Following the Indian wars: the story of the newspaper correspondents among the Indian campaigners

735 Pages·1993·3.47 MB·English

by  Oliver Knight

Following the Indian Wars : The Story of
title: the Newspaper Correspondents Among the
Indian Campaigners
author: Knight, Oliver.
publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
isbn10 | asin: 080612508X
print isbn13: 9780806125084
ebook isbn13: 9780585100913
language: English
Indians of North America--Wars--1866-
subject 1895, War correspondents--West (U.S.)--
Biography, Press--West (U.S.)--History.
publication date: 1993
lcc: E83.866.K58 1993eb
ddc: 973.8/092/2
Indians of North America--Wars--1866-
subject:
1895, War correspondents--West (U.S.)--
Biography, Press--West (U.S.)--History.
Page iii
Following The Indian Wars
The Story of the Newspaper Correspondents Among the
Indian Campaigners
by Oliver Knight
Foreword by Sherry L. Smith
UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA PRESS : NORMAN AND LONDON
Page iv
By OLIVER KNIGHT
Fort Worth: Outpost on the Trinity (Norman, 1953)
Following the Indian Wars: The Story of the Newspaper
Correspondents Among the Indian Campaigners (Norman, 1960)
60-8751
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER:
ISBN: 0-8061-2508-X
Copyright © 1960 by the University of Oklahoma Press, Publishing
Division of the University. All rights reserved. Manufactured in the
U.S.A.
First edition, 1960. First paperback printing, 1993.
2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
Page v
For Mike and Skipper
Page vii
Contents
Foreword xi
Preface xv
Precede 3
1. Indian Fighting Is Hardest Kind of War
Early 30
2. Indian War Beginning in West
First Lead 69
3. Custer Attacks at Washita
Second Lead 104
4. Modocs Hold Off U. S. Army
Bulletin 159
5. Crook Fights Sioux at Rosebud
Flash 194
6. Custer Command Wiped Out
Add Custer 220
7. Terry Takes Field Again
Add Crook 233
8. Sioux Push "Fighting Irish Pencil Pusher"
Add Crook 257
9. Where Are the Indians?
Follow 289
10. Later and Lesser Campaigns
Goodnight 316
11. Closing the Wire
Bibliography 331
Index 339
Page ix
Illustrations and Maps
Western Commander: General William Tecumseh facing
Sherman page 48
Camp Warner, Oregon, 1873 49
Black Kettle of the Cheyennes 64
Fort Larned, Kansas, 1867 65
Gillem's Camp and Tule Lake 144
U. S. Troops Prepare for the Attack on the Modoc 145
Stronghold, 1873
General George Crook's Infantry in the Black Hills, 160
1876
Horse Travois Carrying Casualty after the Battle of Slim 161
Buttes, September 9, 1876
Sitting Bull 176
Sitting Bull's Camp in the Big Horn Mountains, 1873 177
General George Armstrong Custer in Montana Territory 192
in the 1870's
Chief Joseph of the Nez Percés 193
Maps
Western Posts, Camps, and Stations on page
35
The Military West, 1874 61
Winter Campaign, 186869 8081
Klamath and Tule Lake Basins, 1873 111
Crook's Trail in the Big Horn and Yellowstone 163
Expedition, 1876
The Yellowstone and Missouri River Areas, 1876 208209
Route of the Nez Percé Retreat, 1877 29293
Page xi
Foreword
By Sherry L. Smith
Oliver Knight had a newsman's nose for a rousing good story and a
scholar's sense of its significance. In fact, when Knight sat down to
write this book, over thirty years ago, he brought to the task the talent
and experience of both journalist and historian. The result is a work
that engages the reader with its human interest but also with its
enduring message about the sometimes scrappy, sometimes symbiotic
relationship between news correspondents and news makers.
Oliver Knight was born in a small Texas town into a family of modest
means. Family financial problems, coupled with the Great Depression,
left Knight few opportunities for advanced education. Yet, the man
could write. In time the youngster from Brownwood, Texas,
established himself as a largely self-taught journalist, representing the
United Press International at Franklin Delano Roosevelt's White
House press conferences. Knight spent the duration of World War II
as an officer with the army's forces in Panama. After that, the GI Bill
allowed him to pursue that long-postponed educationan undergraduate
degree from the University of Oklahoma and a Ph. D. from the
University of Wisconsin where he specialized in the history of the
American West. Following the Indian Wars, then, was a logical
subject for this journalist-turned-historian.
The military maneuvers of the nineteenth-century Indian Wars had
long attracted writers' attention. Knight was one of the first, however,
to look beyond the drums and bugles and examine the larger social
and cultural framework of the battles. By turning the spotlight away
from the generals and