On the far side of the open parade ground and post buildings, another mounted force could be seen approaching from the south: Spotted Tail was bringing his promised warriors to prevent any crisis. Beyond, on the hills and benches west of the creek, Brule camps were also moving downstream, to pitch tipis around the agency. Suddenly, a new movement was detected. No Water’s party of scouts, walking their punished ponies, approached the post. Seeing the uniforms of the Oglala scouts, the northern warriors burst forward from their line. White Thunder’s scouts interposed themselves between the two parties, forcing the warriors back into line. At last Crazy Horse quietly told the northern warriors to fall back. Wasting little time, No Water’s party mounted their beaten ponies and hurried upstream to the agency.47
The ambulance lumbered onto the Camp Sheridan parade ground with its escort of warriors, shouting and singing. Simultaneously, Spotted Tail’s three hundred Brule warriors rode in from the south. The two parties edged forward, their flanks pressing ahead so that the lines threatened to converge and only a space at the center, about six feet by eight, was left empty. Into this arena, the officers debarked from the ambulance. Through Bordeaux and Merrivale, they asked Crazy Horse to enter the office with them, but the war chief would not speak. Impatiently, Burke told Crazy Horse that he could not stay here; he would have to return to Red Cloud Agency. Burke promised him that he would not be hurt, but Crazy Horse remained silent. Now Burke turned to address the northern warriors, asking them through Merrivale to dismount, but they did not respond.48
Spotted Tail nudged his pony into the gap and said, “I am Spotted Tail, the Chief of the Sioux and I want you[,] Crazy Horse[,] to go to [Camp Robinson] to talk with the White Chief.” On both sides warriors continued to press forward, contracting the space in the center to “about the size of a prize ring.”49
The officers proposed that the chiefs “go into a house for a talk; but the [northern Indians] insisted that they all had a right to hear what was said.” Crazy Horse appeared ever more fearful of treachery: one woman watching from the post buildings observed that the war chief “looked like a hunted animal.” The mill of warriors was growing ever louder; whoops and yells sounded as rifles and pistols were flourished openly, and Burke and the interpreters could no longer make themselves heard. Spotted Tail again seized the initiative and, speaking in “a clear, ringing voice” to Crazy Horse, facing him only six feet away, declared,
We never have trouble here.... [T]he sky is clear, the air is still and free from dust! You have come here and you must listen to me and my people! I am chief here. We keep the peace. We, the Brules, do this! They obey me! and every Indian who comes here must listen to me! You say you want to come to this agency and live peaceably. If you stay here you must listen to me. That is all!50
Spotted Tail’s dramatic pauses were punctuated by the click of Winchester hammers, and as he closed,” 400 vociferous ‘hows’” acclaimed the Brule chief. Spotted Tail asked Crazy Horse if he would now talk with the officers in the adjutant’s office. Crazy Horse finally offered his first words since reaching the post. “I will,” he quietly agreed.51
Just as the situation seemed to be resolving itself, a frenzied warrior urged his pony into the gap. Buffalo Chips, a Sans Arc, turned his pony to face Crazy Horse. “You are afraid to die, but I will die for you,” he shouted. Turning to Spotted Tail, he shouted again, “You are a coward!” and leapt from the saddle. Crazy Horse sat stolidly, but Spotted Tail laughed. Buffalo Chips seized Captain Burke by the shoulders, clutching at his uniform coat. He begged Burke to hang him instead of Crazy Horse.52
Burke laughed nervously and observed that he did not want to hang anyone. As Buffalo Chips ran out of breath, a Loafer warrior thrust his carbine into the Sans Arc’s face, and a second Brule rode up. He dragged Buffalo Chips across his pony and urged it through the crowd. After the extravagant performance, the crowd quieted and began dispersing. Only a few leading Lakotas remained on the ground, and as daylight failed, they dismounted and followed the officers and Crazy Horse into Burke’s private quarters.53
