“‘Revenge!’ cried Rain-in-the-Face,
‘Revenge upon all the race
Of the White Chief with yellow hair!’
And the mountains dark and high
From their crags re-echoed the cry
Of his anger and despair.”
—“The Revenge of Rain-in-the-Face,” Henry Wadsworth Long fellow, 1878
1835(?)–1905
Born into the Hunkpapa band of the Lakota Nation in Dakota territory near the Cheyenne River, Rain-in-the-Face’s unusual name was attributed to two possible causes: when he was a boy his face was spattered with blood after a fight with another young brave, and later in life he was involved in a battle which took place during a rainstorm. After the battle his face was streaked with warpaint.
Part of the Indian attack during the Fetterman massacre, Rain-in-the-Face also killed the Army veteran John Honsinger during the Battle of Honsinger Bluff, and was arrested for this crime by Captain Thomas Custer under the orders of his brother, General George Armstrong Custer. Imprisoned, Rain-in-the-Face escaped, possibly as a result of help from sympathetic Indian guards, and returned to the Standing Rock Reservation. In 1876 he joined the band of the great chief Sitting Bull, and took part in the Battle of Little Big Horn. Here, legendarily, he is said to have cut out the heart of General George Armstrong Custer, an episode that was immortalized by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in a poem that bears his name, “The Revenge of Rain-in-the-Face.” Later, however, Rain-in-the-Face would deny that this happened.
Rain-in-the-Face fled south after Big Horn with other members of the tribe, and was taken to Standing Rock some years later when he surrendered. He died in 1905, still at Standing Rock. Allegedly, he confessed to killing George Armstrong Custer while on his deathbed, but this has never been substantiated.
A road-building crew working in northern California in the 1930s exposed a massive boulder, some 4,000 pounds in weight, which turned out to be an object that was sacred to the Shasta. Buried, it is believed, some 200 years ago, the giant boulder was believed to have the power to prevent flooding and rain. It was dug up and moved to a museum in Fort Jones, where descendants of the Shasta still request that the rock is covered from time to time for occasions when rain is not wanted.
In the southwest, the term for a small settlement or village, in contrast to the larger Pueblos. Rancherias often consisted of several different bands.
“When we first made treaties with the Government, this was our position: Our old life and our old customs were about to end; the game upon which we lived was disappearing; the whites were closing around us, and nothing remained for us but to adopt their ways and have the same rights with them if we wished to save ourselves.”
1822–1909
Mahpiya Luta, a.k.a. Red Cloud, was born close to North Platte in Nebraska.
Chief of the Oglala Sioux from 1868 until his death, Red Cloud not only led a successful campaign against the United States Army, but was instrumental in introducing his people to life on the reservations. In many ways this great Native American was part-warrior, part-politician, and also a great statesman.
Since the Lakota were matrilineal, any children belonged to the mother and her clan rather than to the father. Accordingly, the young Mahpiya Luta spent a lot of time with Old Chief Smoke, the brother of his Oglala Lakota mother, “Walks as She Thinks.” When his father died in the 1820s, Red Cloud was not much older than a toddler, and was taken into Old Smoke’s home. He was very young when he sharpened his instincts for fighting in skirmishes with Crow and Pawnee enemies, who were also their neighbors, as well as other Oglala. In fact, in 1841 Red Cloud’s killing of one of his uncle’s rivals would divide the Oglala for the next 50 years.
Before long Red Cloud was renowned for his fierce fighting style, and he was leading territorial wars against other peoples, including the Crow, Shoshone, Ute, and Pawnee.
His mettle was proven conclusively, though, when from 1866 onward Red Cloud directed what would prove to be the most successful war ever fought between the Indian Nation and the United States. This war was so prominent that it is known as Red Cloud’s War.
It all started because the U.S. Army had begun to build forts along a route named the Bozeman Trail, which ran from Colorado’s South Platte River right through the middle of Lakota land in what is now Wyoming, through to the gold fields in Montana. More and more miners—looking for gold—and potential settlers began to appear on the horizon, and Red Cloud was haunted by what had happened a few years earlier, when the Lakota people had been expelled from Minnesota (1862–1863).
