St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1895-08-14
HAVE EASILY COST UNCLE SAM
"a FULL BILLION OF DOL
LARS.
NOW A THING OF THE PAST,
THE BATTLE OF WOUNDED
KNEE BEING THE WATER.
Leo OF THE INDIAN,
NOT ENOUGH LEFT TO FIGHT.
The Few Tribes still in Existence
y Peacefully COrrnlled on
Reservations.

Ihere was an engagement at
wounded Knee, S. D., on Dec 20,
1880, between United States. troops
and Sioux Indians. The whites lost
one officer and twenty-four men,
While their adversarieS were disas-
trously defeated with loss of 12S
warriors, says the Philadelphia
Press. This has never ranked among
the great battles of the world; the
forces engaged and casualties suf-
tered seemed trifiing compared with
those of a Waterloo or a Gettys-
burg; and yet it was in reality one
OF the most tragically decisive con-
nlcts that the world has ever SEEN
For it was the last stand of the man
Oh the stone age against the all
conquering European-the last time,
in all probability, that the two shall
ever meet in battle array. It was the
expiring gasp of the vanquished in
four-century-long conflict for lord
ship over the fairest continent on the
globe.
No entirely reliable estimates can
be made of the Indian population
four centuries ago.. but the most
probable would fix it at not more
than half million. The Indians, ac-
cording to their own statements,
were at the time of the advent of
the Europeans eXterminat ting them
selves. They told fabulous stories of
f,.;l -
now extinct; of vast hordes of large
sized men in the west of the CONT
nent who were overcome and de-
stroyed.
Their numbers have persistently
dwindled down to the present time.
The census of 1850, which was the
first that took an enumeration of the
Indians, placed them at an even 4OO,-
600, and in 1890 they counted not quite
100000. The extinction is not pro-
crossing, it is true, as rapidly as
did that of the Indians under Span
ish rule in the more Southern parts
Of the continent, nor have they faded
away like the South Sea islanders
under single generation of Euro
pean domination, but none the less
surely it is a matter of but a few
decades more, until the Indian races
of the United States will have ceased
to have
a SEPARATE EXISTENCE.
Twenty-one stocks are already eX-
tinct, and only $50 tribes and parts
of tribes, many of them so mixed as
not to contain a single pure blooded
individual of the original stock, re-
main in place of the far more numer-
Gus tribal names known to history.
In 1890 the deaths among the Indians
exceeded the birth 800, and the phys
zeal condition of the most of the
tribes was reported as deplorable
The red man, contrary to the 'gener-
al belief in this regard, is not natur-
ally brave, but constitutionally a
coward. He fights behind trees and
rocks, and usually begins his wars
with the murder Of women and chill
dren. He is always treacherous, a
past master in all the arts of cru
city, and never generous to a fallen
foe. In no instance has he been
found capable of contending on equal
terms with white troops, and the
regiments raised by thu Southern
Confederacy among the civilized ma
lions of the Indian territory We're
found almost useless for services
against the North. But the Indian
lights When cornered like a devil in
carnate. The very Indians who seem
brutally brave in the shock of bat
tie, when compelled to fight for their
lives, are at other times arrant cow
ards. The fierce and warlike Apaches
OF Arizona, cruel and apparently
brave in warfare, hide like towards
at night, and traveller and soldier is
always safe from their attacks after
the light has faded away The once
dreaded Brule Sioux on the Brule
reservation, South Dakota, will not
venture abroad at night, and, when
forced to do so, will keep up
an incessant hallooing, listening
eagerly for the answer of friendly
shouts
Yet the Indian has done a good
deal of fighting with the forces of.
this government. More than forty
wars of more or less ma gnitude have
taken place since 1776. They are
estimated to have cost the lives of
ABOUT $4,000 white men, women and
children, including 5000 killed in in
d1vidual combats; and the lives of
$4,000 Indians, $500 of whom were
likewise killed in private affairs. 1t
Will be seen that according to this
showing the Indian has had decided
ly the worst of it in the battle for a
continent which he already held pos
session. But the actual number of
Killed and wounded Indians must be
very much greater than the estimate
given, as they conceal where possible
their actual loss in battle, and carry
off or
SECRETE THEIR WOUNDED.
An enumeration of all these wars
would be extremely tedious. Most of
them were of brief duration, and al
ready forgotten. Few of them will live
In history, unless it be in the trucu-
lent pages of the dime novelist. sur
rounded by romantic glories that the
combatants would not have been able
to- comprehend. The Florida war of
1883, which employed over 10000 United
states troops, was probably the most
extensive Indian campaign which the
government ever carried on. The most
recent ones have been against the
Northern Cheyennes and Sioux in 1876
~, against the NeZ-Perces in 1877, the
Pannocks in 1878 and the Northern
Cheyennes in 1879. The list ends with
the Sioux campaign of 1880.
The number of actions between regu-
lar troops and Indians since 1866 has
been 0eS md LIZ nn0 oHino,r 81 -.