|
The Great Sioux War of 1876, also known as the Black Hills War, was a series of battles and negotiations which occurred between 1876 and 1877 involving the Lakota Sioux and Northern Cheyenne against the United States. As gold was discovered in the Black Hills, settlers began to encroach onto Native American lands, while pressure was mounted by the federal government for the natives to remain on the Sioux reservation. Traditionally, the United States military and historians place the Lakota at the center of the story, especially given their numbers, but some Native Americans believe the Cheyenne were the primary target of the U.S. campaign and that it should have been called "The Great Cheyenne War". Among the many battles and skirmishes of the war was the Battle of the Little Bighorn, often known as Custer's Last Stand, the most storied of the many encounters between the U.S. army and mounted Plains Indians. That Indian victory notwithstanding, the U.S. with its superior resources was soon able to force the Indians to surrender, primarily by attacking and destroying their encampments and property. The Great Sioux War took place under the presidencies of Ulysses S. Grant and Rutherford B. Hayes. The Agreement of 1877 (, enacted February 28, 1877) officially annexed Sioux land and permanently established Indian reservations. ==Background== The Cheyenne had migrated west to the Black Hills and Powder River Country before the Lakota and introduced them to horse culture about 1730. By the late 18th century, the growing Lakota tribe had begun expanding its territory west of the Missouri River. They pushed out the Kiowa and formed alliances with the Cheyenne and Arapaho to gain control of the rich buffalo hunting grounds of the northern Great Plains.〔 The Black Hills, located in present-day western South Dakota, became an important source to the Lakota for lodge poles, plant resources and small game. They are considered sacred to the Lakota culture. By the early 19th century, the Northern Cheyenne became the first to wage tribal-level warfare. Because European Americans used many different names for the Cheyenne, the military may not have realized their unity. The US Army destroyed seven Cheyenne camps before 1876 and three more that year, more than any other tribes suffered in this period. From 1860 on, the Cheyenne were a major force in warfare on the Plains. "No other group on the plains achieved such centralized tribal organization and authority."〔 The Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, signed with the US by Lakota and Northern Cheyenne leaders following Red Cloud's War, set aside a portion of the Lakota territory as the Great Sioux Reservation. This comprised the western one-half of South Dakota, including the Black Hills region for their exclusive use.〔George Hyde, ''Red Cloud's Folk: A History of the Oglala Sioux Indians'' (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1937)〕 It also provided for a large "unceded territory" in Wyoming and Montana, the Powder River Country, as Cheyenne and Lakota hunting grounds. On both the reservation and the unceded territory, white men were forbidden to trespass, except for officials of the U.S. government.〔〔("Treaty with the Sioux — Brulé, Oglala, Miniconjou, Yanktonai, Hunkpapa, Blackfeet, Cuthead, Two Kettle, Sans Arcs, and Santee — and Arapaho, 1868" (Treaty of Fort Laramie, 1868). ) , Apr. 29, 1868. Ratified Feb. 16, 1868; proclaimed Feb. 24, 1868. In Charles J. Kappler, compiler and editor, ''Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties — Vol. II: Treaties.'' Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1904, pp. 998-1007. Through Oklahoma State University Library, Electronic Publishing Center...〕 The growing number of miners and settlers encroaching in the Dakota Territory, however, rapidly nullified the protections. The US government could not keep settlers out. By 1872, territorial officials were considering harvesting the rich timber resources of the Black Hills, to be floated down the Cheyenne River to the Missouri, where new plains settlements needed lumber. The geographic uplift area suggested the potential for mineral resources. When a commission approached the Red Cloud Agency about the possibility of the Lakota's signing away the Black Hills, Colonel John E. Smith noted that this was "the only portion (their reservation ) worth anything to them". He concluded that "nothing short of their annihilation will get it from them".〔Smith to Gen. Ord, June 27, 1873, Department of the Platte, Letters Received, National Archives. Colonel (brevet Brigadier General) Smith was commander of the 14th Infantry, headquartered at Fort Laramie, who had extensive experience with the Lakota.〕 In 1874, the government dispatched the Custer Expedition to examine the Black Hills. The Lakota were alarmed at his expedition. Before Custer's column had returned to Fort Abraham Lincoln, news of their discovery of gold was telegraphed nationally.〔Donald Jackson, ''Custer's Gold: The United States Cavalry Expedition of 1874'' (New Haven, 1966). Ernest Grafe and Paul Horsted, ''Exploring with Custer: The 1874 Black Hills Expedition'' (Golden Valley Press, 2002).〕 The presence of valuable mineral resources was confirmed the following year by the Newton-Jenney Geological Expedition.〔H. Newton, W. P. Jenney, et al., ''Report on the Geology & Resources of the Black Hills of Dakota'' (Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1880).〕 Prospectors, motivated by the economic panic of 1873, began to trickle into the Black Hills in violation of the Fort Laramie Treaty. This trickle turned into a flood as thousands of miners invaded the Hills before the gold rush was over. Organized groups came from states as far away as New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia.〔 〕 Initially, the United States Army "struggled" to keep miners out of the region. In December 1874, for example, a group of miners led by John Gordon from Sioux City, Iowa, managed to evade Army patrols and reached the Black Hills, where they spent three months before the Army decided to eject them. Such evictions, however, increased political pressure on the Grant Administration to secure the Black Hills from the Lakota. In May 1875, Sioux delegations headed by Spotted Tail, Red Cloud, and Lone Horn traveled to Washington, D.C. in an eleventh-hour attempt to persuade President Ulysses S. Grant to honor existing treaties and stem the flow of miners into their territories. They met with Grant, Secretary of the Interior Columbus Delano, and Commissioner of Indian Affairs Edward Smith. The US leaders said that the Congress wanted to pay the tribes $25,000 for the land and have them relocate to Indian Territory (in present-day Oklahoma). The delegates refused to sign a new treaty with these stipulations. Spotted Tail said, "You speak of another country, but it is not my country; it does not concern me, and I want nothing to do with it. I was not born there ... If it is such a good country, you ought to send the white men now in our country there and let us alone."〔Griske, pp. 64–69〕 Although the chiefs were unsuccessful in finding a peaceful solution, they did not join Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull in the warfare that followed. That fall, a US commission was sent to each of the Indian agencies to hold councils with the Lakota. They hoped to gain the people's approval and thereby bring pressure on the Lakota leaders to sign a new treaty. The government's attempt to secure the Black Hills failed.〔James C. Olson, ''Red Cloud and the Sioux Problem'' (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1968).〕 While the Black Hills were at the center of the growing crisis, Lakota resentment was growing over expanding US interests in other portions of Lakota territory. For instance, the government proposed that the route of the Northern Pacific Railroad would cross through the last of the great buffalo hunting grounds.〔M. John Lubetkin, ''Jay Cooke's Gamble: The Northern Pacific Railroad, the Sioux, and the Panic of 1873'' (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2006).〕 In addition, the US Army had carried out several devastating attacks on Cheyenne camps before 1876.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Great Sioux War of 1876」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|