After this war, Black Hawk led a group of Sauk and Fox warriors against the incursions of the European-American settlers in Illinois, in a war that was named after him: the Black Hawk War of 1832. It was this Black Hawk War that gave Abraham Lincoln his one experience of soldiering, too.
Black Hawk was vehemently opposed to the ceding of Native American territory to white settlers, and he was angered in particular by the Treaty of St. Louis, which handed over the Sauk lands, including his home village of Saukenuk, to the United States.
As a result of this treaty, the Sauk and Fox had been obliged to leave their homelands in Illinois and move west of the Mississippi in 1828. Black Hawk argued that when the treaty had been drawn up, it had been done so without the full consultation of the relevant tribes, so therefore the document was not, in fact, legal. In his determined attempts to wrest back the land, Black Hawk fought directly with the U.S. Army in a series of skirmishes across the Mississippi River, but returned every time with no fatalities. Black Hawk was promised an alliance with other tribes, and with the British, if he moved to back to Illinois. So he relocated some 1,500 people—of whom about a third were warriors and the rest old men, women, and children—only to find that there was no alliance in existence. Black Hawk tried to get back to Iowa, and in 1832 led the families back across the Mississippi. He was disappointed by the lack of help from any neighboring tribes, and was on the verge of trying to negotiate a truce when these attempts precipitated the Black Hawk War, an embittered series of battles that drew in many other bands of dissatisfied Natives for a four- to five-month period between April and August of 1832. At the beginning of August the Indians were defeated and Black Hawk taken prisoner along with other leaders including White Cloud. They were interred at Jefferson Barracks, just south of St. Louis, Missouri. By the time President Andrew Jackson ordered the prisoners to be taken east some eight months after their internment, their final destination to be another prison, Fortress Monroe, in Virginia, Black Hawk had become a celebrity; the entire party attracted large crowds along the route and, once in prison, were painted by various artists. Toward the end of his captivity in 1833, Black Hawk dictated his autobiography, which became the first such book written by a Native American leader. It is still in print today, a classic, and is a timeless testament to Black Hawk’s dignity, honor, and integrity.
After his release, Black Hawk settled with his people on the Iowa River and sought to reconcile the differences between the other tribes and the white men. He died in 1838 after a brief illness.
BLACK HAWK WAR
See Black Hawk
BLACK KETTLE
“Although wrongs have been done to me, I live in hopes. I have not got two hearts … Now we are together again to make peace. My shame is as big as the earth, although I will do what my friends have advised me to do. I once thought that I was the only man that persevered to be the friend of the white man, but since they have come and cleaned out our lodges, horses and everything else, it is hard for me to believe the white men anymore.”
1803(?)–1868
Born as Moketavato in the hills of South Dakota, Black Kettle was a Cheyenne leader who, in 1854, was made chief of the council that formed the central government of the tribe.
The First Fort Laramie Treaty, dated 1851, meant that the Cheyenne were able to enjoy a peaceable existence, However, the Gold Rush which started a few years later in 1859 meant that the hereditary tribal lands were encroached upon by gold-hungry prospectors who invaded Colorado. The Government, whose duty it should have been to uphold the treaty, instead tried to solve the problem by demanding that the southern Cheyenne simply sign over their gold-rich lands, all except for a small reservation, Sand Creek, which was located in southeastern Colorado.
Black Kettle was pragmatic, and also concerned that unless they agreed with what the U.S. Government was suggesting, a less favorable situation might be on the horizon. Accordingly, the tribe moved to Sand Creek. Sadly, the land there was barren; the buffalo herds were at least 200 miles away, and in addition to these hardships a wave of European diseases hit the tribes and left their population severely weakened. The Cheyenne had no choice but to escape the reservation, relying on thieving from passing wagon trains and the white settlers. These settlers took the law into their own hands and started a volunteer “army”; the fighting escalated into the Colorado War, 1864–1865. The Sand Creek Massacre, a result of this war, saw 150 Natives slaughtered, many of them either the very old or the very young. Despite his wife having been severely injured at Sand Creek, Black Kettle continued to arbitrate for peace, and by 1865 had negotiated a new treaty which replaced the unusable Sand Creek Reservation for lands in southwestern Kansas.
Many of the Cheyenne refused to join Black Kettle in the exodus to Kansas, choosing instead to join up with the northern band of Cheyenne in the hills of Dakota. Others aligned themselves with the Cheyenne leader Roman Nose, whose approach to the white settlers was diametrically opposed to that of Black Kettle. Roman Nose believed the way forward was not via treaties or agreements, but via brute force. The U.S. Government saw that the Cheyenne were simply ignoring the new treaty, and sent General William Tecumseh Sherman to force them onto the assigned reservation.
Roman Nose and his followers retaliated by repeated attacks on the white settlers who were heading westbound; these attacks were so prevalent that passage across Kansas became virtually impossible. The Government tried to relocate the troublesome Cheyenne once again, this time to the Indian Territory in Oklahoma, tempted by promises of food and supplies.
Once again, the peacemaker Black Kettle signed the agreement, which was entitled the Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867. However, the promises were empty; even more of the Cheyenne joined Roman Nose’s band and continued to stage attacks on the farms and dwellings of the pioneers. General Philip Sheridan devised an attack on the Cheyenne habitations. George Armstrong Custer was the leader in one of the attacks which was launched on a Cheyenne village on the Washita River. This was Black Kettle’s village. Despite the fact that the village was within the reservation, Custer launched an attack at dawn. He also ignored the fact that the white flag was flying from Black Kettle’s tipi. In 1868, 170 peaceful Cheyenne were massacred. Among the dead were Black Kettle and his wife.
BLACKFEET SIOUX
Nothing to do with the Blackfoot Tribe, the Blackfeet Sioux, also referred to as the Siksika or Pikuni, originally lived by the Saskatchewan River in Canada and in the very northernmost parts of the United States. By the middle of the 19th century, however, they had relocated to the Missouri River and the Rocky Mountains, close to the Standing Rock Agency and Reservation. The tribe are part of the Algonquian language family.
A band of the Dakota Sioux, there are two legends that explain how the name of the Blackfeet Sioux came about.
The first explains that some of the tribe had been chasing some Crow Indians; however, the quest was dramatically unsuccessful and resulted in the Sioux braves losing everything, including their horses. They