History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 72

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198

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A treaty was negotiated with the Lower Brule band of Sioux Indians in 1865. which provided that in consideration of the Brules becoming and remaining friendly and withdrawing their opposition to the overland routes already estab- lished or to he established through their country ( west of the Missouri), the Government of the United States would pay them $6,000 annually for twenty years, and also set apart for the tribe a reservation near the month of White River to include Fort Lookout, twenty miles in a straight line along the Missouri River and ten miles in depth, and when fifty lodges or families should occupy said reservation the United States would furnish to each the sum of $25 a year for five years to be expended for live stock and agricultural implements.

As has been stated the peace commission on their first visit to the hostile In- dians in 1865 found the Indians anxiously prepared to make peace ; but the hostile spirit had been actively manifested during the summer and but a few weeks before the Great Father's commission came with the olive branch, numerous small war parties continued their depredations and kept the frontiers in continual excite- ment. Troops were kept busy. The steamboat traffic had grown immensely owing to the gold discoveries in Montana and Idaho. The steamers Sam Gaty, Benton.

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Welcome, Silver Heels, Roanoke, J. II. Lacy, David Watts, Fannie Ogden, A. Majors, Magill, Mars, Prairie State and Spray were all in the upper river before the end of May, 1865, and all were more or less armored as a protection against the bullets and arrows of the savages who held the steamboat in deadly aversion. The Steamboat Benton reached Yankton on her return trip from Fort Benton in August, 1865. She had been in the upper river between three and four months, having been impressed into Government service to transport supplies and troops from point to point, and had been frequently attacked by skulking war parties. Her captain estimated that the craft had been the target for at least one thou- sand shots but no man had been hit. There were thirty-three bullet holes in the upper portion of the boat where the armor had failed to protect it, and the chim- neys were decorated with scores of indentations where the bullets had struck them.

There was a radical change in the military program carly in the summer. The original design was to send a small expedition of about one thousand men under General Sully up into the Black Hills and Yellowstone country, for the purpose of constructing a fort near the forks of the Cheyenne and another on Powder River. The military forces consisted of one battalion of the Seventh Iowa, Colonel Pottee ; four companies of Brackett's Minnesota Battalion, and five com- panies of the Sixth Iowa Cavalry under Lieutenant Colonel Ten Broeck ; all under command of Brigadier General Sully. The expedition got away from Yankton on Tuesday the 13th of June, intending to proceed up the river to the mouth of the Big Cheyenne and accompany Brookings wagon road expedition up that stream to the forks. A number of changes had taken place during the summer in various military departments, many of them no longer rendered necessary owing to the termination of the Civil war; and the Department of Dakota, which had not been before disturbed, was made a part of the Department of the North- west, headquarters at St. Louis, with the famous Gen. W. T. Sherman in com- mand ; and about the same time General Pope was superseded by General Cur- tis. Two days after General Sully left Yankton Major Weed, of General Cur- tis' staff, reached that point bearing dispatches from headquarters. and pushed on the same night to overtake Sully. The effect of these dispatches was to cause a change in the destination of General Sully, who was ordered to proceed to the Devil's Lake country and select a site for a fort. This explains why Mr. Brook- ings failed to get his military escort for his wagon road expedition to the forks of the Cheyenne. General Sully therefore did not cross the Missouri, but con- tinued up the east side of the Missouri to a point above Fort Rice, and then marched his command across to Devil's Lake, and selected the site for the new army post, Fort Totter, and constructed some log barracks, enclosing them with a stockade. He left a sufficient force to protect the public property and defend the post and returned to Fort Sully in the fall with the lowa troops. As the three years of service of the lowa Volunteers expired that fall, they were sent to Sioux City and mustered out. No difficulty was met with from the hostile Indians on the trip. The comparatively few unrepentant and warlike ones that had infested the Devil's Lake region retired into British America. These were Inkpa- duta's band of Santees, and another band of the same tribe under Standing Buf- falo, and two or three hundred Yanktonais who had fought against Sibley and Sully in 1863. (See Pope's order in 1866.)

