Taĥċa Wakutėpi: Where They Killed Deer

A golden eagle at sunset at the place where they killed deer.

Taȟčá Wakútepi: Where They Killed Deer
Sacred Site Also Historical
By Dakota Wind
KILLDEER, N.D. – Killdeer Mountain is hardly a mountain, but it is a beautiful and majestic plateau nonetheless as it rises gently above the steppe of the Northern Great Plains. In the summer, native plants and flowers dot the hillside and grow in the cracks of shattered sandstone. Short and middle indigenous grasses sway in a wind that has been present since creation.

The song of coyotes hauntingly fills the air on a gentle midsummer’s eve. The trees, a mix of ash and cottonwood grow in clusters, but it’s the cottonwood trees which sway and shush the world. Crickets take up their hum in the twilight where the cicadas left off theirs in sunlight.

Aeries of golden eagles and hawks remind the meadowlarks and rabbits to keep a wary eye on the skies. One golden eagle circles lazily above me and I take it as a good sign, my prayers will be carried, and I pause a moment to remember my grandparents.

The sunset, from the plateau of Killdeer Mountain. At the bottom of this image is the entrance to Medicine Hole. The wind exhaling the cave created a faint whistle.

At the very top of the plateau is a cave, an entrance into the heart of grandmother earth. Medicine Hole. Since the days of warriors and legend the Nu’Eta (Mandan) have called the mountain Bah-eesh, the Mountain That Sings. By day, like a great inhalation, the wind rushes into the deep embrace of the earth and at night like a long sigh the wind comes out with a whistle, and if one listens carefully, the song of the earth.

The breathing earth. The singing earth. To the Lakota what has breath has spirit, and the earth is a living breathing being, a grandmother. It is a reminder that we human beings belong to the earth. The earth doesn’t belong to people. In the Lakota language, Lahkol’iya, the earth is called Makoċė, grandmother. And she is honored as such.

"We estimated the natural gas flame had at least a 30' vertical from where it exited the stack," said Aaron Barth, Great Plains historian and archaeologist. Photo courtesy of Aaron Barth.

At dusk, when the sun’s fire has gone below the far horizon, true night no longer arrives. The moon no longer spreads her ebon robe over the land, and her embrace becomes a memory. In the distance are oil rigs. One can literally hear the fires of industry and human ingenuity humming across the land. The unnatural firelight smothers the land in perpetual gloomy twilight.

The site known today as the Killdeer Battlefield near Killdeer, ND, is known primarily for the conflict which occurred on June 28, 1864. On that day, General Sully led a command of 4000 soldiers in the last days of his Punitive Sioux Campaign in retaliation for the Minnesota Dakota Conflict of 1862. The village of Lakota and Dakota which Sully attacked had little to nothing to do with the 1862 conflict. The Teton and Yanktonai who were present had actually fought under Colonel Leavenworth’s command in the Arikara War of 1823.

General Sully’s assault continued into the evening and night with a hail of cannon volley.

The attack on the Lakota and Dakota camp from Sully's perspective.

Killdeer is designated a North Dakota State Historical Site and is valued for its contribution to the story of the state. The signage on site reflects the value the state has placed on the conflict. While there is nothing wrong with valuing, protecting, and interpreting the site as a battlefield, the story of the site as a hunting place, the story of the site as a spiritual place goes largely untold, and maybe that’s how it should be. But these are different days and the site should be preserved for more than the tragedy that occurred there.

The site was maintained by the North Dakota Department of Parks and Recreation at one time and shows it. Like Whitestone Hill, old picnic tables and a weathered playground await visitors. It’s an odd sight and it’s something that wouldn’t be seen at places like Gettysburg. A visit to a battlefield should be for reflection, not recreation.

Killdeer, or Taĥċa Wakutėpi, was more than just a place where they killed deer. Young Lakota and Dakota men would ascend the hill for prayer and reflection in the ceremony called Haŋblėċiyė, Crying For A Vision. They would mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually prepare far in advance for their spiritual pilgrimage. The site for their quest also determined long in advance. Their quests generally lasted four days on the hill or mountain, standing, kneeling or sitting while they prayed through cold rain, blistering heat, and desperate thirst to humble themselves before the creator. Killdeer was and still is a special place for prayer and reflection.

