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While we know our northern friends may not feel it, in the South, Spring is
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The morning after this council, I
addressed the following letter to the agent
of these Indians, which is published in the
report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs
for 1864, page 220:
"Colorado Superintendency
Indian Affairs, Denver,
September 29, 1864.
"Sir:
"The chiefs brought in by Major
Wynkoop have been heard. I have
declined to make any peace with
them, lest it might embarrass
the military operations against
the hostile Indians on the
plains. The Arapahoe and
Cheyenne Indians being now at
war with the United States
Government, must make peace with
the military authorities. Of
course this arrangement relieves
the Indian Bureau of their care
until peace is declared with
them; and as these tribes are
yet scattered, and all except
Friday's band are at war, it is
not probable that it will be
done immediately. You will be
particular to impress upon these
chiefs the fact that my talk
with them was for the purpose of
ascertaining their views, and
not to offer them anything
whatever. They must deal with
the military authorities until
peace, in which case, alone,
they will be in proper position
to treat with the government in
relation to the future.
"I have the honor to be, very
respectfully, your obedient
servant,"
JOHN EVANS,
Governor Colorado Territory and
ex-officio Superintendent of
Indian Affairs.
MAJOR S. G. COLLEY,
United States Indian Agent,
Upper Arkansas.
It will thus be seen that I had, with the
approval of the Indian Bureau, turned the
adjustment of difficulties with the hostile
Indians entirely over to the military
authorities; that I had instructed Agent
Colley, at Fort Lyon, that this would
relieve the Bureau of further care of the
Arapaho and Cheyenne, until peace was made,
and having had no notice of such peace, or
instructions to change the arrangement, the
status of these Indians was in no respect
within my jurisdiction, or under my official
inspection.
It may be proper for me to say further, that
it will appear in evidence that I had no
intimation of the direction in which the
campaign against the hostile Indians was to
move, or against what bands it was to be
made, when I left the Territory last fall,
and that I was absent from Colorado when the
Sand Creek battle occurred.
The report continues:
"It is true that there seems
to have been excited among the
people inhabiting that region of
country a hostile feeling
towards the Indians. Some had
committed acts of hostility
towards the whites, but no
effort seems to have been made
by the authorities there to
prevent these hostilities, other
than by the commission of even
worse acts."
"Some had committed acts of
hostility towards the whites!"
Hear the facts: In the fall of
1863 a general alliance of the
Indians of the plains was
effected with the Sioux, and in
the language of Bull Bear, in
the report of the council,
"Their plan is to clean out all
this country."
The war opened early in the spring of
1864. The people of the East, absorbed in
the greater interest of the rebellion, know
but little of its history. Stock was stolen,
ranches destroyed, houses burned, freight
trains plundered, and their contents carried
away or scattered upon the plains; settlers
in the frontier counties murdered, or forced
to seek safety for themselves and families
in blockhouses and interior towns; emigrants
to our Territory were surprised in their
camps, children were slain, and wives taken
prisoners; our trade and travel with the
States were cut off; the necessities of life
were at starvation prices; the interests of
the Territory were being damaged to the
extent of millions; every species of
atrocity and barbarity which characterizes
savage warfare was committed. This is no
fancy sketch, but a plain statement of facts
of which the committee seem to have had no
proper realization. All this history of war
and blood-all this history of rapine and
ruin -all this story of outrage and
suffering on the part of our people-is
summed up by the committee, and given to the
public in one mild sentence, "Some had
committed acts of hostility against the
whites."
The committee not only ignore the general
and terrible character of our Indian war,
and the great sufferings of our people, but
make the grave charge that "no effort seems
to have been - made by the authorities there
to prevent all these hostilities."
