WOUNDED KNEE  --  A Look at the Records
 By Brig. Gen. E.D. Scott, Retired

(Continued from Last Month)

Colonel Forsythe talked to the Indians at some length, through an interpreter, explaining to them that they must surrender their arms.  They talked this over among themselves but appeared to arrive at no decision.  At last twenty were tolled off to go into the camp and bring their arms.  Some went part way but circled back and mingled with the crowd; most of them went to the camp, returning with two broken carbines, and said these were all the arms they had.  They could not have been under the impression that only government arms were meant, for more carbines were found in the camp when it was searched.

Colonel Forsythe and Major Whitside talked the situation over, decided nothing could be accomplished this way, and had Big Foot brought out of his tent to talk to his people.  He was supported by an Indian and the hospital steward.  Big Foot talked with his bucks and finally stated that they had no arms, that the latter had been destroyed on the Cheyenne, where they had been some days before.  This was an astonishing statement in view of the fact that the whole band had marched into camp fully armed the evening before.  The Chief was very sick; his mind may have wandering, his bucks were obdurate and perhaps thinking of his leadership as being about at an end anyway, any answer was good enough.

Bucks were constantly passing between the council and the camp and seemed to be exciting the squaws, which may have had some connection with their efforts to get the pony herd ready for the road.  It was decided to stop this circulation and to search the camp.  Troop B deployed from its right on a line facing east and about half-way between the Indians and their camp; Troop K passed to the east of the gathering and deployed on the south in similar position, facing north.  The men were at intervals of
two yards, and there was a gap of about twenty yards between the troops.  Curiously, Surgeon John van R. Hoff, gave the only detailed description of this movement, and he noted that in Troop K there was an 'involuntary' closing in to the left, but the men on the right maintained the frontage with wider intervals.

Captain Wallace (K) took six or eight men and began at the southeast end to search the camp; Captain Varnum (B) took a similar party and began to search from the north end.  The squaws did all they could to hide weapons in their clothing, under them as they sat on the ground; one was too sick to move but a new Winchester was taken from under her.  One of the parties took only firearms, the other took bows and arrows, knives, hatchets as well.  Captain Wallace picked up a stone warclub and carried it during the search.

It was found near his body after the fight and was the foundation for the story that he was killed by it.  He was killed by a bullet through the stomach.  Part of the arms were carried to the battery position by men sent by Captain Moylan from the "One-third A and I" shown on the map, part were carried to a wagon near the cavalry camp, placed there for the purpose by Lieut. Guy Preston.  He had received 29, mostly old, some of them carbines from the Custer fight, when the firing broke out.

All of this must have taken up a lot of time; it is curious that no question of time was asked by the Board in its investigation and no mention made by witnesses except as to the 8 o'clock formation, and as to the attack on Troops C and D two miles west of the battlefield, at 11 o'clock.  Colonel Forsythe in his formal report written December 31, states that the fighting began at 9:15, "when the fighting began at 9:15, 10 minutes hot fight and forty minutes skirmishing".  This refers to the fighting about the camp only.

It was now decided to search the bucks, many of whom had by this time settled down on the ground.  Major Whitside and Captain Varnum began passing them between them, one at a time.  Search of the first three or four yielded one Winchester and many cartridges.  The Major directed that the latter be collected; someone handed Captain Varnum an old hat; he and his first sergeant held it while it was filled; the captain turned his head away and called to one of his men to bring a grain sack.  Then as he stated, "[ ] they all seemed to rise with a purpose of passing through to be searched, when I saw five or six bucks throw off their blankets and bring up their rifles.  I turned to Major Whitside saying, 'By GOD, they have broken" and the Indians faced my troop and began firing."  Major Whitside states, "One shot was fired by an Indian, instantly followed by a
volly from the others, who had jumped to their feet and thrown off their blankets."

On the hillside across the ravine to the south, Lieut. Charles W. Taylor, commanding the Indian Scouts, was watching the scene from a distance of about 200 yards. "A buck threw off his blanket and fired a rifle, apparantly at the group where General Forsythe was standing.  Other shots were fired and the Indians threw off their blankets.  Then there was a lull for a second or two, and the soldiers began firing.

