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Sitting Bull by DF Barry –

Top 10 Outstanding Facts about Sitting Bull

Sitting Bull was a Hunkpapa Lakota leader who led his people during years of resistance against United States government policies. He is remembered for his lifelong distrust of white men and his stubborn determination to resist their domination. He was killed by Indian agency police on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation during an attempt to arrest him, at a time when authorities feared that he would join the Ghost Dance movement.

Sitting Bull was born on land later included in the Dakota Territory. In 2007, Sitting Bull’s great-grandson asserted from family oral tradition that Sitting Bull was born along the Yellowstone River, south of present-day Miles City, Montana. He was named 葹ok谩 Ps铆膷e (Jumping Badger) at birth, and nicknamed H煤艐ke拧ni or “Slow” said to describe his careful and unhurried nature.

Here are 10 outstanding facts about Sitting Bull.

1. Sitting Bull joined his first war party at age 14 

When he was fourteen years old, Bull accompanied a group of Lakota warriors which included his father and his uncle Four Horns in a raiding party. They took horses from a camp of Crow warriors. He displayed bravery by riding forward and counting coup on one of the surprised Crow, which was witnessed by the other mounted Lakota.

Upon returning to camp his father gave a celebratory feast at which he conferred his name upon his son. While the name, T葻at葻谩艐ka 脥yotake, in the Lakota language roughly translates to “Buffalo Who Sits Down”, Americans came to commonly refer to him as “Sitting Bull”.Thereafter, Sitting Bull’s father was known as Jumping Bull. At this ceremony before the entire band, Sitting Bull’s father presented his son with an eagle feather to wear in his hair, a warrior’s horse, and a hardened buffalo hide shield to mark his son’s passage into manhood as a Lakota warrior.

2. Bull survived a gunshot in his left hip during a war

Sitting Bull and Buffalo Bill by Wm. Notman & Son –

In 1864, two brigades of about 2200 soldiers under Brigadier General Alfred Sully attacked a village. The defenders were led by Sitting Bull, Gall, and Inkpaduta. The Lakota and Dakota were driven out, but skirmishing continued into August at the Battle of the Badlands. 

In September, Sitting Bull and about one hundred Hunkpapa Lakota encountered a small party near what is now Marmarth, North Dakota. They had been left behind by a wagon train commanded by Captain James L. Fisk to effect some repairs to an overturned wagon. When he led an attack, Sitting Bull was shot in the left hip by a soldier. The bullet exited through the small of his back, and the wound was not serious.

3. Sitting Bull was made Supreme Chief of the whole Sioux Nation

Respected for his courage and wisdom, Bull was made principal chief of the entire Sioux nation about 1867. In 1868 the Sioux accepted peace with the U.S. government based on the Second Treaty of Fort Laramie, which guaranteed the Sioux a reservation in what is now southwestern South Dakota.

But when gold was discovered in the Black Hills in the mid-1870s, a rush of white prospectors invaded lands guaranteed to the Indians by the treaty. Late in 1875 those Sioux who had been resisting the whites鈥� incursions were ordered to return to their reservations by January 1876, or be considered hostile to the United States. Sitting didn鈥檛 comply with this directive.

4. Sitting Bull and other Lakota bands were pursued by the US military as hostiles

Wives and children of Sitting Bull by David Francis Barry –

In November 1875, President Grant ordered all Sioux bands outside the Great Sioux Reservation to move onto the reservation. Bull and his compatriots did not comply with this directive. In February 1876, the Interior Department certified as “hostile” those bands who continued to live off the reservation.

Even had Sitting Bull been willing to comply, he could not possibly have moved his village 240 miles in the bitter cold by the specified time. This certification allowed the military to pursue Sitting Bull and other Lakota bands as “hostiles.

5. Sitting Bull had a vision in which he saw many soldiers, “as thick as grasshoppers,” falling upside down into the Lakota camp

Before the Battle of the Little Bighorn, Sitting Bull had a vision in which he saw many soldiers, falling upside down into the Lakota camp. This vision is what his people took as a foreshadowing of a major victory in which many soldiers would be killed. 

