Kansas agitator. [volume] (Garnett, Kan.) 1890-1905, 1891-02-17
TALKS ABOUT INDIANS.
Trouble Arising From Race Antagonist
Squaws Killed Hardly Deserve Pity.

"Our trouble with the Indians seem
chiefly to arise from race antagonism,
pure and simple" says Mr.. Theodore
Roosevelt. 1.-The whites, on the one
hand, make no distinction worth mon
tioning between good Indians and bad
ones, while the Indians themselves, are
apparently as little inclined to draw like
distinctions with regard to the pale
faces.
For example, if white man has his
horse stolen by a thieving savage, he
considers himself warranted in exacting
PREPARATION from the first friendly and
honest Indian he meets. have known
a hunting party OF whites to lose ascOre
OF horses by raid from predatory
band OF Sioux, by which occurance, the
losers considered themselves warranted
In making descent upon the nearest
village of innocent red men OF another
tribe and driving of at least as many of
their animals. Again, have known In
dams who have suffered depredations at
the hands of lawless white ruffians to at
tack cowboy camp in search OF revenge
If an Indian experiences an indik-
nifty or outrage from one white man he
will kill the next white man he comes
across, though the latter may be entire
ly inOffensive; and so it goes. To the
whites all Indians are the same, and
vice versa.
lone thing should like to be quoted
as saying, with much emphasis, and that
is that the Indian police and judges
ought to be paid much better than they
are. In the recent skirmish in connec-
ton with the arrest of Sitting: Bull
the Indian police behaved admirably,
and the government should provide for
the families of those who were killed, as
we'll as reward the survivors. My own
experience of Indians has been very linn
tied. They are always treated white on
my ranch, and the same cannot be said
of many other ranches, I regret very
much to say"
Said an old soldier who had fought
the Indians with Custer, now employed
at the Treasury Department.:
KILLING OF SQUAWS.
''This talk that has been made about
the, killing of the Indian women by tho
troops during the recent difficulty ii
altogether unfair. When fighting ID
going on the squaws usually are on
hand to take part in the scrimmage.
If their side is victorious they rush IN
with knives and often do "a great deal Of
execution. They ride astride like tho
men, and 1t is apt to be impossible to
distinguish them in the fray from tho
warriors. though they keep in the rear
until their opportunity arrives. 1t h
not the fault of the soldiers If few Of
them get shot, and people would not
feel so much like sympathizing With
their fate if they were aware of the fact
that it is the squaws who do the mutt
lating of the bodies of their fallen foes.
BLooDTHIRsTY WOMEN.
Son all occasion when the troops may
chance to be driven back the squaws
dash forward on their ponies and dis
mounting proceed with their knives to
murder the wounded and mutflate the
bodies in every fiendish way Imaginable
If possible they take away parts of the
dismembered corpses for holding horri-
BILE Publications over afterward. AS
for the warriors, they rarely do more
than take scalps, though frequently
they will take more than one from q
single person. The chief honor, of
course, attaches to him who cuts off
the disc-shaped piece of flesh from the
very crown of the head with the tuft Of
hair attached, but it is also honorable
to take a second, third or even a
fourth scalp from other, parts of the
skull. However, there must always be
a scalp lock attached. An Indian will
never take any scalp from bald-headed
man, so that there is some advantage
in having lost ones wool if one lives in
the far west"
An