Louis S. Warren (110 page)

33. Bonds and Contract, April 14, 1887, no. 9855, Box 388, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, Bureau of Indian Affairs, NARA.

34. G. H. Bates to LCQ Lamar, Jan. 11, 1887, no. 1124, Box 367; also, WFC to Upshaw, Jan. 12, 1887, no. 1157, Box 368; W. R. Maul to Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Jan. 28, 1887, no. 3054, Box 372; G. H. Bates to Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Feb. 7, 1887, no. 3637, Box 374, all in Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

35. Box 574, no. 34459, Rosebud Agency—J. Geo. Wright to CIA, Nov. 23, 1887, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

36. Box 575, no. 34973, from Company River Agency, Henry George to CIA, Nov. 25, 1889, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

37. Box 578, no. 35938, from Devil's Lake Agency, John W. Cransic to CIA, Dec. 10, 1889, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

38. Box 579, no. 36269, John Blair to CIA, 1889, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

39. Rev. John F. Copley of the Omaha Mission, quoted in Robert Ashley to CIA, Jan. 9, 1890, no. 1239, Box 586, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

40. There were rumors, too, of several Indian deaths from smallpox or influenza in Spain. See Moses,
Wild West Shows and the Images of American Indians,
86–87, 94.

41. “Three Hungry Indians,” unattributed clipping, n.d., in G. C. Crager Scrapbook, 1891–92, BBHC.

42. James O'Beirne to H. D. Gallagher, July 4, 1890, Pine Ridge, Misc. Css. Received, Folder Feb. 18, 1889–Dec. 29, 1890, RG 75, NARA-CPR.

43. G. C. Crager Scrapbook, 1891–92, BBHC, includes a smattering of the news coverage.

44. A. C. Belt to Secretary of Interior, Nov. 18, 1890, RG 75, Correspondence Land Division, Letters Sent, vol. 104, Letterbook 207, pp. 191–201, NARA.

45. “Three Hungry Indians,” unattributed clipping, n.d., G. C. Crager Scrapbook, 1891–92, BBHC.

46. For Rocky Bear, see WFC to George LeRoy Brown, April 22, 1892, RG 75, Pine Ridge, Misc. Css. Received, 1891–95, A–C, Folder Jan. 4–May 10, 1892, NARA-CPR; Standing Bear,
My People the Sioux,
253.

47. For twenty-five-cent fee, see Red Cloud to Nate Salsbury, July 18, 1889, NSP, YCAL 17, Box 1, Folder 6, July 18, 1889; interference, see Cody to LCQ Lamar, March 20, 1887, no. 7592, Box 383, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

48. “Memorial of Sioux Indians,” Senate Doc. No. 90, 55th Congress, 1st Session, May 17, 1897.

49. Petition from the Tribal Council, May 10, 1901, “Petitions, ca. 1875–1907,” Box 780, RG 75, Pine Ridge, NARA-CPR. Thanks to Thomas Andrews for the citation.

50. Chauncey Yellow Robe, “The Menace of the Wild West Show,” address to the Fourth Annual Conference of the Society of American Indians, Oct. 6–11, 1914, in
Quarterly
Journal of the Society of American Indians,
no. 2 (1914): 223–24.

51. WFC to George LeRoy Brown, April 22, 1892, RG 75, Pine Ridge, Misc. Css. Received, 1891–95, A–C, Folder Jan. 4, 1892–May 10, 1892, NARA-CPR.

52. Sam Madra,
Glasgow's Ghost Shirt
(Glasgow: Glasgow Museums, 1991); George Crager to H. Q. C. Lamar, June 21, 1890, no. 19021, Box 634, Letters Received, 1881–1907, Records of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, RG 75, NARA; Nate Salsbury to Commissioner of Indian Affairs, enclosing affidavit of G. C. Crager, March 1, 1892, no. 9249, Box 834, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

53. Rex Alan Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees: The Tragedy at Wounded Knee and the End of the
Indian Wars
(New York: Crowell, 1975), 48.

54. Emily Greenwald,
Reconfiguring the Reservation: The Nez Perces, Jicarilla Apaches, and the
Dawes Act
(Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2002); also Wilcomb E. Washburn,
The Assault on Indian Tribalism: The General Allotment Law
(
Dawes Act
)
of 1887
(Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1975).

55. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
61–62; Starita,
Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge,
91; Utley,
Last Days
of the Sioux Nation,
40–59.

56. These were the conclusions of the Merriam Report of 1928. See Philip Weeks, ed.,
The
American Indian Experience: A Profile,
1524
to the Present
(Arlington Heights, IL: Forum Press, 1988), 240.

