SITUATION GROWING WORSE.
INTRIGUES OF THE HALF-BREEDS.
But while the severe lesson of Ash Hollow, the frank counsel of General Harney, and the presence of a military force at Fort Randall, kept the tribes in comparative peace, the wrongs from which they suffered continually increased, and their temper grew constantly worse. The discovery of gold in Montana brought a multitude of emigrants to and through this country, with the consequent destruction of game and threats of roads and railroads and loss of lands. Events were fast developing into a crisis, when the outbreak of the Civil War in the United States gave the tribes their desired opportunity. The frontier garrisons were depleted in order that the regular troops might be sent south. New levies made up of the able-bodied citizens went away to the war. The Indian was quick to see how this movement weakened the frontier settlements. He was made to believe, by gross exaggeration, that the situation of the Great Father in Washington was a desperate one, that his capital was about to be taken and his power destroyed. It has been asserted that the Confederates had emissaries among the Indians, but there is no proof of any direct intrigue of this character. Indirectly, however, they exercised a powerful influence upon them. The people of the British possessions, like those of the mother country, sympathized ardently with the South, and this sympathy found effective expression in the intercourse of the British half-breeds north of the boundary with the Indians south. These half-breeds knew the border tribes perfectly, and had greater influence with them than the whites, who were strangers to their customs and the authors of their many wrongs. Selfish motives of trade combined with national prejudice to stir up strife against the Americans and to provide means for making that strife effective. The half-breeds circulated freely south of the border, and the tracks of their carts could be seen everywhere from the Red River of the North to the Missouri River. They brought powder and balls, guns, rum, and regular merchandise of trade, and their influence at this particular time was decisive. Their territory, moreover, offered a sure asylum from punishment for any outrages which the Indians might commit.[68]
THE MINNESOTA MASSACRE.
Trouble first broke out in 1862 among the Minnesota Indians, where the evil conditions from which the tribes had been suffering had reached an acute stage. Under the leadership of a noted Sioux chief, Little Crow, the Indians in the valley of the Minnesota River above Mankato attacked the settlement of New Ulm and others in that vicinity, on the 18th of August, murdering and taking captive the inhabitants, destroying property, and spreading consternation in every direction. In the course of three days nearly a thousand persons were killed and two million dollars’ worth of property destroyed.
The State and national governments sent instant relief; the outrages were checked; the Indians were driven up the Minnesota Valley and beaten in several battles; the captive whites were mostly released, and a large number of hostiles engaged in the massacre were taken prisoners. This work was done under the immediate leadership of General H. H. Sibley, first Governor of Minnesota. The captured Indians were tried by court martial, and a great number were condemned to death, but this penalty was commuted by President Lincoln except in the cases of thirty-eight, who were hanged at Mankato, December 26, 1862.
AN INDIAN WAR.
In the meanwhile the Indians under Little Crow, though checked and driven back, were not conquered or discouraged. Their emissaries were active among the tribes of the Missouri, who were aroused almost to the point of war. The execution of the Indians at Mankato exasperated Little Crow to a desperate pitch, and he vowed extermination of the whites. It was clear that an Indian war was at hand, and the government at once prepared for it. Its conduct was placed in the hands of General John Pope, who had been relieved from his command of the Army of the Potomac after the second Bull Run, and was now in command of the Department of the Northwest, with headquarters at Milwaukee. General Pope organized two expeditions, one under General Sibley, to move west from Mankato against the Indians and drive them toward the Missouri, and the other under General Sully, to move from Sioux City up the Missouri and cut off their retreat. The plan was well conceived, but the extreme low water in the Missouri in 1863 prevented General Sully from receiving his supplies in time to carry out his part of the programme.
EXPEDITION OF GENERAL SIBLEY.
Sibley’s expedition left Camp Pope in the Minnesota Valley June 16, 1863, and two days later that of General Sully left Sioux City. Sibley’s route lay up the Minnesota to its source, thence by way of Lake Traverse to the Cheyenne River of North Dakota, and up that stream toward Devil’s Lake, where the Indians were supposed to be. Learning that they had left that region and had gone toward the Missouri, General Sibley changed his march to the southwest, and pursued the retreating enemy with great vigor. He came upon them and fought three battles within a week—Big Mound, July 24; Dead Buffalo Lake, July 26; and Stony Lake, July 28. The Indians were defeated in all three fights, and then crossed the Missouri River just below where Bismarck, N. D., now stands. General Sibley reached that stream on July 29, and here his expedition ended. Two days later his command set out on its homeward march.[69]