by J. R. WRIGHT
“I’m sure Chaska will come for her eventually. Is Cola prepared for that?”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Once the freight wagons containing the commodities arrived, there was serious debate as to what to do with them. The Indians that were to receive them were gone, and apparently didn’t want to be found, in light of what happened. Finally it was decided that Bordeaux would receive ten wagonloads of assorted foodstuffs as partial restitution for his losses in the siege. The remainder would be stored at Fort Laramie to be later distributed to the tribes that came in who weren’t a party to the Grattan massacre, as many at the post called it.
When asked if he would pursue the fleeing Indians, Colonel Snively responded, “I have no intentions of taking a stroll through the valley of death at this point in my life. And if ever I should become so insane as to do such a fool thing, I beg someone put a ball through my skull before I ride my troops to slaughter.”
Luke took that as an indication that his services would not be immediately needed in resolving the Grattan affair. And because of that, he had a suggestion to make.
“There are some tribes up along the Niobrara and Cheyenne Rivers, as well as in the Black Hills, that could use their share of those commodities. Most of them were parties to the treaty of fifty-one. All except the Lakhota tribe that recently moved into the Black Hills, near the Belle Fourche River.”
Indian Agent John Whitfield perked up with that news. “Where did these Lakhota come from?”
“Best as I can ascertain they came from the northern plains, west of the Red River a piece,” Luke said, letting his mind drift back fifteen years to the Teton village on the plains where he suspected Breanne was being held. That is, until he found her charred remains at the smaller burnt out village to the north, led there by the last of the Santee renegades that had taken her. My god, these were the same people! These Lakhota called themselves Teton back then, or at least the renegades called them by that name. He guessed he had suspected that for a while, but hadn’t let himself believe it.
“Then they wouldn’t be entitled, Hill,” Whitfield said. “The treaty of fifty-one was enacted for the sole purpose of protecting travelers and forts along the emigrant trail through that portion of the Indian Territory. I doubt those Indians have any concern for what goes on down here. How many are they?”
“Just a few hundred, with some Dakotah mixed in. And you’re right, I doubt they even know of the Oregon Trail, let alone care who travels it. But what they do care about is the land they now occupy. Paha Sapa, they call it. They’re awfully fearful someday they will be asked again to move, as dictated in the treaty of thirty-eight, when they lost their beloved woods in western Minnesota.”
“Well that just won’t happen, Tom. You can assure them of that. Who would want that pile of rocks anyway? Surely no roads could be built through there, if an interest did arise at some point. You say there are Dakotah among them?”
“Yes. About half, from what I could see. But there is a lot of mixing going on, as is always the case.”
“All tribes of the Dakotah are included in the treaty. I guess if they have an interest in receiving a fair share of the commodities we now have available, they can come here.”
“I was thinking, in the interest of better relations, we could deliver them, sir.”
Whitfield thought on this for a time and then gave a flat “No” for an answer. Luke was disappointed, to say the least. Sometimes a small gesture of kindness went a long way when it came to future negotiations. That was evident with the treaty of fifty-one, when the Indians wanted to physically see what they would be getting before signing. That day was saved by James Bordeaux, when he near cleaned out his store of bacon, bags of corn meal, sugar, and wheat flour, to be given as gifts to the important chiefs.
“Could I then requisition a sampling of what’s available to distribute among the tribes?” Luke persisted.
“For what purpose?” Whitfield asked.
“Sir, I’m called on to be among these people on a regular basis, and it always helps when I’m looked on favorably. I thought a little gift may serve us all well further up the road, in light of what happened here last week. News among the Indians travels fast.”
“I think Hill is on to something here, Whitfield,” Colonel Snively said. “No doubt every Indian tribe on the plains will be upset over what Grattan took it upon himself to do. Perhaps we should make a display of peace, at least to those tribes uninvolved. Of course the Cheyenne and Crow are out. They haven’t complied with the treaty. And now that the Brule and Oglala are out, that leaves the Arapaho, Assiniboine, Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara, and that tribe of Lakhota Dakotah that Hill just told you about.”
