by 1864-1898 Indian War Veterans: Memories of Army Life;Campaigns in the West
5 “Pension” in the late nineteenth century was defined as “a stated allowance to a person in consideration of past services; payment made to one retired from service for age, disability, or other cause; especially a yearly stipend paid by government to retired officers, disabled soldiers, the families of soldiers killed, etc.” Thomas Wilhelm, A Military Dictionary and Gazetteer (Philadelphia: L.R. Hamersly and Company, 1881), p. 421. For earlier period reference, see also the definition in Henry L. Scott, Military Dictionary: Comprising Technical Definitions; Information on Raising and Keeping Troops; Actual Service, including Makeshifts and Improved Materiel; and Law, Government, Regulation, and Administration Relating to Land Forces (New York: D. Van Nostrand, 1864), pp. 461-62. Invalid pensions to soldiers disabled during Indian wars service, and to the dependents (widows and orphans) of soldiers killed in such service, were customarily extended by Congress under existing pension laws from the War of 1812 (Brigadier General William Henry Harrison’s campaign against the Shawnees and affiliated tribes, for example) to the Civil War. Notably, they offered benefits the same as those for War of 1812 service to those combat casualties of Indian wars in Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, and elsewhere. The pension act of 1862 also included benefits to soldiers disabled in Indian conflicts and to surviving dependents. William Henry Glasson, History of Military Pension Legislation in the United States (New York: Columbia University Press, 1900), pp. 64-66; William H. Glasson, Federal Military Pensions in the United States (New York: Oxford University Press, 1918), p. 114. For the various early pension acts, see Robert Mayo and Ferdinand Moulton (comps.), Army and Navy Pension Laws, and Bounty Land Laws of the United States, Including Sundry Resolutions of Congress, from 1776 to 1852 (Washington, D.C.: Jno. T. Towers, 1852); Laws of the United States Governing the Granting of Army and Navy Pensions Together with the Regulations Relating Thereto (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1912), chapter 2, and passim. A less bureaucratically phrased account of early pensions into the 1880s, designed especially for informational purposes for soldiers and veterans, is in The Soldier’s Manual: A Hand Book of Useful and Reliable Information showing Who are Entitled to Pensions, Increase, Bounty, Pay, Etc. (Washington, D.C.: Milo B. Stevens and Company, General War Claims Attorneys, 1888), passim.
6 Glasson, Federal Military Pensions, p. 115; Laws of the United States Governing the Granting of Army and Navy Pensions, pp. 20-21, 22, 23, 184-85; Winners of the West, October 30, 1935; Winners of the West, September 30, 1937. Throughout the post-Civil War Indian wars period, the standard retirement for career enlisted men was thirty years, after which they were entitled to enter the Soldiers Home, Washington, D.C. Don Rickey, Jr., Forty Miles a Day on Beans and Hay: The Enlisted Soldier Fighting the Indian Wars(Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1963), pp. 29, 341.
7 “The Grand Encampment. Indian War Veterans of the North Pacific Coast,” membership certificate dated July 16, 1889, in the editor’s possession; Peter Gottfredson (comp., ed.), History of Indian Depredations in Utah (Salt Lake City: Skelton Publishing Company, 1919), pp. 332-35; Amendment to Charter of the Cantonements [sic] of the National Indian War Veterans of the United States of America, Wichita, Kansas, January 7, 1925, State of Kansas, Department of State, executed February 28, 1925. Original copy in the Scrapbooks of Albert Fensch, National Adjutant General, NIWV and UIWV, Scrapbook No. 1, editor’s collection (hereafter cited as Fensch Scrapbooks). “National Indian War Veterans [Kansas], in The Veteran, 8 (November, 1925), p. 7. Luther Barker of Clay Center, Kansas, founded the Kansas organization. Authorization for badges for Indian wars service appears in General Orders No. 170, War Department, August 15, 1907, as cited in “Report of the Adjutant-General,” October 17, 1907, in War Department, U. S. A., Annual Reports, 1907(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1907), pp. 260-61.
8 Winners of the West,March 30, 1926; U. S. Congress, House, Subcommittee of the Committee on Pensions, [Hearings Regarding] Pensions for Survivors of Certain Indian Wars, 63rd Cong., 2d sess., March 7, 1914, p. 3; Certificate of Incorporation, National Indian War Veterans, State of Colorado Office of the Secretary of State (duplicate), April 17, 1911. Fensch Scrapbooks, Scrapbook No. 1.
