Washita

[Diane Merkel]

The whipping winds brought back memories for Lawrence Hart.

The 74-year-old Cheyenne-Arapaho peace chief was one of several hundred who gathered Friday for the dedication of a new cultural center at the Washita Battlefield National Historic Site.

While he signed books after the ceremony, he heard the 100-year echo of the event the site commemorates: Lt. Col. George Custer's 1868 attack on a group of 300 Cheyenne-Arapaho families.

In 1868, Custer's 7th Cavalry swooped down on the peaceful American Indians, killing men, women and children.

In 1968, the centennial of the battle, Hart recalled another unprovoked incident of terror.

To cooperate with planners for centennial commemorations, Hart's family re-enacted the 1868 Black Kettle camp along the Washita River.

His eldest daughter and his only son were camping with his sister in a re-enactment of that cold winter's morning.

Without warning to the Harts, another group -- The Grandsons of the 7th Cavalry -- rode through the encampment, shooting blanks from their guns liberally, Hart said.

The Cheyenne reaction was terror and stunned disbelief.

Article: www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?articleID=070421_1_A1_ANWor82671

[Diane Merkel]

Here's a blogger's viewpoint of the dedication:

www.huffingtonpost.com/tim-giago/honoring-those-who-died-a_b_46519.html

[markland]

admin said:

Here's a blogger's viewpoint of the dedication:

www.huffingtonpost.com/tim-giago/honoring-those-who-died-a_b_46519.html

I have that saved to reply to when I am in a better mood, which at the rate I am going will be sometime in 2021. Whenever my view comes out, it will, in some ways, surprisingly resemble CSS's viewpoint.

Billy

[gary]

What? You don't agree that "the Heritage Center is a magnificent piece of architecture"?

[markland]

gary said:

What? You don't agree that "the Heritage Center is a magnificent piece of architecture"?

Billy

[AZ Ranger]

"HEY CHARLIE, DUCK YER HEAD!!
(sound of arrow whizzing by)
Hmm, you're a little bit late on that one, Charlie
Hooh, I bet that smarts!"

Should have paid attention during arrow drill.

[clw]

Hey Mr. Custer?
You mind if I be excused the rest the afternoon?

Must have missed the arrow drill entirely, eh?

[gary]

Some good links for info on the Washita include the NPS site:

www.nps.gov/waba/

The families' stories (courtesy of John Sipes, Cheyenne historian):

home.epix.net/~landis/washita.html

and a page created by the Wynkoop family:

freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~wynkoop/webdocs/washita.htm

[Banned]

Honoring Clara Blinn's murderers and paying tribute to the people who smashed her son against a tree. How touching it is.

Is Oklahoma ready for a monument to Abu Mussab Zarqawi ? Should be "touching" too.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4534E1cCLyQ

[Tricia]

I think you're picking on the wrong state, CSS. Does "Oklahoma City" ring a bell?

[markland]

custerstands said:

Honoring Clara Blinn's murderers and paying tribute to the people who smashed her son against a tree. How touching it is.

Is Oklahoma ready for a monument to Abu Mussab Zarqawi ? Should be "touching" too.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=4534E1cCLyQ

CSS, read up on your history of Oklahoma and you will quickly realize that the area comprising that state was at one time given solely to Indian tribes. The Civilized Nations which had been expelled from the East as well as the tribes transported southward from Kansas, the Comanche, the Cheyenne. It was stolen by land-hungry whites from those tribes.

And you still ignore the fact that Custer himself said that they found the bodies at a distance from the Washita battlefield in an abandoned village, supposedly Kiowa.

Billy

[Banned]

First, the "peace monuement (what a joke) was dedicated near the Washita battlefield, to show everyone that Americans are "nice" and weak to thank the people who murdered their civilians in the past. Thanks a lot, people, for having murdered Mister Shaw, Miss Shaw, Borgadus, Miss Bell, abducted the Bell daugthers (you have the whole story told by Little Rock in My Life in the Plains), Miss Bassett etc. etc. etc.

Custer wanted to attack the Kiowas with Sheridan, and he had the right to do so (the MCIlroy children or Melissa Candle were abducted/raped/killed by the Kiowas). He put the Blinns as a direct cause of the probable attack.

But Custer and Sheridan didn't find the bodies of the Blinns. It was the men of the 17th Kansas. And they all said that it was on the Washita Battlefield.

[Banned]

Extract of the article Diane posted :

Governor Darrell Flyingman of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma put things in realistic perspective when he arose to speak. He talked about the thousands of acres of land either ceded or stolen by hook and crook from the people of his nation over the years. He said, "I consider this to be a site of a massacre and not a battlefield as it is named and I will do everything within my power to see that the site is renamed as the Washita Massacre rather than Battlefield. Gov. Flyingman said that he felt great sorrow for the friends and family members of the massacre at Virginia Tech, but he was sad the television reporters kept referring to this tragedy as the worst massacre in American history. "The massacre of American Indians at Washita, Sand Creek and Wounded Knee were just as horrible and many more died at each massacre site as what happened at Virginia Tech, but I suppose the fact that it was 'just Indians' being slaughtered meant that it was not a part of American history," he said.

Yipee ! The worse example of NA revisionism. But who cares, hum ? American are so nice with the Cheyennes. I think someone should put on the Washita monument that Custer did actually shoot the students in Virginia Tech too. Be nice, please !

Nice guys. So nice. Smile, buddies, your history is stolen. But take the information with sensitiveness. You're so nice. oooo... Kiss... Shake hands... Nice people. Nice world. Nice Oklahoma.

Next step: Peaceful chief Timothy McVeigh is honored in Oklahoma, and the Governor of Oklahoma will renamed McVeigh's death to "the American unjust killing."

Please, be nice. Don't hurt the feelings of the sects around the world. Do you imagine the feelings of all those members of the sects who saw their buddy McVeigh being in jail, and then executed, just like the peaceful Black Kettle years ago?
Be nice. Open your minds. Don't be bad, bad Whites.

[yksin]

So nice to see a familiar face. The above statements are much the same as we've run up against from who seems to be the selfsame person on Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Battle_of_Washita_River#Request_for_comment.

-- Yksin

[Diane Merkel]

I kept hoping he would be like Swiss Cheese and mature with age, but it never happened.