Talk:Black Kettle

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I was under the impression that since 2002, American Indian, has replaced Native American, as being more politically correct. I was told that the "Native" in Native American implied "savage." Can I hear any other views on this subject? If I am right, we should probably move Native American to American Indian. Any thoughts on this subject will be appreciated. Greenmountainboy 00:02, 10 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I haven't heard. To me "Native" means 'here first'.

Native, means that they are originally from that place. From that point of view, all non-inmigrant americans are native.

But is still a much better term than "American Indian" since the word "indian" comes from the early belief that America was indeed, India.

I would keep the term Native American, since they are an american-born civilization.

i.e.-"ABORIGINAL implies having no known race preceding in occupancy of the region <the aboriginal peoples of Australia>." (http://www.m-w.com/)

Please sign your comments. As far as I'm concerned, political correctness is overrated and the most appropriate term is the person's actual tribe. 66.229.160.94 08:39, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

There is a Black Kettle Museum but the link at the bottom of the page is no good. Oklahoma Historical Society does not appear to have a page on it; I haven't found an official page. ;Bear (talk) 23:05, 26 November 2008 (UTC)

However POV

In 'Medicine Lodge treaty' it states that the relationship between the warring Dog Soldiers and Black Kettle is unclear, but it clearly implies one, by using the conjugation 'however' plus an unsubstantiated association implies that Black Kettles peace agreement was disingenuous. This should read something like "Though, a band (or bands) of Dog Soldiers continued to..." As it stands, it plants a seed, that it shouldn't. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.109.98.246 (talk) 09:40, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

Washita

Doesn't mention the women and children killed by the Americans, nor the 1000 horses slaughtered. Doesn't seem to link to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Washita_River 88.109.98.246 (talk) 09:50, 28 November 2008 (UTC)

There wasn't a battle there was a massacre that Black Kettle and his wife were murdered in. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.123.31.102 (talk) 23:18, 15 February 2013 (UTC)

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Suggestions for improvement

Coming back to this article after years of absence, I have noted a couple of points that merit correction IMHO:

1.) „In 1861, he and the Arapaho surrendered to the commander of Fort Lyon under the Treaty of Fort Wise, believing he could gain protection for his people. The treaty was highly unfavorable to the Southern Cheyenne.“

As there was no state of war, between the Cheyennes and the US, this was obviously not a „surrender“. The treaty was conducted with the then acting Commissionary of Indian affairs. Black Kettle and his peace faction had been pressing for a treaty for years with the aim of getting land guarantees since the 1851 treaty was being violated by then. The treaty was only signed by a few chiefs and got never sanctioned by the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribal authorities. It is also necessary to stress that all the Indian signatories later stressed that they had only acted on behalf of their bands and had neither been authorized nor willing to cede lands on behalf of their respective nations. US authorities acknowledged this and tried to induce additional chiefs to sign the treaty. When that failed in 1863, Governour Evans concluded that war was „inevitable“.

2.) „Many Cheyenne warriors, including the Dog Soldiers, did not accept the treaty and began to attack white settlers.“ That’s not just massively POV but even factually wrong. There were some Cheyenne reprisals in 1855/56further north after the Army had killed several Cheyenne men, followed by a large Army punitive expedition which culminated in the battle of Solomon’s fork and the destruction of a 180 lodges village by the Army. The Cheyennes didn’t attack white settlers in Coloado prior to the 1864 Colorado war.

3.) „Whether Black Kettle opposed these actions, tolerated them, or encouraged them remains controversial among historians.“ A questionable sentence as there is no source which would support ther claim that BK encouraged raids. What is also crucially missing here is BK’s July 1864 peace mission which was rebuffed by Cpt. Parmetar, Commander of Fort Larned.

4.) „By the summer of 1864, the situation had reached a boiling point. Southern Cheyenne hardliners, along with allied Kiowa and Arapaho bands, raided American settlements for livestock and supplies.“ Shouldn’t we add to the picture that before that the Colorado 1st Cavalry had attacked no less than four Cheyenne camps and murdered Peace Chief Lean Bear when he had approached the troops for a parlay? Why is BK’s courageous act of preventing the massacre of the troops after the murder of Lean Bear missing as well?