Had the committee taken the trouble, as they
certainly should have done before making so
grave a charge, to have read the public
documents of the government, examined the
record and files of the Indian Bureau, of
the War Department, and of this
superintendency, instead of adopting the
language of some hostile and irresponsible
witness, as they appear to have done,
they would have found that the most earnest
and persistent efforts had been made on my
part to prevent hostilities. The records
show that early in the spring of 1863,
United States Indian Agent Loree, of the
Upper Platte Agency, reported to me in
person that the Sioux under his agency, and
the Arapaho and Cheyenne, were negotiating
an affiance for war on the whites. I
immediately wrote an urgent appeal for
authority to avert the danger, and sent
Agent Loree as special messenger with the
dispatch to Washington. In response
authority was given, and an earnest effort
was made to collect the Indians in council.
The following admission, in the report of
the council, explains the result:
"Governor Evans: Hearing last fall
that they were dissatisfied, the Great
Father at Washington sent me out on the
plains to talk with you and make it all
right. I sent messengers out to tell you
that I had presents, and would make you a
feast; but you sent word to me that you did
not want to have anything to do with me, and
to the Great Father at Washington that you
could get along without him. Bull Bear
wanted to come in to see me, at the head of
the Republican, but his people held a
council and would not let him come.'
"Black Kettle: `That is true.'
"Governor Evans: I was under the
necessity, after all my trouble, and all the
expense I was at, of returning home without
seeing them. Instead of this, your people
went away and smoked the war-pipe with our
enemies.'
Notwithstanding these unsuccessful efforts,
I still hoped to preserve peace.
The records of these offices also show that,
in the autumn of 1863, I was reliably
advised from various sources that nearly all
the Indians of the plains had formed an
alliance for the purpose of going to war in
the spring, and I immediately commenced my
efforts to avert the imminent danger. From
that time forward, by letter, by telegram,
and personal representation to the
Commissioner of Indian Affairs, the
Secretary of War, the commanders of the
department and district; by traveling for
weeks in the wilderness of the plains; by
distribution of annuities and presents; by
sending notice to the Indians to leave the
hostile alliance; by every means within my
power, I endeavored to preserve peace and
protect the interests of the people of the
Territory. And in the face of all this,
which the records abundantly show, the
committee say: "No effort seems to have been
made by the authorities there to prevent
these hostilities, other than by the
commission of even worse acts."
They do not point out any of these acts,
unless the continuation of the paragraph is
intended to do so. It proceeds:
"The hatred of the whites to
the Indians would seem to have
been inflamed and excited to the
utmost. The bodies of persons
killed at a distance-whether by
Indians or not is not
certain-were brought to the
capital of the Territory and
exposed to the public gaze, for
the purpose of inflaming still
more the already excited
feelings of the people."
There is no mention in this of anything
that was done by authority, but it is so
full of misrepresentation, in apology for
the Indians, and unjust reflection on a
people who have a right from their birth,
education, and ties of sympathy with the
people they so recently left behind them, to
have at least a just consideration. The
bodies referred to were those of the Hungate
family, who were brutally murdered by the
Indians, within twenty-five miles of Denver.
No one here ever doubted that the Indians
did it, and it was admitted by the Indians
in the council. This was early in the
summer, and before the notice sent in June
to the friendly Indians. Their mangled
bodies were brought to Denver for decent
burial. Many of our people went to see them,
as any people would have done. It did
produce excitement and consternation, and
where are the people who could have
witnessed it without emotion? Would the
committee have the people shut their eyes to
such scenes at their very doors?
The next sentence, equally unjust and
unfair, refers to my proclamation, issued
two months after this occurrence, and four
months before the "attack" they were
investigating, and having no connection with
it or with the troops engaged in it. It is
as follows:
"The cupidity was appealed
to, for the Governor, in a
proclamation, calls upon all,
either individually, or in such
parties as they may organize, to
kill and destroy as enemies of
the country, wherever they may
be found, all such hostile
Indians; authorizing them to
hold, to their own use and
benefit, all the property of
said hostile Indians they may
capture. What Indians he would
ever term friendly, it is
impossible to tell."
