Burial of Crazy Horse

[Diane Merkel]

From a website visitor:

Are there any believable theories as to where Chief Crazy Horse is buried? I have heard speculation that he was buried just across the Nebraska border near Porcupine, South Dakota, on Pine Ridge Reservation.

[clw]

Why are we so determined to discover his grave? Nothing could be clearer than the fact his people don't want the location known. I wish we could simply respect their wishes.

[crzhrs]

There's an excellent book on CH called TO KILL AN EAGLE.

A White farmer/rancher (Kadleck) who was on good terms with the Sioux interviewed many elderly Indians, some even knew CH. They told him stories about him including his death and the ceremonies afterward. There are photos of the "burial" tree CH was suppoedly put in and some possible locations of where his remains were buried.

It was said CH's father and closest followers took his remains and laid them in a "secret" cave then rolled huge bolders over the entrance to conceal it.

Quite an interesting book regardless.

I agree CH's remains should not be revealed. Let him lay in peace.

[BrokenSword]

"...Why are we so determined to discover his grave? Nothing could be clearer than the fact his people don't want the location known. I wish we could simply respect their wishes...."

clw & crzhrs, I agree with you both. I guess people probably have a number of reasons for 'wanting to know where' he rests.

The family, no doubt, has an equal number of reasons for NOT having it known. People like 'strange' possibly being reason # 1.

M

[bc]

I'm just wondering, if anyone knows, just how did Indian culture in those days treat their burial sites? I've heard of lone scaffolds and lone tepees out on the plains and have also heard of groupings of scaffolds, etc. in places which we would probably call a burial ground/cemetery. They would also place their belongings in the scaffold/tepee. But those would not be considered permanent markers once the scaffolds/tepees collapsed with the weather. They were such a transient culture that except for the reservations they never had a permanent campsite such as a white eye townsite which means there has to be burial locations next to about every creek and river in western buffalo country.

The white eyes could place a cemetery or grave anywhere but they usually mark the grave with some type of marker unless they were worried about later desecration.

Another question, we didn't have a Memorial Day holiday in the 1800's. What did the white eye as well as the Indian cultures do for revisiting grave sites and remembering their dead?

[BrokenSword]

bc-

I imagine that in the minds of a nomadic people on the Plains, most 'burials' probably equated to a 'burial' at sea in the white man's mind. I have heard of family members revisiting the burial places of some relatives.

I think that Memorial Day, as we have it today, had its birth in the Civil War when masses of graves came about after the large scale battle casualties. Remembrance Days were set aside for once a year clean up and refurbishing outing.

My family happens to have a cemetery of its own that dates back to 1847. Older aunts and uncles have told me that when they were children, the families agreed on certain dates and all met there for just such a general refurbishing. They brought picnic lunches and made a whole day of it. That was always the way it was done as far back as anyone can remember.

I imagine that prior to the establishment of National Cemeteries, local communities did the same sort of thing.

M

[brock]

I have been privileged to have seen Waglula's and Rattling Blanket Woman's grave sites. I have also been taken to One Horn's, Good Looking Woman's among others. But I have never seen Crazy Horse's and have told the family I would rather not know where he is at. I will say that they have told me all that's been written is either wrong or just plain misinformation to keep folks away. Although there are some folks who mix up the grave site of Albert Greasy Hand as Crazy Horse's because he used Crazy Horse's name as his own after marrying Nellie Larrabee. That site would be on Pine Ridge.

All one has to do is look at what a long and storied mess the bones of Sitting Bull has caused by just knowing where they are to understand the fear of divulging the info. In fact there are those in the Sitting Bull family that wish he would have had the same type of secret burial as Crazy Horse.


As far as burial types...sometimes some were not put on scaffolds but were immediately buried in a sitting position so they wouldn't be discovered. Good Looking Woman was buried in the sitting position during a 'cold camp' (no fires) on her way back to the agency just prior to the battle of the Little Bighorn. It seems they didn't want to alert the soldiers that they were in the area. From what I have gleamed some families put their people on a scaffold for four days and then buried them. Some put them on a scaffold for the duration. Spirituality in the Lakota world was personal, so variations existed...they never craved the same uncompromising order as do other societies, that many here are much more familiar with. Also they remembered where they were by geographic settings in the same manner we remember where things are at via street signs.

[crawdaddo]

I hope the site of Crazy Horse's grave is never revealed because some authority would probably want to build a fence around it and then build a statue with some misspelt words on it,let his remains stay a secret.

[bc]

Couple more questions.

