IVDARK DAYS OF WINTER

The Brave Cheyennes Were Running Through the Frosted HillsThis is Dull Knife’s band of Northern Cheyennes, known as the Spartans of the plains. And deservedly were they called a Spartan band, for, relentlessly pursued by cavalry troops for over ten days, these gallant warriors fought to their last nerve, making their last stand only when nature itself was exhausted.Illustration fromA SERGEANT OF THE ORPHAN TROOPbyFrederic RemingtonOriginally published inHarper’s Magazine,August, 1897

This is Dull Knife’s band of Northern Cheyennes, known as the Spartans of the plains. And deservedly were they called a Spartan band, for, relentlessly pursued by cavalry troops for over ten days, these gallant warriors fought to their last nerve, making their last stand only when nature itself was exhausted.

Column of cavalryCampaigning in WinterA body of United States cavalry in winter rig in pursuit of a band of Minneconjous Sioux, who had left their agency and were making for the camp of the hostiles in the Bad Lands.Illustration fromA SERGEANT OF THE ORPHAN TROOPbyFrederic RemingtonOriginally published inHarper’s Magazine,August, 1897

Campaigning in WinterA body of United States cavalry in winter rig in pursuit of a band of Minneconjous Sioux, who had left their agency and were making for the camp of the hostiles in the Bad Lands.Illustration fromA SERGEANT OF THE ORPHAN TROOPbyFrederic RemingtonOriginally published inHarper’s Magazine,August, 1897

A body of United States cavalry in winter rig in pursuit of a band of Minneconjous Sioux, who had left their agency and were making for the camp of the hostiles in the Bad Lands.

Our moccasins grew thin with our hurrying. We were always cold and hungry. No wood could be found. We burned our lodge poles. Our horses weakened and died and we had no meat. The buffalo had fled, there were no antelope, and the wind always stung—yet we struggled on, cold, hungry, hearing the wails of our children and the cries of our women, pushing for a distant valley where our scouts had located game.

At last the enemy dropped behind and we went into camp near the mouth of the Milk River on the Big Muddy, and soon were warm and fed again, but our hearts were sore for the unburied dead that lay scattered behind us in the snow. Do you wonder that our hate of you was very great?

There we remained till spring. The soldiers had been relentless in pursuit until the winter shut down; after that they, too, went into camp and we lived in peace, recuperating from our appalling march. And day by day The Sitting Bull sat in council with his “Silent Eaters.”

Our immediate necessities were met, but the chief’s heart was burdened with thought of the future. All our allies had fallen away. The Cheyennes and Ogallallahs were bravely fighting for their land in the south, but the Yanktonaise and Minneconjous, our own blood, with small, cold hearts, were sitting, self-imprisoned, in the white man’s war camp.

You must not forget that we had no knowledge of geography such as you have. We knew only evil of the land that lay to the north and west of us. We were like people lost in the night. Every hill was strange, every river unexplored. On every hand the universe ended in obscurity, like the lighted circle of a campfire. A little of the earth we knew; all the rest was darkness and terror.

We could not understand the government’s motives. Your war chief’s persistency and his skill scared us. We were without ammunition, we could neither make powder nor caps for our rifles, and our numbers were few. Miles had the wealth of Washington at his back. This you must remember when you read of wars upon us. Where we went our women and children were obliged to go, and this hampered our movements. What would Miles have done with five hundred women and children to transport and guard?

All these things made further warfare a hopeless thing for us, for we were dependent upon our enemy for ammunition and guns, without which the feeding of our people was impossible. To crown all our troubles, the buffalo were growing very wild and were retreating to the south.

Up to this time we had only temporary scarcity of food, but now, when we could not follow the buffalo in their migrations, my chief began to see that they might fail us at the very time we most needed them. “Surely the Great Spirit has turned his face from us,” he said, as his scouts returned to say the buffalo were leaving the valley.

