Sand Creek Massacre--29 Nov 1864
Sand Creek massacre
(Black Kettle died at Washita (custer) 27 nov 1868)
Part of the Colorado War, American Indian Wars, American Civil War
A depiction of one scene at Sand Creek by witness Howling Wolf
Date November 29, 1864
Location Colorado Territory
Present-day Kiowa County, Colorado
Belligerents
United States Cheyenne(since they were attacked, NOT belligerents!!)
Arapaho
Commanders and leaders
United States John M. Chivington Black Kettle
Strength
700[1] (nurderers) 70–200 (the victims)
Casualties and losses
24 killed, 52 wounded[2](murderers) 70–163 killed[2] (massacre victims)
Native American losses include civilian casualties (which most of them were)
The Sand Creek massacre (also known as the Chivington massacre, the Battle of Sand Creek or the massacre of Cheyenne Indians) was a massacre in the American Indian Wars that occurred on November 29, 1864, when a 675-man force of Colorado U.S. Volunteer Cavalry[3] attacked and destroyed a village of Cheyenne and Arapaho in southeastern Colorado Territory,[4] killing and mutilating an estimated 70–163 Native Americans, about two-thirds of whom were women and children. The location has been designated the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site and is administered by the National Park Service.
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In November 1858, however, the discovery of gold in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado,[7] then part of the Kansas Territory,[8] brought on the Pikes Peak Gold Rush. European-American immigrants flooded across Cheyenne and Arapaho lands. They competed for resources, and some settlers tried to stay.[7] Colorado territorial officials pressured federal authorities to redefine the extent of Indian lands in the territory,[6] and in the fall of 1860, A.B. Greenwood, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, arrived at Bent's New Fort, along the Arkansas River, to negotiate a new treaty.[7]
A delegation of Cheyenne, Kiowa, and Arapaho chiefs in Denver, Colorado on September 28, 1864. Black Kettle 2nd from left front row
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The beginning of the American Civil War, in 1861, led to the organization of military forces in Colorado Territory. In March 1862, the Colorado volunteers defeated a Confederate Army from Texas in the Battle of Glorieta Pass, New Mexico by destroying their supply wagons, forcing them to retreat. The Confederates returned to Texas, and the First Regiment of Colorado Volunteers returned to Colorado Territory. They were then mounted as a home guard under the command of Colonel John Chivington. Chivington and Colorado territorial governor John Evans adopted a hard line against Indians, whom white settlers accused of stealing livestock. Without any declaration of war, in April 1864, Colorado soldiers began attacking and destroying a number of Cheyenne camps, the largest of which included about 70 lodges, about 10% of the housing capacity of the entire Cheyenne nation.[14] On May 16, 1864, a detachment under Lieutenant George S. Eayre crossed into Kansas and encountered Cheyenne in their summer buffalo-hunting camp at Big Bushes, near the Smoky Hill River. Cheyenne chiefs Lean Bear and Star approached the soldiers to signal their peaceful intent, but they were shot down by Eayre's troops.[15] This incident touched off a war of retaliation by the Cheyenne in Kansas.[14]
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. ... Kill and scalp all, big and little; nits make lice.
— Col. John Milton Chivington[16][17]
. . . .
Unwilling to surrender themselves to military authority most of the tribal warriors refused the offer of protection, leaving only about 75 men, plus all the women and children in the village. The men who remained were mostly too old or too young to hunt. Black Kettle flew an American flag, with a white flag tied beneath it,[20] over his lodge, as the Fort Lyon commander had advised him. This was to show he was friendly and forestall any attack by the Colorado soldiers.[21] Meanwhile, Chivington and 425 men of the 3rd Colorado Cavalry rode to Fort Lyon arriving on November 28th 1864. Once at the Fort Chivington took command of 250 men of the 1st Colorado Cavalry and maybe as many as 12 men of the 1st Regiment New Mexico Volunteer Infantry then set out for Black Kettle's encampment. James Beckwourth, noted frontiersman, acted as guide for Chivington.[22] The following morning, Chivington gave the order to attack. Two officers, Captain Silas Soule and Lieutenant Joseph Cramer, commanding Company D and Company K of the First Colorado Cavalry, refused to obey and told their men to hold fire.[23]
However, the rest of Chivington's men immediately attacked the village. Ignoring the American flag and a white flag that was run up shortly after the attack began, they murdered as many of the Indians as they could.
I saw the bodies of those lying there cut all to pieces, worse mutilated than any I ever saw before; the women cut all to pieces ... With knives; scalped; their brains knocked out; children two or three months old; all ages lying there, from sucking infants up to warriors ... By whom were they mutilated? By the United States troops ...
— John S. Smith, Congressional Testimony of Mr. John S. Smith, 1865[24]
I saw one squaw lying on the bank, whose leg had been broken. A soldier came up to her with a drawn sabre. She raised her arm to protect herself; he struck, breaking her arm. She rolled over, and raised her other arm; he struck, breaking that, and then left her with out killing her. I saw one squaw cut open, with an unborn child lying by her side.
— Robert Bent, New York Tribune, 1879[20]
There was one little child, probably three years old, just big enough to walk through the sand. The Indians had gone ahead, and this little child was behind, following after them. The little fellow was perfectly naked, travelling in the sand. I saw one man get off his horse at a distance of about seventy-five yards and draw up his rifle and fire. He missed the child. Another man came up and said, 'let me try the son of a b-. I can hit him.' He got down off his horse, kneeled down, and fired at the little child, but he missed him. A third man came up, and made a similar remark, and fired, and the little fellow dropped.
— Major Anthony, New York Tribune, 1879[25]
Fingers and ears were cut off the bodies for the jewelry they carried. The body of White Antelope, lying solitarily in the creek bed, was a prime target. Besides scalping him the soldiers cut off his nose, ears, and testicles-the last for a tobacco pouch ...
— Stan Hoig[26]
Jis' to think of that dog Chivington and his dirty hounds, up thar at Sand Creek. His men shot down squaws, and blew the brains out of little innocent children. You call sich soldiers Christians, do ye? And Indians savages? What der yer s'pose our Heavenly Father, who made both them and us, thinks of these things? I tell you what, I don't like a hostile red skin any more than you do. And when they are hostile, I've fought 'em, hard as any man. But I never yet drew a bead on a squaw or papoose, and I despise the man who would.
— Kit Carson to Col. James Rusling[27]
The natives, lacking artillery, could not make much resistance. Some of the natives cut horses from the camp's herd and fled up Sand Creek or to a nearby Cheyenne camp on the headwaters of the Smoky Hill River. Others, including trader George Bent, fled upstream and dug holes in the sand beneath the banks of the stream. They were pursued by the troops and fired on, but many survived.[28] Cheyenne warrior Morning Star said that most of the Indian dead were killed by cannon fire, especially those firing from the south bank of the river at the people retreating up the creek.[29]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sand_Creek_massacre
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