Sitting Bull

[ladonna]

Oh ok i don't worry about the date because in the indian census its a best guess,
when an agent looked at you and decided you were born about this year that was wrote down then the next agent wrote another date down so one
person can have three or four birthdates, I find that the Indian women who were recorded are aways older then their husbands but as they get older
they get younger, so i don't spend no time worrying about the dates, most every date is about five years from the real birth either way,
it's like Sitting Bull he was born from 1831 to 1834 and people are arguing about it.
So you are right if you read some of the census they have birthdates for women saying that they had a child at 8 years old which is not true.
So i would believe Little Assiniboine was born before 1844 but with they way they record our history we can't rely other dates. But it all we have.

[kshawk63]

Sorry to bump an old thread, but I can see my great-grandmother Agnes Looking Elk and her parents on the list, but where does that place Looking Elk? Is a brother, a nephew, a cousin to sitting bull? A bit confused there, thanks!

[Dietmar]

Many thanks to our member Wolfgang who identified Sitting Bull´s mother in this photograph taken by W. R. Cross at Fort Randall:

[wolfgang]

Dietmar, thank you.

[gregor]

Dietmar, amazing. I know/knew both pictures, but I never realized that the Ladies could be the same person. Good Job!
Happy X-Mas to you!

[gregor]

Oh, exact reading helps. Sorry, Wolfgang it was your discovery. Good Job and thank you!

[gregor]

Here again Sitting Bull's mother. The use of a walking cane supports Wolfgang's discovery.



Bailey, Dix & Mead marketed the above photograph (Dietmar's post) as "No. 4 Medicine Teepe".
The caption on the back gives also a hint to SBs mother. It says "...the old squaw, 90 years old, watching the work of some preparation on a wolf skin she is tanning".



And again, a great detection. Thanx Wolfgang!

[Dietmar]

Peter has sent me this picture circulating the web as Sitting Bull´s war shirt.
The war shirt is located on the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto Canada:



Does anyone know if it is authentic?

[allenc]

It is a magnificent old shirt. The ROM's web site (Cat. No 955.105) attributes it to S B but provides no other useful information. They also have some moccasins that are similarly attributed.

[peter]

Thank Dietmar for posting it. Hope someone can tell whether is the true war shirt of Sitting Bull. I'm puzzled

[gregor]

The two most distinctive native American items at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) in Toronto are two articles attributed to Sitting Bull: a typical Lakota Eagle feather headdress and a war shirt. These articles are issued approximately every 20-30 years.

The origin of the headdress is clarified - to my knowledge. Sitting Bull is said to have given it to Major James Morrow Walsh (1840 - 1905) as a farewell gift. After leaving the North-West Mounted Police, Walsh was entrepreneurial active. He has worked for the Dominion Coal, Coke and Transportation Company and the Canadian Pacific Railway. Around 1900, Walsh then gave the headdress to the head of the Canadian Pacific Railway President, Sir William Van Horne (1843 – 1915), who bequeathed it to the ROM in 1915. This is also confirmed by a newspaper article that appeared on October 7, 1916 in the Toronto Star Newspaper. This provenance is confirmed today by the curator of the ROM, Arni Brownstone. And Sitting Bull's great-grandson Ernie LaPointe accepts this view.

The origin of the shirt is more difficult to track down. Due to the material (sheepskin, human hair, weasel skins, horsehair, porcupine quills) of the embellishments and embroidery, it appears to have been made by Nez Perce, Crows or Blackfoot. According to ROM, the shirt is made of sheepskin, which is rather unusual for Lakota. It may also be a gift from Blackfoot chief Crowfoot (1830 - 1890), whom SB visited in 1877 in Canada for peace negotiations. Sitting Bull was so impressed by Crowfoot that he named one of his sons after him.
The shirt was donated to the ROM by Albert Housley. The ROM wrote about the shirt:

“His [Sitting Bull’s] shirt came to the ROM in 1955 through the family of Albert Housley, a North West Mounted Police corporal who had been stationed at Fort Walsh in June 1881. The shirt has an accompanying note certifying it on the White Mud River, Saskatchewan, by a North West Mounted Police interpreter, William LeQuesne." [Related to the “Le Caine family of Wood Mountain Lakotas?]
It is known that William E.A. LeQuesne worked as a translator for the NWMP but also for the US Army. By his own admission he knew Sitting Bull in person. Unfortunately, I could not identify the place name "White Mud River".

We also have to keep in mind that in 1880/1881 the Lakota were starving in Canada, turning everything into money or food, which was of value to potential buyers.
In that regard, it is not excluded that the shirt actually belonged to Sitting Bull or that it was at least acquired from the exile Lakotas in Canada.

I'm oppen for corrections, toksha ake Gregor

[peter]

Thank you, I also suspected that a sheepskin war shirt was not a Lakota trademark.

[kingsleybray]

that's not correct, peter, Lakota shirts were made from a range of different animal skins, but the Shirt Wearer garments were meant to be made from mountain sheep skin.

[gregor]

Kingsley, you're right. I forgot the mountain sheeps. Reading about "sheepskin" i had "New Zealand" in mind :-)

[peter]

Thanks Kingsley, I was referring to the regular sheep not to the mountain sheep. Sorry for the miss understanding. I took Gregor explanation for granted. My question remains the same. Could it be or it is Sitting Bulls war shirt? Your expertise is really appreciate. What do you know or what you think? Thank you