River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1878-11-07
THE INDIAN QUESTION.

IL Is Discussed at Length 6y Gen. Sherman
ia His Annaat Report-The Causes Of
Indian Wars-Our PoifeH CoHtrasted
Nth that of the British Government.
The following is an abstract of Gen. Sher-
idan TO Gen. Sherman concerning the work
and workings during the past year of the
military division of the Missouri. 1t con-
tains many interesting facts, which will be
very generally read throughout the West,
and its suggestions are such as will COM
mend themselves to all who are acquainted
with the state of affairs throughout the
Northwest, the West, and the Southw st.
No other army in the world has such a
difficult line to keep in order, and no army
in modern times has had such an amount OF
work put upon the same number of men. In
all other countries it is the custom to estab-
lish garrisons of not less than regiment or
abrigade, while we have for the performance
of similar duties only one or two companies.
With us regiments are rarely, if ever, to-
gether; the posts are generally garrisoned by
one, two, or four companies, who are ex
pected to hold and guard against one of
the
MOST ACUTE AND WARY FOES TX THE WORLD
a space of land that in amy other country
would be held by brigade. TO do this re-
quires sleepless vatchfulness, great activity,
and tireless energy, and l am gratified to
know that as a general thing, our officers
possess those soldierly qualities.
The reports of the several commanders
that accompany this will fully advise the
general of the army of the operations of the
troops in detail during the past year. The
frontier has been greatly advanced, aud
mineral and agricultural interests have been
largely Developed while the cattle and sheep
interests a.e assuming extraordinary pro
portions. The valley of the Yellowstone
and the valleys along the eastern base of the
Big Horn mountains are gradually opening
up with settlements and mail routes. The
mineral wealth of the Black Hills is now I'M
doubted, and ores exist in such quantities as
to be-almost inexhaustible, while the coun-
try around the foothills, embraced by the
south branch of the Cheyenne river and the
Belle-Fourche, presents the most favorable
prospects agriculturally. The progress OF
the settlements, and the increase of farming
and grazing interests IN Nebraska, Western
and Southern Kansas, and Northern and
Northwestern Texas, has been very great,
while the agricultural and mineral develop
more than kept pace with the healthy pro-
gress elsewhere noticed throughout this dl-
vision.
THE INDIAN SITUATION AT THE PRESENT TIME
is, am sorry to say, unsatisfactory. The
Indian department, owing to want of suffi-
cient appropriation or from wretched mis-
management, has given to the settlements IN
the Western country constant anxiety dur
ing the last year, and in some places loss of
life and loss of property, attended with
dreadful crimes and cruelties. There has
been an insuf1iciency Of food at the agencies,
and, as the game is gone, hunger has made
the Indians in some cases desperate, and
almost any race of men will rather fight
than starve. 1t seems to me, with wise man
agement, that the amounts appropriated by
Congress ought to be sufficient, if practically
applied to the exact purposes specified, and
if the supplies are regularly delivered, but
the reports of the department commanders
forwarded herewith would indicate different
result, except in the case of the Red Cloud
and Spotted Tail bands of Sioux, who, al
though threatening in their conduct, have
been the best supplied, and have been hui
mored until their increasing insolence con-
stantly threatens to bring about breach OF
the peace. | had hoped that the agencies
of these Indians would have
been retained on the Missouri river, where
they could have been fed and and looked
after at comparatively small expense; but
that would not have suited the traders and
contractors who fear, labored systemati-
cally last summer and fall to work up the
result which has been obtained, and now
their Indians are on worse ground than the
Missouri river bottom, and located at points
beyond the river lines of transportation;
for instance, Red Clouds band, where the
expense of feeding will be probably tive
times as great as on the Missouri river. In
addition, these Indians are now located near
the line of travel to the Black Hills, and are
on the extreme western limit of their reser-
walton, and where contact with the whites is
liable to frequently occur, and l doubt if, II
the present frame of mind of the Red
Cloud Indians, the two races can live SO
closely together without fighting.
There does not seem to be now, and there
never has been, much steadiness in the
management of the Indians, and, if it were
not for the results which SO severely involve
the military, this would be none of my bust
ness and would not be mentioned here.
They believed that all the region | have
described belonged to them, and
RIGHTLY
to the country and what it contained, but
alas for the poor savage, along came the
nineteenth century progress, or whatever il
may be called, to disturb their happy condi-
ton. The white men crowded on the
grounds of the Indians and made encroach-
ments on their rights which no government
could stop. Our handful Of soldiers was al
first sent to protect the Indians, but such at
tempts were powelless. The government
made treaties, gave presents, made promises
none of which were honestly fulfilled, and
like all original treaties with Indians IN this
country, they were the first steps in the pro
cess of developing hostilities The Indian
became Jealous; he made in his simplicity
blind bargains; he began to see his lands
wrested from his possession. his herds OF
buffalo, which believed the great spirit
had given him, rapidly diminish, and the elk,
deer, and antelope killed for the market, and
by the sportsman, and widely scattered by
both, and his rude nature under similar
conditions naturally rebeled. He COM
menced war, war as he had been accustomed
to make it, and men, women, and children
intruders upon his soil, were killed, no diff
ference being made between the innocent or
guilty, the armed or unarmed.
The government followed up these acts OF
hostility with an army too small to intimi-
date or even punish, and, after years oil
struggle, the Indians south of the Union
Pacific railroad and down to the Gulf of
Mexico, including the Cheyennes, Arapahoes,
Kiowas, and Comanches, were forced on to
reservations at Forts Sill and Reno, in the
Indian Territory, by the constant hammering
of an inadequate force.
Only breathing spell interviewed when
the same tide of restless emigration was at
tracted to the Northwest. The Black Hills
contained gold, the valleys of the South
Cheyenne, Belle-Fourche, and Yellowstone,
and along the eastern slope of the Big Horn
Mountains invited the agriculturist, while
the upper table land country presented the
finest grazing ranges in the world. The
northern herds Of buffalo had fattened upon
them for hundreds of years, and it was too
much for the wave of emigration to with
stand, and the invasion of this country COM
menced.
WAR WITH THE SIOUX FOLLOWED,
and when it ended the country was lost to
these Indians, and those who did not flee the
country to British America, found them
selves confined to a reservation embracing
the poorest of all this extensive region, with
agencies on the Missouri river, with the
exception of the Red Cloud band of Ogalla-
las and the Spotted Tail band of Brule Sioux,
whose agencies are now on White river.
Nebraska, so that in 1877, the great country
above referred to, which, IL 1869 belonged
A. IL 4 AL SINs.