Part of a series of articles titled Understanding Sand Creek.
Previous: Overview of the Sand Creek Massacre
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Legacies of Sand Creek
War erupts on the Great Plains in the wake of the Sand Creek Massacre. An enormous force of Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux warriors obliterate a detachment of U.S. troops, then attack and destroy the railroad town of Julesburg in northeastern Colorado. Denver is temporarily cut off from the outside world. Congress and the U.S. Army investigate Sand Creek and issue damning indictments of Chivington's conduct. Territorial Governor Evans is allowed to resign. Silas Soule reveals details of the massacre during his testimony. He is gunned down near his home in Denver a few months later. Many in Colorado concluded that he was killed in revenge for his testimony against Chivington.
United States officials persuade a handful of Cheyenne and Arapaho chiefs to meet on the Little Arkansas River in Kansas and negotiate and sign a new treaty in October 1865. Under the terms of the Treaty of the Little Arkansas, the United States condemns and repudiates "the gross and wanton outrages perpetrated against certain bands of Cheyenne and Arapahoe Indians" at Sand Creek. In Article 6 of the treaty, the government effectively assumes responsibility for the massacre by committing to compensate those who lost property at Sand Creek. Bent family members and others were granted lands south of the Arkansas River. Reparations to many other descendants have never been paid.
Despite the new treaty, fighting continues sporadically on the plains of Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, and Wyoming over the next several years. The Cheyenne Dog Soldiers and their allies fight desperately to prevent railroad construction from destroying their hunting grounds along the Smoky Hill River. Buffalo are slaughtered by the millions for the next two decades, their hides in demand as machinery belts. Yet another treaty with the peace factions of the tribes
is signed on Medicine Lodge Creek in Kansas in 1867. Under the terms of this treaty, the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes relinquish claims to lands within Kansas, including their traditional Smoky Hill hunting territory. The tribes' warrior factions refuse to recognize the treaty.
is signed on Medicine Lodge Creek in Kansas in 1867. Under the terms of this treaty, the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes relinquish claims to lands within Kansas, including their traditional Smoky Hill hunting territory. The tribes' warrior factions refuse to recognize the treaty.
The Dog Soldiers and their allies nearly obliterate a force of U.S. Army scouts, but the charismatic warrior, Roman Nose, is slain in a battle on a tributary of the Republican River in northeastern Colorado in late summer of 1868. A few months later, on November 27, nearly four years to the day after Sand Creek, the 7th U.S. Cavalry under Lt. Col. George A. Custer launches a surprise attack on Chief Black Kettle's village on Washita Creek in what is now Oklahoma. The village is destroyed. Black Kettle, a staunch peace advocate to the end, is killed, along with his wife and over 100 other Cheyenne men, women, and children. General Phillip Sheridan reportedly remarks on hearing of Black Kettle's death,
"So the old scoundrel is dead at last." The Comanche, Kiowa, Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes continue the fight to save the last buffalo herds on the southern plains.
"So the old scoundrel is dead at last." The Comanche, Kiowa, Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes continue the fight to save the last buffalo herds on the southern plains.
The remaining bands of Dog Soldiers under their headman Tall Bull retreat from Colorado toward Wyoming to join their Northern Cheyenne kinsmen. A powerful column of U.S. Cavalry supported by Pawnee scouts intercepts them at Summit Springs in northeastern Colorado. Dozens of Dog Soldiers and family members are killed in the fighting. William F. "Buffalo Bill" Cody builds a national reputation based in part on his claim that he slew Tall Bull in the fighting, but tribal tradition remembers that the legendary Dog Soldier survived the battle. Eighteen years have passed since the 1851 Fort Laramie Treaty granted the tribes nearly half of what later became the state of Colorado. After Summit Springs, no Cheyennes or Arapahos live within the territory. The tribes' claims to Colorado have been extinguished by the irresistible forces of conquest.
