What were the reasons for conflict between the natives and white settlers?

Sometimes the wives of a few of the men accompanied a large war party to help care for their clothing and to do the cooking. A sacred War Pack, kept in the Tent of War, was important in any war activities. The contents of the pack were believed to protect the tribe from harm. A returning war party with the scalp of an enemy held a special scalp or victory dance. Men who won special honors on the warpath were permitted to wear an eagle feather in their scalp locks. Certain warriors might also wear a deer-tail headdress. Only important men wore the large feathered headdress seen in movies and only on social occasions. Only the men wore feathers in their hair, but the women might wear them on their clothing.

Ft. Laramie Treaty of 1851

In 1851 government officials met with Cheyenne, Crow, Blackfeet, Arapaho, Assiniboine, Dakota, Lakota and Nakota tribal members at Fort Laramie, in Wyoming, just west of what would become Nebraska. Approximately 10,000 Native Americans camped and talked with U.S. representatives. The tribes and the government negotiated a treaty that had several main points:

• The treaty called for peace and friendship among rival tribes.
• It promised each tribe $50,000 each year for 10 years.
• In exchange, the treaty recognized the U.S. government’s right to build roads and forts and the rights of immigrants to travel on the Overland Trail in peace.
• The treaty drew lines on the map where tribes were allowed to hunt and fish; later treaties created actual reservations.
• The treaty allowed the government to withhold the money if the tribes violated the terms of the agreement.

The Fort Laramie Treaty paved the way for the U.S. to allow tribes the right to govern themselves. It also began several decades of treaty negotiations and agreements that eventually transferred almost all of the tribal lands to the U.S.

Unfortunately the peace did not last. In 1854 — eight years before the Homestead Act — some Lakota near Fort Laramie butchered an emigrant’s cow they thought was abandoned. Lt. John Grattan and 29 soldiers were sent to investigate. Grattan opened fire on the Indian camp. The Indians fought back, killing all of the soldiers.

The next year Gen. William Harney was ordered to restore peace on the trail. He found a Lakota camp at Blue Water Creek in Garden County and attacked it, although the camp residents had nothing to do with the Grattan slaughter. Harney’s troops killed 136 men, women, and children. Although peace was restored, pressure continued to build, and war broke out again in 1863 with attacks on Overland Trail travelers. In 1867 the Lakota pushed eastward and attacked a Union Pacific railroad train in Dawson County, Nebraska. Attempts at peaceful settlements resulted in payments of food, guns, and other goods to the Lakota.

In the years after the Homestead Act of 1862, more Europeans moved into Native American territory. The Homestead Act gave free land to settlers who lived on the land for five years. In the 1860s and ’70s, the United States Army was at war with the Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho tribes. The Pawnee tribe had fought these other tribes for years, and so the Army turned to the Pawnee for help against a common enemy.

The Pawnee became scouts. They were very successful in helping protect the railroad as it was being built across Nebraska, and they accompanied several U.S. Amy expeditions against the warring Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho. But, by the late 1870s, the Pawnee Scouts were disbanded. The U.S. Government had removed most members of the Pawnee tribe from Nebraska to Indian Territory south of Nebraska.

There were more conflicts during the early homestead period with a band of Cheyenne in the Republican River valley of south central Nebraska. Again, a military expedition was sent out in 1869 to subdue the Cheyenne. The campaign killed 50 warriors.

For the immigrants, the threat they felt from Native Americans was probably greater than the actual history. There was conflict — theft, fights and murder on both sides. But there were also hundreds of treaty negotiations across the continent. These treaties lessened the conflict and, more importantly, transferred legal title for land that native tribal people had lived and hunted on for centuries to the U.S.

What caused conflict between settlers and native?

What were the conflicts between American settlers and Indians?

Why was there conflict between indigenous people and white settlers as they expanded west?

What were the major conflicts with the Native Americans?