I offer the following statement of the
circumstances under which this proclamation
was issued by the Hon. D. A. Chever. It is
as follows:
Executive Department,
Colorado Territory,
August 21, 1865.
"I, David A. Chever, Clerk in
the office of the Governor of
the territory of Colorado, do
solemnly swear that the people
of said territory, from the
Purgatoire to the Cache la
Poudre rivers, a distance of
over two hundred miles, and for
a like distance along the Platte
river, being the whole of our
settlements on the plains, were
thrown into the greatest alarm
and consternation by numerous
and almost simultaneous attacks
and depredations by hostile
Indians early last summer; that
they left their unreaped crops,
and collecting into communities
built blockhouses and stockades
for protection at central points
throughout the long line of
settlements; that those living
in the vicinity of Denver City
fled to it, and that the people
of said city were in great fear
of sharing the fate of New Ulm,
Minnesota; that the threatened
loss of crops, and the
interruption of communication
with the states by the combined
hostilities, threatened the very
existence of the whole people;
that this feeling of danger was
universal; that a flood of
petitions and deputations poured
into this office, from the
people of all parts of the
territory, praying for
protection, and for arms and
authority to protect themselves;
that the defects of the militia
law and the want of means to
provide for defense was proved
by the failure of this
department, after the utmost
endeavors, to secure an
effective organization under it;
that reliable reports of the
presence of a large body of
hostile warriors at no great
distance east of this place were
received, which reports were
afterwards proved to be true, by
the statement of Elbridge Gerry
(page 232, Report of
Commissioner of Indian Affairs
for 1864); that repeated and
urgent applications to the War
Department for protection and
authority to raise troops for
the purpose had f ailed; that
urgent applications to
department and district
commanders had failed to bring
any prospect of relief, and that
in the midst of this terrible
consternation and apparently
defenseless condition, it had
been announced to this office,
from district head-quarters,
that all the Colorado troops in
the service of the United States
had been peremptorily ordered
away, and nearly all of them had
marched to the Arkansas River,
to be in position to repel the
threatened invasion of the
rebels into Kansas and Missouri;
that reliable reports of
depredations and murders by the
Indians, from all parts of our
extended lines of ex-posed
settlements, became daily more
numerous, until the simultaneous
attacks on trains along the
overland stage line were
reported by telegraph, on the
8th of August, described in the
letter of George K. Otis,
superintendent of overland stage
line, published on page 254 of
Report of Commissioner of Indian
Affairs for 1864. Under these
circumstances, on the 11th of
August, the Governor issued his
proclamation to the people,
calling upon them to defend
their homes and families from
the savage foe; that it
prevented anarchy; that several
militia companies immediately
organized under it, and aided in
inspiring confidence; that under
its authority no act of
impropriety has been reported,
and I do not believe that any
occurred; that it had no
reference to or connection with
the third regiment of
one-hundred-days men that was
subsequently raised by authority
of the War Department, under a
different proclamation, calling
for volunteers, or with any of
the troops engaged in the Sand.
Creek Affair, and that the
reference to it in such
connection in the report of the
Committee on the Conduct of the
War is a per-Version of the
history and facts in the case.
DAVID A. CHEVER.
Territory of
Colorado, Arapahoe County,
City of Denver,
SS.: Subscribed and sworn to
before me this 21st day of
August, A.D. 1865.
ELI M. ASHLEY, Notary Public.
I had appealed by telegraph, June 14th,
to the War Department for authority to call
the militia into the United States service,
or to raise one-hundred-day troops; also had
written to our delegate in Congress to see
why I got no response, and had received his
reply to the effect that he could learn
nothing about it; had received a notice from
the department commander, declining to take
the responsibility of asking the militia for
United States service, throwing the people
entirely on the necessity of taking care of
themselves.
It was under these circumstances of
trial, suffering, and danger on the part of
the people, and of fruitless appeal upon my
part to the general government for aid, that
I issued my proclamation of the 11th of
August, 1864, of which the committee
complains.
