by Enss, Chris
1. Patrick M. Mendoza, Ann Strange-Owl-Raben, and Nico Strange-Owl, Four Great Rivers to Cross: Cheyenne History, Culture and Traditions, 61, 74–75; Grace Jackson Penney, Tales of the Cheyennes, 2–4.
2. Penney, Tales of the Cheyennes, 2–4; George Bird Grinnell, The Cheyenne Indians: Their History & Lifeways, 202–3.
3. Grinnell, Cheyenne Indians, 202–3; Report of the Secretary of War Sand Creek Massacre, 182; George E. Hyde, Life of George Bent Written from His Letters, 241–43.
4. Hyde, Life of George Bent, 200–201; Patrick M. Mendoza, Song of Sorrow: Massacre at Sand Creek, 106; Peter Harrison, Mochi: Cheyenne Woman Warrior, 4; Galveston Daily Bulletin, December 1, 1868; Linda Wommack and John L. Sipes, Jr., “Mo-chi: First Female Cheyenne Warrior,” Wild West Magazine, April 2008.
5. Wommack and Sipes, “Mo-chi: First Female Cheyenne Warrior”; Hyde, Life of George Bent, 164–68.
6. Hyde, Life of George Bent, 132, 177; New York Times, July 23, 1865.
7. Hyde, Life of George Bent, 178; Mendoza, Song of Sorrow, 131.
8. Galveston Daily Bulletin, December 1, 1868.
9. Galveston Daily News, August 9, 1886.
10. Mendoza, Song of Sorrow, 110–11, 128.
11. Hyde, Life of George Bent, 178–82.
12. Ibid.; Mendoza et al., Four Great Rivers to Cross, 75.
13. Mendoza, Song of Sorrow, 110–11; Galveston Daily News, August 9, 1886.
14. Galveston Daily Bulletin, December 1, 1868.
15. Mendoza, Song of Sorrow, 144; Wommack and Sipes, “Mo-chi: First Female Cheyenne Warrior,” http://home.epix.net~landis/mochi.html as prepared by John L. Sipes; Harrison, Mochi: Cheyenne Woman Warrior, 4; Mendoza et al., Four Great Rivers to Cross, 75; Emporia Daily Gazette, April 13, 1925.
16. Emporia Daily Gazette, April 13, 1925; Hutchinson News, July 16, 1972; Hyde, Life of George Bent, 246–49.
17. Hyde, Life of George Bent, 248; Hutchinson News, July 16, 1972; Harrison, Mochi: Cheyenne Woman Warrior, 5; Mendoza et al., Four Great Rivers to Cross, 75.
18. San Antonio Light, August 17, 1972; Hyde, Life of George Bent, 283–84; Blockton News, October 7, 1937.
19. New Albany Daily Leader, October 31, 1867.
20. Blockton News, October 7, 1937; Hyde, Life of George Bent, 248.
21. Hyde, Life of George Bent, 248–49.
22. Report of the Secretary of War Sand Creek Massacre, 25–31; Harrison, Mochi: Cheyenne Woman Warrior, 6.
23. Grinnell, Fighting Cheyennes, 254–58.
24. Ibid.; Blockton News, October 7, 1937; Hyde, Life of George Bent, 298–99; New Albany Leader, October 31, 1867.
25. Mendoza et al., Four Great Rivers to Cross, 75; Harrison, Mochi: Cheyenne Woman Warrior, 5.
26. Jerome Greene, Washita: The U.S. Army and the Southern Cheyenne 1867–1869, 103–8; Barbara Andre, “Custer at the Washita,” West Magazine, June 1968; Mendoza, Song of Sorrow, 138–39.
