THE SPIRIT LAKE MASSACRE
THOMAS TRAKLE

THE SPIRIT LAKE MASSACRE

THE SPIRIT LAKE MASSACRE

BY
THOMAS TEAKLE

PUBLISHED AT IOWA CITY IOWA IN 1918 BY
THE STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF IOWA

THE TORCH PRESS
CEDAR RAPIDS
IOWA

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION

The massacre of the white settlers in the region of Lake Okoboji and Spirit Lake in 1857 by a band of Indians under the leadership of Inkpaduta has come to be known as “The Spirit Lake Massacre”, although the tragedy was for the most part enacted on the borders of Lake Okoboji. There seems, however, to be no substantial reason for renaming the episode in the interest of geographical accuracy; and so in this volume the familiar designation of “The Spirit Lake Massacre” has been retained.

Benj. F. Shambaugh

Office of the Superintendent and Editor

The State Historical Society of Iowa

Iowa City Iowa

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

It is probable that no event in the history of northwestern Iowa has aroused more popular interest than that of the Spirit Lake Massacre of March, 1857. Not alone in northwestern Iowa but also in the adjacent sections of Minnesota and South Dakota is the story of its events and associated incidents well known.

The Spirit Lake Massacre came as the culminating episode in a long series of incidents intimately connected with the settlement of northern and western Iowa. For years previous to 1857 the Indians of the Siouan tribes had obstinately resisted white settlement and had succeeded in a marked degree in retarding the movement. It may be said with a reasonable degree of certainty that if the events of March, 1857, had not occurred the settlement of this region would have been postponed for some years: the Massacre not only aroused the authorities of the State of Iowa to the necessity of exerting the force of military pressure upon the Indians to discourage or end their forays, but it also enlisted the efforts of the Federal authorities in the same direction. This joint interest and protection could have only one result—the retirement of the Sioux to the region of the Missouri and the rapid influx of white settlers. The Massacre definitely settled the Indian question for Iowa: henceforth the red man ceased to play any important part in the history of this Commonwealth.

While the following pages are, as far as practicable, based upon primary materials, the writer acknowledges his obligation to many other sources in the notes and references which follow the text. Since no adequate history of the Spirit Lake Massacre can be written wholly from primary materials, considerable reliance upon secondary sources has been found necessary in this work. Furthermore, the writer is well aware that he has taken a number of new positions concerning causes and incidents of the Massacre; but in this he feels well sustained by the preponderance of authority.

Without the unflagging interest and the tireless enthusiasm and encouragement of Dr. Benj. F. Shambaugh the more than four years of research involved in this work would never have been undertaken or carried through to its close. To many others the author also feels himself obligated for invaluable assistance. Among these may be noted Curator E. R. Harlan, Librarian Alice Marple, Assistant Editor Ida M. Huntington, and Superintendent of Archives C. C. Stiles, all of the Historical Department of Iowa. Dr. Dan E. Clark, Associate Editor in The State Historical Society of Iowa, assisted in editing and verifying the manuscript; and to him the author is indebted for the index.

Thomas Teakle

The North High School

Des Moines Iowa

CONTENTS

I
THE ADVANCING FRONTIER

Clothed in myth and legend and held in sacred awe by the Siouan Indian, Lake Okoboji and Spirit Lake had rested in seclusion for ages at the headwaters of the Little Sioux. To the red men these lakes had been a sort of Mecca, second only to the red pipestone quarry to the northwest, for the silent adoration and worship of the Spirit.[1] Although the region had been little disturbed by the whites the Sioux were becoming uneasy as the frontier continued its westward advance. By the middle of the nineteenth century the meeting and clashing of the two races became more frequent.

This rivalry of the races was engendered by the white man’s disregard of what the Indian held as sacred: it was embittered by the unstable policies of the government. Finally, in the early days of March, 1857, came one of those tragic events in the long series of misguided attempts to deal with the Indian and solve the problem of the frontier. In this terrible tragedy in the pioneer history of northwestern Iowa, the lives of more than forty white people were sacrificed. The Spirit Lake Massacre was the result of an Indian policy which has been characterized as “vacillating, full of inconsistencies and incongruities, of experiments and failures.”[2] For the Sioux this policy had been the cause of frequent humiliation.

It must be frankly admitted that in dealing with the Indian the whites too often lost sight of the fact that the red man was really a human being, seeking to have his person as well as his rights respected. To compel the respect which his proud spirit demanded, he frequently resorted to massacre. In fact, an Indian was open to insults and abuse from his fellow tribesmen until he had killed a foe.[3]

To some extent the Indian appreciated his own inferiority, and he was expectantly on the alert to prevent being over-reached and deceived by the whites. Suspicious by nature, he became doubly so when his activities brought him into relation with another race. Unhappily he was not always wrong in his suspicions of the white man’s deception, and many unpleasant border difficulties sprang from his attempts to match deception with deception. Physically superb, he too often had recourse to those physical means of redress that have marked the history of the frontier with tales of tragic revenge.[4]

Accustomed to the matching of intellects, the whites frequently resorted to the stilted verbiage of treaties in their efforts to push the Indian farther toward the setting sun. In these treaties the red man found much cause for complaint—not so much in the strict wording of the documents themselves as in the management of affairs they induced. This too often exasperated and provoked the Indian.[5] To him the Iowa country was a paradise. Not only was it his home and hunting ground, but here centered much of the traditional lore of his tribe and race. Thus Iowa was doubly dear to him and worth his most determined effort to hold. As the wave of settlements advanced, the Indian was induced to sell—sometimes under circumstances provoking a strong suspicion of compulsion rather than voluntary agreement in the transfer. He felt instinctively that he had to retire, but in his racial pride he resented the necessity. He knew well the later traditions of his race, in the light of which he could foresee that in a very brief time force, which “comprises the elements of all Indian treaties”,[6] would be used to drive him from his domain.

As tract after tract was ceded, lands that the Indian did not want were given to him in exchange—lands devoid of good camping places and wanting in such game as was essential to his very existence. Moreover, the very lands the Indians prized most were the most sought for by the whites. The qualities causing them to be prized by the one made them desirable for the other. Thus the Indian’s subsistence became so precarious that often he was on the verge of starvation. Coupled with this deprivation of favorite pleasure and hunting grounds was the white man’s idealistic dream of civilizing the Indian by making him work at tilling the soil or at the various trades. This seemed to the haughty red man a real degradation. He could die fighting, if need be; but work he would not. His steadfast refusal to work or become civilized could only end in banishment from the lands he valued so highly. In view of this policy of forcing him into an involuntary exile, one ceases to wonder that he grew discontented and rebelled rather than submit.[7] He could not have done otherwise and retain his pride of race.

Forcible dispossession of his ancestral hunting ranges, however, would not have provoked in him an overweening hatred for the white man if it had not been so often coupled with a show of military force. The sole purpose of such military campaigns seems to have been to frighten the Indian in order that he might learn to be peaceful and pliant through fear of punishment.

These campaigns—of which the one by General Harney against the Sioux ending in the affair of Ash Hollow on September 3, 1855, is the most cruel example—sometimes ended not in pacification but in massacre in which the ferocity of the white man vied with that of the Indian. Harney had been recalled from Europe and sent into the West against the Indians for no other purpose than that of terrifying them.[8] Such affairs as this were most unworthy of the American soldier. Nor did the Indian soon forget these atrocities: thereafter he seldom let an opportunity pass which offered revenge.

The military expeditions referred to were frequently followed by the making of treaties providing for land cessions and the consequent westward recession of the Indians. Moreover, these treaties, the making of which was stoutly resisted, were usually acknowledged only by a tribal remnant; and so they were not deemed as binding by the widely scattered major portion of the tribe. Their provisions were not always observed, and often blood had to flow to secure a temporary obedience. Thus the story of the government’s relations with the Sioux became an alternation of treaties and Indian and white retaliatory measures. A treaty was only too often accepted by the Indians as a challenge for some shrewdly devised scheme of vengeful retaliation.

Through a series of treaties extending from 1825 to 1851 the Indian occupants of Iowa soil were slowly but surely dispossessed. They felt the westward push of white migration, and were fearful of being unable to stem it. Unluckily for themselves they fell to intertribal quarreling, and for the moment, being off their guard, they accepted white mediation. Thus, the two treaties of Prairie du Chien had attempted to settle the differences between the Sioux and their traditional enemies, the confederated Sacs and Foxes.[9] But they did not succeed, since the line established in the first of these two treaties was so indefinite that neither white man nor Indian could locate it to his own satisfaction. To the Sioux their claim to northern and western Iowa seemed assured, and they proceeded confidently to its occupation. The Sacs and Foxes believed the same concerning their rights in southeastern Iowa and jealously sought to exclude all others from it.

By the second treaty of Prairie du Chien there was established the Neutral Ground, which only aggravated the difficulties already existing.[10] Then, by the treaty of September 15, 1832, the eastern portion of the Neutral Ground was designated as a reservation for the Winnebagoes.[11] The Wahpekuta Sioux never forgot this action, which they regarded as a violation of their proprietary rights in the district; and from that time on they became increasingly more difficult to deal with and more restive of restraint. Later the Winnebagoes by two successive treaties made an absolute cession of this land.[12] It was then opened to settlement, and the Sioux sulkily retired westward.

In 1832 Black Hawk, the able Sac and Fox leader, burning with revenge for past wrongs and fearful of his waning power as a tribal leader as well as of the steady advance of the westward moving frontier, declared war. The conflict was brief, resulting in the defeat of Black Hawk. By four successive treaties covering the period from 1832 to 1842 he or his people were compelled to accede to agreements which had for their purpose the removal of the Indians to lands west of the Missouri wholly unsuited to their needs.[13]

Likewise the Iowas were required to surrender all claims which the United States had recognized in former treaties as entitling them to occupy Iowa soil.[14] With the surrender of all right or interest which they held in the Iowa country they were in turn removed to a reservation beyond the Missouri. Southern Iowa had not as yet been cleared of its aboriginal inhabitants, for remnants of the Pottawattamies, Chippewas, and Ottawas yet remained. By the treaty of June 5 and 17, 1846, however, these Indians agreed to withdraw to other reserves further west and south.[15]

The withdrawal of these tribes left only the Sioux who were striving to maintain a precarious foothold in northwestern Iowa. The steadily advancing frontier was menacing their peace of mind, as it now became increasingly evident that they in turn would be ejected. Two conditions, the urgent demands of alarmed and annoyed border settlers and the troublesome character of the Sioux themselves, determined the Indian authorities at Washington to remove the members of these tribes. When informed of the government’s intention to remove them, the Sioux begged to retain their lands. Notwithstanding Indian importunities representatives of the Sissetons and Wahpetons were cited to appear at Traverse des Sioux, Minnesota, to consider withdrawal. Here they gloomily gathered at the time appointed. Though outwardly ready to treat for withdrawal they did not conceal their displeasure. On July 23, 1851, however, the treaty of Traverse des Sioux was witnessed, by the terms of which these Indians were to definitely withdraw from northwestern Iowa to lands on the Minnesota River.[16]

At the close of the conference all seemed settled. But within a brief time the Sioux, who had not been parties to the treaty, positively refused to abide by its provisions. Later, at Mendota, Minnesota, on August 5, 1851, the Mdewakanton and Wahpekuta tribes, in part, acceded to the Sisseton and Wahpeton cessions.[17] These cessions had not been accomplished without considerable opposition: strong tribal parties refused their consent outright and threatened trouble.[18] For the period of nearly a decade the frontier settlements of the northwest were not free from the alarms created by these discontented bands.

II
INDIAN WRONGS AND DISCONTENT

Unhappily the relinquishment of the Iowa country had not been free from a strong suspicion of wrongs done the Indians. The Indians had obstinately contested the giving up of these lands, and at no time was a treaty of relinquishment signed that may be said to have expressed the tribal will. These treaties of cession had instanced bad faith toward the natives, unwarranted interference on the part of the trader element, compulsion which at times approached intimidation in the securing of signatures, allotment of lands to the Indians as reserves that appeared worthless from the Indian viewpoint, undue urgency of prospective settlers anxious to “squat” upon the vacated lands, and the forceful effect of the presence of the military. All of these factors had operated to secure cessions at the doubtful price of irritating the Indian and arousing his resentment.

Officers in administrative charge of Indian affairs, far removed from actual contact with the Indians, too often failed to realize that Indian treaties should be regarded with some deference to their observance. Promises were made concerning the payment of annuities which were long delayed in their fulfillment or never kept: to the Indian these promises seemed to be made only to be broken—as happened in the treaty of Traverse des Sioux. According to second chieftain Cloudman, the Indians for five years following the making of this treaty remained quietly upon their reserve. At the expiration of that time, not having heard of or received any of the money promised, they began raiding the adjacent frontiers in an effort to produce action.[19]

Lack of good faith in treaty matters often precipitated long periods of bad feeling, and occasionally blood was shed before the Indians could be convinced that faith was being kept or that agreements entered into were in turn to be kept by them. If treaties had been honestly and faithfully carried out in every instance it is not unlikely that the Sioux and other Indians might have been far readier to refrain from wrong-doing than was often the case. Altogether the conditions on the frontier tended to create disaffection among the Indians and a loss of respect for government promises.

Not infrequently, as has been noted, the Indians were allotted lands that were wholly inadequate to supply their needs. The Sioux had outlived “the means of subsistence of the hunter state”: they were unable longer to eke out an existence exclusively through the spoils of the chase.[20] The buffalo and larger game were rapidly disappearing. But what was still worse, the Sioux often found upon going to the specified reserves that their coming had been anticipated by other hunters and the game was gone, if indeed any had ever been there. In the presence of such conditions it was useless to appeal to the garrison commanders—to whom such complaints seemed absurd. On the other hand, the killing of intruders was nearly always resorted to as a warning against marauders.[21] To live it was necessary to resist the encroachment of others not of their kind, for barbarism demands a wide range of untrammeled activity. Thus the Indians came to think that “if they would have game to kill, they must kill men too.”[22]

A great deal of Indian discontent is traceable in the final analysis to another cause: the presence upon the Indian reserve, as well as on the white frontier, of a large number of undesirables, both red and white. As forerunners of white settlement, many adventurous characters found their way to the frontier posts and systematically preyed upon the Indian. Undesirable as elements of civilization, they were equally troublesome on the frontier. In civilized communities it was possible to restrain them, but along the borderland this power was either lacking or not organized. Oftentimes when these adventurers pushed matters to an extremity, the outraged feelings of the Indian would demand a settlement or make one. Unhappily, post commanders were often only too willing to take up the needless quarrels of these frontier disturbers and exact a severe and not always just settlement in their behalf. Later when the more peaceably disposed settlers—the real pioneers—began to arrive the Indian refused to make any distinction between them and their more turbulent predecessors.

Again, the National government when settling the Indians upon their reserves took no account of the fact that there were both good and bad Indians—that there were Indian criminals as well as Indians willing to abide by the rules of tribal law. Both good and bad were settled indiscriminately upon the same reserve. The seditiously disposed were constantly creating trouble, and the Indian people as a whole incurred the blame and displeasure arising from the misdeeds of a few. These matters irritated those Indians who were well disposed and created an ever-ready excuse for an attack.

Such, in the main, had been the attitude of the government toward the Sioux as the last of the Indian races inhabiting the Iowa country. It had not been an altogether enlightened policy; nor had it been one that was calculated to secure their good will. Instead, it had stirred the Indians to wreak vengeance at every convenient opportunity. However mistaken this policy toward the Indians had been, the attitude toward the frontier and its white inhabitants had been no wiser and at times scarcely as wise. Much Indian trouble and no few massacres resulted from the loose administration of frontier affairs—more specifically from the lack of control exercised over various commercial interests whose chief justification for existence seemed to have been that they might prey upon the near-by red inhabitants. The government failed to appreciate the need for an adequate defense of the frontier.

Venders of whiskey and other intoxicants frequented the frontiers and Indian villages—unmolested, oftentimes, in pushing their sales.[23] It is true that laws had been enacted by Congress with a view to putting an end to the liquor nuisance among the Indians; but the effective enforcement of these measures had scarcely been attempted. If a more than usually zealous Indian agent forbade dealers to carry on their nefarious business within reserved grounds, they would erect their cabins upon the ceded lands immediately adjoining the reserves—places to which the Indians were at all times free to go. To make matters yet worse the agent was in some cases powerless to act even though he desired to do so. The Chippewa agent, for example, complained that the treaty of 1855 deprived him of assistants or force through which to punish or apprehend violators of departmental rules and regulations.[24]

Thus was produced that state of affairs where the Indian was being robbed and debauched, while innocent settlers were threatened by Indian violence during the periods of his drunken orgies. Not infrequently the massacre of isolated settlers completed the tale of an Indian visitation to a near-by liquor dealer’s establishment. Fortunate it was that the Sioux, “the Iroquois of the West”, were slow to take up and make their own the vices of their white neighbors.[25]

To the activities of another type of frontiersman, the trader, Indian wars were sometimes due. In many instances the trader was an individual who was unable to earn an honest living among his white neighbors further east: necessity had made of him an exile from civilization. These traders secured the confidence and good esteem of the Indians in various and devious ways, and the latter soon became indebted to them. In fact their deliberate aim in most cases was to secure upon the Indian a leverage of such a character as to render necessary the surrender of most of the Indian’s profits from the chase or treaties. Because of the Indian’s profligacy it was necessary that he should buy on credit if he bought at all. When government payments became due, traders were always on hand, and their books invariably showed Indian indebtedness enough to absorb a considerable portion if not all of the payment. The Indians kept no books as a matter of course; and not understanding those of the traders, they could not deny the debt. As a matter of fact, the Indians were always willing to anticipate the next payment in order to get credit. In the face of this situation “the poverty and misery of the Indian were continually growing”. Again, the Indian could not sue in the courts if he had so desired. Out of such conditions trouble or bad feeling inevitably arose.[26]

Owing to their long residence in the Indian country and their keen knowledge of Indian character, the traders had become “the power behind the throne”. This was especially true in treaty-making. The Indian commissioners grew to realize the power of the traders in the securing of treaties and were not slow to request their services. It was to the financial interest of the traders that treaties should be made, for thus there was insured a steady supply of money with which the Indians could pay their debts. “The commissioners did not do much more than feed the Indians and indicate what they wanted; the traders did the rest.”[27] Due to their influence, the government habitually incorporated in treaties a clause providing for the compulsory payment of the Indian debts to the traders. These debts, in some cases, were in the aggregate equivalent to small fortunes. To prevent abuses, the traders were to be paid out of the first cash annuities.[28] It was not an uncommon thing to have these debts absorb even more than these first annuities. Hence, the Indian had to wait long for his first money. Concerning this plan the Indians were not always consulted, but the traders expressed their satisfaction.

