Makhipiya-Luta (1822-1909)

Red Cloud, a great Lakota warrior, was born on the placid banks of the wide, slow-flowing Platte River, near what is now North Platte, Nebraska. Although his parents came from different tribes (his mother was an Oglala; his father, who died while Red Cloud was still young, was a Brule), he was raised as an Oglala Sioux in the home of his mother’s uncle, Chief Smoke.

Though the banks of the Platte were placid as young Red Cloud grew, the countryside was not. His tribe spent much of his formative years fighting wars of territory with the neighboring Pawnee, Crow, Ute and Shoshone tribes.

Oral tradition states that in 1841, Red Cloud killed a man who was vying with Chief Smoke for power. The killing caused a great rift to appear in the Oglala tribe, a split that lasted fifty years. However, he did gain stature and respect for his actions as a war leader during the battles against the other tribes.

In 1866, Red Cloud watched the army building forts along the Bozeman Trail into Montana gold country. The trail ran straight through the Oglala’s lands. Miners and settlers came, first in a trickle, then in great wagon trains that cut deep ruts into the land. Red Cloud had seen the army drive the eastern Lakota from their land in Minnesota during bloody battles in 1862 and 1863. Unwilling to allow his people to suffer the same fate, he led a series of attacks on the forts along the Bozeman Trail -- the single most successful offense ever carried out by an Indian nation. These battles included the overwhelming defeat of eighty men led by Lt. Col. William Fetterman in 1866. News of the Fetterman battle left the states farther east with no doubt; War had been declared along the Bozeman Trail. Throughout the frozen winter, the forts were kept in a constant state of alarm, the soldiers exhausted and expecting another of the Indians’ frequent attacks.

After two years of violent struggle, the U.S. Government agreed to the Fort Laramie treaty, in which it agreed to abandon its garrisons along the Bozeman Trail and grant the Lakota a huge territory that included the Black Hills and parts of Montana and Wyoming.

Gold interfered with the peace that ensued. Though the government had guaranteed the Lakota a land free from white settlers, the discovery of gold in the Black Hills caused a constant stream of white miners and explorers to brave hostility in search of riches. In 1874, Gen. George A. Custer and the Seventh Cavalry rode off on the Black Hills expedition, plunging the plains Indian nations once again into war.

Red Cloud did not join with Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull in the Indian wars of 1876-77 and was not at the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Even after his nation had been defeated militarily, he continued to fight for his people’s dignity and freedom.

In the 1880s, Red Cloud waged a political battle with Pine Ridge Indian agent Valentine McGillycuddy over the proper distribution of government food and supplies, some of which were not finding their way into the bellies and teepee's of the Indian people. He at last forced McGillycuddy’s dismissal. He survived the army’s occupation of the reservation; Sitting Bull did not. He fought without success against the Dawes Act of 1887, which carved reservations into individual tracts.

Until his death in 1909, he continued to lobby for tribal control of their lands and keeping power in the hands of the chiefs.