Red Cloud organized a strategic series of assaults on the forts; the most prominent attack was the defeat and massacre of 79 soldiers and two civilians near Fort Phil Kearny in Wyoming toward the end of 1866, in what the U.S. would call the Fetterman Massacre. Captain Fetterman had been sent to chase away what he thought was a small band of Indians who had attacked his troops a few days earlier. Disobeying orders—and, in all likelihood, spoiling for a fight—would prove to be his downfall. The troops pursued what they thought were the small posse of Indians. However, this was a decoy. Crazy Horse, pretending to be riding an injured horse, led the soldiers into an ambush comprised of over 2,000 Cheyenne, Sioux, and Arapaho warriors. Native American fatalities numbered 14, while the entire Fetterman contingent was wiped out.
It was because of this battle that the U.S. Peace Commission visited the area a year later, to find out what could be done to restore an amicable relationship between the Native Americans and the gold prospectors/settlers. It must have been self-evident that the Indians had been incited to violence when the white men encroached upon their territory; accordingly, the Commission suggested that the tribal territories should be defined conclusively. The Treaty of Fort Laramie of 1868 was an attempt to bring about that peace, and was supported by the northern Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Lakota. The forts along the Bozeman Trail were abandoned and the U.S. left the Lakota territory, which extended from the western half of South Dakota and included the Black Hills, considered sacred by the Indians, as well as large tracts of Montana and Wyoming. Securing the Black Hills, in particular, signified a great victory; the Hills were decreed at the time to belong to the Indians “for as long as the grass shall grow.” And it was Red Cloud who was instrumental in securing this agreement.
However, relations between the U.S. and the Natives were still uneasy, and the white contingent were evidently outraged that so much “good land” had been given away. Skirmishes started to rise up almost as soon as the treaty was signed.
A delegation of 20 Sioux chiefs, with Red Cloud as one of their number, traveled to Washington, D.C. to speak to President Ulysses S. Grant in 1870 to explain that there were still problems, after which the Red Cloud Agency was established on the Platte River. Part of the agreement was that the Natives would be paid an annuity and given rations; these were often of poor quality and frequently didn’t even arrive. The miners continued to arrive in droves. Red Cloud visited Grant again in 1875 along with Spotted Tail and Lone Horn to ask him to honor his earlier agreement. There, the chiefs were outraged to be told that the matter would be settled by Congress, who would pay the Indians $25,000 for the land; they, in the meantime, would be moved to the Indian Territory in Oklahoma. This had never been a part of the agreement as far as they were concerned. Red Cloud was particularly vociferous, and it was an impressively unwise maneuver which saw the President’s office dispatch Red Cloud to New York—presumably hoping that he would be dazzled by the world of the white man. Red Cloud, unimpressed, used the opportunity to address a large number of people. Here, he explained in simple terms precisely what had happened, demonstrating a gift for oratory which would mark him in the history books as a great statesman:
“In 1868 men came out and brought papers. We could not read them, and they did not tell us what was in them. We thought the treaty was to remove the forts, and that we should then cease from fighting … When I reached Washington, the Great Father [the president] explained to me what the treaty was, and showed me that the interpreters had deceived me. All I want is right and just. I wish to know why Commissioners are sent out to us who do nothing but rob us and get the riches of this world away from us.”
A humiliated Government were forced to take action after this speech, and offered Red Cloud an “agency” 32 miles east of Laramie, Wyoming.
Red Cloud evidently felt that he could not negotiate any better terms, and, on returning to his home, symbolically hung up his weapons of war. In his discussions with Grant, the President had urged Red Cloud to speak to his people and try to make peace that way, rather than by fighting.
This decision split the mighty Sioux tribe. Two-thirds decided to follow Red Cloud to the allotted land, but the rest stayed where they were, in the northern buffalo plains of North Dakota and Wyoming.
When some white prospectors strayed into Lakota territory, they were attacked by the Native Americans; citing a transgression of the treaty, the U.S. Government wrested the gold-rich Black Hills from the hands of the Indians. But another great white warrior loomed on the horizon: one George Armstrong Custer, whose presence there with a large contingent of gold prospectors—as well as journalists—meant that the wars would resume.