In time matters grew so bad and the Indians became so rebellious that Congress, in March, 1843, stipulated by law that no payment of Indian debts to traders should henceforth be provided for in treaties. But the traders were ingenious and evaded the law.[29] Matters came to a crisis in 1853 when the Indians rebelled, claiming that by misrepresentation in the treaties of Traverse des Sioux and Mendota in 1851 they had signed away their annuities to the traders to the amount of two hundred thousand dollars. Investigation proved nothing.[30] As Superintendent Cullen remarked upon this act of fraud, “it is equally important to protect the Indians from the whites as the whites from the Indians.” It is safe to say that if the traders had been curbed in their operations many a frontier horror might have been averted. It is no wonder that the Indian’s “untutored mind was, now and then, driven to the distraction of savage vengeance”.[31]

III
THE UNPROTECTED FRONTIER

While failing to protect the Indians against the traders, the government also failed to protect the frontier in an adequate manner against the vengeance of the Indians who had a desire to even matters. Apparently the government failed to realize that as the frontier expanded to the west and northwest in Iowa there was also a growing need for protection. Many unfortunate incidents had occurred along the border before a government surveyor by the name of Marsh, from Dubuque, was attacked near the Des Moines River in 1849.[32] Upon the filing of Marsh’s complaint, soldiers, dispatched from Fort Snelling in Minnesota, established Fort Clarke (later renamed Fort Dodge) on August 23, 1850.[33] The inadequate garrison of this post, numbering two officers and sixty-six men, was at this time practically the only defense on the northwestern Iowa frontier.[34] Following the establishment of this fort the predatory Sioux bands generally retired westward ten or twenty miles.[35]

By 1851 the last remaining Sioux lands within the limits of Iowa had been ceded and opened to settlement. Trouble for a time seemed at an end. Until that time the only protection against the Indians was the “watchfulness, courage and trusty arms” of the settlers themselves, with the nearest troops probably one hundred fifty miles away at Fort Randall on the Missouri and Fort Snelling in Minnesota near the mouth of the Minnesota River. Occasional rumors of Sioux activity still came from the outlying settlements. The most definite of these came from the valley of the Boyer more than fifty miles to the southwest of Fort Dodge. Here a family was attacked and some of its members carried away as prisoners. This was in October, 1852. A detachment was sent from Fort Dodge which took and held as hostages the Indian leaders, Inkpaduta and Umpashota. Upon the return of the prisoners, the Indians were liberated. Other Indian incursions reported from the north usually dissipated into mere rumors.[36]

The apparent quietness of the Indians in this section induced General Clarke, commanding the Sixth Military Division, to direct the abandonment of Fort Dodge. This order, which was issued on March 30, 1853, directed the removal of the garrison to Fort Ridgely.[37] With the abandonment of the post by Major Woods, there were left at Fort Dodge only Major Williams, his son James B. Williams, and two discharged soldiers. A more ill-advised order could scarcely have been issued; for following the actual abandonment of the post on June 2, 1853, the Indians “inaugurated a reign of terror among the settlers as far east as the Cedar river.”[38]

Many settlers in alarm began the abandonment of their homes; but many others, having staked all in the development of their claims, decided to remain and appeal to both the State and National governments for protection. Appeal to the latter availed nothing. The Indian authorities at Washington were entirely out of touch with the situation: they were firm in the belief that the treaties of Traverse des Sioux and Mendota had definitely settled the question of Indian occupation in this section and that the Indians had withdrawn or had ceased being troublesome.

Parties of Indians frequently returned to their former hunting grounds, and nearly as frequently committed depredations more or less terrorizing to the widely scattered settlers along the Des Moines.[39] Weary of making unheeded appeals to National authorities, while the Indian depredations became more alarming, the settlers appealed to the State officials. Major William Williams,[40] who had accompanied the troops at the time of the founding of Fort Dodge and who had remained after its abandonment, was authorized by Governor Hempstead to organize a force, if necessary, to protect the frontier.[41] Little, however, could be done in the way of organizing an adequate force on account of the widely scattered character of the settlements.

In a letter to Governor Grimes in 1855 Major Williams again expressed his great anxiety for the safety of the frontier as the Indians had become increasingly bolder. His former commission was renewed and he was granted full power to act upon any sign of hostility. Not only did Governor Grimes receive urgent letters from Major Williams, but from others as well: he was beset with petitions for protection. The Governor appears to have been wholly at a loss as to what course to pursue, since he believed he had no power to act. He appealed, therefore, to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs at Washington—although he believed that his only reward would be an acknowledgment of his letters with promise of action. Failing here, he appealed to the President, but received no response. Finally, in apparent despair, he wrote to Secretary of State George W. McCleary that he knew not “how much credit to give to any of” the letters he had received and in fact he had about made up his mind to disbelieve them all.[42] As a last appeal for action, the Governor addressed a letter to the Iowa delegation in Congress on January 3, 1855, in which he expressed the hope that they would coöperate with him in pressing the matter upon the attention of the proper Federal officials and in urging badly needed relief.[43]

Not only were the settlers near Fort Dodge alarmed, but those in Woodbury, Monona, and Harrison counties were even more disturbed, owing to the hostile attitude of large bands of Omahas and Otoes in that section. Near Sergeant Bluff large bands of Sioux had gathered and expressed their determination to remain, while nearly five hundred Sioux were encamped in the vicinity of Fort Dodge. These Indians amused themselves by stealing hogs, cattle, and other property of the settlers. Fears for the safety of the settlers were increased, in view of the fact that the National government was now preparing to chastise the Sioux near Fort Laramie for their manifold crimes committed along the California and Oregon trail in Nebraska and Wyoming. It was thought this action would cause the Sioux to seek refuge east of the Missouri and, as a matter of revenge, carry death and destruction with them as they fled toward the Mississippi Valley frontier.[44]

Because the Indians were becoming more threatening, appearing in larger numbers than heretofore, and extending their depredations over an increasingly wider territory, in the early winter of 1855 Governor Grimes was asked to call out the militia; but he declined since he believed he was “authorized to call out a military force only in case of an actual insurrection or hostile invasion.”[45] Nearly everyone now anticipated bloodshed. White men, illy disposed, were reaping large profits from the sale of whiskey; while the Indians were “becoming devils”. Hence, Governor Grimes on December 3, 1855, addressed a letter to President Pierce urging that the Indians be removed to their treaty reserves.

The Governor pointedly stated that the government owed protection to these settlers in the homes it had encouraged them to occupy. He further stated that a post in this section would curb the Indians and give quiet to northwestern Iowa.[46] To be sure these troubles had not reached any great magnitude, “yet there was a continuous succession of annoying and suspicious occurrences which kept the frontier settlements in a state of perpetual dread and apprehension, and made life a burden”.[47] Even in the presence of this distressing condition of affairs the military authorities of the National government did nothing to relieve matters. No troops were sent to protect the settlers, nor were the letters of Governor Grimes even granted consideration. Thus there developed slowly but surely a situation where the Indians grew sufficiently emboldened to make a general attack.[48]

Such a policy, characterized by a disregard not only for Indian welfare but also for the well-being of the white frontiersmen, could only bring unhappy consequences. It became more and more apparent that the Indians were bent upon concerted action of some sort. Annoyances now occurred along the whole frontier, no part of which was free from alarm. War parties were in evidence in nearly every section, and the attitude of the Indians became one of defiance. Not only in Woodbury, Monona, and Harrison counties, but in Buena Vista and what are now Humboldt, Webster, Kossuth, Palo Alto, and Sac counties the settlers were feeling the effects of Indian enmity.[49]

The resentment of the Indians at this time arose partly from a feeling of jealousy toward the whites, partly from the fact that they were retrograding, and partly from the undue influence of the American Fur Company.

From the start the Indians, particularly the Sioux, had been jealous and suspicious of the whites. As time passed and the Indian observed indications of a general and permanent occupation by the whites of the territory which he had known as home, his jealous fears increased. The land of his fathers, the home of his traditions, was about to pass into the hands of another people, to the intense sorrow of the Indian. It “was a trying ordeal” and “naturally awakened in his breast feelings of bitter regret and jealousy.”[50] His “distrust grew into open protest as claims were staked off, cabins built, and the ground prepared for cultivation.” It seemed that the Indians had resolved not to submit “until they had entered an armed protest against the justice of the claim which civilization makes to all the earth.”[51]

In addition to this feeling of jealousy and distrust of the whites, the Indians were gradually retrograding by taking unto themselves many of the vices of the white race. This was the inevitable result of a loose administration of the frontier which permitted it to be invaded in many places by refugees from civilization. Although this statement may seem to be somewhat sweeping, it is a well-known fact that among the first to appear on the frontier there were always some men of the reckless, rough-and-ready type whose contempt for the finer things of civilized life made a longer residence amid such surroundings undesirable and frequently impossible.

Foremost among the causes of the red man’s retrogression may be cited whiskey.[52] But there were other causes, such as the treaty of 1855 with the Chippewas, which rendered the agent powerless to control the Indian or his seducers if he had so desired.[53] Then there were the errors committed by people who were brought to the frontier by the government as helpers in advancing the Indian’s welfare, but who had, through mistaken methods, produced opposite results. Again, the Indian had been mistakenly led downward “by many years of luxurious idleness and riotous living.... In this state of demoralization they were gathered up and thrown together on their little Reserve, where all the worst characters could act in concert, and where they found bloody work for their idle hands to do.”[54] The government had liberally supplied them with tobacco, and they had never lacked money with which to buy whiskey. Their wants had been looked after so paternally that they had little else to do but spend their time in idleness. Craving entertainment they soon learned to find it in a wrong way. They no longer cared to hunt for food, since they did not need to do so. Soon their expeditions became mere raids upon their protectors, accompanied by unrestrained destruction committed to gratify their craving for some form of entertainment. Thus, while the forces of retrogression were at work the Indian was daily becoming more of a menace to the well-disposed border settlers who viewed his changing attitude in helpless terror.

But most insidious of all in keeping the Indian inimical to his white neighbors was the influence of the fur traders—especially those of the American Fur Company. The admitted purpose of this organization was to keep the Indian a savage hunter and at the same time to frighten the white settlers away from the frontier in order that the annual crop of cheaply obtained but valuable furs might not suffer diminution. To keep the Indian in such a condition it was necessary to prevent him from assuming too friendly an attitude toward the whites—in order that he might the better beat back or discourage their westward advance. There were strong suspicions that more than one attack upon border settlers by Indians occurred because the presence of these settlers threatened the fur-gathering preserves of the American Fur Company.

It would be wrong, however, to create the impression that the fur traders operated in secret. Practically everyone knew their purpose and methods: their purposes they openly admitted, and their methods consisted largely in dispensing “fire water” and in selling to the Indian on credit. The latter practice was useful, for it obligated the Indian to serve the Company in realizing its ends. Perhaps the most notable example of the Company’s interference with plans of Indian amelioration is to be found in the case of the Winnebagoes. Their agent, Joseph M. Street, one of the most enlightened Indian agents the Iowa country ever knew, had for some years been striving to improve the condition of the Winnebagoes, but without success. He had failed, not because his plan was impracticable, but because he came into direct conflict with the purposes and methods of the American Fur Company.[55]

IV
THE GRINDSTONE WAR AND THE DEATH OF SIDOMINADOTA

The strained relations between the whites and the Indians resulted in unfortunate incidents which served to intensify the bad feeling already engendered. Of these, two may be noted as especially significant in the frontier history of northwestern Iowa. Thus, in 1854 and 1855, the so-called “Grindstone War” caused the whites to abandon the frontier for a time and spread alarm far and near. This incident might properly be said to have had its origin in intertribal hatred.

For some time a group of Winnebago families had been accustomed to camp near Clear Lake. In this they had been encouraged by an old Indian trader by the name of Hewett. At the same time there also encamped among these Winnebagoes some Sac and Fox Indians who for years, in the Iowa country, had been the greatest enemies of the Sioux. When the latter became aware of the presence of these Sacs and Foxes among the Winnebagoes they swooped down upon them and by mistake scalped a Winnebago. Greatly alarmed, Hewett and his Indian friends fled down the valley, telling their story, which appears to have suffered somewhat from repetition as they proceeded. Within a brief time about one hundred armed settlers collected at Masonic Grove. According to some reports, about four hundred Sioux warriors fortified themselves some twelve miles distant.[56] Thus matters remained during 1854 with no action from either party.

As time passed the Sioux became bolder, until matters reached a climax in an incident which occurred near Lime Creek. A settler, James Dickerson by name, possessed an unusually fine rooster which was craved by a begging band of Indians. In chasing the rooster, a young brave upset and demolished a grindstone, and then made off with the largest piece in continued pursuit of the fowl. Dickerson pursued the Indian and, seizing a piece of the grindstone, knocked him to the ground, where he lay for a time insensible. The Indians, enraged at Dickerson’s act, demanded a settlement for the injury to the brave, making it plain that only Dickerson’s best horse or one hundred dollars in money would satisfy them. After no little parleying, in which Mrs. Dickerson acted as mediator, the Indians were pacified when Mrs. Dickerson had given them about six dollars in money, a number of quilts, and many other articles of household use.

This “grindstone incident” caused the settlers to become greatly alarmed: men from Clear Lake, the Mason City settlement, and vicinity organized and undertook to drive the Indians out of the country. After a chase of some miles, the band of over twenty-five white men came in sight of the rapidly fleeing Indians, who, realizing that they would soon be surrounded and punished, signified a desire to settle matters. Following an interchange of protests, the peace pipe was smoked, after which the Indians resumed their way westward. This understanding, however, did not allay the fears of the settlers who fled panic-stricken to Nora Springs, abandoning for a time their claims in the vicinity of Lime Creek and Clear Lake.[57]

However ready the Indians may have seemed to make peace, the settlers feared for the future; and so along the line of settlements they spread the alarm that the Indians were on the warpath. Many appeals were made to Governor Hempstead for aid. But when he sent Major William Williams from Fort Dodge to investigate the charges, the Major reported that no danger from further attacks seemed to exist. Unable to secure State protection, the settlers armed themselves. Doubtless the “grindstone incident” soon ceased to impress the settlers with any permanent sense of impending danger, for it was not long before they began to return to their deserted claims.

But not far from the scene of this near tragedy there occurred another incident which displays the temper not alone of the Indian but also of the white borderer of the more troublesome type. It appears that this tragic event grew to undue proportions mainly through the vengeful hate of a frontiersman by the name of Lott. The incident, somewhat trivial in itself, has been given so much prominence as a reputed chief cause of the massacre at Okoboji that it is deemed worthy of somewhat extended notice in this place.[58] Its connection with later events may well be a matter of conjecture, owing to the character of the Indians concerned.

For nearly a decade after the whites had begun to settle in northwestern Iowa the inhabitants of that region had been obliged to endure constant molestation from a roving band of Sisseton Sioux Indians.[59] Though at first composed of only about five lodges—mainly, it is said, of desperadoes and murderers—the band had grown by the gathering of like characters, fleeing from their avenging fellow-tribesmen, until it numbered at times nearly five hundred.[60] The band as a whole only assembled from time to time for the purpose of united warfare against others—particularly against isolated bands of the Sac and Fox Indians.[61] It was known and feared from the Des Moines westward to the Vermillion and northward to the Minnesota River on account of its peculiarly ferocious and quarrelsome character. It was, in short, a band of Indian outlaws. As such, it was hated and feared by red men and white men alike. In its forays it spared neither friend nor foe, but preyed upon both without discrimination. It claimed no home, but roamed at will wherever its fancy might lead.