57. Note in Letters Received, 1881–1907, Box 551, no. 24780, Sept. 2, 1889, RG 75, NARA.

58. Starita,
Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge,
91–92; Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
40–59; Jeffrey Ostler, The Plains Sioux and U.S. Colonialism from Lewis and Clark to Wounded Knee (New York: Cambridge, 2004), 235–39; Raymond J. DeMallie, “Teton,” in Handbook of North American Indians, ed. William C. Sturtevant. 17 vols. (Washington DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1990–2001), vol. 13, pt. 2: 815.

59. Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
57.

60. Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
69.

61. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
75, 103–6; Starita,
Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge,
100. Other sources for my discussion of the Ghost Dance include James Mooney,
The Ghost-Dance
Religion and the Sioux Outbreak of
1890
(1896; abridged ed., Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965); Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation.

62. James Mooney: “The Sioux nation numbers over 25,000, with between 6,000 and 7,000 warriors. Hardly more than 700 warriors were concerned altogether, including those of Big Foot's band and those who fled to the Bad Lands. None of the Christian Indians took any part in the disturbance.” Mooney,
Ghost-Dance Religion,
98.

63. Starita,
Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge,
102. See also Commissioner Morgan, quoted in Mooney,
Ghost-Dance Religion,
98.

64. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
118–45.

65. Starita,
Dull Knifes of Pine Ridge,
103; Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
110–11.

66. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
119.

67. Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
126. See also Jeffrey Ostler, “Conquest and the State: Why the United States Employed Massive Military Force to Suppress the Lakota Ghost Dance,”
Pacific Historical Review
1996, 65 (2): 217–48.

68. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
146; Russell,
Lives and Legends,
359. On the back of his calling card, which he gave to Cody, General Miles also wrote “Com'd'g officers will please give Col. Cody transportation for himself and party and any protection he may need for a small party.” Russell,
Lives and Legends,
359. Typescript of orders is in WFC Collection, MS 6, Series I:B Correspondence, Box 2/23, BBHC.

69. Russell,
Lives and Legends,
307–8, 423–24; “Dr. Frank D. Powell as Manager,”
Wyoming
Stockgrower and Farmer,
March 22, 1904, in Robert Haslam Scrapbook, CHS.

70. Corbett,
Orphans Preferred,
198–99; and see the testimony of Haslam in CC, File 7-1, p. 133; WFC to Robert Haslam, Jan. 20, 1883; “Soldiers' Hospital Train Is Expected,”
Dayton Daily
[no state] clipping, n.d., and “ ‘Pony Bob' Is Dead,” unattributed clipping, Feb. 29, 1912, all in Robert Haslam Scrapbook, CHS.

71. “The Messiah Found,”
Rocky Mountain News,
Nov. 25, 1890, p. 1.

72. “Buffalo Bill Ready,” unattributed clipping, n.d., in Robert Haslam Scrapbook, CHS.

73. See Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
146–49; and David Humphreys Miller,
Ghost Dance
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1959), 159–61.

74. James McLaughlin,
My Friend the Indian
(1910; rprt. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1989), 209–11; Peter E. Traub, “The First Act of the Last Sioux Campaign,”
Journal of the United States Cavalry Association,
no. 15 (1905): 872–79.

75. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
146–49; Traub, “First Act of the Last Sioux Campaign.”

76. Clipping from
Chicago Herald,
Dec. 13, in BBWW 1893 program (Chicago: Blakely Printing), 50.

77. Quote from Traub, “First Act of the Last Sioux Campaign,” 874. See also Maj. M. F. Steel, “Buffalo Bill's Bluff,”
South Dakota Historical Collections
9 (1918): 475–85; E. A. Brininstool, “Buffaloing Buffalo Bill,”
Hunter-Trader-Trapper
76, no. 4 (April 1938): 17–18; also Utley,
Lance and the Shield,
294; Ostler,
Plains Sioux,
313–16.

78. Utley,
Lance and the Shield,
265; Stanley Vestal,
Sitting Bull
(Norman: University of Oklahoma, 1932), 251.

79. Stanley Vestal,
New Sources of Indian History,
1850–1891
(Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1934), 2–3.

80. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
157–60.

81. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
180–200; Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
209–30.