Why bury in the sitting position and was there any particular direction they faced?

Also, seems like I have read an account of cremation where they would burn someone inside a tepee and maybe I saw that on this board somewhere referring to post LBH battle. Did they practice any type of cremation?

Horse, what is this about a burial tree? Are you saying they buried him in a tree? Seems like there were some pictures posted here a while back about a tree by, under, or next to where Sitting Bull was buried.

Regarding Crazy Horse, if he was buried in a natural cave, then that suggests to me some type of rock formation probably made of limestone/sandston and probably close to the Black Hills. If there is one natural cave, then it is likely that it is in an area where others may be. Boulders only occur in certain formations. I suspect some geologic research could narrow the possible areas unless half of South Dakota meets that criteria. I suspect that if someone said he was buried in Kansas that way, I or others could narrow it down. Boulders were formed from retreating glaciers.

BTW, it is kinda nice to read and learn something here without having to get into an argument about how it fits a theory.

[crzhrs]

The "burial" tree was just a temporary spot for religious reasons. The body was taken down. Supposedly the military provided CH's father with a coffin. The coffin was too small so CH's father had to "break" CH's legs to get him to fit inside the box( true or false?)

They then took the coffin to a secret location and in a remote part of Bear Butte (a special place CH loved) found a small cave and placed the body in it. Large stones were then rolled from the top to fall in front of the opening to conceal it, along with other stones near the entrance (not sure if that is fact remembering reading somewhere)

[clw]

Sometimes a tree was used in place of a scaffold, bc. I suspect it depended on where they were and what was availabe, as well as the spiritual aspects of the particular death. I've heard four days too, Brock and also up to a year. Like you said, there were no rules.

And once white encroachment began, the factor of having a scaffold desecrated became important to how soon a body was safely buried.

[bc]

Regarding cremation after the LBH. Seems like I read something on this but it could have been referring to the burning of white soldiers and not NAs.

Regarding the burial site. One thing I learned as a kid one summer in Browning, MT is that you have to be very careful what you do around an Indian reservation or you might see the sharp end of a knife. Bear Butte, itself, is basically an uplifting of magma that did not form into a volcano. It is volcanic rock. It is owned by the South Dakata state fish, game, and parks division and is not part of a reservation. Land adjacent to it is privately owned by whites as well as some parcels owned by various tribes which may be a clue to the burial site. Bear Butte, near Sturgis, is similar in appearance to Devils Tower in Wyoming which probably isn't very far away. Also has this Mount Suribachi, Iwo Jima appearance. If CH was buried on the butte itself, it is not something the average person can go wondering around looking for a grave. Most people probably couldn't climb it. It is 1253' tall and there is a hiking trail to the summit. If it is structurally similar to Mt. Suribachi and other volcanic formations, then I can see where there would be cracks, crevices, cave like openings suitable for burial that could be covered up. Apparently, the Japanese didn't have trouble building caves in volcanic magma.

There are also a lot of offerings left in the area for a lot of people. I suspect it would be impossible to identify anything specific to CH. Assuming that he is buried there. One account I read indicated he was moved a number of times before reaching his final spot.

[brock]

Burying in a sitting position was normally done when they didn't want to be discovered as having been in the area. The hole requires less real estate to be moved, making the burial faster, and harder to spot or identify by a pursuing enemy.

The only cremation I'm aware of is when some medicine men burned the bodies of some dead Lakota that were in the path of Custer's 1874 route through the Black Hills in order to protect them from the soldiers scavenging the scaffolds for souvenirs or scattering body parts...kind of an emergency run.

Also the Black Hills was really a big burial ground...one of the reasons it is considered sacred by the Lakota.

[Melani]

I seem to recall reading (Stanley Vestal?) that Sitting Bull was buried in lime by the authorities, to decompose the body quickly. True or not? And were there any taboos regarding the speaking of the name of someone who had died?

[brock]

Melani,
There was no lime found when they dug his bones up. I discussed what Ernie LaPointe had relayed to me on this on the Sitting Bull thread a few months back as far as what his mother, Angeline Little Spotted Horse/LaPointe, told her him when she witnessed the digging up and moving of Sitting Bull's (her grandfather's) bones to Mobridge. She was the only family member that understood English that went to the autopsy at that time. Clarence Grey Eagle also went but he got his info through an interpreter.

As far as the taboo of not talking about them to those outside the family circle, this is true. However inside the circles of a family and the oral history that they pass, the feats of those who have gone to the other side are still passed on to the youth.