Leadership of this band had been early acquired by one Sidominadota or “Two Fingers”. He had succeeded to the leadership of this loosely consolidated band upon the death of Wamdisapa, an Indian of somewhat milder disposition than his successor. Sidominadota well maintained the savage character of the band and may be credited with the inspiration of many vengeful and frightful deeds committed during his brief leadership.[62] He was only nominally the head of the united group, while really the leader of a small band seldom numbering more than fifteen and frequently less. By all who had to deal with him, red or white, he was looked upon with distrust. His fellow leaders associated with him only in time of dire necessity, for they well knew that Sidominadota would go any lengths to accomplish an end. While he continued to make his refuge and headquarters along the Vermillion, as did his predecessors, his favorite haunts were the headwaters of the Des Moines and Little Sioux Rivers and the region of the Iowa lakes.[63]

About 1847 Sidominadota began to frequent that portion of the Des Moines Valley where Fort Dodge now stands. It was his band that in 1849 attacked a party of surveyors in charge of a man by the name of Marsh about three miles from the present site of Fort Dodge. Marsh and his party had been sent from Dubuque to run a correction line across the State. After crossing to the west side of the Des Moines River, they were notified by Sidominadota not to proceed with their work as this territory was Indian land. With the departure of the Indians, the surveyors continued to run their line. In a short time the Indians returned, destroyed the instruments and landmarks of the surveyors, stole their horses, and drove the men back across the Des Moines.[64] About a year later some settlers, more adventurous than their fellows, located near the mouth of the Boone River. Sidominadota, becoming aware of the arrival of these settlers, paid them a visit and ended by destroying their cabins and driving the people out of the country. This sort of behavior was continued toward every white man who ventured into that territory until the founding of Fort Dodge in 1850.

“Among others who had received indignities from this band was one Henry Lott...who in 1846 settled near the mouth of Boone River in Webster County.”[65] Lott’s past had been a varied one and much of it was obscure. He boasted of New England origin, while his wife claimed to be a daughter of an early Governor of Ohio or Pennsylvania. If, however, we are to accept the judgment of their contemporaries the family had degenerated.[66] Lott is almost always described as being notoriously lawless, a horse thief, a vender of bad whiskey, a criminal, half-civilized, a desperado, an outlaw, and a murderer.[67] Up to the time he appeared in the valley of the Des Moines his whole life had been one of adventure.

His first appearance in Iowa, so far as known, was at Red Rock, Marion County, in 1845, where he essayed the role of Indian trader while dealing out bad whiskey to the Indians and surreptitiously stealing their ponies. It is said that his Red Rock neighbors in 1846 requested him to leave the neighborhood—which he did by moving on to Pea’s Point. Here his stay seems to have been brief, for during the same year he is found located on the Des Moines River near the mouth of the Boone, where he erected a cabin and resumed his whiskey-selling and horse-stealing.[68]

Lott’s horse-stealing activities caused the Indians to grow suspicious; and finally they traced the loss of five ponies directly to him and his fellow marauders. This led to an Indian council which decided that Lott should be driven out of the country. Accordingly he was waited upon by Sidominadota and warned “that he was an intruder; that he had settled on the Sioux hunting grounds”; and that he was expected to get off at once. Lott contended that he was not an intruder and refused to go. The Indians then began the destruction of his property: his horses and cattle were shot, his bee-hives rifled, and his family threatened. Lott seems to have been something of a coward, for when the Indians began taking summary action he fled. While the Indians were destroying or stealing his property and abusing the helpless members of his family he, according to his own story, crossed the river and secreted himself in the brush. Later he and his stepson, leaving his wife and young children to the mercy of the Indians, fled down the Des Moines River to Pea’s Point, a short distance south of the present site of Boone.

Here Lott related his story to John Pea and others of the settlement. Aroused by his tale, the settlers organized a relief party to return to his cabin and if possible to punish the Indians. An appeal for more help was sent to Elk Rapids, sixteen miles away. At this point lived Chemeuse or “Johnny Green”, a half-breed Pottawattamie and Musquakie chief, with many of his people who traditionally hated the Sioux. The chief with twenty-six of his men and seven settlers from Pea’s Point went to Lott’s assistance. It was past the middle of December, and the weather was intensely cold. After Lott’s flight from his cabin, his twelve-year-old son, Milton, had started in search of his father, but when about twenty miles from his home and three miles from Boonesboro had frozen to death.[69] The relief party, on December 18,1846, found the dead body of the boy a short distance below the village of Centerville. After burying the body on the spot where it was found, the party continued on its way to Lott’s cabin. When they arrived they found that the Indians had gone. The family was safe, though suffering and destitute as they had been robbed of everything. The wife, however, had been so mistreated and had suffered so extremely from exposure that she died a short time thereafter.[70]

Vowing vengeance, Lott moved south to the settlements and built a second cabin.[71] Here and at other points in the vicinity he remained a few years, according to all accounts, and bided his time in true frontier style. In the autumn of 1853 he and his stepson passed through Fort Dodge on their way to settle at a new location. In early November he selected a site for his cabin about thirty miles north of Fort Dodge, in Humboldt County, at a point where a small creek joins the Des Moines River. This creek has since been named Lott’s Creek in honor of the first white settler in that vicinity.[72] With three barrels of bad whiskey, he re-opened trade with the Indians. And the trade was good; for at this time there was only one cabin, other than his own, north of Fort Dodge—the cabin of William Miller which was located six miles from Fort Dodge.

In January following Lott’s new settling, Sidominadota and his family—which was composed of his squaw, mother, four children, and two orphan children—came up the Des Moines and encamped on “Bloody Run”, a short distance below the mouth of Lott’s Creek. Aware of the coming of the old chief, Lott plotted his destruction. Going to the lodge of Sidominadota, where he perceived that he was not recognized, Lott reported the presence of a large drove of elk feeding on the Des Moines bottom at a point since known as the “Big Bend”.[73] The chief’s family being in sore need of food, the Indian was easily trapped by the ruse. Sidominadota, having been liberally treated to whiskey, mounted his pony and set out for the hunt; while Lott and his stepson followed. When a safe distance away from the Indian camp and beyond earshot, Lott and his stepson fired upon the Indian, killing him outright. Secreting themselves during the day, the murderers, at the coming of darkness, disguised themselves as Indians, returned to the lodge of the murdered Indian, raised a terrific war cry for purposes of deception, and then surprised and killed all the members of the family except a boy of twelve and a girl of ten years who escaped under cover of darkness.[74]

Completing the work of destruction, Lott returned to his own cabin, burned it to make the whole affair appear the work of Indians, and in the company of his stepson fled down the Des Moines Valley. Some years later a report came back to Iowa that he had made his way to California and had there been lynched by a vigilance committee.[75]

Something more than a week after the murder of Sidominadota and his family a band of Indians from a camp on the Lizard Creek, while hunting in the vicinity of the mouth of “Bloody Run”, discovered what had taken place. They reported the fact not only to Fort Ridgely but also to Major Williams at Fort Dodge, demanding an investigation and the righting of the wrong as far as possible. Major Williams at once raised a company of whites and Indians and set out in an attempt to locate the murderers, but to no avail. The Indians were firm in their conviction that Lott had committed the deed. A coroner’s jury under the direction of Coroner John Johns met at Homer, the county seat of Webster County, and placed the guilt upon Lott and his stepson. But no very great effort was or could be made by the authorities to secure the offenders, owing to the start of ten days which they had secured. Later they were indicted by a grand jury sitting in Des Moines, which ended the attempt to find and punish them.[76] The Indians were highly incensed not only at the murder itself, but at the apparent inaction of the authorities in apprehending and punishing the murderers.

Many reports became current as to the final disposition of the dead chief’s body after it had been taken to Homer for the inquest. These reports only added to the embitterment of the Indians, who had expected much from the inquest, having been told that this would settle matters. That the inquest took somewhat the form of a farce was due to the attitude of the prosecuting attorney of Hamilton County, Granville Berkley, who humorously conducted the affair.

Fearing later unpleasant results, the whites attempted to pacify the Indians with many promises. But the Indians grew sullen and suspicious and behaved in such a manner as to create the impression that they might retaliate. It soon became evident that the authorities had no intention of keeping their promises. The Indians after some threatening seem to have disappeared.[77] One can understand how such incidents, coupled with past grievances, “real or only imaginary”, might in the end lead to desperate deeds.

V
THE FRONTIER AND THE WINTER OF 1856-1857

With the Indians in a most unhappy and vengeful state of mind the Traverse des Sioux Treaty lands were thrown open for settlement in 1853. For several years people had settled along the border of this territory patiently awaiting the opening. Assurances were given the settlers that the Sioux were all established upon their reserve seventy miles north of Iowa’s northern boundary. With these assurances of safety, the settlers rapidly pushed to the westward of the Des Moines River which hitherto had been the farthest limit of their movement.

The line of frontier settlements by 1857 extended in a semi-circle from Sioux City to Fort Dodge as a center and thence to or near Springfield (now Jackson) in Minnesota.[78] Only a brief time served to destroy this line as the settlers moved westward in search of the choicest claims. Before discussing the events which were soon to transpire it will be well to note the outward movement of this frontier to the northwest. The effect upon the Indians of the sudden outward bulging of the line was little short of maddening, as they felt themselves being swept onward by a tide they could not stem. All of their illy concealed hatred of the whites now bade fair to be loosed, while all past wrongs seemed about to be avenged.

Times were now “flush” and the tide of emigration “swept across the state with an impetus that carried everything before it.”[79] During the summer of 1855 “land-hunters, claim seekers and explorers” steadily flowed into northwestern Iowa. At this time little more was done by many of the settlers than to make temporary improvements, after which they returned eastward planning to take up permanent possession in the following summer.[80]

The main arteries for this westward movement were the Little Sioux and the Des Moines. From Fort Dodge the wave spread out in fan-shape to the furthermost limits of the frontier. The lines of the movement were in the main determined by two facts: Fort Dodge had been established as a United States land office for the territory west and north, and Lizard Creek made that region readily accessible to settlers. Up the Des Moines, settlers had pushed to the point where Jackson, Minnesota, now stands. Many had stopped at occasional points along the Des Moines and made permanent settlements. Near the present site of Algona, in 1854, two brothers, Asa C. Call and Ambrose A. Call, made “the first settlement on either branch of the Des Moines above the forks.”[81] To the west of Algona at Medium Lake was the “Irish Colony”—a group of five or six families of Irish extraction from Kane County, Illinois. This settlement has become the Emmetsburg of to-day.[82] George Granger had staked out and settled upon a claim in Emmet County just south of the State line, and beyond this was Springfield, Minnesota, with six families. Thus a line of isolated settlements extended up the Des Moines Valley from Fort Dodge to Springfield.

To the northwest of Fort Dodge the incoming settlers moved up the course of Lizard Creek, which they followed to its beginning. Thence they crossed to the Little Sioux and settled near Sioux Rapids and Peterson. Near the latter place in the midwinter of 1855-1856 had come J. A. Kirchner and Jacob Kirchner, in company with Ambrose S. Mead. They did nothing at this time but select claims and return to Cedar Falls, from whence they returned in the early spring. After putting in his crops J. A. Kirchner had returned to New York. About the time of his departure, James Bicknell with his family and two men by the name of Wilcox also arrived at the little settlement in Clay County. Up the Little Sioux to the north were about six families at what became known as Gillett’s Grove.[83] In the early spring of 1856 the Hon. William Freeborn of Red Wing, Minnesota, and others projected a settlement at Spirit Lake. Their first attempt had not met with much success, and they now awaited the coming of the spring of 1857 to renew the attempt.[84] In the late summer of 1856 about forty people had settled along the shores of Lake Okoboji and Spirit Lake.

Following the original movement up Lizard Creek and the Des Moines River, settlers had begun pushing up the course of the Little Sioux from the Missouri River to a later junction with those coming by way of Lizard Creek to Sioux Rapids and beyond. This movement was marked by an initial settlement at the present site of Smithland, Woodbury County, in about 1851 by a group of three apostate Mormons from Kanesville.[85] In the spring of 1856 the Milford, Massachusetts, Emigration Company had founded a colony of about twelve families near Pilot Rock in Cherokee County.[86] The site chosen was a little north of the present city of Cherokee. Nearly ten miles above this point was a second settlement. To the northeast of these, in Buena Vista County, was the Weaver family at Barnes’s Grove. Above this in O’Brien County was H. H. Waterman, at Waterman, who could boast of being the only white man within the confines of that county. Further up the Little Sioux, in the southwestern corner of Clay County, were the families of Mead, Kirchner, and Taylor.[87]

This stretch of settlements outlined the extreme limits of the frontier. To the west there were no settlers; while to the north and northeast the nearest settlements were those on the Minnesota and Watonwan rivers.[88] Although on ceded ground, all of these settlements were in the heart of the Indian country, where the passing of Indian bands was not uncommon. All were separated from each other by vast stretches of prairie, and frequently the settlers of one place were wholly unaware of the presence of any other white people in the region. Their complete isolation from each other and consequent helplessness in case of Indian attacks were probably best known by the Indians who not infrequently visited them. This isolation appears the more complete when it is recalled that the nearest railroad station in Iowa at that time was Iowa City—over two hundred miles away.

By 1857, therefore, the northwestern frontier may be described as “commencing at Sioux City and extending irregularly in a northeasterly direction, by way of Correctionville, Cherokee, Waterman, Peterson, Sioux Rapids, Gillett’s Grove and Okoboji, to Spirit Lake; thence turning abruptly to the east by way of Estherville and Emmet to the headwaters of the Des Moines and Blue Earth Rivers, where it extended into Minnesota, terminating at Mankato.”[89]

Thus was the meeting-ground of the Indians and the white settlers rather roughly demarked when the winter of 1856-1857 began. Although the fertility of its soil had not been doubted and its great natural beauty and attractiveness as a region of boundless prairies had never been disputed, the northwest had acquired a reputation of climatic extremes—of hot summers and cold winters. This partly accounted for the fact that many settlers delayed their permanent coming to the region until they were amply prepared for the vicissitudes of climate which they must endure in their new homes. Glowing reports had brought the region into general notice, and by the fall of 1856 many people to the east were preparing to migrate to this wonderful country in the not distant future.

“The winter of 1856-7 set in with a fury, steadiness and severity, which make it a land-mark in the experience of every person”[90] who passed through it. The storms came early in November, and for weeks northwestern Iowa witnessed nothing but a succession of terrific blizzards, accompanied by the most intense cold. By December 1, 1856, the snow was three feet deep on the level and from fifteen to twenty in the ravines and other low places. Communication of settlement with settlement was well-nigh impossible. The scattered settlers were illy prepared for such a winter: their cabins were unfinished and generally without floors, as all lumber had to be hauled a distance of more than one hundred miles. Most of the settlers had planted no crops during the preceding growing season; hence provisions were scarce and could only be obtained by the use of snowshoes and hand sleds. Wild game was nowhere to be had, for it had either migrated before the oncoming storms or perished in the snow.

As the season progressed the intensity of the cold also increased; while heavy wind-driven snows continued to fall at frequent intervals. The prairies became bleak and barren snow-covered wastes, lashed by terrific winds and untenanted by man or beast. The closing of February and the opening of March witnessed no abatement in the severity of the winter. The snow which had been falling the whole winter long yet remained on the ground. Indeed, the season was so prolonged that it is said spring came only in late April, while May and June were cold. In July great banks of snow were yet to be seen in some of the sheltered places.[91]

Although the white settlers suffered considerably from self-imposed denial of food and from unsuitable houses in which to shelter themselves, their privations could not compare with those of the Indians. In Dakota, which was their winter home, they suffered terribly. Their game was gone—where they did not know. Nor were they able to follow it if they had known. As the winds swept over the prairies of Dakota and sharply penetrated the thickets wherein they lodged, their desperation grew apace. At last, in the closing days of February, the intense suffering from cold and famine could be endured no longer and they sallied forth. The course of their march spread out to the east, the north, and the south, and took them to the white settlements along the Iowa and Minnesota frontiers where they sought and took both food and shelter.[92]

VI
OKOBOJI AND SPRINGFIELD IN MARCH 1857

Of the settlements made or projected in northwestern Iowa previous to 1857, those having preeminent interest in this connection were along the shores of Lake Okoboji and Spirit Lake in Dickinson County. Although this lake region had been visited many times in the spring and summer of 1855, no settlements had been made at that time. The visitors had simply planned to return as soon as arrangements for permanent occupancy could be perfected. They had been attracted thither by the tales told by Indians and traders concerning the great natural beauty of the region.

For some time the lake region had been well-known to the traders and voyageurs of the upper Mississippi Valley, and their tales concerning it were all favorable. The French interpreter of the Lewis and Clark expedition wrote so clearly of the region as to leave no doubt as to his having been there. He it was who first wrote of the Lac D’Esprit, mentioning it for its great natural beauty of location and as being the chief seat of one of the Dakotan tribes. Hunters, traders, trappers, and adventurers visited the region frequently thereafter, but left only oral accounts as to its character and worth. The same region was visited in the summer of 1838 by Nicollet and John C. Fremont, who made observations as to elevation, latitude, and longitude. It was following this official visit that white frontiersmen began to frequent the locality.

All reports of the region indicated it was the favored home of the Wahpekuta Yankton Sioux. Spirit Lake especially was believed by this tribe to be the scene of various myths and legends intimately connected with the origin and life of the tribe. It was reputed to be always under the watchful care of the Great Spirit whose presence therein was clearly evidenced by the lake’s turbulent waters which were never at rest. It was this suggestion of the supernatural—a sort of mystic veil surrounding the region—that led many people to visit it. Some came only to view the lake and, having done so, departed to add perhaps one more legendary tale to the volume of its romance. Practically every visitor enlarged upon the great charms of the groves of natural timber bordering its shores.