If you were to talk for a day, using your strongest words, you could not set forth the meaning of the buffalo to my people at this time. They were our bread and our meat. They furnished us roof and bed. They lent us clothing for our bodies. The chase kept us powerful, continent, and active. Our games, our dances, our songs of worship, and many of our legends had to do with these great cattle. They were as much a part of our world as the hills and the trees, and to our minds they were as persistent and ever-recurring as the grass.

To say “The buffalo will fail” was like saying “The sun will rise no more.” Our world was shaken to its base when a red man began even to dream of this. We spoke of it with whispered words.

“To go farther north is to say farewell to the buffalo,” the chief said to my father—and in this line you may read the despair of the greatest leader my tribe has produced. To go north was to face ever-deepening cold in a gameless, waterless, treeless land; to go south was to walk into the white chief’s snare.

One day as the old men sat in council a stranger, a friendly half-breed from the north, rose and said:

“My friends, I have listened to your stories of hard fighting and running, and it seems to me you are like a lot of foxes whose dens have been shut tight with stones. The hunters are abroadand you have no place of refuge. Now to the north, in my country, there is a mysterious line on the ground. It is so fine you cannot see it; it is finer than a spider’s web at dusk; but it is magical. On one side of it the soldiers wear red coats and have a woman chief. On the other they wear blue coats and obey Washington. Open your ears now—listen! No blue soldier dares to cross that line. This is strange, but it is true. My friends, why do you not cross this wonder-working mark? There are still buffalo up there and other game. There is a trader not three days’ ride from here, one who buys skins and meat. There you can fill your powder cans and purchase guns. Come with me. I will show the way.”

As he drew this alluring picture loud shouts of approval rang out. “Let us go!” they said one by one. “We are tired of being hunted like coyotes.”

The chief smoked in silence for a long time, and then he rose and his voice was very sad as he chanted: “I was born in the valley of the Big Muddy River. I love my native land, I dread to leave it, but the pale soldiers have pushed us out and we are wanderers. I have listened to our friend. I should like to believe him, but I cannot. White people are all alike. They are all forked and wear trousers. They will treat us the same no matter what color of coats they wear. If any of you wish to go I will not hinder. As for me, I am not yet weak in the knees, I can still run, and I can still fight when need comes. I have spoken.”

Part of the people took the advice of the Cree and went across the line, but The Sitting Bull remained in the valley of the Missouri till the spring sun took away the snow.

I shall never forget that dreadful winter. It seems now like one continuous whirling storm of snow filled with wailing. We were cold and hungry all the time, and the white soldiers were everon our trail. Many died and the cries of women never ceased. It was as if the Great Spirit had forgotten us.

The chief, satisfied at last that the Cree had told the truth and despairing of the future, turned his little band to the north, and in the early spring crossed the line near the head of Frenchman’s Creek and camped close to the hill they call Wood Mountain, where the redcoats had a station and a small store. No one would have known this small, ragged, sorrowful band as “the army of The Sitting Bull.”

My father was a great man—as great in his way as his chieftain—but he was what you call a philosopher. He spoke little, but he thought much, and one day soon after this he called me to him and said: “My son, you have seen how the white man puts words on bits of paper. It is now needful that some one of us do the same. We are far from our home and kindred. You must learn to put signs on paper like the white man in order that we may send word to those we have left behind. I have been talking with a black-robe (a priest) and to-morrow you go with him to learn the white man’s wonderful sign language.”

My heart froze within me to hear this, and had I dared I would have fled out upon the prairie; but I sat still, saying no word, and my father, seeing my tears, tried to comfort me. “Be not afraid, my son. I will visit you every day.”

“Why can’t I come home each night?” I asked.

“Because the black-robe says you will learn faster if you live with him. You must travel this road quickly, for we sorely need your help.”

He took me to Father Julian and I began to read.

We lived here peacefully for two years. The Cree had told us the truth. General Miles dared not cross the line, but he chased my people whenever they ventured over it. At Wolf Point, on the Missouri, was a trader who spoke our language (he had an Indian wife) and with him my chief often talked. He had spies also atFort Peck, which was an agency for the Assiniboines, and so knew where the soldiers were at all times.