5.) „Sometimes they took captives, generally only women and children, to adopt into their tribes as replacements for lost members.“ That’s straight from the Leatherstocking Tales and demonstrable nonsense. Cheyennes didn’t kidnap white women and children to turn them into Cheyennes.

6.) „On July 11, 1864, Indians killed a family of settlers, an attack which the whites called the Hungate massacre after the family. Pro-war whites displayed the scalped bodies in Denver. Colorado governor John Evans believed tribal chiefs had ordered the attack and were intent on a full-scale war.“ That was the first time the Indians killed settlers in this war, fully 8 weeks after the first Army attack on one of their villages. It should be clarified how this incident was instrumentalized. And, when we’re at it, let’s add the September ‚64 Buffalo Springs massacre of two Cheyenne families for the sake of „fair and balanced“.

7.) „Black Kettle decided to accept Evans' offer and entered negotiations.“ This requires that a preceding negotiation effort in July by BK had been rebuffed.

8.) „On September 28, he concluded a peace settlement at Fort Weld outside Denver.“ Careful! He initiated the talks by mentioning white prisoners and suggesting a prisoner exchange. Wynkoop had to coak Evans into even holding the talks as Evans didn’t want to enter into any settlement before the „Bloodless Thirdsters“ had killed a sizable number of Indians. The result of the talks was ambiguous, the Whites would later stress that no formal peace had been concluded at the talks.

9.) „The agreement assigned the Southern Cheyenne to the Sand Creek reservation and required them to report to Fort Lyon, formerly Fort Wise.“ Chivington had demanded that the Indians lay down their arms and submit to white authority in order to get peace. To his surprise, the chiefs agreed and took him by his word.

10.) „At dawn on November 29, Chivington attacked the Sand Creek reservation; the event became known as the Sand Creek massacre.“ He didn’t attack a reservation, he attacked a village.

11.) „Most of the warriors were out hunting.“ A popular meme and not borne out by any primary source. That ought to be deleted.

12.) „Roman Nose and his Dog Soldiers took a prevailing hard line and continued warfare.“ Nonsense. Roman Nose was NOT even a member of the Dog Soldiers.

13.) „The Dog Soldiers continued their raids and ambushes across Kansas, Texas, and Colorado.“ Unduly tendentious. The Dog Soldiers simply didn’t submit to ethnic cleansing and clung to their hunting lands. They attacked intruders, that’s all.

14.) „The relationship between the two groups is a subject of historical dispute. According to Little Rock, second-in-command of Black Kettle's village, most of the warriors came back to Black Kettle's camp after their attacks.“ That’s not what the Little Rock Interview says. He says that warrior from all camps, including that of BK, went north in August 1867 and, upon discovering fresh white settlements on their last hunting grounds, attacked them.

15.) „White prisoners, including children, were held within his encampment.“ Sensationlist exageration. We’re talking about one white woman (Clara Blinn) and hre son Willy. They were found dead in a deserted Kiowa camp after the Washita attack, miles away from BK’s Cheyenne village.

16.) „By this time Black Kettle's influence was waning, and it is unclear whether he could have stopped the younger warriors' actions.“ As a peace Chief he was unable to do so. Policing powers rested with the warrior societies. BK was a council chief, not a warrior society headman.

17.) „In response to the continued raids and massacres, General Philip Sheridan devised a plan of punitive reprisals.“ As Prof. John Monnet has demonstrated in the December 2015 issue of Wild West magazine („The bloody ground“), the Saline and Solomon raids were chiefly executed by white whiskey peddlers and their mixed gang of customers. General Sully investigated the raids and summarized his findings in a letter to Sherman. Sherman filed the letter away, only to be redicovered in the 2010s and blamed the Cheyennes because he wanted to destroy them.

18.) „Custer's troops killed more than 100 Native Americans, mostly Southern Cheyenne.“ Custer claimed to have killed 103 Cheyenne men (he mentioned killed women and children but didn’t bother to clarify their numbers). A body count was never done by his troops. Cheyenne survivors claimed about 35 villagers killed.

I think there is some work to do! ;)

Lookoo (talk) 21:44, 16 January 2017 (UTC)