Indian wars in American history, general term referring to the series of conflicts between Europeans and their descendants and the indigenous peoples of North America.

Early Conflicts

Each of the colonial powers in North America met and overcame Native American resistance. In the Southwest the most notable incident precipitated by the Spaniards was the ferocious Pueblo uprising led by Popé in 1680. New France was constantly menaced because of the hostility of the Iroquois Confederacy , although the French missionaries and traders maintained better relations with other Northeastern tribes. The history of the English settlements is studded with tribal conflicts, including the war of the Pequot against the Connecticut settlers in 1637; the uprising of the Wampanoag and Narragansett against the New England colonies in 1675-76, known as King Philip's War ; the wars with the Yamasee on the South Carolina frontier; and Pontiac's Rebellion in the Northwest Territory in 1763.

Struggles in the Northwest Territory

After the American Revolution, the most pressing Native American problem facing the new government was the unwillingness of the tribes of the Northwest to acquiesce in the settlement of the Ohio valley. After unsuccessful expeditions under generals Josiah Harmar (1790) and Arthur St. Clair (1791), Gen. Anthony Wayne defeated the tribes of the Northwest Territory at the battle of Fallen Timbers in 1794. By the Treaty of Greenville (1795) they agreed to give up their lands in Ohio and move to Indiana.

Settlers soon began to encroach on Native American lands in Indiana, provoking the Shawnee chief, Tecumseh , and his brother, the Shawnee Prophet , to organize a powerful native confederacy. In 1811, William H. Harrison defeated the Shawnee Prophet at Tippecanoe . Tecumseh allied himself with the British in the War of 1812 and was killed in the battle of the Thames (1813), which ended the threat from Native Americans in the Northwest Territory. During the War of 1812 the Creek also rose and were defeated (1814) by Andrew Jackson .

Relocation across the Mississippi

After 1815 a policy of removing the indigenous population to reservations across the Mississippi River was pursued by the U.S. government with such success that by 1860 the great majority of the tribes had been relocated. Often, however, this was accomplished only after a struggle. The attempt to remove the Seminole from their lands in Florida resulted in a number of wars; the most notable Seminole War involved the celebrated Osceola . Similarly the refusal of the Sac and Fox to be removed led to the Black Hawk War of 1832.

Wars in the West

After 1860 the wars continued but they now took place W of the Mississippi; the heaviest fighting occurred on the Great Plains, but there was also intermittent warfare in the Southwest and Northwest. In these conflicts most of the fighting was done by the regular army led by two of the more renowned Indian fighters, generals George Crook and Nelson Miles . Much of the opposition was furnished by four tribes: the Sioux , the Apache , the Comanche , and the Cheyenne . Other tribes that presented courageous but generally futile opposition to the white man's rapacity were the Arapaho , the Kiowa , the Ute , the Blackfoot , the Shoshone , the Nez Percé , and the Bannock . Among the Native American fighting leaders were Geronimo , Crazy Horse , Chief Joseph , Captain Jack , Red Cloud , and Mangas Coloradas . The warfare was characterized by numerous atrocities on both sides.

Until 1861 the Plains people had been relatively peaceful, but the advance of white settlers, with their wanton slaughter of the buffalo herds on which the Native Americans depended for their livelihood, led to the first of the numerous outbreaks in the West. Dissatisfaction among the Native Americans continued; the contributing causes were corrupt Indian agents, transgressions by prospectors seeking valuable minerals in tribal lands, and the interference of the railroads with the tribes' traditional hunting practices. Hostilities between the army and indigenous tribes reached its height between 1869 and 1878, when over 200 pitched battles were fought. Although the Native Americans fought fiercely and courageously, the continuing flow of settlers to the West and the spread of a Western railroad network made their resistance ineffectual.

Notable incidents in this bloody warfare include the virtual siege of Tucson by a band of Apaches led by Cochise , the massacre at Sand Creek , the Fetterman Massacre (see under Fetterman , William Judd), Custer's last stand (see Custer, George Armstrong ), and the battle of Wounded Knee . Wounded Knee in 1890 is often considered the last battle of the Indian Wars although there was an expedition against the Ojibwa in Minnesota in 1898. By 1887, with the passage of the Dawes Act , a new era had begun. The resistance of the Native Americans was at an end, and the government had successfully confined them to reservations.

Bibliography

See A. Britt, Great Indian Chiefs (1938, repr. 1969); M. F. Schmitt and D. A. Brown, Fighting Indians of the West (1948, repr. 1966); R. H. Lowie, Indians of the Plains (1954, repr. 1963); A. M. Josephy, The Patriot Chiefs (1961); J. Tebbel and K. W. Jennison, The American Indian Wars (1961); J. Tebbel, The Compact History of the Indian Wars (1966); A. W. Eckert, Wilderness Empire (1969); D. A. Brown, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (1970); S. Longstreet, War Cries on Horseback (1970); H. Bird, War for the West, 1790-1813 (1971); S. L. A. Marshall, Crimsoned Prairie (1972). See also the bibliographies under the various chiefs, tribes, and wars cited.