I had a friend, a Cree, who could read the papers, and from them I learned what the white people said of us. Through him I heard that many people sympathized with The Sitting Bull and declared that it was right to defend one’s native land.

These words pleased the chief, but it made two of his head men bitter. They grew jealous because their names were not spoken by the white man, and they would have overthrown my chief if they dared, but now the “Silent Eaters” came to his aid. With them to guard him, the chief could treat the jealous ones with contempt. Wherever he went my father and others of his bodyguard went with him, so that no traitor could kill him and sell his head to the white people.

The redcoats liked my chieftain well. He was always just and peaceful. If a reckless young man did a wrong thing against the settlers The Sitting Bull punished him and said: “A righteous man does not strike the hand which saves him from the wolf. No one can steal from these our friends and not be punished.”

Once when he went to visit the trader at Wolf Point I went with him, and was present at a long talk which they held. The trader gave us a tent and some food and at night when we had eaten he came and sat down to smoke.

“Sitting Bull,” he began, “I cannot understand you. I cannot see as you do. We white people look ahead, we ask ourselves what is going to happen in the future; but you seem to go on blindly. My friend, what do you intend to do?”

The chief considered this carefully, but said nothing.

The trader went on: “The buffalo will soon be gone—you can see that. The cold is killing them and the guns of the white hunters crack, crack all the time. What will you do when they are gone?”

The chief broke forth passionately: “I did not leave the BlackHills of my own will; the soldiers pushed me out. I loved my home, but the paleface came and with his coming all the old things began to change. I kept out of his way, I did not seek war with him, but he never slept till he drove me among the redcoats. The redcoats do not say much to us, but what they speak is fair and straight. So long as a gopher remains on the plains I will stay and I will fight. All my life I have been a man of peace, but now my back is to the rock; I shall run no more. I am not afraid to die and all my warriors are of my mind.”

The trader replied: “Your people are poor and suffering. The Canadian government cannot help you. Our Great Father is rich. He will take care of you and your people. Why don’t you do as the Yanktonaise did—go to a reservation and settle down.”

“Because I am a red man. If the Great Spirit had desired me to be a white man he would have made me so in the first place. He put in your heart certain wishes and plans, in my heart he put other and different desires. Each man is good in His sight. It is not necessary for eagles to be crows. Now we are poor, but we are free. No white man controls our footsteps. If we must die we will die defending our rights. In that we are all agreed. This you may say to the Great Father for me.”

The trader waited till the chief’s emotion passed away, and then he said: “Look you, my friend, all white men are not your enemies. There are many who are on your side.”

“I cannot trust them. A few months ago some men came professing friendship; they offered me land and a house, but I fear all those who come bearing gifts. I will trade; I will not take gifts. I do not make war; I only defend my women and children as you would do.”

The trader rose. “Very well. I have said all I care to say on that head, but I shall be glad to see you at any time and I wish to trade with you.”

“Will you trade guns?”

“No, I can’t do that.”

“If we kill game we must have guns.”

“I know that, but I fear the soldiers as well as you, chief. They tell me not to sell you guns, and I must obey.”

The Sitting Bull rose and took from his side his embroidered tobacco pouch.

“You are of good heart and I will trade with you.” He handed the pouch to the trader, for this is an emblem of respect among my people, and they shook hands and parted. If all men had been like this man, we would not now be an outcast race.

All that autumn while I studied the white man’s books my people camped not far away and traded at Wolf Point. It was well they did, for the winter set in hard. The cold became deadly and they had few robes. They were forced to sell all they had to buy food and ammunition. It is a terrible thing to be hungry in a land of iron. Do you wonder that we despaired?