But in nearly all of the accounts and tales of the region there was persistent confusion with regard to the several bodies of water. The Indians had always plainly distinguished at least three lakes; while reports by white men as persistently spoke of only one. The Indians knew of Okoboji, “the place of rest”, of Minnetonka, “the great water”, and of Minnewaukon, “the lake of demons or spirits” or Lac D’Esprit or Spirit Lake as it is known to-day. It is the first of these, Lake Okoboji, with which this narrative is primarily concerned. Upon its borders the first permanent white settlers built their cabins and staked their claims; and here was perpetrated the awful tragedy which has come to be known as the Spirit Lake Massacre.

The lakes, lying closely together as a group, occupy a large portion of the townships of Spirit Lake, Center Grove, and Lakeville. The northernmost and somewhat the largest of the group is Spirit Lake, which is about ten square miles in area. The northern shore of this lake touches upon or extends into Minnesota along practically the whole of its course. To the south, not connected at this time, and extending in a narrowed, almost tortuous course, stretches East Okoboji for a distance of over six miles. At no point is East Okoboji much over three-quarters of a mile in width. West Okoboji lies to the west of its companion and is connected with it by a narrow strait a few yards in width. The west lake stretches to the west and north, circling in a segment of a circle nearly halfway back to the north and east to Spirit Lake. In length it is about the same as the east lake, although its width is over four times as great at one point. Issuing from the southernmost bay of East Okoboji is the outlet stream, which at a distance of six miles from its source effects a junction with the main stream of the Little Sioux.

The shores of the Okoboji lakes are in the main well wooded, while those of Spirit Lake have only occasional clumps of trees. Along the shores of the latter prairie and water usually meet without interruption by bands of timber. In some respects the Okobojis present a reasonably good reproduction of the smaller lakes of southern New York and New England. Thus easterners felt that here could be reproduced the familiar scenes of “back home”. Although the attractiveness of the place was widely known, no one had settled in the region before the middle of the century. The vanguard of the permanent settlers came on July 16, 1856, with the arrival of Rowland Gardner and his family.

THE LAKE REGION: THE SCENE OF THE SPIRIT LAKE MASSACRE

Rowland Gardner was a native of Connecticut, having been born in New Haven in 1815. Here he spent his boyhood years and learned the trade of comb-maker. Growing tired of life in New Haven he migrated to Seneca, New York, where he resumed his trade. At the occupation of comb-maker he had been able to accumulate some three thousand dollars, which, for the time, was considered rather a comfortable little fortune.[93] On March 22, 1836, he married Frances M. Smith, and four children, Mary, Eliza, Abigail, and Rowland, were born while the family lived at Seneca. Abigail, the youngest daughter who is to figure so largely in the story of the Spirit Lake Massacre, was born in 1843. Later the father abandoned the trade of comb-maker and turned to that of sawyer. This change in occupation did not come, however, until the family had again moved—this time to Greenwood, New York. Again, in 1850, they removed to the near-by town of Rexville.

But Gardner had a love for roaming that could not be satisfied by short moves; and so it was not long before he left Rexville for Ohio. His first stop in that State was at Edyington, where he opened a boarding house. His next resolve was to go to the then Far West. Thus, in the spring of 1854 he made his way with his family to Shell Rock, Iowa.[94] Here the family spent their first winter in the West and suffered much from the change of climate. Shell Rock, however, was only a temporary stopping place, for Gardner had no thought of settling short of the farthest bounds of the frontier.

In the early spring of 1855 Gardner, in company with his son-in-law, Harvey Luce, made a rather extensive prospecting tour to the west and north. He seems to have decided to settle, for a time at least, at Clear Lake; for a little later we find him and Luce with their united families moving up the Shell Rock Valley to Nora Springs and thence across the prairie to Clear Lake. This journey consumed the greater portion of April and early May. Settling too late to plant crops that season, the families could not look forward to a very comfortable year.

Gardner and Luce decided upon Clear Lake for the same reason that later led them to settle at Lake Okoboji. To a New Englander accustomed to the lakes and streams of his native parts, Clear Lake with its waters and groves made a strong appeal—one that could not readily be resisted. Open prairies seemed to be “the abomination of desolation” itself. The Mason City settlement on Lime Creek was thought of, but the natural advantages of Clear Lake outweighed any inclination in that direction. At this time Mason City was little more than a station on the westward trail: it consisted of only three or four houses on the open, wind-swept prairie.

It was while the Gardner family was living at Clear Lake that there occurred the so-called “Grindstone War”, in which indeed they were active participants. After the scare had spent its force, Gardner again grew uneasy; and, having heard of the attractiveness of the lake region farther to the west along the frontier, he became anxious to settle there. Thus, scarcely had they harvested a first crop when the Gardners were once more en route to the westward. The small returns from the sale of the claim at Clear Lake were invested in some oxen, cows, and young cattle.[95]

To the homeseeker the lake region was regarded as a “promised land”. This was largely due to its natural beauties as well as to the very great abundance of fish in the lake waters and the plenitude of wild game in the groves along its shores. Many claim seekers had visited the region previous to July, 1856, but no claims had been staked out. The Gardners found no settlers at the time of their arrival.[96] In fact no settlers had been seen by them since leaving the claim of the Call brothers near the present site of Algona.

The journey from Clear Lake had been an arduous one, having been made with ox teams hitched to heavy, cumbrous carts into which had been loaded not only the family but the household goods and the farming implements as well as the food supply. Thus burdened the oxen could make only slow progress even under the most favorable conditions. Furthermore, it seems that the Iowa plains had suffered from an over-abundance of rain that summer: numberless quagmires were encountered; while many streams could hardly be forded on account of their swollen condition. Added to these conditions was the uncertainty of the route—due to lack of knowledge of the country. Many a time it was necessary to unload and carry articles of freight over difficult places. Enduring these trials with the fortitude of well-tried pioneers they steadily pushed on. Upon July 16th they came to the southeastern shores of West Okoboji; and here they rested, for they were at their journey’s end.

Since leaving New York the Gardner family had been augmented by a union with the family of Harvey Luce. The latter had planned from the first to unite his fortunes with those of the Gardners, but had been unable to do so at the time of their leaving New York. Luce had married Mary, the eldest of the Gardner girls; and at the time of their arrival at Lake Okoboji, the family numbered two children, Albert aged four and Amanda aged one.[97] The Gardner-Luce party was thus composed of nine persons at the time of its arrival.

Luce and Gardner did not settle at once: while the families tented, the men spent several days in a careful survey of the lake shores and the surrounding prairie region, the better to determine a suitable site. Since the lake region was to be the place of their permanent settlement they desired to make a careful selection of lands.

In the end it was decided to build cabins upon the southeastern shore of the west lake. The location selected was several rods southeast of what is now Pillsbury’s Point upon the high, oak-wooded ridge which terminated in that point of land. The site was ideal. To the north and northwest the outlook presented a sweeping view of the lake; while to the south there was as fair a prospect of prairie land as any country could afford. No better selection for a home could have been made. The erection of a log cabin for the Gardners was begun at once. Fronting south, this cabin was for its time rather pretentious, since it was one and one-half stories high.

The season being far too advanced for the planting of crops little could be done besides preparing the land for the next year. This was accomplished by breaking some of the prairie sod. In addition hay was made as feed for the oxen and other cattle during the long winter season. The making of the hay was largely carried through by Mrs. Gardner and her children, including Mrs. Luce; while Gardner and Luce pushed ahead with the building of the cabins in order to afford protection for all as soon as possible. Shelter was also provided for the cattle. By the time this had been done, the season was so far advanced that, though the Luce cabin had been begun, its completion had to be postponed until the return of favorable weather in the coming year. Thus it came about that the Luces took up their abode with the Gardners for the winter which was now upon them.[98]

While out prospecting for claim sites in the two or three days following their arrival, Luce and Gardner heard a report of fire-arms and upon tracing it to its source found that other settlers had just arrived in the vicinity. The camp of the new arrivals was in process of being pitched on the shore of the west lake near the strait connecting the two Okobojis. The party was composed of Carl and William Granger, Bertell E. Snyder, and Dr. Isaac H. Harriott. They had come to the lake region for the purpose of examining the country with a view to future settlement.[99] Having completed their reconnaissance, the members of the party were preparing to spend some time in the neighborhood hunting and fishing.

These newcomers came to be so well pleased with the advantages of the region that they finally resolved to spend the winter here and possibly make a permanent settlement. After reaching this conclusion they constructed a cabin on Smith’s Point north of the strait. These men, moreover, were members of a townsite company which had been founded in May, 1856, at Red Wing, Minnesota. As promoters it was their purpose to start a town on the border of some one of the lakes in this region. The Grangers as leading stockholders in the concern laid claim to the point upon which the cabin was built, as well as to all the land lying along the northern shore of the east lake. After resolving upon permanent settlement all but William Granger decided to remain during the coming fall and winter and engage in preparing the townsite for prospective settlers. William Granger was the only married man of the group, and his purpose in returning to Red Wing was two-fold—that of advertising the townsite which had been selected and of bringing back his family in the spring of 1857.[100]

Although the Gardner and Luce families were the first to arrive at the lakes, they had not long to wait before other groups began to arrive, all of whom hurried preparations for the winter that was now not far removed. The sound of the saw and hammer was soon heard in a number of places along the lake shores, while signs of still greater activity in the future grew apace. All of the newcomers located within a radius of six miles of the Gardner cabin.[101] The nearest settlement was that at Springfield, Minnesota, about eighteen miles to the northeast; while to the south the nearest was at Gillett’s Grove, more than forty miles away.[102] Neither of these settlements had made any provision for its protection against a hostile party of any kind. So far as anyone knew no reason existed for their apparent feeling of assurance against danger.

So rapidly had emigration set in that by November 1, 1856, there were six separate groups of people prepared to spend the winter in this vicinity. The first family to arrive after the Gardners was that of James H. Mattock, who came with his wife and five children directly from Delaware County, Iowa. They settled south of the strait, nearly opposite the site chosen by the party from Red Wing, and the place of their settlement has since become locally known as Mattock’s Grove. The site was about one mile from the Gardner-Luce cabin. With the Mattock family had also come a Robert Madison, who was about eighteen years of age. Robert Madison had preceded the other members of his family, who were still in Delaware County but were planning to move to the lake region when suitable accommodations had been provided for them by the son.[103]

From Hampton, Franklin County, Iowa, there came in the late fall the families of Joel Howe, Alvin Noble, and Joseph M. Thatcher. These people had been neighbors at Hampton and had come west as a group. They settled along the east shore of East Okoboji, some two or three miles from the Mattock cabin. The Howe family was large, consisting of Mr. and Mrs. Howe and six children. Jonathan, the eldest of the children and a young man of twenty-three, remained in Hampton, since it was planned that he should come out in the following spring or as soon as he could procure the supplies which would be needed by the three families in their work of pioneering. Alvin Noble, Howe’s son-in-law, brought with him his wife and one child—a two year old son. The Thatcher family was also small, consisting of Mr. and Mrs. Thatcher and a child about seven months of age. The Howe cabin was the first to be erected and was also the nearest to those on West Okoboji. When it had been completed, all hands joined in the erection of a cabin about a mile beyond or northeast of Howe’s place which was to be jointly occupied by the Noble and Thatcher families until further arrangements could be made. Boarding with the latter families was Morris Markham—a sort of frontiersman from Hampton, Iowa.[104]

Late in September came Mr. and Mrs. William Marble from Linn County, Iowa. Having stopped temporarily on the Okoboji lakes, the Marbles after some prospecting decided to locate on the southwest shore of Spirit Lake—distant, in an air line, about six miles from the Gardners and perhaps a mile less from the Howes. Their cabin was the most isolated of all—which made it easily possible for events to transpire upon the shores of the Okobojis without the knowledge of the Marbles for days or even weeks.[105]

Such was the chain of settlements of those pioneers who were to pass the frightful winter of 1856-1857 on this isolated frontier. As winter closed in upon them they felt reasonably secure, since Indians had only very rarely been seen. With little or no experience of frontier life on an American prairie, they believed their supply of provisions to be ample for the closed season. No one anticipated an unusual winter. During February a trapper named Joseph Harshman came to the cabin of the Red Wing people. Being a man of genial disposition he was encouraged to spend the remaining portion of the winter with them. Whence he came no one knew; nor did anyone inquire concerning his antecedents, since on the frontier such questions were regarded as discourteous to the stranger.

About eighteen miles to the northeast, on the Des Moines River in Minnesota, was the newly formed settlement of Springfield. Here were to be found by the winter of 1856-1857 about six or seven families. The town had been platted in the summer of 1856 by three brothers—William, George, and Charles Wood of Mankato, Minnesota. For many years these brothers had been widely known in Minnesota and the northwest as Indian traders. By the winter of 1856-1857 they had concentrated their trading interests in a store in Springfield, which made the little village the meeting and trading place of the Indians and whites for many miles around. Indeed, Springfield was the only settlement of note within a radius of fifty miles.[106]

Most of the settlers comprising the Springfield, or as it was sometimes called the “Des Moines City” settlement, had come from northeastern Iowa. The vanguard had appeared in August, 1856, and had located on the east side of the Des Moines River. The Wood brothers had come somewhat earlier and had established their post on the west side of the river, where they laid out the town which they planned to promote. As in the region of the lakes, the cabins were widely scattered up and down the river for seven or eight miles.[107] By the opening of winter the settlement had about seventeen able-bodied men and twelve adult women; but by March, 1857, the number had somewhat increased so that the settlement had about forty-seven people in all, living in seven or eight family groups.

In general the cabins were centered about the home of J. B. Thomas, who had built in the edge of the timber near the river about one and a half miles from the Wood brothers’ store. In this family were Mr. and Mrs. Thomas and five children, the eldest of whom was a boy, Willie, of twelve or thirteen years. About two miles from the Thomas cabin upon the open prairie lived Joshua Stewart with his wife and three children; while the Wheeler cabin was about three-fourths of a mile and the John Bradshaw home nearly one and a half miles away. The Adam P. Shiegley cabin, where he and one son lived, was the most isolated, being far removed from all of the others. In addition, there were the homes of Strong, Skinner, Smith, Church, and Harshman.

In the family of Dr. E. B. N. Strong, the community surgeon, were Dr. and Mrs. Strong, two children, and Miss Eliza Gardner, the daughter of Rowland Gardner of the Okoboji settlement.[108] The Strongs had made the acquaintance of the Gardners after the latter had come to the lakes. As Mrs. Strong was not in good health Eliza Gardner had been prevailed upon to accompany the Strongs to their new home at Springfield. In the Church home were Mr. and Mrs. William L. Church, two children, and Miss Drusilla Swanger, a sister of Mrs. Church. The family of J. B. Skinner comprised, beside himself, his wife and two children; while in the Harshman home there were also two children. Mr. and Mrs. William Nelson had one child; while Mr. and Mrs. Robert Smith and a second Harshman and wife were without children.[109] The unmarried men of the community were Joseph Cheffins, Henry Tretts, Jareb Palmer, David N. Carver, Nathaniel Frost, John Henderson, and John Bradshaw. As the result of being badly frozen during the winter of 1856-1857, it had been necessary for Dr. Strong to amputate both of Henderson’s legs and one of Smith’s. These operations had been performed shortly before the visit of the Indians in March, 1857.[110]

VII
THE JOURNEY EAST FOR SUPPLIES

By February the unusual severity of the winter was occasioning some alarm at the lake settlements—particularly as the stock of provisions laid by for the winter was nearing exhaustion. In view of the deep snow and the intense cold it seemed more than foolish to think of attempting to make one’s way even to the nearest depot of supplies—which was Fort Dodge. The banks of snow were fifteen and often twenty feet high and offered an almost impassable obstruction to the use of teams. Add to this the intensity of the cold, and one can well imagine what courage or dire necessity it must have required to induce the traveller to set out for the purpose of making his way over an untrodden and in many respects an unknown waste of snow. But the food situation was such that it became increasingly evident that some effort must soon be made to relieve a condition which might become intolerable. Moreover, no one had had any experience in this section which would serve as an index to indicate how long the winter season might continue.

Finally, it was decided that Luce and Thatcher were to return to their former homes in the eastern section of the State in quest of the needed food. With a sled and an ox team they set out in the early days of February. The journey proved to be one of almost incredible hardships: the cold was nearly unendurable, while the banks of snow so impeded their progress that not infrequently little advance was made as the result of a whole day’s effort. In the end, however, they made their way safely to Hampton, but only to suffer the disappointment of learning that the settlers here could do little or nothing for them. Compelled to go still farther, they pushed on to Shell Rock, Cedar Falls, and Waterloo before they were able to obtain sufficient supplies for all the people at the lakes.

Securing at last the needed supplies, they remained at Cedar Falls for a brief time to permit the recuperation of both their oxen and themselves. Finally, they began preparations for the return journey which would probably prove more trying than the one east, for now they would be compelled to face the cutting winds and hard driven snows of the open prairies. Although warning of the possible hardships of such a journey was given by Luce and Thatcher, the prospects did not deter four young men from accompanying the two settlers upon their return to the lakes. These men were Robert Clark, a young friend of Luce from Waterloo; Jonathan Howe, the son of Joel Howe already settled at Okoboji; Enoch Ryan from Hampton, a son-in-law of Joel Howe; and Asa Burtch, a brother of Mrs. Joseph M. Thatcher.

