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| Buffalo Hunt - Charles M. Russell |
In the final pages of My
Life as an Indian, J. W. Schultz, a white frontiersman adopted into the
Piegan band of the Blackfoot Indian Tribe, states in a melancholy tone: “That
was the last herd of them (Buffalo) that Nat-ah-ki and I ever saw.” (p. 211)
This simple but moving statement marks a tragic shift in the lives of all
Plains Indians. In 1884, frontier hunters killed the last free ranging buffalo.
At the same time, the United States government began a vicious campaign to
subdue and consolidate the Plains Indians. In the mist of this political and
cultural turmoil, Russell F. Tharp (Dr. Clancy Clark’s grandfather) was born.
Although his life is unique in many respects, it is emblematic of the experiences
of many Native Americans in the early twentieth-century. Russell endured a
period of forced assimilation that resulted in him questioning his spiritual
and cultural identity. This post retraces and contextualizes the major events
of Russell’s life into the history of White-Indian contact on the plains.
It is crucial to understand several historical events in
America preceding Russell Tharp’s birth. In the late 1700s, European settlers
in North America considered the frontier to be the western slopes of the
Appalachians. The “Panther Captivity,” Account
of a Lady Taken by the Indians in 1777, is reflective of this mentality.
The author describes this unknown land in his narrative:
We traveled for thirteen days in a
westerly direction, without meeting any thing uncommon or worthy of
description, except the very great variety of birds and wild beasts, which
would frequently start before us, and as we had our muskets contributed not a
little to our amusement and support. (Account
of a Lady Taken by the Indians in 1977, 1, Garland Publishing, Inc., 1978 )
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| Lewis and Clark Reach Shoshone Camp Led by Sacajawea the "Bird Woman" |
By the 1800s, this frontier had reached its western limit.
Explorers, such as Lewis and Clark (1804-1806) reached the Pacific Ocean in the
first decade of the nineteenth-century. Following close on the tail of these
early frontiersmen were emigrant Euro-Americans who sought a new life in the
West. Francis Parkman captures this frantic mass settlement of the West in The Oregon Trail. He states:
I have often perplexed myself to divine
the various motives that drive impulse to this migration; but whatever they may
be, wherever and insane hope of a better condition in life, or a desire of
shaking off restraints of law and society, or mere restlessness, certain it is,
that multitudes bitterly repent that journey, and after they have reached the
land of promise, are happy enough to escape from it. (Francis Parkman, The Oregon Trail, 5, 1946)
As a result of the major influx of
emigrants, conflict between settlers and Native Americans reached tantamount in
this period. Native Americans aggressively resisted the emigration of white
Euro-Americans and the relocation of Southeastern Indians into their
territories. Misconceptions of Euro-Americans helped to stimulate this
hostility. Many politicians, frontiersmen, and settlers perceived the West as
an open landscape sparsely populated with nomadic savages. By settling the
West, it was not going to waste.
The following events exemplify this rapid expansion: The
Louisiana Territory was purchased from the French in 1803; the state of Texas
was annexed in 1845; the Oregon Territory was established in 1846; California,
Nevada, Utah, Northwestern Arizona, and Western Colorado were obtained in
1848;and the entire mainland of the United States was established as the United
States property by1853 (Joanna Cohan Scherer, 12, Crown Publishers, Inc. 1973)
In the 1850s, the United States government entered into
negotiations with Native Americans in the West to pacify them and cure the “Indian
Problem.” Federal policy spreads over two centuries, is divided into four
periods: Reservation Period (1850); Allotment Period (1885-1930); Reorganization
Period (1935-1950), and Termination Period (1950-1970). Specific legislation
(Treaties, Dawes Act, Howard-Wheeler Act, Reorganization Act, and Termination
Act) marks each of these periods. Each new policy brought a reduction to Native
American lands. (Trosper 1976:258)
Similar conditions of White-Indian conflict were present in
Montana, the location of Russell Tharp’s birth. Treaties, such as the Hellgate
Treaty (Flathead Indian Reservation, 1855) were formulated in the mid-1800s. In
contrast to other states/territories, Montana did not experience rapid
settlement until 1890. The Northern Pacific Railroad, which opened in 1882,
severed the Flathead and Blackfoot Indian Reservations and made their lands
into a disjointed checkerboard of allotments. Despite the effects of this
development, the Blackfoot as well as the tribes of the Flathead Reservation,
the Kootenai and Salish, were not aggressive towards the United States
government. Oscar Lewis describes the Blackfoot response to federal policy as
follows:
On at least three occasions the
Blackfoot refused to join anti-white movements. The first was when Sitting Bull
fled to Canada after the Custer battle and appealed to the Blackfoot to join
the Sioux in their war against the whites. Later, in 1885, the Blackfoot
refused to associate themselves with the rebellion led by Riel, the Cree
half-breed. The third was the failure of the Blackfoot to participate in the
Ghost Dance movement of the nineties, with its revolutionary anti-white
ideology, which was eagerly taken up by neighboring tribes. (Oscar Lewis, The Effects of White Contact upon Blackfoot
Culture, 68, University of Washington Press 1942)
Some disputes, which lead to warring
mainly revolved around land claims, territory rights, and land ownership. In
return, the federal government responded in a paternalistic manner culling the
Indians into reservations.
Written by Dr. Clancy J. Clark
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