New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1870-03-15
TBr N1TJONAL DISGRACE.


About the year 1890, white trader near
Council Bluffs finding himself cheated in
fur trade by some Pawnees, loaded n horse
with the clothes Of man who had died oil
the smallpox, drove it into their village, and
went on his way rejoicing. Two or three
months afterward, Col. Dougherty (the famous
Indian agent for so many years beyond the
Mississippi, with his troop, visited this village
for the purpose Of making the annual settle
ment. For miles along the prairie scattered
human bones were bleaching in the hot August
sun; as he came nearer, the bodies, sWelled
and putrefying, of the more recent victims
were found, usually at the edge OF the pools
or water-courses, where the poor wretchcs had
crept in their agony of thirst. In the village
itself there was the silence of death. Out OF
thirty villages visited by Doughcrty that Sum
mer, only two had escaped. Naturally mas
sacre of the whites followed the next winter;
and again, of course, this swas succeeded by
still more bloody slaughter of the Indians by
the Government troops. The sequence IS III
eyitabe, and has gone on since the beginning
1t is an old story, but one which clearly Illus
trates our mutual relations with the Indians
since the murders 10y the Paxton Boys and COL
Cresup hundred years ago, to that more
foul and cowardly one the other day when
army officers joculary dcnomnate as their
hard hit.
Il is time we looked this Indian question full
in fine face. The Cheyenne and Sioux is bar
barian-a filthy, lazy uncomfortable fact among
us; he Jars, perhaps, against our finer sense at
every turn; but he is our creditor. We have
To, tha ri "
breathe. 1t is a plain business matter; we
must pay him. But how9 He is thief, per-
haps a drunkard, and an assassin. and we are
n Christian people. But we have habltuaIly
sent out to deal with him, as pioneers OF our
civilization and Chist's gospel, traders Pixies,
and agents, who were drunkards, thieves, ana
assassns. They showed him the way. Now
how shall we punish him because he followed
How shall we punish this ignorant savage for
being savagc2 Being Christian people, and
hidden to preach the Gospel to every creature,
can we deal with the Indian in no other mode
than by becoming more bcastly and barbarous
than heP While we stretch out one hand 10
stay the HindoO mother from sacrificing her
child, are we to pat with the other those gal
liant officers and Christian gentlemen APPROX
ingly Oh the head, who cut the Threats OF women,
and strangc babies at their mothers breasts
If this is the only method left us of meeting
the problem of this relic of heathepdom IN
our midst, then our civilization and Chris
tianity are proven to be impotcnt shams and
lies. If we are driven to take up the red
mans weapons, it must be because our own
are less strong than his. Gen. Sheridan meets
the matter boldly, and defends the late mas
sacrc by saying that either the whites or
| Indians must be murdered; and we for our
part meet it on the other hand, and assert
! that if centuries of education and Christianity
cannot raise us whit above the Indians but
have left us, like them, brutal towards, mere
women and baby strangers there Is no reason
to choose between us. Better the redskins
should be left to torment Us on the border,
than these successful butchers in our army to
condemn us in the eyes Of the world and of
| God.
Government has too long wlfully remained
blind to these outrages upon the Indians on
the frontier. of which this last, though the
most garing, is but one of class. 1t is, we
know, vexatiOus difficult question, but it
never has been fairly met. Slavery was as
difficult; expcdiency and political interest
with swift and terrible action. The Indian in
diets us for wrongs and cruelty as deep as
those of the negro; we may call it senti-
mental and pulling to plead them; the lightest
question of price in stocks or fall in dry goods
seems to us n more weighty and real matter
than the cheated and wretched savages on our
border. There is but one thing however, GER
tain in history-that in the lives of nations, as
individuals the great currents of right and
wrong ebb and flow steadily toward enghten-
ment or barbarism-cuuents which, under all,
God rules and that it is not questions of dry
goods and stocks which bring upon a nation
either punishment or ACKNOWLEDGMENT, but
human or religious rights infringed. England,
in India laid aside her Christianity to meet
heathenism with hcathcnish cruelty, and was
taught her mistake at Lucknow and Gavin
pore. We have just atoned by the most bloody
civil war ever known to the world. for our
treatment of the negro. 1t is too soon for the
lesson to be lost on us.