Native Americans 1865 - 1900 Flashcards
What was the shift in attitude towards Natives in the 1860s?
The policy of westward expansion, the government wanted to implant white settlers on the plains via the Homestead Act in 1862. The Gold Rush and the Union Pacific Railway too encroached on Native lands.
What was the Homestead Act of 1862?
It released land in 160 acre plots, available to farmers for free on the basis that they would farm the land for 5 years. By 1865, 20,000 homesteaders had settles on the plains. Bad impact for Natives.
What was general white attitude over ‘manifest destiny’?
They believed that the land completely belonged to them and that the NAs were for servitude. A clear reflection of the one-sided attitude of government at the time.
What was the Native reaction to white settlers?
It was often violent as many tribes like the Sioux and Cheyenne were hostile to white encroachers during the Civil War, especially during the plains wars 1862-7.
What was the Sand Creek Massacre and what did it show?
It was in 1864. A troop of cavalry attacked an undefended Cheyenne camp killing and mutilating elderly men, women and children. It showed how powerless the Natives were against these encroaching white people.
After 1851, what did many tribes do in return for trust?
They signed treaties and gave land to the white people. For example in the Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867. BUT, the government did not follow through on agreements and just ended up with more land and Natives in a more vulnerable position.
What did the white settlers and treaties do to the ability to follow buffalo herds?
It reduced it, this was their source of life and without the same access to it the population suffered greatly.
What were reservations?
They were government-made land specifically for Natives, tribes like the Navajo and Apache were forced onto these. It was an effort to make them citizens.
Why did the government want to assimilate the Natives?
They represented a ‘threat’ to the government because they had self-determination and were outside US governance.
What did ‘Americanisation’ or ‘assimilation’ entail?
It was the removal of tribal customs and beliefs via education, conversion and learning to farm.
For example, men had to give up polygamy, the matriarchal system was removed, tribal laws were replaced by state laws and authority of the reservations lay under an Indian Agent, who was often corrupt. Children were taken away and sent to white boarding schools.
What was the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty?
It created the Great Sioux Reservation for example.
Who took over treaty making from the government after 1871?
Congress did under the 1871 Indian Appropriation Act.
What did the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876 show?
It showed the growing discontent from NA tribes. It just ended up with the Great Sioux Reserve being split up into 6 smaller reserves, hindering NA land rights further.
What was the Battle of Little Bighorn?
Custer and his men were sent up to round up Sioux and Cheyenne Indians who had left the Great Sioux Reservation and were refusing to return.
Custer didn’t wait for the rest of his men to arrive and tried to circle the Indians. Him and his 200 men were quickly overwhelmed by superior numbers and all were killed.
Why was there no united opposition to government policy?
Because the tribes were often enemies and even at war with each other.
How harsh was life on the reservations?
It was incredibly tough. The land they were given was often unfarmable. Indian Agents from The BIA were corrupt and didn’t deliver appropriate aid. Famines and disease hit hard. Mass scale devastation of the Buffalo destroyed their food source. By 1900, only 100k of the 240k in 1860 remained.
What happened at Wounded Knee in 1890?
A desperate band of 200 starving and unarmed Sioux Indians including women and children who had left their reservation were gunned down by the army at Wounded Knee in South Dakota.
Did any tribes benefit from reservations?
Yes, the Navajo did. They quickly adapted to farming and had received more than 10.5 million acres as a reward for their good work. By 1900 more than 22,000 lived on from 8,000 in 1868.
How was education key at ‘Americanising’ the NAs?
Children were taught English, though this was limited as many teachers were frustrated at conditions and the language barrier. The establishment of vocational schools in the 1870s did provide trades for boys like masonry and girls cooking and sewing but few found employment and returned to the reservation. It was purely an attempt to make NAs lost their tribal essence.
What did the Indian Rights Association do?
In 1882 they promoted the ending of tribal lifestyle and wanted NAs to fully assimilate into society as true Christian, American citizens, pedalling the government’s policy of Americanisation. This would be done via reforms to tribal faith and customs.
Why did the federal government (Congress) bring in the Dawes / General Allotment Act 1887?
It was clear that reservation policy wasn’t assimilating Natives.
What was the Dawes Act of 1887?
It divided reservations into allotments or homesteads for NAs, similar to the Homestead Act of 1862 for white people.
Every head of the family would receive 160 acres of farmland or 320 acres of grazing land for 25 years of trust. After 25 years the NAs would have full ownership of the land and citizenship.
Did any reservations survive under the Dawes Act?
Yes, some reservations such as the Navajo reservation survived but most were significantly reduced or destroyed.
How can the Dawes Act be seen as negative for NAs?
It completely disrupted their way of life, the fact that land could belong to someone was alien to them. Land was also given to the male head, disrupting the matriarchy.
NAs found it hard to adapt to reservations and land was often bought by white people, with glass beads and worthless ‘currency’.
