The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1876-08-09
The Indian Question.

Mr.. Steele, OF Wyoming, In the
United States House, during discns-
sion on the Indian bill, said it was not
fact that the military operations were
carried on without reference to the
peace policy. In 1858 the United States
had made treaty with the Sioux nation,
which was grave mistske, if it was not
a national dishonor and diygrace. That
treaty had been the foundation of all
the difficulties in the Sioux country, and
the cause of the death of Custer and his
men in the Big Horn country. In 1855
Gen. Pope established posts at Forts
Phil. Kearney, Reno and Q: F. Smith,
so as to open the roads to Montana and
to protect the country OF the friendly
Grows from the hostile Sioux. In keep
ing these posts and opening that road
many men, citizens and soldiers, had
been killed. Notable among the actions
that had taken place there were the
massacre of Fetterman and his command
at Fort Phil Kearney-ninety-si1 men
and officers; and yet after these men had
sacrificed their lives the government
went to work and made treaty by which
it ignominiously abandoned that coun-
try to these savages, dismantling it's own
posts, and leaving there the bones Of the
men who laid down their lives in the
wilderness. Was it to be wondered at,
under these circumstances, that Sitting
Bull and his men believed that they
were superior to the general govern
menta Anybody who knows anything
about the Indians nature, knows that
the legitimate result of that cowardly
policy of "peace at any Price was
only to defer the evil day which has now
come upon us. Since that time the
Sioux have been constantly depredating
on the frontiers of Nebraska. Wyoming
and Montana; and more men have fallen
there in the peaceful svocations OF civil
life, without murmur being heard, than
fell under the gallant Custer on the
twenty-6fth of June. The friendly
Grows have been raided upon with every
full moon, 80 with the Shoshones, and at
last these outrages have become 80 great
and 30 long continued that even the
peaceable Indian department could not
stand them any longer, and called onthe
military arm of the government to
punish these men. It was in carrying
out this policy that Custer and his men
have been sacrificed. l was up in that
country at the time that the COM
missioners were there attempting to
negotiate with the Sioux. At that time
Young Man Afraid of his Horses, the
hereditary chieitain of the Ogallala
tribe and the man who by birth is en-
titled to rule over these people, told me
that there was not in that northern coun-
try, under Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse,
more than from one hundred to two
hundred lodges, which would not give
them over eight hundred fighting men,
all told, and yet the report which we
now get is tnat there were 1900 lodges,
aggregatinly $500 or 1000 fighting men
in the encampment or village attacked
by Custer. Where did these men come
from3 They came from the agencies
where they had been fed and fattened
by our government and where they had
been better armed than the soldiers are.
They came from those reservations to
fight our troops, and if the present
policy is continued they will 60 back
there as soon as the snow falls to feed
themselves and their ponies for new
onerations next spring.