The Lakota Wars numbered Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull among its leaders. Believing that fighting was pointless, Red Cloud opted not to fight alongside these Sioux chiefs, and instead argued for Native American rights outside the arena of war. Red Cloud realized that the sheer numbers of white men meant that war was not the way forward, and that they must reach peaceable agreements. When the Ghost Dance craze spread rapidly among the Sioux, Red Cloud resisted it, and so survived unscathed. Afterward, he made determined efforts to safeguard the rights of Native chiefs. Red Cloud could also see the damage that the Allotment Act would do to the Indian Nation, and he fought it vehemently—alas, in vain.
Red Cloud died in 1909, the longest-lived of all the great Sioux chiefs. He was buried where he died, on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.
See Red Cloud
“The white people, Brother, had now found our country. Tidings were carried back, and more came among us. Yet we did not fear them. We took them to be friends. They called us brothers. We believed them, and gave them a larger seat. At length their numbers had greatly increased. They wanted more land; they wanted our country. Our eyes were opened, and our minds became uneasy. Wars took place. Indians were hired to fight against Indians, and many of our people were destroyed. They also brought liquor among us. It was strong and powerful, and has slain thousands.”
1750(?)–1830
Red Jacket belonged to the Seneca people and was a chief of the Wolf Clan. Although the place of his birth is disputed, it is known that he spent many of his early years at Basswood Creek in Seneca County, New York. His father was a Cayuga, and his mother a Seneca of the Wolf Clan. The Seneca were a matrilinear people, hence Red Jacket belonged to his mother’s family. When he was ten years old Red Jacket was given the name Otetiani, meaning “always ready.” As an adult, he lived on the Seneca lands by the Genesee River, New York, and was made the chief of the tribe; as a Pine Tree Chief, he was superior to a hereditary chief.
Red Jacket became known by that name when he was given a highly decorated red coat as a gift after he fought on the side of the British against the colonies in the Revolutionary War. He had hoped to be able to preserve the longstanding trading arrangements with the British, and also to halt the encroachment of further white settlers onto Seneca territory. After the war, Red Jacket began to campaign for the rights of Native Americans, and his impressive oratory earned him yet another name: Segoyewatha, meaning “he keeps them awake,” a direct commentary on his speaking skills. His most famous speech, entitled “Religion for the white man and the red,” was preserved and documented, and can still be read.
His oratorical skills and intelligence meant that he played a leading part in the negotiations with the newly minted American Government after the War, and was awarded a peace medal by President George Washington. This medal can be seen in any portrait of Red Jacket.
The Treaty of Canandaigua, signed in 1794 by Red Jacket along with 50 other Iroquois chiefs, saw the U.S. take over vast tracts of land previously belonging to the Iroquois. Three years later a further treaty enabled some Seneca territory to be sold outright; Red Jacket was not in favor of signing the Treaty of Big Tree, and tried to convince the other chiefs to reject it. But he was unable to influence them.
The Europeans introduced alcohol to the Natives and, like many of his people, Red Jacket succumbed to it, much to his regret, and described later how he had “degraded” himself by drinking the white man’s “firewater.”
Red Jacket died in 1830; he was interred in an Indian cemetery, but some 54 years later his remains were disinterred and reburied at the Forest Lawn Cemetery in Buffalo, New York. A monument to this great chief of the Seneca was unveiled in 1891 at Forest Lawn Cemetery, Buffalo.
The infamous island prison of Alcatraz, just off the coast of Sausalito in California, had been abandoned for some years when it was occupied by a group of 89 Native Americans in November, 1969. This demonstration was the catalyst of the Red Power movement commonly attributed to Vine Deloria Jr., an author and activist for Native Americans.
The 89 Natives described themselves as “Indians of All Tribes,” and said they had claimed Alcatraz in accordance with a clause in an 1868 treaty between the Sioux and the U.S. Government. This treaty gave the Sioux the rights over any abandoned Federal properties situated on Indian lands.
