Man on Two Ponies

by Don Worcester

  A large crowd of angry Ghost Dancers immediately surrounded Thunder Bear and his men, brandishing Winchesters and shouting “Kill them!” Hearing the commotion, the chiefs rushed out and saw the crowd recklessly jabbing the police with cocked rifles. Somehow American Horse made himself heard above the tumult. Even though he’d lost prestige by signing the land agreement, his voice was still forceful enough to command attention.

  “Stop!” he shouted. “Think what you are doing! Killing these men of our own race? Then what? Kill all the helpless white men and women? What will these brave deeds lead to in the end? How long can you hold out? Our country is surrounded by railroads. Thousands of white soldiers will be here in three days. How many bullets have you? What will you do for food? What will become of your families? Think, think, my brothers. This is a child’s madness.”

  The crowd fell silent and the warriors lowered the hammers on their rifles and released the police. Jack Red Cloud, who had been stirring up the crowd, now rushed up to American Horse and stuck a cocked pistol in his face. “It’s you and your kind who brought us to this,” he shouted.

  American Horse ignored him as not worthy of notice, turned his back, and with head erect walked up the steps to the council room and closed the door behind him. The police could only watch as the Ghost Dancers dispersed, taking the smirking Little with them.

  That evening Royer called Dr. Charles Eastman, an eastern Sioux who was the reservation physician, to his office. Already there were Special Agent John Cooper, the chief clerk, and a Sioux Episcopal minister named Cook. “I want your advice,” Royer told them. “Do you think I should ask for troops?” Only Eastman and Cook were opposed, for both were confident that the Oglalas had no desire to start a war. The arrival of bluecoats, they knew, could easily change that.

  After they left Royer asked chief of police Sword, Thunder Bear, and American Horse the same question. All three, who had been threatened by angry Ghost Dancers, approved. They were sure that troops from Camp Robinson in Nebraska had already been ordered to Pine Ridge, and that the agent had called them in merely to gain their approval of an action he’d already taken.

  The next morning an Oglala appeared at Royer’s office. “I come from Little,” he said through an interpreter.

  “Is he ready to surrender?”

  “No! He demands that you fire all those police who tried to arrest him. He says if you don’t he’ll make big trouble for you and American Horse the next ration issue.” Royer wiped his moist face with his handkerchief. The Ghost Dancers had openly defied him, and he was powerless to punish them. Now that villain Little was even threatening him. It was too much to bear.

  He wired the Indian Bureau that 200 maddened Ghost Dancers had seized control of the agency. The police are powerless and discouraged, he said. “We have no protection. We are at the mercy of the crazy dancers.” Troops must be sent immediately to Pine Ridge. He begged for permission to come to Washington so he could explain the situation in person. The Secretary of the Interior showed the message to the President, who remarked that the army was already looking into conditions at the Sioux agencies. For the present, he said, the agents should do nothing more than separate friendly Indians from the Ghost Dancers. They must be careful to avoid any action that might irritate the Indians.

  The Indian Commissioner relayed the message to Royer, adding that if conditions were as bad as he claimed it was hardly the proper time for him to leave his post. But because of the flood of pleas and demands for protection from the citizens of Nebraska and South Dakota, on November 13 the Commissioner glumly recommended that Secretary Noble alert the War Department concerning the emergencies at Pine Ridge and Rosebud and request assistance. The President, when informed of the request, directed the Secretaiy of War “to assume responsibility for suppressing any threatened outbreak, and to take such steps as may be necessary to that end.”

  At his Chicago headquarters, General Miles ordered his subordinates in Omaha and St. Paul, the commanders of the departments of Platte and Dakota, to prepare to send troops to the Sioux agencies if necessary. Royer’s distraught telegram of November 15 convinced authorities in Washington that troops were needed immediately.

  “Indians are dancing in the snow and are wild and crazy,” Royer stated. “I have fully informed you that the employees and government property at this agency have no protection and are at the mercy of the Ghost Dancers. Why delay by further investigation? We need protection, and we need it now. I have submitted to you the result of six weeks’ calm, conservative investigation, and nothing short of 1000 soldiers will settle this dancing. The leaders should be arrested and confined in some military post until this matter is quieted, and this should be done at once. Royer, Agt.”

