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The Colorado War was an Indian War fought in 1864 and 1865 between the Southern Cheyenne, Arapaho, and allied Brulé and Oglala Lakota people (or Sioux) peoples versus the U.S. Army, Colorado militia, and white in Colorado Territory and adjacent regions. The Kiowa and the Comanche played a minor role in actions that occurred in the southern part of the Territory along the Arkansas River.Bertbrong, Donald J. (1963), The Southern Cheyenne, Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, p. 199 The Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Lakota Sioux played the major role in actions that occurred north of the Arkansas River and along the South Platte River, the Great Platte River Road, and the eastern portion of the Overland Trail. The United States government and Colorado Territory authorities participated through the 1st Colorado Cavalry Regiment, often called the Colorado volunteers. The war was centered on the Colorado Eastern Plains, extending eastward into Kansas and Nebraska.
The war included an attack in November 1864 against the winter camp of the Cheyenne people Chief Black Kettle known as the Sand Creek massacre. The engagement, initially hailed as a great victory, was later publicly condemned as an act of genocidal brutality. The massacre resulted in military and congressional hearings which established the culpability of John M. Chivington, the commander of the Colorado Volunteers, and his troops.
The Indians' response to the Sand Creek Massacre was a move northward to the more isolated lands of Wyoming to join their relatives, the Northern Cheyenne, the Northern Arapaho, and the main body of the Lakota Sioux. En route they carried out extensive raids along the South Platte River and attacked U.S. military forts and forces, successfully eluding defeat and capture by the U.S. army.
On February 18, 1861, six chiefs of the Southern Cheyenne and four of the Arapaho signed the Treaty of Fort Wise with the United States"Treaty with the Arapaho and Cheyenne, 1861" (Treaty of Fort Wise). 12 Stat. 1163, p. 810. at Bent's New Fort at Big Timbers near what is now Lamar, Colorado. They ceded more than 90 percent of the lands designated for them by the Fort Laramie Treaty.Greene, 2004, p. 27 Their new, much reduced reserve was located in eastern Colorado. Some Cheyenne including the Dog Soldiers, a militaristic band of Cheyennes and Lakota people that had evolved beginning in the 1830s, disavowed the treaty and refused to abide by its constraints.Greene 2004, pp. 12-13. They continued to live and hunt in the bison-rich lands of eastern Colorado and western Kansas, becoming increasingly belligerent over the tide of white immigration across their lands.Hoig 1980, p. 62. Cheyennes opposed to the treaty said that it had been signed by a small minority of the chiefs without the consent or approval of the rest of the tribe, that the signatories had not understood what they signed, and that they had been bribed to sign by a large distribution of gifts. The whites, however, claimed the treaty was a "solemn obligation" and considered that those Indians who refused to abide by it were hostile and planning a war.Hyde 1968, p. 118.
The Hungate massacre involved the murder of the family of Nathan Hungate along Running Creek (Box Elder Creek near present-day Elizabeth, Colorado) on June 11, 1864.12 It was a precipitating factor leading to the Sand Creek massacre of November 29, 1864.