The aim of the occupation was to use the opportunity to gain funds from the Government for an educational and cultural center, which the Native Americans felt was necessary as a focus for the growing sense of self-hood and identity on the part of American Indian Nations.
The prison was occupied for a year and a half by a shifting group of 100 permanent “residents” and a continuous stream of visitors from numerous tribes.
The occupation of the prison inspired other pro-Native demonstrations and events. These included painting Plymouth Rock red—an act carried out by an organization called AIM, which stood for the American Indian Movement, founded in 1968.
Indeed, the 1960s saw a resurgence of interest in all matters relating to Native American culture. It was in 1961 that the book Black Elk Speaks was reprinted to worldwide acclaim. There was also a renaissance in American Indian crafts, literature, and the arts, and spiritual practice. The “Powwow Circuit” provided a forum through which various Native groups could publicize their activities all across the U.S. Younger Natives, inspired by this activism, looked to the elder members of their communities to learn about the old customs of the tribes.
One of the major goals of the Red Power movement was to persuade the Government to honor the obligations that were still outstanding from the many treaties that had been signed, and to provide resources for the indigenous peoples of America. Many of these treaties are still under scrutiny today.
Many of the items on the “wish list” of the Red Power movement have come to fruition. Perhaps the jewel in the crown is the National Museum of the American Indian, part of the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. The museum opened in 2004, and has a sister branch in New York City.
A euphemism for the enforced removal of Native American peoples from their homelands, often to what became known as the Indian Territory in Oklahoma. Relocation took place during the 1800s.
The history of the reservations is a labyrinthine and troubled one. It all began when, in 1851, the U.S. Congress passed the Indian Appropriations Act, which legislated for the creation of reservations in what is now Oklahoma. This was intended as a way to resolve the problems between the Native Americans and the white settlers, which were growing progressively worse as the white settlers were not only trespassing more and more onto the Natives’ hereditary lands, but were also depleting natural resources in the process. It is worth bearing in mind that the initial attitude of the Natives to the white men was one of friendly cooperation; they saw no reason why the land could not be shared by everyone. The white men, however, did not share this attitude to land—nor did they share it with regard to gold.
President Ulysses S. Grant was promulgating a “peace policy” by the late 1860s; this policy included assigning specific territories to the Natives, often far away from the homelands where they had dwelled for generations. Further, Church officials would replace Government officials on these plots of land, since the teaching of Christianity was considered an essential part of “civilizing” the Native peoples. Various incentives, such as guaranteed food rations, were offered to the tribes to entice them toward life on the reservations. These promised incentives, however, often failed to materialize.
Unsurprisingly, many Native Americans were not happy at the thought of leaving their homelands—places where generations of their ancestors had lived, died, and were still buried. They were used to being free to roam if they wanted to, or free to settle. Where the Natives resisted, the U.S. Army had a policy of forcing the resettlement; this resulted in massacres, war, and deaths on both sides. And even when some tribes did agree to move to the reservations, they found the conditions were often not conducive to healthy survival: the places they’d been allocated were often arid desert regions unsuitable for farming, for example.
Toward the end of the 1870s the Government’s policy was generally acknowledged to have failed, and President Rutherford B. Hayes started to phase it out. What came in its place, however—the Allotment Act—was equally flawed.
Today, many of the reservations have living conditions that are not commensurate with a First World economy. There are issues of drug and alcohol abuse, infant mortality, poor nutrition, and poor life expectancy.
The definition of a “reservation” is a tract of land that is managed by the tribe to whom it belongs, under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Indian Affairs. Today, there are some 300 reservations and over 550 tribes, which means that not every tribe has its own dedicated reservation; some share, others have none at all. Some reservations contain areas that are given over to non-Native peoples, because of the way that the Allotment Act “worked.” The entire area given over to reservations accounts for some 2.3 percent of the United States. This amounts to 55 million acres of land.
The laws on reservations are in the hands of the tribes, with certain limitations, and so there are instances where what is possible on a reservation is not permitted elsewhere. Native American law allows gambling in casinos to take place on the reservations, for example, since the tribes have jurisdiction over the reservations as tourist attractions—and casinos attract tourists. This right was ratified in 1988, when the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was passed by Congress; the one condition was that the state in which the reservation is located must itself allow gambling and gaming. Where gaming is allowed, the lives of the Natives seem to have improved somewhat. For example, the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development showed that their gaming enterprises earned $19.4 billion in 2005.