Surgeon John van R. Hoff was near Big Foot.  "At this moment a shot was fired while I was walking toward General Forsythe, and my back towards the Indians.  I turned instantly and saw these Indians breaking from their center apparently in the direction of the gap between B and K troops, firing continuous volleys as they advanced.

Lieut. James D Mann, Troop K, assisted Captain Wallace in the search of the camp.  The next day he was mortally wounded in a brush with Indians, and on his death bed dictated to his brother a story of the fight.  Surely full credence should be given it. The following is an extract:

'In front of me were four bucks, three armed with rifles and one with bow and arrows.  I drew my revolver and stepped through the line to my place with my detachment.  The Indians raised their weapons over their heads as in votive offering, then brought them down to bear on us, the one with the bow and arrow aiming directly at me.  They seemed to wait an instant.  The Medicine Man threw a handful of dust into the air, put on his war bonnet, and then I heard a gun fired near him.  This seemed to be the signal they were waiting for, and the fire immediately began.  I ordered my men to fire and the reports were almost simultaneous.'

Lieutenant Mann was on the opposite side of the Indian mass from the group about Colonel Forsythe, and when the first shot was fired the Indians were ready, in part at least, faced toward the troops between them and the camp.

The Medicine Man has been haranguing the Indians for some time and dancing.  The interpreters said he was stirring them up, telling them they were proof against the bullets of the white men, that their own bullets would go true to the mark.  One close by witness describes the tenseness that grew up, '[  ] the dusky faces of the interpreters were ashy gray.'  There can be no doubt whatever that the firing was begun by the Indians, nor can there be any doubt that it was wholly unexpected by the troops.

One of the party with Colonel Forsythe was Father Francis M. J. Craft, a Catholic missionary priest, who had been ten years with the Indians of the Northwest.  He happened to be at Pine Ridge Agency on a tour of visits to Catholic missions and schools, knew Big Foot and his band well, and went over to Wounded Knee in the hope of being helpful.

'Malicious whites on and near all Agencies, during the present excitement, have by misrepresenting the intentions of the army, caused such a state of alarm and suspicion among the Indians as to make it possible for the least excitement or misunderstanding to precipitate serious trouble.'

His description of events is pretty much like that of others, and he reasoned with some of the Indians himself, noting among them some of the worst characters in the Sioux reservation.  When some Indians raised their rifles he spoke to them, but 'no one seemed to listen' said to be a son of Big Foot, fired, and others followed his example.

Father Craft was severely wounded almost immediately, stabbed in the back by an Indian.

One of the interpreters, P.F. Wells, a half-breed, was also attacked by an Indian with a knife.  He knocked the Indian over with his rifle and then shot him, but not before he had lost the end of his nose by the knife.  The other interpreter, Ward, was also attacked by an Indian with a knife, and was unable to use his gun.  They grappled and went down, the Indian on top. A soldier killed the Indian with his revolver.

Wounded Indians who continued firing were, of course, dispatched; those who ceased firing were cared for.  One such asked an interpreter just after the melee ended, the identity of a body lying near.  Being told it was that of the Medicine Man he spoke as though to the corpse, "If I could be taken to you I would stab you."  Then to the interpreter, "He is our murderer.  Only for him inciting our other young men we would all have been alive and happy."  His statement was taken later in the hospital and
embodied in the proceedings of the board.

An old squaw said, "The treacherous ones are of Big Foot's band; we of Hump's band honestly wanted peace."

Apparantly the Indians made the mistake of trying to shoot it out with the soldiers, they could have dashed through that thin line and reached their camp before the soldiers could have gotten in a second shot.  It was less than fifty yards.  Had there been no firing and the Indians simply made a dash for their camp and the shelter of the ravine beyond, probably not a soldier would have fired a shot, there would have been no time for orders and they had none. In the space of a minute the Indians could have been in some sort of cover, ready to fight.  Perhaps they were too sure of their repeating rifles; perhaps they were firmly imbued with what their medicine man had been telling them for an hour or more, that the white soldiers' bullets could not harm them.  Whatever it was they paid dearly, their heaviest losses were right there.

