Bear Face

[ephriam]

BEAR FACE Mato Ite (c1830-1914). Hunkpapa. Headman at Standing Rock Agency. Later known as Leo Bear Face.

Born about 1830 or 1831, he was the son of the prominent Hunkpapa headman Bear Face who signed the Atkinson Treaty of 1825. He had five brothers, including Rain in the Face and Iron Horn. His mother was Sihasapa. He married about 1864 to Brown Tracks, later known as Annie Bear Face.

Settled at the Standing Rock Agency. In early October 1876, he was prevailed upon by the Army to go out with Long Feather in an attempt to induce the non-treaty bands to surrender. Helped arrange a council between Sitting Bull and Lt. Col. Otis. He returned to Standing Rock on November 5, 1876 and was recognized as a band leader at the agency. In late 1876, his band only consisted of 2 families; by 1877, he had eight; and by the following year his band had grown to seventeen families.

I am having difficulty in locating his children. It appears that his eldest daughter was Rosa Bear Face, a graduate of the Hampton Institute and one of the first native teachers on the Standing Rock Reservation. He also had a son, probably Vital Bear Face (c1874-1939) who later became a community leader on Standing Rock. Perhaps family oral history can help...

Leo Bear Face died in December 1914.

[ladonna]

Hi here is what i have I do have more on my computer at work.

Bear Face II

Mato Ite- Leo Bear Face II: born abt. 1830 died 1-20-1915

Spouse: Oyegiwin-Brown Tracks born 1847

Children:
A. Son: Sunkyanajica- Samuel Bear Face Born 1863
B. Daughter: Louisa Bear Face born 1863
C. Daughter: Rosa Bear Face (Topala)- born 1865 died 1891
D. Son: Vital Bear Face born 1874
E. Son: Canyanysin - John Bear Face born 1873
F. Son: Jerome Bear Face born 1889


(A) Sunkyanajica- Samuel Bear Face Born 1862
Spouse: Tasina –Her Robes Agnes Bear Face born 1862

Children
1. Son: Felix Bear Face Born 1882
2. Daughter: Rosa Bear Face born 1893
3. Daughter Rose Bear Face Born 1900 died 1901

(B) Louisa Bear Face born 1863
Spouse: Four Bear

Children
1. Daughter: Flora Four Bear Born 1883
2. Daughter: Martha Four Bear Born 1885
3. Son: Armstrong Four Bear Born 1887

Spouse: Thomas Sand born 1878
Spouse: Eagle Boy
Spouse: Joseph Garter Born 1858

(Marcella Lebeau's grandmother)

(C) Rosa Bear Face -First school Teacher of Sitting Bull Camp
Bear Face, Rosa (Topola=Fourth Born Daughter): Sioux (Standing Rock, ND). Daughter of Chief Bear Face. At Hampton October 1881-May 1884; October 1887-April 1888. Missionary and camp school teacher. Died in 1891.


(D) Vital Bear Face born 1874
Spouse: Otilia Bear face

Children:
Son: Christian Bear Face:
Son" John Bear Face:
Daughter: Annie Bear Face:
Daughter: Odelia Bear Face:
Son: Todelo Bear Face:

Vital Bear Face born 1874
2nd Spouse: Jean Rough Surface born 1894

Children
Son: William Bear face born 1927
Daughter: Doraphine Bear Face

Otilia Bear Face
2nd Spouse: James Bear Shield


I still have more work but Marcella Lebeau from Cheyenne River is a direct descandant and of course i am related too

[Dietmar]

I think this is the only picture we have of Bear Face II, taken from a Standing Rock group photograph:


Bear Face

[ladonna]

wow thank you so much

[emilylevine]

Rosa Bear Face was a very good friend of Josephine Waggoner's at Hampton (and before). Josephine brought her home when she got sick. (You can see her in the photo we have posted---maybe in the Lakota women thread...)

Here is my annotation note: (PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHT)
© Emily Levine
Rosa Bear Face (Topala or Fourth born daughter 1865-1891) was the daughter of Matȟo Ite, Chief Bear Face (1830-Jan. 20, 1916) and (Annie) Oyeǧiwiŋ or Brown Tracks Woman (1847-December 14, 1917). She had a sister named Agleška, born in 1875, and a brother named Not Groaning, born in 1873. From Twenty-Two Years’ Work: “Daughter of Chief Bear Face or Mato-Ite. Returned home May 26, 1884, and in the autumn took a camp school, where a dinner had to be cooked and served to the pupils every day. For a time she had Frances White Cow for assistant and was so very successful that on visiting the school a skeptical senator was inspired to exclaim, ‘Well, this settles the Indian question.’ In ’87 the camp was moved, the school broken up, and Rosa returned to Hampton to get more knowledge and experience. The bright young girl who went home three years before, came back a broken down woman, with an air of patient endurance that told its tale all too plainly. Her health failed so rapidly that she was returned as soon as possible, May 1, ’88. Though in confirmed consumption and so ill as to be at times almost helpless, her influence upon her home and friends, and upon the women and girls whom she gathered around her was truly wonderful, and her life has been a most potent influence in the civilization of her own particular people. In writing about her, the Agent says, ‘Rosa has done more than well. She is a remarkable girl, with modesty, force of character and amiableness of disposition to be envied by many whites with superior advantages.’ Through her influence her father is one of the most progressive of the Sioux chiefs, her home greatly improved in every way, her sisters and friends in citizen dress, and scores of others have been radically helped and influences by her noble example of love and devotion to right” (380). The 1891 report….states [], “went home after three years. Took a camp school, with Frances White Cow for assistant, and ran it with its midday meal most successfully for three years. Breaking up of the camp closed the school and she returned to Hampton, but so physically broken down that she was unable to do anything. She returned expecting to die, but lived over two years….Until her death she was a leader among the progressive women” (DOC 6).
Documentation of Rosa Bear Face’s employment at No. 3 Day School, three miles south of Fort Yates, can be found in NARA SR Box 332 and 410. The influence of Hampton can be found in her June 30, 1885 Monthly Report: “The pupils of this school are all new beginners, being from the families of the late hostile Sioux, and considering their home influences they have done as well as could be expected.”

