Cheyenne

From Wikinfo

Cheyenne
Cheyenne portraits
Total population
6,591
Regions with significant populations
United States (Oklahoma, Montana)
Languages
Cheyenne, English
Religion
Christianity, other
Related ethnic groups
Arapaho and other Algonquian peoples

For criticism see Criticism of Cheyenne

Cheyenne are a Native American people of the Great Plains. The Cheyenne Nation is composed of two united tribes, the Só'taa'e (more commonly as Sutai) and the Tsé-tsêhéstâhese (singular: Tsêhéstáno; more commonly as the Tsitsistas), which translates to "those like us". The name Cheyenne derives from Dakota Sioux Šahíyena, meaning "little Šahíya". Though the identity of the Šahíya is not known, many Great Plains tribes assume it means Cree or some other people that spoke an Algonquian language related to the Cree and the Cheyenne.^[1][2] However, the common folk etymology for "Cheyenne" is "bit like the [people of an] alien speech" (literally, "red-talker").^[3]

During the pre-reservation era, they were allied with the Arapaho and Lakota (Sioux). They are one of the best known of the Plains tribes. The Cheyenne Nation comprised ten bands, spread all over the Great Plains, from southern Colorado to the Black Hills in South Dakota. In the mid-nineteenth century, the bands began to split, with some bands choosing to remain near the Black Hills, while others chose to remain near the Platte Rivers of central Colorado.

Currently the Northern Cheyenne, known in Cheyenne either as Notameohmésêhese meaning "Northern Eaters" or simply as Ohmésêhese meaning "Eaters", live in southeast Montana on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation. The Southern Cheyenne, known in Cheyenne as Heévâhetane meaning "Roped People," along with the Southern Arapaho form the federally-recognized tribe, the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes, situated in western Oklahoma. Their combined population is 12,130, as of 2008.^[4]

Cheyenne lodges with buffalo meat drying, 1870

Language

Main article: Cheyenne language

The Cheyenne of Montana and Oklahoma speak the Cheyenne language, known as tsêhésenêstsestôtse in the Cheyenne language, with only a handful of vocabulary items different between the two locations; the Cheyenne alphabet contains fourteen letters. The Cheyenne language is part of the larger Algonquian group.

History

Cheyenne maiden photographed by Edward S. Curtis in 1930.

The earliest known official record of the Cheyenne comes from the mid-seventeenth century, when a group of Cheyenne visited Fort Crevecoeur, near present-day Chicago. During the 17th and 18th centuries, the Cheyenne moved from the Great Lakes region to present day Minnesota and North Dakota and established villages. The most prominent of these ancient villages is Biesterfeldt Village, in eastern North Dakota along the Sheyenne River. The Cheyenne also came into contact with the neighboring Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara nations and adopted many of their cultural characteristics. In 1804, the Lewis and Clark visited a Cheyenne village in North Dakota. Pressure from migrating Lakota and Ojibwa nations was forcing the Cheyenne west. By the mid 19th century, the Cheyenne had largely abandoned their sedentary, agricultural and pottery traditions and fully adopted the classic nomadic Plains culture. Tipis replaced earth lodges, and the diet switched from fish and agricultural produce to mainly bison and wild fruits and vegetables. Having acquired horses they adopted an nomadic lifestyle, their range expanding from the upper Missouri into what is now Wyoming, Colorado and South Dakota.

19th century and Indian

Migration south

At the beginning of the nineteenth century the Cheyenne continued to have a substantial presence near the Black Hills, but engaged in hunting and trading for horses as far south as the Arkansas River. They may have engaged in horse stealing raids into Nuevo Mexico. They had been preceded in movement to the south by the Kiowa and the Arapaho. They traded both with the Spanish and with other tribes, trading goods obtained on the upper Missouri with tribes further south. They were encountered camping and trading at the present site of Denver, Colorado and on the Arkansas as early as 1820 and were probably hunting and trading in that area earlier. They may have migrated to the south to winter. The Hairy Rope band is reputed to have been the first band to move south, capturing wild horses as far south as the Cimarron River Valley.^[5]

In addition to endemic warfare with the Assiniboin to the north, and occasional conflict with the Sioux they warred with the Crow, suffering a major defeat in 1819, but taking many prisoners in 1820 who were incorporated into the tribe. Endemic warfare with the Crow, the Utes, and the Pawnee were a fixture of Cheyenne life until the 1860s.^[6]