9 Winners of the West,July 30, 1930. Pension benefits were administered by the Bureau of Pensions of the Department of the Interior until 1930, when the Veterans Administration was created. VA History in Brief: What It Is, Was, and Does(Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1983), pp. 1, 2, 4. Technically, membership was extended to “those who served in Indian wars between Jan. 1, 1817, and Dec. 31, 1898, in accordance with the classification given Indian war veterans by the United States pension office.” St. Joseph Gazette,September 13, 1927.
10 Winners of the West,December, 1923. An early undated roster, perhaps from ca. 1917-18, lists the names and addresses of 407 members of the “N-A-I-W-V” (National Association of Indian War Veterans). Original in the Walter M. Camp Collection, Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument, Crow Agency, Montana.
11 Winners of the West,December, 1923; Winners of the West,February, 1924; Winners of the West,December, 1924; Winners of the West, July, 1925; Winners of the West,March 30, 1926; Winners of the West,December 30, 1935; Winners of the West,September 30, 1937; San Francisco Examiner, December 22, 1912; Glasson, Federal Military Pensions,p. 115. (A table showing numbers of Indian wars pensioners and pension expenditures between 1893 and 1916 is in ibid.) For the act, see Public Law 400, Statutes at Large,39, Part 1, pp. 1199-1201.
12 Winners of the West, January, 1924; General Orders No. 170, War Department, August 15, 1907, as cited in “Report of the Adjutant-General,” October 17, 1907, pp. 260-61. Keating later wrote: “As originally drawn, the Keating bill was to pension all veterans of all Indian conflicts. The members of the committee on pensions of the House of Representatives took the position that only those who had participated actually in ‘Indian campaigns’ should be pensioned. That made it necessary to get a definition or designation of ‘Indian campaigns’ or ‘Indian wars.’ So we appealed to the War Department, and found that at various times the Secretary of War and his associates had designated certain ‘campaigns’ against the Indians as ‘wars.’ The committee on pensions took it for granted that the War Department knew what it was doing, and we wrote into the bill the official designation of every ‘war’ that the department certified to us. I am now [1923] convinced that there are a great many ‘campaigns’ or ‘wars’ which were omitted by the War Department, which should have been included in that bill.” Winners of the West,December, 1923.
13 Winners of the West, December 30, 1935; Winners of the West, April, 1924; Winners of the West, December 28, 1944. Two other publications initiated by Webb were his compilation entitled, Chronological List of Engagements between the Regular Army of the United States and Various Tribes of Hostile Indians which Occurred during the Years 1790 to 1898, Inclusive (St. Joseph, Mo.: Wing Publishing and Printing Company, 1939; reprinted New York: AMS Press, Inc., 1976), and a commemorative booklet First Account of the Custer Massacre published in the Tribune Extra, Bismarck, Dakota Territory, July 6, 1876. Republished for Distribution at Sixtieth Anniversary Commemoration of The Custer Battle, Custer Battlefield, June 25, 1936 (St. Joseph, Mo.: Winners of the West, 1936). Winners of the West was published twice monthly for a short time; it also changed its format and design several times during its run.
14 Winners of the West,October, 1924 (first quote); Winners of the West, October, 1924; Winners of the West,June, 1925; Winners of the West,July 31, 1926 (second quote); Winners of the West,February, 1938. The constitution and by-laws of the NIWV appear in ibid.
15 Winners of the West,September, 1940. The creation of the different camps is periodically discussed in various issues of Winners of the West between 1923 and 1944, its range of publication. Camp No. 11 evolved after disaffected members of the Kansas organization united against the Kansans’ leadership to honor the spirit of the original Denver NIWV. Winners of the West,Septemb
er, 1940. For a comprehensive list of the NIWV camps, see Jerome A. Greene, Indian Wars Veteran Organizations (Mattituck, New York, and Bryan, Texas: J.M. Carroll and Company, 1985), pp. 33-35.
16 Houston Post-Dispatch,January 16, 1927. Minutes of Scranton Camp No. 22 on February 10, 1930, read as follows: “Meeting opened at 8:00 o’clock [p. m.]. Advance of colors, after which club sang three verses of ‘America.’ The camp was led in prayer by Chaplain Mrs. Jacob Goerlitz. Reading of last meeting’s minutes. Reading of communications from Geo. W. Webb. A motion was passed and seconded that the Hawaiian Trio be non-paying members on the condition that they bring their instruments to each meeting. Refreshments were served. Meeting adjourned.” “National Indian War Veterans, Scranton Camp No. 22” Minutes book, 1928-1931, in editor’s possession.
