If any people ever fought for liberty and justice, it was the Cheyennes.
If any ever demonstrated their physical and moral courage beyond cavil,
it was this race of purely American heroes, among whom Little Wolf was a
leader.
I knew the chief personally very well. As a young doctor, I was sent to
the Pine Ridge agency in 1890, as government physician to the Sioux and
the Northern Cheyennes. While I heard from his own lips of that gallant
dash of his people from their southern exile to their northern home, I
prefer that Americans should read of it in Doctor George Bird Grinnell’s
book, “The Fighting Cheyennes.” No account could be clearer or simpler;
and then too, the author cannot be charged with a bias in favor of his
own race.
At the time that I knew him, Little Wolf was a handsome man, with the
native dignity and gentleness, musical voice, and pleasant address of so
many brave leaders of his people. One day when he was dining with us at
our home on the reservation, I asked him, as I had a habit of doing, for
some reminiscences of his early life. He was rather reluctant to speak,
but a friend who was present contributed the following:
“Perhaps I can tell you why it is that he has been a lucky man all his
life. When quite a small boy, the tribe was one winter in want of food,
and his good mother had saved a small piece of buffalo meat, which she
solemnly brought forth and placed before him with the remark: ‘My son
must be patient, for when he grows up he will know even harder times
than this.’
“He had eaten nothing all day and was pretty hungry, but before he could
lay hands on the meat a starving dog snatched it and bolted from
the teepee. The mother ran after the dog and brought him back for
punishment. She tied him to a post and was about to whip him when the
boy interfered. ‘Don’t hurt him, mother!’ he cried; ‘he took the meat
because he was hungrier than I am!’”
I was told of another kind act of his under trying circumstances. While
still a youth, he was caught out with a party of buffalo hunters in a
blinding blizzard. They were compelled to lie down side by side in the
snowdrifts, and it was a day and a night before they could get out. The
weather turned very cold, and when the men arose they were in danger of
freezing. Little Wolf pressed his fine buffalo robe upon an old man who
was shaking with a chill and himself took the other’s thin blanket.
As a full-grown young man, he was attracted by a maiden of his tribe,
and according to the custom then in vogue the pair disappeared. When
they returned to the camp as man and wife, behold! there was great
excitement over the affair. It seemed that a certain chief had given
many presents and paid unmistakable court to the maid with the intention
of marrying her, and her parents had accepted the presents, which meant
consent so far as they were concerned. But the girl herself had not
given consent.
The resentment of the disappointed suitor was great. It was reported in
the village that he had openly declared that the young man who defied
and insulted him must expect to be punished. As soon as Little Wolf
heard of the threats, he told his father and friends that he had done
only what it is every man’s privilege to do.
“Tell the chief,” said he, “to come out with any weapon he pleases, and
I will meet him within the circle of lodges. He shall either do this
or eat his words. The woman is not his. Her people accepted his gifts
against her wishes. Her heart is mine.”
The chief apologized, and thus avoided the inevitable duel, which would
have been a fight to the death.
The early life of Little Wolf offered many examples of the dashing
bravery characteristic of the Cheyennes, and inspired the younger men
to win laurels for themselves. He was still a young man, perhaps
thirty-five, when the most trying crisis in the history of his
people came upon them. As I know and as Doctor Grinnell’s book amply
corroborates, he was the general who largely guided and defended them in
that tragic flight from the Indian Territory to their northern home. I
will not discuss the justice of their cause: I prefer to quote Doctor
Grinnell, lest it appear that I am in any way exaggerating the facts.
“They had come,” he writes, “from the high, dry country of Montana and
North Dakota to the hot and humid Indian Territory. They had come from
a country where buffalo and other game were still plentiful to a land
where the game had been exterminated. Immediately on their arrival they
were attacked by fever and ague, a disease wholly new to them. Food was
scanty, and they began to starve. The agent testified before a committee
of the Senate that he never received supplies to subsist the Indians for
more than nine months in each year. These people were meat-eaters, but
the beef furnished them by the government inspectors was no more than
skin and bone. The agent in describing their sufferings said: ‘They have
lived and that is about all.’
“The Indians endured this for about a year, and then their patience gave
out. They left the agency to which they had been sent and started north.
Though troops were camped close to them, they attempted no concealment
of their purpose. Instead, they openly announced that they intended to
return to their own country.