His prophecy was fulfilled on June 25, when Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer rode into the valley, and he and all the men under his immediate command were annihilated in the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

Bull’s leadership inspired his people to a major victory. In response, the U.S. government sent thousands more soldiers to the area, forcing many of the Lakota to surrender over the next year. Sitting Bull however refused to surrender.

6. Bull refused to adopt any dependence on the U.S. government

Sitting Bull holding a Winchester lever-action carbine by W. Notman –

After the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868) and the creation of the Great Sioux Reservation, many traditional Sioux warriors, such as Red Cloud of the Oglala and Spotted Tail of the Brul茅, moved to reside permanently on the reservations. 

They were largely dependent for subsistence on the U.S. Indian agencies. Many other chiefs, including members of Sitting Bull’s Hunkpapa band such as Gall, at times, lived temporarily at the agencies. They needed the supplies at a time when white encroachment and the depletion of buffalo herds reduced their resources and challenged Native American independence.

Bull’s refusal to adopt any dependence on the U.S. government meant that at times he and his small band of warriors lived isolated on the Plains. When Native Americans were threatened by the United States, numerous members from various Sioux bands and other tribes, such as the Northern Cheyenne, came to Bull’s camp. His reputation for strong medicine developed as he continued to evade the European Americans. 

7. Sitting did not take a direct military role in the war; instead, he acted as a spiritual leader

Throughout the first half of 1876, Bull’s camp continually expanded as natives joined him for safety in numbers. His leadership had attracted warriors and families, creating an extensive village estimated at more than 10,000 people.

A week before the Custer attack in June 1876, he had performed the Sun Dance. He fasted and sacrificed over 100 pieces of flesh from his arms. 

The Sun Dance was the most important religious ceremony of the Plains Indians of North America. It was also used for nomadic peoples, an occasion when otherwise independent bands gathered to reaffirm their basic beliefs about the universe and the supernatural through rituals of personal and community sacrifice.

8. Sitting Bull went into exile across the border into Canada

Sitting Bull and nephew, One Bull by Palmquist & Jurgens –

The Sioux emerged the victors in their battles with U.S. troops, but though they won the battle they didn鈥檛 win the war. They depended on the buffalo for their livelihood, and the buffalo, under the steady encroachment of whites, were rapidly becoming extinct. Hunger led more and more Sioux to surrender, and in May 1877 Sitting Bull led his remaining followers across the border into Canada. 

Sitting Bull and his people stayed in Canada for four years. The Canadian government could not acknowledge responsibility for feeding a people whose reservation was south of the border. After those years, during which Bull鈥檚 following dwindled steadily, famine forced him to surrender. His presence in the country had led to increased tensions between the Canadian and the United States governments.

9. Bull returned to the United States and surrendered in 1881

Hunger and desperation eventually forced Sitting Bull and his family and followers to return to the United States and surrender on July 19, 1881. 

Bull showed up in the parlour of the Commanding Officer’s Quarters in a ceremony the next day. He told the four soldiers, warriors, and other guests in the small room that he wished to regard the soldiers and the white race as friends despite their interactions the past few years.

Bull and his band of people were kept separate from the other Hunkpapa gathered at the agency. Army officials were concerned that he would stir up trouble among the recently surrendered northern bands.

10. Sitting Bull was killed in a shootout between his followers and the police

Sitting Bull by Julian Scott –

In 1890, James McLaughlin, the U.S. Indian Agent at Fort Yates on Standing Rock Agency, feared that the Lakota leader was about to flee the reservation with the Ghost Dancers. He ordered the police to arrest him. The plan called for the arrest to take place at dawn on December 15 and advised the use of a light spring wagon to facilitate removal before his followers could rally. 

They surrounded the house, knocked, and entered. Bullhead told Sitting Bull that he was under arrest and led him outside. When Sitting Bull refused to comply, the police used force on him. The Sioux in the village were enraged.

One of Bull鈥檚 Lakota followers shouldered his rifle and shot Bullhead, who reacted by firing his revolver into the chest of Sitting Bull. Another police officer shot Sitting in the head, and Bull dropped to the ground dead.