While General Sully was engaged in his work of establishing Fort Totter he was apprised that a large body of Indians who had been engaged in hostilities against the Government forces the year before would meet him at Fort Rice and sign a treaty of peace. The general's orders would not permit of his engag- ing in making treaties, the Government having appointed commissioners for this purpose, who were then about to start on their mission. This was the Edmunds peace commission. The Indians who had signified their desire to make a treaty were largely the Yanktonais who had belonged to Big Ilead's forces and San- tees who had remained in the hostile camp.

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FORT DAKOTA AND FORT JAMES

The military authorities of the District of Dakota were busily employed dur- ing the season of 1865. Measures to protect the settlements of Dakota against any future hostilities were adopted, the prominent feature being the erection of mili- tary posts at Sioux Falls and near the mouth of Firesteel Creek, on James River. These posts were built during the summer and garrisoned by 100 men each. The troops were employed in patrolling the country between the forts, the same system being employed between Firesteel and the fort at Crow Creek, thus mak- ing a patrol guard along the frontier from Sioux Falls across to the Missouri at Crow Creek. No hostile body of Indians could slip through the lines undetected and they seldom made this attempt. The site of the fort at Sioux Falls was located by Lieutenant Colonel Pottee of the Seventh lowa. The fort was built of stone, and was of sufficient capacity to accommodate 100 men, a year's supply of provi- sions and stabling for 100 horses. It was first named Fort Brookings, but later, by order of the War Department, it was officially called Fort Dakota. That sec- tion of Dakota had been abandoned in August, 1862, and no attempt at settle- ment had been made there in the meantime owing to the Indian troubles. In the summer of 1865 there was not a sign of white man's habitation between James River and Sioux Falls along the section of country usually traversed in going from Yankton to that place, and no settlement was attempted in Minnehaha County until late in 1867. A. F. Hayward, of Yankton, who was a member of the New York colony, was the first sutler, assisted by Christopher Brookings, a nephew of Judge Brookings, who had come out from Maine during the spring.

The site for the fort on the James River was also selected by Pottee. It was on the west bank of the stream about sixty-three miles from Yankton and fifty-seven miles from Sioux Falls. Its dimensions were 152 by 200 feet, intended to accommodate eighty men and animals. The materials used in the construction was stone and hewn timber. It was named Fort James and was garrisoned by one company of the Sixth lowa. Maj. W. P. Lyman, of Yankton, was ap- pointed sutler.

Notwithstanding the success of the peace commission in effecting treaties with the hostile tribes, the realignment of the Indians on the Dakota reservations caused a great deal of commotion and gave the appearance of serious disturbance at some points where a large population of Indians were gathered. At and in the vicinity of Fort Thompson there were several thousand natives of the un- tamed and untutored class. Dr. H. F. Livingston, who was the surgeon at Fort Thompson, visited the settlements about this time, and commenting upon the Indian situation, explained that while the Indians were not manifesting any un- usual unfriendliness toward the whites in the country there was a continual state of war between the Sioux and the Indians of other tribes. One serions cause of trouble that was apprehended would grow out of the removal of Southern Indians to that country which already had more than it could well subsist. The increase of Indian population was a heavy tax on the natural resources of the country in the line of fish and game, and there was a good deal of complaint about the lack of subsistence. Even the aid extended by the Government was not sufficient to keep the wolf from the door, and the authorities at Fort Thomp- son. which was under the supervision of Major Hanson, were making every legitimate effort to feed and clothe the savages, in order that they might have no pretext for committing depredations. The Indians in time of plenty are prone to be improvident, and not at all like the proverbial ant who in summer lays by a store for winter. And where an Indian does exercise summer frugality for winter's use, his poor indigent relations will consume it all before the winter is half over. An Indian's hospitality toward his kindred is limited only by his last crust.

Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman was placed in command of the military Department of the Mississippi in the fall of 1865 with headquarters at St. Louis.

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Dakota was in this department. In January, 1866, Governor Edwards applied to Sherman for military protection for the settlements, there being a general appre- hension that the new Indian policy of the Government had resulted in exposing the settled portions of the territory to imminent danger from Indian depredations. Sherman, in replying to the request of the governor, said :

I assure you that the care of the interests of the emigrants and the people who choose 10 cast their fortunes amid the Rocky Mountains, shall ever have all the protection which the military can give, but no people know better than you of Dakota, that the volunteer army is now substantially out, and that our regular army is too small to do more than guard key points in that vast region known as the plains.

This was equivalent to saying that there were not troops enough in the regular army to do more than garrison the widely scattered forts, leaving the settlements to their own defense. The Dakota settlements were not, however, entirely without military protection. There was a small force at each of the border posts, to-wit: Fort Randall, Fort James and Fort Dakota, but these troops were not employed in patrol duty, and bands of Indians could reach the settlements with- out detection. Later in the season the settlers on Brule Creek, represented by W. W. Frisbie, Joseph Collins, Caleb Cummings, Alva Hubbard, Albert Gore, R. L. Shattuck, Harvey F. Fairchild and Henry E. Hyde, sent a petition to the governor asking that a detachment of troops be stationed in that neighborhood as a measure of precaution against lawless Indians. Their fears had been stimu- lated by a band of Santees, hunting and fishing in that vicinity, and they recalled the tragedy of the killing of LaMoure and the wounding of Watson, in that vicin- ity the summer before. Secretary Spink, who was acting governor at the time, took the matter up and secured a detachment of troops from Fort Dakota, and had them stationed on the Brule during the farming season. This led to a more rigid enforcement of the regulations prohibiting Indians from leaving their reser- vations, and special messengers were dispatched to gather in the Indians who had left the reservations for the hunting grounds and fishing pools.

An order from headquarters of the Northwest military division, issued in February, 1866, designated the fort at Sioux Falls as Fort Dakota instead of Fort Brookings ; and the fort near the mouth of the Firesteel Creek as Fort James instead of Fort LaRoche. An order issued in March assigned the second and third battalions of the Thirteenth Infantry to General Sully's department of the Upper Missouri, and he was instructed to station the different companies at Forts Union, Berthold, Rice, Sully and Randall; also one company at Fort Dakota and one at Fort James. Three companies were set apart to construct a military post on the north side of the Black Hills on the Belle Fourche or the north fork of the Big Cheyenne. This was the first step toward the establishment of Fort Meade.

There was an annual election held in the Territory of Dakota in 1865 when a full legislative membership was chosen, but for some cause there was much less discussion of the subject than is usually the case. The Johnson-Congress diffi- culty had not assumed such proportions in the territory as to cause much com- ment in political circles ; but the peace policy which it was proposed to inaugurate for the control and management of the Indians, and dispense with the military, was quite generally discussed and partisans for both the civil and military con- trol were not only numerous but were quite equally divided without regard to their party predilections.

The close of the Civil war had aroused an expectation of numerous immi- gration of the ex-soldiers who had been given valuable inducements to settle on the public lands being allowed all of the time of their service in the army to apply on that required by homestead settlers before they would be entitled to prove up ; and the subject of immigration was considered of the first importance to the welfare of the territory in its then sparsely settled condition, and it was believed that one of the greatest aids in securing a greater population was the

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proposed peace policy in governing the Indians. On the other hand the Gov- ernment had been expending hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in the territory to support the army and maintain the forts. A surprising proportion of the active business men of the towns were interested in profitable contracts ; merchants shipped largely of supplies to the population of the posts and Indian agencies ; and the wagon transportation which employed the owners of teams, and which was in evidence every month in the year but more noticeable when the Missouri River was closed with ice, was a wide-spread industry that distributed money to all the settlements and nearly every farmer's home. Therefore there was a strong sentiment which favored preserving "the goose that laid the golden eggs."