In spite of the difficulties encountered, all went well on the return until the party reached a point known as Shippey’s near the mouth of Cylinder Creek in Palo Alto County, about ten miles south of the “Irish Colony”. Here the overloaded and exhausted oxen were unable to proceed any further. After some deliberation it was decided that Burtch and Thatcher should remain at Shippey’s and care for the oxen until they had regained their strength sufficiently to allow them to proceed upon the journey. Meanwhile, Luce, Clark, Howe, and Ryan were to hasten onward to the lakes with the good word that succor was near at hand. They made the trip on foot and in two days, reaching the settlements on the evening of March 6th. Here they found all well with the settlers who rejoiced at the prospect of relief in the near future.[111]

By a careful husbanding of resources and a system of mutual exchange the settlers had been able to prevent much suffering which a lack of care might have entailed. But the time had not elapsed without the occasional appearance of Indians. Apparently a number of red men were wintering in the groves near by, as it seemed unlikely that they could have come from any great distance. They were always friendly in their attitude toward the whites, who from time to time took occasion to relieve their too evident suffering from cold and hunger. They had not only been invited within the cabins to share the comfortable firesides, but were also encouraged to share in the settlers’ humble meals if they happened to arrive at meal time. They never left a settler’s cabin empty-handed at any time.

But as the time for the opening of spring neared it had been noted that the Indians grew more restless and less sociable: they seemed to avoid contact with the whites as much as possible. At the same time, the settlers, untrained in Indian ways, saw nothing singular in their later attitude and felt no occasion for alarm. Future developments, however, were to show that there had been more than one occasion for alarm. More than once the Indians had been observed to stalk each cabin and in other ways manifest an undue interest in the settlers. This, however, was accounted for at the time as untutored curiosity in things new and strange.

VIII
THE INKPADUTA BAND

For a number of years preceding the killing of Sidominadota another Indian band, similar in character to that led by the murdered leader, had roamed the country and terrorized the people between the Des Moines and the Big Sioux rivers. Under the leadership of Inkpaduta or “Scarlet Point”, this band had frequented in particular the headwaters of the Des Moines: they resorted to the Big Sioux and beyond only when fleeing from punishment.[112] Their refuge beyond the Big Sioux was with the Yanktons, whose camps along the James or Dakota River were always an asylum for outlawed and disorderly Sioux bands. Here Inkpaduta was free to go at any time for shelter and defense. But with no other group was Inkpaduta able to maintain even the semblance of friendly relations.[113] The Inkpaduta band of Indians had become well-known either by the name of its leader or as the “Red Top” band, from the fact that it frequently carried pennons of red cloth attached to lance ends.[114]

Inkpaduta, the leader of the band, was a Wahpekuta Sioux of a villainous and unsavory reputation even among his own tribesmen, who feared or hated him. Due to his misdeeds he had been expelled from membership in his own gens division of the Wahpekuta Sioux.[115] But this did not serve as a lesson in proper conduct; instead it seemed only to enrage him to the point of committing other and worse deeds—if such were possible. Owing to his lawless disposition a serious quarrel arose among the Wahpekutas. Originally this division seems to have arisen out of a very marked difference in opinion as to the proper attitude to assume toward their hereditary enemies, the Sac and Fox Indians. One section advised a cessation of hostilities which seemed to have resulted in the accomplishment of no purpose. Moreover, in several of the encounters the Wahpekutas had suffered severe losses which they had not been able to successfully recoup.

A second division of the tribe led by Wamdisapa, or “Black Eagle”, was so quarrelsome and revengeful that it stoutly opposed any consideration looking toward peace. Black Eagle is characterized as “a reckless, lawless fellow, always at war” with other tribes. After the treaties of Prairie du Chien in 1825 and 1830, he was “one of the first” of the Sioux to violate their provisions by making war upon the neighboring tribes. His conduct in this respect grew especially bad after the treaty of 1830, when his attitude won for him the “ill will of all his people”, who claimed that his conduct provoked their enemies to make many reprisals upon them. Refusing to alter his conduct, Wamdisapa and a small group of kindred spirits were virtually driven away from the tribe and no longer considered as its members.[116]

Striking out boldly across the prairies of Minnesota, the outlaws took a course which led them south and west: they were evidently headed for the lower James, the place of their future rendezvous. Their course led them to the present site of Algona, where they tarried for some time. Resuming their flight, they travelled westward, crossing the Big Sioux. Finally, they established themselves on the Jacques or James River in the vicinity of Spirit Lake, South Dakota.[117] After removing to this region they were not infrequently known as the “Santies” of the James. They seemed to have lost their identity with the Wahpekutas.

As this party of defection grew in numbers, differences of opinion arose among them. After suffering disruption the band reorganized under two leaders or chieftans—Wamdisapa and Tasagi (“His Cane”). Under this dual leadership, they seemed for a time to prosper as never before. But their misdeeds became so numerous that the neighboring Sioux requested them to leave the country.[118] The dual chieftanship was not continued beyond the lives of the original holders, since internal jealousies and ambitions rendered it not only undesirable but impossible. The quarrels were largely due to temperamental differences in the leaders. Tasagi was of a mild disposition; while Wamdisapa was noted for his quarrelsome, ferocious, and revengeful nature.

After signing the treaty of 1836, Wamdisapa shifted his band to the Blue Earth region. From here he conducted raids into the Iowa country against the Sacs and Foxes, who, in retaliating, made no distinction between the Indians of Wamdisapa and those of Tasagi on the Cannon River. This caused much suffering among the Cannon River people; but Wamdisapa could not be prevailed upon to discontinue his raids. In the meantime Wamdisapa’s son, Inkpaduta, had grown to manhood and leadership. He seems to have inherited to the full the relentless cruelty of his father. More ambitious for leadership than his father, he planned to unite as speedily as possible the leadership which his father had been content to share with Tasagi.

When the consolidation of the leadership did not progress as rapidly as Inkpaduta wished, it is said that he hastened the event by securing the murder of Tasagi. This occurred probably in 1839.[119] As Inkpaduta had planned so it came to pass that upon Wamdisapa’s early death the two divisions accepted in the main Inkpaduta’s leadership. At the same time a strong faction refused his leadership. Becoming alarmed for his safety Inkpaduta fled further into the Blue Earth country, hoping thereby to gain time for the firmer union of his loyal followers.[120] Even so he could not tarry long since the Cannon River Wahpekutas were on his trail. With a still smaller number of followers he again fled—this time to northern Iowa—preferring to brave the hatred of the Sacs and Foxes to that of his fellow Wahpekutas.

It is thought that the incident of Tasagi’s murder and the later flights nearly broke up the band of Wamdisapa, so that it could scarcely be said to exist. In a few years, however, through a prolonged series of intertribal quarrels conditions had become such that Inkpaduta was recognized as the undisputed master of the greater and more turbulent sections of both of the original bands. By the time of the successful realization of his plans—about 1848—Inkpaduta had made a reputation for relentless savagery that had spread throughout northwestern Iowa, Dakota, and Minnesota. Upon him rests the stigma of having planned the murder not only of Tasagi but also of his own father.[121] His band seemed to thrive upon its evil reputation: thus it is said that “from time to time some villainous Sioux committed a murder, or other gross crime upon some other member of the tribe, and fled for fear of vengeance to the outlawed band of Wahpakootas for protection.”[122]

The Inkpaduta band of Indians became, as it were, accursed. It could call no place its home—excepting perhaps the temporary winter rendezvous with the Spirit Lake Yanktons. Thus the members of this band became as “Ishmaelites whose hands were against all other men”.[123] The character of its members was that of its leader, who acted as a magnet to draw to him the worst types from the surrounding tribes. Even according to the Indian moral code they would be classed as toughs and criminals. Inkpaduta was universally reputed as the most blood-thirsty Indian leader in the Northwest. Whites and Indians upon whom his displeasure might fall feared him as death itself. The members of his band became widely known as the renegades and outlaws of the frontier. Spending their lives as wanderers and marauders, they never remained long in any locality. “They went as far west as the Missouri, as far north as the Cheyenne, as far south and east as the Upper Des Moines, in Iowa.”[124] Their life of necessity was but an outgrowth of their villainous disposition. It has been said that their actions grew so unbearably bad that even Sidominadota—by many regarded as an arch fiend—left the band and went far down the course of the Des Moines the better to escape the wrath of its leader.[125] It was soon after this act that Sidominadota and Lott crossed paths with the result that the Indian’s life paid the forfeit.

Many of the unpleasant incidents in frontier life from 1836 to 1857 in Minnesota and Iowa were directly chargeable to these Bedouins of the prairies who tarried at a “trading house but a few minutes and in seeming fear and dread hurried away.” The first exploit officially credited to the band was the massacre of Wamundiyakapi, a Wahpekuta chief, along with seventeen warriors on the headwaters of the Des Moines in Murray County, Minnesota, in 1849. Prior to 1850 they had broken up, plundered, and driven away two parties of United States surveyors. The cabins of numerous settlers in the upper Des Moines country had also been wantonly destroyed and they had been driven from the country—in face of the fact that it was well known what band was at work and where its usual rendezvous was located.[126] Settlers along the Boyer River had also suffered outrages at its hands as late as 1852. Major William Williams stated it as his opinion that a general attack upon the frontier was planned to occur about 1855; but the plans failed for some unknown reason. Inkpaduta seems to have been much displeased thereat and attempted to take upon himself the execution of the original plan.[127]

The unusually strenuous life which had been led by the band was having a telling effect upon its membership: by 1852 there were evidences of a near dispersion. It seems that even to a criminal Indian compulsory exile from his race was distasteful, and one by one the followers of Inkpaduta were slipping away. To stimulate an interest in his band, Inkpaduta appears to have settled upon a plan of making concerted attacks upon the northwestern frontier of settlements; and he was successful in creating in the minds of some the belief that he had general control of no less than five or six hundred warriors operating along the frontier in isolated bands of fifteen or twenty Indians each. It is now positively known that such was not the case and that at the time of its greatest prosperity the Inkpaduta band did not number more than fifty or sixty souls. By the autumn of 1856 the group had become so diminished in numbers that it was upon the eve of dispersion.

This rapid disintegration of the band could be accounted for by the character of its leader. His arrogance was rapidly rendering followers impossible. Inkpaduta, in 1856, was evidently between fifty and sixty years of age. He was born, probably in 1800, on the Watonwan River in Minnesota. For a Wahpekuta Sioux he was large, being probably more than six feet tall and very strongly built. He was not a person of pleasing appearance; for, coupled with the immoral character of his life, smallpox had badly marked him. Indeed, he presented an unusually repulsive appearance. His features were coarse; his countenance was of brutal cast; and he was very near-sighted. His near-sightedness became total blindness in old age, so that at the time of the battle of the Little Big Horn he was carefully piloted about by his small grandsons who, managing to save him from the general slaughter, succeeded in having him safely carried into Canada in the party of Sitting Bull.[128]

Although his band as a whole was of bad repute, Inkpaduta stood out above his followers on account of his hatred for the whites, his revengeful disposition, and his nearly matchless success in war.[129] Mrs. Sharp speaks of him as “a savage monster in human shape, fitted only for the darkest corner in Hades.”[130] “Of all the base characters among his fellow outlaws, his nature seems to have been the vilest, and his heart the blackest.”[131] “It was only as a war chief that he won a place in the admiration of the Indians. In civil life they would have none of him. Except where bloodshedding was the business in hand, they knew by sore experience he was not to be trusted.... It is scarcely probable from all of his conduct that he was other than he seemed, a terrible monster.”[132]

His unusual disposition was coupled with an ambition to see his people and tribe restored once again to their wide and extensive hunting ranges. As he witnessed the frontier expanding westward he saw his great ambition vanish, and he was irritated beyond control. Unspeakably immoral himself, he nevertheless hated the vices of the whites that were slowly taking hold upon the members of his band and race.

He yearned to be a party to the treaties of the Wahpekutas as a chief and to share in the annuities which resulted therefrom. The annuities, with the exception of those of 1854 and 1856, he was permitted to enjoy. Upon the death of Wamdisapa it appears that Inkpaduta was definitely dropped from membership in the Wahpekutas; and so he was not consulted regarding the disposal of the Minnesota and northwestern Iowa lands. It was thought that he had forfeited his council rights; but when the first payment was made he was on hand and demanded his share—which was denied him by the agent. He then turned his attention to the treaty-making Indians and compelled them to pay him the share which he claimed in the annuities. Thereafter he appeared annually, and only twice was he definitely refused. This denial was an affront extremely hard for him to bear, for it was to him a denial of his rights in the name and birthright of the Wahpekuta Sioux.[133] Claiming the Yankton and Santee tribal rights he appears to have gained an acknowledgment of them by the year 1865.

IX
INKPADUTA SEEKS REVENGE

Burning with hatred for Indians and white men alike, Inkpaduta and his band left the Fort Ridgely Agency of the Lower Sioux in the autumn of 1856. They appear to have gone westward to the Big Sioux, where they spent some time in hunting and fishing. Their next and final move, before entering camp for the winter, was to the Yankton camp near Spirit Lake, South Dakota. There Inkpaduta planned to spend the winter of 1856-1857 with his well-tried friends and protectors. Doubtless during the fearful ordeal of that unusual season when they suffered from cold and hunger they recalled past wrongs, which they now credited with causing their present condition, and planned revenge upon their persecutors.[134]

The question has frequently been raised as to where the Inkpaduta band of Indians really passed the winter season of 1856-1857. Some writers have held that they remained at Loon Lake, in Minnesota; while others have insisted that they camped among the Yanktons in Dakota. The latter seems the more probable. Indeed, it is highly improbable that any Indians, after having suffered, as all agree this band had suffered during the winter in the valleys of the Des Moines and Little Sioux, would go down the valley of the one, as they are reputed to have done, and finding no food on the way down, as all taking this view agree was the case, until they arrived at Smithland, would then have doubled back upon a trail known to be barren. It is far more probable that the band wintered in Dakota, and with the approach of spring returned to their favorite hunting grounds. When they had been denied food at Smithland, they at once started up the Little Sioux and hastened to the hunting grounds of presumed plenty. One thing is certain: at the first breaking of winter they were on the move.[135]

It so happened that in February, 1857, there came a promise of spring, and with this promise Inkpaduta and his band of Indians left their winter camp. Verging upon starvation, they hastened on foot or on horseback toward the white settlements along the Iowa frontier; and it can truly be said of Inkpaduta that “wherever he appeared, murder and theft marked his trail”.[136] Reaching the Big Sioux, he and his followers passed down its course and across its waters to the beginning of the white settlements upon the Little Sioux in eastern Woodbury County.

At the time of arrival at these settlements the band was not large—having, presumably, been sadly depleted by desertion or by the severity of the winter. Apparently there were only about ten lodges in all, comprising men, women, and children. So far as known the warriors in February, 1857, included the following: Inkpaduta, the leader; Roaring Cloud and Fire Cloud, the twin sons of Inkpaduta; Sacred Plume; Old Man; Putting on Walking; Rattling, son-in-law of Inkpaduta; Big Face; His Great Gun; Red Leg; Shifting Wind; and Tahtay-Shkope Kah-gah, whose name does not appear to be translatable. Nothing further need be said of the band’s personnel than that they had been well trained by Inkpaduta for the work in hand.[137]

As the settlements were neared it doubtless seemed to the Indians that they were approaching a land of plenty, for game which had hitherto been seen nowhere now began to make an occasional appearance. It must have seemed to their primitive minds that this region, their land of plenty, had been usurped by the whites. They were eager for revenge and prepared to carry arson, murder, and pillage the full length of Iowa’s western frontier.

It should be borne in mind, as events rapidly follow, that the deeds of these Indians were not by any means spontaneous or the result of any single or isolated incident or circumstance. As an explanation of what occurred in Iowa in the spring of 1857, there has been advanced the theory that Inkpaduta was merely seeking revenge for the murder of his brother, Sidominadota. This explanation has been advanced so frequently that it has been long accepted by most people as an undoubted fact. In all probability, however, such was not the motive of the Indians: on the contrary the real cause must be sought in the innate character of the band that committed the tragic deed. In fact this unhappy incident in Iowa’s pioneer history was but one of many justly charged against this particular band of wild Bedouins of the prairies.

The murder of Sidominadota in all probability did not cause Inkpaduta much concern. Moreover, it should be said at the outset that Inkpaduta and Sidominadota were not brothers—as has so often been claimed—since Inkpaduta was a Lower Sioux, a Wahpekuta; while Sidominadota was an Upper Sioux, a Sisseton. Hence they could not have been brothers. It is true that in some phases of Indian relationship they might have been spoken of as brothers, but the conditions making such a reference even remotely possible were not present in the case of these two Indian leaders. Hence the theory of blood revenge can not be accepted. Furthermore, the term “brother” with the Sioux was not limited to blood relationship. “The tribe consists of a group of men calling one another brother, who are husbands to a group of women calling one another sister.” To call one another brother was a common practice and carried with it no idea of relationship as ordinarily interpreted.

Granting that the two were brothers, if Inkpaduta could not have avenged the death within a year he could not have done so thereafter according to the practice of blood revenge universally taught and practiced among the Sioux. In religious practice and ceremonial observance Inkpaduta was neither a heretic nor an outcast. The Sioux have never been noted for retentive memories in matters of revenge, but rather for their laxity.