1848–1920
“Toby” Riddle was a woman of the Modoc people whose real name was Winema. When Winema was first born she was named Nanookdoowah, meaning “strange child,” since her hair had a reddish tint. Possibly a cousin of Kintpuash, a.k.a. Captain Jack, it seems that Winema was something of a tomboy, joining in with the boys and men of her tribe when they went out on raiding parties to steal horses from their neighbors.
Winema married a white settler, Frank Riddle, who had been a prospector during the California Gold Rush. They had one son, who had an Indian name, Charka, meaning “handsome,” and also an English name, Jefferson Columbus Davis Riddle, in honor of the U.S. Army officer who had brought an end to the Modoc wars (and not to be confused with the Jefferson Davis who was leader of the Confederacy during the Civil War).
While her son Frank learned the Modoc language, Winema had learned English, so both were able to serve as interpreters. This skill was especially crucial during the negotiations to bring peace after the Modoc Wars. Winema had a tranquil manner about her, too, which helped. In particular, she carried messages between General Jefferson C. Davis, Edward Canby, and Kintpuash. Somehow or other Winema gained intelligence that the Modoc, including Kintpuash, were plotting to kill Canby; she was able to warn the Peace Commission about an impending attack, but they ignored her. The attack did indeed take place and Canby was killed, but Winema saved the life of Alfred B. Meacham, who was the chairman of the Peace Commission. The Modoc instigators were captured by Jefferson C. Davis, brought to trial and executed; among those sentenced to death was Kintpuash. Some 153 of the Modoc band were then taken to the Indian Territory in Oklahoma, where they were imprisoned.
Despite the attack on him, Alfred Meacham did not stop campaigning for the rights of Native Americans, and as part of an awareness-raising campaign he wrote a play, Tragedy of the Lava Beds (“Lava Beds” was another name for the Modoc Wars). Featuring Winema, her family, and other members of the tribe, the play toured for two years. Winema, by now famous, proved a hit with audiences; Meacham even wrote a book about her, highlighting her courage and thanking her for saving his life. He also described her as one of “the greatest women of all time.”
Meacham campaigned for Winema to receive a military pension, and she became one of a very small number of women to receive this recognition. She was paid $25 dollars every month from 1891 until she died.
The Roanoke lived on an island of the same name off the coast of North Carolina. Sir Walter Raleigh established a small colony on this island in 1585–1586, and the Roanoke people are sometimes referred to as the “lost colony of Croatan,” simply because no one knows what happened to Raleigh’s colony, although he had arrived there with seven ships containing some 600 people. Fort Raleigh was constructed on Roanoke Island, and the Governor, Ralph Lane, who had contact with some of the Native American peoples, set out to explore the area. These early colonists included a man named John White, who drew maps of the territory as well as painting pictures of the people and their surroundings. Another colonist, scientist Thomas Harriot, catalogued the wildlife of Roanoke. Among these works were the first pictures to be seen in Europe of wigwams, the process of making a dugout canoe, Indians fishing using spears, rituals, ceremonial dancing, etc.
Despite all these endeavors, relationships between the colonists and the natives became frayed, especially after an entire village was burned by the English because a silver cup had been stolen. Ralph Lane was heavy-handed with the tribespeople, and had the son of a chief held to ransom to insure that his men, searching for pearls and precious metals, would be given food and other supplies. Wingina, the brother of one of the chiefs and someone who had shown previous kindnesses to the settlers, tried to make the English leave by starving them. Ralph Lane, under the pretext of meeting with Wingina, attacked his village and beheaded him. Two and a half weeks later the colonists finally left the island on ships belonging to the explorer Francis Drake.