The first phase of the fight was unique for modern times; soldiers and Indians stood on their feet and shot it out face to face.  The soldiers had the advantage of position, being at intervals of two or more yards on a quarter-circle.  The Indians were within that curve and closely crowded.  The soldiers had the disadvantage of the single-shot carbine, the Indians had the advantage of the seven-shot repeating rifles.  But the latter advantage ends with the emptying of the magazine; it is difficult to use the rifle as a single loader and a soldier handy with the carbine could get in several shots in the time necessary to fill in the magazine.

There is much uncertainty as to how long this first phase lasted, estimates varying from 'a few minutes' to 'eight or ten minutes'.  It would seem that the repeating rifle furnishes a fair yard-stick.  The Indians were in a crowd and could not fire all at once; they expected their bullets to kill the soldiers; but most of them stayed on their feet and continued firing; they believed themselves immune to the soldiers' bullets, but found themselves being killed fast; attempts to reload their new Winchesters must have been fumbling at best; one may reasonably conclude that fighting was over for the Indians when they had emptied their magazines, perhaps in two or three minutes.  Bewildered, disillusioned, the remaining Indians, more than half, rushed through the line of soldiers toward the only refuse in sight, the brushy ravine beyond their own camp.  Some few wounded continued to fire from the ground until killed; one kept up a hot fight from a tepee; a soldier ran across to it with the remark that he would bring him out, slashed an opening in the tepee with a knife, and was promptly killed.  The battery then disposed of the Indian by two or three shells into the tepee.  A number of Indians fired from concealment elsewhere in camp but were soon killed.

Things happened fast when the melee began.  On the north, Lt. Nicholson, a staff officer, 'made a break and went around in rear of E Troop, and watched the fight from the battery.'  Colonel Forsythe also made his way to the battery.

On the east, Troop G broke in the center, the right platoon led by Lt. T.Q. Donaldson went to the rear and 'around the wire fence,' dismounted, and returned to the field to fight on foot.  This troop was the only one in the line of fire of Troops B and K during the melee, and it did not have a single casualty.  The rest of the troop went to the left rear into the ravine and also dismounted to fight on foot.  On the south, flying bullets caused the sentinel line to run forward down the slopes of the ravine, the nearest shelter.

The Indian scouts scattered, part following the sentinel line into the ravine, part going farther to the right where Troop G was preparing to fight on foot, part going to the rear and left seeking shelter in the small ravines.

When bullets reached the line of Troops C and D they began a rearward movement which was accelerated when a 1.65-inch shell fell close.  Captain Godfrey said, "I ordered the troop to rally behind a hill to our left rear."

Troop C conformed and the two formed a dismounted line on the crest of the hill. Squaws and children rushed out of camp to the west, southwest and south, seeking shelter in the ravines.  Quite a number of squaws, and some bucks, managed to start the pony herd off to the northwest along the Fast Horse Road. They passed Troop E in a cloud of dust, into which that troop, now dismounted, fired in an effort to stop them.  Some Indians fired back, one of them a squaw and Lt. Sedgwick Rice prevented his men from shooting her.  The batter fired a few shots ahead of the herd and it came to a half less than a mile from where it started.

Some of he Indians who fled to the ravines hid at once, but many kept on up the big ravine and many crossed it and continued their flight up the slopes to the south through the sentinel line.  Some of these groups were fired on by the battery and by Troops C and D, bucks being hardly distinguishable, and there were some of the latter.

Captain H.J. Nowlan, Troop I, had command of what was left of the sentinel line on the south side of the ravine, and his testimony gives a clear picture; 'Indians rushed down in the ravine, up and down it.  Not a shot was fired at them but they were allowed to escape.  But right behind them came the bucks and the cry went up from officers and men, 'Here comes the bucks, let them have it.' and our fire was returned by the bucks." Which goes far to establish what is said above about the Indians trying to shoot it out and then making their dash for shelter; the women and children had got clear of the camp before they did.  And certainly most of these found dead or wounded in camp must have been the victims of Indian bullets, since the Indian fire directed against the men of Troops B and K, which was practically all of it, necessarily passed through the Indian camp, directly behind the soldiers.

