My Home in Indian Territory.
“I am a Kiowa Indian boy twenty-three years old. My home is in the Indian Territory. My people are not much civilized. They live in houses made of skins of the buffalo. They like to hunt and fight. When I was a little boy I did not see many white people. The Kiowas moved camp often to keep near the buffalo, and we lived on buffalo meat and berries all the time. We had no bread, no coffee or sugar. We boys talked all the time about hunting the buffalo, going to fight the Utes, Navajoes, or Pawnees, and most about fighting the white people or stealing horses. The old Kiowas talked all the time to us about fight or hunt the buffalo. Sometimes the men would go off and bring back scalps of white men and women, or Indian men and women; then we had a big dance. This was all I heard and all I saw, and I thought it was good, so I will be a big fighter and a good hunter too, and may be I get to be a big chief. When I was about fifteen years old I killed my first buffalo with a bow and arrow. I had no gun. Then I was called a man, because I could kill buffalo. Then I went with the young men to fight the Utes and Navajoes and steal horses. I was in three fights with the Utes and two with the Navajoes. All this time I wore a blanket or a buffalo robe, and liked to have my hair long, and paint my face and wear big rings in my ears. I did not know anything about God, or churches, or schools, or how to make things grow from the ground to live on. Four years ago there was a big war. The Kiowas, Comanches and Cheyennes fought the soldiers all winter. The buffalo were nearly all gone, and the Indians got very hungry. The horses worked hard, and it was so cold the grass was poor, so they got very weak, and we lost many in fights with the soldiers. Then the soldiers came to our camps and we had to run away and leave our lodges, then the soldiers burned them. We all got very tired and hungry, and the women and children cried, so the chiefs said we will go into Fort Sill and give up. We met Captain Pratt in the Wichita Mountains. He had some Indian soldiers and two wagons loaded with bread, sugar and coffee. He gave us plenty, and we gave him all our guns, pistols, bows and arrows, shields and spears. That night we had a big dance because we had plenty to eat. I went to Florida. Then I first began to learn something about the good way, and I find Indian’s way very bad; so I thought I will never live Indian’s way any more. Captain Pratt was our good friend. He taught us many things and showed us the white man’s road. We stayed in Florida three years, and then some of the Indians went back home, but the young men wanted to stay east and get a good education. We came to Hampton. We have been here one year, and we study hard and are learning to work and be men. We like it. I see that every white boy and girl, and every black boy and girl can go to school, and that is the way they get ahead of the Indians. Indians have no chance. You give all Indian boys and girls schools and teachers like you have, and Indians will do better.”