Indian Wars. Warfare between whites and Indians began when the first colonists set foot in the New World. Whites posed a threat to Indian lands and way of life. For four centuries the struggle kept pace with the westward movement of whites. Often tribes met the invasion with aggressions against settlers and travelers. When hostilities escalated, both sides often resorted to full‐scale war using organized military forces.

Colonial Era.

Throughout the Colonial Era, fighting periodically broke out along the Atlantic coast and the northern frontiers of New Spain. Some wars sprang from resistance to European intrusion, others from rivalries of colonial powers exploiting traditional tribal animosities. Among the more destructive wars were those between the English settlers of Jamestown and the Algonquian tribes in 1622 and 1644; King Philip's War in New England in 1675–1676; the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, which expelled Spaniards from New Mexico for a decade; and the Pontiac “conspiracy” of 1763–1766, which aimed at driving the English from the Great Lakes. All the wars took a frightful toll in life and property, and all ended in Indian defeat.

From 1790 to 1870.

After the Revolutionary War, hostilities continued from the Appalachian Mountains to the Mississippi River. In 1790–1791, in Ohio, the Miami chief Little Turtle decisively defeated U.S. forces under Generals Josiah Harmer and Arthur St. Clair. These defeats led the infant American government to establish a regular army. In 1794, in the Battle of Fallen Timbers, General Anthony Wayne (1745–1796) crushed Little Turtle and opened the Ohio Country to settlers.

Early in the nineteenth century, the Shawnee chief Tecumseh sought to unite all the tribes, north and south, against the white invader. General William Henry Harrison destroyed this design in 1811 at the Battle of Tippecanoe, in Indiana. In 1814, a Creek faction, the Red Sticks, rose against settlers in the South but was crushed by General Andrew Jackson at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, Alabama.

In the 1820s and 1830s, the United States backed diplomacy with force to move the eastern tribes to new homes west of the Mississippi River. Most went without major armed resistance. Under Black Hawk, the Sacs and Foxes of Illinois briefly fought back in 1832 but were swiftly overpowered.

Federal authorities hoped to end Indian warfare by separating Indians and whites with a “Permanent Indian Frontier” extending from Minnesota to Louisiana. In 1845–1848, however, the settlement of the Oregon boundary dispute and the territorial acquisitions of the Mexican War dashed this hope. Beginning with the California gold rush in 1848, Indian warfare attended the westward movement until the frontier closed in 1890.

In California, most of the small native groups vanished as gold seekers overran the Sierra Nevada. In Oregon and Washington, stronger tribes fought back. The Yakima and Rogue River Wars of 1854–1856, followed by an uprising in the Columbia Basin, prompted a ruthless military offensive. In 1858, victories by Colonel George Wright ended Indian warfare in the Pacific Northwest.

The most intense fighting of the 1850s occurred in Texas, where settlers pushed westward and the army tried to protect them from raiding parties of Kiowas, Comanches, and Apaches from the north. A chain of military posts extending from the Red River to the Rio Grande failed to deter the raiders.

In New Mexico, American newcomers inherited old rivalries between Hispanic colonizers and Apaches and Navajos. The army established a system of forts, but they proved no more effective than in Texas.

On the Great Plains, transcontinental emigrant trails stirred Indian wrath. Near Fort Laramie, the Grattan Massacre of 1854, caused by the imprudent actions of a young officer, led to General William S. Harney's campaign of 1855. At the Battle of Bluewater, Harney destroyed a Sioux village and killed Chief Little Thunder. To the south, Kiowas, Comanches, and Cheyennes disrupted the trade with New Mexico and struck south into Texas.

The Civil War years of 1861–1865, when volunteer units replaced regulars, intensified fighting. In Minnesota, years of injustice exploded in the Sioux uprising of 1862, which took the lives of four hundred settlers. General Henry H. Sibley quelled the rebellion. It spread west into Dakota territory, however, where other Sioux deplored gold seekers crossing their territory to mines in western Montana. In 1863–1865, both Sibley and General Alfred Sully fought successful battles against Indians on the upper Missouri River.

In New Mexico, as Apache and Navajo wars continued, General James H. Carleton ordered U.S. troops into the field. In 1863–1864, under Colonel Christopher “Kit” Carson (1809–1868), the troops rounded up Mescalero Apaches and Navajos and confined them on a bleak reservation far from their homelands.

In the Summer of 1864, Indian unrest on the roads connecting Colorado with the East formed the backdrop for the Sand Creek Massacre—a treacherous attack by Colonel John M. Chivington on Black Kettle's peaceful Cheyenne village. Sand Creek set off a general war that spread over all the Plains country in 1865.

The Late Nineteenth Century.

