit with him during his last hours. He was an honored Elder of the Chickasaw and his grandpa Eastman Maytubby worked as a U. S. Marshall in Oklahoma. I have a photo copy of Eastman. He was an impressive looking gent.
From what I've researched, both sides often dreamed about genocide during the conflicts, but at least for the U. S. Government, whose Approval Ratings recently have hovered around 13%, Genocide was never an official policy. To the contrary, the Peaceniks often thwarted military plans, but in so doing caused much greater losses later on. Like Neville Chamberlain, who tried to placate Hitler, he benightedly abetted a process which cost 50 million people to die.
Curt Neeley
Collections of Tappans letters are extensive according to footnotes in Gary L. Roberts 1884 Doctoral Thesis and deserving of extensive study.
Tappan was a newspaper correspondent from whom extensive letter collections are to be expected. Robert's Thesis "Sand Creek, Tragedy and Symbol" was a tough read for me over the past 7 months; 970 pages in two volumes. University of Oklahoma awarded Roberts his Ph. D. but was too wordy for them to publish his work. It is said that Roberts refused to shorten it, so now you can obtain it from University of Michigan Dissertation Services for about $100. Roberts did exhaustive research and Iearned much from it although his bias in places seems pro-indian, pro-Confederacy and pro-Revisionista. For instance he calls the Washita battle 4 years after Sand Creek a "Tragedy". I see it as expected consequences for Black Kettle's continued raiding. Gen. Sheridan's;troopers started out on their winter campaign south from Ft. Dodge Kansas and soon crossed a war party trail which they followed and attacked then next morning. Unlike Sand Creek, Black Kettle was killed and his sister Ma-wis-ha captured. She later told Custer that she had warned Black Kettle many times to quit hanging out with the Bad Guys but he wouldn't listen. Clara Blinn and her son Willy had been captured near Ft. Lyon earlier and was killed as Custer attacked, which was customary for white captives.
After refitting at their Camp Supply base, Custer returned to the Washita along with the 19th Kansas Volunteer Cavalry commanded by Gov. Crawford. The 19th was a 180 days Regiment raised to rescue Mrs. Morgan and Miss White who were taken prisoners by the Cheyenne in August. Gov. Crawford had resigned his position to command them when he raised them. The detachment had 1500 Troopers on its roster.
They encountered Kiowa Chief Lone Wolf's band along with Chief Satanta and started them toward their Reservation. But Lone Wolf and Satanta were playing cutesey so General Sheridan, along as an observer, told Custer to take them hostage and threaten to hang them if thier bands didn't stay on course. It took some prodding but the Kiowa got straight when they learned Sheridan was serious. After Ft. Cobb, Custer turned the detachment west toward the other fleeing Cheyenne in the Texas Panhandle. Ma-wis-ha and another woman Mon-a-sita-a guided. After some weeks they located the Cheyenne and Little Raven's band of Arapaho. Custer followed Sheridan's example, seized a few Chiefs and threatened to hang them if they didn't release Miss White and Mrs. Morgan and proceed to their Reservation. After many fakings, the tribes agreed and released the women captives. The Kansas Volunteers had wanted to attack the bands as pay backs for the murders and raids. But after the women came out, they couldn't say enought nice things about Custer.
Robert's doesn't mention this in his 970 pages. I think the omission is deliberate. Nor does he mention that two years before Sand Creek the Santee Sioux uprising had massacre'd 800 defenseless German immigrants in the Minnesota River Valley in 3 days. Paybacks on that slaughter caused the Minnesota Volunteers to attack across the Dakotas and in to Teton Sioux territory with major victorys at WhiteStone Hill and Kildeer Mountain. The history Revisionista's want to blame all the indian wars on Sand Creek, but the truth is that the northern parts of the U. S. were already aflame with battles before Sand Creek.
Roberts also fails to mention that General Grant's top aid since the seige of Vicksburg was Col. Ely S. Parker penned the surrender document for Robert E. Lee to sign at Appomatox as Grant composed the words. Parker was a full-blood Seneca Chief, an engineer and lawyer and a Grand Sachem of the Iriquois Confederacy…. truely an accomplished man.
You can look-up his story on the internet. Indians were involved in the Civil War. The Confederacy appointed General Albert Pike as Brigadier commanding them. The Cherokee Chief Stand Watie was the only indian appointed to Brigadier General rank and didn't surrender until some two months after Robert E. Lee.
Curt Neeley
Dana Younger, Our chief researcher found that your ancestor Samuel Forster Tappan (the first time) was born in 1795. Samuel Forster Tappan who chaired the post-Sand Creek Military Commission in Denver was born in 1831. You may find it Ironic that Tappan Brothers Mercantile was one of the earliest and most reputable firms in Old Colorado City on the east flank of Pikes Peak. It was there that the First Colorado Volunteer Infantry rested while awaiting horses ordered by Chivington, who had negotiated such duing a trip to Washington D. C.
Tappan people may have been present when lawyer Rufus Cable benamed a nearby red rock formation "The Gardent of The Gods".
It must have been near the Garden where John Potts Slough almost got himself shot the first time, (as far as I kjow) when he pointed his pistol at Lt. Kerber of I Company because Kerber wasn't moving towards Glorieta until his German immigrant soldiers got 3 wagons like all the other Companies. Potts found himself the target of Kerber's entire Companie's rifles. Soi he prudently backed down. He ordered Major Chivington to march the men 6 miles below Old Colorado City on Fountain Creeki and to go into camp again. Chiivington did, during which time a third wagon was located for Company I. It wasn't Slough's first confrontation because even before he came west he had been censured by the Ohio Legislature for brawling in Session. He subsequently failed at re-election.
He further aggravated the !st. Colorado at Ft. Union when he refused Co. Gabriel Paul's offer of tents and hot meals after their forced march from Denver. The men had to sleep in the cold New Mexico night on empty stomachs, and all this after Slough had pulled rank on West Pointer and experienced military man Col. Paul. It's a marvel that Slough ever got as far as Glorieta. Slough's volunteer Commission predated Paul's promotion to Col. by only a few days.
Our lead researcher is combat savvy, unlike most ot you know-it-all Revisionista's who seed to see that no dissenting opinion ever escapes alive. Our Colonel is the most combat-decorated West Pointer (there were 38 of them at Glorieta) Class of 1950…… and schooled by the Red Chinese Army in Korea. He also is one of only nine Colonels designated as "Distinguished Alumnus" and was Chief of Staff at Ft. Carson when he retired. His lot was pivotal in creating President Nixon's notion of an all-volunteer army. His exampleshines in the Arkansas Valley as boasting more honor that ten thousand Revsionista academecs. The town of Pueblo, massacred on Christmas Eve 1854 by Moach Ute Chief blanco, boasts more Medal of Honor recipients than any other per capita locale in the U; S.
Curt Neeley
What does sittin bull,the N.P.A and some childhood chief that played baseball have to do with sand creek? The native American people were lied to and took advantage of my people were forced ona reservation nowhere near their their homelands it's basically a consentration camp with no razer wire.killing children is butal and my people are just as guilty. i like reading everbodies comment.
What is your source for the assertion that Cannon was a morphine addict?
There is plenty of historical evidence that John M. Chivington was a man of flawed character and unbridled political ambition. He fomented the action at Sand Creek in order to lead the "bloodless Thirdsters" of the Third Colorado cavalry into battle shortly before their 100 day commissions expired. He had tried once before after Glorieta Pass to become a Brig General and had failed in his quest despite written support from Lt. Col Tappan (his avowed "enemy") and his predecessor Col. Slough . He also needed a victory over the Indians in order to avenge the murder of the Hungates and to position himself both within the Colorado political hierarchy and to win the promotion to a generalship that he so dearly coveted. His modus operandi as Colonel of the Colorado Military District had always been to promote his cronies and to punish and discredit his rivals using force if necessary. Col. John P. Slough resigned his commission after Glorieta Pass in part because he had been attacked by his own men, apparently put up to it by Chivington he alleged. Col. Jesse Leavenworth also suffered at the hands of Chivington when he attempted to prevent reinforcments from being sent to support Leavenworth while in the field. Chivington consistently sought to dislodge Lt. Col Samuel F. Tappan from his post so he could replace him with one of his own men. He also repeatedly used "military inspections" or reports from other allies to discredit his rivals with charges of alcohol abuse, military ill-discipline, and other erroneous charges. Gen. Curtis repeatedly turned away these false and irresponsible attacks on his fellow serving officers. This pattern of conduct ascribed to Chivington was particularly apparent after the murder of Silas Soule following his damning testimony against Chivington. Ditto for Cannon after his death by mysterious circumstances. Chivington received powerful support in these efforts from fellow Mason William Byers who was editor of The Rocky Mountain News and a willing accomplice in efforts to blacken the reputations of those who dared to cross the Chivington cabal. Gov John Evans was at times an unwitting accomplice in these efforts (he also happened to be both a fellow Mason and a Methodist). Chivington's villainy at Sand Creek is exposed by the facts compiled after the fight and the physical evidence (overstating the number of Indians killed in official reports to inflate the importance of the "victory" to support his claims for promotion; appropriating Indian ponies which he later sold for personal profit; encouragement of vicious conduct and mutilation of corpses by the troops under his command; and obfuscation of the origin and circumstances of the action in his later testimony before multiple official inquiries). His moral failings and general character flaws are abundantly illustrated in the facts concerning his life which other biographers (namely the hagiography "The Fighting Parson" written by his grandson Reginald Craig and William Clark's "I Stand by Sand Creek") conveniently ignore. His "location" from the Nebraska Methodist convention. His efforts to subvert military order and discipline within his Colorado command. His often threatening behavior towards non-compliant subordinates. His despicable conduct towards his 2nd and 3rd wives. His criminal behavior in falsifying multiple claim documents. His theft of personal property while working as a coroner in Denver. These and other incidents form a consistent pattern that thoroughly attest to Chivington's flaws as a human being and which may have helped to precipitate the proceedings at Sand Creek. Greg Michno is guilty of a terrible miscarriage of justice with this attempt to "re-write history" to further "reward" the chief perpetrator of Sand Creek and to further besmirch some of those who stood up to Chivington's actions. He has apparently been taken in hook, line and sinker by the Sand Creek "apologists" who controlled the popular press in the aftermath of the action. These "accomplices" not surprisingly sought to protect the good names and reputations of their Colorado friends and neighbors against such charges. However the verdict of history falls heavily against Chivington much as he and others may try to explain away his motivations and actions. Even in his own time Chivington was excoriated for Sand Creek by his military contemporaries including Kit Carson, U.S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman. It is also reflected in all of the objective analysis of the US government at the time, both in the War Department and the Bureau of Indian Affairs. In fact less than a year after Sand Creek the Treaty of the Little Arkansas in October 1865 was specifically designed to provide reparations for the outrages perpetrated by Chivington and his men at Sand Creek. The military records and history of proud and honorable conduct of men such as Wynkoop, Tappan, Soule and Cramer is belied by Michno's voluble and poorly substantiated charges. They deserve better treatment from a professional historian than Michno has accorded them. This is truly regrettable.