Just when the winter was deep with snow a messenger came to warn us that a great military expedition was on its way to catch The Sitting Bull and his people. The chief immediately gave orders to pack, and with stern face again led the way to the north across the Great Divide. The white soldiers had plenty of blankets and food. They followed us hard. The storms were incessant. The snow, swept to and fro by the never-resting wind, blinded the eyes of the scouts and path finders.

Oh, that terrible march! In the gullies the horses floundered and fell to rise no more. There was no tree to shelter a tepee, no fuel for our fire. Women froze their arms and breasts, and little children died of cold and hunger. The camp grew each day more silent. The dogs were killed for food, and each night the lodge poles were cut down to make kindling, till each tepee became like a child’s toy. The guides lost their way in the storm and the whole camp wandered desperately in a great circle. My words cannot picture to you the despair and suffering of that march.

When at last they came into the old camp at Wood Mountain they were bleeding, ragged, and hollow eyed with hunger. The Sitting Bull looked like an old man. The commander hardly recognized him, so worn and broken was he, and I, who remembered him as the proud leader of two thousand lodges of people, was made sorrowful and bitter by the change in his face.

That winter was the coldest known to my people. They sat huddled over their camp fires in the storms, while hunters ranged desperately for game. The redcoats helped us as much as they could, and strangers far away, hearing of our need, sent a little food and some clothing, but, in spite of all, many of our old people died.

Hunting parties rode forth desperately to the south, and some of them never returned. The buffalo were few and very, very distant, and our scouts from the Yellowstone reported whole herds already frozen. Myriads were starving because of the deep snow. “By spring none will remain,” they said. “Surely the Great Spirit has turned his face away from his red sons.”

The sufferings of the children broke the proud hearts of the chiefs. One by one they began to complain. Some of them reproached The Sitting Bull and there were those who would have delivered his head to the white men, but were prevented by the “Silent Eaters,” who were ever watchful.

Many now said: “Let us go back. The buffalo are gone. We are helpless and our children starvewhile our brethrenat the Standing Rock have plenty and are warm. We are tired of fighting and fleeing. The Great Spirit is angry with us. He has withdrawn his favor and we must do as Washington wishes. We must eat his food and do his work. He is all powerful. It is useless to hold out longer.”

To all this the chief made no reply, but brooded darkly, talking only in the soldier’s lodge. His mind was busy with the problems of life and death which the winter wind sang into his ears.

From my warm home with the priest, from the comfort andsecurity which I was just beginning to comprehend and enjoy, I went now and again into the camp, and the pity of it was almost more than I could bear. No one talked, no one sang, no one smiled. It was like some dreadful dream of the night.

What could I do? I had nothing. I ate, but I could not carry food to my chief. I had warm clothing, but I could not lend it to my father. Though hardly more than a boy, my heart was big as that of a man. I began to understand a little of the mighty spread of the white man’s net, and yet I dared not tell the chief my secret thought.

How can I make you understand? Can you not see that we were facing the end of our world? My chief was confronting captivity and insult and punishment. His bright world of danger and freedom and boundless activity was narrowing to a grave, and only the instinctive love of life kept him and his “Silent Eaters” from self-destruction. In all the history of the world there has been no darker day for a race than this when midwinter fell upon us in that strange land of the north.

The first days of spring were worse than the winter. Rain and sleet followed each other, and the few remaining buffalo seemed to sink into the ground, so swiftly they disappeared. White people read in papers of wars and elections and the price of wheat; our news came by brave runners, and their tales were ever of the same dole.

“What of the buffalo? Where are the buffalo? Are the buffalo starving?” The answers always were the same. “The buffalo are gone. We are lost!”

The report of our desperate condition went out over the world and sympathetic people came to urge us to surrender. One messenger, a priest, a friend of General Sherman, the great war chief,came, and The Sitting Bull called a council to sit with him, and some Canadian officers also were there.