17 Winners of the West,July, 1925; Winners of the West, July 30, 1930; Winners of the West,October, 1924; Winners of the West, July, 1925; Winners of the West,September 30, 1937. The NIWV constitution and by-laws appear in Winners of the West,February, 1938.
18 Winners of the West,December, 1923; San Francisco Examiner, December 22, 1912; National Tribune,March 19, 1936; Winners of the West, December 30, 1931 (quote); Winners of the West,October, 1940. Farley’s attempts to resurrect the Denver camp are mentioned in Webb to Farley, April 29, 1932, and May 31, 1932. Copies provided by Marcella Farley Dillon in the editor’s collection. For more about Farley, see Mary M. Farley and Marcella E. Dillon (comps.), The Farley Scrapbook: Biography of John F. Farley, 1849-1940, One of “The Winners of the West”(Pueblo, Colo.: Privately printed, 1985). For a list of pension recipients in a single typical omnibus bill, see Winners of the West,April 30, 1926.
19 St. Joseph Gazette,October 11, 1928; Winners of the West,December, 1924 (Miles quote); Winners of the West,January 30, 1930; Winners of the West,October 30, 1935; Winners of the West,September 30, 1937. For details of a typical bill never enacted yet seeking apportioned increases in pensions based upon advancing age and disability, as well as extending increased benefits to widows with provision for orphaned children, see Winners of the West,June, 1924. Precursor of the Leatherwood-Smoot measure was various legislation introduced in 1925 and 1926 by Senator Selden P. Spencer (Missouri), Representative Addison T. Smith (Idaho), Senator Frank R. Gooding (Idaho), and Representative Leatherwood. Winners of the West,October, 1925; Winners of the West,December, 1925; Winners of the West,March 30, 1926. The Leatherwood-Smoot bill of 1927 passed Congress over the objections of Secretary of the Interior Hubert Work, who opposed the cost of the increase. Winners of the West,June 24, 1926. For an effort to publicize the act to appropriate veterans, see “Pension the Indian Fighters,” Frontier Times,4 (July, 1927), pp. 36-37. The 1898 addition accommodated service during the Chippewa uprising of October, 1898. For the act, see Public Law 723, Statutes at Large, 44, Part 2, pp. 1361-63. Later amendatory efforts did not succeed to provide for those who served during the 1906 expedition to capture Ute Indians (the “Absentee” Utes) who left their Utah reservation to take up residence at the Cheyenne River Sioux reservation in South Dakota. See U. S. Congress, House, Committee on Invalid Pensions, Hearings…on…Bills to Liberalize the Now Existing Benefits with Reference to Veterans and Dependents of Veterans of the Indian Wars,76thCong., 3d sess., January 22 and 23, 1940, passim.
20 Winners of the West,March 30, 1933; Winners of the West,February 28, 1934; Winners of the West, June 30, 1933 (quote); Winners of the West, September 30, 1937. Throughout the 1930s, many bills introduced in Congress sought to amend the 1927 law to raise pensions of the Indian wars class to a level equitable to those of other war veterans. Some proposed a single higher rate (as high as $75) for all Indian wars pensioners, yet none were enacted. See Winners of the West,January 30, 1931; Winners of the West, January 30, 1932; Winners of the West, December 30, 1933; Winners ofthe West,March, 1937; Winners of the West,May, 1939.
21 Winners of the West, May 30, 1937; Winners of the West, March 28, 1944; Winners of the West, December, 1939; Winners of the West, January, 1940; Winners of the West, June, 1940; Winners of the West, April, 1941; Winners of the West, May 28, 1943; Winners of the West, June 28, 1943; Frank Ostlin, What Every Veteran Should Know(Chicago: Published by the author, 1945), pp. 100-01, 102-03, 108. Following Webb’s death, the editor of the paper from 1938 to 1944 was Virginia Elizabeth Wing (Mrs. Frederick S. Bangerter) of St. Joseph. Winners of the West, June 28, 1942. The final issue, dated December 28, 1944, carried the following notice: “Due to existing conditions beyond our control, labor finances, and war-time constriction, we are forced to discontinue the publishing of Winners of the Westat least for the duration of the war. This is our last issue.”