Dana R. Younger's comments severely challenge Greg Michno's work. He flings a flurry of assertions subtly presented as fact, as though he is an unquestioned know-it-all. My Google of Dana to locate other history authorship and schholarship indicate that Dana contributed to the Tappan Family geneology and suggests perhaps that he is related. If so, my comment re Lt. Col. Samuel F. Tappan's trashing of Chivington at the Denver Sand Creek Military Hearings may have offended him.. I picture Sam Tappan and his vicious conduct of them characterizing him as "Press Trash With A Grudge".
But the minutes of the military hearing clearly prove to be Tappan's self-serving Star Chamber slander and defamation of Chivington
A convincing lie must have an element of the truth. It looks to me like Dana compromised his entire list of assertions by not mentioning his family connection, if any.
Just this past year, Colorado City HIstory Museum researchers have discovered heretofore unread first person accounts of Sand Creek. Due to the effects of the internet, the Sand Creek history is far from complete. So all you big time "experts" take a deep breath, relax and stay tuned..
If true, Dana needs to apologize to History. Net, to Greg Michno, to the thousands of Colorado school children who have been brainwashed by Massacre blather, to the citizens of Colorado….
in my opinion as of today.
to Curt Neeley
While I found some of the information in Michno's article interesting, most of it was biased and twisted to prove his point. Was Chivington a villain? Absolutely! Was he the only one? Absolutely not! Michno's article sugar coats Chivington's deeds and attempts to convince the reader that he was a saint who had to deal with a multitude of lying back stabbers hell bent on ruining him. The truth is, none of these men were innocent. To portray 1000 soldiers sneaking up on a band of knowingly peaceful natives and opening fire making sure to butcher every vulnerable one as a Battle rather than a massacre is falsifying history. Had it been a battle, the soldiers would have aimed for the warriors who they allowed to escape because they were too busy picking off the innocent children trying to run for cover.
As a historian, I found it offensive that a historical magazine would and History Net would publish such a twisted account of history. If Michno had stuck to the facts of the hearings, newspapers, diaries, etc as we historians are taught and drawn conclusions on those facts alone, the article would have been great. However, to try to manipulate the facts to be more than what they were is the number one mistake any historian can make. Our jobs are to collect, preserve and share the stories of the past, not turn them around to make them fit our own beliefs and agendas.
As for Dana, he did make it clear in his first post that he was a decedent of Tappan and merely pointed out more facts overlooked by Michno.
reply to Kathleen R's reply;
Kathleen, I find no reason to believe a word you wrote. If you truely had read Michno's article and his many books you should be aware that Michno is not fond of the historical character Chivington. You claim Michno "sugar coats" Chivington's deeds. That's not true to the careful reader.
You wrote there were a 'thousand" soldiers at Sand Creek when the official record shows about 750. "sneaking up on a band of knowingly peaceful natives" is another big fib. The many bands at Sand Creek were not peaceful and they had a good 45 minutes forewarning from when Little Bear saw movement on the southern horizan and sounded the alarm.
You deplore "twisted historical accounts" and want the magazine to clean the mess up. I suggest you start with yourself. As for the "facts" of three hearings, they were precious few. One of the foremost "witnesses" at all of them were John Simpson Smith who was a trader and interpreter and opportunist. Gary Roberts referred to Smith as "Gray Blanket". But most other sources refer to him as "Lying John Smith" who had stolen and allegedly murdered Blackfoot Indians during his stay with them. The indians gave him the name "Lying John" because he had cheated them for years. And during his stay in early Denver he operated as a land salesman with special insider privilages from marriage to an Arapaho woman. However, Denver residents ran Lying John out of town after he caught his wife dancing in public with another man without his permission.
Lying John beat her so badly with a three-legged milking stool (called a "creepie") that he broke her back.
Lying John Smith was a creepie teller of tall tales and yarns. He was a favored witness to the subsersive purposes of Samuel Forster Tappan at the Military Commission hearing in Denver and also both Congressional hearings. Dana Younger replicated the tendency in his lame Michno bashing. Ya'll just can't seem to stand it that no reputable historian has refuted Michno's recent find that 24 troopers died at the Sand Creek fight and 51 were wounded… and the idians started the shooting first.
Curt Neeley (How about you front you full name, Kathleen, instead of hiding?)
Let’s just say, i am not surprised by the response i received from Curt Neeley. Why would i read books of a man such as Michno (who in all honesty is probably one and the same as Neeley) when his short articles are full of bias and embellishments. If Neeley would have un-biasedly read my post, perhaps he would not have felt the need to use such bully tactics that he has been using on every post here. I guess he feels that if he continues to call everyone else a liar it will cover the inaccuracies of Michno's article and all new readers will believe him over the other voices of reason. So be it. I have better things in life than to play a game of verbal tit for tat. I just felt that other readers should be aware, that it is best to base articles on accurate primary sources, as any historian knows.
yes
Speaks with a forked tongue like the wind that blows north and south at te same time.
Jeronimo, I agree. Younger gets his panties wadded in an anti-Chivington twist every time I catch him short on Sand Creek history. He gets keyboard fumey and wordy. To his credit he is a high achiever according to his internet bio; a major league Greenie with billions of dollars in renewable energy jobs in a hundred countries, probably with extensive government connections. I don't think he can make his case about is ancestor Lt. Col. Samuel Forster Tappan not screwing Chivington as Tappan chaired the Military Commission Hearings about Sand Creek in Denver. I've re-read all 228 pages of the hearings minutes. Capt. Soule lied when he bragged to the press and his family that he didn't let his Company fire on the Cheyenne at Sand Creek. Soule makes no such mention in his sworn testimony at the Hearings.
I think pioneer Irving Howbert wrote most accrately about Tappan;
"The overshadowing reputation made by Colonel Chivington in the
campaign agains the Texas invaders of New Mexico, and his subsequent promotion to the Colonelcy of the Regiment over Lt. Co. Tappan, although apparently acquiesed in at the time, aroused a spirit of jealousy, envy and antagonism against him on the part of a small g roup of officers headed by Lt. Col. Tappan and Major E. W. Wynkoop. This antagonism manifested itself on every possible occaision. After their return mrom New Mexico, these officersnever allowed an opportunity to pass for discrediting and injuring the "Preacher Colonel", and after the battle of Sand Creek, they never tired of referring to it as an evidence of his unfitness". (Page 139, MEMORIES OF A LIFETIME IN THE PIKES PEAK REGION, reprint from Old Colorado City History museum bookstore).
Historian Gary Roberts in his massive research reviewed the work of the later Prof. Ramond Carey at Denver University. Carey reviewed the individuals of the 3rd Volunteer Cavalry raised to fight the Cheyenne.
They weren't the Denver bar trash and thugs commonly cited by many historians but were stand-up citizens defending their meager projects along the front range. Most of them lived out their lives and many like Howbert became major contributors over their lifetimes.
Also, Not only did Tappan trash Chivington in Denver in 1865 but in 1892 wangled another shot at Chivington on his claim for lost horses stolen by indians in 1867. As investigator of the claim, Tappan went at it with zeal and dug up much which had a lot to do with Chivington and little to do with the claim. Tappan dug up dirt in several states to trash Chivington again.
Carrying the grudge for 27 years makes Tappan a grudge champion.
I found it odd that a recent internet reading list by the National Park Service failed to mention either Michno's of Howbert's significant books. Howbert was an eye witness at Sand Creek. The NPS omission makes me wonder if they harbor a subservice Revisionista Cell in the Denver Office doing censorship on Sand Creek. I heard that Chuck and Sheri Bowen were shoved off their Sand Creek Battle Site dig in the Bowen Bend in part by government thugs. Chuck was raised on that land. I've seen a photo of him as a Cub Scout with his pack at the traditional Sand Creek monument. Chuck and Sheri had carefully photo'd their metal detector finds in-ground along side a GPS device to record location. They had several thousand. The NPS Christine Whitiker promised Bowens credit for their find, but later NPS bigshots stiffed them. I think the Cheyenne would like to steal them.
The National Monument land came from a former Kiowa County Judge who I remember reading about in the ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS many hears ago who was fired from office for judicial misconduct and subjected to a search by the Alcohol, Tabacco and Firearms people. He was hostaging license plates of trespassers looking for the lost Sand Creed site and maybe arrowheads. For a time locals called him "Shotgun Willy" behind his back I've heard. But when he sold his land to the casino's for 1.5 million dollars he got the last laugh. The casino gave the land to the Cheyenne who had Senator Campbell put it in Congressional Trust with the NPS managing it. Excited Ph. D.'s found few artifacts on it, even below the bluff which typically was said to over see Black Kettle's village.
The artifacts were found two miles up stream in the Bowen Bend. The elitist Ph. D's had their panties wadded that a mere rancher/photographer had the artifacts. And the village was over a half mile long along Sand Creek. Chivington could never have encircled it like Major Anthony wanted.
Rumor has it that the new Congress will defund many of these projects to try to balance the budget. Maybe Sand Creek can get mothballed until the history gets straightened out while Revisionistas collect unemployment.
Curt Neeley
It is sad that Mr. Neeley feels he has to engage in a form of "character assassination" rather than providing any substantive rebuttal to the "assertions" which I provided. This is tantamount to "shooting the messenger" rather than responding to the "message". Apparently he believes that anything that Gregory Michno writes must be the "truth" and that everything that I have written is only an "assertion." He should perhaps rather acknowledge that real truth comes from a careful examination of all of the available facts as well as the perspective with which one views a complex historical event like Sand Creek. Greg Michno is as capable of bias and misguided analysis as anyone despite his credentials as a published historian and author.
Fact: Samuel F. Tappan signed the petition of all of the officers of the First Colorado requesting the promotion of Maj. Chivington to Colonel after the battles at Glorieta Pass and the resignation of Col. Slough. Further it was Tappan who presented the petition to General Edward Canby on April 9, 1862. [See pg 129 of Gary L. Roberts Ph.D. Dissertation "Sand Creek: Tragedy and Symbol" (1984)]
Fact: Samuel F. Tappan was a serving officer in the US Army when ordered to conduct the military investigation into the Sand Creek affair (Special Order No. 23 of Col. Thomas Moonlight dated Feb 1, 1865). Had he refused to follow orders he would have been subordinate and be subject to court-martial. His orders as President of the commission were as follows: "The commission . . . is convened for the purpose of investigating . . . the Sand Creek fight, to ascertain . . . who are the aggressors, whether the campaign was conducted . . . according to the recognized rules of civilized warfare, and whether based upon the law of equity from the commencement of Indian hostilities to the present time . . . whether the Indians were under the protection of the government, and by what authority, or through what influence, they were induced to place themselves under that protection; whether Colonel Chivington was knowing to this fact; and whether, or not, the campaign was forced upon the Indians by the whites knowing their helpless condition; and whether the Indians were in a state of open hostility and prepared to resist any and all of the United States troops. Whether any prisoners were taken . . . and the disposition made . . . If the proper steps were taken . . . to prevent unnatural outrages . . . and [to] punish the transgressors, if such there were . . . the amount, kind, and quality of property captured . . . the disposition made of that property, and the steps taken . . . [to] insure justice to all parties, . . . the treatment of government property, such as horses and mules in the service, during the campaign." [See William J. Mellor, "The Military Investigation of Colonel John M. Chivington Following the Sand Creek Massacre" in: Chronicles of Oklahoma, Vol 16, No. 4, 1938, pg 444.]
