By this date in 1823, troops of the United States Sixth Infantry were back in their barracks after a punitive expedition against the Arikaras. A generation of tensions had led to the conflict. St. Louis fur traders felt entitled to go anywhere they wanted on the Missouri River, while the Arikara felt entitled to control their own territory.
The Lewis and Clark Expedition intended to promote better relations with the Arikara Confederacy, and the principal leader of the Arikara, Too Né, made a journey to Washington, but he fell ill and died there. When word of his death came back to the Arikaras, they beat the messenger.
Meanwhile, a robust sex trade prompted additional contempt. In 1811, visitor Henry Brackenridge wrote of chief who said: “I was wondering whether you white people have any women amongst you.” After Brackenridge assured him in the affirmative, the chief said: “Then why it is that your people are so fond of our women, one might suppose they had never seen any before.”
In 1819, Colonel Atkinson's Yellowstone Expedition came to Pawnee villages. They told local leaders that a smallpox vaccine existed, but they weren't getting any. The Arikaras may have learned of this neglect of their Pawnee relatives, another source of tension.
In early 1823, a band of Arikara warriors beat up six fur traders from the Missouri Fur Company, stole everything they had, and abandoned them. As this band hung around a Missouri Fur Company post, a female captive dashed toward the fort, with Arikara warriors in pursuit. The fur traders opened fire, killing two. One of them was the son of Grey Eyes, mayor of the lower Arikara village.
When Henry Ashley's Rocky Mountain Fur Company arrived at the lower Arikara village a few weeks later, Grey Eyes demanded compensation for the two men killed by Ashley’s rival fur company. Ashley said he was interested in trade and promised that the federal government would investigate.
But the event that finally triggered open combat came after two of Ashley’s fur traders went looking for sex in the middle of the night in the Arikara village. One of the men was killed, while the other was followed by hundreds of angry Arikaras to the fur traders' camp. In an impromptu ambush, twelve men died and eleven were wounded, leading to calls for vengeance and the war that followed.
Dakota Datebook by Andrew Alexis Varvel
References:
- William R. Nester, The Arikara War (Missoula, MT: Rocky Mountain Publishing Company, 2001), page 181.
- Tracy Potter, Sheheke: Mandan Indian Diplomat (Helena MT & Washburn, ND: Farcountry Press and Fort Mandan Press, 2003), pages 140-145.
- We Proceeded On (Bismarck: Lewis and Clark Trail Heritage Foundation), May 2018, volume 44, number 2, page 31.
- https://lewisandclark.org/wpo/pdf/vol44no2.pdf
- W. Raymond Wood and Thomas D. Thiessen, Early Fur Trade on the Northern Plains (Norman, OK: Oklahoma University Press, 1985), pages 68-69.
- Reuben Gold Thwaites (editor), Early Western Travels, 1748-1846: Volume V: Bradbury's Travels in the Interior of America, 1809-1811 (Cleveland: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1904), pages 140-141 (June 17, 1810).
- Thwaites, Volume VI: Brackenridge's Journal up the Missouri, 1811 (Cleveland: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1904), pages 128-131 (June 18, 1811).
- Thwaites; Volume XV: Part II of James's Account of S. H. Long's Expedition, 1819-1820 (Cleveland: The Arthur H. Clark Company, 1905), page 202.
- Ibid., page 208.
- Nester, pages 136-145.