27. Mendoza, Song of Sorrow, 138–39; Greene, Washita, 103–8; Andre, “Custer at the Washita.”
28. Indianapolis Journal, June 29, 1869.
29. Harrison, Mochi: Cheyenne Woman Warrior, 5; Wommack and Sipes, “Mo-chi: First Female Cheyenne Warrior.”
30. Ibid.
Chapter 6
Lessons from Yellow-Haired Woman
Two days short of the fourth anniversary of the Sand Creek Massacre, General George Armstrong Custer and his troops attacked a sleeping Indian encampment near the Washita River. The Cheyenne who were not killed were taken hostage. An expert from General Custer’s report described the scene of the event as “gruesome.” “Men stabbed through with shotgun barrels, Cheyenne women and children clubbed to death,” he noted.[1] Custer claimed that “squaws and children had been slain in the excitement and confusion of the first charge.”[2]
For many mourning Indians such as Mochi, the ruthless attack was not dissimilar to the Sand Creek Massacre. Several articles in East Coast newspapers defended the army’s decision to raid the Indian camp because the Indians continued to attack white settlements and military outposts. According to the December 29, 1868, edition of the Daily Rocky Mountain News, Custer was “led to the hostile camp by following the trail of a war party that were returning from raids west and south of Fort Riley.” The article continued:
They had fresh scalps and four white men in their possession. One was that of a military express rider who was butchered and horribly mutilated but a few days before between Fort Dodge and Fort Larned. The mail he was carrying was found in the conquered camp. The contents of rifled mails, effects from plundered settlements, and the green and reeking scalps of murdered citizens were also found in the captured camp. There were those who cried “friendly Indians” and “another Sand Creek Massacre” lustily at first, but it quickly dwindled to the faintest whisper. Thank God the military, civilization, and the cause of the frontier settler are victorious this time.[3]
For the Cheyenne who escaped the actions of Custer and his men the invasion was unjustified. Mochi and other women from the tribe wrapped the bodies of the warriors in blankets and bound them with ropes in order for them to be moved from the area and buried. More than one hundred women, children, and braves were slain. Several acres of dead ponies lay among the slaughtered Indians, unconcealed. Once the grim task of caring for the deceased tribesmen was done, Mochi and the other Dog Soldiers left the area. She and the other warriors went in the opposite direction of the Indians who decided to relocate to the reservations the United States government had assigned to them in the Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867.[4]
While the Cheyenne were either moving on to reservations or establishing other camps in the plains and planning counterattacks against the military, Custer’s report on the Battle of Washita was making the rounds. This report, addressed to General Philip Sheridan, head of the Department of the Missouri, a command echelon of the United States, read:
On the morning of the 26th, this command, comprising eleven troops of the Seventh Cavalry, struck the trail of an Indian war party. My men charged the village, and reached the lodge before the Indians were aware of our presence. The moment the charge was ordered, the band struck up “Garry Owen,” and, with cheers that strongly reminded me of scenes during the war, every trooper led by his officer, rushed toward the village.
The Indians were caught napping for once, and the warriors rushed from their lodges and posted themselves behind trees and in deep ravines, from which they began their most determined defense. The lodges and all their contents were in our possession within a few minutes after the charge was ordered, but the real fighting, which was rarely, if ever, equaled in Indian warfare, began when attempting to clear out or kill the warriors posted in ravines and underbrush; charge after charge was made, and most gallantly too, but the Indians had resolved to sell their lives as dearly as possible. After a desperate conflict of several hours, our efforts were crowned with the most complete and gratifying success.
The entire village, numbering forty-seven lodges of Black Kettle’s band of Cheyenne, two lodges of Arapaho, and two lodges of Sioux, fifty-one lodges in all, under command of their principal chief Black Kettle, fell into our hands. By a strict and careful examination, after the battle, the following figures give some of the fruits of our victory.
