Crazy Horse, Loved or Hated?

[ladonna]

It is true women alway had choice, but if a man offered the family some good horse they would talk their daughter in to accepting. We have story of young women who were forced to marry. Even up into the 1950s.
We have the belief of woman having a choice and big mouths ;D,
also a great respect for our menfolks. the children usually went down though the father's people. You can tell by the stories of men who kept the children but let the wife go.

[ladonna]

I find that there is not just one way
but many

["Hunk" Papa]

ladonna, may I say with great respect Mitakuye Oyasin

[ephriam]

Hunk papa:

I am in agreement with you that the information clearly identifies Crazy Horse as an Oglala, of the Hunkpatila band -- not Minnecoujou.

I have enjoyed Brock's CDs very much. They contain very interesting information from the Clown family's perspective. However, I have also listened to other Lakota oral histories, particularly on the Pine Ridge Reservation, that disagree on this point. John Colhoff, who grew up on Pine Ridge and was extremely knowledgable about Oglala history and culture, told Eleanor Hinman in 1930 that Crazy Horse's band were the Hunkpatila. He Dog spoke of Crazy Horse's early years in Man Afraid of His Horse's band (the Hunkpatila). In the 1870s, he is shown interacting with the Oglala leadership, not the Minnecoujou. To me, the evidence seems clear. While Crazy Horse (like all Lakota) had relatives throughout the tribes, including the Minnecoujou, Brule, etc., I believe if asked he would have identified himself as Oglala.

ephriam

[brock]

Ephriam
I guess I will agree to disagree. The matter is in tribal court.

But I will say virtually all the families I'm working with all have a story to tell. They quite often have indicated their relatives have been defined unfairly by what somebody said or how somebody was interpreted years ago (in atmospheres and under circumstances that are rarely noted). That's not to say that some of what's been said couldn't be true and probably is. But I also know the full story has yet to be told, that I'm sure of.

There is a ground swell of Native information waiting to come forward...all one has to do is agree not to judge it, just listen to it. And that's what I do. As a result I have found many aspects of the history for this period and especially the Natives portion to be wanting in so many ways.

By the way I've never done a CD. I only do DVDs. I wonder how many disagreements the misuse of that word will cause one hundred years from now if someone wants to debate what I did for a living. ;-)

Later

["Hunk" Papa]

Thanks for your input Ephraim, its great to see you back on these boards. I saw your likeness in a group photograph whilst doing some research recently so I can now put face to your name.
Brock, is it not possible that in some way were are all correct with our opinions? Prior to the advent of the reservation period, the various small bands of the Lakota led a nomadic life making little contact with others except for annual gatherings. Would it not be likely that their relative isolation would make them consider themselves firstly as belonging to whichever sub-band they normally held allegiance, e.g. Hunkpatila, Bad Face and secondly as whatever sub-tribe, e.g. Oglala, the sub-band held allegiance to? Rather like maybe, the way that well known American personalities are described as 'the Californian' or 'the Montanan' and not simply as American.
Reservation life keeps the people on them more or less in one place. Over time, is it likely that this static lifestyle has blurred the clearer demarcation lines that might once have existed, rendering the traditional tribal nomenclature obsolete?
I have the greatest respect for the right of the Native Americans to render their oral histories from their own point of view, but are those oral histories any more accurate than the contradictory versions of the same event that we find in our own written history?
It puts me in mind of the apochryphal First World War story of a verbal message from the front line saying 'Send reinforcements we are going to advance' being carried to HQ via a chain of messengers until it was finally rendered as 'Send three and fourpence [old U.K. currency] we are going to a dance.'
I am not trying to be flippant, just simply illustrating my point. I totally accept what you say about the carelessness of some reported Native American descriptions from many years ago, but His Crazy Horse was not someone insignificant and the standing of most of those who described him as Hunkpatila Oglala, is quite high.

"Hunk" papa

[brock]

Hunkpapa,
I won't put myself above any of these families oral histories. I keep my word. Because of that I've been privileged to see and hear things that I can't explain...maybe someday but not now. I've been fortunate enough to hear both the Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull oral histories and have found them to be not that dissimilar. Including the reactions by the individual families when their family leader was killed by their own people.

I think you have a good point in that what band you belong to is more important today because after being stuck in one spot for a while you kind of become a 'homer'. If we moved around as they did in the buffalo days, I don't think being a New Yorker or Londoner or Bostonian would have much meaning.

As far as the verbal message being told from one to another. That's strictly a cultural preference. As little children we are all taught in school that if you tell someone something and they tell twenty people by the time it gets back to you it will be different. It re-enforces our reverence for the written word. It re-enforces the very reason we go to school. The Lakota was oral and they think it's funny that we have to hire lawyers to figure out the meaning of some of our most basic writings (like our laws). I will say I have been impressed by the accuracy of their oral history...they do take it very seriously. That they can go to a place they've never been before and find something that they've never seen before and know from their oral history where it is and what they were looking for. Just ask Jack Bailey, the owner of the land (his family has owned the land since 1877) where Deer Medicine Rock sits. He's seen it in action.

As far as your last enquiry, when I was in the army I was a medic. When my friend got hurt in Viet Nam and I worked to save his life the battalian surgeon came out to meet us in an ambulance (we were right outside the base) and told me to stop because he was dead. I didn't believe him and kept working on him. By the time we got him got back to the medical tent and they put IVs in his arms, my friend sat up and asked what happened. My heart went through my throat and it taught me a lesson. There is no such thing as an expert.