In a diary entry, Father Francis Craft dates the girls return to May 5, 1888: “…They passed on the road, Rosa Bear-face & Josephine McCarty, returning from Hampton School” (At Standing Rock and Wounded Knee: The Journals and Papers of Father Francis M. Craft, ed. Thomas W. Foley, 108). On April 25, before their return, Craft, in a rather unchristian rant, records that “[Chief] Bear-face came in, furious against Hampton School, for refusing to pay his sick daughter’s fare home. He says he sold a horse for $30.00 & sent her the money himself. Serves him right. I tried to persuade all those Catholic girls to go to Avoca last fall, but they preferred Hampton, though they knew of its corruption & deviltry. But perhaps that was just the attraction” (At Standing Rock, 95-96). Rosa became a member of the Catholic St. Mary Society on Standing Rock and as such was supposed to adhere to certain rules. When Craft found her returning from a wanaǧi ceremony, he had words with her. “She seemed sullen, & did not take the advice well, & walked off. She seemed to regret it, & would have returned, but I refused to talk further…. The society will advise her less gently” (274).
Rosa Bear Face was buried in the Kenel cemetery and since the rising of the waters from the Oahe Dam, she now rests in the new cemetery along side her mother whom she preceded in death.

© Emily Levine. PLease write me if you want to quote or use any of this. Thanks.
_________________________________
I have Rosa Bear Face's teaching records from KC NARA.

[ladonna]

do you have anymore about Frances White Cow she married Spud Murphy I have been looking for who her family is.

[emilylevine]

I'll try uploading my first image and see if this works...

[emilylevine]

cool, it worked!
LaDonna, I don't think I have any genealogical info for Frances White Cow but I'll keep looking. There was a Sarah White Cow at Hampton---she was from Lower Brule, so not a relative? I have a little info on her.
From KC NARA "Descriptive Statement of Pupils Transfered to Hampton..." 1881:
says Frances White Cow's father was Eagle Man, a policeman
she was 14 at the time
weighed 95 lbs.
4' 101/2"
I'll keep my eyes open for more.




Images from Paulette F. Molin's articles in ND History on SR students at Hampton.

Do you know anything about the church down by Black Horse, just west of Hwy 65 on the Grand R.?

[emilylevine]

Mar 20, 2010 0:54:02 GMT -5 ephriam said:

BEAR FACE Mato Ite (c1830-1914). Hunkpapa. Headman at Standing Rock Agency. Later known as Leo Bear Face.

Settled at the Standing Rock Agency. In early October 1876, he was prevailed upon by the Army to go out with Long Feather in an attempt to induce the non-treaty bands to surrender. Helped arrange a council between Sitting Bull and Lt. Col. Otis.

OK, here's my attempt to upload a PDF. It's John S. Gray's article on Long Feather and Bear Face going out to see SB:

Attachments:

[ladonna]

wow thatwas great and you helped me a great deal can't wait to get to my office and finish the genealogy for Eagleman and Francis

[emilylevine]

I'm so glad that helped, LaDonna.

Has anyone seen a painting that was done of Bear Face and Rosa by an Anglo painter in the late 1870s on Standing Rock?

[kingsleybray]

thanks for posting the John S. Gray paper on Bear Face and Long Feather's peace mission, Emily. I've been meaning to track that down for years!

Kingsley

[csalway13]

Hello. My name is Crystal Salway and I am very excited about this post. My mom is Reta Ann Bear Face and my aunt is Jean Bear Face. My uncles Phillip and Bob Bearface passed away when I was a child. I am 21 years old and I have grown up to only know my Salway side. My mom's parents both passed away when she was young and was adopted by the Two Hawk family that are Sicangu (Rosebud Sioux). We don't know much about our Bear Face sides. My aunt is the oldest of Bear Faces that we know of and shes in her 60s, my mom will be 60 this May 2011. I really appreciate these postings... it has made me very excited because I have come to the conclusion that my unborn sons are going to have the last name Bear Face to keep the name alive. Please contact me, I would greatly appreciate it! Thank you!

[csalway13]

also my mother's parents names were William Bear Face And Mabel Iron Horn originally Iron Horn Elk, from what I have been told.

[kingsleybray]

Bear Face (1830-1915) was an informant for Frances Densmore's TETON SIOUX MUSIC study. He gave her important information about the Ghost Owning ceremony (see page 78), observing that "his first spirit keeping was for a son who died at the age of 15." Of the ceremony Bear Face observed: "It is one of the great undertakings of the tribe, not simply in the honor which surrounds it, but because of the work and obligation it involves, so that a man who can carry through this successfully is recognized by the tribe as a man who is qualified to fulfill large responsibilities".

Bear Face and his brothers comprised one of the leading extended families within the Che-okhba band of the Hunkpapa. They settled early at Grand River Agency (relocated to Standing Rock 1873). The brother Iron Horn, who seems to have been a herald or camp crier (eyapha), was first rated by the government as a chief. On November 6, 1876, after Bear Face returned from his peace mission to the non-treaty bands (download the important John S. Gray essay that Emily posted above), the army commander at Ft Yates, Lt Col. W. P. Carlin, issued a certificate recognizing Bear Face as a chief.

The Bear Faces were a very important family of the Hunkpapa tribe.

Kingsley