  Two days later Miles ordered Brigadier General John Brooke, commander of the Department of the Platte, to dispatch troops to the trouble spots—Pine Ridge and Rosebud—to arrive at exactly the same time at each agency. Brooke was to station most of his command along the railroads south of the two agencies and west of the Pine Ridge reservation. “You are to keep pressure on the Indians by your presence only,” Miles instructed his field commanders. “Do not come into active contact with them unless it is impossible to avoid doing so. ’ ’ Two trainloads of troops, horses, and equipment were dispatched that night, one to Valentine for Rosebud, the other to Rushville for Pine Ridge.

  At daybreak on November 20, round-faced, white-haired General Brooke, accompanied by Royer and Special Agent Cooper who met him at Rushville at his request, rode into Pine Ridge. Following them were three troops of the black Ninth Cavalry, five companies of infantry, and Hotchkiss and Gatling guns. The troops marched through the agency and set up tents in neat rows on high ground overlooking Pine Ridge. The soldiers were armed with single shot Springfield rifles and carbines the army had adopted seventeen years earlier. The Tetons had acquired the most recent model Winchester repeating rifles.

  The Oglalas were alarmed and excited by the coming of the bluecoats, but they did nothing to cause trouble and only a few fled. When Brooke sent messages to the cabin settlements for the friendlies to camp at the agency, they began streaming toward Pine Ridge, accompanied by many Ghost Dancers. Soon there were large tipi camps near the agency. Brooke also ordered all white and mixed blood employees—teachers, farmers, and missionaries—to bring their families to Pine Ridge. Several whites were so fearful they didn’t stop at the agency but continued on to the safety of towns in northern Nebraska.

  The Oglala Ghost Dancers went wild when they learned that troops were at Pine Ridge, and for a time all was confusion. Then Little Wound took charge, and they resumed dancing with greater intensity than ever. Hundreds more joined those on White Clay Creek, all of them determined to fight if troops interfered. When the dances began a few months earlier, no one had been permitted to bring a gun. Now the dancers had cartridge belts draped over their shoulders and carried Winchesters. No one who saw them could doubt that they were ready to kill anyone who tried to stop the dancing.

  Little Wound sent a message to Brooke. “We have done nothing wrong,” he said. “Our dance is a religious one, and we are going to dance until spring. If we find that the Messiah doesn’t appear we will stop dancing. I have been told that you intend to stop our rations. For my part I don’t care. The rations we get amount to little. We don’t intend to stop dancing for them.”

  When the bluecoats marched into Rosebud the Brulés panicked, and more than a thousand fled. Most were with old Two Strike, who headed for Pine Ridge. Small bands under Eagle Pipe, Crow Dog, and others rode to the northwest comer of the Rosebud reservation before continuing on to join Short Bull’ s camp on Pass Creek.

  Billy watched for Pawnee Killer whenever new groups arrived, for he was sure his father was still a believer. Finally he asked Short Bull where his father was.

  “When Sitting Bull talked about a big war in the spring,” Short Bull replied, “your father and some others who’d been with him in Grandmother’s La
nd went to Standing Rock to be with him. I told them not to go, for the Messiah will take care of the Wasicuns in his own way, but they wouldn’t listen to me. They’d rather drive the Wasicuns away themselves than let the Messiah do it. They did promise to keep on dancing.”

  As Eagle Pipe and his people streamed into the camp, Billy was astonished but thrilled to see Mollie Deer-In-Timber in one of the wagons, looking worried and frightened.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I had no choice. I was on my way to visit my mother when they came along, running away from the soldiers. They made me come. I’m afraid.”

  “Stay with me and you’ll be safe.” A young Oglala couple he knew had a small tipi to themselves, and they were happy to share it with Mollie and Billy. “They’ll think we’re married,” Billy told her. “We should be, anyway.” She looked at him wide-eyed.

  “But we’ll just pretend we’re married, won’t we? We won’t...?” Billy frowned but nodded in agreement, for that wasn’t what he wanted to hear. Now he had to tell Bull Bear and his wives he was moving out. Mollie waited while he went for his blankets and rifle. Bull Bear was away, but Bright Star and White Faun were in the tipi.