Fact: Samuel F. Tappan was the only military officer above the rank of Captain then serving in the Colorado military district who had not been involved in the action at Sand Creek. Knowing that there would be criticism of Tappan due to his outspoken views previously expressed about the events at Sand Creek, Col Moonlight carefully wrote Tappan's instructions as follows: "This commission is not intended for the trial of any person, but simply to investigate and accumulate facts called for by the government, to fix the responsibility, if any, and to insure justice to all parties. Colonel Chivington, under these circumstances, has not the right of challenge, and I have been careful to appoint a commission composed of officers not engaged in the operations they are called upon to investigate." [Moonlight to Tappan, Feb 12, 1865 per footnote 7 for Chapter XV in Gary L. Roberts Ph.D. Dissertation "Sand Creek: Tragedy and Symbol" (1984)]
Fact: Samuel F. Tappan was not a journalist at the time of the military investigation into Sand Creek. He had been continuously in voluntary military service since 1861 when he was appointed as a Captain in the First Colorado Volunteer regiment by Territorial Governor William Gilpin. He had been a journalist in Kansas in the 1850s writing about early settlement of Kansas by anti-slavery abolitionists for the New York Tribune, the Boston Atlas and other newspapers. [See Page 796 from volume II of "Kansas: a cyclopedia of state history, embracing events, institutions, industries, counties, cities, towns, prominent persons, etc. ... / with a supplementary volume devoted to selected personal history and reminiscence. Standard Pub. Co. Chicago : 1912. 3 v. in 4. : front., ill., ports.; 28 cm. Vols. I-II edited by Frank W. Blackmar. Transcribed July 2002 by Carolyn Ward.]
Fact: John M. Chivington's only counsel at the military investigation was Maj Jacob Downing, an attorney who was a close associate of Chivington's and who had also participated as an officer in the Sand Creek events. Tappan had not been involved in Sand Creek nor had he been in command of the 3rd Colorado. On several occcasions Chivington tried to have Tappan removed as a "worthless officer" and Downing was promised Tappan's post as Lieutenant Colonel if he would assist Chivington to have him removed. [See pp. 185-186, Gary L. Roberts Ph.D. Dissertation "Sand Creek: Tragedy and Symbol" (1984)]
Fact: In 1911 Jacob Downing's widow donated to the Colorado State Historical Society a scalp taken from an Indian "warrior" at Sand Creek. [See Register of Colorado Historical Society, Object E.1748.1--"A scalp taken from the head of an Indian warrior at the Battle of Sand Creek, Colorado, November 29, 1864" (donated by Mrs. Jacob Downing in 1911, who probably inherited it from her husband, Major Downing, a leader of the massacre.)]
Fact: Judge Advocate General Jodeph Holt wrote a detailed review of the 800 pages of testimony taken by the military commission over which Tappan presided. Holt condemned Sand Creek as a "cowardly and coldblooded slaughter" of friendly Indians, sufficient in itself "to cover its perpetrators with indelible infamy." But the "shocking and demoniac barbarities" committed on the dead, Holt continued, generated the impulse "to seize the perpetrators, and bring them to condign punishment." Holt deplored the fact that he could not bring charges against Chivington since"by the prevailing rule of law" he was "beyond reach of military trial." due to Chivington's separation from military service sometime earlier. He did recommend that the government, "manifest not only its disapproval, but its utter abhorrence of the savage crimes committed in its name, and that it would so rebuke and brand the authors of these crimes by name, and their infamy shall cling to them, and that they shall thus become a warning to others in all time to come." [Report of the Judge Advocate General in the Case of Colonel John M. Chivington, First Colorado Volunteer Cavalry, Record Book, Vol 17, pp 424-434, Judge Advocate General, National Archives, Record Group 153]
Fact: Senator Benjamin Wade of Ohio who chaired the Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War in its investigation of Sand Creek reached the following conclusion concerning Chivington, "As to Colonel Chivington, your committee can hardly find fitting terms to describe his conduct. Wearing the uniform of the United States which should be the emblem of justice and humanity; holding the important position of commander of a military district, and therefore having the honor of the government to that extent in his keeping, he deliberately planned and executed a foul and dastardly massacre which would have disgraced the veriest savages among those who were the victims of his cruelty." ["Massacre of Cheyenne Indians", Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, 38th Congress, Second Session, Washington, DC, 1865]
Fact: Samuel F. Tappan was appointed by President Andrew Johnson to the Indian Peace Commission in 1867. This Commission, whose members included Gen William Tecumseh Sherman and Gen William Harney negotiated important peace treaties with many tribes in the aftermath of the "Indian wars" stirred up by Sand Creek. Official records substantiate the opinions of Gen U. S. Grant, Gen Sherman, Kit Carson and others with respect to Col Chivington and the events at Sand Creek.
Fact: Samuel F. Tappan had no children and is buried at Arlington National Cemetery. He and his wife Cora Hatch Daniels Tappan did adopt an orphaned Cheyenne Indian girl who was a survivor of the "battle" at Sand Creek whom he had educated in New England and at the Preparatory Department at what later became Howard University in Washington, DC where she was under the tutelage of Tappan's friend General Oliver Otis Howard.
Fact: Following his wife Martha's death in 1867 John M. Chivington married his dead son Thomas' widow Sarah Lull Chivington. This was apparently done in an effort to gain a portion of his son's modest estate from a freighting business following Thomas' death by drowning in the North Platte river in 1866.
Fact: Even his old friend and fellow Mason William Byers was scandalized by this development, writing in an editorial in the Rocky Mountain Daily News of June 10, 1868, "What he (Chivington) will do next to outrage the moral sense and feeling of his day and generation remains to be seen; but be sure it will be something, if there is anything left for him to do." [as quoted on page 406 in Ronald Becher's "Massacre along the Medicine Road" (1999)]
Fact: Maj General Innis Palmer of the 2nd US Cavalry denounced Chivington's claim filed in 1892 for " financial losses" suffered in his son's freighting business in 1867 due to Indians and filed long after after Sand Creek events as follows: "I happen to know a great deal of this Colonel Chivington who, it appears has made this claim against the government, and which I have no doubt is a fraud, pure and simple. Althought Chivington is a Methodist preacher, I consider him one of the greatest scoundrels in this or any other country. He is alone responsible for that horrible Sand Creek Massacre than which nothing since the massacre of the French by the Spaniards in the 16th Century, in Florida can compare." [Feb 28, 1892 letter, Chivington vs. the United States and the Sioux Tribe, Band, or Nation of Indians, Indian Depradation Case File No. 3473, US Court of Claims, National Archives, Record Group 123]
If being distantly related to Samuel F. Tappan is somehow disabling or prejudicial then I am "guilty as charged". We have a common ancestor as I am descended from his grandfather Rev. Benjamin Tappan, the minister of the Congregational Church of Manchester, Massachusetts from 1745-1790. However, I think most impartial observers can distinguish between an exchange based on facts and one based on innuendo and smears. Further, there are plenty of examples of fine historians who are descendants of those they wrote about and who are capable of writing with openness to newly uncovered facts and alternative interpretations. There are also many "amateur historians" who have made important contributions to history. Apparently Mr. Neeley is capable of honoring the work done by gifted "amateur historians" such as Chuck & Sheri Bowen who have uncovered much of the evidence substantiating the location of the Sand Creek events despite their lack of credentials as military historians or archeologists. Treating the events at Sand Creek as recounted by Cheyenne oral history and sworn Congressional and military testimony as a "fairy tale" belittles all who were involved in this important historical event and its aftermath which reverberates until today.
Please also see the following paragraphy from Historynet.com's June 12, 2006 article entitled: "Kit Carson: The Legendary Frontiersman Remains an American Hero".
"In the A few days after the Battle of Adobe Walls, Colonel John M. Chivington led the infamous massacre of Cheyennes at Sand Creek in Colorado Territory (see story in December 1998 Wild West). Chivington gloated, 'I have eclipsed Carson and posterity will shortly speak of me as the great Indian killer.' Carson was livid: 'To think of that dog Chivington, and his hounds, up thar at Sand Creek! Whoever heerd of sich doins among christians! Them pore Injuns had our flag flyin' over 'em….Well, here come along that durned Chivington and his cusses. They'd bin out huntin' hostile Injuns, and couldn't find non….So they just pitched into these friendlies, and massa-creed them…in cold blood….And ye call these civilized men Christians and the Injuns savages, du, ye?…I never yit draw a bead on a squaw or papoose, and I loath and hate the man who would. 'Taint natural for brave men to kill women and little children.' "
Dana, neither the quotes on Chivington and Carson as well are sourced and therefore are as suspect as any Sand Creek related quotes. And, if they are accurate, Chivington would have been largely correct because Carson barely escaped from his Adobe Walls attack on Little Mountain's and other camps. Even he admitted that his batallion barely escaped with all their hair, saved by the two 12 Pounder Mountain Howitzers they had.
Also, Carson didn't fare so well shortly before the Glorieta battle when Col. Canby's forces challenged Gen. Henry Hopkins Sibley's regiments at Valverde, below Albuquerque. Carson commanded the New Mexico Volunteers who eventually broke and ran while on the Union left. Sibley's troops overran Capt. McRae's battery of canon and Canby had to back across the Rio Grande River and withdraw back to Ft. Craig. So Carson's performance at both Adobe Walls and later at Valverde was marginal. He did perform well later under General Carelton in defeating the Apache and also invading and destroying Navajo homeland supplies. Their subsequent confinement at Ft. Sumner on the Pecos (Bosque Redondo) was disasterous. Hundreds of them died from malnutrition and cold. Not until General Sherman inspected the facility (accompanied by your ancestor Samuel Forster Tappan after the Taylor Peace Commision was disbanded as ineffectual ) were the Navajo moved back in to their homelands instead of shipped of to Florida. I've often wondered whether Tappan influenced Sherman's decision because Sherman was skeptic about frontier settlers up until his friend Capt. Fetterman and his company were Massacred in northern Wyoming. After that, Sherman declared that the Sioux nation should be exterminated, man, woman and child.
Carson's comments, along with the pecularities of Colonel Moonlight in structuring the Denver Military Commission Hearings after Sand Creek prompt me to wonder if all the top brass gathered to Scapegoat Chivington for Sand Creek. General Samuel Ryan Curtis telegramed Chivington during the Camp Weld Conference for Chivington to punish the indians more … not specifying about no prisioners or saving women and children. Curtis was slated to manage construction of the Cross Continent railroad after the Civil War. He and his superiors might have distanced him from the Bad Sand Creek Press by suiting Chivington up in the proverbial silk pajamas. But the effort proved pointless because Curtis died shortly after the Civil War ended.