There were reports of raids by the Cheyenne and other tribes on parties on the Santa Fe Trail in the 1820s and troops were sent out from Fort Leavenworth to protect the trail.^[7] In 1834 Charles Bent and his partners established Bent's Fort on the Arkansas. The Bents had been trading on the upper Missouri but were unsuccessful. Good friends with the Cheyenne, they were encouraged to relocate to the Arkansas where the Cheyenne and Arapaho traded with them.^[8]

Treaty of 1825

In the summer of 1825 the tribe was visited on the upper Missouri by a treaty commission consisting of General Henry Atkinson and Indian agent Benjamin O'Fallon accompanied by a military escort of 476 men. General Atkinson and his fellow commissioner left Fort Atkinson on May 16, 1825, and ascending the Missouri, negotiated treaties of friendship and trade with tribes of the upper Missouri, including the Arikara, the Cheyenne, the Crow, the Mandan, the Ponca, and several bands of the Sioux. At that time there was still rivalry with British traders on the upper Missouri. The treaties acknowledged that the tribes lived within the United States, vowed perpetual friendship, and recognized the right of the United States to regulate trade, promising to deal only with licensed traders. The tribes agreed to forswear private retaliation for injuries and to return or indemnify the owner of stolen horses or other goods. Efforts to contact the Blackfoot and the Assiniboin were unsuccessful. Returning to Fort Atkinson at the "Council Bluff" in Nebraska, successful negotiations were had with the Ota, the Pawnee and the Omaha.^[9]

The Cholera epidemic

During the California Gold Rush the emigrants spread cholera to the Plains Indians resulting in severe loss of life during the summer of 1849. About half the Cheyenne died as did many of the people of the other tribes. Perhaps because of loss of trade during the 1849 season Bent's Fort was abandoned and burned.^[10]

Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851

In 1846 Thomas Fitzpatrick was appointed Indian agent for the upper Arkansas and Platte. His efforts to negotiate with the Cheyenne, the Arapaho and other tribes led eventually to a great council at Fort Laramie in 1851 at which treaties were negotiated by a treaty commission consisting of Fitzpatrick and D.D. Mitchell, United States Superintendent of Indian Affairs, with the Indians of the northern plains assigning territories to each tribe and pledging mutual peace. The United States was permitted to maintain roads such as the Overland Trail and the Santa Fe Trail through Indian country and maintain forts to guard them. The tribes were compensated with annuities. Cheyenne and Arapaho territory on the Great Plains between the North Platte and the Arkansas was affirmed by the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851. This territory included what is now Colorado east of the Front Range of the Rockies and north of the Arkansas, Wyoming and Nebraska south of the North Platte, and extreme western Kansas.^[11]

Punitive expedition of 1857

In April, 1856 there was an incident at the Platte River Bridge, near present day Casper, Wyoming, which resulted in the wounding of a Cheyenne warrior. After his return to the camps of the Cheyenne on the plains there was trouble near Fort Kearny along the Overland Trail during the summer of 1856 which resulted in an attack by the cavalry on a Cheyenne camp on Grand Island in Nebraska. 10 warriors were killed and 8 or more wounded. In retaliation at least 3 emigrant parties were attacked before the Indians returned to the Republican River. Apparently successful negotiations were had with the Indian agent at Fort Laramie, but under orders from the Secretary of War, a punitive expedition under the command of Colonel Edwin V. Sumner was sent against the Cheyenne in the spring of 1857. One part of the expedition under the command of Major John Sedgwick went up the Arkansas, and via Fountain Creek to the South Platte. The other, under Sumner's command went west along the North Platte to Fort Laramie, then down along the front range to the South Platte where the combined force of 400 troopers went east through the plains searching for the camps of the Cheyenne. The Cheyenne on their part, under the influence of the medicine men White Bull, then Ice, and Dark or Grey Beard, had become convinced that strong medicine would prevent the soldiers' guns from firing, but when the encounter came on the Solomon River, with the troopers charging, not with guns, but drawn sabers, the Cheyenne warriors fled. The was the first battle the Cheyenne fought with the United States Army. Casualties were few on either side. The troopers continued on and two days later burned the hastily abandoned camp destroying lodges and the winter supply of buffalo meat. Sumner continued on to Bent's Fort where he distributed the annuities due the Cheyenne to the Arapaho. He intended further punitive actions, but was ordered to Utah where there was trouble with the Mormons. The Cheyenne fled below the Arkansas into the Kiowa and Comanche country and in the fall the Northern Cheyenne returned to their own country north of the Platte.^[12][13][14]

