The fight for peace and freedom

Native Americans were permanently involved in bloody fights. There were a lot of very heavy fights between different tribes long before white men had come. But only with him war became a permanent state of affairs.
White men's part was not the peace-loving one. Treaties were broken and promises ignored. Native Americans were forced to protect their lives and country with weapons.
The wars waged by the conquerors were extermination wars, genocide on behalf of the Government. The growing giant USA needed a lot of space and the Native Americans were to be willing to be kept like animals in inhospitable reservations.

The Indian wars got a new quality with the end of the Civil War in 1865. Forts were supported by new troops from the east. New outposts were erected and slow infantry was completed by moveable cavalry. After the Civil War Indian wars in the Rockies and Plains became the last phase in the conflict between American Natives and white men.

The time when white intruders made first steps in the New World was the beginning of Indian wars. They finished with the massacre at
Wounded Knee.

The selected events are limited to the northern Plains.
They show very clearly the increasing escalation of the situation whose peak was the battle at Little Big Horn.

Selected events in chronological order:

		Powder River Expedition 1865			Beecher's Island 1868			Slim Buttes 1876
		Fetterman Massacre 1866			Massacre at Washita 1868			Bear Paw Mountains 1877
		Hayfield Fight 1867			Rosebud 1876			Flight of the Cheyennen 1878
		Wagon Box Fight 1867			Little Big Horn 1876			Wounded Knee 1890
		Hancock's War 1867			War Bonnet Creek 1876			map overview