while Americans expanded their territory
and crossed the plains the Sioux tribe
remained fairly unaffected by American
expansion until the California Gold Rush
in the late 1840s Americans began to
cross Sioux lands
so in 1851 they signed a treaty at Fort
Laramie with the United States that set
their territorial boundaries and allowed
travelers to pass and army forts to be
built all in exchange for an annuity
from the US but the first confrontation
came near Fort Laramie in 1854 when
soldiers tried to arrest tribesman for
theft a dispute happened the soldiers
shot the chieftain so the entire village
massacred the soldiers 31 and all a year
later in response the army raided a
village of Sioux killing 86 with 27
deaths of their own peace reign till the
Civil War when two wars broke out the
first happened in 1862 when the
government failed to pay the annuity to
the Dakotas Sioux in Minnesota so the
Dakotas attacked a settlement and killed
as many as 800 Americans the u.s.
cavalry began a two-year long war with
several battles some Dakota warriors
were captured and eventually 38 were
hanged in the u.s. s largest mass
execution because of their continued
belligerents the Sioux were expelled
from Minnesota altogether but not
without interning them for a year in
wretched conditions the next began after
several tribes including the Lakota
Sioux were forced into a treaty by show
of force and malicious dealings which
made them lose their hunting rights in
Colorado reading of settlements began in
1863 by a polyglot of tribes called dog
warriors but it was still fairly
low-level at least until a fresh militia
unit went to hunt down these Raiders
during the winter and came across a
peaceful Indian encampment near a fort
on Sand Creek the militia slaughtered a
hundred and sixty of its inhabitants and
this in turn encouraged the dog warriors
to kill many more Americans in
retaliation a general military presence
was made and the u.s. fought a guerrilla
war for another couple of years in
Colorado Indians of numerous tribes
especially the Sioux Cheyenne and
Arapaho from both wars had fled to the
mid Northwest
they continued ranging along the Bozeman
trail and the u.s. sent an expedition to
stop them in 1865 it had a few
successful battles
destroyed one village but ultimately
resulted in nothing after a rounded
negotiations with the Sioux leader named
Red Cloud failed a second expedition
fortified the trail and fought against
raiding for two years one attack managed
to kill 81 US soldiers at once after
some defeats of large scale attacks the
Indians took two small raids again for
the next year in 1868 the u.s. abandoned
the forts along the Powder River and
made massive reservations for the
Indians under Red Cloud for nearly a
decade peace was maintained on the
Lakota Sioux and Cheyenne reservations
covering all of western South Dakota but
in 1875 the u.s. sent an exploratory
party under the command of George Custer
into the Black Hills
there's golden than our heels and Custer
leaked the information to the press
causing an illegal Gold Rush despite it
being Indian territory the Americans
continued mining so after a year of
failed negotiations the Indians under
Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse began
raiding encroaching Americans President
Grant responded by sending the cavalry
but the Sioux Cheyenne and Arapaho
banded together to take on the US Army
most famously they defeated the army at
the Battle of Little Bighorn where
Colonel Custer made his so-called last
stand but most battles went the other
way and the Indians were beaten back
into smaller and smaller territorial
claims until they could no longer resist
the military and surrendered in 1877
ending the Great Sioux war they would
lose progressively more land until 1910
but many Indians despised their loss of
land so a prophet named wovoka started a
movement convincing many that it could
be regained they had a special dance
that was supposed to summon the ghosts
of their fallen and reignite territorial
warfare in their favor but in 1899 the
US government took even more land and
many US soldiers believed the Ghost
Dance was a military movement and began
shooting into a village near Wounded
Knee Creek in 1890 this developed into a
massacre as the survivors were hunted
down and over 300 were killed though the
Sioux did kill 31 soldiers there angered
the Lakota launched raids on the US Army
but the war ended quickly after very
little fighting the anger runs deep for
the misdeeds of these wars the u.s. gave
20 medals of Honor to the murderers of
Wounded Knee a protest of these medals
and numerous other issues developed into
an armed standoff
Wounded Knee in 1973 that lasted for
months there were a couple of shootouts
with a total of 17 casualties the medals
by the way have yet to be rescinded by
the United States reflected in all of
this the current protests in Standing
Rock have turned violent we just don't
have the information as of yet to say
what is happening there so that was the
Sioux wars it's a heck of a tale
once again I'm cypher the cynical
historian if you want to see some more
of my historical stuff come check out my
channel there's a lot there maybe soon
Jeb Z will make an appearance there
himself