I'll challenge the 13 "facts" that you tried bluffing with in your Nov. 30 Post next time. Stay tuned for the next exciting episode.
More debunking on Dana Younger's Nov. 30 posting;
"Fact " #2
"Tappan was ordered to conduct the Military Commission"
Why was the Commission confined to Denver? Routinely courts marshalls and official proceedings were conducted at Ft. Riley of Ft. Leavenworth before all the bad press about Sand Creek. This move doesn't pass the smell test.
And who appointed the blundering Col Moonlight? He was a name not previously appearing in the Sand Creek or 1st Colorado lore. And why was he chosen?
Moonlight succeeded Chivington as command of the military district of Colorado for only a period of 90 days. Then he assumed command of Ft. Laramie where he bungled his way out of the army; First Moonlight saw the Ogalalas Two Face and Black Foot bring Mrs. Eubanks. They claimed to have ransomed her from Cheyenne captors of the Little Blue.
"She was almost naked and told some horrible tales of barbarity and cruelty by the indians including Two Face and Black Foot" So Moonlight
"…concluded to tie them up with trace chain suspended from a beam of wood and leave them there without any foothold". (Utley, FRONTIERSMAND IN BLUE p.317)
After the Laramie Sioux were ordered moved to Ft. Kearny Capt. Fouts got himself killed in the process, Hearing about, Col. Moonlight organized 234 cavalry and galloped off in pursuit. 103 men returned to Laramie with broken horses. On June 17 120 miles northeast of Laramie he was attacked by 200 Sioux who ran off his horses. Moonlight had to order all saddles burned and march back to Laramie. General Connor relieved Moonlight of Command, General Dodge ordered him mustered out of the army. But not to be deterred, according to one source, Moonlight later succeeded well in politics.
This was the man who arranged the structure details for Tappan to shaft Chivington at the Denver Military Hearings. He specified such nonsense as "recognised rules of civilized warfare" (during the Civil War!?), "Law of equity" (what?????) "kind and amount of property taken" (not usually inventoried, but rather burned and destroyed to remove enemy's war making means), "….knowing the helpless ocnditionof the indians" helpless? 24 troopers killed and 51 wounded by "helpless" Cheyenne? Not, "steps taken to insure justice to all parties?" What justice did the warriors deliver upon the helpless immigrants on Plum Creek and the Little Blue? nonsense.
More debunking next. Curt
Dana Younger, you faulted me for viewing the "oral histories" about Sand Creek and the subsequent Congressional Hearings as "fairy tales" Perhaps my phrasing was too too provocative. But I'll hold to it for now for good cause; Oral histories are even more susceptible to strayed interpretation than written ones. For instance, Dr. Alexa Roberts recorded one Cheyenne woman as claiming that the Sand Creek fight happened in Estes Park Colorado, a few hundred miles from the actual battle site proven by artifacts from the Bowen Bend of Big Sandy Creek. Like Michno stated in his miliary persspective book, sound scholarship requires caution. Michnn has scolded me so many times for sloppy sourcing that he no longer returns my e-mails.
Also, Revisionista twisting reuires caution. One example is a former Ethinic Studies Professor at University of Colorado-Boulder.
Charges of plagiaism and academic fraud were so strong (Ironicdally some of them debunked by reputable scholars of indian ancestry) that the Board of Regents denuded the Prof. of Tenure and dismissed him from employment. It seems to me that such hucksterism falls within a fair definition of "Fariy Tales" You can revew the epose' in many copies of the now-retired ROCKY MOUNTAIN NEWS.
Also, your reference to Chuck and Sheri Bowen's archeology on the actual Sand Creek site seems apt. It's true that they were not intellectually contaminated by some dysfunctional graduate school.
Chuck went to college to learn documentary film making, after his childhood on the battle site which was part of the 20 square mile Golden Rule Ranch founded by the Bowen grandparents. Chuck learned professional photoraphy in college, which came in handy as he photographed his Sand Creek metal detecting finds in-ground along side a Global Positioning Sensor so's to accurately locate them.
And although Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell promised Kiowa County ranchers that their properties were safe from Federal seizure, the National Park Service and others have made him out to be a liar because Bowen's have been shoved off their site. So Chuck lost his most fun hobby and the U. S. A. lost a significant piece of verifiable history. But I understand that Chuck and Sheri's many artifacts will be displayed in a safe repository in to memorialize the Bowen parents and grandparents. As for NIghthorse Campbell, it looks to me like the Park Service has yet again exploited the Red Man.
To properly credit the National Park Service, they have done sound work on Glorieta Pass as well as the Florissant Fossil Beds on the west slope of Pikes Peak. It was through the Fossil Bed history that our chief researcher learned about Charlotte Coplen Hill's paleontolgy.
Charlotte discovered some 125 new specimens during her spared time while also raising six children in Old Colorado City. And her brother John Coplen joined Chivington's forses as they rested for a few hours at Ft. Lyon en route to Sand Creek. He was there about the time your ancestor Sam Tappan also came through while returning from a trip to Washington to shmooze Cora Daniels and General Sherman. But Tappan didn't join Chivington at that at that time. It was something about a busted foot from a horse accidente. As for John Coplen, he was another of the Thridsters who went on to live long and prosper in Colorado.
Regards, Curt Neeley
Dana Younger, Our Chief Researcher now reminds me that several sources say your ancestor Samuel Forster Tappan never really did sign the petition by the Junior Officers to have Chivington appointed to command the First Colorado. I suggest you have your research staff locate the document, review it for Sam's signature, and advise us all.
Also, you mentioned Sam's appointment to the Taylor Peace Commission, but it didn't amount to much. At it's last meeting and after the Fetterman Massacre, public sentiment ran against the indians and the member-generals voted the Peacenik commission out of existent. General Grant was to be elected to the U. S. Presidency in November and he ended the problematic business of Treaty-Making with Justice John Marshall's ""domestic dependent nations" definition.
That made indians as subject to U. S. Laws as all the whiteys.
And you mentioned Sam's marriage to Cora Daniels but you omitted that they divorced later on. (I curious to know who fired who from that match. I've found that Crusader-types often separate and are probably incompatible most times. Several therapists of my acquaintance agree that Social Crusaders suffer subconscioius conflicts.
Gary Roberts wrote that Sam Tappan died at age 83, feeble and isolated. His days of shmoozing and demonizing leaders were long passed. I don't doubt he was buried at Arlington National Cemetary. By Contrast, John M. Chivington had one of the largest attended funerals of the era in Denver.
One other note on Col. John P. Slough; he may have been quite perceptive to understand that he was finished at Glorieta. My take on it is that he returned to Denver to pull strings to get him transfered to the East where his military career would better flourish. He was promoted to General and assigned to a post in Virginia, if I remember right. Maybe he was involved it trashing Chivington from those far reaches.
Slough met his fate at the La Fonda Hotel in Santa Fe, according to several sources. He was working as New Mexico Chief Justice. His tendency to bash people went astray when he verbally assualted Col. Rynerson of Carleton's California Column so violently that Rynerson shot Slough dead. Rynerson pleaded self-defense and the Santa Fe jury agreed.
Curt Neeley
Another deficiency of Gary Roberts two-volume Sand Creek history is that he cherry-picked Irving Howbert's first person account in several places.. For instance Roberts wrote that Elbridge Gerry's (a Platte River rancher married to a Cheyenne woman) ride to Denver to alert Governor Evans re impending attacks by Cheyenne warriors mid-summer of 1864 (before Sand Creek) was a false alarm. Roberts maintains the Cheyenne were then peaceable. But Howbert and 10 men at Old Colorado City already had a skirmish with a Cheyenne advance scouting party and had made preparations by forting-up the Anway hotel.
So when the estimated 800 Cheyenne wariors assembled at Point of Rocks on Beaver Creek, planning to disperse into small bands which would depopulate the front range of whiteys, their attacks flopped because all the whiteys were forted-up. All the warriors could do was kill cattle and burn buildings. Howbert wrote that had Elbridge Gerry not made his alarm ride to Gov, Evans, the Cheyenne massacre would have riveled the Santee Sioux attacks on the Minnesota River two years earlier.
Howbert's account of his part in the Sand Creek fight reads quite different than most others. But I assess it as fairly accurate. Howbert was a keen observer and accomplished reporter. He continued to be a trustworty person the remainder of his 88 years. He was elected El Paso County Clerk 5 time times starting in 1869 by acclimation of the Democrats and Republicans.
Howbert later orchestrated the womens vote to oust Gov. Davis Waite
(The Populist who "suffered from the disease of Socialism") by ordering a women officer in every Precinct statewide. Howbert succeeded in mining, banking and agriculture and was pivotal in building the railroad to the goldmines on south-west Pikes Peak on its southwest flank….. the railroad the scenery of which Teddy Roosevelt said "bankrupts the English language'.
Howbert was a Trustee at The Colorado College for 42 years and all the Howbert men maintained sterling reputations all life long, even the younger brothers who fortunately survived the Arapahoe raids on Monument and Fountain Creeks in 1868.
Even today the Howbert name represents integrity. Irving Howbert the grand son toured the Bowen Bend with us at age 92 wanting to see where his grandpa fought. He is a retired attorney from the reputable firm of Howbert, Haney and Akers , which later merged with the also reputable Denver law firm of Holland and Hart. One example of the Howbert reputation recently surfaced was in Bob Olson's biography of mining magnate Spencer Penrose. During Penrose last days as he established his legacy in what is called the El Pomar Foundation, he appointed William Howbert as one of the 4 original Trustees. Spec Penrose didn't choose loosers.
Also a Trustee at The Colorado College was Dr. William A. Bell, who as a young man worked his way west as photographer on a Kansas-Pacific Railroad survey party. It was Dr. Bell who photographed his recent acquintaince Sgt. Wylyams of the 7th Cavalry. Wylyams was also like Bell a Eton College (college of the Royals) graduate and was supposed to help Bell develop photographic plates that night. But the Cheyenne massacred and mutilated Wylyams troop that day. So Bell photographed Wylyams mutilated body to send to Washington dumbumbs so's they would get a better glimpse of what life was really like at Ft. Wallace, near the Kansas-Colorado Border. It's a graphic glimpse of the Cheyenne cultural style. You can order copies of the photo from Kansas State HIstorical Society as large as 14 by 20 inches. And you can read excerpts of the tribal significance on line in Bells book NEW TRACKS IN NORTH AMERICA at Virginia. edu books on line. Dr. Bell later prospered as a Partner with Gen. Wm. Jackson Palmer in the Denver-Rio Grand Railroad and many other ventures. Bell founded the Colorado towns of Manitou Springs and Durango. You can obtain his history THE BELLS OF MANITOU at the old Bell estate now called the Briarhurst Restaurant in Manitou Springs for $2..75.
Curt Neeley
Dana R. Younger, come now my latest gleanings from Gary Robert's unpublished Doctoral Thesis "Sand Creek, Tragedy and Symbol";
You have asserted in the above postings that Chivington had ruthless
political ambitions which caused him to try to exploit the attack on the Sand Creek indian camps as a lever to hoist him into a Senator's seat.