82. BBWW 1893 program, 53.

83. Thayer's office was inundated with requests from western Nebraska for food and drought relief through much of the fall. Those requests shifted abruptly, to urgent demands for guns and ammunition, in November. See for example: J. M. Thayer to A. D. Cole, Nov. 21, 1890; “A Homesteader” to John Thayer, Nov. 24, 1890; J. M. Thayer to George M. Sheldon, Nov. 26, 1890; L. P. Sudden to J. M. Thayer, Nov. 26, 1890; J. T. Sumny to John Thayer, Nov. 27, 1890, and Nov. 28, 1890; Neil Brennan to J. M. Thayer, Nov. 29, 1890; J. M. Thayer to Capt. Sidney B. Higgins, Nov. 29, 1890; J. M. Thayer to C. W. Worth, Dec. 13, 1890; J. M. Thayer to S. A. Daly, Dec. 1, 1890; J. M. Thayer to Capt. A. L. Field, Dec. 1, 1890, all in Record Group 1, SG14, Box 7/64, NSHS.

84. Oliver Knight,
Following the Indian Wars: The Story of the Newspaper Correspondents Among
the Indian Campaigners
(Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1960), 313–15.

85. William J. Adelman, “The Road to Fort Sheridan,” in David Roediger and Franklin Rosemont,
The Haymarket Scrapbook
(Chicago: Charles H. Kerr, 1986), 130.

86. Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
271–72; Moses,
Wild West Shows and the Images of
American Indians,
110–11.

87. Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
271–72; “Prisoners of War on Exhibition,”
Harper's
Weekly,
May 30, 1891, p. 399.

88. Smith,
Moon of Popping Trees,
201–4; Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
230, 249.

89. For the egregious propaganda that passed as journalism in the Ghost Dance troubles, see Elmo Scott Watson, “The Last Indian War, 1890–91: A Study of Newspaper Jingoism,”
Journalism Quarterly
20 (1943): 205–19.

90. The letters were widely reprinted in show publicity. See for example BBWW 1893 program; and Burke,
Buffalo Bill from Prairie to Palace,
258–59. Emphasis added.

91. BBWW 1893 program, 51; Burke,
Buffalo Bill from Prairie to Palace,
257.

92. BBWW 1893 program, 44; James Mooney,
The Ghost-Dance Religion and the Sioux Out
break of 1890,
14th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, 1892–93, Part 2 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1896), p. 657.

93. BBWW program 1893, 61–62. Emphasis in the original.

94. For military officer at Pine Ridge, see Utley,
Last Days of the Sioux Nation,
282; for Brown, see George LeRoy Brown to WFC, May 21, 1891, RG 75 Pine Ridge, Misc. Letters Sent, 1887–1891, vol. 7, BOX 342, NARA-CPR.

95. They remained at Fort Niobrara until 1906. Biolsi,
Organizing the Lakota,
23.

96. A. C. Belt to Secretary of Interior, Nov. 18, 1890, Correspondence Land Division, Letter Sent, vol. 104, Letter Book 207, pp. 191–201, RG 75, NARA.

97. D. F. Royer to T. J. Morgan, Jan. 10, 1891, no. 3186, Box 699, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA; Burke,
Buffalo Bill from Prairie to Palace,
257.

98. DeMallie, Sixth Grandfather, 277–78.

99. DeMallie, Sixth Grandfather, 281.

100. In 1890, bricklayers made on average $3.55 a day: plasterers $3.50 per day. Indian wages amounted to $0.96 per day (assuming a six-day workweek; the Wild West show did not perform on Sundays). Wage information from Scott Derks,
The Value of a Dollar: Prices
and Incomes in the United States,
1860–1989
(Washington, DC: Gale Research, 1994), 15.

INTERLUDE: STANDING BEAR

1. DeMallie, Sixth Grandfather, 101, 106, 184–89. Quote from 106.

2. Standing Bear left behind is in D. F. Royer to Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Jan. 10, 1891, no. 3186, Box 699, Letters Received, 1881–1907, RG 75, NARA.

3. DeMallie, Sixth Grandfather, 254.

4. Even while traveling, Indians with Buffalo Bill often received notes about the latest family news from the reservation. I discuss the phenomenon of Lakota correspondence in the next chapter.

5. “Standing Bear Information as compiled by Adrienne DeArmas for the Lakota section of the Changing Cultures in Changing World Exhibition, Dec. 13, 1993,” typescript, copy in author's possession, courtesy of Arthur Amiotte; author interview with Arthur Amiotte, June 21, 2003, tapes in author's possession.

6. Interview with Arthur Amiotte, June 21, 2003 tapes.

7. Family tradition tells of how Louise and others adapted to a temporary shortage of tanned soft leather by sewing canvas tops onto rawhide soles, making “the first sneakers.” Interview with Arthur Amiotte, personal communication to author, March 24, 2005; Arthur Amiotte, June 21, 2003.