Major Whitside had gone to the southside of the ravine, to the second position of Troops C and D.  There he directed Captain Jackson (C) to take his troop up the hills 'and round up anything I found there,' and bring int he Indians pony herd, which he he pointed out, then 'a couple of miles to the northwest.'

Jackson started due west 'up the bluffs' with his troop and had to go two miles to reach the head of the ravine.  There he found some Indians well protected in the sharp breaks of the ravine's edge. He dismounted and attacked on foot.  The fight lasted some time and one soldier was killed.

Lieutenant Taylor came up with two of his Indian Scouts, and thesecrept near enough to open conversation with the Sioux.  "It took a half hour's talk and I had to withdraw my men before they would come out.".

There were eight bucks, of whom five were wounded, and seventeen women and children, about half of them wounded.  Jackson at once sent a request to Colonel Forsythe for an ambulance and a wagon for the wounded.  Meantime, first aid was given to all.

Before the arrival of Major Whitside on the position, Captain Godfrey had sent Lt. S.R.H. Tompkins with twelve men towards his left front to prevent Indians making their way up the ravine into the hills.  Before he got in position the party Jackson found at the head of the ravine must have gotten by, and also a larger party that took up a position in one of the lateral ravines and had to be dislodged by artillery fire.  But there were still armed Indians coming up and Lt. Tompkins' party had some skirmishing which resulted in three bucks being killed.

Major Whitside directed Captain Godfrey to pursue, with the remainder of his troop, some Indians seen going up the hills to their rear.  He did so but saw only one Indian, far off.  He continued on to the Divide, a couple of miles from his starting point, and down the opposite slopes for some distance.  It was on this scout that an incident occurred that was the cause of a special investigation.

Godfrey started on foot with two or three men to search a brushy ravine head, and suddenly glimpsed blankets quite close, and opened fire.  No reply coming, they went in and found a squaw, a boy, and two small children dead.  Captain Godfrey and his men were exonerated of the charge of wanton killing.

Returning toward camp he saw Captain Jackson's troop off to the north and joined him.  Jackson was waiting for the transportation for his wounded prisoners.  Jackson was the senior, and he suggested that Godfrey return to camp, scouting the big ravine as he went.  Godfrey detailed a few men to follow the bottom of the ravine, he with the others, to follow them on the high ground.

They were just starting off when four or five mounted Indians approached from the direction of the Agency (West) and waited to see what this might portend.

These Indians were armed and one wore the bade of the Indian Police. They rode up with words of friendly greeting and shook hands with the two officers.  One gave Captain Godfrey's hand such a pull as nearly unhorsed him.  He asked the policeman what he meant by it, and received the peculiar reply,  "I don't know; he is my father."

Then they rode off in the direction from which they came, turned at about a hundred yards and fired, except the policeman, who was waving his arms and appeared to be trying to stop them.

These Indians then galloped off and disappeared but presently some fifty or sixty came in sight from that direction, deployed in line and at the gallop.  Others appeared appoaching on either flank.  The Indians began firing; one of the soldiers was wounded; Captain Jackson mounted quickly, abandoned his prisoners, and retired to a better defensive position about a quarter of a mile to the rear and north of the ravine, where he again dismounted to fight on foot.  He had thirty-four men, Godfery fourteen, allowing for the minimum of horseholders, about forty soldiers awaited the attack of mounted Indians whose numbers had now
increased to about 150.  But the attack was not made; Troops E and G were in sight, 'coming up on the jump' and most of Troop A.  Indian Scouts and the hostile lines faces to the rear and galloped off.