The little group sat in chairs or on the floor. Burke and Lee, with the post adjutant scribbling notes and Louis Bordeaux interpreting, faced Crazy Horse and Touch the Clouds. Spotted Tail and Swift Bear represented the Brule chiefs. Crazy Horse, recalled Lee, “seemed like a frightened, trembling, wild animal, brought to bay, hoping for confidence one moment and fearing treachery the next. He had been under a severe nervous strain all day and it plainly showed.”54
Nevertheless, when the war chief was invited to speak, the officers were impressed. Asked to state why he had left Red Cloud to come to Spotted Tail, Crazy Horse first observed that “he should like to keep his country” ; then repeated “that there had been so much trouble over at the other camp and he had been talked to so much that his head was in a whirl, and he wanted to get away.”55
Moreover, he expanded, at Red Cloud “there were bad winds blowing. He did not understand why it was so but that there was feeling against him there and he was being misrepresented. He was desirous of having peace, for which purpose he had surrendered and he would be glad to do anything to keep out of trouble, but he did not think this would be possible over at Red Cloud.”56
He added that he had fled the Oglala agency only when he saw a big body of scouts coming to his camp; he had gone to his kinsman Touch the Clouds to avoid disturbance. Moreover, his wife was ill, and he had brought her here to be treated. Therefore, he would like “to be transferred to Spotted Tail Agency where things were quiet and no winds blowing. He would be out of the turmoil and he would assure [the officers] that if this request would be granted they would find him a peaceable Indian.”57
Burke and Lee asked how the “reported threats and conspiracies had become current and. . . if he had said such things in council as Grouard had reported him to have said.” Crazy Horse denied them strenuously and agitated that he had been misrepresented since the talk with Clark four days previously.58
In a speech of unprecedented length, the war chief tried to set the record straight. He recalled his surrender, when he told Lieutenant Clark on the pipe that he would go no more to war. That promise was the reason why he had not wanted to scout against the Nez Perces. “When I was asked to take my young men to go and fight the Nez Perces I did not refuse. I said that I had come here because I was told that there should be peace and not war between the white man and the red man. Now there was war again. I am asked to take a few of my young men to go and fight. I will not do that. If the white man cannot conquer his enemies, I will take all my people and go north and do it for him.”‘ Pausing for a moment, he addressed his Lakota hosts, “At Red Cloud I am in constant trouble. I understand you have a good Agent here and I wish to join this Agency and stay here.”59
After Touch the Clouds confirmed that these had been Crazy Horse’s words in the talk with Clark, the door was opened to admit a courier. He handed to Burke a letter from Bradley stating that the war chief must be captured and returned to Camp Robinson. Quickly scanning the note, Burke turned to his adjutant and whispered to him “to write. . . in reply explaining the dangers and difficulties of the situation and saying that Crazy Horse would be persuaded to return.” A note was quickly scribbled and hurried off to Bradley. Burke conferred briefly with Lee, explaining the new development. The officers returned to the talk just after sunset, about 8:00 P.M.60
Burke and Lee explained to Crazy Horse that they had received orders to send him to Camp Robinson. The “only thing for him to do was to go over there and make his statement of his case there. [Crazy Horse] was under some misgivings and did not know. . . what was best to do. If Lee and Burke would promise to intercede for him with Gen. Bradley and have him transferred to Spotted Tail, he would go.”61
Lee took up the conversation, pledging “his word. . . that no harm should happen to [Crazy Horse],” and that he would have the opportunity to state his case fully to Bradley the next day. Moreover, both Lee and Burke
would use their influence to have Crazy Horse’s village transferred to the Brule agency.62
Lee would personally accompany the war chief the following morning and “get him a hearing.”63 Swift Bear and Touch the Clouds would use their influence to expedite the transfer. Spotted Tail was more guarded. He insisted that the “Oglala people are yours. Something good should happen to you with them.” Crazy Horse had to return to Camp Robinson. As the minimum of good manners, Spotted Tail promised him a fine horse but left little doubt that he had no wish for his nephew’s presence.64