The Pikes Peak Gold Rush

Starting in 1859 with the Colorado Gold Rush, European settlers moved into the lands reserved for the Cheyenne and other Plains Indians and travel greatly increased along the Overland Trail along the South Platte River. There was peace for several years with the only conflict being endemic warfare between the Cheyenne and Arapaho of the plains and the Utes of the mountains. Negotiations with Black Kettle and other Cheyenne who favored peace resulted in the Treaty of Fort Wise establishing a small reservation for the Cheyenne in southeastern Colorado in exchange for the territory agreed to in the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851, but many Cheyenne did not sign, and continued to live and hunt on their traditional hunting grounds in the Smokey Hill and Republican basins between the Arkansas and the South Platte where there were plentiful buffalo. Efforts to made a wider peace continued, but in the spring of 1864, John Evans, governor of Colorado Territory, and John Chivington, the commander of the Colorado Volunteers, a citizens militia began a series of attacks on Indians camping or hunting on the plains, killing any Indian found on sight, initiating the Colorado War. These attacks led to general warfare and many raids on the trail along the South Platte that Denver was dependent on for supplies. The road was closed from August 15 until September 24, 1964.^[15]

Dull Knife (Cheyenne: Vóóhéhéve or Lakota: Tamílapéšni), One of the chiefs of the Northern Cheyennes

On November 29, 1864, a Cheyenne and Arapaho encampment under Chief Black Kettle, flying a flag of truce and indicating its allegiance to the authority of the national government, was attacked by the Colorado Militia. The Sand Creek massacre resulted in the death of between 150 and 200 Cheyenne, mostly unarmed women and children. The survivors fled northeast and joined the camps of the Cheyenne on the Smokey Hill and Republican rivers. There the war pipe was smoked and passed from camp to camp among the Sioux, Cheyenne and Arapaho camped in the area and an attack on the stage station and fort, Camp Rankin at that time, at Julesburg was planned and carried out in January, 1865. This successful attack, carried out by about a thousand warriors was followed up by numerous raids along the South Platte both east and west of Julesburg and a second raid on Julesburg in early February. A great deal of loot was captured and many whites killed. The bulk of the Indians then moved north into Nebraska on their way to the Black Hills and the Powder River.^[16]

Black Kettle continued to desire peace. He did not join in the second raid or in the plan to go north to the Powder River country. He left the camp and returned with 80 lodges to the Arkansas River intending to seek peace.^[17]

Battle of Washita River

Buffalo Hunter Ralph Morrison who was killed and scalped December 7, 1868 near Fort Dodge Kansas by Cheyennes. A Lt Read of the 3rd Infantry and John O. Austin in background. Photograph by William S. Soule. An original print and Story can be found here at ^[18]

Four years later, on November 27, 1868, Black Kettle's band was attacked by George Armstrong Custer and his troops at the Battle of Washita River. The encampment under Chief Black Kettle was located within the defined reservation and thus complying with the government's orders, but some of its members were linked both pre and post battle to the ongoing raiding into Kansas by bands operating out of the Indian Territory. Over 100 Cheyenne were killed, mostly women and children.

There are conflicting claims as to whether the band was hostile or friendly. Chief Black Kettle, head of the band, is generally accepted as not being part of the war party within the Plains tribes, but he did not command absolute authority over the members of his band. Consequently, when younger members of the band participated in the raiding, the band was implicated.

Battle of the Little Bighorn

The Northern Cheyenne participated in the Battle of the Little Bighorn, which took place on June 25, 1876. The Cheyenne, along with the Lakota and a small band of Arapaho, annihilated Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer and much of his 7th Cavalry contingent of Army soldiers. It is estimated that the population of the encampment of the Cheyenne, Lakota and Arapaho along the Little Bighorn River was approximately 10,000, which would make it one of the largest gathering of Native Americans in North America in pre-reservation times. News of the event had traveled across the United States and reached Washington, D.C., just as the United States was celebrating its Centennial. This caused much anger towards the Cheyenne.,

Northern Cheyenne Exodus

Main articles: Northern Cheyenne Exodus and Fort Robinson tragedy

Little Coyote (Little Wolf) and Morning Star (Dull Knife), Chiefs of the Northern Cheyennes

Following the Battle of the Little Bighorn attempts by the U.S. Army to capture the Cheyenne intensified. In 1877, after the Dull Knife Fight, when Crazy Horse surrendered at Fort Robinson a few Cheyenne chiefs and their people surrendered as well. The Cheyenne chiefs that surrendered at the fort were Dull Knife, Little Wolf, Standing Elk, and Wild Hog with nearly one thousand Cheyenne. On the other hand Two Moon surrendered at Fort Keogh with three hundred Cheyenne in 1877. The Cheyenne wanted and expected to live on the reservation with the Sioux in accordance to an April 29, 1868 treaty of Fort Laramie of which both Dull Knife and Little Wolf had signed.^[19]

