P
“The nights and days were long
before it came time for us to
go to our homes. The day be-
fore we were to start we went
a little way towards home, be-
cause we were so anxious to
start.... We told the drivers
to whip the mules, we were in
such a hurry. When we saw the
top of the mountain from Albu-
querque we wondered if it was
our mountain, and we felt like
talking to the ground, we loved
it so, and some of the old men
and women cried with joy when
they reached their homes.”
—Navajo leader Manuelito,
describing his tribe’s 1868 return
to their homelandonly about one-fifth of the Navajo’s original
homeland.
The treaty also ends the tribe’s four-year incar-
ceration at Bosque Redondo in eastern New Mexico,
where the Navajo had been forcibly removed by the
U.S. Army (see entry for FEBRUARY TO MARCH
1864). The tribe’s return to their homeland and sub-
sequent efforts to rebuild their lives and traditions
there marks the beginning of the modern Navajo
Nation.JulyThe Snake Indians surrender to the
U.S. Army.
Ending a two-year military campaign against
them (see entry for 1866), 800 Northern Paiute
(Numu) known as the Snake surrender at Fort
Harney in Oregon. The Snake Indians fought
nearly 50 battles with troops led by General
George Crook. During these conflicts, approxi-
mately 500 Snake were killed, including the
influential Chief Pauline.Lakota leaders with U.S. peace commissioners during the negotiation of the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie (South
Dakota State Historical Society/State Archives)