The Indians left on the ground, and in our possession, the bodies of 103 of their warriors, including Black Kettle himself, whose scalp is now in the possession of one of our Osage guides. We captured, in good condition, 875 horses, ponies and mules. Two-hundred forty-one saddles, some of very fine and costly workmanship; 523 buffalo robes, 210 axes, 140 hatchets, 35 revolvers, 47 rifles, 535 pounds of powder, 1,050 pounds of lead, 4,000 arrows, 90 bullet-molds, 35 bows and quivers, 12 shields, 300 pounds of bullets, 775 lariats, 940 buckskin saddle-bags, 470 blankets, 93 coats, 700 pounds of tobacco. In addition, we captured all their winter supply of dried buffalo meat, all their meal, flour and other provisions, and, in fact, everything they possessed, even driving the warriors f
rom the village with little or no clothing. We destroyed everything of value to the Indians, and have now in our possession, as prisoners of war, fifty-three squaws, and their children. Among the prisoners are the survivors of Black Kettle’s and the family of Little Rock. We also secured two white children held captive by the Indians. One white woman, who was in their possession, was murdered by her captors the moment we attacked. A white boy held captive, about ten years old, when about to be secured was brutally murdered by a squaw, who ripped out his entrails with a knife.[5]
As Mochi and the other members of the tribe put distance between themselves and the horrific setting at the Washita River, the sound of the Central Pacific and Union Pacific Railroads encroaching upon the land could be heard. The cry of the engine whistle not only signified impending doom for the buffalo, whose great numbers had been diminished with the flood of white settlers on the frontier, but also meant the end of the Indians. Mochi was unwilling to go along quietly with what the United States government insisted was the fate of all Indians in the face of progress. Heartsick and angry over the loss of her daughter, Mochi followed after Medicine Water and the band of braves who were set on making the white intruders pay for their atrocities.[6]
Shortly after the Battle of Washita, Medicine Water was made a leader in the Bowstring Society. The Bowstring Society was a warrior military sect. They were exceptional marksmen with a bow and arrow. They were tenacious, cunning, and, because of what they had witnessed at the hands of the United States cavalry, ruthless and unforgiving.[7]
Mochi was devoted to the society and its cause. She patterned her actions after another female warrior of fierce renown, Ehyophsta or Yellow-Haired Woman. The thirty-seven-year-old Cheyenne woman had fought in major battles and proven she could be as violent and menacing as her male counterparts during a skirmish with the Shoshone Indians. In 1869, Ehyophsta pursued a Shoshone warrior to a spot between the Colorado-Texas border where she and her tribe had been fighting. During their clash she managed to stab and scalp the Indian she was battling. Mochi desired to be just as courageous.[8]
Mochi and Medicine Water were still lamenting the loss of Tahnea when the five-year-old girl was returned to the Bowstring camp in June 1869. A member of another tribe of Cheyenne Indians led by a chief named Little Robe found Tahnea hidden in the banks of the Washita River. She had been shot and was severely injured, the bullet having hit her in the hip. The parent and child reunion was a heartfelt occasion but the drive to confront the United States Army over what had been done did not subside. Tahnea had been left crippled and her life changed forever.[9]
Newspapers such as the New York Tribune, New York Times, New York Post, Philadelphia Press, and Chicago Tribune criticized the events that took place at the Washita River and compared General George Custer to Colonel John Chivington. According to Chivington’s biography, he believed Custer’s actions were justified. In his opinion the “government’s lack of uniform policy, and its alternating between extreme severity and foolish sentimentality in dealing with the savages, only accentuated and prolonged the conflict.”[10]
By the time the Battle of Washita took place, Colonel Chivington had long been removed from the military. The multiple hearings to review his actions at Sand Creek resulted in his castigation and a ruling that would keep Chivington from ever serving in the army again.[11]
Concerned that the controversy surrounding the massacre would create problems within the church if he were assigned a flock to minister, Chivington opted to keep his name on the inactive list. He believed he was too bitter to preach. He was angry about what he deemed were “unjustified and vicious attacks” on him by the military and the public.[12]
The Seventh U.S. Cavalry charging Black Kettle's village at daylight during the Battle of Washita.
The Denver Public Library, Western History Collection, X-33802
Although he was never again assigned as the pastor of any local congregation, he was still connected with the church as a member and would serve as an agent of the Nebraska Conference Church Extension Society. John moved to Nebraska after the incident at Sand Creek and invested in a freighting business. The business was not without its setbacks; the wagons were frequently attacked by the Indians and entire shipments of goods were either stolen or destroyed.[13]
From time to time supporters of Chivington would request he come and speak to various civic organizations about his views on the Plains Indians, the military, and government leaders. In October 1866, he was asked to address some of his admirers at Council Bluff, Iowa. According to a report in the November 1, 1866, edition of the Sullivan Democrat, Chivington’s statements were incendiary and biting. “If we go to heaven and any Democrat dare intrude there, we will kick him out,” he told the crowd. “If we go to hell, we will heap fire and brimstone on them. Yes, I would stand on the battlements of heaven and kick Democrats into hell; and, if I go to hell, I will pour a cauldron of red hot iron down upon them.”
