tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8732486.post5914214301401705834..comments2023-10-26T03:19:41.569-07:00Comments on Stephen Bodio's Querencia: Sand Creek and Glorieta PassSteve Bodiohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14434597061701369867noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8732486.post-15471938217546593842007-05-15T11:19:00.000-07:002007-05-15T11:19:00.000-07:00Photos of the dedication ceremony can be seen at:h...Photos of the dedication ceremony can be seen at:<BR/>http://www.DigPicPhoto.comAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8732486.post-23300032320202377642007-05-07T08:50:00.000-07:002007-05-07T08:50:00.000-07:00The Sand Creek Massacre was a retaliatory raid tha...The Sand Creek Massacre was a retaliatory raid that hit the wrong encampment. Cheyenne and Arapaho warriors had banded together in an organization called the "Dog Soldiers." They had been raiding ranch and farm houses in the Denver area, where they murdered and multilating men, women and children. The Colorado militia were searching for the Dog Soldiers' camp and found Black Kettle's camp instead. The Dog Soldiers were encamped nearby and had been going back and forth between villages. The Colorado militia found fresh scalps in Black Kettle's village. (Whether Black Kettle's band was really peaceful is questionable. Custer later tracked a raiding party back to Black Kettle's camp on the Washita.)<BR/><BR/>The Sand Creek Massacre, which inspried the movie "Soldier Blue," has been the one of most publicized massacres because it happened relatively recently. It is far from the worst massacre. The worst massacre was probably the Fort Mims massacre in 1813 near Mobile, Alabama, where a faction of Creek Indians known as the "Red Sticks" killed 500 white men, women and children. As the Lakota Sioux migrated from the Great Lakes area to the Black Hills in 1175, they massacred 400 Arikara and Mandan men, women and children at a village near the Missouri. <BR/><BR/>As a percentage of population, casualties were low on both sides in warfare between Native Americans and Europeans. Native Americans killed more Europeans than Europeans killed Native Americans. About 7,193 Native Americans died in conflicts with European and their allied Native American forces. Native Americans killed about 9,156 whites. These figures cover more than 300 years and include all the famous massacres such as Sand Creek and Wounded Knee. The combined death toll is about the same a three days of fighting between Union and Confederate forces at the Battle of the Wilderness in 1864. Assuming that the Native American population north of Mexico was about 5 million—a mid-range estimate—the number of Native Americans killed in combat against Europeans would have amounted to less than one half of one percent of the Native American populationAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8732486.post-54898213410004217402007-05-02T13:02:00.000-07:002007-05-02T13:02:00.000-07:00Certainly some Cheyennes had been raiding in Kansa...Certainly <I>some</I> Cheyennes had been raiding in Kansas, but Black Kettle was not necessarily among them; the consensus seems to be that he was committed to peace. After Sand Creek, he signed treaties in 1865 and again in 1867. His very presence on the Washita was an indication of his intentions, as the government had ordered "friendlies" to go there; Indians elsewhere in the territory were to be considered <I>ipso facto</I> hostile. And while it is possible that some raiders may have taken refuge in Black Kettle's camp, it is also possible that Custer's Osage scouts may simply have taken the opportunity to settle old scores with their Cheyenne and Arapaho adversaries.<BR/><BR/>Whether Washita is considered a battle or a massacre depends largely on one's point of view, but has nothing to do with whether militia or Regular Army troops were involved. I will concede that Custer's men were far more disciplined than Chivington's, and Custer proved himself willing to take prisoners.<BR/><BR/>I will dispute Jerry's contention that Black Kettle's camp on the Washita was not an easy target. Black Kettle had just returned from a meeting with military officials, and had every reason to believe that his camp <I>on the Washita, the designated location for non-hostile Indians</I>, would be safe. And while there <I>were</I> other villages in the area, Custer seems to have been entirely unaware of this fact until his unit was already engaged.<BR/><BR/>The incident at Haditha is well-documented. I suspect that similar incidents occur in most wars, especially "unconventional" wars, without coming to public attention. This is not slander (I find the accusation offensive) but an observation on human nature and the nature of warfare. The more things change, the more they stay the same.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8732486.post-40711554433354411492007-05-02T08:44:00.000-07:002007-05-02T08:44:00.000-07:00As I recall, Custer attacked the Cheyenne camp on ...As I recall, Custer attacked the Cheyenne camp on the Washita after trailing an Indian war party back to it. Black Kettle's band had been killing, raping or enslaving more than two hundred white civilians in Colorado and Kansas. <BR/><BR/>Washita was a battle conducted by the regular army, not a massacre. And it was not against an "easy" target. That village was one among many in the area, and Custer came close to being cut off and wiped out, eight years before Little Big Horn.<BR/> <BR/>Sand Creek was clearly a massacre, a crime conducted by a militia against innocent people. But it also was preceded by Indian atrocities against settlers. That doesn't excuse the crime. But it explains the angry, vengeful mood in Colorado.<BR/><BR/>Slandering our current soldiers fighting in Iraq by the behavior of a militia 142 years ago is Horse Shit.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8732486.post-64543222546368307172007-05-02T07:50:00.000-07:002007-05-02T07:50:00.000-07:00Good post on the Confederate military operations i...Good post on the Confederate military operations in the Southwest. Some of the most fascinating episodes in the War took place outside the major theaters.<BR/><BR/>Not mentioned in some newspaper accounts (though I see the <I>LAT</I> did include it) was the eventual fate of Black Kettle: Four years after Sand Creek, his camp was attacked again, this time by US troops under George Armstrong Custer, on the banks of the Washita River in Oklahoma. Black Kettle was killed in this massacre. These episodes and others demonstrate one of the tragedies of American history: it was nearly as dangerous -- and sometimes more so -- to be a "friendly" Indian as a "hostile" one, as the Army often went after the easiest targets it could find. Whether ignorance (mistaken identity) or apathy (sheer angry racism) on the part of the Army was to blame isn't always clear, but non-combatant groups such as Black Kettle's, having no particular reason to hide, often ended up bearing the brunt of military retribution.<BR/><BR/>Parallels in the present war (e.g., Haditha) are sobering.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com