But your case fails because there was not Senate seat available for any one because the Colorado Territory election for Statehood failed months before Sand Creek. Colorado didn't become a State and have any Senate seat at all until 1876.
Gov. Evans was elected U. S. Senator during the 1864 Statehood contest, but resigned when there was no Senatorial seat.
And now it becomes even more signigicant to learn that John Potts Slough petitioned to replace Evans as Territorial Governor as the Tappan-Slough conspiritors sought to get him fired over the alleged Sand Creek horrors. Thus it becomes clear that Tappan and Slough had been in on all the trashings of Chivington and Evans all along because they were connected in the East with the Congressional hearings of Senator's Doolittle and Wade as well as keeping Tappan in the Cat Bird seat as Chairman to trash Chivington in the Denver Military Commission hearing. All that testimony and harsh condemnation of all those hearings is suspect and therefore factually
worthless.
Furthermore, Wynkoop knew about Chivington's orders from General Curtis to attack the indians more from the time of the Camp Weld Conference onward. But Wynkoop continued to meddle and cause trouble. So it was Wynkoop's ambitions as well as Tappans which cause the bloodshed at Sand Creek moreso than anyone else.
Further, Wynkoop had no good reason to drag the released indian captives Laura Roper and the three children to the Denver conference other than to make them props in his self-promoting road show.
Isabell Eubanks died in November in Denver even before Sand Creek.
Daniel Marble died in March. All the children were battered and ill from tribal captivity from the outset, and that after watching their families slaughtered by the Cheyenne.
By todays' standards, Wynkoop would be prosecuted for child abuse and murder. And I'll speculate that the abused condition of the children were in part the cause of Chivington's vigorous paybacks for the August raids on the Little Blue and Plum Creek raids where the captives were taken.
Curt Neeley
Dana Younger, I was pleased to have lunch this week with the grandson of Cpl. Irving Howbert, G Company, Third Colorado Cavalry.
As you must know, and Gary Roberts also must know, Grandpa Irving Howbert published his memoirs in 1925 entitled "MEMORIES OF A LIFETIME IN THE PIKES PEAK REGION".
I was pleased to report that Grandpa Howbert's Sand Creek escription of his experience as an 18 yr. old Corporal on 29NOV1864 was largely accurate in my opinion, thanks to Gary Robert's massive detail in his 970 page doctoral dissertation. Robert's report on these volunteers from El Paso and Pueblo Counties (Colorado) as solid citizens (per Professor Raymond Carey's research) established that they were not mass murderers like Cheyenne activists like to portray.
Further, Gary Robert's discovery that John P. Slough was largely responsible for initiating the politically charged Doolittle and Wade congressional investigations was his personal revenge on Chivington for the Glorieta Pass humiliation.
At this point I'm willing to condemn any R.I.N.O. Republican politician who supports the Sand Creek National Monument as a massacre instead of a battle to a one-term political career. I've been sympathetic to the "Tea Party" mind set but not a member. But now that some name-calling brats on this blog have called me one. I think I'I'll join the Tea Party. And I condemn you as a descendent of Samuel Forster Tappan (a.k.a. "Press Trash With-A-Grudge". There were several reputable Tappan family members in Colorado. I say Sam wasn't one of them, despite his high-profile propaganda.
Further, it looks to me like the National Park Service in Denver has done some censorship on any books and publications, such as Greg Michno's BATTLE AT SAND CREEK, THE MILITARY PERSPECTIVE, to do their Jihadi thing on any dissenting historical research. I'm wondering whether the Powers That Be would consider a change of personnel up there..
One instance some years ago on the Sand Creek Project was a report that the late Mr. William Lee Pedro of the Cheyenne Tribe had delivered a speech at the Kiowa County Court House before some 50 University of Wisconsin students who were traveling the Santa Fe Trail. I gathered from the report that Mr. Pedro was goaded by unkown Park or County persons to report that he thought the 9/11 Twin Tower attack victims deserved to die because the whiteys had stolen Manhattan from the indians. I tried to confirm the report with a posting on the then-KiowaCountyColodotcom website Sand Creek discussion board with Dr. Alexa Roberts. Alexa was Supt. of the Site construction back then. But Alexa never answered me one way or another.
Some time later the website was possible purged of all postings. Or maybe all were lost when the Webmistress changed servers. Fortunately, several of us had downloaded the postings and will be glad to rebuild it if asked. As it is, no one has much used the discussion board for 2 or 3 years.
I've heard that Dr. Roberts has since been promoted to managment of the Bent's Fort NPS site. But I see the name "Alexa" in place of where Chuck and Sheri Bowen used to run their "Sand Creek Tours" web site. Curious thing, hun?
I surmise that if a provocative speech about the 9/11 attacks were reported in the Pueblo County or El Paso County Court Houses, there might be a fist fight or two on hand. And Political Sleaze probably would be voted out of office at the next opportunity. But it seems that those Kiowa County politico's just couldn't stand to see Bowens enjoying their Sand Creek Battle Site hobby, plus it might bad for government tourist business travel. It's a tale of bureaucratic thuggery.
Curt Neeley
Hi Curt,
Another step towards Sand Creek reconciliation.
Dana
Journey Toward Understanding
We are JuDee Gilmer and Jeannie Hall, members of the Peace with Justice Committee of the First United Methodist Church of Sheridan, Wyo., and active members of United Methodist Women. Jeannie serves as president of the Yellowstone Conference United
Methodist Women. Barbie Flack and Dorothy Hackman are also members of United Methodist Women and the Committee. Other members include Jean Damson, Susan Appell and our pastor, Don Derryberry. As white people, we have become actively
engaged in a process of relationship-building between our church and the Northern Cheyenne Tribe.
200 Northern Cheyenne and Arapaho were massacred in Sand Creek Colorado in 1864. The massacre was led by Colonel John Chivington, a Methodist minister, district superintendent and leader of the Third Regiment of the First Colorado Volunteers. The horror and trauma of the massacre continues to live with the Cheyenne people. In 1996
the United Methodist Church passed a resolution to “Support Restitution to the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma for the Sand Creek Massacre” as well as the “Sand Creek Apology” [Book of Resolutions 1996, p. 389, p. 395]. The resolutions recall that the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes signed the Forth Laramie Treaty with the U.S. government in 1851, giving 51.2 million acres to the tribes, including all of Colorado. But gold was discovered at Pike’s Peak in 1859, and white miners began to pour in, establishing mining towns on Indian lands, including Denver, Pueblo and Colorado City. The Territory of Colorado made it a public policy to “rid itself” of
Indians, including attacks on Indian villages where women were raped and food and other possessions taken. A peace chief, Black Kettle, met with the governor and Colonel Chivington and was assured that hostilities would cease. The governor asked the Cheyenne and Arapaho to camp for the winter at Sand Creek and promised them safety. As a sign, they flew an American flag over the camp. Instead, on November 29, Chivington’s regiment staged a pre-dawn attack, killing over 200 mostly women and children. Bodies were mutilated, dismembered and displayed in a parade through downtown Denver. Both Chivington and Governor Evans hoped this event would further
their political careers. Chivington was not punished for the event, and has been honored as hero and pioneer by many. While Congress later acknowledged the massacre and awarded millions of dollars to descendents, they never received monetary awards. In
1996, the United Methodist Church called on the United States to disburse these monies and offered the “Cheyenne and Arapaho a hand of reconciliation and asked forgiveness for the death of over 200 persons…acknowledging that racism is a sin, but also seeing
one another as whole people who need one another, as we acknowledge that we also need God.” The 1996 General Conference in Denver held a healing service with tribal leaders and elders.
Today, First United Methodist Church of Sheridan has formed a relationship with Charles Little Old Man, a spiritual leader for the Cheyenne tribe, and has met with Steve Brady, Otto Braided Hair and other Sand Creek Massacre committee members, to learn about the
massacre and the history of the Cheyenne people. As we begin to build this relationship we are painfully aware of the cultural differences. We have so much to learn about the culture of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe, as do many in Sheridan. We have reached out and members of the Northern Cheyenne have accepted our invitation. We do not know where this journey will take us, but we are now on the journey together.
We began the process with our own education. The Northern Cheyenne have been willing to share their culture and spiritual traditions with us, and to teach us. We have felt honored to be invited to participate in Cheyenne spiritual practices, including a sweat
lodge, and a summer solstice celebration at a spiritual site high in the mountains. Charles Little Old Man gifted us a sweat lodge, which we have used a couple of times. We have been invited to come to Cheyenne camps at their Pow Wows throughout the summer.
The Medicine Wheel, a sacred site in the Big Horn Mountain Range is on public land and sacred to many tribes and cultures. We have been asked by members of the Cheyenne tribe to host a meeting between the National Park Service and the tribe regarding these sites. We approached the tribe and asked for a relationship, and we are now involved and helping—it’s happening.
For many years the tribes have been urging Congress to declare the Sand Creek Massacre site a National Historic Site. On April 28 and 29, 2007, the land was finally dedicated as a National Historic Site with both private and public ceremonies. When we asked Sand
Creek Committee how we could support this historic celebration, they asked if we could help with the cost of transportation, housing and food for tribal participants. We were able to raise $2,600 to help elders from Wyoming to travel by bus to the event. The Sand Creek Committee invited us to be a part of the dedication ceremony at the site of the massacre in Colorado. Later our church was gifted a limited edition Pendleton blanket commemorating the dedication. We feel our relationship is growing and deepening.
Another goal has been to organize a cultural sensitivity workshop for members of our church and other churches in the area, led by members of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe. We held two five-hour sessions in May and June 2007 with about 40 participants. Many
organizations in the community were represented. We explored history and organization of the tribe, diversity among tribal members, spiritual beliefs, cultural differences, white privilege and a common desire to “save” the Indians instead of supporting their self- determination. The presenters created a space for much discussion, to meet the needs of the participants. Participants left very excited, wanting more, and wanting to do more to engage with the reservation. This was the first in an on-going cultural diversity training
in our community.
We have also begun to build a partnership with Trinity United Methodist Church in Denver, Colo., where John Chivington’s funeral was held. That church had also made some efforts towards reconciliation in the past. In Spring 2007, our pastor, Don
Derryberry, Jean Damson and JuDee and members of the Northern Cheyenne Sand Creek Committee met with a representative of the Rocky Mountain Annual Conference and Trinity United Methodist Church. We hope that one outcome may be potential
partnerships between the tribe and our churches in the future.
As we reflect on this journey we realize that the real struggle, what is so hard, is learning how to stop being “white” long enough to hear and see others and to allow another culture to be present. Our ongoing challenge is to move aside our white culture enough to make room for more than one culture. We continue forward on this difficult but
deeply rewarding path.
Hi Curt,
Here's the text of the Treaty of the Little Arkansas. Please read Article 6. I'm sure you will find it of interest.
Dana
Articles of a treaty made and concluded at the camp on the Little Arkansas River, in the State of Kansas, on the fourteenth day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-five, by and between John B. Sanborn, William S. Harney, Thomas Murphy, Kit Carson, William W. Bent, Jesse H. Leavenworth, and James Steele, commissioners on the part of the United States, and the undersigned, chiefs and head-men of and representing the confederate tribes of Arrapahoe and Cheyenne Indians of the Upper Arkansas River, they being duly authorized by their respective tribes to act in the premises.