It was learned later that these were Brule Sioux from Pine Ridge Agency.  Of course all Indians thereabout must have known of Big Foot's surrender, and have greatly stirred up about it.  The news of the fighting must have reached them, but that seems scarcely probable in the time available.  It was thought and with good reason, that no particular band was involved; that this was a gathering of hotheads who started off with some idea of a relief expedition.  There is a possibility that some contact was made with Big Foot's band during the night and that the latter expected some such relief party, which might explain the long delay about the surrender of arms and the frantic efforts of the squaws to get the train packed and ready to move.

Immediately after the melee Edgerly (G) and Taylor (Indian Scouts) had assembled their commands and proceeded to the vicinity of the battery. There Col. Forsythe directed Edgerly to proceed with these two troops and Troop E to the West to round up the Indian herd and look for hostile Indians.  He quickly did the former, left some soldiers and scouts in charge and went on, arriving in time to save Jackson and Godfrey from their precarious situation, as described above.

One batch of Indians had established themselves in the head of a small ravine, about half a mile up the big ravine, and a lively fight went on for some time.  Finally Col. Forsythe sent one gun under Lt. Harry L. Hawthorne to dislodge them.  He went into action at 500 yards and the Indians were soon finished off.  Hawthorne was severely wounded in this action.

Besides the small engagements described there were many smaller exchanges of shots on or in the vicinity of the battlefield. It must be remembered that smokeless powder had not been heard of at that time.  When an Indian fired from concealment a large puff of smoke betrayed his position and brought shots from all who saw it.  Should the soldiers have waited and tried to learn if any women and children were in the vicinity of that smoke?  The idea is absurd.  There was an armed buck at that
smoke, trying to kill one of them and he might succeed if there was any delay in dispatching him.

During the mopping-up officers gave repeated warnings to their men against shooting women and children, and it is highly improbable that a single one was intentionally shot.  There was one case of intentional shooting of a wounded buck by a very young soldier.  His troop commander gave him a savage berating on the spot.  The boy burst into tears and said he understood a wounded Indian was as dangerous as any.

From the testimony of several witnesses it is possible to give a fair picture of what happened at the camp after the melee.  The mass of the Indians rushed through Troop K, through the Indian camp, to the ravine, but some hid in the camp and continued firing from concealment there.

Troop K fell back on the cavalry camp, thus clearing the way for the artillery to end the activities of an Indian in a tepee, as related above.  The men of Troop K were now, of course, facing south and southwest and their fire against these Indians was for the first time in the direction of other troops, the sentinel line from A and I, the Indian Scouts and Troop C and D.  Lt. Garlington was in charge of the sentinel line on the west and with the men near him, dropped into a sunken road.  He was
wounded by an Indian firing the ravine after the rush through, and the hospital steward was killed near him.  The action by the sentinel line on the south is described elsewhere. Just when or how the heavy losses by the sentinel line occurred cannot be determined, but when the Indians opened fire those men were standing in groups of three, along the arc of a circle over which the fire swept, and from 100 to 150 yards from the rifles.  It is much more likely that their losses were greater then than during the subsequent intermittent firing.

Troop B suffered heavily in the melee but the rush of the Indians through Troop K freed them of pressure, and Captain Varnum led them to their picket line, mounted up and reported to Col. Forsythe, who directed him to 'cover the hospital,' and some hours later to clear up a portion of the ravine.  He found many dead and wounded Indians and brought out nineteen unwounded women and children.

The losses suffered by these two troops (nearly one-half the total) and those inflicted by them on the Indians, were almost wholly during the progress of the melee. Two-thirds of Troop A and I, in groups of three or four, formed the sentinel line behind the Indian camp, wholly in the field of fire of the Indians.  Their casualties nearly equalled those of B and K.  After the melee, in the mopping-up of the camp, the fire of these lines into it endangered both, but it was not heavy and was soon ended.  None of the other troops fired into the camp area.

Capt. Capron 'opened fire with all four guns as soon as the field was sufficiently cleared as to allow us to shoot without injury to our own men'.  His first target, 'for my own two guns' was at a 'bunch of Indians firing on our troops' about 300  or 400 yards away.  He fired at groups here and there over the field, but could not distinguish squaws from bucks.  After the fight he saw two bucks and one squaw that had been killed by artillery fire, '2,000 or 2,500 yards from the battery.'

