Wounded Knee Research Paper

Big Foot was the chief of a subtribe of the Lakota called Miniconjou. He was very old and had pneumonia. He was taking his tribe to the Pine Ridge Reservation in south-western South Dakota.

In June, Grant led his expedition on the same route Montgomerie had taken. Sensing another ambush at a pass near the site of Montgomerie's battle, Grant dispatched Marion with 30 men to flush out the Cherokees. Using trees for cover, Marion's detachment cautiously advanced within range of the Cherokees, whereupon the Indians sounded their war cry and fired. By the time the pass was secured, only nine of Marion's men were left. Grant's column proceeded through the pass and engaged the Cherokees for several hours, until the Indians fled. Marion's capture of the pass allowed Grant to create a path of destruction in the Cherokee lands, burning 15 Indian towns and destroying their corn crops. Finally, Chief Attakullakulla, known by some as "Little Carpenter," surrendered.

desired farming land, and to send them West to undesired land. Andrew Jackson played the key

Black Elk was born in 1863 in Wyoming (“Black Elk”). He would later become the Oglala Lakota holy man (“Black Elk – 1863-1950”). Chief Crazy Horse led a group of Sioux Native Americans in government resistance. Being Black Elk’s second cousin, Black Elk was able to closely see the actions of the government towards the Native Americans. In May of 1877, Chief

Throughout the settlement of Western America, Native Americans were culturally assimilated. This was an attempt by the Americans to transform the Natives’ culture and civilize them through white education and living on reservations. However, the Natives preserved their cultures, tribal identities, and even developed self-sustaining economic practices. First, The Ghost Dance Movement was a revival of Native beliefs that further helped them regain hope through religion. Specifically, it was a religion of the late 1880s and early 1890s that combined elements of Christianity and traditional Native American religion. It fostered the Plains Indians’ hope that they could resurrect the great bison herds and call up a storm to drive whites back across

They say that only the Native Americans died on this trail, but along with the Native Americans, there were piles soldiers that led trail that died as well. They had a lack of food and

This mainly occurred due to the false statements that the United States had given to the American people. Making it seem like the Native Americans went willingly and glossing over the number of deaths that had occurred. This made the Cherokee wary of any outsiders even till this day

The religion of the Ghost Dance started with a man named Wovoka. On January 1, 1889, he had a ‘vision’ during a solar eclipse in Nevada (Peterson 27). It brought a message of hope to the oppressed Indians of only the Indians living. The Indians called Wovoka the ‘Messiah’ (“The Ghost Dance” par. 1) and it was believed that he would bring a “day of deliverance” (Phillips 16) to the

The Cherokee basically needed to start over. Between 85 different tribes there was about 250,000 Cherokees living between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River. The government could not afford to police such a huge reign so they decided to make peace with the Indians. As long as they became civilized. George Washington said “The Indians

America and Indians did not see eye to eye in the 1800’s. During that time America would try to remove and relocate tribes to a new land. This would cause the Indians and America to be built off of tension that would cause difficulties and harm to both sides.

On the way, approximately 1/3 of the Cherokee people died. This event, known to the Cherokee as “the Trail where they cried,” is better known as we know, the ‘Trail of Tears,’ in the U.S. History books. This relocation of the Native Americans along the route from Georgia to Oklahoma which The United States Government forced tribes to migrate to reservations west of the Mississippi River in the 1820’s, 1830’s ,and 1840’s.’ (Foner, Give Me Liberty! 3-11) When the first settlers arrived in the new world, they wanted land to expand in the name of freedom, religious freedom, wealth, and power. The thing standing in the way of these desired treasures was the Indians themselves. Realize also, it would be the strongest European nations that wanted the ambitious expansion of America. Others, like the Dutch came to North America to trade, not conquer. So, the Europeans think! Anyway with the different nations that could vie for land themselves; I’m sure this must have speed up the Indian Removal Act. “Two important tribes have accepted the provision made for their removal at the last session of Congress, and it is believed that their example will induce the remaining tribes also to seek the same obvious

The Ghost Dance religion was an answer to the domination of Native Americans. It was an attempt to make culture and to find a way to improve poverty and disease, all the reservation life of the Native Americans. The Ghost Dance originated among the Paiute Indians in 1870. The tide of the movement came in 1889 with a Paiute shaman Wovoka. Wovoka had a vision during a sun eclipse. In this vision he saw the second coming of Christ and received warning about the evils of white man. The messianic religion promised an apocalypse that would destroy the white man and the white guy. The earth then would be returned to the Native Americans.

The Ghost Dance was a religion or movement that combined Christianity and traditional Indian religion elements that served as a nonviolent form of resistance for Indians in the late nineteenth century. At the time, conditions were bad on Indian reservations and Native Americans needed something to give them hope or something to look forward too. So they created and turned to the Ghost Dance.

They took supplies from the Indians; sometimes paying for them, sometimes not. They were ruthless.

Unfortunately, the Sioux population misconstrued Wovoka’s teachings and adapted them to their own personal needs. When the Sioux adopted the Ghost Dance, they turned it from a religious ceremony into a violent act. When Wovoka had preached to be passive and patient for God’s intervention, the Sioux thought this meant to rid their land of the white population (Malinowski 467). For example, the militant leaders Short Bull and Kicking Bear attended the Ghost Dance and went home with the interpretation they should proactively rid the continent of whites through any means necessary (Malinowski 467). The Sioux had always been recognized as warlike, but now with the Ghost Dance, they were viewed as “half-crazed ‘savages’” who set out to be “demonic killers” (Moses 342). With this misunderstanding, the Ghost Dance received a bad reputation. If the Sioux did any killing in the name of the Ghost Dance, all tribes associated with the religion were also seen in a negative way.