For the Lakota, ceremonies began a long time ago. “Ceremonies are forever,” says Cedric Goodhouse, an Uncapa Lakota on the Standing Rock Sioux Indian Reservation, “We live a life, and all the negative statistics associated with that, are the direct result of having a void of our spirituality, being denied a right to practice where and when our ceremonies are done, appropriately.”

The Nu’Eta (Mandan Indians) have the tradition that the bison entered into the world from Medicine Hole.

They also have the tradition that the mountain was once solid and unbroken stone until the son of Foolish One was killed. The spirits who were present at the death of Foolish One’s son entered the mountain. When Foolish One took up the lifeless body of his son, he smote the mountain with his staff and clove it in two leaving the two parts broken and cracked as we know it today.

Medicine Hole is where some of the Lakota and Dakota people fled into when Sulley began his unwarranted assault. The story goes that some of the people wound their way through the labyrinth and came out west of the mountain. It’s possible. A landslide, however, now marks the western exit.

The entrance to Medicine Hole. 

Medicine Hole splits into three passages. In 1973, a spelunker named Earle Dodge, determined that one passage went west for about 120 feet, another was too narrow for exploration, and a third went east about 120 feet. Another spelunker made a descent of eighty feet before extreme cold made the exploration difficult to continue.

The following day after Sully’s assault, his command destroyed all that was left behind, even the dogs, of which over 3000 were put to sleep. Children who were left behind in the hastily abandoned camp were killed.

Sully executed total war theory. Up to the Battle of Antietam, the Confederate States of America were winning the Civil War. The Union needed to win and subscribed to the total war theory of treating the civilians of the enemy as enemies. This meant the capture and imprisonment of innocent women and children, if they weren’t killed outright on the battlefield.

The success of the Union in the Civil War is directly related to the success of total war theory as demonstrated in the Punitive Campaigns of 1863 and 1864. If the site should be protected and preserved for its tragic history, then it must be argued that Killdeer holds a key to the victory of the union and must be protected.

In the summer of 1998, Isaac Dog Eagle officiated the Releasing Of The Souls ceremony at the Killdeer conflict site. The following year, he conducted the Wiping Of Tears ceremony to facilitate the healing process of people who lost family in the conflict.

Several private landowners and ranchers in and around Killdeer Mountain, many of them non-native but who have fostered a relationship with the land and want to preserve the site for its natural history, are gathering together to protect the site. A group of interested individuals are coordinating efforts to enlighten oil industry officials, and hopefully preserve the integrity of a natural site worth saving for its aesthetics as it is for the cultural traditions surrounding it.

There will be a public hearing about the preservation of Killdeer Mountain at 1:00 PM on Thursday, January 17, 2013 (or January 24, 2013) with the North Dakota Industrial Commission in the Governor’s Conference Room at the State Capital. Visit http://www.nd.gov/ndic/ or call (701) 328-3722 to inquire about the correct time and date.

My Trip to Fort Buford and Back, a Photo Essay Part 2

The new Sitting Bull statue is unveiled at Williston State College.

My Trip to Fort Buford and Back

Photo Essay Part 2

By Dakota Wind

WILLISTON, N.D. - Williston State College wants to challenge and change the sense of place that the community of Williston has of it. The campus has what this writer could only describe as an industrial look to it. The architecture of the campus is heavy on brick, concrete, and pavement. Some locals have taken to calling it “Walmart.”

On July 15, 2011, Williston State College unveiled the Sitting Bull statue to commemorate the 130th anniversary of Sitting Bull’s return to the United States. Sitting Bull and the Hunkpapa, or at least the Hunkpapa who followed him, numbered about 200 at Fort Walsh across the border. Sitting Bull actually returned to Fort Buford on July 18, 1881, just over five years after the Battle of the Little Bighorn.  

Michael Westergard created the bronze Sitting Bull statue which now stands at Williston State College. At the base is the speech which Sitting Bull was said to give as he handed his gun to Crow Foot, who in turn turned it over to commanding officer of Fort Buford. The speech is also in Lakota. Did Sitting Bull Surrender? On Standing Rock, where the Hunkpapa Lakota reside, some interpret the event as an exchange of one lifestyle that of the nomadic hunter-gatherer for that of a sedentary one.

Kevin Locke performed the hoop dance and some flute playing. Locke rendered White Cloud’s “The Indian Prayer” and an American Indian version of the 23rd Psalm in Plains Indian sign and gesture. I did not take pictures of Locke demonstrating the prayers.

