Post by Dietmar on Jun 8, 2019 7:46:02 GMT -5
Harry Eaton by D.F. Barry
I have known the photographs of Harry Eaton (more of them further below) taken by David F. Barry for many years, but only recently have I wondered about who the man portraited really is.
Harry Eaton was a Hidatsa, who are also known under the French term Gros Ventre.
He belonged to the Knife Clan.
Grahame wrote in an older thread that Harry´s other names were Sand Hill Crane and One Eye.
More about him so far can only be found in some newspaper articles at the Library of Congress.
Accordingly, Harry Eaton was half Hidatsa and half Crow. He was born in 1856 in the area where the Fort Berthold reservation was later established.
His father, who according to one newspaper was a Crow chief, died early, and so he was adopted by a white officer into his family. These gave him the name Harry Eaton.
In 1866 Harry went to Virginia where he attended public schools and took courses at night schools, which qualified him for college. From 1871 he studied in Amherst, Massachusetts, where he received agricultural training for three years. In 1874, being 18 years old, and a year before he would have graduated, Harry got tired of the East and went back to where he was born.
Being home, he started a career as an Indian Scout for the U.S. Army, in whose service he joined in 1875. From then he scouted the Yellowstone country in eastern and central Montana for many years. He started serving under the command of Colonel Crawfton of the 15th Infantry, with headquarters at Fort Buford, where Captain Reed was in charge. Later he got to know George and Tom Custer and especially their white and Indian scouts. It is said that at one time he was with Custer, without specifying on which occasion or campaign.
Harry Eaton served as a scout until 1892, when he was mustered out.
Afterwards he lived in or near Elbowoods (near Fort Berthold reservation) and according to the Evening Times of 16 September 1913, he practiced farming and plied his trade of sign painting.
However, in 1913 First Sergeant Harry Eaton was leading a group of former Arikara and Crow (more likely Hidatsa) scouts who negotiated in Mandan, N.D., with Governor L. B. Hanna about their outstanding pensions for their past services.
While visiting Glendive, Montana, Harry Eaton told the Yellowstone Monitor on August 10, 1911 that it was his first visit to this section in 22 years and he stated that it made his heart ache to come back here now and witness the change. He said “ the way of the white man is strong, but when the buffalo used to roam these prairies I never thought that a city like Glendive would be built here.”
See:
The Billings Gazette, March 7, 1902
Yellowstone Monitor, August 10, 1911
The Evening Times, September 16, 1913
The Ward County Independent, September 18, 1913
Before posting the D.F. Barry portraits of Harry Eaton, I´d like to present this rare picture archived by the National Park Service, where Harry Eaton is identified as part of a group at Fort Buford in 1887:
npgallery.nps.gov/AssetDetail/1d7349866a534394a26be96cd3cd11fc
Major D. H. Brotherton, Mrs. Brotherton, Lieutenant William H. C. Bowen, Mrs. Bowen, and two Gros Ventres Indians, one identified as Harry Eaton, Fort Buford, May 1887
Harry Eaton
Harry Eaton by D.F. Barry (Denver Public Library):
digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15330coll22/id/68530/rec/2
digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15330coll22/id/69546/rec/4
Wolf Chief and Harry Eaton
digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/singleitem/collection/p15330coll22/id/42036/rec/3
Wolf Chief and Harry Eaton
Here Harry Eaton is again with Wolf Chief, portraited by William DeGraff, perhaps a few years later as in the Barry photos:
Please add or correct what else is known about Harry Eaton. Thanks.
