found guilty of murdering two peace commis-
sioners six months earlier (see entry for APRIL 11,
1873). The heads of the executed men are cut off
and sent to the Army Medical Hospital in Wash-
ington, D.C., for study (see entry for 1868). Two
other Modoc are sentenced to life imprisonment at
Alcatraz for their involvement, and about 150 of
Kintpuash’s followers are sent to live at Fort Qua-
paw in Indian Territory.
While awaiting his execution, Kintpuash asks
Alfred Meacham, who was injured in the Modoc’s
attack, to take down the Modoc leaders’s version
of events. Meachem will include this material in
his book Wi-Ne-Ma (The Woman-Chief ) and Her
People (1876), which will make a folk hero out of
Kintpuash’s cousin Winema (Toby Riddle), the
would-be peacemaker of the Modoc War.
1874Summer
George Armstrong Custer leads soldiers into
the Black Hills.
In violation of the Treaty of Fort Laramie (see entries
for APRIL TO AUGUST, 1868, and for NOVEMBER 7,
1868), Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong
Custer leads an expedition of U.S. troops through
the Great Sioux Reservation. In the Black Hills, an
area sacred to the Lakota Sioux and other Indian
groups, the soldiers find gold. Their discovery in-
spires white miners to flock to the region. Despite
its treaty promises, the federal government does
little to keep the whites out of the reservation (see
entry for 1876).
June 27
Indian warriors attack buffalo hunters at
the Battle of Adobe Walls.
In the first attack of a planned campaign against
non-Indian buffalo hunters (see entry for 1871), a
war party of 250 Cheyenne, Comanche, and Kiowa
led by Quanah Parker and Lone Wolf descend on
28 men and one woman camping near the trading
post of Adobe Walls on the Texas Panhandle. The
area has symbolic importance to the Indians as the
site of a battle between a Kiowa-Comanche force
and U.S. Army troops 10 years earlier (see entry for
NOVEMBER 25, 1864).
One member of the war party, Eschiti, claims
to have the power to make warriors bulletproof. The
Indians are, therefore, stunned at their vulnerability
to the hunters’ breechloading guns, which are much
faster to reload than traditional muzzle-loading guns.
In the face of withering gunfire, the warriors retreat
after several hours of fighting. The inconclusive bat-
tle is demoralizing to the Indian forces, which as a
result of their attack will become the target of the
massive military retaliation later known as the Red
River War (see entry for SEPTEMBER 28, 1874).September 28U.S. soldiers attack a Kiowa-Comanche camp
at Palo Duro Canyon.
Troops led by Ranald S. Mackenzie set upon Kiowa,
Comanche, and Cheyenne in their stronghold in
Palo Duro Canyon. Although only three Indians are
killed, the entire camp is destroyed, including the
Indians’ herd of 1,500 ponies. The attack is so de-
moralizing to the exhausted Indians that many soon
decide to give themselves up to soldiers at reservation
agencies. By the following spring, the Red River War
(see entry for JUNE 27, 1874) ends with the surrender
of nearly all off-reservation Kiowa and Comanche.
(See also entries for MAY 1875 and for MAY 3, 1875.)1875Congress passes the Indian Homestead Act.
Modeled after the Homestead Act (see entry for
MAY 20, 1862), the Indian Homestead Act offers
160-acre homesteads to western Indians willing to
leave their reservations and become private land-
owners. These Indians are to receive title to their
homesteads if they occupy them for five years and
make certain improvements to the land. Intended to