Post by ohio1953 on Oct 28, 2019 13:58:11 GMT -6
After a refreshed interest in the topic of my ancestors I do find it ironic that the man (GAC) everyone believed to be incapable of having such a long line of decendants did produce just that.
I will have to be at home and check the dates that I do have on my ancestors and get back to you, if there are any available. I should be able to find out where they settled. I know my great grandfather, Yellowbirds son, lived in Rocky Ford on the Pine Ridge indian reservation. Yellowbirds wife was named Annie Long Horn. There may be a way to trace where the Long Horns originated and that would offer an idea of where they lived. I know them to have lived on or close to the Pine Ridge indian reservation. I don't see them having moved far from there as natives were not well taken outside of the res.
John was Yellow Bird at birth.. but if you understand Native history the Native usually bore a single name and did not have surnames in relation to family. Once white settlers came into the Dakotas and began converting the "savages" into a more civilized race it was forced upon them to begin describing their families by assigning a recognizable name. Yellow Bird became John Yellow Bird.
I understand my great grandfather, Yellow Birds son, was sent to a boarding school. This was also typical of the whites, they took Native children from their parents to educate them in white ways. That school, from my understanding, is where the Steele name came from. At that school, my very Sioux/Cheyenne great grandfather became Harold (Harry) Steele. He was beaten if he spoke in indian and became a dovout Catholic - most of our Native culture was washed away because of this.
Harry's wife, my great grandmother, also attended a boarding school (the same boarding school I believe) and shared a similar experience and that experience was past on to their children. None of their six children spoke any native language and all worshiped a new God. Corporal punishment became the method to use for disciplining children as they were no longer sacred...
Monaseetah was Cheyenne Woman to everyone who talked about her when I was growing up. My grandmother told me her name was Monaseetah, but GAC called her Cheyenne Woman and that is what everyone in my family called her. My great aunt, who is dead now, walked me to her grave when I was a small child and told me that this is where "Cheyenne Woman" is buried. SHe is buried at the family gravesite which is in Rocky Ford on the Pine Ridge Indian reservation.
I believe her name is spelled how it sounds and my hunch is that it is actually two words, but I don't speak Cheyenne.
I apologize if I offend anyone by using the word white/s, or the way I told the story of my relatives. I do not mean to offend anyone, I only mean to tell the story as it was told to me.
I also want to add that I believe Cheyenne Woman had nothing to gain and everything to lose from this portion of her life.
I know none of my relatives have ever tried to make a profit or any type of gain from our history. My grandmother gave everything she had on this story to the author of "Lost bird of Wounded Knee" in an attempt to have the story told. That story was never told from the Yellowbird/Steele family outside of verbally, that I am aware. I want to tell people the story the way it was told to me, whether you choose to believe it or not is not my burden. I shared with all of you a photo of my great great grandfather and I told the story to those who care to know.