ARTICLE 1.
It is agreed by the parties to this treaty that hereafter perpetual peace shall be maintained between the people and Government of the United States and the Indians parties hereto, and that the Indians parties hereto, shall forever remain at peace with each other, and with all other Indians who sustain friendly relations with the Government of the United States. For the purpose of enforcing the provisions of this article it is agreed that in case hostile acts or depredations are committed by the people of the United States, or by Indians on friendly terms with the United States, against the tribe or tribes, or the individual members of the tribe or tribes, who are parties to this treaty, such hostile acts or depredations shall not be redressed by a resort to arms, but the party or parties aggrieved shall submit their complaints through their agent to the President of the United States, and thereupon an impartial arbitration shall be had, under his direction, and the award thus made shall be binding on all parties interested, and the Government of the United States will in good faith enforce the same. And the Indians, parties hereto, on their part, agree, in case crimes or other violations of law shall be committed by any person or persons, members of their tribe, such person or persons shall, upon complaint being made, in writing, to their agent, superintendent of Indian affairs, or to other proper authority, by the party injured, and verified by affidavit, be delivered to the person duly authorized to take such person or persons into custody, to the end that such person or persons may be punished according to the laws of the United States.
ARTICLE 2.
The United States hereby agree that the district of country embraced within the following limits, or such portion of the same as may hereafter be designated by the President of the United States for that purpose, viz: commencing at the mouth of the Red Creek or Red Fork of the Arkansas River; thence up said creek or fork to its source; thence westwardly to a point on the Cimarone River, opposite the mouth of Buffalo Creek; thence due north to the Arkansas River; thence down the same to the beginning, shall be, and is hereby, set apart for the absolute and undisturbed use and occupation of the tribes who are parties to this treaty, and of such other friendly tribes as they may from time to time agree to admit among them, and that no white person, except officers, agents, and employees of the Government, shall go upon or settle within the country embraced within said limits, unless formerly admitted and incorporated into some one of the tribes lawfully residing there, according to its laws and usages: Provided, however, That said Indians shall not be required to settle upon said reservation until such time as the United States shall have extinguished all claims of title thereto on the part of other Indians, so that the Indians parties hereto may live thereon at peace with all other tribes: Provided, however, That as soon as practicable, with the assent of said tribe, the President of the United States shall designate for said tribes a reservation, no part of which shall be within the State of Kansas, and cause them as soon as practicable to remove to and settle thereon, but no such reservation shall be designated upon any reserve belonging to any other Indian tribe or tribes without their consent.
The Indians parties hereto, on their part, expressly agree to remove to and accept as their permanent home the country embraced within said limits whenever directed so to do by the President of the United States, in accordance with the provisions of this treaty, and that they will not go from said country for hunting or other purposes without the consent in writing of their agent or other authorized person, such written consent in all cases specifying the purpose for which such leave is granted, and shall be borne with them upon their excursions as evidence that they are rightfully away from their reservation, and shall be respected by all officers, employees, and citizens of the United States as their sufficient safeguard and protection against injury or damage in person or property by any and all persons whomsoever.
It is further agreed by the Indians parties hereto that when absent from their reservation they will refrain from the commission of any depredations or injuries to the person or property of all persons sustaining friendly relations with the Government of the United States; that they will not, while so absent, encamp by day or night within ten miles of any of the main traveled routes or roads through the country to which they go, or of the military posts, towns, or villages therein, without the consent of the commanders of such military posts, or of the civil authorities of such towns or villages; and that henceforth they will, and do hereby, relinquish all claims or rights in and to any portion of the United States or Territories, except such as is embraced within the limits aforesaid, and more especially their claims and rights in and to the country bounded as follows, viz: beginning at the junction of the north and south forks of the Platte River; thence up the north fork to the top of the principal range of the Rocky Mountains, or to the Red Buttes; thence southwardly along the summit of the Rocky Mountains to the headwaters of the Arkansas River; thence down the Arkansas River to the Cimarone crossing of the same; thence to the place of beginning; which country they claim to have originally owned, and never to have relinquished the title thereto.
ARTICLE 3.
It is further agreed that until the Indians parties hereto have removed to the reservation provided for by the preceding article in pursuance of the stipulations thereof, said Indians shall be, and they are hereby, expressly permitted to reside upon and range at pleasure throughout the unsettled portions of that part of the country they claim as originally theirs, which lies between the Arkansas and Platte Rivers; and that they shall and will not go elsewhere, except upon the terms and conditions prescribed by the preceding article in relation to leaving the reservation thereby provided for: Provided, That the provisions of the preceding article in regard to encamping within ten miles of main travelled routes, military posts, towns, and villages shall be in full force as to occupancy of the country named and permitted by the terms of this article: Provided, further, That they, the said Indians, shall and will at all times during such occupancy, without delay, report to the commander of the nearest military post the presence in or approach to said country of any hostile bands of Indians whatsoever.
ARTICLE 4.
It is further agreed by the parties hereto that the United States may lay off and build through the reservation, provided for by Article 2 of this treaty, such roads or highways as may be deemed necessary; and may also establish such military posts within the same as may be found necessary in order to preserve peace among the Indians, and in order to enforce such laws, rules, and regulations as are now, or may from time to time be, prescribed by the President and Congress of the United States for the protection of the rights of persons and property among the Indians residing upon said reservation; and further, that in time of war such other military posts as may be considered essential to the general interests of the United States may be established: Provided, however, That upon the building of such roads, or establishment of such military posts, the amount of injury sustained by reason thereof by the Indians inhabiting said reservation shall be ascertained under direction of the President of the United States, and thereupon such compensation shall be made to said Indians as in the judgment of the Congress of the United States may be deemed just and proper.
ARTICLE 5.
At the special request of the Cheyenne and Arrapahoe Indians, parties to this treaty, the United States agree to grant, by patent in fee-simple, to the following-named persons, all of whom are related to the Cheyennes or Arrapahoes by blood, to each an amount of land equal to one section of six hundred and forty acres, viz: To Mrs. Margaret Wilmarth and her children, Virginia Fitzpatrick, and Andrew Jackson Fitzpatrick; to Mrs. Mary Keith and her children, William Keith, Mary J. Keith, and Francis Keith; to Mrs. Matilda Pepperdin and her child, Miss Margaret Pepperdin; to Robert Poisal and John Poisal; to Edmund Guerrier, Rosa Guerrier, and Julia Guerrier; to William W. Bent's daughter, Mary Bent Moore, and her three children, Adia Moore, William Bent Moore, and George Moore; to William W. Bent's children, George Bent, Charles Bent, and Julia Bent; to A-ma-che, the wife of John Prowers, and her children, Mary Prowers and Susan Prowers; to the children of Ote-se-ot-see, wife of John Y. Sickles, viz: Margaret, Minnie, and John; to the children of John S. Smith, interpreter, William Gilpin Smith, and daughter Armama; to Jenny Lind Crocker, daughter of Ne-sou-hoe, or Are-you-there, wife of Lieutenant Crocker; to – Winsor, daughter of Tow-e-nah, wife of A. T. Winsor, sutler, formerly at Fort Lyon. Said lands to be selected under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior, from the reservation established by the 1st article of their treaty of February 18, A.D. 1861: Provided, That said locations shall not be made upon any lands heretofore granted by the United States to any person, State, or corporation, for any purpose.
ARTICLE 6.
The United States being desirous to express its condemnation of, and, as far as may be, repudiate the gross and wanton outrages perpetrated against certain bands of Cheyenne and Arrapahoe Indians, on the twenty-ninth day of November, A.D. 1841, at Sand Creek, in Colorado Territory, while the said Indians were at peace with the United States, and under its flag, whose protection they had by lawful authority been promised and induced to seek, and the Government being desirous to make some suitable reparation for the injuries then done, will grant three hundred and twenty acres of land by patent to each of the following-named chiefs of said bands, viz: Moke-ta-ve-to, or Black Kettle; Oh-tah-ha-ne-so-weel, or Seven Bulls; Alik-ke-home-ma, or Little Robe; Moke-tah-vo-ve-hoe, or Black White Man; and will in like manner grant to each other person of said bands made a widow, or who lost a parent upon that occasion, one hundred and sixty acres of land, the names of such persons to be ascertained under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior: Provided, That said grants shall be conditioned that all devises, grants, alienations, leases, and contracts relative to said lands, made or entered into during the period of fifty years from the date of such patents, shall be unlawful and void. Said lands shall be selected under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior within the limits of country hereby set apart as a reservation for the Indians parties to this treaty, and shall be free from assessment and taxation so long as they remain inalienable. The United States will also pay in United States securities, animals, goods, provisions, or such other useful articles as may, in the discretion of the Secretary of the Interior, be deemed best adapted to the respective wants and conditions of the persons named in the schedule hereto annexed, they being present and members of the bands who suffered at Sand Creek, upon the occasion aforesaid, the sums set opposite their names, respectively, as a compensation for property belonging to them, and then and there destroyed or taken from them by the United States troops aforesaid.
ARTICLE 7.
The United States agree that they will expend annually during the period of forty years, from and after the ratification of this treaty, for the benefit of the Indians who are parties hereto, and of such others as may unite with them in pursuance of the terms hereof, in such manner and for such purposes as, in the judgment of the Secretary of the Interior, for the time being, will best subserve their wants and interests as a people, the following amounts, that is to say, until such time as said Indians shall be removed to their reservation, as provided for by Article 2 of this treaty, an amount which shall be equal to twenty dollars per capita for each person entitled to participate in the beneficial provisions of this treaty, and from and after the time when such removal shall have been accomplished, an amount which shall be equal to forty dollars per capita for each person entitled as aforesaid. Such proportion of the expenditure provided for by this article as may be considered expedient to distribute in the form of annuities shall be delivered to said Indians as follows, viz: one-third thereof during the spring, and two-thirds thereof during the autumn of each year.
For the purpose of determining from time to time the aggregate amount to be expended under the provisions of this article, it is agreed that the number entitled to its beneficial provisions the coming year is two thousand eight hundred, and that an accurate census of the Indians entitled shall be taken at the time of the annuity payment in the spring of each year by their agent of other person designated for that purpose by the Secretary of the Interior, which census shall be the basis on which the amount to be expended the next ensuing year shall be determined.
ARTICLE 8.
The Indians parties to this treaty expressly covenant and agree that they will use their utmost endeavor to induce that portion of the respective tribes not now present to unite with them and acceed to the provisions of this treaty, which union and accession shall be evidenced and made binding on all parties whenever such absentees shall have participated in the beneficial provisions of this treaty.
ARTICLE 9.
Upon the ratification of this treaty all former treaties are hereby abrogated. In testimony whereof, the said Commissioners as aforesaid, and the undersigned chiefs and headmen of the confederated tribes of the Arrapahoes and Cheyennes of the Upper Arkansas, have hereunto set their hands and seals, at the place and on the day and year first hereinbefore written.
