Moreover, the integration of agency and northern contingents reinforced Crazy Horse’s influence. Clark’s effective demotion of Red Cloud threatened a power vacuum that a determined man might exploit. Red Cloud’s suspicions of the war chief’s intentions were deepened by the corrosive corruption of jealousy. Rumor even had it that General Crook would use the Washington trip to have Crazy Horse recognized by the president as head chief of the Oglalas. Although Camp Robinson commander Bradley assured General Crook that “Clark [has] done extremely well in this business and I think he is entitled to much credit for his good sense and patience,” the jealousies created by the scout reorganization only deepened the potential for critical factionalism on White River. Some of the intermarried community believed that too much leeway was being given Crazy Horse.9
At a scout meeting held in Clark’s quarters at Red Cloud one week later, the layout of the room vividly illustrated these issues. Seated “on the rim of an office chair, with his feet on the seat, high enough to see and be seen,” Clark addressed his audience in fluent sign language. Seated in an arc on the office floor, thirty sergeants and corporals passed the pipe. Red Cloud was notable by his absence but, in a second chair close to Clark’s desk, Crazy Horse occupied a position unmistakably elevated above his fellow officers.10
With both Red Cloud and his own Company C sergeants absent, Crazy Horse was as aware as Clark was of the theater of space and hierarchy. His occupancy of the chair asserted a strong self-belief in his supremacy among the Lakotas, and was a clear statement of his parity of status with Clark. For the moment, supremely assured in his own leadership, and confident in the implementation of Crook’s springtime promises, Crazy Horse continued to place that highly symbolic chair beside the lieutenant. But as the second week of July opened and departure day neared, that confidence would be shaken and his self-assurance would begin to be undermined. Crazy Horse would not again relax in easy trust of his own willpower and wasicu promises.
Affairs in the distant East ensured that the long-deferred diplomatic schedule would stall and founder. The year 1877 was critical one of labor agitation, and in July the season climaxed with a railroad strike and rioting in Chicago. Preoccupied with civil unrest, the Hayes administration stalled the Lakota delegation trip. General Crook was summoned to join army chiefs of staff for emergency talks on the national crisis. Crook would not return to the West until the final days of August. His departure put on hold the White River delegation for critical weeks.
The projected hunting expedition had been conceived as immediately preceding the trip to Washington. As the delegation timescale slipped, so did army support for the hunt. The schedule was further delayed when Lieutenant Clark was called to Fort Laramie on detached service, leaving Camp Robinson for eleven days beginning July 16. The departure date of July 8 had already slipped from the schedule. Just before Clark left, he and Bradley met with Crazy Horse and the Lakota chiefs at Camp Robinson. After explaining the circumstances, insisting that only a modest delay was involved, the two officers succeeded in reassuring the chiefs. They then proposed a new twist to the long-delayed schedule: “We have advised them,” Bradley wrote Crook, “to defer [the hunt] until the return of the delegation from Washington,” reversing the original sequence.11
The northern Deciders chose not to contest the decision. Since hunting operations were the specific preserve of the Deciders, Crazy Horse registered no open complaint. But as the days stretched into the second half of the month, the war chief began to feel some misgivings about his easy acquiescence. Short Bull recalled that the issue of the trip east began to sour at this point: “This was the only cause of misunderstanding at the time. Crazy Horse wanted to have the agency established first, and then he would go to Washington. The officers wanted him to go to Washington first. The difference of whether Crazy Horse should go to Washington before or after the site of the agency was settled upon brought on all the trouble little by little.”
