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2.   1860 – 360,000 Indians in the West  In the path of migrating settlers  Impacted by diseases (ex. Cholera, typhoid, smallpox)  Reduction of buffalo population Expansion impacts Indians

3.   Treaties created the reservation system in the West  Whites could not understand that most Indians had no real leader and did not recognize an authority outside their immediate family  Indians surrender their lands after promises to be left alone and provided with food, clothing and other supplies  Indian agents corrupt Treaties of Fort Laramie (1851) and Fort Atkinson (1853)

4.   White troops and Native Americans had a series of violent clashes beginning in the 1860s  These clashes intensified after gold was discovered in the Black Hills of South Dakota which was part of the Sioux reservation  Culminated in the Battle of Little Bighorn (1876)  General George Custer and his 264 men were killed in the battle Violence erupts George Custer

5.   Violent confrontations continued as one by one Indian groups were defeated  Why were the Indians ultimately defeated?  Indian spirit shattered  Indians cheaper to feed than fight  Railroad made transportation easier  Disease  Virtual extermination of buffalo “Taming” the Indians

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7.   Attempt at Indian assimilation  Focus on educating Indian children  Dissolved tribes  Wiped out tribal ownership of land  Head of each Indian family got 160 acres  Would get the title to their land and citizenship in 25 years  Reservation land not allotted to Indians was sold to railroads and white settlers Dawes Act (1887) Sen. Henry Dawes who introduced the Dawes Act

8.  Arrest of Sitting Bull  In December 1890, the US Army ordered the arrest of the Sioux’s chief, Sitting Bull, because of a rapidly growing Ghost Dance movement, a ritual that promised to restore their land and way of life  During the arrest, Sitting Bull was killed and the remaining 350 starving and freezing Sioux were arrested and taken to Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota The Ghost Dance Ritual

9.  Battle of Wounded Knee  The next day, the soldiers demanded that the Sioux give up their weapons – a shot was fired, no one knows from which side, and when it was over, 300 Native Americans, including several children, were dead  This brought the Indian Wars to a bitter end – Native Americans in the United States were fully confined to reservations Spotted Elk lies dead after the Battle of Wounded Knee

10.   By 1900, Indians had lost 50% of the 156 million acres they held 2 decades earlier  By 1887, only about 243,000 Native Americans remained Impact on Indians

11.   Gave settlers as much as 160 acres of land by living on it for 5 years and paying a fee of $30  2 out of 3 were forced to give up their land as result of drought  Led to fraud Homestead Act of 1862