Just two years after this another ship, intended to start a colony at Chesapeake Bay, set out from England. However, when the ship’s pilot reached Roanoke, he refused to go further and the passengers were forced to disembark. A swift attack from the natives showed that none of the wrongs done to them had been forgotten, but John White, the Governor, appointed a friendly native, Manteo (who had traveled to England with the retreating colonists and who had returned with the new party), Lord of Roanoke in an attempt to displace the Native chief who had led the attack. Manteo was also christened. White’s granddaughter, Virginia Dare, was born, too, the first English baby to be born in America.
White set off back on the return journey to England, in August 1587, to bring back supplies. However, his return journey was delayed for a number of reasons: the war with Spain, looting by pirates, the Spanish Armada. He eventually returned to Roanoke in 1590 to find that the colonists had vanished, and still no one knows what happened to them. It has been conjectured that they may have been killed by the Natives, or attempted to sail to their original intended destination, Chesapeake Bay.
Roanoke was also a term used to describe the shells that proliferated in the area and which were used to make wampum; it is possible that the word roanoke means “place of white shells.”
The son of Pocahontas and John Rolfe.
“Are not women and children more timid than men? The Cheyenne warriors are not afraid, but have you never heard of Sand Creek? Your soldiers look just like the soldiers that butchered women and children there …”
1835(?)–1868
Called Woqini by his northern Cheyenne people, this warrior took the name of “Hook Nose,” which was interpreted by the white men as “Roman Nose.”
Although he was never officially either a chief or even a leader, Roman Nose’s skills as a warrior meant that the U.S. military leaders assumed that he must be the chief of the entire Cheyenne Nation. The actual chief was in fact Black Kettle, a peaceable, statesmanlike chief whose view was that agreements and treaties were the way to keep the peace between the Natives and the settlers. In fact, Roman Nose had so little regard for treaties that he repeatedly opposed them, having no trust in the word of white men.
By all accounts Roman Nose was a frighteningly imposing figure, flamboyant and intimidating. Isaac Coates, a U.S. Army Surgeon, described him as “… one of the finest specimens of his race … six feet tall in height, finely formed with a large body and muscular limbs.” Further adding to the powerful picture, on this occasion Roman Nose was wearing the uniform of a U.S. Army General and was armed with five guns as well as the more traditional bow and arrow.
Roman Nose had a lot of mystery and magic enshrouding him, too, which served to further mythologize him. His highly decorative warbonnet, for example, which had been specially made for him by a medicine man, was believed to make him impervious to the white man’s bullets. The protection would be rendered null and void, however, if he ever used the white man’s implements. Before one particularly ominous skirmish, known as the Battle of Beecher Island, it transpired that the meat Roman Nose ate had been touched with a fork—definitely a tool of the white man. Roman Nose was told about what had happened but didn’t have enough time to perform the necessary cleansing rituals. Accordingly, he held back, uncharacteristically, during the battle, but then opted to throw caution to the winds and lead the final attack. His protection had indeed been lost, however: Roman Nose was shot dead at the battle on September 17, 1868.
Living off the land—as the Native Americans did—meant that they had to have a great deal of initiative, ingenuity, and a willingness to experiment. As well as using the parts of a plant that were above ground, roots, too, proved very useful, as foodstuff, as medicine, as a raw material with which to make things, and as dyes and pigments.
The camas is a good example of a root that was used as food, and it was abundant; camas could be found from Utah to the Canadian border and all the way west to the Pacific Coast. Another root of a plant, named kouse, was used to make large biscuits by the Nez Perce.
Potatoes of different sorts were used, too. The Hopi, Zuni and other eastern peoples foraged for wild potatoes, which could also be dried and ground into a flour, used to make bread; this was a common practice among the Seminole with a root named coonti, which has a high starch content. White people, too, liked coonti and produced it in flour mills in the Florida area. Indians of the Plains liked the Indian Turnip, also called the Indian Potato.
Ginseng is thought of as a Chinese medicine, but it was found in the Americas and later exported to China by the white settlers. The Native peoples chewed it, believing that it gave them strength and vigor. There were numerous roots, too, that yielded dyes. Aptly, “blood root” was used for its red dye by the eastern and northern tribes.
Plants with long, trailing roots were valued, too, for the cordage and fibers yielded by their roots. These included red cedar, hemlock, and cottonwood.