“We have heard much in past years of the march of the Nez Perces under
Chief Joseph, but little is remembered of the Dull Knife outbreak and
the march to the north led by Little Wolf. The story of the journey has
not been told, but in the traditions of the old army this campaign was
notable, and old men who were stationed on the plains forty years ago
are apt to tell you, if you ask them, that there never was such another
journey since the Greeks marched to the sea....
“The fugitives pressed constantly northward undaunted, while orders were
flying over the wires, and special trains were carrying men and horses
to cut them off at all probable points on the different railway lines
they must cross. Of the three hundred Indians, sixty or seventy were
fighting men--the rest old men, women, and children. An army officer
once told me that thirteen thousand troops were hurrying over the
country to capture or kill these few poor people who had left the
fever-stricken South, and in the face of every obstacle were steadily
marching northward.
“The War Department set all its resources in operation against them,
yet they kept on. If troops attacked them, they stopped and fought
until they had driven off the soldiers, and then started north again.
Sometimes they did not even stop, but marched along, fighting as they
marched. For the most part they tried--and with success--to avoid
conflicts, and had but four real hard fights, in which they lost half a
dozen men killed and about as many wounded.”
It must not be overlooked that the appeal to justice had first been
tried before taking this desperate step. Little Wolf had gone to the
agent about the middle of the summer and said to him: “This is not a
good country for us, and we wish to return to our home in the mountains
where we were always well. If you have not the power to give permission,
let some of us go to Washington and tell them there how it is, or do you
write to Washington and get permission for us to go back.”
“Stay one more year,” replied the agent, “and then we will see what we
can do for you.” “No,” said Little Wolf. “Before another year there will
be none left to travel north. We must go now.”
Soon after this it was found that three of the Indians had disappeared
and the chief was ordered to surrender ten men as hostages for their
return. He refused. “Three men,” said he, “who are traveling over wild
country can hide so that they cannot be found. You would never get back
these three, and you would keep my men prisoners always.”
The agent then threatened if the ten men were not given up to withhold
their rations and starve the entire tribe into submission. He forgot
that he was addressing a Cheyenne. These people had not understood that
they were prisoners when they agreed to friendly relations with the
government and came upon the reservation. Little Wolf stood up and shook
hands with all present before making his final deliberate address.
“Listen, my friends, I am a friend of the white people and have been so
for a long time. I do not want to see blood spilt about this agency. I
am going north to my own country. If you are going to send your soldiers
after me, I wish you would let us get a little distance away. Then if
you want to fight, I will fight you, and we can make the ground bloody
at that place.”
The Cheyenne was not bluffing. He said just what he meant, and I presume
the agent took the hint, for although the military were there they
did not undertake to prevent the Indians’ departure. Next morning the
teepees were pulled down early and quickly. Toward evening of the second
day, the scouts signaled the approach of troops. Little Wolf called his
men together and advised them under no circumstances to fire until
fired upon. An Arapahoe scout was sent to them with a message. “If you
surrender now, you will get your rations and be well treated.” After
what they had endured, it was impossible not to hear such a promise with
contempt. Said Little Wolf: “We are going back to our own country. We do
not want to fight.” He was riding still nearer when the soldiers fired,
and at a signal the Cheyennes made a charge. They succeeded in holding
off the troops for two days, with only five men wounded and none killed,
and when the military retreated the Indians continued northward carrying
their wounded.
This sort of thing was repeated again and again. Meanwhile Little
Wolf held his men under perfect control. There were practically no
depredations. They secured some boxes of ammunition left behind by
retreating troops, and at one point the young men were eager to follow
and destroy an entire command who were apparently at their mercy, but
their leader withheld them. They had now reached the buffalo country,
and he always kept his main object in sight. He was extraordinarily
calm. Doctor Grinnell was told by one of his men years afterward:
“Little Wolf did not seem like a human being. He seemed like a bear.”
It is true that a man of his type in a crisis becomes spiritually
transformed and moves as one in a dream.
At the Running Water the band divided, Dull Knife going toward Red Cloud
agency. He was near Fort Robinson when he surrendered and met his sad
fate. Little Wolf remained all winter in the Sand Hills, where there was
plenty of game and no white men. Later he went to Montana and then to
Pine Ridge, where he and his people remained in peace until they were
removed to Lame Deer, Montana, and there he spent the remainder of his
days. There is a clear sky beyond the clouds of racial prejudice, and
in that final Court of Honor a noble soul like that of Little Wolf has a
place.