The fire from scattered Indians finally ceased, with one notable exception; a lone buck in the head of a coulee keep up the fight until the troops had marched for Pine Ridge Agency!  Col. Forsythe stated this in his formal report of December 31; fire had failed to get or dislodge the buck and the Colonel considered him not worth the casualties that might follow an attempt to rush him.

Charges of inhumanity by the troops were refuted by every witness. Surgeon John van R. Hoff was emphatic.  "I saw none.  All the field which was the center of active operations came under my observation [ ] considerable number of wounded bucks and squaws brought in had their wounds dressed by company bearers."  As to whether any soldiers were victims of the fire on the troops, "I have not the slightest reason to know or think so; it was possible, but I have no reason to believe it."  And in his
capacity of surgeon of the command he must have known the nature of all the gunshot wounds.

The fighting at an end, the troops gathered up the wounded Indians and their own dead and wounded and marched to Pine Ridge Agency.  They had one officer and twenty-six men and an Indian Scout dead; four officers and thirty enlisted men wounded.  Sixty-two women and eighty-three bucks were buried in a common grave a few days later. Some of the wounded died later.

Some writers have chosen to animadvert on this abandonment of the Indian dead.  But the troops had suffered a heavy loss, collecting the wounded and getting them ready for the march required some time; the march would require four hours, it was necessary that the command return to the Agency as soon as possible, not only to get proper medical attention for the wounded but to escape possible attack by the thousands of Indians within a few hours' march.  There was only a short winter afternoon
available, they made the best possible use of it.  And actually, several thousand Indians decamped that night and were only returned to the reservation after several skirmishes.

On the following day, December 30, six of these troops of the 7th Cavalry were ordered out and before evening had scored another victory in a skirmish at White Clay Creek.  Each had one or more casualties, the total being one killed and seven sounded.  Lt. James O. Mann being among the latter.

There is nothing to conceal or apologize for in the Wounded Knee battle, beyond the killing of a wounded buck by an hysterical recruit.  The firing was begun by the Indians and continued until they stopped it, with the one exception noted above.  That women and children were casualties was unfortunate but unavoidable, and most must have been from Indian bullets.

Looking back from this distance in time, it seems curious that so little apprehension of danger was felt by the troops.  Most of Whitside's officers spent the evening of December 28 in a Sibley tent, listening to Lt. Garlington's narrative of the Arctic relief expedition of which he had been a member.  Had there been any thought of danger, each would have been with is men.

Assistant Surgeon Charles B. Ewing, from Pine Ridge Agency, was with the group near Colonel Forsythe, and had got in his wagon to return when the first shot was fired.

The hospital steward and the regimental sergeant major, certain to be men of intelligence and common sense, had wandered into the camp during the search and were both killed.

The troops were at a strength of about fifty men.  For the formation the cooks and a few others would normally have been left in camp, but it would see that some, at least, of the troop commanders did not consider it necessary to turn out all available men.  Captain Jackson had thirty-four and Captain Godfrey fourteen men in their fight with the Brule; each troop had had one casualty and Godfrey had detached Lt. Tompkins with twelve men.  So the actual numbers of men present in ranks were thirty-five
and twenty-seven.  Definite figures cannot be had, but apparantly A and I, the two guard troops, were the only ones in near full strength.

Father Craft, with ten years' experience among these Indians and well acquainted with this particular band, did not believe a break would come until it actually did.

The formation was one well designed to impress the Indians, but not all suited for fighting them, would an old and experienced soldier like Col. Forsythe have ordered it, had he even dreamed of armed resistance?

Not since the battle of the Little Big Horn in 1876 had anything comparable happened.  Then, most of the 7th Cavalry was killed, including its colonel; at Wounded Knee most of a band of Indians was killed, including its chief...and by the 7th Cavalry.