Inkpaduta was superior to Sidominadota in rank; hence he would not have succeeded him and could not have taken up blood revenge as his successor. Moreover, these two men had bitterly disagreed, and Sidominadota had severed all relation and connection with Inkpaduta or any of his band and had grown to be one of the bitterest and most vindictive of enemies. Inkpaduta knew this. It is likely that Inkpaduta would have rejoiced at the news of his enemy’s death: it is certain that the murder would not have caused him much if any concern. “With him it was every man for himself; he never had a sentiment so noble and dignified as that of revenge, and would not turn on his heel to retaliate for the slaughter of his nearest friend.”[138]

Again, according to Siouan practice each band is absolutely separate: one band must not concern itself with the affairs of another. War would inevitably have followed such conduct. Although Inkpaduta was lawless in many respects, no instance in which he broke over the strict letter of this custom has come to light.

Finally, the bands were so widely separated and so busily engaged in dodging each other that “it is doubtful whether Inkpadoota ever heard the particulars of All Over Red’s murder; it is certain that he would not have been concerned if he had.”

Thus it seems evident that Inkpaduta could not have been on a mission of blood revenge: it seems more probable that his own character and that of the members of his group, coupled with an overemphasized conviction of wrongs suffered in years past, allied with the intense suffering of the moment, had produced an outburst of savage frenzy culminating in murder. This would seem to be more in keeping with the known character of the Indian and in line with his known conduct. The idea of blood revenge has made a strong appeal since it was advanced as an explanation by Major William Williams, but it can not be made to rest upon a foundation of known and recognized facts in connection with the Spirit Lake Massacre.[139]

X
THE SMITHLAND INCIDENT

The approach of Inkpaduta and his band to the white settlements was unobserved—due probably to the fact that the severity of the winter had driven into the settlement all the traders and trappers who were commonly the purveyors of such news along the frontier. Although the Indians appeared at Smithland on the Little Sioux in southeastern Woodbury County unannounced, no alarm was felt since they had been there before and seemed quite friendly. Even now they bore, outwardly at least, every indication of friendship for the whites. Quietly and inoffensively they begged from the settlers who, pitying their evident starving condition, gave as liberally as they could to satisfy their needs rather than their demands.[140]

It seems that the Indians had been at the settlement but a brief time when they discovered that the whites had not been able to complete the harvesting of the past season’s corn crop on account of the coming of the early and deep snows. Much of the corn had been buried, where the settlers had been content to leave it for husking in early spring. Upon making this discovery the Indians with a will set about gathering corn from the fields. Very naturally the settlers objected and demanded that the Indians desist, which they did after some jangling and expressions of ill feeling. They did not, however, cease their demands for food.

The settlers now assumed a plainly unfriendly attitude toward the Indians, which in turn gave impetus to a change in the temper and attitude of the Indians toward the whites. They soon became sullen and insolent, with a manifest tendency to commit a variety of malicious acts—probably for the purpose of trying the temper of the settlers. Only acts of a trivial character, however, were actually committed; and so the wiser heads in Smithland were successful in warding off for some time any serious trouble.

Several days after the arrival of the Indians a large drove of elk appeared in the timber on the river bottom. This meant plenty to the nearly famished Indians, and they at once began preparations for the hunt in which all were to participate. When the hunt had gotten well under way an Indian was attacked by a settler’s dog which apparently had become over zealous in the chase. The Indian retaliated by killing the dog. Then the owner of the dog sought to even matters by administering a rather severe beating to the Indian, at the same time forcibly disarming him. To a young Indian brave such treatment was an insult calling for retaliation. When the other settlers learned of this reckless action on the part of one of their number they grew alarmed, for they knew Indian character well enough to conclude that the incident was not a closed one by any means.

Meanwhile the petty pilfering and thieving by the Indians continued. Especially annoying were the squaws who, constantly haunting the cabins and other buildings of the settlement, would sometimes carry away grain and hay. Occasionally a settler catching a squaw in the act would give her a whipping—which only increased the tension of the situation. Finally, a settlers’ council was called, the result of which was an effort to disarm the Indians as an assurance of safety. Failing to realize the full purport of what was being done, the Indians offered little opposition. The guns were hidden, and for a while the settlers breathed easily. But in their alarm, they had really taken a very unwise course. They probably thought that the Indians would soon come forward and offer some reasonable and peaceful settlement of any wrongs that had been committed. In this, however, the settlers exhibited little appreciation of the character of the Sioux Indian.[141]

Not a little enraged, the Indians committed other depredations upon the settlers; and it was not long before the settlers awoke to a realization of the mistake they had made. But they soon committed a worse blunder in seeking to correct the first. A militia company of twenty-one men was organized among the men of Smithland and vicinity under the leadership of Seth Smith, the founder of the settlement. Captain Smith was selected as leader of the organization not for his known military ability, but because he owned a “magnificent suit of regimentals, with its quivering epaulettes, gaily bedecked cocked hat and flashing sword.” Surely these would strike terror to the souls of the Indians.

The party was quickly and quietly prepared for a demonstration of military power, after which they marched to the Indian camp and there paraded before the Indians. When the demonstration was ended, Captain Smith demanded of the Indians that they leave at once. This seemed impossible to the Indians, who are said to have replied that the weather was so cold and the snows so deep up north that nothing to eat could be secured by them in that direction. They added, however, that they would like to go on down the river to the camps of the Omahas and treat with them. This the whites did not seem to think would be advisable: they evidently thought that the Indians would visit them again upon their return to the north. When denied the privilege of passing on to the Omahas the Indians flatly refused to leave at all—an action that may have been due in part to the fact that not all of the Indians were then in the camp.[142]

The settlers, finding themselves sufficiently strong after this demonstration of military preparedness, began a series of annoying acts directed toward the Indians, who seemed to submit stoically to these impositions. Finally, one morning the settlers were not a little gratified to discover that the Indians had gone. But the joy was only temporary; for the Indians later reappeared with guns—possibly the very ones that had been taken from them by the settlers. How they secured these arms was not known; but it was evident that the reclamation of their property had a marked effect upon their conduct. They now became defiant and openly committed theft to satisfy their wants; for they knew that they were now better prepared for resistance than were the whites.

It was shortly before this time that General Harney had conducted his march through the Indian country in Kansas and Nebraska, thence westward into Wyoming, and back northeastward to or near Fort Pierre in Dakota. Every Sioux knew of him and held him in a sort of superstitious awe or dread. They thought of him as one guided and guarded by the Almighty in his work as an avenger. Aware of the regard with which the Sioux held Harney, it was proposed by the settlers to use him as a means of ridding themselves of their Indian guests. Accordingly a settler donned the soiled uniform of an army officer and at sunset appeared in the edge of the timber on the bank of the Little Sioux opposite the Indian camp. His appearance there was called to the attention of the Indians, along with the suggestion that the stranger was Harney, in all likelihood, in close pursuit of them. The ruse, it is said, was effective: that same night the Indians fled up the river from Smithland. As they fled it became increasingly evident that they were thirsting for revenge. From suffering indignities themselves they now turned to the infliction of atrocities upon whomsoever chanced to cross their path. While the more level-headed settlers at Smithland regretted the tricks played upon the Indians, all congratulated themselves upon being rid of their unwelcome guests.[143]

XI
FROM SMITHLAND TO OKOBOJI

After leaving Smithland the next place visited by Inkpaduta and his band seems to have been Correctionville—a place about twenty miles up the course of the Little Sioux. Here the Indians appear to have been friendly at first; but they were not long in the settlement before their begging and thieving led to opposition from the whites. Indeed, during the later portion of their stay they used their guise of friendship only for the purpose of securing an entrance to the cabins of the settlers, and having been admitted helped themselves to whatever was most convenient and best suited to their needs, such as food, guns, and ammunition.

The ugliness of their real character for the first time appeared in their treatment of a settler by the name of Robert Hammond. It seems that Hammond resisted their thieving after he had admitted them to his cabin, with the result that he was badly beaten. This episode appears to have started the Indians upon their fiendish career. Having left Hammond helpless in his cabin, they turned, when some distance away, and literally shot the cabin door off its hinges. This was done, presumably, as a warning of what was likely to happen if they were further interfered with. They then left the settlement and continued their journey northward.

As he proceeded up the course of the Little Sioux, Inkpaduta followed the policy of sending out scouting and foraging parties into the surrounding country. At nearly every cabin found by these parties everything in the line of guns, food, and ammunition was either carried off or destroyed. Not infrequently the stock of the settler—hogs, cattle, or horses—was killed and left untouched: the Indians seemed now to be seeking to destroy rather than to take for their own use.

The next settlement reached by the band was Pilot Rock in Cherokee County. While pausing here for a brief time scouts were sent out in all directions through the surrounding country. Very little transpired at Pilot Rock other than the taking of food and arms. Here the Indians found no opposition upon the part of the settlers; and when they had satisfied themselves they left the community.

Another settlement visited was that of the Milford Colony, which was located a little north of the present town of Cherokee. Cattle and hogs were shot, doors torn from their hinges, and furniture ruined. Bedding was torn into shreds, and feather ticks were ripped open and the contents scattered upon the prairie. Here the Indians remained for three days; and while the settlers suffered only from fright and the destruction of property, they were only too happy to note the red men’s preparations for leaving.

The Indians had tarried at Milford Colony evidently for rest and recuperation, finding here more supplies than they had encountered elsewhere. This was doubtless due to the fact that the settlers, having but lately come west from Milford, Massachusetts, were well provided against possible future needs. For three days the Indians feasted and appeared to deliberate. Upon the evening of the third day two of the Milford pioneers returned from a business trip to Sac City. The arrival of Parkhurst and Lebourveau seemed to arouse the Indians’ suspicion. They demanded to be told from whence the settlers had come. Not having received the desired information they probably concluded they were being pursued and that night left the settlement. After the departure of the Indians, the Milford pioneers deserted the colony and sought refuge at various places—at Ashland, at Onawa, and at Smithland.

As they came to isolated cabins north of this settlement the Indians resorted to various modes of terrorizing the pioneers. At the cabin of Lemuel Parkhurst they amused themselves for an hour or more by striking their tomahawks into the floor and logs of the cabin, while flourishing scalping knives about the heads of the affrighted occupants. Mrs. Parkhurst finally pacified them by preparing a meal which she set before them. Having consumed this meal, they proffered the peace pipe, shook hands, and departed.

At the cabin of James A. Brown they seemed to be seeking entertainment rather than food. After compelling Brown to mount a hay stack, two Indians climbed up—one armed with a rifle, the other with a pitchfork. They amused themselves by testing the steadiness of Brown’s nerve. He was alternately lunged at by the possessor of the fork and levelled at by the holder of the gun. After thus amusing themselves for ten or fifteen minutes, the Indians allowed him to get down and go to his cabin. They then went to the stable, killed an ox, and attempted to steal a horse; but the animal was so vicious that they finally gave up the attempt and left. These are but incidents illustrative of the behavior of the Indians as they passed to the north of Cherokee and up the Little Sioux.[144]

Arriving in the northwestern corner of Buena Vista County, their conduct became, if possible, still more vicious. Wherever they appeared they were sullen, as contrasted with their tendency to talk and seek entertainment at points further down the river. Waste, violence, and cruelty now characterized their actions. At the home of a Mr. Weaver they not only wantonly shot all his hogs and cattle, but also roughly handled him and the members of his family. Satisfied with this, they moved off to the northwest.

They were next heard of at the home of H. H. Waterman in O’Brien County. The visit to the Waterman cabin, however, seems to have been from a scouting detachment rather than from the band as a whole. In Waterman’s own words “Seven big strapping Sioux bucks stopped at my house; they were so tall I had to look up at them”. They told him of the Smithland affair. Although they seemed much excited, Waterman paid little attention to their story for he recognized them as the same Indians that had called upon him more than once before. He did, however, become alarmed when they began stealing his property—to which he finally objected. But they took everything they could lay hands on; and ended by beating Waterman in the back and stringing him up by the thumbs. Apparently satisfied, they committed no further mischief, but departed in the direction from which they had come.[145]

After the episode at the Waterman cabin the band concentrated at the site of the present town of Peterson in southwestern Clay County, where they found white settlers—at which they were apparently much surprised. Peterson was only a short distance away from the cabins of Weaver in Buena Vista County and Waterman in O’Brien. Here it would seem they began in earnest the campaign of terror which was to end in massacre at the lakes and in the attack upon Springfield. They were no longer satisfied with thieving and pillaging; but the torturing of people and the taking of human life now seemed to be the pronounced bent and purpose of their raid. The mere presence of white people seemed to infuriate them to frenzied acts, and the wonder is that the general massacre of the settlers did not begin at Peterson rather than at Okoboji.

As already noted there were at Peterson by February, 1857, the families of James Bicknell, Jacob Kirchner, and Ambrose S. Mead. Although the news of Indian depredations had reached these families before the coming of the Indians themselves, conditions were such that no steps could be taken to offer resistance. The Bicknell cabin, being located the furthest to the south and west, was reached first. This probability had been anticipated, for by the time the Indians arrived the inmates had fled to the shelter of the Kirchner home across the river. At the Bicknell home everything was either taken or destroyed. Early on the following morning the Indians crossed the river and appeared at the Kirchner home, where were huddled closely together for mutual protection the families of Bicknell and Jacob Kirchner. Here the Indians repeated their atrocities, leaving only the cabin and the lives of the settlers.

Although the Meads have been spoken of as a part of the Peterson settlement, they were not properly so since they were located some little distance up the course of the stream and were nearer the open prairie. It seems that they had not been warned of the coming of the Indians. Mr. Mead was absent at Cedar Falls; but before going he had arranged with a family by the name of Taylor to jointly occupy the Mead cabin with Mrs. Mead and the children. When the Indians appeared Mr. E. Taylor resisted their meddling in matters about the cabin. This enraged them and they threatened to kill him unless he desisted from objecting to their pillaging. Fearing that they might carry out the threat, Taylor managed to elude the watchfulness of the Indians and started south with a view to procuring help. Mrs. Mead meanwhile had been knocked down and otherwise abused for resisting.

The whole affair at the Mead cabin ended by the Indians attempting to carry off the women and children as prisoners. They succeeded in carrying away Hattie, the eldest of the Mead children, but when they attempted to take Emma Mead, who was about ten years of age, she resisted so strongly that they contented themselves with beating her all the way back to her cabin home and then letting her go. The Taylor child was kicked into the fireplace where he was fearfully burned; while his mother and Mrs. Mead were carried away to camp. On the following morning the prisoners were allowed to return to their home. The Indians evidently feared pursuit or did not care to be burdened with prisoners at this time.[146]

Mr. Taylor made good his escape and started across the country to the Sac City settlement for aid. After some privation, he was successful in reaching the settlement. A relief party consisting of a company of men under Enoch Ross as captain made the march up the Raccoon River to Storm Lake and across country to the Mead home on the Little Sioux. Of course the Indians were gone by this time, but the company started up the river in pursuit. It is written by someone that a member of the party when out on a reconnaissance, discovered the Indians, and at once hurried back to report his discovery. Upon reaching the main party he found an active quarrel going on among the members; and when he reported his news the company at once disbanded and hurried home. Other accounts have related that the Indians were pursued to within a few miles of Spencer, when the company was stopped by a terrific blizzard and compelled to turn back without having accomplished its purpose of punishing the Indians.[147]

While the Sac County relief party was forming and on its way across the country, the Indians had moved up the river to the little group of cabins where Sioux Rapids now stands. No damage was done at this settlement, the band seeming to be content with asking and receiving. Before the relief party arrived, the Indians had reached Gillett’s Grove where again they seemed disposed to create trouble.

In the summer and fall of 1856 the Gillett brothers had settled in what was perhaps the finest body of timber along the whole course of the Little Sioux. Through this grove, dividing it nearly equally, flows the Little Sioux. Each of the two brothers had built a cabin upon his claim, one on either bank of the stream. In preparing for the winter they thought in the main only of their need of food and shelter: they troubled themselves little concerning an Indian visitation, reasoning that such an event was quite unlikely as Indians had not been seen since their arrival. Moreover, fishing in that region was poor and game was extremely scarce.

Great therefore was the surprise of the Gillett brothers when in the late winter they learned of the arrival of an Indian party. Although the cabins were well placed for purposes of shelter, the Indians readily located them and at once paid them a visit. The red men were well received and their wants attended to by the settlers. Seeming well pleased they left with protestations of friendship. A few days later a second and different group appeared, led by the same Indian as the first. As the days passed this red man’s visits became unpleasantly frequent, but thus far no offensive attitude had been assumed by the Indians. When, however, he began paying unwelcome attentions to Mrs. Gillett it was decided to put an end to his coming.

One day, after the Indian had been peculiarly annoying, Gillett followed him and at some distance from the cabin shot him. The next morning the brothers visited the spot where the Indian had fallen, and finding the body beheaded it. Having committed this outrage they became frightened and decided upon flight to save themselves from Indian vengeance. Accordingly, they hastily packed a few belongings and started across the country toward Fort Dodge. It was later learned that when the Indians discovered the body of the murdered man they destroyed as much of the Gillett property as they could lay hands upon. The influence of this murder in provoking the terrible deeds committed by the Indians a few days later when they reached the lakes can not be definitely determined.[148]

When the Gilletts fled from their homes they knew not whence they were going except that they were seeking to escape from Indian retribution. They finally decided to make an attempt to reach Fort Dodge, although they realized that this would be an exceedingly difficult task since they knew only in a general way the direction in which that station lay. In their wanderings they finally reached the little settlement at Sioux Rapids, where after some counselling it was decided to send couriers to Fort Dodge for relief. Abner Bell, E. Weaver, and one of the Wilcox brothers were chosen to make the journey.