“How many wagons of commodities are we talking about?” Whitfield asked.
Snively looked to Luke for that answer, and he gave it. “Fifty ought to do it. It’s not that any of those tribes mentioned need it. They’ve done a good job of providing for themselves. It would serve primarily as a token of good will.”
“Well said, Hill,” Whitfield replied. “I’ll go along with it under one condition, and that is if I get full credit for the idea. The eastern papers will be interested to know.” He smiled broadly.
“Will you need an escort, Tom?” Snively asked.
“I’d rather not. Just seeing the blue coats coming would anger some of these tribes. A buckskin flag of peace will serve me just fine.”
“Then you’ll leave in the morning,” Snively said. “I trust the wagons will be ready to roll, Whitfield.”
“They will.”
When morning came Luke said his farewells to James Bordeaux, his wife Cola, and Bright Moon before taking his place out front of fifty loaded wagons, each harnessed with six mules, and gave the motion to proceed. Each wagon had two teamsters and the plan was to roll non-stop from daybreak to sundown, hopefully covering forty miles each day. At that pace a loop all the way up to Fort Union and back to Fort Laramie should take a month, give or take a few days. As wagons were emptied, the plan was to share the loads with full ones. Therefore, as they traveled, the burden on the mules became less and less until all wagons were eventually empty and rolling free the last leg of the journey. With the exception of the Lakhota in the Black Hills, who Luke wanted to make last for a good reason: he wanted to spend some time there talking with Chaska. Perhaps he could convince him to come along for a visit to Bright Moon at Laramie. He just couldn’t understand why he hadn’t done that already after the affection they showed for one another at the cave.
Of course, nothing ever goes as smoothly as planned. On the third day out, an axel broke on one of the wagons. The lead teamster claimed it would take the better part of a day to repair. Of course Luke would have no part of that. Nor would he allow any of the other wagons to be overburdened by taking on the load. The mules were unhitched and the crippled wagon left on the open prairie, shy of its canvas top and one barrel of cooked pork, of which the one hundred teamsters shared in eating on the spot. Five miles further up, however, when Luke looked back on the wagon with Pierre’s expandable telescope, he saw that a traveling tribe of Oto Indians he’d seen at a distance earlier had it surrounded and were having a feast. With that he smiled, and thirty miles farther up, lightened the loads of ten additional wagons. This for the Missouri Indians of the area, who also traveled, it seemed, continuously.
After servicing some splinter camps of the Arapaho and Shoshone, and several small villages of Sioux along the Niobrara River, they headed northeast for the Missouri River. A big surprise came when they crested a hill overlooking the Cheyenne River and Luke spotted a moving group of Indians that stretched for miles. A bigger surprise came when he recognized them as being Omaha. The Omaha hadn’t drifted far from the Missouri in all the while he had known them.
Confused as to why they were on the move, Luke took the buckskin flag from the lead wagon and rode below to find out. Looking for a chief among them, he traveled along-side for a mile, before finding who he
was looking for. There, flat on his back, riding a travois and smiling up at him, was Chief Cante Waniyetu (Winter Heart).
“Hill,” the old chief said in English, seeming surprised to see him. He then spoke in the Omaha dialect of Sioux. “Why do you come to visit Winter Heart?”
“It makes my heart dance to see my old friend. But it would be good to know why you move your people so far from home?” Luke returned in Omaha, along with hand signs.
“We go because soldiers come soon with mighty army to kill all of us that dwell so close to the white man.”
“Who told you that?”
“My brother, Little Thunder, who speaks for the Brule and Oglala, has sent word. All peoples should go to Powder River country, build mighty war party. Blue coats already kill my friend Chief Conquering Bear. Is this true, Hill?”
