They had been left behind by a wagon train commanded by Captain James L. In September, Sitting Bull and about one hundred Hunkpapa Lakota encountered a small party near what is now Marmarth, North Dakota. The Lakota and Dakota were driven out, but skirmishing continued into August at the Battle of the Badlands. The defenders were led by Sitting Bull, Gall and Inkpaduta. In 1864, two brigades of about 2200 soldiers under Brigadier General Alfred Sully attacked a village. Despite being embroiled in the American Civil War, the United States Army retaliated in 18, even against bands which had not been involved in the hostilities. ĭuring the Dakota War of 1862, in which Sitting Bull's people were not involved, several bands of eastern Dakota people killed an estimated 300 to 800 settlers and soldiers in south-central Minnesota in response to poor treatment by the government and in an effort to drive the whites away. At this ceremony before the entire band, Sitting Bull's father presented his son with an eagle feather to wear in his hair, a warrior's horse, and a hardened buffalo hide shield to mark his son's passage into manhood as a Lakota warrior. Thereafter, Sitting Bull's father was known as Jumping Bull.
The name, Tȟatȟáŋka Íyotake, which in the Lakota language approximately means "buffalo who set himself to watch over the herd", was simplified as "Sitting Bull". Upon returning to camp his father gave a celebratory feast at which he conferred his own name upon his son. He displayed bravery by riding forward and counting coup on one of the surprised Crow, which was witnessed by the other mounted Lakota. When he was fourteen years old he accompanied a group of Lakota warriors (which included his father and his uncle Four Horns) in a raiding party to take horses from a camp of Crow warriors. He was named Ȟoká Psíče (Jumping Badger) at birth, and nicknamed Húŋkešni or "Slow" said to describe his careful and unhurried nature. In 2007, Sitting Bull's great-grandson asserted from family oral tradition that Sitting Bull was born along the Yellowstone River, south of present-day Miles City, Montana. Sitting Bull was born on land later included in the Dakota Territory.
In 1953, his Lakota family exhumed what were believed to be his remains, reburying them near Mobridge, South Dakota, near his birthplace. His body was taken to nearby Fort Yates for burial. During an ensuing struggle between Sitting Bull's followers and the agency police, Sitting Bull was shot in the side and head by Standing Rock policemen Lieutenant Bull Head ( Tatankapah, Lakota: Tȟatȟáŋka Pȟá) and Red Tomahawk ( Marcelus Chankpidutah, Lakota: Čhaŋȟpí Dúta), after the police were fired upon by Sitting Bull's supporters. Due to fears that he would use his influence to support the Ghost Dance movement, Indian Service agent James McLaughlin at Fort Yates ordered his arrest. forces.Īfter working as a performer with Buffalo Bill's Wild West show, Sitting Bull returned to the Standing Rock Agency in South Dakota. He remained there until 1881, at which time he and most of his band returned to U.S. Sitting Bull refused to surrender, and in May 1877, he led his band north to Wood Mountain, North-Western Territory (now Saskatchewan). government sent thousands more soldiers to the area, forcing many of the Lakota to surrender over the next year.
Sitting Bull's leadership inspired his people to a major victory.
George Armstrong Custer on June 25, 1876, annihilating Custer's battalion and seeming to bear out Sitting Bull's prophetic vision. About three weeks later, the confederated Lakota tribes with the Northern Cheyenne defeated the 7th Cavalry under Lt. īefore the Battle of the Little Bighorn, Sitting Bull had a vision in which he saw many soldiers, "as thick as grasshoppers," falling upside down into the Lakota camp, which his people took as a foreshadowing of a major victory in which many soldiers would be killed. He was killed by Indian agency police on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation during an attempt to arrest him, at a time when authorities feared that he would join the Ghost Dance movement. 1831 – December 15, 1890) was a Hunkpapa Lakota leader who led his people during years of resistance against United States government policies. Sitting Bull ( Lakota: Tȟatȟáŋka Íyotake c.