The one main thing I have learned is how little we know about their story.

Is he Oglala? The family says no. And I know it will sort itself out at the appropriate time. Just not now.

["Hunk" Papa]

Brock, thank you for that. I thoroughly respect the fact that having given your word you are unable to pass on knowledge that has been confided in you by the Crazy Horse family. I also respect the fact that a great deal of the Plains Indian story has never been revealed. Their treatment at the hands of our race makes that almost inevitable. Your comments have been very enlightening.

[clw]

Well said. We all have different perspectives on such things, but for me there is an intangible dimension -- a reverence -- in this oral history that simply can't be captured when it is written down. No writer has the ability to act as a conduit for that, it has to be experienced. Walking the land, hearing the stories, I get transported and just when I think the shear weight of my feelings is on overload, somebody cracks a hilarious joke that puts it all in perspective and I realize this is simply a reality that I've been priviledged to glimpse. A gift. The book learnin' doesn't even come close and the questions end.

Don't mind me. I'm trying to explain the unexplainable. And there's no way to do it without sounding a little loopy. Old women like me get to wander off occasionally.........

clw
You can say there's no such thing as Santa,
But as for me and Grandpa, we believe.

[Montana Bab]

clw,

Thank you for those words.......how beautifully stated, and one knows it's heartfelt!

Bab

[ironshield34]

Among the people today crazy horse is loved as leader of the people as he was one of two last real chiefs among the lakota!! He is seen as the greatest warrior and loved his people till his death!! His last words to his father as told to me "father tell the people they can no longer depend on me"!!! Hoka hey!!

[jamesspottedwolf]

I can tell you that from my research that Crazy Horse was well respected among the Lakota people. Crazy Horse nursed from every woman of age in the village in which he was raised. He had several visions, and one of the visions that he received told him that he was to be a protector of all Lakota and he was well prepared to give his life in defense of the Lakota people. When he was first made a Warrior Chief, and was about to enter his first war council, he was told by a very wise and respected Chief upon entering the council to speak softly, and only when spoken to or ask his advise. He was also told to listen with his ears and not his mouth. The wise old Chief? None other that the great visionary, Sitting Bull. Crazy Horse not only practiced the words of advice from Sitting Bull while in council, but in all aspects of his life. He was a very quite, soft spoken man, and yet his words were respected by all who knew him.

[blackfoot]

You ask how Crazy Horse was viewed by the people. Curly, as he was known before his father bestowed his own name to his son, as a child was though special because he was different than the other children in his age group. He was light skinned, had curly hair and his eyes were a different shade of brown that was normal for the Sioux. He also nursed from every woman in the village and from the time he could walk he would wonder away from the village for hours on end and no one really knew where he went or what he did during those times he was absent. Curly called every man older than himself, Grandfather and every woman older, he called Grandmother. While this was not unusual as the terms were considered terms of respect and Curly began addressing the older men and women at a somewhat younger age than did his peers.
Curly's father, Crazy Horse began teaching his son how to make his own bow and arrows at a young age. It was said he received his first pony, a paint, and began riding with the older warriors on hunts and would pick out the biggest buffalo and charge his horse along side of the bull buffalo and shot arrow after arrow into the bull until it began trying to hook into Curly's horse's underside, but Curly was such an excellent horseman that he easily keep his pony slightly ahead of the bull and would actually run the bull to death. His skill with bow and arrow would later set him above other warriors when he started going on war parties and stealing horses from the Crow and Blackfoot.  He also counted his first coup on his first war party.
Now given his father's name, Crazy Horse, he began riding away from the village more often and stay away for longer periods of time. It was on one of these trips away from his people that he received a vision telling him that he his main job in life was to always protect the people, especially the village elders; widows, and young children. In his vision, he was told that he would never be wounded by either a bullet, arrow or lance from his enemies, but that he would die at the hands of his own people. (Crazy was later killed when stabbed in the left kidney by a Lakota policeman while being escorted to a reservation jail.) In another vision, he was told that he would become a leader, a war chief, but that he should never wear a war bonnet, and he was one of very few Lakota War Chief who was entitled to wear such a headdress, but he was never seen to wear one.
Crazy Horse was so respected and held in high regards by his people that he, was chosen as only one of four Lakota's  to be chosen as a Shirt Wearer. He was chosen to be a Shirt Wearer at the same time as Sitting Bull, and this was an honor of the highest kind among the Lakota. However, Crazy Horse lost this honor when he took up with another warrior's wife, which was very frowned upon by the Lakota. Because of this incident, he received the only gunshot wound he ever sustained in his short life. He carried a very visible scar as he was shot at point blank range by the squaw's husband. The warrior shot Crazy just below the cheekbone on the right-hand side of his face and the bullet passed through his mouth and exited on the left-hand side of his face just below the left cheek bone.  
Crazy Horse, unlike many of his peers including Sitting Bull, Lo-Dog, Little Big Man, Man Afraid of His Horse, Gall and others, never allowed his photo to be taken or his likeness to painted by anyone.  While there were many photos that people would claim were pictures or paintings of Crazy Horse, none of the pictures or paintings showed the scars that were so visible on his face until his death.
An interesting side note to Crazy Horse's life is that he and General Custer were the same age, born a month apart from each others birthday.  Crazy Horse is buried in a secret location on the Pine Ridge Reservation and other than his mother, his father and a medicine man, no one knows the location of his burial site.