It was near the first of March when the men from Sioux Rapids reached Fort Dodge with the intelligence of the Indian depredations along the Little Sioux. At first their story was not believed; but as other reports of Indian depredations in this region continued to come in the people of Fort Dodge came to the conclusion that there must be some truth in what they had been told by the men from Sioux Rapids. Then they became alarmed as they saw evidence of some great plan of Indian revenge against the whole of the exposed frontier. Later the story of Bell and his fellow couriers was confirmed by reports from the Gilletts themselves, from Christian Kirchner, and from Ambrose S. Mead.

An attempt was made to organize a relief party at Fort Dodge, but the effort was soon abandoned by its promoters. The distance was greater than seventy miles, the snow was deep, the cold intense, and the treeless prairies were being constantly visited by terrific storms, all of which combined to make the success of such an expedition seem like the last thing that could be expected. Doubt was strong that such a party would ever be able to reach its destination or offer succor to the settlers on the frontier even though it should be fortunate enough to reach them. It was finally decided that any attempt at relief would probably end in a needless sacrifice of human lives. In the light of future events it may be said that this decision was indeed a wise one.[149]

XII
THE FIRST DAY OF THE MASSACRE

Nothing is known of the Inkpaduta band from the time of the episode at Gillett’s Grove until its appearance at the lakes on the evening of Saturday, March 7, 1857. From events that followed, it is inferred that they were in a fiendish temper at the time of their arrival and that this temper developed in intensity during their stay upon the Okoboji shores. The Indians celebrated their arrival by holding a war dance. Mrs. Sharp refers to this ceremony as a scalp dance; but such it could not have been, since with the Sioux as with other Indians such a dance is held only when scalps have been taken. It is known positively that none had been taken up to the time of their arrival at the lakes.

What must have been the feelings of the settlers when the Indians, arriving near sundown, began the celebration of the war dance of the Sioux! As the hideous painted forms of the red men in a half squat position, in short, quick jumps kept time to the weird accompaniment of the dance, lifting both feet from the ground at once, the settlers must have felt that something unusual was brewing. And when the cadence of the dance was momentarily stopped and the sharp cutting notes of the war whoop rent the frosty air one can scarcely imagine that they could have remained wholly ignorant of its purpose. And yet it is said that the settlers slept that night as they had slept before the appearance of the band; and on the ensuing morning they went quietly and calmly about the duties of their homes wondering, perhaps, when the Indians would leave.[150]

The people at the lakes had received no inkling of the events that had been transpiring to the south, for they were isolated from all other white settlements. They had come to this region so late and under such circumstances that none of the settlers to the south knew they were there. Then, too, the character of the season and the difficulties of transportation were such that no one would think of making a journey in that direction. To the people who had settled along the Little Sioux relief lay in the direction from which they had come—which was also the direction of their source of supplies. Thus it happened that no warning of impending danger from Indian attacks was given to these advanced settlements. Having no information concerning the conduct of red men in the valley to the south, the settlers at the lakes did not anticipate any unfriendly acts upon the part of the Indians who were now in their midst.

The Indians selected as a site for their camp a spot directly across the trail which led from the Gardner cabin to the Mattock cabin and from thence became the highway of communication between all of the cabins of the settlement. Thus its location was strategic in an attack upon the settlers. For purposes of conducting their war dance it was necessary that the tepees should be so pitched as to surround a hollow square. It was directly across this square that the trail ran. Thus the Gardners were cut off from the remainder of the settlement. That there was design in so placing the camp can not positively be asserted; but its location did have the effect of isolating the Gardners.

The day before the arrival of the Indians, Luce and his three companions had come in from Shippey’s, where Thatcher and Burtch had been left with the exhausted oxen. The evening of their arrival had witnessed a slight moderation in the temperature which was still felt on the morning of the seventh. Everyone had begun to feel that possibly spring might not be far distant.

During the absence of Luce and Thatcher it had been decided by the people of the settlement that Gardner should undertake a trip to Fort Dodge upon their return. Wants had arisen during their absence which it was believed could be satisfied by going to Fort Dodge as the nearest outpost for supplies. It was also deemed desirable to make the trip before the breaking of winter should render the roads impassable. Thus, when Luce and Thatcher returned with the news that relief was near, Gardner at once began preparations to start upon his trip two days later or on the morning of Sunday, March eighth. The purpose of the trip was not only to secure food, but also to purchase implements which would be needed in the spring’s agricultural activities.[151]

The morning of March eighth dawned cold but clear and bright, forecasting for Gardner the likelihood of a pleasant first day’s journey. Having learned from the accounts of Luce something of the condition of the prairie, Gardner arose early in order that as much as possible of his journey might be accomplished during the first day. Not only did Gardner himself arise early, but every member of his family did likewise in order that each might contribute something toward speeding him upon his journey.

Breakfast having been prepared and placed upon the table by Mrs. Gardner and her daughter Mrs. Luce, the members of the family were gathering about the table when the latch of the door was lifted and a tall Indian stepped within the cabin with protestations of hunger and friendship. Mrs. Gardner at once prepared an additional place at the table which the Indian was invited to occupy. The Indian accepted this hospitality and seated himself with the family; and all were soon engaged in partaking of the morning’s meal.

It soon developed that this Indian visitor was but a forerunner of more who were to follow. Before the meal had been finished the door was again opened and fourteen Indian warriors, besides women and children, crowded into the cabin. All demanded food, the while protesting friendship as the first comer had done. The Gardners at once set about the satisfaction of this demand as far as possible from their limited store. At first the Indians seemed concerned solely with the gratification of their appetites. But when their hunger had been appeased a member of the party suddenly became insolent. Then others in a sullen overbearing manner demanded various things other than food.

The Indian who had been the first to enter the cabin now demanded that he be given ammunition. Another demanded gun-caps; and yet another asked for powder. Mr. Gardner, willing to appease the Indians if possible and rid himself and family of the intruders, secured his box of gun-caps and prepared to distribute them to all. This did not prove to be satisfactory to one of the number who snatched the box from his hand, appropriating all the caps for himself. Upon the wall hung the powder-horn which another buck attempted to secure, but was prevented from doing so by Mr. Luce who at this moment interfered. This interference angered the Indian who drew up and leveled his gun as if intending to shoot. But Luce was too alert for the Indian and struck the weapon from his hand. The Indians did not seem inclined to carry matters further and withdrew from the cabin—but in a very bad frame of mind.[152]

As they were slowly and sullenly withdrawing from the Gardner cabin, Bertell E. Snyder and Dr. Harriott, from the cabin across the strait, appeared with letters which they wished to send with Gardner to Fort Dodge. They had been unaware of the presence of the Indian camp until they had come to it that morning. Gardner expressed his fears of future trouble to these men who only ridiculed the thought, refusing to believe that there was any possibility of danger. Nevertheless, Gardner advised that a warning be sent to the settlers urging them to concentrate at the Gardner cabin should trouble arise. To Harriott and Snyder this did not seem necessary: they left for home, protesting that there was no occasion for uneasiness. Gardner, however, told them that under the conditions then developing he did not plan to go to Fort Dodge.

In the meantime the Indians had not returned to their camp, but were seen to be prowling about in the vicinity of the Gardner cabin. On their way home Harriott and Snyder met and did some trading with a group of the red men by whom they had been intercepted. So sure were the two men that the Indians were friendly that they did not consider the fact of their presence worth mentioning as they passed the Mattock cabin. As a further indication of their confidence in the friendly character of the red men, it is noted that in a letter written by Dr. Harriott, presumably after his return from the Gardner cabin, he states that Indians had camped near by but they were very friendly and had occasioned no uneasiness among the settlers.

At the same time the fears of the Gardners were increased by the sight of Indians in the near-by timber and by occasional calls at the cabin where new demands were made, many of which could not be met. Although the Indians seemed to maintain a certain gravity of demeanor and apparently were only seeking to gratify their physical wants, Gardner remained firm in his conviction that trouble was brewing and that the remaining settlers should be warned of the impending danger. After much counselling it was decided that Luce and Clark should go at once by a roundabout path along the lake shore to warn the other settlers and to advise that they gather in the Mattock cabin as the one best adapted for defense.

Luce and Clark set out upon their mission about two o’clock in the afternoon. They were to make their way first of all to the Mattock cabin, since it was nearer the Indian camp. Plans decided upon by Gardner, Luce, and Clark were also to be told to the Mattock people so that they might have ample opportunity to prepare for the proposed concentration of the settlers. After this they were to go as far and as rapidly as possible on their work of warning the settlers on the east lake before nightfall would of necessity end their mission.[153]

The fears of the people at the Gardner cabin had been considerably increased by the attitude of the Indians when they took their leave shortly after noon. During the whole of the forenoon they had done no damage to property, and their only overt act had been their behavior within the cabin in the early morning. But they seem now to have suffered a change of mind, for as they moved away toward their camp they drove before them the Gardner-Luce cattle—about six in number—shooting them as they proceeded. Apparently there was no motive in doing this—unless, perhaps, it was the fiendish satisfaction in the taking of life. They did not seem to want the cattle as food, since they left them untouched.

About mid-afternoon a number of shots were heard in the direction of the Mattock cabin. As the afternoon wore away there came no evidence as to the meaning of the firing. The suspense became fearful as all manner of suggestions were offered in explanation of the shooting. Gardner reasoned that it could not have concerned Luce and Clark since they had had plenty of time to be further on their journey than the cabin of Mattock. Mrs. Luce became frantic, for she had believed from the first that her husband would never return. If the Indians should kill any one it would surely be Luce on account of his foiling the savages in their purpose in the morning; and in this intuition she was right. Luce and Clark had not gone far on their mission when they were intercepted and shot by the Indians. This fact, however, did not develop until weeks later when their dead bodies were found along the lake shore not a great distance from Luce’s home. Thus no warning of peril reached the Mattock family.

For two hours time dragged on slowly and fearfully at the Gardner home: all eyes watched either for Indians or for the return of the messengers. Neither came. When the sun had sunk to the horizon Gardner stepped outside to look about. Suddenly he came running back calling that the Indians were coming. Upon entering the cabin he began barring the door, determined after the experience of the morning not to allow the red men to enter. Mrs. Gardner objected that they should have faith in the good intentions of the Indians and that it was better for one not to shed the blood of another. Yielding to her importunities, Gardner desisted from barricading the door. The family now awaited in terror the second coming of the Indians.

Looking through the windows they observed nine warriors hurrying toward them from the direction of the camp. With no more formality than during their morning visit they again entered the cabin. One glance sufficed to tell the frightened family that the anticipated trouble was upon them. The first demand of the Indians was for flour—not only for a part of what the Gardners had but for all. The scarcity of flour had been one of the reasons for the planned trip to Fort Dodge; and yet, at the risk of causing his family to suffer privation, Gardner turned to the flour barrel to gratify the demands of the Indians. As he turned a buck raised his gun to shoot. It seems that either Mrs. Gardner or Mrs. Luce made a move to stay the act of the Indian, but failed. Gardner fell to the floor, the third victim of the Indian massacre at Okoboji. Having made a beginning, the Indians no longer restrained the impulses of their savage nature. After the killing of Gardner their stay at Okoboji became a carnival of murder.

As soon as Gardner fell, the quest for flour was lost sight of and the Indians turned upon the two women who had attempted to protect the object of their rage. Mrs. Luce and Mrs. Gardner were seized and held by several Indians while others beat them into insensibility and death with the butts of their guns. This was but the work of a moment. Indeed, so quickly had it been done that Abbie Gardner did not see the act herself; in her later relations of the affair she relied wholly upon stories related to her frequently by the Indians in their flight following the massacre. Without pause Mr. and Mrs. Gardner and Mrs. Luce were scalped—an act of savagery which the children were compelled to witness. When the Indians entered the cabin, Abbie was striving to quiet the younger child of her sister, while the other Luce child clung to one side of her chair and at the other side crouched Abbie’s brother, Rowland Gardner, Jr.

Having destroyed the parents, the Indians now turned to the destruction of the children. Rowland Gardner and the two Luce children were torn away from Abbie and beaten to death against the posts of the door and the trunks of trees in the yard. Dropping the dead bodies upon the ground, the Indians appeared to counsel concerning the further disposition of the house and its only living inmate. At the close of their deliberation Abbie was seized by one of the Indians and, much to her surprise, was not killed but led away in the direction of the Indian camp. Her last sight of her family showed them strewn lifeless and bleeding about the doorstep of her home.[154]

Before the Gardner cabin was deserted by the Indians it was completely ransacked. Chests were broken open and their contents scattered about the house and yard. All available food stores and clothing were carried away to the camp. Abbie had abundant opportunity to learn this when later about their evening camp fires bucks and squaws alike, arrayed in the clothing of the murdered people, wildly recounted the incidents of the day. Although she had been carried away from her home without any provision for clothing against the winter’s cold, she was not allowed to share in the wearing of the stolen goods. Shivering from cold and fright, she witnessed the fiendish joy with which the events of that memorable day were told and retold by the Indians.

As the evening wore on preparations for the scalp dance began. Soon the rhythmic cadence of the hideous dance song started, and the scalps of the day, elevated on the ends of long poles, could be seen swaying back and forth marking time with the movements of the women who bore them. At every shriek of the dancing women, the captive girl doubtless thought her time had come. In the darkness, lighted occasionally by the flaring of a firebrand, the distorted and hideously painted faces of the savages swinging alternately backward and forward in the dance must have seemed to the prisoner a veritable dance of demons. The dance lasted far into the night, with no sleep for the child who was momentarily expecting to fall a victim of savage fury. Toward morning the dance ended and the savages sought a brief respite in sleep to strengthen them for the work of the succeeding day. At the breaking of the early dawn the Indians were again astir, making preparations for a continuation of their bloody work.[155]

While the inmates of the Gardner cabin were being massacred similar events were transpiring at the home of the Mattocks. What actually happened at this cabin is not known, since no living witnesses, other than red men, survived to tell the tale. From the position of the bodies when found, it is inferred that the Mattocks must have sensed the situation; but thinking that their own home was lacking in security had started for the cabin of Harriott, Snyder, and Granger across the strait. Mrs. Sharp states that when the Indians brought her to their camp, which had been moved during the day and pitched near the Mattock home, the cabin was in flames and shrieks of human beings were issuing from it.[156] But this could hardly have been true unless there were persons staying at the Mattock cabin unknown to others in the settlement, since all the people were later accounted for in the bodies found.

Snyder, Harriott, and Harshman apparently discovered what was happening across the strait, and with rifles in hand came to the rescue. This is inferred from the fact that their bodies were found in company with those of the Mattocks. Resistance had evidently been made by the men: it is not unlikely that they were attempting to cover the retreat of Mrs. Mattock and her children, since they were in advance, while Mattock, Snyder, Madison, Harshman, and Harriott were in the rear with the gun in each case lying by the side of the dead owner. Harriott’s gun had its stock broken as if it had been used for a club after other means of defense had been exhausted. Further evidence that resistance was offered to the Indians is to be found in the fact that one young Indian was badly injured, possibly by Dr. Harriott. No one, however, was spared in the attack by the Indians at that point: the dead bodies of eleven persons were found on the path between the two cabins. These were later identified as Mr. and Mrs. Mattock, their five children, Dr. Harriott, Bertell Snyder, Robert Madison, and Joseph Harshman.[157] To make the destruction more complete, fire was set to the Mattock cabin which was soon in ruins.

It is said that, leaving the Gardner cabin shortly after noon, the Indians had gone to Mattock’s cabin where they wished to get some hay with which to feed their ponies. While they were in the act of taking the hay objection was raised. A parley over the matter seems to have been carried on for some time before the Indians arrived at the killing point. Mattock sent to the Red Wing cabin for help, and Harriott, Snyder, and Harshman responded. Meanwhile the Indians appeared to withdraw, and it was probably decided by Mattock, as a measure of added safety, to take the members of his family to the Red Wing cabin. They were in the act of doing so, Mrs. Mattock and the children ahead and the men in the rear guarding the retreat, when they were fired upon by the Indians from ambush. All were killed outright except Harriott, who resisted and before being disposed of had badly wounded at least one Indian.[158] In their relation of the event the Indians spoke of all having left the cabin before it was destroyed by fire.

Across the strait at the Red Wing or Granger cabin, Carl Granger, who for some reason remained at his cabin when the others crossed to the Mattock home, was brutally slain and scalped. The Indians killed him by splitting his head open with an ax which had evidently been taken from the wood pile near by.[159]

Thus the close of the first day of the massacre witnessed a toll of twenty lives. Three groups of settlers had been wholly wiped out—with the exception of one child who was carried away into captivity.

XIII
THE SECOND DAY OF THE MASSACRE

Although the scalp dance had continued far into the small hours of the previous night, the Indians were astir early on the morning of the ninth of March. They were determined upon completing the fiendish work which they had so well begun on the previous day. No council was held so far as the only white inmate of their tepees could discern. At the same time every Indian seemed to know where to go and what was to be done. There was no confusion of plans or hitch in their execution at any point.