After they had all finished speaking, The Sitting Bull replied: “I am ready to make a peace. But as for going to Standing Rock, that is a question I must consider a long time. I am no fool. I know that the man who kills me will be rewarded and I do not intend to be taken prisoner. I have long understood the power of the whites. I am like a fly in a mountain stream when compared with this wonderful and cruel race. I do not care to have my head sold to make some man-coyote rich. Now this is my answer: I will make a peace. I will keep my people in order but I will not go to the Standing Rock. My children can go if they think best.”

The council broke up at this point, but in private the chief said to a friend: “The Gall is going back, so is The Polar Bear and many others. I shall soon be alone. Black Moon, Running Crane, all are deserting me, but I shall remain; I will not return to die foolishly for the white man’s pleasure.”

All took place as he foresaw. Chief Gall went south and surrendered. So did Red Fish and The Crane. Only a few remained, among them my father and Slohan.

The chief was pleased to know I was getting skilled in the white man’s magic. “I need an interpreter, one I can trust,” he said to me. “Go on in the road you have taken.”

One day as he sat smoking in his tepee I heard him singing in a low voice the “Song of the Chieftains,” but he had changed it to a sad ending:

“I was born a soldier—I have lived thus long.Ah, I have lived to spend my days in poverty.”

“I was born a soldier—I have lived thus long.Ah, I have lived to spend my days in poverty.”

“I was born a soldier—

I have lived thus long.

Ah, I have lived to spend my days in poverty.”

It broke my heart to look upon him sitting there. I had seen him when he was the master spirit of the whole Sioux nation—a proud and confident chief. Now he hovered above his fire, singing a death song, surrounded by a little circle of ragged lodges. YetI could not blame his followers. They surrendered, not to the white man, but to the great forces of hunger and cold.

If you ask what defeated The Sitting Bull, I will answer, “The passing of the buffalo.” If you ask what caused him to surrender his body to the whites, I will say his tender heart. You hear officers boast of conquering Sitting Bull, but the one who brought him to the post was his daughter. The love of the parent for the child is strong in my race; it is terrible. Sitting Bull was a chief, stern and resolved, but he was a father also.

One day a letter came to the British officer from a friend of my chieftain, who said, “Tell The Sitting Bull that the white men have put his daughter in irons.”

This daughter, his best-beloved child, had left the camp, lured away by her lover, and the chief did not know where she was. His heart was bleeding for her, and now when he heard this letter read his indignation was very great. “Is it so?” he cried out. “Do they make war on a poor weak girl? I will go to her. I will kill her captors. I will die beside her.”

That night he called the remnant of his band together and said, “My children, you know that the white men have tried often to get me to go south to act their pleasure, but I have always refused. Now they have taken my daughter, a weak girl with no power to defend herself. They have put irons on her feet and on her hands. At last I must go south. I must follow her. I wish to find her and to kill those who have abused her. I do not want you to go with me. I go alone to suffer whatsoever comes to me.”

Then his people all said, “No, we will go with you.”

He replied: “Friends, you have stayed too long with me. If you wish to go I cannot refuse, but the road is dark and dangerous; whereto it leads I cannot tell.”

We made ready at once to go with him, and though our hearts were filled with fear, we were also glad. “We’re going home,” the women sang. For the last time he gave orders to break camp inCanadian territory, and led the way across the invisible wonderful line into the land of the bluecoats.

His following was very small now. Only his wives and sons and a few of the more loyal of the “Silent Eaters” remained. Many of even this bodyguard had gone away, but those who remained were doubly faithful, and on them he relied to resent any indignity. “If we are assaulted let us die fighting, as becomes warriors,” he said, and all the men responded firmly, “Aye, that will we.”

Do you think it an easy thing to set your face toward the land of your deadly foes, with only a handful of warriors to stand between you and torture? Yet this is what my chieftain did. He knew the hate and the fear in which the white man held him, for I could now read to him and report to him what was said. He was aware of the price on his head and that many men were eager to put him in chains; yet he went.

“I shall go to the white soldiers,” he said. “Theywill know about my daughter. They are warriors, and warriors respect a chieftain.”

