"A Day That Will Live in Infamy ..."

   But it's not my story to tell. I'm to only not forget that this day, the day after Christmas in 1862, thirty-eight Santee Dakota men were simultaneously hung in Mankato, Minnesota, the largest mass execution ever in the United States; two more were kidnapped from Canada and hung in 1865. 

This is my humble acknowledgment of it; the best that I can do. I include website URLs for further information.

Mikwendaagoziwag (They are remembered.)

 https://indiancountrytoday.com/news/traumatic-true-history-full-list-dakota-38

Tipi-hdo-niche, Forbids His Dwelling

Wyata-tonwan, His People

Taju-xa, Red Otter

Hinhan-shoon-koyag-mani, Walks Clothed in an Owl’s Tail

Maza-bomidu, Iron Blower

Wapa-duta, Scarlet Leaf

Wahena, translation unknown

Sna-mani, Tinkling Walker

Radapinyanke, Rattling Runner

Dowan niye, The Singer

Xunka ska, White Dog

Hepan, family name for a second son

Tunkan icha ta mani, Walks With His Grandfather

Ite duta, Scarlet Face

Amdacha, Broken to Pieces

Hepidan, family name for a third son

Marpiya te najin, Stands on a Cloud (Cut Nose)

Henry Milord (French mixed-blood)

Dan Little, Chaska dan, family name for a first son (this may be We-chank-wash-ta-don-pee, who had been pardoned and was mistakenly executed when he answered to a call for “Chaska,” reference to a first son.

Baptiste Campbell, (French mixed-blood)

Tate kage, Wind Maker

Hapinkpa, Tip of the Horn

Hypolite Auge (French mixed-blood)

Nape shuha, Does Not Flee

Wakan tanka, Great Spirit

Tunkan koyag I najin, Stands Clothed with His Grandfather

Maka te najin, Stands Upon Earth

Pazi kuta mani, Walks Prepared to Shoot

Tate hdo dan, Wind Comes Back

Waxicun na, Little Whiteman (this young white man, adopted by the Dakota at an early age and who was acquitted, was hanged, according to the Minnesota Historical Society U.S.-Dakota War website).

Aichaga, To Grow Upon

Ho tan inku, Voice Heard in Returning

Cetan hunka, The Parent Hawk

Had hin hda, To Make a Rattling Noise

Chanka hdo, Near the Woods

Oyate tonwan, The Coming People

Mehu we mea, He Comes for Me

 

Wakinyan na, Little Thunder

Wakanozanzan and Shakopee:

These two chiefs who fled north after the war, were kidnapped from Canada in January 1864 and were tried and convicted in November that year and their executions were approved by President Andrew Johnson (after Lincoln’s assassination) and they were hanged November 11, 1865.

More than 25% of the thousands who surrendered would be dead before the end of 1863. Thousands were exiled to the Dakotas, Montana or as far as Manitoba. 

In addition, 265 men, 16 women, and 2 children were taken from the Dakota concentration camp below Fort Snelling, in 1863, by steamboat down the Mississippi to Camp Kearney, the prisoner of war camp at Davenport, Iowa.

MHS: https://www.usdakotawar.org/history/aftermath

   I purchased this book

The Dakota Prisoner of War Letters:        Dakota Kaskapi Okicize Wowapi

Clifford Canku & Michael Simon, translators  MHS 2013

https://tribalcollegejournal.org/dakota-prisoner-war-letters-dakota-kaskapi-okicize-wowapi/

  

   Fifty of these letters written in the Dakota language during the post-Dakota War years have been translated from Dakota into English allowing readers a view into the world of Dakota imprisonment and confinement at Camp Kearney and Camp McClellan at Davenport, Iowa, between 1863 and 1866.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_McClellan_(Iowa)

   The translation process of each letter was completed in three parts: first, the original Dakota message was reproduced, line by line. Next, each Dakota word was individually translated into English. Finally, a translation of the original Dakota message was composed in prose-like, standard English.

 

    Since the birth of our Anishinaabeg grandson eleven years ago, I’ve been studying the historical relationship between the estimated 12-million First Peoples of this continent and their encounters with European explorers prior to 1492 and on, although American history having been a matter of great personal interest to me since the publication of Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee by author Dee Brown.
 

   My early Indigenous history interests stemmed from reading a memorial history marker along a highway near Fort Ridgely in southwestern Minnesota, that told about the U.S.-Dakota War of 1862. The implication that this tragic situation happened in Minnesota, of all places, and became the beginning of the Plains Indian wars after 1863, later involving Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, grew in my mind exponentially; I was very keen to learn more, but it wasn’t for another twenty years that I finally got around to actually doing it. I think it took some maturity to take it all in objectively.

    The bulk of my reading has concentrated on the interactions between the hundreds of Indigenous nations themselves, and the newly-minted Americans of the 400 years hence, when Native deaths stemming from infectious disease and genocide reduced the Indigenous population to less than 250,000 by 1890. With numerous forays into present-day texts and video discussions authored by Indigenous writers and teachers, I’ve learned the 7th Generation are thriving survivors; our grandson and his family (all our relations) in Wisconsin are included in the strengthening 2.5 million population.

"Go cry over someone else's tragedy," a quote attributed to Bobby Wilson, (Sisseton-Wahpeton Dakota) during a 2013 TEDx Talk in Manitoba: “Cause we’re alive and thriving, we have absolutely... The thing that gets forgotten in the middle of all the other things is that we’re modern. We’re human. We’re here!”

https://journal.acs.org.au/index.php/ajis/article/view/1581/778