No newspaper men witnessed the fight but they soon began arriving, and photographers as well.  In their accounts the drama of the affair overshadowed the cold and simple facts that made up the true story.  Hastily collected stories and 'color' could not present a true picture.  The writers could not be blamed; any reporter who sat down to analyze and weigh the 'evidence' he collected, would have been hopelessly late in getting the 'story' to his paper and soon be seeking a job elsewhere.

It is highly improbable that any of these young men were motivated by a desire to do an injury to the army in general or the troops in this fight in particular, but the idea did creep into the press that the 7th Cavalry had at last got its revenge for the "Custer Massacre" of fourteen years before.

Many writers toyed with this idea in the years following, and many military men made indignant denials and defended the honor of the army in the public press.  Sometimes official records were drawn upon but more often only personal recollections.

Four days after the fight at Wounded Knee, President Harrison, shocked by the reports, direction, [ ] immediate inquiry into the killing of women and children."  A Board of Investigation began its work on January 7, on the spot.  Its records are on file in the War Department, and it is from them that this article is written.  No tale compiled in the excitement of the days following the fight could possibly be as accurate as one compiled from the sworn evidence of eyewitnesses, obtained on the spot by a tribunal following the cool and impartial procedure prescribed by law and regulation.

Wounded Knee and controversies arising therefrom long ago lost all news value, but there was something of a flurry in 1931 when a book entitled, 'Massacre," by Robert Gessner, appeared.  It is a general attack on the government's policies toward the Indians throughout our history.  The part relating to Wounded Knee is a sob story containing more misinformation, misrepresentation, ignorance, and falsehood, than probably any story ever written.  In proof of this let us analyze it a bit:

To begin with, he 'drove very hard' and arrived at the scene 'very tire'.  One gets the idea he is talking of December 1890, and the idea persists until far on into the narrative; "As I sat in the Wounded Knee store an old soldier cam in who was present. During the past forty years he had never returned to the scene, but he had come on that day."  So the reader at last learns that his visit was forty years after the battle.  He gives the man's name as D.E. Babb, but the rolls of the troops at Wounded Knee on file in the War Department bear no such name.

He 'sat by the fire and recalled the events of that day'.  But he knew the average reader is not critical, so he did not trouble to look up a map, inform himself as to the military dispositions prior to the battle, or the organization and equipment of the troops.

Big Foot led his band down through the Bandlands with the four battalions of the 7th Cavalry 'in full pursuit'.

No Cavalry regiment had four battalions; two of the 7th were at Pine Ridge Agency from November 27 until about December 26, when one of them was sent to Wounded Knee; Big Foot was somewhere far to the East of the Badlands and it was a mission of the military to prevent his reaching them.

But he gets a bit mixed and has the four battalions of the 7th in camp at Wounded Knee.  And speaking of the Indians "they managed to worm themselves through a pass, leaving the desolate, barren Badlands and came to camp at Wounded Knee."

Again he gets mixed up, as witness, "In the meantime General Forsythe and Major White (sic) with all of the battalions of the 7th Cavalry, surrounded Big Foots camp, the old chief willingly surrendered.  He was not seeking a battle; he was only trying to find some forgotten corner of the earth where his band might worship unmolested."

Big Foot surrendered to Major Whitside nine miles northeast of Wounded Knee and was taken there by him.

"The troops got drunk at Christmas," and were still in that condition December 29th.

That would have required a lot of whiskey and it was many miles to any source of supply.  And it hardly seems consistent with the 'full pursuit' through the Badlands that terminated with the 'surrounding' of Big Foot's camp on December 28.

   "On the morning of the 29th a dozen drunken soldiers dragged Big Foot from his tent and killed him".  This is perhaps the most atrocious of the many lies in the narrative.  The proof is absolute as to the events preceding the fighting and described herein.

He gives a thrilling picture of the fight, the troops firing indiscriminately at Indians of any age or sex, "Gatlin guns poured in
their fire, etc".

There were no Gatlin guns with the troops.  General Miles had declined the offer of some in a telegram to the War Department on November 23, in which he stated Gatlins were useless in fighting Indians.

"Two officers were wounded, twenty-five privates were killed and thirty-three wounded".