“I too am saddened by the passing of Conquering Bear. That was a mistake for which I am very sorry,” Luke signed and noticed a crowd gathering around him. “The man who did that awful thing was like a young warrior who had no authority from chief. He is already dead, or surely he would be punished for his bad behavior.”
“I already know this man was killed by Red Cloud, who saved village from big guns.”
Luke remembered Cola saying this Red Cloud had led the party of young warriors that killed Grattan and his men. “Who is this Red Cloud that is so brave?” Luke asked, trying to sound as though he was neutral in the affair. This was no time to ruffle feathers, he could see by all the attention he was getting. Now hundreds had gathered, with more coming from both directions, up and down the line.
“I am Mahpiya Lute (Red Cloud),” a very tall young Indian speaking Oglala pushed through the crowd and faced up to Luke, still sitting the calico mule. He had paint on his face, as none of the others around did. And his only weapon was a Green River skinning knife stuck in his waistband. “Why have you come here – buckskin white man who travels alone to and from the fort?”
Luke had no idea he was watched so closely by someone so young. “I have come to tell all Indians on the plains that what Grattan did was wrong. None who were involved are being pursued.”
“Where is the food we were promised that has caused this problem? Should we just forget that, like all the other lies we have been told?”
“I have brought food,” Luke said, seeing his previous plan flying away like a bird in the night. Perhaps Indian Agent Whitfield wouldn’t appreciate what he was about to do, but he could see little choice in the matter at this point.
“Your people’s commodities are there,” Luke pointed to the hill top where the forty-nine wagons sat impressive in the afternoon sun.
“This is a trick,” Red Cloud said accusingly. “Where do the soldiers wait to ambush us?”
“There are no solders,” Luke said, then focused back to Winter Heart who had stood from the travois to better see the wagons on the hill.
“I believe this man, Hill,” Winter Heart spoke directly to Red Cloud. “He has never lied to me. Many years I know him.”
“Then I will travel to see what is in those wagons,” Red Cloud said and pushed back through the crowd.
Luke watched him go to a horse held for him at the edge of the crowd, mount, and ride up the hill. He gave an all’s well signal to the teamsters. He didn’t want any problems now. What he was about to do could very well head off an all-out Indian war. That was evident by what Winter Heart had just told him.
My god! If all the Indians on the plains grouped into one force, there wouldn’t be enough soldiers to hold them at bay for a single day. And then it would be a massacre. Over the coming months, there wouldn’t be a fort, military or trading, left standing on the plains. Thousands of small settlements, squatter farms, and road houses would vanish in a flurry of killing from the Missouri River to the Rocky Mountains, and north to the Canadian border. And what of travel on the Oregon trail? It would be non-existent, of course, and would remain that way for years to come. That alone would literally divide the nation in half. That’s why he must do something now, before it was too late.
“You must take your people back to the Missouri River,” Luke said to Winter Heart. “There will be no war between our peoples, no matter what happens. Go and live in peace where you were. I will come to visit my old friend with gifts once this misunderstanding is resolved.”
“I see you have a fine rifle there on your mule,” Winter Heart said casually. “It is one of the new Hawkens that can be fired even in the rain. That would make a fine gift for chief. Do you have another?”
Luke had not forgotten how conniving Winter Heart was. On his last visit to the Omaha village, he had let the old man talk him out of a near new Bowie knife. He said he needed the shiny knife to send sun signals to his girlfriend who lived across the village. At eighty, or better, that was unlikely.
“I have another. Will you turn around if I give it to you now?”
“In the time it takes to beat a heart,” he smiled up to Luke. “And maybe just a little of that food you have in those many wagons, so old chief has something to chew on as he travels home.”
“I’ll bring you a bag of dried apricots.”