The Cheyennes and Arapahos fight on with the Sioux in Wyoming, Dakota, and Montana in an effort to maintain their freedom on the western plains. The insatiable hunger for land and gold pushes the tribes into new conflicts with U.S. troops. The tribes win a major victory over their old enemy Lt. Col. George A. Custer at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, but are soon overwhelmed. The Cheyennes fight on until 1880. With the buffalo nearly wiped out, native peoples are pushed into confinement. The leaders of the Cheyenne resistance are incarcerated in wretched conditions at Fort Marion, Florida. An 1869 presidential executive order authorizes the creation of Indian reservations. From Texas to Canada, the Arapaho,
Cheyenne, Comanche, Kiowa, Sioux, and other tribes of the plains and mountains are swept up and forced onto reservations—Indian islands in a vast sea of whites.
Cheyenne, Comanche, Kiowa, Sioux, and other tribes of the plains and mountains are swept up and forced onto reservations—Indian islands in a vast sea of whites.
With their lands taken and the buffalo nearly extinct, the tribes are reduced to utter dependence on the U.S. government. Some whites fear (while others hope) that the Indian people face extinction. In an attempt to assimilate native peoples into white society, Congress, in 1887, passes the Dawes Act to distribute reservation lands into 160-acre holdings and force Indians to give up communal claims on reservation lands. Tribal religion and cultural practices are outlawed, tribal government eliminated, and reservation lands reduced by over 60%. Native children by the thousands are separated from their families and sent east to be raised and educated as whites in boarding schools. The United States incredibly finds a way to inflict additional misery on Indian peoples. The ability to justify the continued assault on native culture and
identity is the enduring legacy of Manifest Destiny.
identity is the enduring legacy of Manifest Destiny.
Colorado develops rapidly with the completion of the Denver Pacific and Kansas Railroads. Denver grows from a dusty plains town to become one of the largest cities in the country. With the buffalo nearly gone, the Colorado plains are transformed into a cattle ranching empire. Farming triggers a population boom and the plains are defined by numerous new counties. The massacre is redefined as a battle in the list of engagements on Colorado's Civil War monument
in front of the State Capitol. The memory of the Sand Creek massacre is obscured and the Cheyennes and Arapahos are remembered in Colorado largely as street and county names on the lands once recognized as theirs.
in front of the State Capitol. The memory of the Sand Creek massacre is obscured and the Cheyennes and Arapahos are remembered in Colorado largely as street and county names on the lands once recognized as theirs.
George Bent provides invaluable information to researchers about the Cheyennes and preserves the history and culture of hls people, including hls eyewitness accounts of the Sand Creek massacre and the Plains wars. The tribes regain political autonomy in the 1930s and press for reparations promised under the Treaty of the Little Arkansas. Sand Creek descendants prevent the naming of a new boulevard in Denver after John Chlvington. In 1950, the Colorado State Historical Society placed a small stone marker on the bluff overlooking the massacre site.
Government policies in the 1950s and 1960s force tribal members off the reservations and into urban areas in a continuation of assimilation policies. Indians in the cities encounter the same virulent racism they have come to expect in the towns bordering the reservations. The publication of Dee Brown's Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee in 1970 reawakens the nation to the injustices perpetrated on American Indians. The massacre at Sand Creek features prominently in this compelling account of the conquest of the American West. Empowered tribal members retake control of their own affairs and press for a congressional report regarding treaty interpretation, which results in the creation of the
American Indian Policy Review Commission and publication of a two-volume report in 1977. Ben Nighthorse Campbell becomes the first Native American member of Congress. Campbell spearheads legislation redressing the wrongs of the past. Custer Battlefield becomes Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument and in 2000, Senator Campbell sponsors
a bill that establishes "Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site" as a unit of the national park system. The National Park Service assumes management of the site in 2007 and with the Cheyenne and Arapaho peoples, begins planning for the future of Sand Creek.
American Indian Policy Review Commission and publication of a two-volume report in 1977. Ben Nighthorse Campbell becomes the first Native American member of Congress. Campbell spearheads legislation redressing the wrongs of the past. Custer Battlefield becomes Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument and in 2000, Senator Campbell sponsors
a bill that establishes "Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site" as a unit of the national park system. The National Park Service assumes management of the site in 2007 and with the Cheyenne and Arapaho peoples, begins planning for the future of Sand Creek.
Last updated: October 13, 2023