Rationalizations and justifications are aspects of psychological processes that shape our memories. What is surprising is how little we have to say in the matter.
These same processes were impacting the participants on both side before, during, and after the encounter at Sand Creek. They include cognitive dissonance or motivated reasoning, as well as self-perception or selfaffirmation. Understanding these processes helps us better understand past events, including Sand Creek.
The theory of “cognitive dissonance” was formulated in 1954 by social psychologist Leon Festinger. Cognitions (or thoughts) are bits of knowledge we possess, and dissonance (or conflict) occurs when we hold contradictory thoughts. According to Festinger, a person relies on a positive self-image to feel good about himself and therefore cherishes that self-image. Therefore, he will work hard to keep that positive self-image intact if he is challenged by any inconsistent attitudes or actions, i.e., he will experience “cognitive dissonance.”
Most people believe they are morally conscientious and responsible, but when their behavior violates their self-expectations, an internal conflict arises. The more disparate the thoughts and actions, the greater the need is to correct them. Since we cannot change the reality of any past behavior, it is easier to change attitudes by incorporating harmonious thoughts. In other words, we either align our current ideas with our past behavior, which is often very difficult, or we live in psychological turmoil.1
Self-perception can be thought of as a flip side to cognitive dissonance. In the latter, the hypothesis is that attitudes cause behavior, while the hypothesis of the former is that behaviors cause attitude. Take, for example, a test that divided people into two groups, one strongly pro-environment and the second with weak or inconsistent views on the same issue. Leading questions about their behaviors were introduced into the test like the “frequent” versus “occasional” use of carpooling. When the word “occasional” was used, the subjects tended to answer “yes” (they did engage in that activity) and in later sessions were more likely to identify themselves as “pro-environment.” When the word “frequent” was used, subjects were more likely to answer “no” (they did not engage in that activity frequently) and later saw themselves as “anti-environment.” The correlation was strongest with those whose attitudes were tentative. Those people “are much more likely to infer their attitudes by observing their own behavior. Those who possess well-defined attitudes on a particular topic, however, are much less vulnerable to outside influences.”2
There is little or no doubt that attitudes can affect behavior, and behaviors can also affect attitudes. But whatever theory one prefers, the brain has a mind all its own. Most people want to feel good about themselves. When their actions or words are challenged, many alter their attitudes, behaviors, and memories in order to maintain their positive self-image. Cynics are often critical of those who change their attitudes to justify their behavior and see them as hypocrites. Tests show, however, that “what looks like disingenuous rationalization from without may feel genuine from within.”3
One important facet of cognitive dissonance addresses testimony, which can be related to some of our eyewitnesses at Sand Creek. Was what they swore under oath to have seen and heard going to be accurate months later, assuming it was even accurate when it was first experienced?
A set of experiments that involved potential buyers of an inexpensive, fuel-efficient car and a flashy sports car helps us better understand this issue. Some of those who initially believed that economy was the most important selling point still ended up buying the fuel-guzzling sports car. Their original dispassionate analysis and validation had succumbed to an impulse, and the dissonant cognitions had to be eliminated. Ill at ease with the change of heart, the subconscious mind adjusted itself to accommodate the decision. Most people are adamant they have made the right choice after they have made it, especially when the choice was economically or socially costly. The more important a decision is, the greater the need to reduce the resultant dissonance by overemphasizing the correctness of the choice—subconsciously, of course.4
It is possible to see the workings of cognitive dissonance reduction by examining the testimonies of Silas Soule, who was nearly universally depicted as a hero for speaking out against the Sand Creek attack. Captain Soule was once a Colonel Chivington supporter, but he experienced a radical change of mind. In an outraged letter to Major Wynkoop penned on December 14, 1864, Soule insisted that he had not taken part in the massacre. “I refused to fire and swore that none but a coward would,” he wrote. “My Company was the only one that kept their formation, and we did not fire a shot.” Soule went on to tell Wynkoop that the others killed “about 140 women and children and 60 bucks.”5
Four days later on December 18, Soule wrote a letter to his mother in Kansas. After having recently experienced an event that so outraged him (Sand Creek), he noted that he was lazy, “and have so little that would interest you.” Eventually he got around to writing, “I was present at a massacre of three hundred Indians mostly women and children it was a horrable scene and I would not let my Company fire.” He blamed the slaughter on the “100 day men who accomplished the noble deed.” He also told her that he had a horse shot from under him, apparently a wild long shot, since he claimed he was not in the fight. The soldiers, he added, lost twelve killed and forty wounded.
A month later on January 18, 1865, Soule again wrote to his mother that he had spent New Year’s Day “on the battleground counting dead Indians there were not as many killed as was reported there was not more than one hundred and thirty killed.” He once more noted, “I would not fire on the Indians.”6
Captain Soule appeared in Denver as a witness at the military commission inquiring into the Sand Creek affair. On February 16, 1865, he testified that Major Anthony moved his battalion to within 100 yards of the Indian lodges “and ordered us to open fire; some firing done,” but when the battery moved behind them and prepared to open fire, Anthony had ordered Soule’s company “to move up the creek and for the purpose of killing Indians which were under the banks.” Soule testified that he complied, but the hot firing “was unsafe” and so he moved across the creek and then upstream. He also testified that he saw only 69 dead Indians on the battlefield.