Colonel Ranald S. Mackenzie and his Fourth Cavalry were transferred to the Department of the Platte as part of a "troop surge" following the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Stationed initially at Camp Robinson, they formed the core of the Powder River Expedition that departed in October 1876 to locate the northern villages. On November 25, 1876, his column discovered and defeated a village of Northern Cheyenne in the Dull Knife Fight in Wyoming Territory. Their lodges and supplies destroyed and their horses confiscated, the Northern Cheyenne soon surrendered, hoping to be allowed to remain with the Sioux in the north. However, they came under pressure to locate on the reservation of the Southern Cheyenne in Indian Territory. After a difficult council, they eventually agree to go. When they arrived conditions were very difficult with inadequate rations, no buffalo left alive near the reservation, and, according to several sources, malaria. Desperate, a portion of the Northern Cheyenne, led by Little Wolf and Dull Knife, attempted to return to the north in the fall of 1878, the Northern Cheyenne Exodus. They succeeded in reaching the north but after dividing into two bands, the band lead by Dull Knife was imprisoned in an unheated barracks at Fort Robinson without food or water. Escaping on January 9, 1879, many died in the Fort Robinson tragedy. Eventually the Northern Cheyenne were granted a reservation in the north, the Northern Cheyenne Reservation in southern Montana.^[20][21][22]

Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation

Main article: Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation

Northern Cheyenne Indian Nation flag

The Cheyenne who traveled to Fort Keogh (present day Miles City, Montana) had settled near the fort among them was Little Wolf.^[19] Many of the Cheyenne worked with the army as scouts. The Cheyenne scouts were pivotal in helping the Army find Chief Joseph and his band of Nez Percé in northern Montana. Fort Keogh became the staging and gathering point for the Northern Cheyenne. Many families began to migrate south to the Tongue River watershed area and established homesteads. The United States established the Tongue River Indian Reservation, now named the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation, of 371,200 acres by the executive order of President Chester A. Arthur November 16, 1884. This configuration excluded Cheyenne who had homesteaded further east near the Tongue River. Those people were served by the St. Labres Catholic Mission. The western boundary is the Crow Indian Reservation. On March 19, 1900, President William McKinley extended the reservation to west bank of the Tongue River, total of 444,157 acres. Those who had homesteaded east of the Tongue River were relocated to the west of the river. ^[23] The Northern Cheyenne at Pine Ridge were finally allowed to return to the Tongue River on their own reservation. The Cheyenne, along with the Lakota and Apache nations, were the last nations to be subdued and placed on reservations (the Seminole tribe of Florida was never subdued.).

Through determination and sacrifice, the Northern Cheyenne had earned their right to remain in the north near the Black Hills. The Cheyenne also had managed to retain their culture, religion and language. Today, the Northern Cheyenne Nation is one of the few American Indian nations to have control over the majority of its land base, currently at 98%.

Culture

A Cheyenne sun dance gathering, c. 1909.

Cheyenne courting scenes, by Big Back, before 1882

Over the past four hundred years, the Cheyenne have gone through four stages of culture. First they lived in the Eastern Woodlands and were a sedentary and agricultural people, planting corn, and beans. Next they lived in present day Minnesota and South Dakota and continued their farming tradition and also started hunting the bison of the Great Plains. During the third stage the Cheyenne abandoned their sedentary, farming lifestyle and became a full-fledged Plains horse culture tribe. The fourth stage is the reservation phase.

The traditional Cheyenne government system is a politically unified North American indigenous nation. Most other nations were divided into politically autonomous bands, whereas the Cheyenne bands were politically unified. The central traditional government system of the Cheyenne was the "Council of Forty-Four." The name denotes the number of seated chiefs on the council. Each of the ten bands had 4 seated chief delegates; the remaining 4 chiefs were the principal advisors of the other delegates. This system also regulated the Cheyenne military societies that developed for planning warfare, enforcing rules, and conducting ceremonies. This governing system was developed by the time the Cheyenne reached the Great Plains.

There is a controversy among anthropologists about Cheyenne society organization. When the Cheyenne were fully adapted to the classic Plains culture, they had a bi-lateral band kinship system. However, some anthropologists note that the Cheyenne had a matrilineal band system. Studies into whether the Cheyenne ever developed a matrilineal clan system are inconclusive.

