Tonja Lyla June, I know this horrific story of Genocide that happened to Black Kettle and Arapaho and Cheyenne relatives. The US Military told Black Kettle, who was well known, among all our Indigenous Nations across the Plains, as a great man of peace, where to camp, so they would not be mistaken as "hostiles," including flying an American Flag in front of his Lodge. And if ever confronted by US Military Black Kettle was told to add a white flag, that the Military gave him.
Then, after a drunken night of riding from Denver, US Army Colonel Chivington, knowing exactly where Black Kettle was camped, with a flag of the USA flying outside his Lodge, Chivington and his almost 700 US soldiers, except Captain Silas Soule and his small number of troops, attacked the defenseless Camp at sunrise, including using howitzers, guns, and bayonets . Even though Black Kettle immediately put up the white flag of surrender, as instructed, Chivington and his soldiers slaughtered every elder, mother, child and the men they could. (Many of the men were out hunting for food.)
In their drunken slaughter, the soldiers cut off the Cheyenne and Arapaho men's scrotum sacks and made them into tobacco bags. They cut out women's vaginas and put them over their saddle horns. One of the most sickening acts, to me, was cutting open the wombs of pregnant women and sticking their unborn babies on their bayonets and then riding around holding up the unborn babies on their bayonets, like trophies! They did the same to newborn babies! OF THE ALMOST 500 MASSACRED, 2/3 WERE CHEYENNE AND ARAPAHO WOMEN AND CHILDREN!
During following investigations, numerous witnesses came forward with damning testimony, almost all of which was corroborated by other witnesses. One witness Captain Silas Soule, who had ordered the men under his command not to fire their weapons, was murdered in Denver just weeks after offering his testimony.
However, despite the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the Wars' recommendation, no charges were brought against those who committed the massacre or who murdered Captain Silas Soule. Chivington was beyond the reach of army justice because he'd already resigned his commission. The closest thing to a punishment he suffered was the effective end of his political aspirations.
But Tonja Lyla June, as you share so beautifully in "Time Machine", we are now in the sequel! As I was a very voracious reader and had a father who wanted me to understand what had happened to our Indigenous Peoples of Turtle Island, I begin encountering what happened at Sand Creek and the many other massacres of our Indigenous Relatives across Turtle Island, as a young boy. In fact, in my younger days, every football game I played and every match I wrestled, was payback time against my opponents. I had no mercy!
I am still working on entirely forgiving Sand Creek and the many other similar massacres by the US Military across Turtle Island, but I do understand that only hurt people, hurt people and just colonized people, colonized people. As my beloved father always told me, “ If you can feel it, you can heal it, and if you can talk about it, you can understand it!”
Thank you, Captain Silas Soule, for standing up and giving your life for the truth! I look forward, in time, to personally thank you in the Other Side Camp! You are indeed an unsung hero and deserve to be remembered and honored far more than the Colonel you testified against! And there have been many “Captain Silas Soule’s” whose courage and humanity that has never been told! My heartfelt thanksgiving to you all!