22 Pertinent news clippings from the St. Joseph News Press,October 11, 1928, and the St. Joseph Gazette,October 11, 1928; State of California, Department of State, Articles of Incorporation of the United Indian War Veterans of the United States, November 5, 1928. Original copy, along with cited clippings in Scrapbook No. 1, Fensch Scrapbooks; Program, First Annual Convention, United Indian War Veterans, U. S. A.,Sept. 15, 16, 17, 1929 (copy in editor’s possession). The charges against Webb apparently centered on the belief “that the St. Joseph Camp No. 11 was exercising more power than it was entitled to have at the convention. As editor of the publication Winners of the West,Webb was alleged to be able to dominate the convention. “He has been president [National Commander] for two years.” Clipping from an unidentified St. Joseph newspaper in Fensch Scrapbook No. 3. Another charge against Webb was “that he had sought to control the organization by enrolling distant veterans in St. Joseph Camp No. 11.” Clipping from the St. Joseph Gazette,October 12, 1928, in ibid. Webb was re-elected commander of the NIWV following the walkout by the rebels, while St. Joseph was voted as the “permanent national headquarters” of the NIWV. Ibid. A prospectus for a history of the United Indian War Veterans in 1931 enumerated and perhaps exaggerated the causes culminating in the breakaway from the NIWV as “the struggles against the exploitation, graft, racketeering methods for selfish gain, and maladministration into which it [the NIWV] had fallen prior to the 1928…reorganization.” Fensch Scrapbook No. 3. In the organization into UIWV departments, four camps of Utah Indian War Veterans joined the Department of Nevada and Utah under commander Brigham Jarvis, while the Kansas organization amalgamated into the Department of Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska, and Missouri, under Luther Barker. The Indian War Veterans of the North Pacific Coast merged into the Department of Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Alaska, under William Murphy. Prescott Evening Courier, September 15, 1931; “Annual Convention, Encampment, and Reunion United Indian War Veterans, U. S. A. Our Old ‘Winners of the West,” Yavapai Magazine,21 (August, 1931), p. 7.
23 Winners of the West,December 30, 1935; Program, Eighteenth National Convention, United Indian War Veterans, U. S.A., and the Ladies Corps, San Francisco, California,October 16-17, 1948. Excerpts of the constitution and by-laws of the UIWV appear in Program, Twenty-fourth National Convention, United Indian War Veterans, U. S. A., San Francisco, California, October 15-16, 1954; Program, Twenty-ninth National Reunion, United Indian War Veterans, U. S. A., and the Ladies Corps, San Francisco, California, October 13-14, 1960; Albert Fensch, “The Policies of the United Indian War Veterans,” clipping in Scrapbook #2, Fensch Scrapbooks (quote); Fensch to Lieutenant Colonel Willis Metcalf, U. S. Army, ca. December, 1931 (quote regarding Webb). Transcribed copy in editor’s collection; Prescott Evening Courier, September 15, 1931.
24 Prescott Evening Courier,September 15, 1931; Prescott Journal-Miner, September 16, 1933; Prescott Journal-Miner, September 17, 1931; Los Angeles City News,February 11, 1937. Some UIWV camps were located in the East, for example, the Gen. Adna R. Chaffee Camp of Washington, D. C. Pension news was disseminated to UIWV members via a mimeographed paper entitled The War-Path,published initially in 1939. The pamphlet cited was Rimes and Chimes of the Mountains and Plains(Los Angeles: United Indian War Veterans, U. S. A., 1937). Broadside regarding the “Custer Massacre” ob
servance, “Thursday evening, June 25, 1936” in Fensch Scrapbook No. 4. Historian Don G. Rickey conducted the survey mostly in 1954, and assembled a body of questionnaires, personal letters, and interview materials. See the Rickey Papers, Manuscript Archives, U. S. Army Military History Institute, Army War College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Based partly on this information, Rickey published Forty Miles a Day on Beans and Hay.The final UIWV assemblies are recounted in clippings from an unidentified San Francisco newspaper, circa October 10, 1962, and November 13, 1968, in Fensch Scrapbook No. 5. The last two surviving Indian war veterans were Reginald Bradley, 105, who joined the Fourth Cavalry at Fort Bowie, Arizona Territory, in 1889, and died February 5, 1971; and Fredrak W. Fraske, 101, of Chicago, who died June 18, 1973. San Francisco Chronicle, October 26, 1967; Washington Post, February 6, 1971. For three terms, Minnie Saunders served continuously as National Commander of the Ladies Corps from 1930 through 1962. Before UIWV was organized, she belonged to the NIWV.