Without means to mount or pay militia, and
failing to get government authority to raise
forces, and under the withdrawal of the few
troops in the Territory, could any other
course be pursued?
The people were asked to fight on their own
account at their own expense and in
lieu of the protection the government failed
to render. They were authorized to kill only
the Indians that were murdering and robbing
them in hostility, and to keep the property
captured from them. How the committee would
have them fight these savages, and what
other disposition they would make of the
property captured, the public will be
curious to know. Would they fight without
killing? Would they have the captured
property turned over to the government, as
if captured by United States troops? Would
they forbid such captures? Would they
restore it to the hostile tribes?
The absurdity of the committee's saying that
this was an "appeal to the cupidity," is too
palpable to require much comment. Would men
leave high wages, mount and equip themselves
at enormous expense, as some patriotically
did, for the poor chance of capturing
property, as a mere speculation, from the
prowling bands of Indians that infested the
settlements and were murdering their
families? The thing is preposterous.
For this proclamation I have no apology. It
had its origin and has its justification in
the imperative necessities of the case. A
merciless foe surrounded us. Without means
to mount or pay militia, unable to secure
government authority to raise forces, and
our own troops ordered away, again I ask,
could any other course be pursued?
Captain Tyler's and other companies
organized under it, at enormous expense,
left their lucrative business, high wages,
and profitable employment, and served
without other pay than the consciousness of
having done noble and patriotic service; and
no act of impropriety has ever been laid to
the charge of any party acting under this
proclamation. They had all been disbanded
months before the "attack" was made that the
committee were investigating.
The third regiment was organized under
authority from the War Department,
subsequently received by telegraph, and
under a subsequent proclamation issued on
the 13th of August, and were regularly
mustered into the service of the United
States about three months before the battle
the committee were investigating occurred.
Before closing this reply, it is perhaps
just that I should say that when I testified
before the committee, the chairman and all
its members except three were absent, and I
think, when the truth becomes known, this
report will trace its parentage to a Single
member of the committee.
I have thus noticed such portions of the
report as refer to myself, and shown
conclusively that the committee, in every
mention they have made of me, have been,. to
say the least, mistaken.
First: The committee, for the evident
purpose of maintaining their position that
these Indians had not been engaged in war,
say the prisoners they held were purchased.
The testimony is to the effect that they
captured them.
Second: The committee say that these
Indians were and always had been friendly,
and had committed no acts of hostility or
depredations. The public documents to which
I refer show conclusively that they had been
hostile, and had committed many acts of
hostility and depredations.
Third: They say that I joined in
sending these Indians to Fort Lyon. The
published report of the Commissioner of
Indian Affairs, and of the Indian council,
show that I left them entirely in the hands
of the military authorities.
Fourth: They say nothing seems to
have been done by the authorities to prevent
hostilities. The public documents and files
of the Indian Bureau, and of my
superintendency, show constant and
unremitting diligence and effort on my part
to prevent hostilities and protect the
people.
Fifth: They say that I prevaricated
for the purpose of avoiding the admission
that these Indians "were and had been
actuated by the most friendly feelings
towards the whites." Public documents cited
show conclusively that the admission they
desired me to make was false, and that my
statement, instead of being a prevarication,
was true, although not in accordance with
the preconceived and mistaken opinions of
the committee.
This report, so full of mistakes which
ordinary investigation would have avoided;
so full of slander, which ordinary care of
the character of men would have prevented,
is to be regretted, for the reason that it
throws doubt upon the reliability of all
reports which have emanated from the same
source, during the last four years of war.
I am confident that the public will see,
from the facts herein set forth, the great
injustice done me; and I am further
confident that the committee, when they know
these and other facts I shall lay before
them, will also see this injustice, and, as
far as possible, repair it.
Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
JOHN EVANS,
Governor of the Territory of Colorado, and
ex-officio Superintendent of Indian Affairs.