Actually one officer and twenty-six enlisted men and one Indian Scout were killed, four officers and thirty enlisted men wounded.

But inaccuracy is nothing to Mr. Gessner. After giving the officer casualties as two wounded, he later describes Capt. Wallace as being dead "with a tomahawk sprouting from his forehead."  He assigns him to the 9th Cavalry, no mistake in the figure, he spells it out, "Ninth".

Actually Wallace was shot twice and had a bruise on the head which might have been inflicted by a stone warclub that lay near.

"Only one soldier was killed at the hands of an Indian."

But why continue? Not a statement of Gessner's that cannot be refuted by sworn testimony given forty years before Massacre was written.  The pity is that such a foul libel on the Army of our country should be permitted in circulation.

Seven years after the appearance of "Massacre," Wounded Knee again made the front pages, two indians, alleged survivors of that battle, appeared before a Committee of the Congress, and under the guidance of a Washington lawyer, told their stories.  This was in support of a bill to reimburse the survivors and the descendants of Indians in that fight, in the sum of $1,000 each, the estimated total being $280,000.

The Indians at Wounded Knee brought on their own destruction as surely as any people ever did.  Their attack on the troops was as treacherous as any in the history of Indian warfare, and that they were under a strange religious hallucination is only an explanation, not an excuse.  They do not come into court with clean hands, though they may believe their recollections of what happened forty-seven years ago are accurate.

One officer and twenty-six enlisted men and one Indian Scout died on the field doing their duty.  Three more enlisted men died next day. Four officers and thirty enlisted men were wounded on the field.  Has anyone thought of compensation for twenty-nine bereaved white families and an Ogallala one?  Or for the families of the wounded soldier?  Or for those killed and wounded next day on White Clay Creek, the direct aftermath of Wounded Knee?  Or for the descendants of all those and the four hundred odd soldiers and the hundred loyal Indians who risked their lives on that
field?
  Not that anyone has heard! "

References, Battle of Wounded Knee
1.  Major S.M. Whitside, 7th Cavalry, Testimony before Board 1/7/1891
2.  Captain Miles Moyland, Tr. A 7th Cavalry
3.  Capt. Charles A. Varnum, Tr. B, 7th Cavalry
4.  Letter to Chief Historical Section, GS, April 11, 1931
5.  Lt. W.J. Nicholson, Tr I, 7th Cavalry
6.  Asst. Surg. John Van R. Hoof, Med Dept
7.  Capt. Edwin S. Godfrey, Tr D, 7th Cavalry
8.  Col. Edwin S. Godfrey, correspondence
9.  Same letter to Historical Section, GS 1931
10. Lt. Sedgwick Rice, Tr. E, 7th Cavalry
11. Lt. Charles W. Taylor, Tr A Indian Scouts
12. Capt W.S. Edgerly, Tr. G, 7th Cavalry
13. Capt. Henry Jackson, Tr C, 7th Cavalry
14. Lt. T.Q. Donaldson, Tr G, 7th Cavalry
15. Lt. S.R.H. Tompkins, Tr D, 7th Cavalry
16. Capt. Allyn Capron, Battery E, 1st Artillery
17. Captain H.J. Nowlan, Tr. I, 7th Cavalry
18. Gen. Garlington Tr I, 7th Cavalry, Letter His Sec GS, April 1931
19. Gen. Guy H. Preston (Lt. Tr. A, Indian Scouts)
20. Robert Gessner, "Massacre" Published 1931
21. General order 2, Dq. Div. of the Missouri in the Field, Pine Ridge
      Agency, SD Jan. 18, 1891
22. Father Francis J. Craft, Testimony before Board.
23. P.F. Wells, Indian Interpreter. Testimony before Board
24. "Frog", wounded Indian.  Testimony before the Board
25. Lt. James D Mann, 7th Cavalry. Narrative as quoted in Cavalry Journal,
      May/June, 1934.
26. U.S. Weather Bureau for Moon Phase at time of battle
27.  Lt. H.L. Hawthorne, Report and correspondence.