Short Bull’s brother He Dog recalled pressing Crazy Horse to accept the new schedule. With a hint of impatience, the war chief replied, “First, I want them to place my agency on Beaver Creek west of the Black Hills. Then I will go to Washington—for your benefit, for my benefit, and for the benefit of all of us. And that is the only reason why I will go there.”12
Crazy Horse had begun pondering the case of the Cheyenne exile to Indian Territory. Reflecting on the Washington trip, he feared that if he traveled east “before the site of his agency was settled upon, the authorities might try to intimidate him into signing a transfer of his people to Indian Territory.”13 It is impossible to gauge how much this apprehension arose from Crazy Horse alone and how much was insinuated by Lakota rivals. Certainly, the latter were now exploiting the relocation issue to marginalize and discredit the war chief. By July key agency leaders were jealous of the attention afforded Crazy Horse. Civilian visitors continued to seek Custer’s conqueror. Clark’s preferment of the war chief only honed the unrest. Little Killer suggested that agency chiefs like Red Cloud fed Crazy Horse’s doubts. “When Crazy Horse first came to Fort Robinson, he wanted to go to Washington. But other Indians were jealous of him and afraid that if he went to Washington they would make him chief of all the Indians on the reservation. These Indians came to him and told him a lot of stories.”
Rumors of arrest and punishment resurfaced. As if that were not enough, the tribal consensus for a northern agency evaporated in July. While still opposed to the Missouri River relocation, Red Cloud and other leaders favored a compromise site near the forks of White River, within the existing reservation. Undermining Crazy Horse’s position, they assured the new civilian agent that the site was acceptable to most Oglalas.14
The new mood of suspicion, and the communication vacuum following Clark’s departure, began to overshadow village solidarity. After advising Crook on the sixteenth that “We are as quiet here as a Yankee village on a Sunday,” Bradley conceded that undercurrents were evident: “Crazy Horse and his people say nothing about going on the hunt, at present, though they may take a notion to start at any time” (my emphasis).15
For the moment, the war chief chose not to press the issue. Crazy Horse repeatedly told comrades, “I came here for peace. No matter if my own relatives pointed a gun at my head and ordered me to change that word I would not change it.” His close working relationship with Clark clearly gave him confidence in the fulfillment of Crook’s promises. The takeover by the new civilian agent also seemed to bode well for affairs at Red Cloud. Bradley reported that the Indians “appear to like [Dr. Irwin] and he seems disposed to make them satisfied and contented,” concluding, “I think he will succeed here.”16
After his return to Camp Robinson, Clark also paid tribute to the new agent. “Dr. Irwin makes a superior agent, conservative and yet sufficiently firm.”17 Irwin completed a new census before the end of July, on which rationing could be more fairly based. Although Irwin recognized that “‘Crazy Horse’ and his northern band of Indians were not so well disposed,” the public mood was upbeat. Crazy Horse would find little support for a premature break with the authorities.18 But another unexpected factor underlay the war chief’s sitting out of events. In the most startling development since surrender, Crazy Horse had fallen in love.
Between the agency compound and Camp Robinson stood a cluster of cabins and fifteen Cheyenne lodges. Flanked by two or three ragged lodges housing widowed relatives and their dependents stood the cabin of Joe Larrabee. Fifty-year-old “Long Joe” had spent much of his life with the Cheyennes, moving to the reservation from Colorado after the treaty of 1868. By his two wives, Joe would father nine children. The teenage sons, Philip and Alex, were already old enough to be noted by name in the agency census. Joe’s four daughters went unnamed, classified anonymously as “adult females” or “children females,” but Helen, the second daughter, was a handsome girl of eighteen.