It appeared to be a prevalent though erroneous opinion that military control meant a continuation of Indian hostilities, which would operate to discourage the settlement of families on the open prairies, and thus retard the growth of the territory : while the peace-by-treaty sentiment would quiet all such apprehen- sions; families would venture out and occupy the fertile valleys, thousands in number : railroads would seck the territory to get the traffic which the thousands of cultivated farms would produce, and thus a permanent and growing prosper- ity would be established, roads would be opened, churches and schools organized. and Dakota would flourish.

It was recognized that the influx of luere from the army establishment must of necessity be only temporary-a few years at most-and in the meantime the substantial interests of the people would be neglected and immigration would seek other fields. And inasmuch as the Legislature to be chosen was expected to be a powerful factor in deciding the issue through the influence of memorials to Congress and the President, expressing the sentiments of the people, a candidate's view of the questions involved became a matter of public concern ; and for the reason that at this time and for many years thereafter, Dakota Territory was the theater of the republic where the Indian race was the most numerous and the most warlike- the most barbarous-and where the solution of the problem of civilizing the savage was to have its initiative and its final failure or triumph.

There were at this time but six completely organized counties in the terri- tory, each one having one or more unorganized and uninhabited counties attached for "judicial and election purposes." and for its influence upon newcomers, who were expected to scrutinize the map closely and select a home within the pro- tecting aegis of well defined boundary lines. In most of the counties mass con- ventions were held and legislative tickets nominated harmoniously by selecting one republican and one democrat alternately until the nominations were made. In others, notably Yankton, a convention was called and assembled, but there was such radical disagreement over the Indian control question (Yankton hav- ing a large interest in military contracts), that the convention adjourned without making a nomination, and independent tickets were made up two or three days before the election, which occurred October 9th. The membership of the Leg- islature chosen proved to have suffered little in point of ability and probity, in comparison with former law-making bodies. It was made up of good citizens, who were inclined to be moderate in their partiality, preferring more than anything else to retain the patronage of the troops and secure immigration also by the promise of the ready market afforded and the high prices paid by the military people and the inhabitants of the Indian agencies, for the luxuries and necessi- ties produced by the Dakota farmers.

The political sentiment of the members, measured by the test of Johnson vs. Congress, was discovered to be favorable to the President, who controlled the appointments ; and was nearly equally divided between old-time republicans and "Old Hickory" democrats.

A detachment of troops from the Fiftieth Wisconsin Infantry whose term of service had not expired, having been enlisted and mustered in 1864. for three years, reached Yankton on the 8th of September, 1865. They were on their way

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to Fort Rice, a distance of 700 miles, and had to make the journey by land, as the steamboats that would be sent up were almost certain to be delayed and pos- sibly unable to get through owing to the lateness of the season and low water in the Missouri. About seventy-five of the troops had been so favorably impressed with the country after passing the Big Sioux that they concluded to become citi- zens and residents of Dakota, and while at Vermillion, where the United States land office was located, filed on seventy-five homesteads in Union County, upon which they intended to locate upon the expiration of their terms as soldiers. They were nearly all farmers' boys. At the land office the officials and clerks worked the entire night filling out the necessary papers, in order to accommodate the soldiers' colony. Under the law they could take their homesteads and were not required to reside upon them until six months after their term of service ex- pired. The years spent in the military service were counted as part of their residence. The boys were lost sight of in later years and how many of them fulfilled their declaration to return and complete their residence is not known to the writer.

A distressingly tragic affair was reported to have occurred during the march of these troops across the Yankton Indian Reservation two or three days later, being the fatal shooting of one of the soldiers by a civilian who was traveling with the troops. As unofficially reported the story was that a private soldier, while in camp, discovered upon a distant bluff a man whom he took to be an Indian and so remarked to the captain, adding: "I'm going to take a shot at him." Suiting his action to the word, he raised his gun and fired-the man fell. Going up to the place with the captain it was discovered that the ball had struck with fatal effect, and there before them was stretched out the dead body of the captain's brother, who had strayed away from the command and mounted the bluff to view the country.

