Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1922-08-27

the most terrible calamity that ever
befell the tribe, sweeping off in a
single day about half of their numbers
and leaving the survivors impoverished.
In the summer of that year a war
fever seemed suddenly to have pos
sessed the Crows, and party after
party took the field until eight large
bands had gone forth. comprising the
greater number of their warriors and
the flower of the tribe. While their
main village was left in this com
paratively defenceless condition, the
camp was suddenly assailed by a COM
bined force of Sioux and Cheyennes,
numbering more than 1000 men.
Half of Tribe Is Killed
The Crows, panic-stricken. fled mi
wild confusion over the plain toward
the ~neighboring hills. The Sioux and
C~heyennes rode them down and slew
the men as they ran. Hundreds were
overtaken and killed in and about the
village and hundreds more in the pur-
suit. which extended for miles. 1t
proved to be the most terrible butchery
that ever occurred on the western
plains within the range of history. AT
least 5000 Crows were killed, 1000 of
their lodges were destroyed and the
victors drove away with them hun-
dreds Of horses and 400 young women
and children. The Crows never again
regained the strength they had on the
morning of that fatal day.
When the Sioux retired the miserable
survivors gathered themselves together
once more, and before the war parties
returned some of the damage done had
been repaired. The men hunted with
success, the squaws tanned and sewed
and new lodges, robes and clothing rap
idly took the place of those that had
been destroyed. AS the various war
parties rode into camp a scene of
mourning became continuous.
Every Brave Suffers
Not a man but had lost his wife,
children or relatives. but this was not
all their punishment, for the village re-
sounded with upbraidings for their
selfishness in DESERVING the village in
a desire for glory. In bitterness and
despair hundreds of the men wandered
into the mountains, where they cut off
their hair, gashed themselves with
knives and nearly starved themselves
while their walls and lamentations
echoed through the hills.
The next spring a war council was
held and a plan of revenge against the
hated Sioux was developed. A power
full party of warriors set forth into the
Sioux country. Surrounding a small
village, the Crows attacked the lodges,
killing every man and capturing several
hundred young women. A similar at
tempt against the Blackfeet the same
year was equally successful, nearly
1000 women and girls being made cap
tive. A majority of these Sioux and
BlackfoOt women were taken as wives
by the Crows. AS a result the physical
type of the tribe was materially altered
by the infusion of alien blood.
Grows and BIackfeet Engage
Some years later, probably about
1885, there took place another bloody
battle in which the Crows suffered Sc
we're losses, but this time the enemy
were the Blackfeet instead of the
Sioux. The story of this fight was told
many years ago by a Blackfeet chief,
Little Plume, who witnessed it as a
young boy. His description follows:
at happened that the chief of the
Piegans. a mighty tribe of the great
Blackfeet confederation, and a small
party of his followers were camped on
Sun river. or Medicine river, as we
called it, when one morning a deputa-
ton of Crows came in, praying that q
council be held, saying that they were
weary of war and wished to make q
treaty that would insure peace between
them and the Blackfeet for all time to
come. In those days the Blackfeet
claimed all the territory between Belly
river on the north to the Yellowstone
river on the south as their hunting
grounds, but the Crows, who were
ever working %northward, disputed their
possession of a considerable stretch of
country, including the Judith basin and
the prairie lying north as far as the
Missouri. The consequence was that
the two tribes had been for many years
engaged in continual warfare, which