At the close of the Civil War, regular troops returned to frontier duty. In the desert Southwest and in Texas, hostilities persisted. On the northern Great Plains, Red Cloud's Sioux closed the Bozeman Trail to the Montana mines, besieged the three forts established to protect travelers, and in December 1866 destroyed a force of eighty soldiers under Captain William J. Fetterman.

The Fetterman disaster and other military setbacks led the government to devise a peace movement. Treaties established reservations that promised rations and other goods, attracting many Indians to surrender and accept government handouts. The Fort Laramie and Medicine Lodge Treaties of 1867–1868 bound Plains Indians to settle on reservations. Most of the remaining Indian wars were fought to force Indians onto reservations or to return to reservations from which they had fled.

In 1868–1869, military campaigns forced Cheyennes, Kiowas, and Comanches onto new reservations in the Indian Territory. During this operation, the Cheyenne chief Black Kettle, who had escaped Sand Creek, died when Lt. Col. George A. Custer (1839–1876) devastated his village in the Battle of the Washita. In 1874, these tribes, rebelling against reservation restraints, fled to the West. The Red River War lasted until the Spring of 1875 and, with the surrender of the Indians, ended fighting on the southern Plains and along the Texas frontier.

On the northern Plains, discovery of gold in the Black Hills stirred new tensions. The Sioux War of 1876 resulted, as the army tried to force Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and other chiefs to settle on the Great Sioux Reservation, created by the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. On 25 June 1876 along Montana's Little Bighorn River Indian warriors wiped out Custer and part of his command. Stunned by the disaster, federal authorities ordered large armies into the field. By Spring 1877, most of the Sioux and Cheyennes had surrendered. Sitting Bull sought refuge in Canada but gave up in 1881.

In 1872–1873, war broke out with the Modocs of northeastern California, after the government tried to force a band under Captain Jack and other leaders onto a reservation. Taking refuge in a lava flow, these Modocs held out for four months. During a peace conference, Jack and other Modocs killed General Edward R.S. Canby. The Indians were finally driven from their fortress, captured, and the leaders hanged.

In 1877, the government ordered all Nez Percés of Idaho and Oregon to go to their Idaho reservation. Under Chief Joseph and other leaders, about eight hundred Nez Percés retreated across the mountains to Montana. They had almost reached sanctuary in Canada when a force under Colonel Nelson A. Miles (1839–1925) cut them off at Bear Paw Mountain and forced most to surrender.

Other mountain tribes also fought before surrendering. In 1878, the Bannocks and Paiutes of Idaho and eastern Oregon were defeated. In 1879 the Utes of Colorado met a like fate. The last holdouts were the Apaches of Arizona and New Mexico. Under Cochise (1812?–1874), Apache warriors terrorized the Southwest and Mexico from 1861 until General Oliver O. Howard made peace with him in 1872. General George Crook conducted a successful campaign against other Apaches in the Tonto Basin in 1872–1873. New fighting broke out when the government determined to collect all Apaches on the San Carlos Reservation. The Victorio War of 1879–1880 ravaged much of the Southwest until Mexican troops finally killed the chief and ended the rebellion.

The most famous Apache leader was Geronimo. His little band of fighters scourged settlements on both sides of the Mexican boundary and stood off armies of two nations. General Crook enlisted other Apaches and penetrated the Apache refuges in Mexico. Twice he forced Geronimo to surrender, but it fell to General Nelson A. Miles to bring Geronimo to bay for the last time, in 1886, and end Apache warfare.

One final bloodletting, the Wounded Knee Tragedy in South Dakota, occurred in 1890. Here the Ghost Dance, a revivalist movement, exploded with unintended and unexpected violence. Nearly two‐thirds of Chief Big Foot's people were killed or wounded, while the military force also sustained heavy casualties. Wounded Knee was the last major military encounter between Indians and whites.
See also Expansionism; Gold Rushes; Indian History and Culture: From 1500 to 1800; Indian History and Culture: From 1800 to 1900; Little Bighorn, Battle of the; Manifest Destiny; Seven Years' War; Spanish Settlements in North America; Yamassee War.

Bibliography

Douglas E. Leach , The Northern Colonial Frontier, 1607–1763, 1966.
Robert M. Utley , Frontiersmen in Blue: The United States Army and the Indian, 1846–1865, 1967.
Francis Paul Prucha , The Sword of the Republic: The United States Army on the Frontier, 1783–1846, 1969.
Robert M. Utley , Frontier Regulars: The United States Army and the Indian, 1866–1891, 1973.
Robert M. Utley and and Wilcomb E. Washburn , Indian Wars, 1977.
W. Stitt Robinson , The Southern Colonial Frontier, 1607–1763, 1979.
Wilcomb E. Washburn, ed., History of Indian‐White Relations, vol. 4 of Handbook of North American Indians, ed. William C. Sturtevant, 1988.
Gregory Dowd , A Spirited Resistance: The North American Indian Struggle for Unity, 1745–1815, 1992.

Robert M. Utley