It was on the morning of March ninth that a portion of the Inkpaduta band started for the Howe and Thatcher cabins which were nearly three miles from the Indian encampment. As already noted, the settlers about the lakes had established a sort of mutual exchange system among themselves for the purpose of husbanding their food supplies during the absence of Luce and Thatcher on the expedition to Waterloo and other points in eastern Iowa. This morning Mrs. Howe discovered that the supply of meal was so nearly exhausted that it would be necessary to procure an additional supply from one of the neighbors. Thus it was that on this Monday morning Howe started on what proved to be a fateful trip to the home of either Gardner or Mattock. With his sack thrown over his shoulder he took the path along the south shore of the east lake. He was wholly ignorant of the recent arrival of the Indians.

As Howe walked briskly along he may have been revolving in his mind possible plans for his work in the coming season; or he may have been speculating as to when his neighbor Thatcher would return from the trip back east. Possibly he was cherishing the hope that the privations of the winter might have ample compensation in an abundant harvest. Whatever his thoughts may have been as he walked along the lake, they were soon brought to an end by the Indians, who in all probability quickly disposed of their victim. The details of the murder are not known; but the badly mutilated body was later found and given burial by the Fort Dodge relief party.

After murdering Howe the Indians stealthily hastened on to his cabin. Here the wife and children were as unprepared for the Indians as was the husband and father. Mrs. Howe was no doubt busy in the performance of her Monday morning duties. Engrossed with these activities she, in all likelihood, did not discover the approach of the red men until they were upon her. After killing Mrs. Howe the Indians proceeded to dispatch the remaining members of the family—a grown son and daughter, and three younger children. It seemed obvious to the members of the relief party, from the conditions which they found at the Howe cabin, that there had been no resistance offered to the Indians. No scalping was done here or at any other place after the red men had left the Mattock cabin. Nor did the savages stop to plunder or destroy after taking the lives of this family, but hurried on to the next stage in their work—which consisted of dealing death to the members of the Noble and Thatcher families.

Arriving at the cabin of Noble and Thatcher the Indians secured admission by professing friendship. Here they made demands which could not be granted; and then, as at the Gardner home, they resorted to insult. Their insolence was resisted by Noble and one Ryan—a son-in-law of Howe who had but lately come from Hampton and was staying with the Nobles. This was evidently what the Indians desired, for without further provocation they shot both Ryan and Noble. The former was killed instantly; but Noble was able to walk to the door, where he fell dead after exclaiming “Oh, I am killed!” The two children were then torn from their mothers and dragged by the feet out of the house where they were dashed to death against the oak trees of the door yard. This seems to have satisfied the Indians’ desire for human blood, for they desisted from killing Mrs. Noble and Mrs. Thatcher. For some time the Indians busied themselves in destroying hogs and cattle and in chasing the poultry. Finally, they returned to the cabin where they ransacked its contents, destroying what they did not happen to want. In the end Mrs. Noble and Mrs. Thatcher were seized and led away as prisoners.

Obviously the horrible work at the Howe cabin had not been completed to the satisfaction of the Indians, since upon their return trip they stopped and resumed the destruction of what life was still in evidence. Here a fearful sight met the eyes of the two captive women. Scattered about the door yard they saw the mutilated bodies of the members of the Howe family; while Mrs. Noble found the dead body of her mother under a bed where she had evidently crawled for the purpose of shielding herself from further attacks after she had been terribly beaten with a flatiron. In the yard Mrs. Noble found her thirteen year old brother Jacob, sitting propped up against a tree. He had been horribly beaten and evidently left for dead; but having managed to crawl to a tree he had raised himself to a sitting posture. Although conscious, he was unable to speak. Mrs. Noble urged him to make his way into the house and conceal himself in the clothing of a bed and there await rescue. The boy made the effort, but was discovered by the Indians and killed.[160]

Having completed their destructive work at the Howe cabin, the Indians hastened to their own camp. When Mrs. Noble and Mrs. Thatcher were brought into the camp, Abbie Gardner was permitted to visit them in the tepee set aside for the latest captives. For about an hour the three captives were permitted to talk over their experiences, after which they were separated. Thenceforth each captive was required to remain in a tepee wholly separated and isolated from the others.

The captives were now subjected to training through which the Indians evidently hoped to re-make them into real pale-faced squaws. From the beginning they were required to paint their faces and dress their hair as Indians. They were frequently subjected to torturing ordeals which seemed to have no purpose other than that of noting what the reaction would be. At times they were, as far as the captives could discern, made ready for death so that the red men might see how they would behave under such trying conditions. Guns and revolvers would be loaded and with drawn triggers pointed at them as with intent to shoot, but no shooting occurred. These feints at shooting furnished the Indians a great deal of what appeared to be real amusement. For days they would recite again and again the details of the massacre at the lakes. But this treatment was only a foretaste of what was in store for the captives. For weeks, until they were released by death or ransom, they were to be subjected to nearly every annoyance that the ingenuity of the Indians might invent.[161]

XIV
FROM OKOBOJI TO HERON LAKE

Following the massacre little was done by the Indians except to search the vicinity of the lakes for the homes of other settlers. And so for a brief time scouting parties were at work; but obviously no other cabins were found, since the parties returned empty-handed. On the morning of Tuesday, March tenth, the camp was broken, West Okoboji was crossed on the ice, and after a move of three miles to the northwest, camp was again pitched in what was known as the Madison Grove. The Indians seemed inclined to move very deliberately. This may be accounted for by the fact that they knew they were not pursued. At the Madison Grove they remained but one night, and at early dawn of the eleventh they moved north to a grove beyond the cabin of William Marble on the southwest shore of Spirit Lake.

From Gillett’s Grove the journey for the Indians had become easier inasmuch as they had procured horses and sleds. These must have been obtained by scouting parties while the main body was encamped at Lost Island Lake. Since the Indians had not learned how to hitch the horses to the sleds Abbie Gardner, Mrs. Noble, and Mrs. Thatcher now undertook the task of teaching them how to handle horses and sleds with the thought that travelling might be made easier. In this they were mistaken; for no sooner had the red men learned their lessons than the bucks took to riding while the squaws and captives were required to walk and carry the heavy packs for the whole party. The horses and sleds were for pleasure and not for the transportation of freight and workers.

So deliberate were the movements of the band that although the camp was broken up early in the morning of Wednesday, the eleventh, it was not pitched at the new place, which was only a few miles to the north of Marble’s cabin, until late in the afternoon of the same day. As the Indians proceeded they made numerous side trips, partly for scouting purposes and partly for the pursuit of game. Frequently the squaws and captives found it necessary to pause in their march in order that the bucks might make these side excursions. Under more favorable conditions this would have been most welcome as a relief from fatigue, but now each stop was anticipated as a period of intense suffering from cold and exposure.

As the sun approached the western horizon the Indians began to exert themselves in quest of a suitable camping place for the night. After no little inspection of their surroundings, they decided to camp north of the Marble grove. In reaching this spot they had so circled the Marble cabin that they were not seen by the Marbles; nor had the captives seen the cabin of their white neighbors. Although the captives could discern that a council was held that evening, they had no means of ascertaining its purpose.

Thursday, March twelfth, was a day of inactivity in the camp: the Indians spent the time in gorging themselves upon what food remained from their raids upon the larders and barnyards of the unfortunate white settlers. Nor is the statement fully substantiated that on Thursday a friendly Indian visited the Marbles and informed them that the settlers to the south had all been killed a day or two previously. Even though the suspicion of the Marbles had possibly been aroused, the depth of the snow would have made it difficult if not impossible for them to get out and attempt a verification of the Indian’s statement. Moreover, it does not appear that the Marbles took precautions against possible surprise.[162]

Upon the morning of Friday, the thirteenth, the Indians are said to have arisen early and with great care removed from their faces the paint which until now had indicated that they were on the warpath and which would have served as a warning to the Marbles whom they were now planning to visit.[163] Approaching the cabin they signalled protestations of friendship. Upon being invited to enter they set their guns down just without the door. This little procedure attracted the attention of Mrs. Marble, who had never before seen an Indian leave his gun outside the cabin. The Marbles had just risen from the breakfast table when the Indians were seen to emerge from the timber and approach the house. Having entered the cabin the guests asked for food—a request which Mrs. Marble at once set about to gratify. While she was doing so the Indians, noting Marble’s gun, bantered him for a trade. Marble accepted the banter, and soon a deal was completed for one of the Indian guns. The outcome of the trade seemed to be a matter of no little elation for the Indians who hilariously turned to the food which had been placed before them.

After eating, the Indian with whom the trade had been made proposed that the relative worth of the guns should be determined by their actual use and indicated a desire for target practice. Although Mrs. Marble protested the advisability of such a contest her husband agreed to the proposal. When a suitable wooden slab had been secured and set up the practice shooting was begun. All went well, the Indians appearing to enjoy the sport immensely, until the impact of the shots caused the target to fall. The Indians indicated to Marble that he should replace the slab. Laying down his gun, Marble stepped out from the group. This guileless act on the part of Marble gave the Indians their opportunity for treachery. When the white men had gone but a short distance the Indians, as if by preconcerted action, raised their guns, took aim at Marble, and fired. Marble instantly fell dead.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Marble had been standing at the window watching the target work. When she saw her husband lay down his gun and start to replace the mark she divined that treachery would follow. And so she left the window and started forward to warn her husband when the volley was fired into his back. Fleeing from the cabin, Mrs. Marble started for the timber; but she was soon overtaken and dragged back to the scene of her husband’s death and by signs told that she was to be held as a captive. Following the shooting the cabin was pillaged and Marble was stripped of a leather belt containing a thousand dollars in gold which he had planned to use in improving his claim at the earliest opportunity.[164]

With Mrs. Marble the Indians quickly returned to camp. Again, as after the taking of Mrs. Noble and Mrs. Thatcher, the captives, now four in number, were permitted to meet in the same tepee, while the Indians busied themselves in the adjustment of other matters. The meeting was brief and once again the captives were completely isolated from each other. That evening the events of the day were celebrated by a dance.

The massacre of Marble was the last act in the Indian attacks upon the white settlements at the lakes. Only four individuals had survived to tell the story of the frightful deeds committed since the morning of Sunday, March eighth. Of the four, only two were destined to return to the homes of friends or relatives and relate their tales of suffering and Indian cruelties.

When the work of destruction of the settlements along the shores of East Okoboji, West Okoboji, and Spirit Lake was completed with the shooting of Marble, the total number of human lives taken reached thirty-two. The list comprised the following persons: Robert Clark, Rowland Gardner, Francis M. Gardner, Rowland Gardner, Jr., Carl Granger, Joseph Harshman, Isaac H. Harriott, Joel Howe, Millie Howe, Jonathan Howe, Sardis Howe, Alfred Howe, Jacob Howe, Philetus Howe, Harvey Luce, Mary M. Luce, Albert Luce, Amanda Luce, William Marble, James H. Mattock, Mary M. Mattock, Alice Mattock, Daniel Mattock, Agnes Mattock, Jacob M. Mattock, Jackson A. Mattock, Robert Madison, Alvin Noble, John Noble, Enoch Ryan, Bertell E. Snyder, and Dora Thatcher.[165]

The tale is told that, before leaving the region of the lakes, the Indians left a record of their deeds. They are reputed to have stripped the bark from the trunk of a large tree in the Marble grove and upon the white surface recorded in black paint a detailed description of their exploits. The number of cabins they had visited was shown as six, while the largest, presumably the Mattock cabin, was represented as in flames. The number of persons whose lives had paid the forfeit of their visit was also to be seen—each individual being so drawn as to show the position in which he had been left by his murderers. An attempt was even made to distinquish white men from red men—the white people being shown as pierced by arrows. This pictographic reproduction of the massacre is said to have remained clearly visible for many years after the massacre and was frequently visited by interested or curious persons who came to the region.[166]

Upon leaving the Marble grove, Inkpaduta and his band moved leisurely in a northwestward direction. From the time of their departure from this point, the lot of the captives grew steadily more difficult to bear. The snows of winter melted under the influence of the spring sun on occasional days and caused the prairie trails to become two or three feet deep in slush, except on the exposed knolls which the winds had swept free from snow. In such places an opportunity was afforded the burden bearers to stand on reasonably solid footing. Not infrequently they would be compelled to flounder through gullies and ravines ten or twelve feet deep in soft, yielding snow; while an occasional stream must be waded waist deep in icily cold water. This made the plight of the unfortunate white women doubly hard.

Mrs. Thatcher, who had not been in good health at the beginning of her captivity, found the bearing of the burdens imposed upon her and the long, wearisome marches under such conditions nearly unendurable, but she sustained her strength with the hope that relief would come in time. The sublimity of her faith in rescue was of great inspiration to her companion sufferers who otherwise would soon have lost all hope. But, despite their faith and hope, the captives daily noted that their journey was leading them steadily farther away from the bounds of civilization. No stop longer than over night was made by the Indians at any point in their march for nearly two weeks, when they arrived at Heron Lake, Minnesota, about thirty miles northwest of Spirit Lake and seventeen miles in the same direction from Springfield, Minnesota.

The encampments of the Indians from the time of leaving Spirit Lake had been of the most temporary character, but upon reaching Heron Lake preparations were made for a camp of many days duration. After completing the camp, Inkpaduta’s band at once prepared for a raid upon the white settlements in the vicinity. The warrior members of the band bedaubed their faces with paint, while the squaws hastened their departure by putting the weapons in condition and aiding in various minor ways. When all preparations had been completed, each warrior “with rifle in hand and scalping knife in belt” sallied forth to the taking of more human lives. The squaws and papooses were left at the camp to guard the captives, and upon the departure of the war party the women took every possible means of acquainting the captives with the fact that the expedition was one against the whites. It soon developed, from the direction taken by the party, that Springfield was their objective point.[167]

The food which the Indians had taken from the cabins of the massacred settlers was now nearly exhausted. Hence, upon the departure of the warriors there was rejoicing among the squaws who saw in the expedition the possibility of more feasting. But what of the feelings of the captives? Who can picture the condition of the mind of Abbie Gardner when she realized that the Indians were bound for Springfield? There in the home of Dr. Strong was her sister, Eliza, who except for herself, was the only surviving member of the family that had come into the West. In all probability Eliza was doomed to the same fate as Abbie had seen meted out to her father, mother, relatives, and friends. The possibility was too horrible for contemplation. The mental anguish of the young girl became almost more than could be endured; but the hope of some saving miracle working for the life of her sister sustained her for the days of waiting that were to elapse before the return of the war party.

XV
NEWS OF THE MASSACRE REACHES SPRINGFIELD AND FORT RIDGELY

Morris Markham, who had followed the Okoboji settlers to the lake region, spent the winter in trapping along the lakes and in the marshes of the Upper Des Moines. He had brought with him a yoke of oxen which, during the early days of the winter, had strayed away and were thought to be somewhere in the valley of the Des Moines. But they could not be located; and finally the effort to trace them was abandoned. No information concerning their whereabouts had been received until the sixth of March, when Luce brought word that the oxen were to be found at Big Island Grove in Emmet County. On the following morning Markham left for Big Island Grove where he discovered and identified his property. After spending a few hours in visiting the settlers he started upon the return trip to the cabin of Noble and Thatcher. Owing to the state of the weather and the conditions of travel, he did not attempt to bring the oxen back at this time, but returned alone and on foot.

Owing to his imperfect knowledge of the country and to the darkness that had settled down before he had come within known territory, Markham missed the cabin he was seeking and found himself instead at the Gardner home. As he approached the cabin he was surprised to find it deserted. No light could be seen nor was any sound to be heard. Looking more closely he saw the mutilated bodies of the Gardners scattered about the yard; and upon entering the open door of the cabin he beheld the badly pillaged condition of the once happy home.

It was nearly eleven o’clock on the Monday night following the attack upon the Gardners when Markham reached the scene of desolation and horror. Since he had been walking from early morning and had traveled more than thirty miles he felt the need of rest and food, and so without delay set out for the Mattock cabin. He had not gone far when he was startled by the barking of a dog in the low brush just ahead. Stopping and peering through the shrubs he saw directly across his path the camp in which the Indians were then sitting in solemn council over the events of the day. The barking of the dog for some unexplainable reason passed wholly unheeded by the Indians who continued in consultation over their fiendish deeds. Markham slipped by them and hastened as rapidly as he could across the ice of the east lake to the place he called home.

Upon his arrival at the Howe cabin the same scene of violence, confusion, and desolation greeted him. Sickened at the horrible sight, cold, hungry, and exhausted he pushed on to the home of Noble and Thatcher, hoping that there all would be well. Instead, he found only an empty cabin and murdered friends. Afraid to pass the remainder of the night in a cabin which had been so fearfully visited, he dragged himself to a near-by timbered ravine where he remained until dawn. Fearful that if he lay down he would fall asleep and freeze to death—for the night was bitterly cold—he kept moving through a limited section of the ravine.[168]

With the coming of daylight Markham set out for the nearest settlement, which was Granger’s Point on the Des Moines River. With feet already badly bruised and frozen he journeyed on to spread the tidings of what he had discovered. Famished and half frozen, he struggled for eighteen miles through obstacles that would have deterred all but the most heroic. Completely exhausted from continuous exposure for thirty-six hours, he finally reached the home of George Granger, where he related the story of what he had seen.

Two trappers who happened to be staying temporarily at the Granger home started at once down the Des Moines Valley for Fort Dodge. Upon arriving at Fort Dodge they told the tale of the terrible massacre at the lakes, but their story was so confusing and incoherent that they were not believed. Those who had authority refused to act upon this recital of events; and thus it came about that the first warning of trouble along the frontier went unheeded.[169]