The Columbus journal., 1910-01-19
THE THIRTY YEARS. SIOUX war
BY ]. H. TIBBLES.

I O1 j. II.
Bancroft, Neb., Jan. 40 the Ed.
tor Of The State Journal: Eastern
publishers are just beginning to find
out that there is great empire west
Of the Missouri river, teeming with
energetic, high spirited and intelligent
millions, and for the first time are
giving to the public books in which
are gathered the material from which
history will be written. The old nov
el, generally written in dialect which
no one who has lived on these plains
for the last fifty years ever heard
spoken, and filled with tales of out
laws, scalp hunting Indians, drunken
cowboys shooting up" the towns, is
all that We have had up to the present
time. Now matter of value is being
printed-matter that is much more in
teresting reading than the wild and
impossible trash that has go long filled
the booksellers shelves. The State
Journal is doing some valuable work
along that line. The articles of A. E.
Sheldon, if printed in book form,
would make a source book, to which
the writer's of the future would con.
stantly turn. As literature, they rank
with the best writings of the present
period, and there is far more enjoy.
ment for any sane mind in reading
them than reading any of the works,
either of fiction or history, which east.
ern writer's have produced. "The
Conquest of the Missouri" a volume
recently issued, it being practically
the memoirs of Captain Marsh, the
greatest of the old Missouri river pi'
lots and captains who navigated the
upper Missouri and the Yellowstone, il
a work of the same character as that
of Sheldon.
The truth about Indians, the cause
of the wars between them and the
whites, the true character of their
chiefs, is for the first time being put
into printed form, and among the men
who are doing this honest and accu.
rate historical work, Doane Robinson
of South Dakota, is among the fore
most. Some of US who have known
the facts haye often wondered whetb.
er what is called history, would in the
future be a mass of falsehoods, as it
has been in the past, or whether the
truth would be finally recorded and
accepted. Some of the great magazi-
nes are taking up this work and there
are now running in Putnam's a series
of articles on the Missouri river by
John G. Neihardt. 1t will be noticed
that all this valuable and accurate
work is being done by western men
men who write il the purest English
and with indescribable charm which
can be defined only with the words
good literature"
But the eastern publishers are yet
profoundly ignorant of this great west.
One Of them writing recently to a Ne.
braska author concerning some work
along these lines stated as an accepted
fact that Longs explorations and the
old Oregon trail were one and the
same thing.
It's very fortunate that this valu.
able work is being done while there
are some men still living who made
this history and who can, if they will,
correct any inaccuracies that may be
made, for however careful and honest
a writer may be, or however pains
taking he may be, in gathering his
materials, errors will occur. Doane
Robinson makes one of these errors
when he says that Gen. George Crook
had no idea of the number of hostile
Indians he would face when he started
out on that campaign against Crazy
Snake, and which ended in the de.
structure of Custer and his command.
1t fell to my lot to have a close per-
sonal companionship with General
Crook for several years. As thesaying
is I'VE just took to one another" o. per.
haps on account of the fact that the
general and l were the only white
men ever initiated into the soldier
LODGE" that is, as far as we could
learn. Both of US had met white men
who claimed to be members of the |
soldier lodge, but they could never
give US one of the signs. The years
that General Crook spent in Omaha
were years when we met almost every
day, sometimes at the old Herald edi-
tOrial roOm sometimes at Cnllins' hor.I