Massacre: Minnesota Sioux Uprising: Line of Battle, #5

By Nick Vulich

Massacre: Minnesota Sioux Uprising outlines the Indian uprising of 1862 and explains how it came about. In less than an hour, you will meet the main participants, understand the various battles at New Ulm, Fort Ridgely, Birch Coulee, and Wood Lake, and learn more about the expulsion of the Native Americans from Minnesota. For those readers who want to know more and understand how contemporary readers learned about the uprising, we included several original accounts published in the St. Cloud Democrat, The Pioneer Press, and the Goodhue Volunteer.

It's not the complete story, but enough to bring you up to speed, understand the issues of the day, and maybe encourage you to explore more on your own.

Each book includes a timeline to help you see the bigger picture so you can watch events unfold.

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Whether you are a Civil War buff or are just looking for a simple overview of the Minnesota Sioux Uprising, you will enjoy this book. It is written in a simple, conversational style that makes it easy to understand the complex troop movements of the Union and Confederate armies.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Nick Vulich
• Release date: Dec 31, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393454786

Book preview

Massacre

Minnesota Sioux Uprising

Copyright © 2019 / 2023 Line of Battle

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Table of Contents

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Introduction

Timeline

Cast of Characters

Minnesota Indian Uprising

Appendix

Other-Day, the Hero Indian

We Warn You, Mr. Lincoln

Sioux Trials at Camp Release

The Condemned

Final Days and Execution

Works Cited

Footnotes

Introduction

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The Minnesota Sioux Uprising is a forgotten chapter of the civil war. 

At the time, the government focused on fighting the Confederates. The Army of the Potomac had just suffered another devastating defeat at the Second Bull Run. As a result, the War Department couldn’t spare any troops or ammunition to help the settlers.

Instead, independent militias sprang up spontaneously to defend the frontier. The residents of New Ulm banded together under the leadership of Sheriff Charles Roos and Jacob Nix to defend the town during the first attack. Miles away in St. Peter, Minnesota, Supreme Court Justice Charles E. Flandrau raised a company of 125 Frontier Rangers and raced off to the aid of New Ulm.

Governor Alexander Ramsey appointed Henry Sibley a Colonel of the state militia and sent him to Fort Ridgely with orders to defend the frontier.

Citizens banded together in Forest City, Hutchinson, and dozens of other communities and built crude stockades.

Things weren’t any easier for the Sioux.

Little Crow suffered from the same problems Tecumseh and Pontiac experienced during their uprisings. 

Indian chiefs never had absolute control over their men. Unlike their white counterparts, Indian warriors came and went at their pleasure. 

When it all started, Little Crow warned his braves that they could not win a war against the whites. When it became apparent they would fight with or without him, Little Crow gave in and agreed to lead them. 

After the fighting began, he warned the young men what would happen if they persisted in killing women and children. The young warriors ignored him and brought the wrath of the whites down upon them.

That’s what Little Crow felt had doomed the Sioux. 

The other persistent sentiment among the older men and chiefs was the hopelessness of it all. In the beginning, Red Middle Voice could have surrendered the four men who killed Robinson Jones and the others at Acton. That should have settled the matter, but... everyone was sure the whites would take their revenge on the entire tribe, not just the four guilty men.

George L. Davenport investigated the causes of the uprising shortly after its outbreak. The Sioux have fully made up their mind that they have sealed their own  doom, said Davenport, and are now determined to see how many whites they can butcher before they are overpowered.[1]

In the Indian’s minds, History was against them.

Although General William Tecumseh Sherman hadn’t expressed the thought yet, many settlers and politicians believed the only good Indian was a dead Indian. 

The Sioux felt the hatred and resentment.

Chief Jerome Big Eagle said a lot of it came down to attitude. Many of the whites always seemed to say by their manner when they saw an Indian, ‘I am better than you,’ and the Indians did not like this.[2]

Just days after General John Pope arrived in Minnesota to take charge of the newly created Department of the Northwest, he decided the Indians needed to go. Pope wrote Colonel Henry Sibley, It is my purpose to utterly exterminate the Sioux...They are to be treated as maniacs or wild beasts and by no means as people.[3]

On October 9th, Pope declared the Indian war was over. Retribution was next on his mind. 

Secretary of the Navy, Gideon Welles, understood better than anyone what was behind the crisis. He was disgusted with the whole thing... it was not the production of a good man or a great one. The way he saw it, the Sioux and Ojibway are bad. They deserved punishment, too. The Winnebago were not involved, but they have good land which white men want and mean to have.[4]

Before the end of October, Welles's suspicions proved correct. Governor Alexander Ramsey tried to use the conflict to eject all Indians—good and bad—from Minnesota. He didn’t care if the Winnebago fought alongside the Sioux or not. They were Indians, and they had to go.[5]

Before the end of June 1863, 2,000 Winnebago were removed to the Dakotas, although they were guilty of nothing more than being Indians. The legislators behind the Winnebago Removal Bill said it was best for the Indians. Staying put in Minnesota would only bring grief to the tribe.

This book outlines the Minnesota Sioux Uprising of 1862 and explains how it came about. In less than an hour, you will meet the main participants, understand Indian and militia movements, and learn more about Indian relations on the frontier. 

For readers who would like to know more and understand how contemporary readers learned about the uprising, I’ve included the original accounts of the fighting as published in the St. Cloud Democrat, Pioneer Press, and The Goodhue Volunteer. 

It's not the complete story, but enough to bring you up to speed, understand the issues of the day, and maybe encourage you to explore more on your own.

Each book includes a timeline to help you see the bigger picture so you can watch events unfold.

Let’s get started...

Timeline

July 1

Warriors at the Lower Agency formed a Soldiers’ Lodge (a secret organization that directs the tribe during times of great trouble). Their first decision was not to pay the traders what they owed them when the annuity payment was made. When they informed Captain John Marsh at Fort Ridgely about their decision, he had no objections.

Unfortunately, word of the decision to not pay the traders leaked out. From then on, the traders refused to give the Sioux any more goods on credit.

Trader Andrew Myrick, especially, raised their ire when he suggested they should eat grass.

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August 17 

Four Sioux warriors from the Rice Creek village at the Lower Agency killed Robinson Jones and four other residents. The killings stemmed from a dispute between the warriors over whether it was cowardly to respect the white man’s property—in this case, a few hen’s eggs.

When they realized what they had done, the braves rode back to their village and set the events leading up to the Minnesota Sioux uprising in motion.

August 18

While seeing Sioux warriors at Redwood on the Lower Sioux Agency wasn't unusual, something was different this morning. The Indians spread out in groups of three to four outside each building. Suddenly, someone yelled, Now!

Shots rang out, and the killing began. The traders were some of the first targets. The Sioux killed everyone at Myrick’s store, then moved on to William Forbes’ store, where one man managed to escape,