  “Our leader, Short Bull, wants me to move,” Billy told the women. “I must do as he says. Maybe I can come back later.” Both looked shocked and disappointed as he snatched up his belongings and left before they could question him or try to persuade him to stay.

  He waited impatiently for night to come, when he and Mollie wrapped up in his blankets. He could hear movements across the tipi, then the young Oglala woman moaned softly, and his heart beat faster. Mollie stiffened when he put his arm around her and pulled her close.

  “Remember,” she whispered, “Just pretend.”

  “You’re the only one I ever wanted for a wife,” he whispered, stroking her legs. She pushed his hand away. “I was so unhappy at Carlisle I never realized how much I loved you,” he continued. Running his hand over her legs again, while she half-heartedly pushed it away. “I see your face every night in my dreams. Now, at last, I’m with you, and I’m not dreaming.” This time she didn’t resist.

  In the morning, as the two of them walked through the camp, Billy was aching with love for her. Somehow I must persuade her to stay with me. He was suddenly aware they were being watched and turned his head slightly. Out of the comer of his eye he saw Bright Star and White Faun glowering at Mollie as if they’d like to kill her.

  At Pine Ridge Red Cloud was nearly blind and unable to maintain his role as head chief, but he urged the Oglalas to remain calm. American Horse and Red Shirt still opposed the Ghost Dance, but other chiefs and many of their people camped at the agency still supported the dancers. Young-Mao-Afraid-of-His-Horses and some of his people had gone to visit the Crows. Jack Red Cloud, who’d been one of the most active dancers, now rejected the Ghost Dance and joined the friendlies.

  Although the daily sight of bluecoats and the sound ofbugles irritated the Oglalas and made them nervous, the troops had been sent to protect the agency and the families there, not to stop the Ghost Dance or provoke a war. Brooke assured the chiefs that the troops would harm no one, not even the Ghost Dancers. That satisfied those at the agency, but not the defiant ones in the dance camps.

  The day that troops arrived at Pine Ridge, many Oglala Ghost Dancers had second thoughts about continuing the dance and talked of going to the agency. To dissuade them, the fanatic Porcupine insisted that they let him demonstrate the effectiveness of the Ghost Shirts. While Big Road and No Water and their people watched, Porcupine stood facing Bull Calf, who reluctantly aimed his Winchester at him. “Go ahead and shoot,” Porcupine ordered. Bull Calf fired, and Porcupine fell to the ground, badly wounded.

  Shocked, Big Road and No Water held council. A few die-hards insisted on continuing the dance, but most had lost faith in the Messiah’s coming and agreed to go to the agency. Big Road sent word to Little Wound, then he and No Water took their people to Pine Ridge. Shaken by the news that the Ghost Shirts he had learned about in a trance wouldn’t stop bullets, Little Wound rode into Pine Ridge a few days later and informed Brooke that his people were following.

  General Miles, who had presidential ambitions, greatly exaggerated the Sioux danger. It was clear that the Tetons would fight only if troops tried to stop the dancing; they had no plan for starting a general war or of attacking white settlers around the reservations. “Since the days of Pontiac, Tecumseh, and Red Jacket,” Miles proclaimed, speaking of Sitting Bull, “no Indian has had the power of drawing to him so large a following of his race and molding and wielding it against the authority of the United States.” He was sure that Sitting Bull was plotting a general uprising, and concluded that he should be arrested, but quietly, without starting a fight. Far from attracting a large number of Tetons, Sitting Bull had only about 400 followers, more than half of them women and children. Most of the Hunkpapas opposed him.

  General Miles continued to send reinforcements to the trouble spots, while stationing others in a cordon around all the Teton reservations. To Pine Ridge came four companies of the Second Infantry and another troop of the Ninth Cavalry. On November 26 the entire Seventh Cavalry Regiment under Colonel James Forsyth arrived from Fort Riley, Kansas. The Oglalas had good reason to remember Long Hair Custer’s regiment, for the Tetons had destroyed half of it when Custer charged their camps on the Greasy Grass. Four companies of the Twenty-first Infantry reached Rosebud from Fort Sidney, Nebraska. Miles now had nearly half of the entire U.S. Army on or near the Teton reservatons. He also authorized Brooke to recruit two companies of Indian scouts, and forty Oglalas and Northern Cheyennes enlisted.

