Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2017 19:01:16 GMT -5
Sandra Garner reports in her doctorate dissertation that George Sword and Louis Shangreau (he is named "Changro" in the accout) were involved in two incidents around the time of the 1881 Sun Dance. Garner's original source was "Cowboy life on the Western Plains; the reminiscences of a ranchman" by Edgar Beecher Bronson who gave eye-witness accounts of the encounters.
A band of several hundred Brulé from the adjoining Rosebud agency arrived to attend the Sun Dance and descended upon the agent’s office demanding food, which McGillycuddy refused. According to Bronson, the chief of the group then threatened to “… kill every white man on this reservation …” and McGillycuddy physically threw the chief out of the office. The anxiety of the situation is palpable in Bronson’s account written decades later. The group feared for their lives, a fear that was compounded when Sword and his men left the office. Again I quote at length from Bronson: “Down we all dropped behind the fence wall, rifles cocked and leveled, and we were barely down when up over the bluff, not thirty yards distant, charging us at mad speed, came a sure-enough war party. Keen eyes sought sights and fingers were already pressing triggers when Changro [translator] shouted: “No shoot! Sword he come! It was indeed our trusty Sword, with every manjack of his youngsters! Reining in at the gate, Sword quietly led his men behind – to the north of – the office, left the ponies in charge of a few horse holders, and then lined his men along the wall beside us – honest Sword! Ready to come to death grips with his own flesh and blood in defence of his white chief!”
-- Sandra Garner
After the incident with the Brulé, McGillycuddy and Bourke were uncertain whether or not to visit the dance as they were concerned about the repercussions. However Bronson recalled that, “… both agreed a bold front was likely to permanently settle the Brules’s grouch and the Ogallalas’ resentment of the doctor’s police organization, more likely than to stay tight at the Agency, and leave them suspicious we were afraid of them. The group set out from the agency with Sword’s police in tow as protection. When well within the circle, Sword asked the doctor to stop the ambulances a few minutes. He then proceeded to put his police through a mounted company drill of no mean accuracy, good enough to command the commendation of Major Bourke and Lieutenants Waite and Goldman. The drill finished, and without the least hint to us of his purpose, Sword suddenly broke his cavalry formation and, at the head of his men, started a mad charge, in disordered savage mass, straight at the nearest point of the line of tepees to the west; and, come within twenty yards of the line, reined to the left parallel to the line, and so charge round the entire circle, his men shouting their war-cries and shooting as fast as they could load and fire over the heads of their people, sometimes actually through the tops of the lodges. It was Sword’s challenge to the tribe! One hundred challenging twelve thousand! […] Altogether it made about the most uncomfortable ten or fifteen minutes I ever passed, for we had nothing to do but sit idly in our ambulances, awaiting whatever row this mad freak might stir. At length, the circuit finished, Sword drew up proudly before us and saluted, his horses heaving of flank and dripping of sides, and spoke to Changro, ‘Sword he say now Sioux be good Injun – no bother police any more! They know they eat us up quick, but then Great Father send heap soldier eat them up!’”
-- Sandra Garner
etd.ohiolink.edu/!etd.send_file?accession=osu1281961865&disposition=inline
archive.org/stream/lifecowboywest00bronrich/lifecowboywest00bronrich_djvu.txt
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentine_McGillycuddy
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Beecher_Bronson
A band of several hundred Brulé from the adjoining Rosebud agency arrived to attend the Sun Dance and descended upon the agent’s office demanding food, which McGillycuddy refused. According to Bronson, the chief of the group then threatened to “… kill every white man on this reservation …” and McGillycuddy physically threw the chief out of the office. The anxiety of the situation is palpable in Bronson’s account written decades later. The group feared for their lives, a fear that was compounded when Sword and his men left the office. Again I quote at length from Bronson: “Down we all dropped behind the fence wall, rifles cocked and leveled, and we were barely down when up over the bluff, not thirty yards distant, charging us at mad speed, came a sure-enough war party. Keen eyes sought sights and fingers were already pressing triggers when Changro [translator] shouted: “No shoot! Sword he come! It was indeed our trusty Sword, with every manjack of his youngsters! Reining in at the gate, Sword quietly led his men behind – to the north of – the office, left the ponies in charge of a few horse holders, and then lined his men along the wall beside us – honest Sword! Ready to come to death grips with his own flesh and blood in defence of his white chief!”
-- Sandra Garner
After the incident with the Brulé, McGillycuddy and Bourke were uncertain whether or not to visit the dance as they were concerned about the repercussions. However Bronson recalled that, “… both agreed a bold front was likely to permanently settle the Brules’s grouch and the Ogallalas’ resentment of the doctor’s police organization, more likely than to stay tight at the Agency, and leave them suspicious we were afraid of them. The group set out from the agency with Sword’s police in tow as protection. When well within the circle, Sword asked the doctor to stop the ambulances a few minutes. He then proceeded to put his police through a mounted company drill of no mean accuracy, good enough to command the commendation of Major Bourke and Lieutenants Waite and Goldman. The drill finished, and without the least hint to us of his purpose, Sword suddenly broke his cavalry formation and, at the head of his men, started a mad charge, in disordered savage mass, straight at the nearest point of the line of tepees to the west; and, come within twenty yards of the line, reined to the left parallel to the line, and so charge round the entire circle, his men shouting their war-cries and shooting as fast as they could load and fire over the heads of their people, sometimes actually through the tops of the lodges. It was Sword’s challenge to the tribe! One hundred challenging twelve thousand! […] Altogether it made about the most uncomfortable ten or fifteen minutes I ever passed, for we had nothing to do but sit idly in our ambulances, awaiting whatever row this mad freak might stir. At length, the circuit finished, Sword drew up proudly before us and saluted, his horses heaving of flank and dripping of sides, and spoke to Changro, ‘Sword he say now Sioux be good Injun – no bother police any more! They know they eat us up quick, but then Great Father send heap soldier eat them up!’”
-- Sandra Garner
etd.ohiolink.edu/!etd.send_file?accession=osu1281961865&disposition=inline
archive.org/stream/lifecowboywest00bronrich/lifecowboywest00bronrich_djvu.txt
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentine_McGillycuddy
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Beecher_Bronson
