As a kid growing up, I was a sucker for war films, action shows, sci-fi stuff, and Old Western movies. After the days of Sergio Leoni and Sam Peckinpaw, westerns became much more true to historical fact. As a teenager in the movie theater, I watched Young Guns, which retold the story of the Regulators in the Lincoln County Wars (aka the birth of the Billy the Kid legend). In that not too bad flick (I’ve seen far worse westerns), Lou Diamond Phillips portrayed outlaw Jose Chavez y Chavez who goes on a memorable rant about a place called the Red Sands Indian Reservation
While Red Sands wasn’t a real place, it was based on a tragic and inglorious period in U.S. military history.
Today, November 29, 2014, marks the 150th year since the Sand Creek Massacre. On that fateful morning 150 years ago, some 675 bluecoats of the 1st Colorado Cavalry, 3rd Colorado Cavalry and 1st Regiment New Mexico Volunteer Cavalry attacked a peaceful Cheyenne and Arapaho village of some 200 led by Chief Black Kettle along the Big Sandy Creek. The surprise attack resulted in the deaths of as many as 163 men, women and children. These included at least eight revered elders of the Cheyenne Council.
Led by Colonel of Colorado Volunteers John Chivington, a rather pig-faced Methodist preacher with political aspirations, the cavalry took scalps and mutilated the bodies of the Indians, whose camp consisted primarily of women, old men and children, the braves off attempting to secure food for the harsh upcoming winter. Black Kettle had been told to fly the flag of the U.S. above his tipi to show his allegiance and prevent such an event.
Chivington, quoted as saying, “Damn any man who sympathizes with Indians! … I have come to kill Indians, and believe it is right and honorable to use any means under God’s heaven to kill Indians. … Kill and scalp all, big and little; nits make lice,” didn’t see it like that and ordered a charge. While some 70 casualties were suffered by the blue-coats, most of these were via friendly fire by drunken soldiers.
One man who did not comply was Volunteer Captain Silas Stillman Soule, head of D Company, 1st CO Cav. Seeing the flag above Black Kettle’s tipi, he reigned in his company while the rest of Chivington’s men rode onward to their infamy.
“I refused to fire, and swore that none but a coward would, for by this time hundreds of women and children were coming towards us, and getting on their knees for mercy. I tell you Ned it was hard to see little children on their knees have their brains beat out by men professing to be civilized.”- Soule
Soule, an abolitionist born in Maine who rode with John Brown in Bloody Kansas, was not above a fight. He was above a massacre, however. After the campaign, he blew the whistle on Chivington’s bloody charge and even testified against the good Colonel in a court of military justice. While three official inquiries found the actions of that day despicable, no real punishment was ever handed down.
The honorable Soule, for his part after testifying, was murdered on a Denver street corner by assailants unknown. They were never brought to justice.
Silas S. Soule the closest thing to a hero at Sand Creek. Today a memorial plaque is at the corner of Arapaho Street in Denver to this officer with a conscious.
Those who lost their lives will be remembered as part of the commemoration activities planned at the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site throughout the day.