On about the same date, a band of fourteen Dog Soldiers encountered a group of fifteen to twenty soldiers just north of the South Platte River. The soldiers demanded that the Dog Soldiers throw down their weapons. The soldiers suspected the Dog Soldiers had stolen four mules from a white owner. A fight ensued and two soldiers were killed and three Dog Soldiers wounded.Halaas, David Fridtjof and Masich, Andrew E. (2004), Halfbreed: The Remarkable True Story of George Bent, Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, pp. 113–115 The mixed blood Cheyenne warrior, George Bent, said that the Indians were puzzled by what they regarded as unprovoked attacks by soldiers. Bent speculated that the altercations between soldiers and Indians were an effort by Colonel Chivington and the Colorado Volunteers to avoid being ordered to go to Kansas to fight the Confederates by establishing a need for them to remain in Colorado because of an Indian war.Hyde, George E., ed. Savoie Lottinville (1968), Life of George Bent, Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, p. 127
Also, in May, Major Jacob Downing and a force of Colorado volunteers attacked a Cheyenne village in Cedar Canyon north of the South Platte River. The people in the village were mainly old women and children. Downing reported killing 26 Indians. One soldier was killed.Grinnell, p. 122 On June 11, only from Denver, four Arapaho killed the four members of the Hungate family, creating fear in the city that the war was on their doorstep."The Hungate Massacre," [2], accessed 2 Sep 2019 On July 12, a band of Miniconjou Sioux attacked a wagon train on the Oregon Trail, killing 4 men. Soldiers pursued the raiders but were ambushed and had one man killed. On August 20, the Indians killed 5 members of a family in Nebraska. A total of 51 people were reported killed by Indians along the Little Blue River in Kansas and Nebraska. The roads to Denver across the Great Plains were closed from August 15 to September 24.McDermott, John D. (2003), Circle of Fire: The Indian War of 1865, Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, pp. 12–13
The Hungate massacre involved the murder of the family of Nathan Hungate along Running Creek (Box Elder Creek near present-day Elizabeth, Colorado) on June 11, 1864.12 It was a precipitating factor leading to the Sand Creek massacre of November 29, 1864.
Soldiers from Kansas also got involved in the war. On September 25, Major General James G. Blunt with 400 soldiers and Delaware people Indian scouts encountered Cheyennes on the Pawnee Fork of the Arkansas River. Blunt claimed to have killed 9 Indians at the cost of two dead soldiers.
On their return to Fort Lyon, Wynkoop promised the peaceful Indians protection if they established a village on Sand Creek, northeast of Fort Lyon, and within the area allocated to the Cheyenne and Arapaho by the Treaty of Fort Wise. Black Kettle and his followers moved to Sand Creek. On October 17, however, Wynkoop was relieved of his command by Chivington, apparently because of his advocacy for a peaceful settlement of the war.Grinnell, pp. 135–142
The desire for peace by Black Kettle and others to the contrary, the Dog Soldiers and other hostile Indians continued to raid ranches and wagon trains and to clash with soldiers during the fall, especially in Kansas and Nebraska. Several offensives by the U.S. army were ineffective.
Julesburg consisted of a stagecoach station, stables, an express and telegraph office, a warehouse, and a large store that catered to travelers going to Denver along the South Platte. Its population was about 50 armed men. One mile west was Camp Rankin, with one company, about 60 men, of cavalry. High sod walls surrounded both settlements. On January 7, 1,000 warriors attacked Julesburg and Camp Rankin killing 14 soldiers and four armed civilians at little or no loss to themselves. The surviving soldiers and civilians took refuge inside Camp Rankin while the Indians plundered the settlement.Robrock, David P. "The Seventh Iowa Cavalry and the Plains Indians Wars." Montana: The Magazine of Western History. Vol. 39, No. 2 (Spring, 1989), p. 12Hyde, pp. 169–172Coutant, Charles Griffin. History of Wyoming
accessed 8 Mar 2012
Not all the Indians were committed to war. After the raid, Black Kettle and 80 lodges of his followers (perhaps 100 men and their families) left the main body and joined the Kiowa and Comanche south of the Arkansas River. Many of the Southern Arapaho likewise had moved south of the Arkansas.Hyde, p. 177 Towards the end of January, several ranches and farms belonging to white settlers were attacked and raided upon, mainly the American Ranch, Godfrey Ranch, Wisconsin Ranch, Gittrell Ranch and many others, resulting in an additional small number of casualties. All Known Battles & Skirmishes During the American Civil War - Colorado TerritoryPatten, Jennifer. In View of the Mountains: A History of Fort Morgan, Colorado, Aged Page (June 8, 2011), Chapter: Communication West.
