The Worthington advance., 1878-11-07

or six months: and so cents for three
months, to :" "Ap,v,As,,c;Ez.. J.. worthingtoni
Nobles county, Minnesota" - >i.:::.,,
OF the British Possessions on tho north, and
| almost to the Gulf of Mexico on the south.
had passed into the hands Of the whitea'
with the exception Of the limited reservations
assigned to the indians, and With. no, cum
pensatlon beyond the promise of RELIGIONS
instruction, schools, supplies Of food and
clothing, and an opportunity of learning the
ways in which the white man cultivated the
Rround-most of which promises have never
been fulfilled. In other words, We took their
country and their means of support, broke
up their living, their habits of life, intro
duced disease and decay among them, and il
was for this and against this they made war.
Could any one expect less?' Then why won
der at Indian difficulties? :
These Wars might have been regarded a .
inevitable, and therefore sufficient number
OF soldiers should have been provided to
meet them, but it was not done, and hence
the fatal results which followed. No other
nation in the world would have attempted
the reduction of these wild tribss and occu-
patton of their country with less than 10000
to 70, 600 men, while the whole force en-
ployed and scattered over the enormous re-
gion described never numbered $4,000 men.
and nearly one-third of this force has been
confined to the line of tho Rio Grande to
p,otect tho Mexican frontier. The conse-
quence was that every engagement was = for
lorn hope, and was attended *ith
loss OF life unparalleled in warfare.
No quarter was given to the sava-
gfs, and the officers and men had to enter
on their duties with the most barbarous cru
elites staring them in the face in case
of defeat. Nor was this misfortune confn-
ed 10 the soldier: it extended to the settler,
who was himself killed, or came home to see
bis wife and children murdered and his
stock stolen. Such, in truth, has been the
contest on our western frontier during the
last ten years.. It would have been less ex-
pensive if an army of 10000 or 10000 had
been maintained, and, moreover, the blood
of gallant officers, soldiers, and citizens
would not have rested on our hands. This,
then, was
THE FIRST CAUSE OF OUR INDIAN WARS.
They would have occurred, no matter
what course or policy the government might
have adopted. We could not deprive these
primitive people of their homes where they
had lived in barharous contentment for cen.
turies without war, and the only thing
strange ab.ut these wars was the manner
and means adopted by the government to
meet them.
The second outbreak of Indian hostilities
is caused in this way. After he has lost his
country he finds himself compelled to re-
main on reservations. his limits circum-
scribed, his opportunities of hunting
abridged, his game disappearing, sickness in
his lodge from change Of life and food, and
insuficiency of the latter, and this irregular
" supplied, and the reflection coming to him
of what he now is, and pinched by hunger,
creates feeling of dissatisfaction which, in
the presence of good strong force of SOL
diers. started: him out on the ar-path again,
and unarmed people are killed, settlements
are broken up, farms are abandoned, and
general confusion EXISTS. This condition Of
affairs is we'll illustrated by tie recent out
break Of Northern Cheyennes, who lat. "
| abandoned their reservation at Fo,t Reno.
and the same might be sac of the
! outbreak of the Nez Perces last year, and
certainly of that of the Bannucks and Sho-
shones in this year, of the Cheyennes,
Kiowas. and Commanches in 1874. and un-
less wiser measures prevail hereafter it will
go on. The Grows will come in next, the
Assinabolnes and Gray Ventres and wild
tribes north of the Missouri will be obliged
to follow. Spotted Tails and Red Clouds
people will be driven to the same conditions
eventually, and so on down to the tribes in
the western part of the Indian Territory. To
H.
may occur, We are entirely unprepared, for,
without exposing other important points, we
can collect together but a few hundred
men.
Now that the game, upon which tho Itdi-
ans depended for their regular supply of
food, is gone, we shall require great sup
ply of rations with perfect regularity in it's
issue, to meet the ne eds of these people, to-
gether with strong and stable government,
backed up by sufficient number of soldiers
to enforce spirit of obedience, and to keep
these restless savages within the limits Of
their reservations.
In answer to the frequent remarks about
THE GOOD MANAGEMENT OF THE INDIANS IN
BRITISH AMERICA,
it is only necessary for me to state that they
have never had the conditions existing there
which We have had here. They never had
10 encounter tide of emigration which for
chilly took away the lands of tho Indians,
and which was so great no government
could resist it, and which not only
absorbed their lands, but killed the game on
which the Indians subsisted. Consequently,
the conditions then we're brought down to
simply making a profitable trade with the
Indiana and ~ f1,rkhop fhia fhov n
ried, and the Indian being the most clannish
of all existing races Chs only government
being that of clans), they gradually extended
their influence by the Indians regarding
them as part of their own people. This
was notably the case with the Hudson Bay
company, which almost every agent, from
Gov. Douglass down to the simple employe,
took an Indian wife, aud thereby extended
the influence of their government and trade
by this plan Of assimilation.
It is scarcely necessary to mention to tho
general of the army that to accomplish the
changes which have described was the duty
which
has been performing for the past ten years,
and no body of men of the same size was
ever before so hardly taxed, mentally and
physically, or compelled to make such haz-
! ardous and exacting marches; and no body
of men of equal numbers ever overcame 80
many embarrassing obstacles in their unequal
contest with willy savages, and none ever
lost SO heavily in officers and men. Their
battles, as heretofore mentioned, were Z
series of forlorn hopes, mainly on account
| of the inadequacy of the number of troops
engaged, aud the peculiarities of savage
warfare.
Inc Sp,rit ivOrid.
The very grave is passage into the
| heahfifnl and ulnricns We have laid