Crazy Horse “seemed to realize his helplessness.” Lee stressed he would report his words to Bradley. At last, with great reluctance, Crazy Horse granted that he would go with Lee in the morning. He asked for something to eat, food that would cement kinship relations with the Brule agency hierarchy.65
As a quick meal was prepared, plans were made for the night. Swift Bear suggested that Crazy Horse be permitted to sleep at Touch the Clouds’s village. The Miniconjou chief pledged that he would see Crazy Horse returned to Camp Sheridan at 9:00 in the morning. Crazy Horse was given into the care of Touch the Clouds, and the two men rode back down Beaver Creek. Immediately after they left, Burke and Lee conferred privately with Spotted Tail and Swift Bear. To ensure the war chief was secured, four or five Brule scouts were detailed to watch the northern village.66
Night had fallen, and as Crazy Horse and his comrades wound down the valley, the scatter of Oglala tipis bloomed like lanterns. Pausing in the ride downstream, Crazy Horse dismounted and was asked into the tipi of Standing Bear, who was married to two of his cousins. Over a quiet meal, Crazy Horse asked Standing Bear to accompany him to Camp Robinson in the morning. He was anxious to recruit as many relatives as possible to ride with him, mindful of Spotted Tail’s guarded warning that “something bad” might happen to him here.67
At his village, Touch the Clouds placed a small tipi at Crazy Horse’s disposal. After a final meal in the Miniconjou chief’s lodge, Crazy Horse rode out a short way, tethering his pony atop a wooded hill. Alone in the darkness “he prayed for guidance for himself.” As he meditated, he must have reflected on the day’s events. Of the objectives he had identified that morning, only Black Shawl’s safety had been secured. “I should like to keep my country,” he had told the officers, but the words already rang elegiacally, as when we prepare at last to give up an ideal long cherished. Could the future lie here, at Spotted Tail, relinquishing his role as war chief and taking up the life of a healer, marked out for him in the visions of the previous winter? Political marginalization he knew was the price of life at his uncle’s agency. But even this minimal option seemed elusive: Spotted Tail’s distaste for the prospect showed through the thin veneer of respect and kin obligation.
A day of real action had temporarily relieved the vicious cycle of mood swings for the war chief. Now, in tranquility, he found no peace. “He believed something was going to happen.” Misgivings filled him, and when he left the hill to talk late with Touch the Clouds, he dwelled on death. He had thought long on the significance of his visions, and they now offered him what reassurance he could muster for the future. Reflecting on his lifelong affinity with the powers of Rock, he told his cousin that after death, “his bones would turn to rock and his joints to flint.” Now he sought sleep, but Touch the Clouds pondered his cousin’s words. To him, it seemed that Crazy Horse was “looking to die.”68
29
THIS DAY IS MINE
Late that night a private meeting gathered in the Camp Sheridan sutler’s store. Captain Burke and his adjutant welcomed Agent Lee, interpreters Bordeaux and Tackett, and Spotted Tail with fellow Brules Swift Bear, White Thunder, and Coarse Voice. Touch the Clouds had also been summoned. In a lengthy debate, the men juggled the awkward priorities of the case. Bradley had ordered an arrest, but military realities and the officers’ consciences sat uneasily with any betrayal of their promises to Crazy Horse. It was finally agreed that Spotted Tail would organize the Brule scouts to escort Lee and Crazy Horse to Camp Robinson soon after 9:00 A.M.1
Burke was already busy at his desk when a courier rode up just before dawn with a new dispatch from Bradley:
Camp Robinson
Midnight.
Dear Major:
Your dispatch received. If you have got my dispatch written about 4 o’ clock, it tells you too much. I wrote it after getting the report of Col. Mason, and Clark. We did not get the whole village, but got the greater part of it and shall get some more lodges to-night. Crazy Horse must be held as a prisoner and must come here as such, keep him securely and I will send a body of Indians to bring him here. All the Indians here are with us and behave well, including Little Big Man and the other Northern Chiefs.
