FT. MARION PRISONER OF WAR DESCENDANTS UPDATED ON PROJECT PROGRESS.
By John Sipes
The Fort Marion POW web page linked to the Carlisle Indian School home page now has the Sand Creek Massacre list of families the war department listed in 1865.
The link is set up for descendants to add their oral family histories and extended kinship information. The link will update any Sand Creek information coming in.
Plans are to add information from the past 15 years on all repatriations involving Sand Creek from NAGPRA and any historical information on the massacre. It will include activities happening in Colorado and any other activity involving the massacre.
Since the 1868 Lodge Pole Massacre near Cheyenne, known to some as "the Battle of the Washita," involved the same families and bands that suffered at Sand Creek, a link has been added along with the Sand Creek Massacre to present oral histories and military documents. Descendants of the massacres can now add their family stories to the links.
The POW project now has officers and consultants. A flag will be designed and a color guard will be formed. James BlackBear Jr. is designing shields, lances, leggins, moccasins, bone chest plates and other dress items to be worn by the honor guard.
A song for the memorial of the POWs is being made, as well as a memorial song for the Sand Creek/Washita Massacres.
Research adding to the perspective on the ledger art drawings is now in place with elders, ceremonial priests, chiefs, headsmen and family members of the Ft. Marion POWs who drew ledger art. Copies of some work with old photographs of the POWs and chiefs, headsmen and family extended kinshps will be displayed at future benefit dances.
Ruby Bushyhead and I are progressing on genealogies of POWs and Sand Creek descendants' information. Part of the information is now available to descendants.
A proposed caravan following the route the POWs took after being chained and shackled for their journey to St. Augustine and the old fort is taking shape. The caravan will leave old Darlington/Ft. Reno and travel to Ft. Sill, Ft. Smith, Ark., Ft. Leavenworth, Kan; St. Louis, Mo.; Indianapolis, Ind.; Louisville, Ky; Nashville, Tenn; Chattanooga, Tenn.; Altanta, Ga.; Jacksonville, Fla. and on to Ft. Marion at St. Augustine.
A plaque will be set with a memorial blessing at Ft. Marion. Copies of historical information on incarceration of the POWs is being set up to present to the Ft. Marion archives in St. Augustine.
Eight years ago I inquired about the so-called death masks, or molded plaster images made of the faces of the POWs while in prison. These bust images (at least part of them) were housed at the Peabody Museum and now are at the Smithsonian. A plan to find a museum or institutioin to exhibit for descendants the bust images of the POWs is being followed up on, to try to bring the molded images to Oklahoma. Descendants suggested having an exhibit of the ledger art also with the death mask exhibit.
Benefit dances for the 2005 POW gathering will be held in the Clinton and Thomas area and also as near as possible to communities where descendants of the POWs and Sand Creek victims reside. Updates will be presented at each benefit dance to keep descendants informed of all activities involving the project. The benefit dances will be announced later.
Watonga Republican, October 4, 2004.
10/04/2004
THE INDIAN HELPER
THE INDIAN HELPER....
Helping to remind Indian students to stick to it.
Helping by chiding them about the "savage ornaments" their kin wear at home.
Helping to remind them of the ever-present, all seeing, "Man-on-the-band-stand" in their lives.
Helping to reveal that bad girls are bad girls whether white or Indian, characterized as "loud and coarse and talk too much."
Helping to reassure residents that the boiler is cranking up readying the plant for cold weather (we are beginning to feel it in Carlisle now).
Helping to remind the boys to tip their hats to the ladies.
Helping bring attention to the ultimate goal, splitting up the reservations.
As always, urging students to remember lessons learned and to keep to those lessons after their return to the rez (which they aren't supposed to do, but they do, and this is the reality of the failure of Carlisle).
Henry Standing Bear (Sioux), class '91, writes back about the conditions in S. Dakota after Wounded Knee. He wants to leave the rez. Jemima Wheelock (Oneida) is teaching at the Oneida School. Celicia Wheelock (Oneida) is teaching at the Carlisle School. Samuel Townsend (Pawnee) one of the first newspaper editors, returns to attend Dickinson Law School. Richard Davis'(Cheyenne) success overseeing the milk cows at the school farm is always of interest to HELPER readers.
The Hilton family has a long history as Outing Patrons. They lived in Oak Hill, 2 miles south of town, grew fruit and supported many students. This family name surfaces throughout decades of Carlisle patronage.
Somebody's been throwing their ink around. Messy.
The girls' Endeavor Society debated while the boys'societies played ball.
Helping to remind Indian students to stick to it.
Helping by chiding them about the "savage ornaments" their kin wear at home.
Helping to remind them of the ever-present, all seeing, "Man-on-the-band-stand" in their lives.
Helping to reveal that bad girls are bad girls whether white or Indian, characterized as "loud and coarse and talk too much."
Helping to reassure residents that the boiler is cranking up readying the plant for cold weather (we are beginning to feel it in Carlisle now).
Helping to remind the boys to tip their hats to the ladies.
Helping bring attention to the ultimate goal, splitting up the reservations.
As always, urging students to remember lessons learned and to keep to those lessons after their return to the rez (which they aren't supposed to do, but they do, and this is the reality of the failure of Carlisle).
