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N0KFQ > TODAY 08.01.13 17:35l 60 Lines 2709 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 34154_KB0WSA
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Subj: Today in History - Jan 8
Path: IZ3LSV<IK2XDE<ON4HU<CX2SA<N0KFQ<KB0WSA
Sent: 130108/1524Z 34154@KB0WSA.MO.USA.NA BPQK1.4.53
...
Jan 8, 1877:
Crazy Horse fights last battle
On this day in 1877, Crazy Horse and his warriors--outnumbered,
low on ammunition and forced to use outdated weapons to defend
themselves--fight their final losing battle against the U.S.
Cavalry in Montana.
Six months earlier, in the Battle of Little Bighorn, Crazy Horse
and his ally, Chief Sitting Bull, led their combined forces of
Sioux and Cheyenne to a stunning victory over Lieutenant Colonel
George Custer (1839-76) and his men. The Indians were resisting
the U.S. government's efforts to force them back to their
reservations. After Custer and over 200 of his soldiers were
killed in the conflict, later dubbed "Custer's Last Stand," the
American public wanted revenge. As a result, the U.S. Army
launched a winter campaign in 1876-77, led by General Nelson
Miles (1839-1925), against the remaining hostile Indians on the
Northern Plains.
Combining military force with diplomatic overtures, Nelson
convinced many Indians to surrender and return to their
reservations. Much to Nelson's frustration, though, Sitting Bull
refused to give in and fled across the border to Canada, where he
and his people remained for four years before finally returning
to the U.S. to surrender in 1881. Sitting Bull died in 1890.
Meanwhile, Crazy Horse and his band also refused to surrender,
even though they were suffering from illness and starvation.
On January 8, 1877, General Miles found Crazy Horse's camp along
Montana's Tongue River. U.S. soldiers opened fire with their big
wagon-mounted guns, driving the Indians from their warm tents out
into a raging blizzard. Crazy Horse and his warriors managed to
regroup on a ridge and return fire, but most of their ammunition
was gone, and they were reduced to fighting with bows and arrows.
They managed to hold off the soldiers long enough for the women
and children to escape under cover of the blinding blizzard
before they turned to follow them.
Though he had escaped decisive defeat, Crazy Horse realized that
Miles and his well-equipped cavalry troops would eventually hunt
down and destroy his cold, hungry followers. On May 6, 1877,
Crazy Horse led approximately 1,100 Indians to the Red Cloud
reservation near Nebraska's Fort Robinson and surrendered. Five
months later, a guard fatally stabbed him after he allegedly
resisted imprisonment by Indian policemen.
In 1948, American sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski began work on the
Crazy Horse Memorial, a massive monument carved into a mountain
in South Dakota. Still a work in progress, the monument will
stand 641 feet high and 563 feet long when completed.
73, K.O. n0kfq
N0KFQ @ KB0WSA.MO.USA.NA
E-mail: kohiggs@gmail.com
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