Yours Truly,
[sign.] L. P. Bradley.2
Burke viewed the letter with moral and practical misgivings. It implied active disarming and physical restraint of the war chief. Early in the morning, he sent a messenger to Bradley stating simply that he would have Crazy Horse sent over in an ambulance, accompanied by scout sergeants Swift Bear, Touch the Clouds, and High Bear.3
Burke was not alone in having misgivings as daylight gathered on Wednesday, September 5. At the northern village, Crazy Horse had risen from his troubled sleep full of foreboding. Touch the Clouds and High Bear prepared to ride back to Camp Sheridan. Worm appeared and advised his son to unwrap his sacred bundle and invoke the aid of his guardian the red-tailed hawk. Crazy Horse declined but, as his party passed the Oglala camp halfway to the post, he prevailed on his cousin Fast Thunder to join the group. Fast Thunder, now a trusted scout, and his wife hitched up their wagon and followed the war chief.4
At Camp Sheridan, the scene seemed eerily calm. Crazy Horse and Touch the Clouds waited outside post headquarters, talking to Charley Tackett. Swift Bear and Black Crow rode over from the Brule camps, and Bordeaux appeared from the agency. Burke and Lee were delayed. The war chief’s apprehension was palpable as they awaited the arrival of the officers. At length Crazy Horse said that “he must go back to Touch the Cloud’s camp and get a saddle, he having come from his camp at Red Cloud on his horse bareback.” Tackett brought permission from Major Burke, with word that the officers and scouts would follow him to the northern village.5
Crazy Horse leapt astride his pony and wheeled out of the parade at a run. It was a disturbing sign. Captain Burke appeared, and after a hurried consultation, Swift Bear and Touch the Clouds detailed two scout officers, Good Voice and Horned Antelope, to follow the war chief. Instructed to shoot Crazy Horse’s pony should he attempt to escape, the scouts were also ordered to kill him if he resisted. Accompanied by Tackett, Touch the Clouds, and High Bear, Burke followed at a run down Beaver Creek.6
Minutes later Lee arrived and boarded the post ambulance with Bordeaux. Swift Bear and Black Crow also climbed aboard. The driver whipped up the four-mule team, followed by a string of scouts. At the village, Bordeaux directed the driver to Touch the Clouds’s tipi, where Burke and Tackett were pacing anxiously. Lee conferred hurriedly with Burke. The war chief had changed his mind, Burke warned, and refused to return: “If I go to Red Cloud there will be trouble,” Crazy Horse had confided; he “‘was afraid that something [bad] would happen’” there.7
Touch the Clouds had placed a small tipi at Crazy Horse’s disposal, and the officers repaired there. Speaking through Tackett, the war chief “asked us to go down [to Camp Robinson] without him, and fix up the matter for him and his people,” recalled Lee. “We assured him we had no thought of harming him in any way; that he owed it to his people at Red Cloud to return, and we insisted on his returning peaceably and quietly.” After some thought, Crazy Horse outlined some preconditions for his return: agreeing that neither he nor Lee should take arms, he requested that the agent first tell Lieutenant Clark all that had occurred since Crazy Horse’s arrival at Spotted Tail. Then he wished to make a full statement of his own of “how ‘he had been misunderstood and misinterpreted; that he wa
nted peace and quiet, and did not want any trouble whatever.’” Crazy Horse also wanted Lee to tell Clark “that Major Burke, Spotted Tail and [Lee] were willing to receive him by transfer from Red Cloud.” Lee gave his personal pledge of safety but reminded Crazy Horse that such a decision rested in Bradley’s hands. Clearly unhappy, Crazy Horse suddenly left the tipi to consult friends in the council lodge.8
Telling Lee to continue talks, “get Crazy Horse if he could and go right on,” Burke decided to ride back to Camp Sheridan, gather the Brule scouts, and return to make an arrest should negotiations break down.9 After Burke’s departure with Tackett, Bordeaux rejoined the agent in the small tipi. The two men sat nervously and “waited for Crazy Horse to get ready.”10
In the council tipi, consensus favored the war chief’s return to Camp Robinson: all present “urged him to go.”11 A party of Brule scouts and akicita, led by Sergeant Whirlwind Soldier, a Decider in Spotted Tail’s village, had followed from Camp Sheridan. Three Bears and Spider, Oglala messengers just arrived from Camp Robinson, accompanied the Brules. The Oglalas insisted that Crazy Horse return with them to Red Cloud Agency, but their hosts ensured that the debate remained relaxed. Whirlwind Soldier, Swift Bear, and Black Crow all spoke to the same effect, “coaxing” Crazy Horse toward compliance.12
Crazy Horse looked again for reassurance. His gaze rested briefly on the lean profile of Turning Bear, a Brule scout and an old comrade in the north. Crazy Horse asked Turning Bear his advice. The Brule “advised him to go and said he would accompany him” to Camp Robinson. The assurance of solidarity, the same promise of support Crazy Horse had sought from Standing Bear and Fast Thunder, was enough to tip the balance. Outside a herald could be heard, calling the war chief to eat at the tipi of Touch the Clouds. Indicating his tacit consent to departure, Crazy Horse left the council lodge.13
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