Henry Standing Bear (Sioux), class '91, writes back about the conditions in S. Dakota after Wounded Knee. He wants to leave the rez. Jemima Wheelock (Oneida) is teaching at the Oneida School. Celicia Wheelock (Oneida) is teaching at the Carlisle School. Samuel Townsend (Pawnee) one of the first newspaper editors, returns to attend Dickinson Law School. Richard Davis'(Cheyenne) success overseeing the milk cows at the school farm is always of interest to HELPER readers.
The Hilton family has a long history as Outing Patrons. They lived in Oak Hill, 2 miles south of town, grew fruit and supported many students. This family name surfaces throughout decades of Carlisle patronage.
Somebody's been throwing their ink around. Messy.
The girls' Endeavor Society debated while the boys'societies played ball.
"You see that your pupils are not lazy."
This week's HELPER leads with a lesson on the usefulness of "Pluck."
pluck n.
"an act or instance of plucking or pulling."
"the heart, liver, lungs, and windpipe of a slaughtered animal esp. as an item of food."
"courageous readiness to fight or continue against odds: dogged resolution."
pluck v.
"to move or separate forcibly." "to remove (a person) from one situation in life and transfer him to another."
Example: Children were plucked from their homes and families, placed on trains and sent away to boarding school. It's ironic that the reality of pluck as the verb was lost in the fantasy of pluck as the noun.
Later in the issue, Otto Wells (Comanche student) reveals the pluck that Josh Given (Kiowa student) has shown in securing a contract with the U.S. for haying in Anadarko. Some friendly competition between the Kiowas and Comanches shows up in this letter to Carlisle. Luther Standing Bear (Sioux student) wrote about trying to organize returned Sioux students in an effort to fortify them with "pluck." It would be interesting to discover on what other rez's returned Carlisle students were organizing. We know from Frank Engler's pages that the Cheyennes established their own society of returned students in order to preserve the "Carlisle" model.
Angel DeCora and Lucy Trudell show real ingenuity (pluck?) in their pie-making endeavor at Hampton as reported in Talks and Thoughts. Alhtough they weren't Carlisle girls, they were living a similar existence at the Hampton School. The Carlisle publications frequently included articles from the newspapers of other schools.
The HELPER reports that Reuben Quick Bear (Sioux student) regrets not having stayed at Carlisle longer than 3 years. This kind of subtle chastising strikes me as particularly mean-spirited because the POLICY at the time of Quick Bear's enrollment was to contract students for a period of three years. Later, this time was extended to five years.
News of a parent visiting his children at Carlisle surfaces in this issue of the HELPER.
It was unusual for students to be able to spend time with visiting parents or family members unless the visitor was a tribal leader. That was the case with the (Stockbridge) Miller children whose father came through Carlisle, most likely on his way to Washington DC for business. A higher profile visitor, Chief Joseph came to see his relatives at Carlisle in 1904 and spoke to the assembled students in his own language. Tom Porter, of Kanetsioharake told me a story his grandfather told him, about a "big chief" visiting Carlisle and towering over the children, touched them on their heads as he walked among them. He told them with tears in his eyes, "You, my children - you are the original, the red, the white, and the blue."
pluck n.
"an act or instance of plucking or pulling."
"the heart, liver, lungs, and windpipe of a slaughtered animal esp. as an item of food."
"courageous readiness to fight or continue against odds: dogged resolution."
pluck v.
"to move or separate forcibly." "to remove (a person) from one situation in life and transfer him to another."
Example: Children were plucked from their homes and families, placed on trains and sent away to boarding school. It's ironic that the reality of pluck as the verb was lost in the fantasy of pluck as the noun.
Later in the issue, Otto Wells (Comanche student) reveals the pluck that Josh Given (Kiowa student) has shown in securing a contract with the U.S. for haying in Anadarko. Some friendly competition between the Kiowas and Comanches shows up in this letter to Carlisle. Luther Standing Bear (Sioux student) wrote about trying to organize returned Sioux students in an effort to fortify them with "pluck." It would be interesting to discover on what other rez's returned Carlisle students were organizing. We know from Frank Engler's pages that the Cheyennes established their own society of returned students in order to preserve the "Carlisle" model.
Angel DeCora and Lucy Trudell show real ingenuity (pluck?) in their pie-making endeavor at Hampton as reported in Talks and Thoughts. Alhtough they weren't Carlisle girls, they were living a similar existence at the Hampton School. The Carlisle publications frequently included articles from the newspapers of other schools.
The HELPER reports that Reuben Quick Bear (Sioux student) regrets not having stayed at Carlisle longer than 3 years. This kind of subtle chastising strikes me as particularly mean-spirited because the POLICY at the time of Quick Bear's enrollment was to contract students for a period of three years. Later, this time was extended to five years.
News of a parent visiting his children at Carlisle surfaces in this issue of the HELPER.
It was unusual for students to be able to spend time with visiting parents or family members unless the visitor was a tribal leader. That was the case with the (Stockbridge) Miller children whose father came through Carlisle, most likely on his way to Washington DC for business. A higher profile visitor, Chief Joseph came to see his relatives at Carlisle in 1904 and spoke to the assembled students in his own language. Tom Porter, of Kanetsioharake told me a story his grandfather told him, about a "big chief" visiting Carlisle and towering over the children, touched them on their heads as he walked among them. He told them with tears in his eyes, "You, my children - you are the original, the red, the white, and the blue."
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