Small as his escort was, the commander at Fort Buford respected it. He received The Sitting Bull like a chief, and said, “I have orders to take you as military prisoner to Fort Yates.”

“I know the road home,” my chief haughtily replied. Then he handed his gun to me and added, in a milder tone: “I do not come in anger toward the white soldiers. I am very sad. My daughter went this road. Her I am seeking. I will fight no more. I do not love war. I never was the aggressor. I fought only to defend my women and children. Now all my people wish to return to their native land. Therefore I submit.” My heart ached to hear him say this, but it was true.

The colonel was very courteous. “You shall be treated as one soldier treats another,” he said. “In two days a boat will come to take you back to your people at Standing Rock. It is easy toride on a boat and you will have plenty to eat and I will send a guard to see that you are not harmed by anyone.”

Thereupon he showed us where to camp and issued rations to us, and, as we were all hungry, his kindness touched our hearts.

On the second day he came to see the chief again: “The boat has come to carry you to Standing Rock. I hope you will go quietly and take your place among your people who are living on their ancient hunting grounds near the Grand River.”

“I do not wish to be shut up in a corral,” replied The Sitting Bull. “It is bad for the young men to be fed by the agent. It makes them lazy and drunken. All the agency Indians I have ever seen were worthless. They are neither red warriors nor white farmers. They are neither wolf nor dog. But my followers are weary of being hungry and cold. They wish to see their brothers and their old home on the Missouri, therefore I bow my head.”

Soon after this we went aboard the ship and began to move down the river.

Some of us hardly slept at all, so deeply excited were we by the wonder of the boat, but the chief sat in silence, smoking, speaking only to remark on some change in the landscape or to point out some settler’s cabin or a herd of cattle. “Our world—the Indian’s world—is almost gone,” he muttered. But no one knew as well as I how deeply we were penetrating the white man’s civilization.

We all became excited as the boat neared Bismarck, for there stood a large village of white people and men and women came rushing out to see us. They laughed and shouted insulting words to the chief, and some of them called out, “Kill ’em!” The soldiers who guarded us kept them back and we went on unharmed, but I could see that the sight of this throng of palefaces had again made my chief very bitter.

I shall never forget the strange pain at my heart as we neared the high bluff which hides Fort Yates. I did not know how nearwe were till the old men pointed out the landmarks and began to sing a sad song:

“We are returning, my brothers—We are coming to see you,But we comeas captives.”

“We are returning, my brothers—We are coming to see you,But we comeas captives.”

“We are returning, my brothers—

We are coming to see you,

But we comeas captives.”

At last we came in sight of the fort, where a great crowd of people stood waiting to see us. It seemed as if all the Sioux tribes were there, all my chief’s friends and all his enemies. Some laughed, some sang, some shouted to us. All on board were crazy with joy, but the chief did not change countenance; only by a quiver of his lips could his feelings be read. We saw The Gall and The Running Antelope and The Crow’s Mane and many more of our friends. There were tears on the cheeks of these stern warriors and their hands were outstretched to greet us.

But the chief and my father were taken from the boat under military guard and no one was allowed to come near them. My mother and sister put up our tepee surrounded by the soldiers. Only a few were permitted to come in and see us.

The chief inquired anxiously for his daughter. One day she came, and when she passed into her father’s lodge her face was hidden in her hands, her form shook with weakness. I could not hear what the chief said to her, for his voice was low and gentle, but when I saw her next she was smiling. He had forgiven her and was made happy by her promise to stay with him.

He was greatly chagrined to find himself held a prisoner in the face of all his people, and yet this care of his person—this fear of him on the white man’s part—made some of his subordinates still more jealous of his eminence. They were forgotten, while many strangers came from afar and gave my chief many silver pieces for his photograph. His fame was greater than even I could realize, and chiefs who had no reason to hate him began to speak against him. “Why should the white people send him presents?” they asked, and began to belittle his position in the tribe.

Two different army uniforms

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