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Battle Of Wounded Knee: Battle Or Genocide

            Webster's Dictionary defines genocide as "deliberate extermination of an entire people." To say that the massacre at Wounded Knee and how the American government treated the Indians was an attempt of genocide on the Indian people is a controversial statement. I believe that after reading first hand accounts from both American officers and members of the Indian communities that this was the intent of the Americans. The massacre did not occur only because one Indian warrior refused to give up his gun and fired a shot. There was a series of premeditated events that led up to this event.
             For years, the Indian people were chased off their land, which they settled on before the first colonist arrived on the American continent. They were continuously chased west as more and more settlers arrived here. In an attempt to set up reservations for the Indians to live on many treaties and the Dawes Act was passed. This was set up to give the Indians a certain amount of land based upon the population of the many tribes. But the Indian people were never given this land and were continued to be chased west. The Indians started to grow impatient as the American government delayed giving what was promised to these people. American commanding General Nelson A. Miles states "The difficult Indian problem cannot be solved permanently at this end of the line. It requires the fulfillment of Congress of the treaty obligations which the Indians were entreated and coerced into signing Congress has been in session now for several weeks, and could in a single hour confirm the treaty and appropriate the funds for its fulfillment; and, unless the officers of the army can give positive assurance that the Government intends to act in good faith with theses people, the loyal element will be diminished, and the hostile element increased." This statement tells us how General Miles foresees how impatient the Indians are growing.


Essays Related to Battle Of Wounded Knee: Battle Or Genocide

1. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: Summary and Recommendation

... and atrocity not well told in American history. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is an important piece of literature because it is one of the very few books supporting the Indian cause. This outlook is done using council records, autobiographies and first hand accounts. Each of the nineteen chapters focused on a certain tribe, battle, or historical event. Brown goes into deep detail on each and every ... topic in the nearly 500 pages. I would not say Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is an interesting read, but can be used as teaching material. Generally very little is known about the terrible...

  • Word Count: 1920
  • Approx Pages: 8
  • Grade Level: High School

2. Wounded Knee

... American Indian. That in itself makes Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee an important work of literature as it is one of the few books supporting the Indian cause. This is done through the use of council records, autobiographies, and first-hand accounts. Each of the book's nineteen chapters deals with a certain tribe, battle, or historical event. Brown goes into deep and explicit detail throughout ... , as evidenced by the book's nearly 500 pages. However, while some may complain Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee is boring or text-book-like, I believe the opposite is actually true. Generally, ver...

  • Word Count: 634
  • Approx Pages: 3
  • Grade Level: High School

3. Bury my heart at wounded knee

... American Indian. That in itself makes Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee an important work of literature as it is one of the few books supporting the Indian cause. This is done through the use of council records, autobiographies, and first-hand accounts. Each of the book's nineteen chapters deals with a certain tribe, battle, or historical event. Brown goes into deep and explicit detail throughout ... , as evidenced by the book's nearly 500 pages. However, while some may complain Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee is boring or text-book-like, I believe the opposite is actually true. Generally, ver...

  • Word Count: 697
  • Approx Pages: 3
  • Grade Level: High School

4. Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee

... by Dee Alexander Brown, is a great novel that shows the attempted genocide of Indian nations. Many of the young Indian children were stolen and forced into slavery. Most of the children died along their journey. At the battle of Wounded Knee almost four-fifths of Native lands were taken and most of the native people slaughtered or thrown into slavery. Natives that were put in to slavery were counted everyday to ... make sure no one had escaped or rebelled. If this were to occur the Natives would ... badly corrupted the Indians were by the new settlers and harsh and brutal wars. This bo...

  • Word Count: 503
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

5. Native American Genocide

... taking their land from them. Protests or resistance by the Indians would result in fighting. On occasion, military troops would even lash out against peaceful Indians. Their aggression became out of control. Indian policy gradually shifted from this aggressive mindset to a more peaceable and soft line policy. The Indian Wars ended in 1980 with the Battle of Wounded Knee. The battle resulted in over 200 deaths, but ... policy. Although the policies were less bloody, they did very little to alleviate the problems Native Americans were faced with, and many times exacerbated the problems. T...

  • Word Count: 610
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6. An American Holocaust

... three million individuals within 100 years (Mihesuah, 1996). One reason that such epidemics were so destructive was that without any immunity whatsoever the American Indian population was nearly all afflicted or infected by a disease at the same time. Another reason was the inferior medical practices employed by the Indians, such as sweat houses, herbs, and spiritual prayer were grossly inadequate ... in American Indian population, many tribes were brought to the brink of extinction by war. To be more accurate would be to say genocide by the Anglo-Americans in the name of war (Thornton, ...

  • Word Count: 1959
  • Approx Pages: 8
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: Undergraduate

7. Native American Literature

... our god and our forefathers; for things he never owned and never gave to us. What law or right is that?" Here we can clearly see how the Indians were taken advantage of. The taxation of the Native Americans grew larger until they had to pay the ultimate price. Here we can clearly ... the Bible. Though the golden rule in this religion is to love thy neighbor, Christianity had a lot to do with the mass genocide of the Native Americans. In the beginning of the Bible, it explains how the earth was believed to be created. First God created light, then the earth itself. When he ... now upon...

  • Word Count: 1994
  • Approx Pages: 8
  • Grade Level: High School

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