From January 28 to February 2, the Indians embarked on a great raid along the valley of the South Platte River. The Cheyenne raided west of Julesburg, the Northern Arapaho near Julesburg, and the Sioux east of Julesburg, destroying a dozen or more ranches and stagecoach stations along of the river valley and accumulating a large herd of captured cattle. Near Valley Station (present day Sterling, Colorado), the Cheyenne had a brush with soldiers. Illustrating the difference in accounts between soldiers and Indians, Lt. J. J. Kennedy said that his force had a battle with the raiders and killed 10 to 20 Indians and recovered 400 stolen cattle. George Bent said it was a minor skirmish in which no Indians were killed or wounded and the only cattle the soldiers recovered were the ones the Indians had abandoned as too poor to steal. During the raid, the Cheyenne encountered a group of nine former soldiers. They killed all nine of them and discovered two Cheyenne scalps in their luggage from the Sand Creek massacre. Although soldiers and ranchers claimed to have inflicted heavy casualties on the raiders, Bent said he knew of only four Indians who were killed during the raids. Three were Sioux who were killed while attacking a wagon train and one was an Arapaho who was killed accidentally by a Cheyenne.Hyde, pp. 177–182McDermott, pp. 27–30
On February 2, the Indians left their large camp on the South Platte River and continued north toward the Powder River country of Wyoming to join their relatives there. The Sioux led the way as they were most familiar with the territory. En route the Indians had two more skirmishes in Nebraska with the U.S. army at Mud Springs and Rush Creek.McDermott, pp. 35–45 In subsequent months, the Indians frequently raided wagon trains and military establishments along the Oregon Trail in Wyoming. In the summer of 1865, the Indians launched a large-scale offensive in the Battle of Platte Bridge (present-day Casper, Wyoming) achieving a minor victory. Later that summer, the U.S. army invaded Indian territory in Wyoming with more than 2,000 soldiers in the ineffective Powder River Expedition.Grinnell, pp. 175–196
By December 1865, the Colorado War had fizzled out. Most of the Southern Cheyenne and Arapaho who had journeyed north to Wyoming had returned to the southern Great Plains. The Brulé Sioux under Spotted Tail who had been allies of the Cheyenne and Arapaho had peacefully settled near Fort Laramie."Brule Sioux Chief Spotted Tail," [5], accessed 5 Sep 2019 Black Kettle, always seeking peace, signed the Little Arkansas Treaty in October 1865 obligating his band of Southern Cheyenne to move to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma)."Cheyenne Chief Black Kettle," [6], accessed 5 Sep 2019 Roman Nose and the Dog Soldiers continued to be hostile and to raid and fight the U.S. army in Kansas and Colorado."Cheyenne Dog Soldiers," [7], accessed 5 Sep 2019
The two mixed-blood Cheyennes, George Bent and Edmund Guerrier, also returned to the southern plains. Bent became an interpreter between the Cheyenne and the whites and, through a series of letters to scholar George Hyde, a historian of the Colorado War and the Cheyenne.Halaas and Masich, p. 349 Guerrier worked for a time as a scout for George Armstrong Custer in campaigns against his Cheyenne relatives and as an interpreter for many interactions between the tribe and the United States. Guerrier married Julia Bent, sister of George Bent and also a survivor of the Sand Creek massacre.Hardorff, Richard G., compiler & editor (2006). Washita Memories: Eyewitness Views of Custer's Attack on Black Kettle's Village, Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, pp. 50–51, 221–222
Another congressional committee, the Joint Special Committee on Conditions of Indian Tribes, also investigated the Sand Creek massacre in 1865 as part of a larger review of U.S.-Native American affairs across the country and territories. Of the five conclusions outlined in their report, the first linked the ongoing conflicts with Indigenous Peoples directly to the actions of "lawless white men." A group of legislators from the committee visited Fort Lyon in 1865 and told tribe members there that the government disapproved of Chivington's actions.
Chivington had already resigned his military commission and thus was not prosecuted for the massacre. After Sand Creek, Chivington changed residences frequently and was involved in several scandals.McDermott, pp. 174–176 He defended his actions at Sand Creek until the end of his life in 1894."Placing Blame: The 1864 battle of Sand Creek is still ripe for debate" (May 1, 2004), True West Magazine, [9] , accessed 6 Sep 2019 The Methodist Church, of which he was a lay preacher, apologized for his actions in 1996 and a street named after him in Longmont, Colorado was renamed in 2005. "Sand Creek Massacre research center supported"Hughes, Trevor (December 29, 2004), "Council: So long Chivington", Longmont Times-Call, retrieved April 17, 2011
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