  To help preserve the calm at Pine Ridge, on November27 Brooke ordered Royer to restore the rations to the amount specified in treaties. Their stomachs full for the first time in years, the Oglalas accepted the presence of troops, but hoped they’d soon march away.

  Two Strike’s people looted abandoned cabins in their path and gathered horses and cattle as they crossed the Pine Ridge reservation to Wounded Knee Creek, about fifteen miles from the agency. There they joined a party of Wazhazhas. After the other Brulé refugees reached Short Bull’ s camp on Pass Creek, the whole group traveled up the White River until they met the Oglalas camped at the mouth of White Clay Creek, where they resumed the dancing.

  On the morning of November 28, Short Bull assembled his people. “Last night,” he told them, “four stars came down from the sky and spoke to me. ‘take your people to the Stronghold in the Badlands,’ they told me. ‘the Messiah is ready to come back to earth, and as soon as your people are dancing at the Stronghold, he will come to you there.’ “Short Bull smiled, while the people murmured in pleasure at this good news.

  Excited, Billy glanced at Mollie, who stood by his side. Her eyes were open wide, but Billy was sure she didn’t believe Short Bull’s story. She seemed happy to be with him, but Billy noticed that much of the time she looked sad. “You don’t think the Messiah is really coming, do you?” he asked. She shook her head.

  “Our minister says it’s not true, that all who expect him to come will be disappointed. All this dancing is for nothing.” He wanted to tell her that he had seen the Messiah more than once, and each time he’d promised to come, but refrained.

  “I want to go home,” she said. “Why do these men threaten to kill anyone who leaves?” He didn’t answer. He knew that because the fanatics refused to allow anyone to leave, Mollie was still with him. Otherwise she and the large number of nonbelievers would have left as soon as they’d been assured the troops wouldn’t attack them. I can’t bear the thought of her leaving. How can I make her want to stay?

  At that moment Mash-the-Kettle beckoned to Billy. “Short Bull needs to send messages and wants you to write them,” he said. Billy hurried to Short Bull.

  “Tell Two Strike, Big Foot, Hump, and Sitting Bull what the stars told me,” he said. “Urge them to come to the Stronghold before the Messiah arrives. Tell Sit
ting Bull that as the most famous Teton chief, he especially should be there to welcome the Messiah.” Billy wrote the letters and Short Bull sent riders off with them. It was no longer safe to send men to the agencies to mail them.

  The next day Short Bull and his large following, more than a thousand men, women, and children, moved down the White River to the northeast, while Two Strike’s people headed north down Wounded Knee Creek, gathering stray cattle and looting cabins. On December 1 the two parties met on the White River. Now all of the remaining Ghost Dancers from Rosebud and Pine Ridge were together. There were so many warriors among them they had no fear of bluecoats.

  As the long procession traveled north under a gray sky and facing an icy wind and light snow, Mollie rode sadly in a wagon. Billy’s thoughts were on the new world the Messiah had promised, a world of Indians and buffalo. Mollie’s words had raised some doubts in his mind and shaken his faith, but like the other believers, he still pinned all his hopes on the Messiah. He couldn’t bear to think about what would happen to the Tetons if the Messiah failed them. In that case he might as well be dead.

  They reached the shelter of the high cliffs around the plateau that joined the Stronghold and camped there, sheltered from the gale. When they rolled up in their blankets and he pressed his face against Mollie’s, hers was wet with tears. She lay limply by his side, and he knew she wouldn’t stop him, but he loved her too much to do more than pat her shoulder. She won’t be happy until she’s back with her husband. It doesn’t matter if I live or die.

  In the morning they resumed their journey up a trail to the plateau, where there was no shelter from the bitter wind. On to the north they went, shivering in the freezing weather. At the northern end of the plateau they came to a land bridge leading to another high mesa. The bridge was barely wide enough for wagons to cross, and it was the only entrance.