Sixty-eight years is a long time to be an Indian. Within this span of
life Pretty Voice Eagle has run with swift feet the warpath, and held with
strong hand the battle spear. Bearing well his weight of years and his
heavier burden of struggle, he moves erect and with lithe footstep. He
became stormy and vociferous as he told his story of broken treaties, how
the Indian had been wronged by the white man, and how his life had been
scarred by the storms of life. Then the calm of old age came over him and
the placid joy of childhood memories when asked to tell a folklore tale.
While relating his battle experiences we had the equinoctial gale of
Indian life and then the mellow haze of Indian summer. Recalling his
boyhood days, Pretty Voice Eagle told me that his tribe roamed along the
river, chiefly the Missouri River. There were then no white people in
that country. “I was about ten years old when I saw large boats bringing
white people over the Missouri River. I saw a great many of the white
people killed by the Sioux when they came up the river in small boats. It
was not until I was about twenty years old that they began to build the
railroad along the Platte River going west, and there were also emigrant
wagons going west driving large herds of cattle. The Indians killed the
white people as they came up the river because we felt they were driving
away our game; they had guns and powder and knives, which we did not have.
We also wanted what they had in the boats, and we did not like to see them
go through our country. When I first saw the people emigrating through
our country and then bringing iron horses there I began to be afraid. I
was about twenty-five or thirty years old when they began to run the iron
horse along through the country, and I also heard that they were going to
move the Indians to some hot country, and that the white people would fill
up all the land north and west and south of us; we felt that we ought to
fight the white people, and we began to kill the men who were building the
railroad. The white people began to kill the game when they came into the
country. There was then plenty of buffalo on the east side of the
Missouri River; soon they swam over to the west side, and we then
understood that the President had given them the privilege of killing all
the game, and soon the buffalo were all gone. The white man then went
into the Black Hills, and killed the game. The killing of the game caused
a change in our food. We were accustomed to eating buffalo meat and other
wild game; we loved that and we were all full of health as long as we had
it. The change of food has compelled us to eat bread instead of wild
meat, and that is the reason why the Indians are all dying off. When I
think of those old days my heart is full of sorrow. My father, who was
then the chief, was sent for by the President of the United States, and
when he came back he said that the Indians must adopt the white man’s mode
of living, and that we must send our children to school. The news that my
father brought was received by some with favour, others entirely refused
to send their children to school, and said that they would rather fight
than let their children go to school. And it looked as though there would
be a general uprising. I remember the first group who went off to school,
and it caused great trouble. From that time on we had trouble with the
United States soldiers. While we were carrying this trouble about the
schools in our minds, there was an emigrant train going through the Black
Hills. They had with them a cow which was lame, and and they left it.
The Indians thought they had thrown it away, and killed it. We killed
this cow not for subsistence but because it was lame and we felt sorry for
it. It was not until a year later that the people who owned this cow made
application to the Government for reimbursement for the loss, and the
Government sent United States soldiers there to find out who had killed
the cow. The two men who had killed the cow were Face Powder and Pointed
Forehead. They asked us to give up these men that they might take them to
Fort Laramie, and we refused to give them up. They then asked our head
chief, Axe-the-Bear, to give them up, and when he would not do so he was
taken to Fort Laramie. Part of the Sioux Nation was at Fort Laramie, and
they wanted to know why the soldiers had taken this head chief there. It
was a mistake of the interpreter, for he told the officers in command that
the Sioux Indians were there to kill the soldiers if they did not give up
this head chief. One of the soldiers rather than let the chief go ran him
through with a bayonet and killed him in cold blood. As soon as they
killed this chief, the Indians began to fight right there. There was a
running fight after that until they finally captured Spotted-Tail with his
band and squaws and children. A lot of Spotted-Tail’s men were killed.
They afterward gave up the women and children. That did not satisfy the
Indians; they wanted revenge on the soldiers and had a battle west of the
Black Hills. After that big battle the Indians were chased right into the
territory where the present camp of the great chiefs is located.
Following that there was another big battle on the east side of the
Missouri River. The women and children were all captured. Following this
there was a treaty with the United States not to fight. The treaty was
signed up near Fort Laramie. The trouble still kept up, the treaty was
broken, and we had another big battle near the Rocky Mountains, where a
hundred soldiers were killed. After that there were several battles,
including the Custer fight, and then the bands all split up, some of them
going to Canada and some of them back to the reservations where they are
now located. Then there was a delegation sent to Washington, and when
they came back to the people from the Indian Department, we sent our
children to school. The Indians who went to Canada afterward returned. A
great many Sioux remained on the reservation at the time of the Custer
fight; I was not in the battle myself. I saw General Custer when he left
Fort Lincoln previous to the Custer fight. Custer impressed me as a very
pleasant and good man; he wore his hair long. As he was about to leave
Fort Lincoln a delegation of Sioux Indians, including myself, went to see
him and asked him not to fight the Sioux Indians, but to go to them in a
friendly way. I was the leader of the delegation. We begged him to
promise us that he would not fight the Sioux. He promised us, and we
asked him to raise his hand to God that he would not fight the Sioux, and
he raised his hand. After he raised his hand to God that he would not
fight the Sioux he asked me to go west with my delegation to see those
roaming Sioux, and tell them to come back to the reservation, that he
would give them food, horses, and clothing. After we got through talking,
he soon left the agency, and we soon heard that he was fighting the
Indians and that he and all his men were killed. If Custer had given us
time we would have gone out ahead of him, but he did not give us time. If
we had gone out ahead of Custer he would not have lost himself nor would
his men have been killed. I did all I could to persuade the Ree scouts
not to go with Custer. I gave them horses and saddles not to go, but for
some reason they went.”
[A War Council]