The St. Cloud Visiter
Vol. 1 No. 14 :: June 17, 1858
When Minnesota Indians Engaged in Deadly Warfare
After the Fight
The Shakopee Correspondent of the Minnesotian in reviewing the incidents of the disgraceful battle between the Sioux and the Chipeways, has the following reflections.
This is truly a great country where one can get up by sunrise, take his wife and family in a buggy, ride a mile or so in the fresh morning air witness such a scene as an Indian fight from such a view as we had, be treated to a Chippeway barbeque return to breakfast at a reasonable hour, without costing the first red cent, although several red skins had to pay dearly for the entertainment.
When the fight first commenced opposite Major Murphy’s, his wife, daughter and two lady visitors arose and stepped upon the river’s brink and watched the whole affair unconcernedly, although, at the time, the rifle balls whizzed and sang past them, striking in close proximity.
Before the battle ended, a very large number of the population of men, women, and children of the city, were gathered around the dead, dying, and wounded warriors which the Sioux had brought over the river, and from their elevated position could see, with the naked eye, every movement of the combatants, and with the aid of telescope, counted the number of Chippeways which collected on the opposite bluffs where the Sioux had driven them.
The ground from the river to the bluffs (about three fourths of a mile) is level grassy plain, with a few large elm trees near the north bank, on which we stood, is high, overlooking the whole scene as perfectly as one would sit in the boxes of a theatre and observe the play upon the stage. Only think of what a sight we had of Indians stripped to the breech cloth, running, skulking, crawling, shooting, tomahawking, scalping, mutilating –the squaws carrying the wounded, shouting, and encouraging their braves, who were yelling, fighting, bleeding, dying, crossing and recrossing the river.
The retreat of the Chippeway’s to the opposite hills, gathering under the trees, where all their gestures and actions were clearly visible through the telescope—while among us, and at our feet, were ladies and Chippeway scalps, horses and carriages and Chippeway’s heads, gentlemen, and chippeway hands, children, and strips of Chippeway skin, barking dogs, moaning squaws, dying warriors, bleeding braves, crying children, yelling combatants, neighing horses, cackling hens, whistling bullets, cracking rifles, puffing steamboat, smoking Dutchman mixed up with the different languages, including silvery tones of beautiful women; the whole concluding with the building of a fire, appearance of the headless trunk of a Chippeway, a very extensive retrograde movement of the part of the ladies and children, the contention of those who advocated or objected to the consummation of the barbarous act, the roaring of the flames, the broiling of the carcass, the rising of the incense, and the general leaving in disgust, or lingering for the curiosity of this crowd—and all this adjoining a city of a thousand inhabitants.
Source: This story appeared in the The St. Cloud Visiter, a newspaper in St. Cloud, Minnesota, in 1858. This page is a reprint of a scanned version of the newspaper in the collection of the Minnesota Historical Society. Minnesota became a state of the United States on May 11, 1858, before then, Minnesota Territory.