John B. Sanborn,
Wm. S. Harney,
Thos. Murphy,
Kit Carson,
Wm. W. Bent,
J. H. Leavenworth,
James Steele,
Commissioners on the part of the United States.
Moke-ta-ve-to, or Black Kettle, head chief, his x mark.
Oh-to-ah-ne-so-to-wheo, or Seven Bulls, chief, his x mark.
Hark-kah-o-me, or Little Robe, chief, his x mark.
Moke-tah-vo-ve-ho, or Black White Man, chief, his x mark.
Mun-a-men-ek, or Eagle's Head, headman, his x mark.
O-to-ah-nis-to, or Bull that Hears, headman, his x mark.
On the part of the Cheyennes.
Oh-has-tee, or Little Raven, head chief, his x mark.
Oh-hah-mah-hah, or Storm, chief, his x mark.
Pah-uf-pah-top, or Big Mouth, chief, his x mark.
Ah-cra-kah-tau-nah, or Spotted Wolf, chief, his x mark.
Ah-nah-wat-tan, or Black Man, headman, his x mark.
Nah-a-nah-cha, or Chief in Everything, headman, his x mark.
Chi-e-nuk, or Haversack, headman, his x mark.
On the part of the Arrapahoes.
Signed and sealed in the presence of -
John S. Smith, United States interpreter.
W. R. Irwin, secretary.
O. T. Atwood, secretary.
S. A. Kingman, secretary.
D. C. McNeil,
E. W. Wynkoop,
Bon. H. Van Havre,
J. E. Badger,
W. W. Rich.
N.B. – - The Apache tribe was brought into the provisions of the above treaty by the second article of the treaty with the Apaches, Cheyennes and Arrapahoes, proclaimed May 26, 1866.
Whereas a treaty was made and concluded, by and between the undersigned commissioners on the part of the United States, and the undersigned chiefs and head-men of the Cheyenne and Arrapahoe tribes of Indians, on the part of said tribes, on the fourteenth day of October, A.D. 1865, at the council-grounds on the Little Arkansas River, in the State of Kansas; and, whereas, the Apache Indians, who have been heretofore confederated with the Kiowa and Comanche tribes of Indians, are desirous of dissolving said confederation and uniting their fortunes with the said Cheyennes and Arrapahoes; and whereas the said last-named tribes are willing to receive among themselves on an equal footing with the members of their own tribes, the said Apache Indians; and the United States, by their said commissioners, having given their assent thereto; it is therefore hereby agreed by and between the United States, by their said commissioners, and the said Cheyenne, Arrapahoe, and Apache Indians, by the undersigned chiefs and head-men of said tribes respectively, as follows, viz:
ARTICLE 1.
The said Cheyenne, Arrapahoe, and Apache tribes, henceforth shall be and they are hereby united, and the United States will hereafter recognize said tribes as the confederated bands or tribes of Cheyenne, Arrapahoe, and Apache Indians.
ARTICLE 2.
The several terms, stipulations and agreements to be done and performed on the part of the United States for and with the said Cheyenne and Arrapahoe tribes of Indians, and by the said Cheyenne and Arrapahoe tribes of Indians, for and with the United States, by the provisions of said treaty of October 14th, A.D. 1865, shall be done and performed by the United States for and on behalf of the said confederated tribes or bands of Cheyenne, Arrapahoe, and Apache Indians, and on their part shall be done, observed and performed to, with and for the United States in the same manner, to the same extent, and for like objects, to all intents and purposes, as would have been the case had said treaty been originally made and executed with the said confederated tribes of Cheyenne, Arrapahoe, and Apache Indians.
In testimony whereof, the undersigned, Commissioners on the part of the United States, and the chiefs and headmen of said tribes, have hereunto set their hands and seals at the council-ground on the Little Arkansas, in the State of Kansas, this 17th day of October, A.D. 1865.
John B. Sanborn,
Wm. S. Harney,
James Steele,
Wm. W. Bent,
Kit Carson,
Thos. Murphy,
J. H. Leavenworth,
Commissioners on the part of the United States.
No Dana, I don't much believe that the United Methodist Church carries much moral authority on the Chivington Question, nor on numerous other Social Justice Issues. I'm long familiar with the church and over the years very active in it. But over the past few decades it seems to me as though the UMC has succumbed to an almost Penitente wing in the church that is over-eager to embrace other peoples guilt while ignoring their own. Sand Creek and Chivington have become Doctrine and Dogma to the UMC, prompting them to donate $50,000 this year to further the Sand Creek "Massacre" side of the story rather than render a studious review of recent historical discoveries. Personally, I'm reluctant these days to hang around Bleeding Heart Crusaders. I find their musings to be diagnostically significant. Yours to.
The Treaty of the LIttle Arkansas turned out to be another Do Gooder Folly that the indians violated first and the Army had to clean up.
Curt Neeley.
Hi Curt,
The truth will set you free.
Dana
ORLANDO SENTINEL
Methodists Apologize For 1864 Massacre
Attackers Led By A Methodist Lay Preacher Killed 200 Native Americans In Colorado.
April 24, 1996|By Mark I. Pinsky of The Sentinel Staff
Historically, the Methodists in America are a church of camp meetings and circuit-riding preachers, a rich and often-celebrated heritage.
The United Methodist Church, the 8.6-million denomination that concludes its quadrennial general conference Friday, is also known for founding institutions of higher learning such as Duke, Emory and Southern Methodist universities.
But not all of the history made by Methodists is worthy of pride, say some conference delegates.
Among the petitions presented to the conference is one dealing with the treatment of Native Americans by a prominent member of the denomination.
The Rev. Alvin Deer, a delegate from the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference, petitioned the general conference for an apology for an 1864 massacre of Cheyennes and Arapaho in Colorado that was led by a Methodist lay preacher. Deer asked delegates to extend a "hand of reconciliation and ask forgiveness for the death of over 200 mostly women and children."
The general conference overwhelmingly approved the petition.
There is precedent across the Christian denominational spectrum for the Methodists' move.
In 1995, the Southern Baptist Convention voted to apologize to blacks for that denomination's support for slavery and complicity with racism. Pope John Paul II has asked Catholics to repent for their historic transgressions against Protestants, Jews and Muslims. In 1994, leaders of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America acknowledged continued use of "anti-Judaic diatribes" by Martin Luther, the denomination's founder.
The leader of the 1864 killings, known as "the Sand Creek massacre," was a Methodist lay preacher and denomination official named John Chivington, who was hailed as a hero when he returned to Denver.
The attack on the Indians came in a pre-dawn raid, despite the fact that they were flying the American flag for protection, a flag that had been presented to the Indians at a peace treaty signing.
Chivington, who once explained his reason for killing Indian children by saying "nits make lice," compared the fighting at Sand Creek with "an old-fashioned Methodist camp meeting."
At his funeral at Trinity Methodist Church, Chivington was honored by nearly a thousand mourners. He is buried not far from the center where the general conference is being held.
"The United Methodist Church delegation has recognized this was a tragedy in U.S. history that needed to be addressed," Deer said.
Hi Curt,
The United Methodist Church issued an official apology for Chivington's actions at Sand Creek and others in the Methodist Church in Colorado still believe that more healing is needed.
Have a wonderful Sunday!
Dana
COMMENTARY: Healing Relationships with Indigenous Persons by the Rev. Dr. Stephen Sidorak, Jr.*
New York — History has not been kind to the documented 320 million indigenous peoples in the world. These communities have experienced decades of colonization, racism, intolerance, development, theft of identity and lands, and downright cruelty, not to mention violation of human rights and cultural genocide.
Methodists have played an unfortunate role in this past. Our recognition and acknowledgement of this truth is long overdue.
The Act of Repentance at the 2012 General Conference in Tampa should enable us to confront the raw emotions of those who have suffered, and continue to suffer, from what experts call "historical trauma."
The General Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns' (GCCUIC) staff and board members have learned a lot as we have prepared to fulfill the General Conference mandate to bring healing to indigenous peoples through an Act of Repentance.
The Act of Repentance at the 2012 General Conference in Tampa should enable us to confront the raw emotions of those who have suffered, and continue to suffer, from what experts call "historical trauma." For example, this trauma results from surviving a massacre, or being one of the descendants of the survivors of a massacre, even if several generations removed in time from it. The terrible reality of "historical trauma" is that it lives on in the lives of the survivors, and the descendants of the survivors. We will never get a grip on our need for repentance until we grasp the breadth and depth of the historical injuries sustained by indigenous ancestors and the lasting wounds inflicted upon their descendants, wounds " left in the flesh of the colonized," as Albert Memmi described them in The Colonizer and the Colonized.
Moral clarity about the historical record will be the essential antecedent condition for any Act of Repentance by United Methodists. As I have listened, really listened, to the stories told by indigenous peoples, I was reminded anew of the old proverb "history repeats itself." Then I came upon the discerning words of Roy L. Brooks in the book he edited, When Sorry Isn't Enough. He indicated that an undercurrent of fear exists among survivors of human injustices, a fear that the very same atrocity might be revisited upon them. I was totally undone. How would it make you feel to live in a constant "undercurrent of fear" that what had happened once to your people could happen to them again?
Last September a meeting of the GCCUIC board of directors with tribal leaders from the Northern Cheyenne Nation at the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site in eastern Colorado provided a perspective on what is before us in 2012. The board and tribal members together began to develop a deeper appreciation of the imperative for an Act of Repentance because of the unique circumstances surrounding the vicious events of November 29 and 30, 1864, at Sand Creek.
Tragically, in U.S. history, there were many other massacres of the Native Americans. They provide concrete evidence of the official and brutal governmental policy of the systematic extermination and cultural genocide of the aboriginal inhabitants of what later would become the United States of America. What distinguishes the Sand Creek Massacre for United Methodists is the fact that a Methodist minister, Colonel John M. Chivington, led the charge, giving a whole new horrific meaning to that denominational term.
Although Chivington did not utter the words attributed to General Philip Henry Sheridan that "the only good Indian is a dead Indian," he would have subscribed to its cruel implications. His own words are enough to indict him: "Damn any man who sympathizes with Indians. I have come to kill Indians, and believe it is right and honorable to use any means under God's heaven to kill Indians." In his book, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Dee Brown notes: "In a public speech made in Denver not long before (the Sand Creek Massacre), Colonel Chivington advocated the killing and scalping of all Indians, even infants. ‘Nits make lice!' he declared. Chivington bragged about ‘collecting scalps' and ‘wading in gore.' Despite the fact that he was roundly condemned for the Sand Creek Massacre within his lifetime, Chivington had the unmitigated gall to declare in 1883,19 years after his infamous act, ‘I stand by Sand Creek'."
"In a few hours of madness at Sand Creek, Chivington and his soldiers destroyed the lives or the power of every Cheyenne and Arapaho chief who held out for peace with the white men." Brown observed. "Thus did the Cheyennes and Arapahos abandon all claims to the Territory of Colorado. And that of course was the real meaning of the Sand Creek Massacre."
