Travesty of the Marias Massacre
By tony leather, 9th Apr 2012 | Follow this author
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Posted in WikinutNewsEducation
Despite a brief Congressional storm of outraged protest at the time, General Sherman issued a press denial of any military guilt, blaming the alcoholism of Major Baker.
Travesty of the Marias Massacre
On January 23, 1870, perhaps the most outrageous act of ethnic repression was carried oout by the US cavalry, when they massacred most of an American Indian tribe, the Piegans. The dead were mostly women and children in this possibly greatest slaughter ever of native Americans by U.S. troops.
While the Blackfoot Confederacy - Blood, Piegan and Blackfoots - had endured hostile relations with local white settlers for several years things came to a head when, in 1869, Piegan warrior Owl Child stole several of horses. His victim, one Malcolm Clarke, tracked him and beat him in front of his peers.
The humiliated, Owl Child led a rogue Piegan band in pursuit of Clarke, killing him, the reason a band of cavalry - led by Major Eugene Baker - was sent by General Sheridan to track the killers and punish them. It was this troop that, on January 23, 1870, received a scout report telling of a Piegan group camped along the Marias River.
Dawn saw 200 dismounted troopers spread out in ambush positions around the camp, awaiting orders to open fire. When chief Heavy Runner appeared, he approached the troops waving a safe-conduct paper he had been earlier presented with.
Army scout Joe Kipp shouted that the cavalry had found the wrong camp, but was silenced by Baker, who ordered his men to open fire. Heavy Runner fell, and the ensuing massacre of the unprotected
Indian camp was brutal, 173 innocents, mainly elderly, women and children dying in the hail of bullets.
140 other Piegans were taken prisoner, later released with no food, no clothing and no horses, meaning that the 90-mile trek to Fort Benton, saw many of these poor refugees freezing to death on the march. The incredibly callous and unfeeling murderer Baker never even found the tribe members he was looking for, because they had escaped to Canada.
Despite a brief Congressional storm of outraged protest at the time, General Sherman issued a press denial of any military guilt, blaming the alcoholism of Major Baker for both the massacre and failure to capture the right Indians, an official investigation into the incident never taking place. This little-known incident was every bit as significant and damning as other dreadful acts of savagery by the US military, like Bear River or Washita, where massacres also took place, but, history has overlooked it. No monument was ever erected to mark the site of the mass Piegan grave, but it should not ever be forgotten. America has its own share of dirty secrets and atrocities, something nobody should ever overlook.
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