BLACK KETTLE, a leading chief of the Cheyenne tribe of Indians: b. near the Black Hills of Dakota about 1803; d. 27 Nov. 1868. In the separation of his people into the North ern and Southern Cheyenne tribes, about 1832, he cast his lot with the latter. His name did not appear among the signers of the treaty in which the Southern Cheyenne tribe joined at the Horse Creek council on the Platte, in 1851, but it did appear as that of the ranking chief of the tribe on the treaty which was negotiated at Fort Wise, Col., in 1861. In September 1864, he visited Denver at the head of a delegation of Cheyenne and Arapaho chiefs (their people having been at war with the whites during the summer) to ask for peace at the hands of Gov. John Evans, who was also superintendent of Indian affairs for Colorado Territory. This request having been refused, Black Kettle and several of the other leaders took a large band of their people to Fort Lyon, Col., where they surrendered to the commander, Maj. Edward W. Wynkoop, giving up their horses and arms as an earnest of their sincerity. Major Wyn koop was relieved of his command of the post a few weeks later and his successor, returning the surrendered arms and horses to Black Ket tle and his people, directed them to move their camp to a point on Sand Creek, 40 miles dis tant, where they could subsist by hunting. Trusting implicitly in the good faith and in tegrity of the military authorities, Black Kettle and his followers did as they were told, where upon an expedition was organized at Denver under the command of Col. John M. Chiving ton, marched to Sand Creek and attacked the Cheyenne camp, killing 161 of its people, re gardless of age or sex, 29 Nov. 1864. Despite the evident treachery with which this massacre had been planned and executed, Black Kettle remained inclined toward peace, maintaining his friendship with Major Wynkoop, former Agent William Bent and other white men whom he could trust and who aided in nego tiating a new treaty in the council held at the mouth of the Little Arkansas, in October 1865, whereby the Sand Creek massacre was specifi cally disavowed by the government of the United States and material reparation offered therefor. In the winter of 1866-67, Black Ket
tle visited Fort Harker, Kan., where he made an eloquent though ineffective plea against the extension of the "iron road" across the plains, contending that it "would drive away the buffalo and leave the red children of the Great Father at Washington to starve.° He signed the treaty which was entered into at Medicine Lodge in October 1867, but a large part of his own tribe, resenting the building of the railways across the buffalo range and the increasing encroach ments of white hunters, continued at war the following year. Black Kettle, however, re mained peaceably near the tribal agency at Fort Lamed. In the autumn, against the advice of Agent Wynkoop, he removed the encampment of his band to the valley of the Washita, in the extreme western part of the Indian Territory, whence he made a journey to Fort Cobb to as sure the commandant, Gen. William B. Hazen, of his friendliness. A few days after his re turn from Fort Cobb, his village was attacked and destroyed by the 7th U. S. Cavalry, under command of Gen. George A. Custer, Black Kettle being among the slain, 27 Nov. 1868. Consult 'Annual Report of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs) (Washington, D. C., 1864, pp. 216-58) ; also, "Massacre of the Cheyenne Indians" (a special report of the Committee on the Conduct of the War, House of Representa tives, 10 Jan. 1865).