To the family she was Nellie, to Lakota acquaintances, Brown Eyes, but as she entered marria
geable age, she remained a girl of daunting self-will—flighty, flirty, and widely admired, with a string of suitors haunting the Larrabee dooryard. Gossip even placed White Hat Clark among the callers. Another of the besmitten was Little Bear, a Loafer band Oglala whose nickname Sioux Bob reveals he inhabited the same multiethnic bilingual community as the Larrabees. Long Joe looked with some favor on Sioux Bob’s suit and had accepted gifts preliminary to a bride price for Nellie. Whatever Nellie’s feelings in the matter, Sioux Bob considered himself betrothed.19
Just when the paths of Crazy Horse and Nellie Larrabee crossed is unknown. That unsatisfactory fact actually demonstrates an important truth: the courtship was conducted with some discretion. Speaking to Judge Eli S. Ricker thirty years later, Billy Garnett touched on the couple’s first meeting, but Ricker’s syntax immediately grows opaque with Victorian propriety. The meeting may have been at some public gathering: beef-issue day was an opportunity for beauties to promenade and young men to show off their riding skills. Whatever the circumstance, Nellie fixed on Crazy Horse her “captivating gaze.” To a man used to the shy glances of proper Lakota girls, that forthright stare was unsettling—and thrilling. True to Crazy Horse’s reserve, however, the relationship would not be carried on in the public eye. Instead, by early July, Crazy Horse was making discreet evening visits to the Larrabee household. Crazy Horse even had kinsmen drive several ponies across the river and up to the Larrabee door. When Joe had his boys drive them in with the family herd, it was clear that Sioux Bob had a serious rival in the matrimony stakes.20
A Lakota marriage was not contracted in isolation. Conservative Lakotas could be prim, and many of the war chief’s followers disapproved of the affair. Crazy Horse took a pipe and consulted his most trusted advisers—who confirmed the negative assessment. But Crazy Horse was already in too deep. Before Lieutenant Clark left Camp Robinson, Crazy Horse met him for an informal chat. When the subject of Nellie arose, Clark teased his first sergeant, encouraging the relationship. Realizing that a period of courtship and domestic bliss could mellow Crazy Horse, Clark sought to counter the arguments against the marriage. According to Baptiste Pourier, Clark positively persuaded Crazy Horse to go ahead and marry Nellie.21
For Crazy Horse the courtship neutralized but did not remove the political issues at stake. During the third week of July, these issues snapped into focus. “[N]early all of [Crazy Horse’s] leading men with their friends partially separated from his band,” stated Agent Irwin in his monthly report.22 Revealingly, the initiative did not lie with the preoccupied war chief. As he continued to raise his objections to traveling to Washington, more moderate voices began to argue against him. The principal articulator of the moderate line was the man emerging as his archrival: Little Big Man argued persuasively for accepting the new schedule. He also began to echo the suspicions voiced by agency leaders opposed to Crazy Horse, insinuating that if he went east, Crazy Horse might be arrested and killed for his notoriety as leader in the Custer battle. Such rumors awoke the paranoia Crazy Horse had felt before surrender.23
When Crazy Horse continued to express doubts about the new schedule, Little Big Man again led a significant section of the village nearer to the agency. The separation remained, in Irwin’s phrase, only “partial.” No open break had occurred to rupture solidarity irretrievably. Such movements could always be rationalized as for better pasture, or fresh water: reunion was anticipated, and everyone took care not to force a premature crisis.
Events late in the month showed the wisdom of moderation. The return of Lieutenant Clark suggested a firm timetable might soon be forthcoming. And new developments in the tortured negotiations with Fast Bull’s camp of fugitives indicated an imminent surrender. Over July 22–23 nine lodges, mostly Sans Arcs, surrendered at Spotted Tail. They had left Fast Bull’s camp on the upper Moreau River, waiting “to hear how they were received.” If satisfied, Fast Bull “will come in immediately[;] if not he will cross the Missouri River and join ‘Sitting Bull.’” On July 25 Agent Lee dispatched three Miniconjou messengers northward, predicting Fast Bull’s imminent surrender.24
Crazy Horse could conclude that the diplomatic process should now accelerate and approval of the Beaver Creek site follow speedily. With significant differences between him and Little Big Man removed, the two camps reunited in a single village during the last week of the month. War chief and Decider agreed once more to submerge their personal differences and, in a symbolic gesture, donated their family tipis to build a new council lodge for the village.