“And maybe some corn meal? And just a little sugar?”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Once Red Cloud was confident that all was on the up and up, he rode ahead to pass the good news on to Little Thunder. The plan was to rendezvous at the headwaters of the Cheyenne River, in the heart of the Powder River country, on the sixth day hence. There, the tribes of the Brule and Oglala Indians would jointly receive their annuities as agreed in the treaty of 1851. Although it was far shy of what was originally intended they receive, Luke was fairly confident the gesture would serve as a peace offering in light of what happened back at Laramie.
On the fourth day of travel, however, it became evident that the two tribes were not waiting for them to arrive. On the horizon appeared a mass movement of the entire five thousand of them, exposing a frontal breast three miles wide.
Seeing this, Luke ordered the wagon master to have his teamsters space their wagons a quarter mile distant of each other and dump their loads on the open prairie. It was important they be clear of the area when they arrive, or be consumed by the masses. A feeding frenzy could ensue, and he feared for their safety. A group of low lying hills a goodly distance away was chosen as a place for them to gather for the return trip to Laramie. Luke wanted to speak with Little Thunder before joining them. Taking the peace flag, he galloped off toward the advancing Indians.
Not knowing where he would find Little Thunder, since the tribes were so mixed in their hurried excitement to finally be receiving the promised rations, Luke halted the calico mule a half mile from the center of the group and waited for a sign.
That happened a short time later when a small group of warriors broke from the advancing group and rode full out toward him. Among them was Red Cloud.
“Little Thunder will see you there,” he signed, then pointed to a string of slowly rising puffs of smoke a mile or so to the north.
There, on a sandbar in the center of the Cheyenne River, were a group of chiefs ready to hear first-hand from Luke their fate over the Grattan boondoggle. Every face there was painted, as was expected when war bonnets were worn. This didn’t particularly concern him as he advanced through the shallow water of the river to be among them.
“It’s good to see you are all well,” was his signed greeting as he studied the familiar faces looking up to him on the mule. Climbing down he took the hand of Little Thunder and pulled it to his chest as a signal of peace, then proceeded to do likewise with the remaining chiefs until one refused.
“Matho Wayuhi (Conquering Bear) is not well! His death scaffold stands naked on the prairie far from his birth place. No one there to grieve for him.”
“That is regrettable,” Luke signed. “He was a fine man. A mighty chief of the Brule people. I morn his passing to the place of many fine hunts.”
“Eee nah dah kay! (Shut
your mouth),” Little Thunder barked at the disruptive young chief. “We have better things to talk about on this day. We have to know our people will be welcome back to the fort? If not, how will we receive our future annuities? The treaty we agreed to will be meaningless. Many whites will die that inhabit and travel over our land. It will be impossible to hold my people back if there is no hope of that happening.”
“There must not be any more killing,” Luke was quick to respond. “I will find a way for your people to return. If not, the annuities will be delivered to them, as they were here today.”
“Some of my people yearn for the old camp already,” Little Thunder persisted. “They are frightened of this place also occupied by our lifelong enemies the Cheyenne, Shoshone, and Crow. Some of the older ones don’t rest well.”
Luke thought on this for a moment, then offered, hoping he would get by with it: “The old should return to Laramie. They will be welcome.”
“And what of the Brule? They had no part in what happened to the soldiers.” Little Thunder was still angry for what Red Cloud of the Oglala had done to Grattan and his men. He had tried to stop him, but could not. Now he had to deal with the younger man’s mistake. No doubt Red Cloud was a friend, as he had always been. He would not be punished, because he was needed, now that they were in this fix, more than ever. And who would lead the young warriors of the Oglala, if not Red Cloud? No one was more respected among them for his bravery.
“They too may return, along with the Miniconjou among you,” Luke said and looked to the disruptive young chief of the Brule for his approval, and saw him nod slightly.
With that, Little Thunder turned to Red Cloud. “The many warriors from both tribes will remain with us here, along with whoever wishes to stay. All others will go back to Laramie,” he ordered. “Go tell them now so they may decide before we leave this place tomorrow.”
