Native Americans Flashcards
When were the Plains Wars?
1862-67
What types of tribes live on the Great Plains?
Nomadic Tribes
What did Native Americans believe about land?
Land is a common resource which can’t be owned but does belong to them
When was the Gold Rush?
1848
Where did the Gold Rush happen?
Sacramento Valley
How much had the non-native population increased by in 1849?
1000 to 100,000
How did the Gold Rush affect the NA population?
20 years after 80% of the NA population was wiped out
What were four threats to the Native Americans?
Manifest Destiny
Gold Rush
Homesteader
Railways
What was Manifest Destiny?
Belief that it was American’s God-given right to settle rest of continent
What was the Gold Rush?
Discovery of gold in California 1847 that led to influx of migrant workers
What were Homesteaders?
Gave farmers 160-acre plot free on Great Plains if farmed for 5 years
What were the Railways?
Building of railroads across America from coast-to-coast
What did Manifest Destiny lead to?
Expansion and dismantlement of NA communities
What did Gold Rush lead to?
New settlers disrupted native way of life and brought epidemics, violence and loss
What did Homesteaders lead to?
Disruption of nomadic life
What did Railways lead to?
Brought more European settlers to the plains and disrupted buffalo herds
When was the Sand Creek Massacre?
1864
What happened in the Sand Creek Massacre?
750 Cheyenne forced to abandon their winter campsite and moved to Sand Creek but were attacked and slaughtered by volunteer soldiers
How many Native Americans were killed in Sand Creek Massacre?
148
When was Red Cloud’s War?
1866
What was Red Cloud’s War?
Armed conflict between the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Northern Arapaho on one side and the United States, 80 US soldiers killed
What did Red Cloud’s War result in?
Signing of Treaty of Fort Laramie in 1868
Who led westward expansion to Kansas in 1867?
General Hancock
What did Hancock provoke?
Torched an abandoned NA village and provoked a full scale war
Which treaty did NA sign following the 1867 Kansas expansion?
Medicine Lodge Treaty in October 1867
When was the Great Sioux War?
1877
What was the Great Sioux War?
Opposition of NA against sale of Black Hills of Dakota and treaties proposed by US government - Sitting Bull refused to sign and army led by General Custer
When was the Battle of Little Bighorn?
1876
What was the Battle of Little Bighorn?
Custer and 300 of his men slaughtered by Native Americans (short-term success)
What did the Battle of Little Bighorn lead to?
The death of Custer led to backlash from the US government and the removal of the Black Hills of Dakota from NA reservations
What was the reservation policy?
Policy from 1802 when the federal government began negotiations with ‘Civilised Tribes’ to allocate land to NA
Who were the five ‘civilised tribes’?
Checkasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee-Creek, Seminole, Cherokee Nations
When was the Indian Removal Act?
1830
When was the Navajo Treaty signed?
1868
What was the Navajo Treaty Act?
Agreement of reservation for Navajo tribe in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah
When did Native Americans lose right to determine what happened to their land?
1871
How long did reservation policy last?
1871-87
How was assimilation attempted?
Through education, conversion to Christianity, turning NAs to farmers and establishment of government reservations
How did the US government destroy NA way of life?
Forbade polygamy, herbal remedies and communal living
How did education destroy NA way of life?
Children were forbidden from speaking in their language and had to renounce traditional tribal beliefs
Negatives of reservations
Land impossible to cultivate
Thousands of NAs starved
Segregated them from rest of US society
Bad example of reservations
1890 200 starving and unarmed Sioux Indians left their reservation and were gunned down by army in South Dakota