On the morning of Friday, July 27, Crazy Horse’s confidence seemed well founded. Lieutenant Clark returned from Fort Laramie and immediately invited the chiefs and headmen to hear a message from General Crook. Some seventy headmen took their seats in the agency council room. Crazy Horse and Little Big Man sat beside Red Cloud and the agency leaders, a row of warriors at their backs. Dr. Irwin was invited to attend, accompanied by Indian Office Inspector Benjamin R. Shopp. Shopp’s report summarizes a crucial council and its aftermath. First, Clark read out the message from Crook. The general
had promised that the Indians should go on a Buffalo Hunt. He was about to redeem that promise, and all who wished to might start as soon as they could make the necessary arrangements and be absent about 40 nights, then to return to the Agency. He would exact from them, however, certain terms. They were to go on the Buffalo hunt, conduct themselves peaceably and all return at the time agreed upon. Permission had also been obtained from the Hon. Secretary of the Interior for 18 Indians to visit Washington, D.C. with a view of presenting their grievances as to the contemplated change of the Indian Agency to the vicinity of the Missouri River. They should select their best and strongest men for this mission and not go for their own gratification merely but for the protection of their interests, and seek an interchange of views as to what would ultimately result to their good. They were expected to be in readiness to leave there by the 15th of September next. An opportunity was then given for an expression of their views either approving or disapproving the order, but no feelings of disapprobation were manifested. During the reading of the message or the delivery of the “talk” or explanation of the Lieutenant, they were apparently pleased.
A feast had also been promised to them as was customary on the assembly of councils. Young-man-afraid-of-his horses suggested that the feast be had at the lodge of Crazy horse, and his partner Little-big-man. No oral objections to this proposition were made, although Red Cloud and one or two others left the room. Dr. Irwin promised to issue an order giving them three cattle together with some coffee and sugar, as soon as they should determine to whom it was to be issued. The council then adjourned.25
When the headmen left the compound and mounted their ponies, Crazy Horse had every reason to be pleased. His belief in Crook’s promises at last seemed vindicated. The hunting expedition had been restored to the top of the schedule. Crook had authorized an early departure date: the hunting expedition could leave for the north no later than August 5, only nine days hence. Final details needed to be hammered out, but for Crazy Horse, the peace process was back on track as he crossed White River and headed homeward.
More disturbing was the early departure of Red Cloud and his band headmen. Young Man Afraid of His Horse’s proposal that the northern village host the tribal feast continued his efforts to integrate Crazy Horse and the northern leadership into the smooth running of agency life. Red Cloud had served notice that he and the Bad Face band had withdrawn support for that policy, and later that evening, Red Cloud sent two messengers to call on Dr. Irwin and explain his rationale. First explaining that they “represented Red Cloud and several other bands,” the visitors launched into a sustained attack on Crazy Horse before asserting
that there was considerable dissatisfaction among them as to the proposition to hold the feast with Crazy Horse. He having but lately joined the agency it was but right and a matter of courtesy for him to come to them, and they were not disposed to go to him, a
s such action indicated a disposition to conciliate him. He had always been regarded by them as an unreconstructed Indian, he had constantly evinced feelings of unfriendliness towards the others, he was sullen, morose and discontented at times, he seemed to be chafing under restraint, and in their opinion was only waiting for a favorable opportunity to leave the agency and never return. The time had now come. Once away on the hunt, he with his band of at least 240 braves, well armed and equipped, would go on the war path and cause the Government infinite trouble and disaster. The other Indians these men represented, had no confidence in him. He was tricky and unfaithful to others and very selfish as to the personal interests of his own tribe. The ammunition that would be furnished to them would be used for the destruction of the whites, against whom they seemed to entertain the utmost animosity.26
It was a bitterly partisan account. With just enough grounding in reality for plausibility, it reflected the alarming deterioration in relations between Crazy Horse and Red Cloud. When Red Cloud’s messengers left Irwin’s quarters, they had begun a systematic campaign to discredit Crazy Horse with the agent. They left an indelible impression on Irwin, coloring all his subsequent dealings with Crazy Horse and the northern village. Shopp’s subsequent conversation with the agent showed that, while he doubted the ostensibly “friendly attitude” of the northern village, Irwin had as yet no significant personal dealings with Crazy Horse sufficient to confirm or refute the Bad Face spin. Red Cloud’s bid to marginalize his perceived rival was now operating on a dual front. Playing on the war chief’s insecurity, he was trying to force Crazy Horse’s withdrawal from the Washington trip, neutralizing him as a diplomatic player. Red Cloud opened a second front by eroding Crazy Horse’s credibility with the civilian authorities. Although Red Cloud’s aims were confined to maintaining his own edge as principal Oglala chief, no one could say where the intrigue would end.
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