The Great Sioux War Essay

George Armstrong Custer was a United States cavalry officer who served with distinction in the American Civil War and was the youngest ever brevet brigadier general at age twenty-three (History.com Staff, 2009). Custer had various disciplinary issues throughout his career ranging from abandoning his post for romantic reasons to leaving the field without searching for a slain reconnaissance unit (History.com Staff, 2009). His expedition in 1874 that led to the discovery of gold, was in violation of the treaty of 1868 wherein the Black Hills were recognized to belong to the Sioux Nation. Custer was known to have a reckless temperament and was often at odds with superior officers. Nevertheless, as a Lieutenant Colonel assigned to the Seventh Cavalry Regiment out of Fort Riley, Kansas, Custer was tasked to lead the force against Sitting Bull’s alliance (History.com Staff, 2009).

Economic. A major economic recession coincided with the discovery of gold in the Black Hills. Attempts by the government to buy back the land failed, and many Indians left their reservations and headed for the Black Hills, where a new and charismatic leader, Sitting Bull, emerged to unite a coalition of Sioux and Cheyenne (Batten, 2012).

Once the Sioux figured out that they now had a chance to push the Ponca’s out of Indian Territory, that’s just what they did. They took their crops, horses, and gave many threats towards them. The third most famous war called the Great Sioux war began in 1876. Although the U.S. government had won the war, it still didn’t mean they would stop pleasing the Sioux. The U.S. government gave what was left of the Ponca land to the Sioux. The treaty they made with the Ponca’s was completely broken. They cheated the Ponca Indians, and they were furious. In January 1877, Edward C. Kemble asked the Ponca’s to let him speak during church service. He told them that the government had given their fields and farm to the Sioux for a greater purpose. He also told them that they be getting new virgin lands in Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma). By this time the there only 738 Ponca Indians in the tribe, which meant they were not much of a force to the federal government.

The war really started when four Dakota Warriors attacked and killed five white settlers; after the attack, Little Crow decided to declare war on the U.S by attacking the Lower Agency and killing settlers including women and children. As a result,

Once the gold rush took place, rumors abounded that there was gold located on Sioux land.​

The Comanche Campaign was a generalization of multiple battles and wars between the United States government and the Comanche tribes. Most of the wars were fought between 1867 and 1875 in the freshly settle wild west. The United States military fought against different Comanche tribes in numerous expeditions until the Comanche people surrounded and surrendered. After peace was established between the Natives and the United States, the Comanche people were relocated to a reservation. In the late 1800’s different ideas and proposals, such as the Manifest Destiny and Homestead Act, fueled the expansion of American settlement out West.

In the 1830s, 1829 gold was discovered near Dahlonega which was the heart of the Cherokee nation. White settlers

“The Battle of the Little Bighorn, also known as Custer's Last Stand and, by the Indians involved, as the Battle of the Greasy Grass, was an armed engagement between combined forces of Lakota, Northern Cheyenne and Arapaho people against the 7th Cavalry Regiment of the United States Army. The battle, which occurred on June 25 and 26, 1876 near the Little Bighorn River in eastern Montana Territory, was the most famous action of the Great Sioux War of 1876.”i Was this battle led by a courageous General or a desperate man is search of being seen as an American hero by the eyes of America?

Everything was going very well for the settlers in the west, except for disputes and battles with the native Indian tribes. The tribes had signed many treaties with the Americans regarding their land and their safety; however, the treaties were loosely followed and ignored for the most part. In 1868, the Lakota were having conflicts with the US Army. The Lakota were angry that the army kept coming into their territory. This led to Red Cloud's War. Congress passed the Fort

The Sioux people have been living in the Black Hills for over a thousand years they have been living peacefully until there was gold founded in the black hills causing the Sioux to lose their home and put on a reservation where they still face problems. Today they face the same problems with poverty, police brutality, and theft of their land to make it worse the Government is putting a dangerous oil pipeline that can destroy the reservation.

The conflict that occurred between the U.S. Government and the Native American Indian tribes, known as the Great Sioux War. It was a lengthy, disjointed struggle between the U.S. Army and the allied tribes of the Teton Sioux and Northern Cheyenne Indians that occurred in the span of fifteen months between, March 1876 and May 18771. Hostilities between the U.S. Government and the Native American Indian tribes grew due to the movement of settlers on the land promised to them. The Northern Plains, which consist of the Dakotas, Nebraska, Wyoming and Montana, is where the majority of the war took place. The most prominent battle of this war was the Battle of Little Big Horn, due to the amount of casualties taken by the U.S. 7TH Cavalry led

The Battle of the Little Bighorn, also known as “Cluster’s Last Stand,” which was fought on June 25, 1976 in Montana, U.S. The outcome was indulged for the Lakota Sioux and Cheyenne tribes, who presumably will defeat the U.S Army under Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and its 7th Calvary. This trounce defeat by the tribes, will consider Indians bloodthirsty by the demise of their enemy. The Indians overwhelmed the 200 men by a cluster of 3,000 men. This insisted the battle was lost by the west, and will always be known as “Cluster’s Last Sand.” A battle that only lasted shortly, and took part of the “Great Sioux War of 1876,” will consider Indians unpredictable in the battle field.

Of course, as soon as rumors that the Black Hills contained gold began to circulate, this promise became as empty as any others made by the 'Great White Father' to native peoples. And on May 17th 1876, the breaking of this treaty precipitated the crushing defeat of the 7th Calvary at the hands of the Sioux nation led by the defiant, "You need not bring any guides; you can find me easily. I will not run away" , Sitting Bull (Cooke 136) in the Battle of Little Bighorn (Cooke 133-151). But this battle, though a victory over the Anglo invaders, was temporary and short-lived. By September 5, 1877 Crazy Horse was dead, Sitting Bull was in exile in Canada and "…in all the Great Plains, from Canada south, there was no longer a free tribe or a "wild" Indian. It had not taken long; in 1840 the boundary of the permanent Indian Country had been completed and the Great Plains were to belong forever to Indians. A mere thirty-seven years later every solemn promise had been broken and no bit of ground large enough to be buried in remained to any Indian that could not--and probably would--be arbitrarily taken from him without warning" (Andrist 300). The Westward expansion was on, and the push to break up and the sell the Great Sioux Reservation was supported by a "westward-pushing railroad [and] promoters eager for cheap land to be sold at high profits to immigrants"

Arable lands and rumors of gold in the Dakotas continued to attract white migration the government opened a major new war in 1876. Major battlefield encounters like George Armstrong crushers triumph at the battle of the washita in 1868 had been rare or more telling was the Army's destruction of Indian lodges , horses , and food supplies , exemplified by Ronald Mackenzies slaughter of over a thousand Indian ponies following a skirmish at palo duro canyon Texas in

The next war, the Black Hawk War, occurred in 1831. The cause of this war was due to the Americans’ desire for the Illinois land. Obviously, the Native Americans tried to maintain it, lost, and were murdered. This war is important because it led to the Removal Act, which ultimately led to the Trail of Tears. Once the Removal Act was passed, which forced Indians to the west, the Cherokee tried to get the court’s favor in the case of Cherokee Nation v. Georgia and Worcester v. Georgia. The Principal Chief also tried to bargain with the president himself, which proves he would not back down easily. One article states, “In view of the gold that had recently been discovered in Georgia and North Carolina, he wanted $20 million for all of their