The Native American Indian Wars

[Bootie]

The Apache Wars were fought during the nineteenth century between the U.S. military and many tribes in what is now the southwestern United States. The wars lasted from 1851, with the arrival of American settlers, to 1886, the year Geronimo surrendered.

However, Apache attacks on white settlers continued until around 1900. Some historians group the Apaches and Navajos together because they have similar languages (Athapascan) and cultures.

The United States engaged the Navajos and Apaches (known by themselves as Inde, T`Inde,N'de, N`ne = "people") for their lands or because they affected commerce.

Often the military and/or Native Americans were provoked by white settlers, speculators or a new federal policy.

Apache leaders like Mangas Coloradas of the Bedonkohe; Cochise of the Chokonen (also known as Chiricahua); Victorio of the Chihenne band; Juh of the Nednhi band; Delshay of the Tonto; and Geronimo of the Bedonkohe led war or raiding parties against non-Apaches and resisted the military's attempts, by force and persuasion, to relocate their people to various reservations.

 

[PoorOldSpike]

"The white man only kept one promise to us; he promised to take our land and he took it"
-Crazy Horse

 

[Lord Bane (FGM)]

Crazy horse was wrong. We took more than that. My ex-wife was part Black Foot and my current wife is part Apache. It is the spoils of war.
Lord Bane

 

[PoorOldSpike]

 

[Bert Blitzkrieg]

Crazy horse was wrong. We took more than that. My ex-wife was part Black Foot and my current wife is part Apache. It is the spoils of war.
Lord Bane

A friend of mine once said (when he was living in South Africa at the end of the Apartheid regime: "They made a mistake here. Just like the British in Australia and the Americans (white settlers) in North America, they should have killed the natives here when they had the chance. Now it is too late and we have to give the land to them.... "

A bit cynical and over simplified, but considering the way the Aboriginals and Indians were treated he had a point (viewed from the white African standpoint).

 

[PoorOldSpike]

This is an excellent book about the early English settlers in America-

The English regarded the Indians as 'heathen savages', but when the colonists began to starve through mismanagement they had to go beg food off the local tribes who'd been happily growing and hunting food for centuries, ha ha!

 

[Rico]

A friend of mine once said (when he was living in South Africa at the end of the Apartheid regime: "They made a mistake here. Just like the British in Australia and the Americans (white settlers) in North America, they should have killed the natives here when they had the chance. Now it is too late and we have to give the land to them.... "

A bit cynical and over simplified, but considering the way the Aboriginals and Indians were treated he had a point (viewed from the white African standpoint).

Yes. It's very cynical and oversimplified -- the white colonists in Southern Africa were always small minority (even though with technological advantages) and were never in a position to execute this kind of genocide (I wonder what kind of friends you hang out with, Bert... some right-wing white-supremacist racist nutjob?) -- in USA and Australia, the Native Americans and Aboriginals were a small minority and once settler number expanded into millions, they were ultimately doomed when faced with the settlers hunger for land and resources combined with technological superiority.
In New Zealand for instance, the British fought long and hard campaigns to subdue the Maori.
In South Africa the whole industrial economy and mining industry was eventually based on cheap African labour -- and it took centuries of conflict and warfare to establish white supremacy which eventually culminated in the heinous Apartheid system... the de-humanising after-effects of which we are still living with.

 

[Bert Blitzkrieg]

I wonder what kind of friends you hang out with, Bert... some right-wing white-supremacist racist nutjob?

No, I don't and he isn't. He was voicing his frustration as undoubtedly every white South African has done once or more often. Although he isn't a South African.

About the white settlers having always been a small minority: are you sure ? Thought the large numerical difference was from the last 60 or 70 years or so.

 

[PoorOldSpike]

Arapaho

 

[Louis]

Treaty signing by William T. Sherman and the Sioux at Fort Laramie, Wyoming. 1868.

 

[Corsaire31]

Western civilizations have always been good at killing other people to steal their lands ... lol or spare them to use them as slaves... (all in all nothing to be very proud about imho)

 

[ACSpectre]

Western civilizations have always been good at killing other people to steal their lands ... lol or spare them to use them as slaves... (all in all nothing to be very proud about imho)

I think Mankind as a whole is guilty of this throughout history, regardless of geography.

 

[seel]

Just to point out a small error, the little tag at the top of the article say all 600 cavalry at Little Big Horn were killed. Only Custer's command was wiped. Reno's troops held out, I think 250 or so KIA in total for both commands.

 

[Scotty471]

ah yes the fate of Aboriginal people in the modern era. Jezz you guys like hashing over the good stuff. ....I think if some of you are saying the biggoted and commie things just to rile and heat up the thead....shame on you BUT, if you really believe that crap well your ingnorant. you need to read more history than just the stuff about what the nazis should have done to not lose WW2 (and you germophials know who you are).
But let me talk about a subject that relates to this thead the indian wars in North America.
The American southwest ....from west Texas to the foot hills in Arizonia where dominated by the Comanche from the early 1700s to 1840s. The colonial powers of France, Spain and the flegling U.S. found them militarly powerful and very skilled at politics. they where very good at creating alliances with other indian tribes, Europians or Americans. (and playing them off on each other). They If anything where resposible for the failure of the colony of New Spain in the southwest. Even after the revolution in Mexico they kept things so stired up that it made it much easier for the Texans and later the US government to pick up alot of teritory that was formally Mexico's. Of course they got screwed in the end between the disease, loss of food sources and war. I am not proud of my countrys treatment of our aboriginal peoples But its our history.
I do not feel any less proud being an American. I WILL NOT BE IGNORANT of its past both the good stuff and the warts.

 

[T_Patch]

The Comanches left the Great Basin region in the late 17th century after acquiring the horse. They left the mountains and became one of the most respected and feared tribes on the Great Plains. My take on the "Indian Wars" is that there were massacres a'plenty on both sides. Comanches would attack isolated settlers or small communities, kill the men and make off with women or young children to either sell or make slaves of. And as we all know, settlers, the army, or the Texas Rangers would destroy whole Indian villages. It was indeed a war, albeit undeclared. Both sides lived life on edge and looking over their shoulders. Quarter was rarely given. It was a hard and brutal life in 19th century Texas. In the end, the overwhelming numbers of settlers, an ever growing military force, and the governmental policies of exterminating Indian food sources (buffalo) and transport (horses) spelled doom for the Plains Indians and others of their ilk.
What happened was inevitable. One side trying to keep ancestral lands and the other side growing into a young country and expanding. One side with pride and the other with determination. Could they have lived in peace at that time? Sadly, I think not. It is a scenario that has played itself out throughout history, and not just in western civilizations; the fight for land.

 

[Fredrocker]

The Plains were the last area in the Lower 48 where Indians lived independently before being forced onto reservations. When you hear people talk about Indian Wars in American history, they’re usually referring to warfare on the Plains during after the Civil War, starting with the Dakota War of 1862 up through the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890.


Refugees From Sioux Raid in Minnesota, 1862

 

[Louis]

Cleaning of lost images.