I implored the GCCUIC board members to consider their visit to the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site as a spiritual pilgrimage to a sacred place. As we drove through the flat countryside, the vast plains revealed little about the significant events that took place those fateful November days so many years ago. Thankfully, our Cheyenne hosts painted a very vivid picture for us about peaceful people living in community along the banks of Sand Creek. They described the direction from which the cavalry came and gave their interpretation of what their ancestors experienced.
I doubt there was one, no not one, United Methodist present at the massacre site the day of our visit for whom that "rueful emptiness" did not become palpable.
Let us be mindful of the eerie words of Vine Deloria, Jr. from his book, God Is Red: "Many Indians perceived not only that the next life was a continuation of the present mode of existence but also that the souls of people often remained in various places where they had died or suffered traumatic events. People visiting the Sand Creek location where the Cheyennes were massacred under Colonel Chivington have told me that they can hear the cries of women and children who are still living near this dreaded place."
Without any affectation or pretence, I can humbly report a similar, disarming and unsettling experience myself. As I purposefully slipped apart from the group to be in solitary and disciplined, prayerful meditation at the Sand Creek site, I found myself startled and unnerved by the echoes of the cries I heard ringing in my ears of those at Sand Creek nearly a century and a half ago. I could hardly take it. It was, dare I say, a mystical moment of sheer revelation. I immediately returned to rejoin our group, truth be told, so as to silence the sounds of sheer horror. Yes, the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site has that power. One is powerless before it. I am proud that The United Methodist Church is providing $50,000 in seed money, with a matching grant from the National Park Service, for a Learning Center that will be associated with it.
This is, of course, only a single step in a very complex and emotional journey for our church. I am certain that the Act of Repentance must be more than words. We have to face our collective past and make a commitment to indigenous persons that we will do everything in our power to never let "it" — what the church has done to indigenous peoples and what the church has left undone in regards to indigenous peoples — happen again or be allowed to continue. Only then, may we reach a level of understanding to let the healing begin.
May it be so among United Methodists as we prepare for the 2012 General Conference Act of Repentance.
* Sidorak, an ordained elder in the Rocky Mountain Conference of the United Methodist Church, is general secretary of the General Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns with offices in New York.
All the above bosh reminds me that I ought to cruise down for a series of visits with the local Wesleyans. It should restore what little renewal my soul might need.
Curt Neeley
Hi Curt,
More historical artifacts requiring your "studious review". See excerpt below.
Grave Reservations
The Colorado Historical Society has collected Indian artifacts for 120 years. Now it has to give many of them back.
By Eric Dexheimer
Published on July 24, 1997
“Anxious discussions between tribes and the traditional repositories of Native American antiquities are certain to become more common. As a result of NAGPRA, archivists in museums and universities across the country are re-evaluating their Indian artifacts in anticipation of giving many of them back. Every Native American human remain in the Colorado Historical Society's vast collection, for instance, is to be returned to its descendants.
That includes everything from: …… Object E.1748.1–"A scalp taken from the head of an Indian warrior at the Battle of Sand Creek, Colorado, November 29, 1864" (donated by Mrs. Jacob Downing in 1911, who probably inherited it from her husband, Major Downing, a leader of the massacre)…”
You make another lame attempt to make your case with a 5 year old news article, Dana. I've seen no indication that NAGPRA "representatives" carry much clout. Those I've interviewed aren't lawyers and are otherwise undistinguished academically. I doubt their claims on relics would withstand any court challenge.
Regards, Curt Neeley
P. S. They Cheyenne mostly abandoned their dead on the field at Sand Creek. They made little attempt at retrieval, I'm told. General Sherman took a few specimen skulls for the military and other museum labs.
Ultimately a failed buffalo hunting party came across the remaining bones, according to one source. The loaded them onto their wagons for sale to fertilizer processors. Subsequent claims for body parts by tribal activitis after-the-fact seem unconvincing.
I'll go some more on the Methodists and Sand Creek, Dana. As for Treaties, U. S. President U.S. Grant ordered the end to all treaties with "Domestic Dependent Nations" when he took office. He probably did so with advice from his top aide from the Seige of Vicksberg Col. Ely S Parker, the lawyer, engineer, soldier and full-blood Seneca Chief, and Grand Sachem of the Iriquois Confederacy. Parker had also penned the surrender document as Grant dictated it at Appomatox. Grant then declared his "Peace": policy with the indians. Many tribes didn't believe him. But Grant well knew about Total War, as did Sherman and Sheridan and Custer.
The tribes lost the many indian wars.
As for Methodists, the Elders of the Rocky Mountain Conference apparently are unable to deal with new data regarding Sand Creek.
They appear fixated on an erroneous history. Such a stunted group-think is typical among large organizations suffering stultifiation and dysfunction. I referred to such limitations as "Caiaphas, Inc" during my research in the mid 1980's in Arkansas at Capitol View Methodist Church.
I admonish the Rocky Mountain Conference Elders "Be ye not conformed unto this (politically correct) world but be ye transformed by the renewing of your minds". Otherwise their $50,000 grant to the Sand Creek National Historial Monument might be considered a breach of the Constitutional barrier between church and state.
You admonished me that "The Truth Will Set You Free". You might try that out on yourself. I believe your only interest in all this exchange was to guild the tarnished reputation of your "judgemental and humorless" ancestor Samuel Forster Tappan. In this effort from your high perch as Chief Renewable Energy Advisor of the International Finance Corporation, I think you have failed. You have yet to disprove any of Greg Michno's references. Instead you merely indulged slander and degradation.
Regards, Curt Neeley
Unquestionably imagine that which you stated. Your favorite justification appeared to be at the internet the easiest factor to be aware of. I say to you, I definitely get irked while folks think about issues that they just don't recognise about. You managed to hit the nail upon the highest and also defined out the whole thing with no need side effect , other folks can take a signal. Will probably be back to get more. Thanks
To be a journalist and/or a writer, one must be objective. This means that both sides of a story need to be thoroughly researched. You failed miserably in doing that, and thus, your claim, loses credibility. For openers, Southern Cheyenne Chief Laird (Whistling Eagle) Cometsevah told me that his great-great grandfather told his father that there were over 400 Cheyenne people murdered at Sand Creek on November 29, 1864. This did not include any Arapahoe people since, according to Chief Cometsevah, the Arapahoe, that even though they followed the Cheyenne, they always camped 8 miles away from them.
americans were so un fair now and then the native americans got kicked off there land too many times and every time the whites said they would not be bother well that didnt last long for any of the times they always got booted some eles for either gold good hunting land becaues whites and indians wern't getting along for some many resons that only benifted the whites? talk about unfair right now a days every thing is about money we need a whole new govenment system to change the way things are now i get ou cant change the past but you always have the time and oppertunity to change the e would future and the way were going now nothngs going to change not now not ever. that riht there is a little pice of my mind. but i dont think anybody could express the way they would feel after they got done reading or hearing about this tragic date in americas history.
There are sworn statements by in\idnividuals present at Sand Creek
that women and children were shot down as they tried to surrender, or in some cases, after they had surrendered and were in captivity.
See the statements made by Lt. James Olney, 1st Colorado Cavelry.
The army policy was to attack Indian villages,;
women and children were often killed in
the confusion, but therte is much evidence that
at Sand Creek they were shot down deliberately,
in some cases, after they had already surrendered. Usually,
the Army took scores of prisoners in such attacks (Ash Hollow,Whitestone Hill, Washita, McClellan Creek). Chivington
bragged that he took no prisoners of any age or sex (not true,
the First Colorado troops, most of whom opposed the massacre,
took 2 women and 5 children prisoner and protected them), and
once said his policy in dealing with Indians was to "kill them all,
little and big, because nits make lice". Even if the Cheyennes were
hostile, there is no excuse for the murder of women and children captives, nor for the sexual mutilation of females.
Lieutenant James Olney of the First Colorado Cavalry said in a
sworn deposition that three women and five children who had
surrendered and been taken prisoner were shot down and killed
by Lieutenant Harry Richmond as they begged for mercy. Even
Major Anthony reproted that he saw a two year old child used for
target practice and killed by three of Chivington's men. So much
for the claim that the killing of women and children at Sand Creek
was accidental and the result of the confusion of battle, or that
women were shot only in self defense because they were shooting
at the soldiers. I think the most reliable estimate of the number
killed at Sand Creek was 163–53 men and 110 women and children.
Only 7 were taken prisoner, and those against orders.
In the second attack on (what was left of) Black Kettle's band,
a recent estimate puts the number killed at 58–40 men, 12 women,
and 6 children with 53 (all women and children) taken prisoner.
Custer's (and Sheridan's) orders were to kill only men but take
women and children prisoner to be used as "bargaining chips" in
l;ater negotiations with the natives. Custer had been following a
Kiowa war party and apparently mistook Black Kettle's village
for the home village of the Kiowas.
[...] in his article “Sand Creek Massacre: The Real Villains,” Published Online: June 12, 2006. (http://www.historynet.com/sand-creek-massacre-the-real-villains.htm). In this article, Michno again uses the Cutler quotes as real quotes from real Silas Soule [...]
I'll leave the topic for a time by quoting the most scathing denunciation of the historical character Col. John M. Chivington. I found it on page 405 of Ronald Becher's MASSACRE ALONG THE MEDICINE ROAD;
Perhaps, with diligent effort, modern psychology might construct an explanation for John Milton Chivington. Undeniably he was an individual possessing geat native talent and a coarse charisma, yet his quest for respectability ws continually subverted by his personal crudeness and pathology of character. In the chaotic milieu of the Civil War Frontier, the man of God who labored for the advancement of his church and faith became the sadistic militarist who longed "to be wading in gore". The man would well have become a dynamic builder of the Rocky Mountain Region became instead the awful antihero of Sand Creek, living out the balance of his life in a morally shabby and pointless existence"
The quote about "wading in gore" still seems arguable to me. And who's to say who's exisence is "pointless" in the big scheme of things?.
For myself, I like the Edwin Markham poem in the lobby of the 1st Methodist Church in Eads, Colorado. It's the town nearest the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site. I've attended several funerals in that church and each time paused to read Markham's words.
; "He drew a circle that shust me out-
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But love and I had the wit to win;
We drew a circle and took him in."
Perhaps the best of the two basic versions of the Sand Creek conflict will now play out at the Kiowa County Site. The indian version will prevail there, maintained by government funds and the National Park Service.
Some 39 miles almost due south at Big Timbers Museum in Lamar, the Bowen Battle Site Artifact is now on display as a memorial to the Bowen parents who built the 20 square mile "Golden Rule" ranch.
Hopefully a more scholarly pursuit will reveal greater truths about the conflict. I do believe I saw a copy of Greg Michno's BATTLE AT SAND CREEK, The Military Perspective" a few years ago. Now the museum is greatly expanded to include it's transportation collection. Some 600 people attend the grand opening on June 25, 2011.
Thanks to Ronald Becher for concluding his book by quoting both Chief Seattle and Holy Writ on page 450;
"Tribe follows tribe, and nation follows nation, like the waves of the sea. It is the order of nature, and regret is useless."
Regards, Curt Neeley