“This language would sound strange coming from the mouth of a true Christian,” the Sullivan Democrat reporter added, “but coming from Chivington whose sole military exploit was the coldblooded massacre of the Sand Creek Indian women and children, it is just what might be looked for.”[14] In addition to business losses, Chivington’s personal life suffered as well. On June 26, 1866, his only son, Thomas, drowned in the North Platte River while crossing with a load of government freight. His body was not recovered until March of 1867, and funeral services were held soon after. Two months after Chivington laid his son to rest, his granddaughter fell off a steamship that was traveling along the Missouri River and drowned. In August of that same year, Chivington’s wife of twenty-eight years died from a gastric ailment.[15]
News of Colonel Chivington’s losses would no doubt have been well received by members of the Bowstring Society but wouldn’t have served as just punishment for the massacre at Sand Creek. The Indians were dedicated to fighting back against the injustice done. Between May and June 1869, the Cheyenne Dog Soldiers, along with a band of Oglala Sioux, raided a number of white settlements in Nebraska and Kansas. Many homesteaders and their wives and children were killed and women were kidnapped and raped.[16]
On July 11, 1869, a United States military campaign devoted to the Nebraska frontier pursued the Indians northwest toward the Platte River near Sterling, Colorado. The cavalry anticipated that the Indians would cross the river and then escape into the sand hills, but they didn’t. They were so confident they could overcome the troops that they made camp. A battle ensued and the Indians lost. Among those killed was the leader of the Dog Soldiers, Tall Bull. Surviving Dog Soldiers fled the area but would regroup later and be led to war again, this time with Medicine Water and Mochi in charge.[17]
In the early 1870s, the Bowstring Society and remnants of the beleaguered Dog Soldiers fought government surveyors encroaching on unsettled Indian Territory. The Cheyenne uprooted stakes the surveyors had driven into the earth and drove the workers off the Indians’ hunting grounds. However, more surveyors came. On March 19, 1873, Mochi, Medicine Water, and more than twenty of their warriors decided to make an example of a land surveying crew camped along the Cimarron River in Oklahoma.[18]
The April 8, 1873, edition of the Janesville Gazette was just one of many newspapers that reported on the murder of the workers.
The facts in this gruesome tale are appalling. It seems that Downing and Barrett, government contractors, have their surveyors divided into several parties, and the head compassman of one of these parties sent out a young Mr. Deming, whose father is well known as the proprietor of the hotel in Arkansas City, with two chainmen and a flagman, whose names are not given, a mile and a half or two miles from camp to correct a line run the day previous. Staying longer than they should have done, the party went out to look for them and shortly made an appalling discovery.
Upon the sandy plain were certain marks that the ground had been thrown over something lately and took but little work to reveal underneath
it the bodies of their four comrades. Eddie M. Deming, the nineteen year old captain of the crew had no idea there was any trouble with the Indians when he set out with his party to complete the work they’d been hired to do. He expected to get the work done by noon.[19]
In a letter to the editors at the Janesville Gazette, Hugh F. Richards, one of the members of the survey team, wrote:
At about 11 a.m. he sent one of the cornermen to camp. He got to it all right. When he left the party they had about three miles to meander down the left bank of the Cimarron River. Eddie and his party failed to get in that night, but as no one anticipated they were in any danger we did not suspect there would be any trouble with the Natives although they were very thick through the section. As they did not get in by noon on the 20th we got very worried. A party was sent to look for them.
They struck their trail on the riverbank and followed it until they arrived at the town line where Eddie had closed and finished his work. They there found a great many Indian tracks. A band of some forty or fifty warriors had crossed the river below the town line. From the closing point the tracks turned upstream, in the direction of the camp. We suppose the Indians acted friendly and allowed Eddie and his men to start toward camp, then, as soon as they had their back turned, shot and killed them and buried them where they fell.
