MASSACRE AT WOUNDED KNEE

Massacre at Wounded Knee

Massacre at Wounded Knee

The massacre at Wounded Knee is a military operation that took place in the United States of America, in South Dakota, on 29 December 1890. About 200 Indians of the tribe Lakota Miniconjou (including dozens of women and children) were executed by the army of the United States.

Mass grave with Lakota dead after the massacre at Wounded Knee

The term "massacre" was used by General Nelson A. Miles in a letter dated March 13, 1917 the Commissioner of Indian Affairs. Five hundred soldiers of the 7th Cavalry Regiment of the United States, supported by four machine guns, Hotchkiss, surrounded an encampment of Indians Lakota with orders to convey them by train to Omaha in Nebraska. The commander of the 7th had been ordered to disarm first.

There are different versions of the massacre but historians agree that the shooting started when disarming the Indians. A shot rang out and the Indians, disarmed and surrounded, were shot. A total of 26 troopers and Indians 153 Sioux were killed, including 62 women and children. Indian corpses were buried in a common grave at the site of the massacre. Other Sioux died later of their injuries and a lieutenant in the cavalry (Gregory, 2005).

Preludes

In February 1890, the United States government broke a treaty with the Lakota by dividing the Great Indian reservation Sioux of the State of South Dakota in which all five reserves is smaller. This is done to satisfy the interests of the owners of the East, according to the policy clearly stated the government "to sever tribal relations" and to force “the Indians to conform to the lifestyle of the white man, peacefully if possible or otherwise by force.”

Once reserves "adjusted", the tribes are separated into family units on plots of 320 acres. Because of drought, crop of 1890 are insufficient to ensure the supply of the Sioux. Unfortunately for the Indians, the government also cut rations by half, the Indians are considered "lazy". As the bison has, moreover, was virtually cut off from the plain a few years earlier, the Sioux are in a situation of famine (ibid).

The Dance of the Spirits (Ghost Dance)

In 1890, Jack Wilson, an Indian religious leader known by the name of Wovoka said that during the eclipse of the sun total of 1 January 1889, he received the revelation that he is the Messiah of his people. The spiritual movement he created became known as the “Dance of the Spirits” (Ghost Dance), mixed syncretic of spiritualism Paiute and Christianity Shaker. Although Wilson has predicted the demise of white men, it also teaches that, until the Day of Judgment, the Indian must live in peace and do not refuse to work for whites (ibid).

Among the Sioux, the two early converts to this new religion are Kicking Bear and Short Bull, Reserve Pine Ridge. Both recognize that Wilson has levitated in front of them but they interpret his words differently. They reject the contention of Wilson to be the ...