A grand jury of the Third Judicial District afterwards sifted the affair very thoroughly at its session in October following. Iloratio H. Larned, the young man who did the shooting, had been arrested and placed under guard at Fort Rice after the company reached that post. The name of the man killed was Theodore Putnam. The prisoner was not a soldier, but a civilian whose father resided at Fort Rice, and he was going up to join him. The grand jury investi- gation brought out the following facts :

While in camp on the Yankton Reservation, near twilight in the evening, some of the soldiers discovered the form of a man on a bluff three-quarters of a mile from camp, and supposing it to be that of an Indian ( as strict orders had been given that no soldier should leave camp) prowling around for the purpose of stealing stock, proposed to fire upon him and scare him away. Larned, who was sitting by the fire reading, jumped up, seized his gun, aimed and fired, and the man fell, though it was not thought in camp that he was hit. No further attention was paid to it that night. The following morning Putnam was missed and a search was made, revealing his lifeless body near the spot where the sup- posed Indian stood the night before. Under this statement the grand jury refused to find a bill and Larned was discharged.

An all-day battle took place in August, 1865, between Company G, Sixth Iowa Cavalry, Captain Moreland, at Fort Rice, and a large number of mounted hostile Indians, possibly five hundred. It was something of a novelty in the way of a battle, as it occurred on the plain, back of and adjoining the fort, and within full view of civilians inside the fortifications. The Indians had nearly sur- rounded the post except on the river side, and advanced to attack, forming a semi-circle. The troops were ordered out and the first battle raged for about three hours on the level plain, the Indians occasionally retreating behind a ridge of hills a mile away, from whence they would emerge and charge in force and with persistent courage upon the troops, who always met them with a galling and deadly fire and were supported by two field pieces that seemed to possess more terror for the Indians than all the soldiers. The Indian weapons most

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dreaded by the soldiers were their bows and arrows. An arrow wound is much more severe than a gunshot wound, and although it may be but a slight one it is apt to leave a legacy of pain and sickness and possibly prove fatal. In this battle the arrow inflicted all the injury, although many of the redskins were armed with guns. One soldier was mortally wounded by an arrow that was buried in his side; the surgeon extracted the arrow but could not save the poor fellow's life; another was killed outright by an arrow penetrating his breast, which reached his lungs, and a gunshot very close to it; another was severely cut in the head, and still another caught a barbed arrow in the fleshy portion of his thigh which hung there until the injured man could be carried into the fort and the missile ent out. Scores of Indians were seen to fall. Their com- panions would throw the dead and wounded upon the backs of their ponies and run them back behind the ridges. The Indians were superbly mounted and seemed to be a part of the animals they bestrode. Scores of them were flying across the plains at the same time in some instances, shouting, firing as they flew, and sending out volleys of arrows. The troops, however, had orders to remain near the fortifications, as they were certain to be surrounded and cut to pieces if small bodies got off beyond the reach of the company. The Indians were described as magnificent riders and were frequently seen going at full speed standing upright on the back of the animal and sending their arrows out promiscuously among the troops. They seemed to have an inexhaustible supply of ammunition. The first battle lasted three hours, beginning before breakfast in the morning. It was the principal affair of the day, but the Indians continued to harass the fort the entire day, and troops were kept in the field until sundown, the Indians making occasional sallies in small bands.

The combatants on both sides were afterwards highly extolled, the Indians for their superb horsemanship, and the troops for their courage and skill, and the successful direction of the affair. The Indians finally withdrew after hang- ing about the fort for a week-taking with them a few good cavalry horses that had strayed away from the herd. This brief account of the battle was had from an ex-army officer who was an eye witness and sutler at the fort. He had spent years on the frontier and he pronounced it the nearest approach to a battle between soldiers and Indians he had any knowledge of.

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History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 72

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920 Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1198

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198