Traditional Cheyenne plains culture

As they abandoned their agricultural villages near the Missouri River and acquired horses, the Cheyenne adopted the Plains Indian culture. This nomadic life where the men hunted^[24] and fought with and raided^[25] other tribes; and the women dressed and tanned hides^[26] and gathered roots, berries and other useful plants,^[27] and made from the products of hunting and gathering, the lodges, clothing, and other equipment^[28]was active and physically demanding.^[29] The range of the Cheyenne was first the area in and near the Black Hills, but later all the Great Plains from Dakota to the Arkansas River.

Notable Cheyenne

• Jimmy Carl Black, drummer and vocalist for The Mothers of Invention
• Ben Nighthorse Campbell, Northern Cheyenne, Former Senator, State of Colorado, United States Congress
• Chris Eyre, Southern Cheyenne and Southern Arapaho, directed the film: "Smoke Signals."
• Joseph Fire Crow, Northern Cheyenne, Cheyenne Flutist, Grammy Nominee and winner of numerous prestigious musical awards
• Suzan Shown Harjo, Southern Cheyenne and Muscogee (Creek), Founding Trustee, Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian; President, Morning Star Institute (a Native rights advocacy organization based in Washington DC).
• St. David Pendleton Oakerhater, "Okuhhatuh" or "Making Medicine," Southern Cheyenne (1847-1931), veteran of the Red River War, Fort Marion prisoner of war, ledger artist, deacon of Whirlwind Mission, sun dancer, canonized saint in the Episcopal Church
• Harvey Pratt, Southern Cheyenne and Southern Arapaho, painter, sculptor and a leading forensic artist in the United States
• W. Richard West Jr., Southern Cheyenne, Founding Director, Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian
• W. Richard West, Sr., "Dick West" or "Wahpahnahyah," Southern Cheyenne painter, educator, and Director of Art at Bacone College

See also

• Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes
• Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation
• Native American tribes in Nebraska
• Minnesota State University eMuseum Article on the Cheyenne

References

• The Southern Cheyenne, Donald J. Bertbrong, University of Oklahoma Press (1963), hardcover, 448 pages
• Brown, Dee, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970
• Mackenzie’s Last Fight with the Cheyenne by Bourke, John G. New York Argonaut Press, 1966
• The Fighting Cheyenne, George Bird Grinnell, University of Oklahoma Press (1956 original copyright 1915 Charles Scribner's Sons), hardcover, 454 pages ISBN 0-87928-075-1
• The Cheyenne Indians: Their History and Ways of Life by George Bird Grinnell, Yale University Press (1923) hardcover, 2 volumes, volume 1 358 pages, volume 2 430 pages; trade paperback reprints: The Cheyenne Indians, Vol. 1: History and Society, Bison Books (October 1, 1972) 406 pages, ISBN-10: 0803257716 ISBN-13: 978-0803257719; The Cheyenne Indians, Vol. 2: War, Ceremonies, and Religion, Bison Books (October 1, 1972), 478 pages, ISBN-10: 0803257724 ISBN-13: 978-0803257726
• Hoebel, E.A. "The Cheyennes".
• Life of George Bent: Written From His Letters, by George E. Hyde, edited by Savoie Lottinville, University of Oklahoma Press (1968), hardcover, 390 pages; trade paperback, 280 pages (March 1983) ISBN-10: 0806115777 ISBN-13: 978-0806115771
• Liquidation of Dull Knife by Lackie, William H. Nebraska History Vol. 22, 1941
• Moore, John H. (1996). The Cheyenne, The peoples of America. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 1557864845 9781557864840. OCLC 34412067. 
• Sandoz, Marie, Cheyenne Autumn. ISBN 0-8032-9212-0
• Stands in Timber, John, Cheyenne Memories. ISBN 0-300-07300-3
• Senate Report 708 by US Congress. 46th , 2nd Session, 1860-1891
• The Pursuit of Dull Knife from Fort Reno in 1878-1879 by Wright, Peter. Chronicles of Oklahoma Vol. 46, 1968

External links and further reading

• Cheyenne Arapaho Tribe (Official Site)
• Northern Cheyenne Nation (Official Site)
• Cheyenne Culture and History Links
• Repatriation of Cheyenne remains
• The Cheyenne Outbreak: The Battle of Turkey Springs and Red Hills
• Cheyenne perform Victory Dance to honor Marine tank driver
• WE, THE NORTHERN CHEYENNE PEOPLE: Our Land Our History, Our Culture Chief Dull Knife College, Lame Deer, Montana