The next day on February 17, Soule was asked if he saw soldiers doing any scalping and mutilating. “I did,” he answered. He also replied that by noon, Major Anthony had pulled him out of the battle and that he was guarding wounded and some captured property. On February 20, when asked again if he saw any soldiers scalping or mutilating Indians, Soule answered, “I think not.”7
As is readily apparent, Soule’s correspondence and his testimony is often at odds. Perhaps he was embarrassed by his behavior of firing on Indians he claimed were friendly, so he insisted to his mother and to Wynkoop that he had not allowed his company to participate in the battle. Despite his attempt to ease his conscience, when he had to testify at the inquiry, he confirmed under oath that he had complied with Major Anthony’s orders to fire and take part in the fight—assertions possibly influenced by a concern that other potential witnesses could counter testimony to the contrary. Had Soule admitted to disobeying orders in battle, he would also have been liable to court martial. On the stand, the now-humble captain made no such indignant claims that lofty principles had kept him from shooting Indians.
Was Soule trying to reduce his dissonance by denying his participation, or did he really not participate, but told the court that he had in order to save his own hide? His reconstituted memories served his best personal interest—which was no different than those offered by Wynkoop and Chivington.
One problem for someone who rationalizes his conduct is that he may not remember what he said from one day to the next. For example, one day Soule testified seeing soldiers scalping Indians. Just three days later he claimed he didn’t see any such thing. The number of Indians Soule remembered being killed also changed. When he wanted to emphasize the massacre, for example, he told Wynkoop that 200 had been killed, and he increased that number to 300 when writing to his mother. The next month in another letter to his mother, however, he reduced the number to 130. In court, Soule dropped the number all the way down to 69—while Chivington inflated it to more than 500.
Here we come across the rather odd situation of a commander trying to increase the enemy body count to make himself appear to be a great warrior, but by doing so, he counter-intuitively pushed the incident into the category of a massacre—the very charge against which he was defending himself. We also have subordinate officers trying to prove perfidy on part of their commander and make the massacre charges stick, but who paradoxically lowered the number of Indian dead to keep Chivington from being seen as a hero. As Lieutenant Cramer put it to Captain Cree: They “thought they could make a massacre out of the Sand Creek affair and crush him.” And to Major Wynkoop, Cramer wrote: “for God’s sake, Major, keep Chivington from being a Bri’g Genl.”8
Every soldier noted above had reasons to enhance his own image or to malign others deemed an enemy. This clearly shows how testimony and memory can be nothing more than fables constructed to enhance one’s selfesteem and self-interest, or to hurt another. Bent, Chivington, Soule, Wynkoop and everyone else involved told so many contradictory stories that the actual “facts” concerning some details of what happened at Sand Creek will likely never be known. The congressmen and officers conducting the hearings were charged with finding the “truth,” but they were subject to the same social, political, and psychological forces as those on the witness stand. They had their own self-image and self-interest to sustain. Their truths may already have been established before they began, and possibly reinforced by any number of factors as the hearings progressed.
As is now quite clear, eyewitness testimony can be very inaccurate for many reasons: leading questions and suggestibility, false implanted memories, trauma distortion, and altered attitude and behavior to make us feel good. Once we have packed our brains with all these thoughts, some of them indubitably false, we sometimes try our best to convince others (and ourselves) that they are accurate.
How, then, do we ever get at the truth? When people are presented with incontrovertible facts, will they adjust their attitudes and behaviors?
1 Leon Festinger, Henry W. Riecken, and Stanley Schacter, When Prophesy Fails (London, 2005), viii, 3; Joel Cooper, Cognitive Dissonance Fifty Years of a Classic Theory (London, 2007), 2, 6–8, 96–97; Herbert R. Ginsburg and Silvia Opper, Piaget’s Theory of Intellectual Development (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1988), 23.
2 “Cognitive Dissonance and Self-Perception Theory.” e LearnPortal. http://www.elearn portal.com/courses/psychology/social-and-community-psychology/social-and-communitypsychology-cognitive-dissonance-and-self-perception-th, accessed February 4, 2014.
3 Matthew D. Lieberman, et al., “Do Amnesics Exhibit Cognitive Dissonance Reduction? The Role of Explicit Memory and Attention in Attitude Change.” Psychological Science, 12, no. 2, March 2001: 135-140. http://pss.sagepub.com/content/12/2/135.full.pdf, accessed February 9, 2014.
4 Cooper, Cognitive Dissonance, 11–12; Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson, Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me) Why we Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts (Orlando, FL, 2007), 22–23.
5 Roberts and Halaas, “Written in Blood,” 25–26.
6 Silas S. Soule Papers, Kansas State Historical Society, WH1690, Box 1.
7 “Sand Creek Massacre,” 11, 14, 21, 23.
8 “Sand Creek Massacre,” 190; Roberts and Halaas, “Written in Blood,” 28.