Ernie LaPoint, great-grandson and direct lineal descendant of Sitting Bull, offered some words to the community of Williston and all present about his famous ancestor. He is an enrolled member of the Oglala Lakota on the Pine Ridge Sioux Indian Reservation in South Dakota. LaPoint articulated his ill feelings about the people of Standing Rock to the people in attendance. I don’t know if LaPoint has ever met with the nearly 16,000 enrolled members living on and off the reservation. One can read LaPoint’s thoughts of Standing Rock by reviewing his book "Sitting Bull: His Life and Legacy."

This writer isn’t trying to cut down the works or teachings of LaPoint. Far from it. LaPoint is seemingly a good man possessed of great humor and quick wit. This writer wants you, reader, to be aware that Standing Rock has good people too and is a great place to live and visit. There might not be lineal descendants of Sitting Bull on Standing Rock, but Sitting Bull’s own band are still there, the Hunkpapa Lakota (some are also on the Fort Peck Sioux Indian Reservation).

From Williston State College this writer went to Fort Union. The above picture is the view across the river much the same as Karl Bodmer knew it back it in the 1830s.  

Picture of Fort Union from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, May 1868.

It was once an American Fur Trade company outpost from 1828 to 1867. The Hunkpapa Lakota attacked this fort several times in the 1860s. The fort itself was a rendezvous for several tribes like the Crow, Hidatsa, Arikara, Mandan, Chippewa, Blackfeet, and the Dakota/Lakota.

Last summer, June 2010, this writer asked the ranger on duty in this room, the reception area for trade, for my allotment, to which he said after a stunned moment, “We don’t do that anymore.” 

Mr. Loren Yellow Bird was gracious enough to take a picture with this writer outside the commanding officer’s quarters within Fort Union. The walls were intended to keep out Indians, but now an Indian serves as superintendant of the site. Mr. Yellow Bird brings understanding of cultural and historical context to this national historic site.  

Fort Union along the Upper Missouri River seen today much as it would have been seen in the mid nineteenth century. The fort is inside North Dakota but the drive and parking lot are in Montana.  

A couple of miles east of Fort Union is Fort Buford, a North Dakota state historic site. It was in operation from 1866 to 1895 when the US Army abandoned it. The fort was established as a camp in mid 1866 and was attacked almost daily until the late fall. The Lakota saw the forts along the Missouri as representative of invasion. Fort Buford is where Sitting Bull exchanged one lifestyle for another (generally regarded as a surrender) in July 1881.  

The Missouri-Yellowstone Confluence Interpretive Center. If ever you, dear reader, get a chance to visit the northwest corner of North Dakota, take in this center. A museum is inside and the trails there offer beautiful riverfront walks. The staff are friendly and offer tours of Fort Buford.  

The North Unit of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

Again.

Another view from the other side of the Little Missouri River valley at the North Unit.

On my way home, I stopped by the Killdeer Battle site, a North Dakota state historic site. The signage says “Tachawakute (The Place Where They Kill Deer),” and far be it from this writer to disagree with interpretive signage, and though this writer has often heard it called “Killdeer,” it might be more correct to interpret the name as The Place Where They Hunt Deer, or in Lakota “Tahċa Wakutėpi.”  

Carl Ludwig Boeckmann painted this scene of Killdeer entirely from memory. The depiction of the landscape is surprisingly accurate. Look for similarities between this image and the following pictures.  

This is the east side of the Killdeer plateau. This writer parked and hiked and climbed the east embankment and walls to reach Medicine Hole, where the Dakota and Lakota say that some of them escaped the military by crawling through the tunnels. This author arrived as the sun was setting. A lonely coyote sung in the hills somewhere, dragonflies buzzed and kept the mosquitoes to a minimum. A slight breeze caused the leaves and branches to “shush.” It would have been an entirely peaceful visit if this author wasn’t aware of the gunfight that happened here in 1863.  

Medicine Hole.

A view from Medicine Hole at the top of the Killdeer plateau to the southwest.

A view from Medicine Hole (bottom foreground) to the sunset west-north-westerly.  

A view of the Killdeer plateau from the southeast facing northwest as the sun sank behind the geophysical feature.

A hawk flew into frame as this writer caught one more picture of the Killdeer site from the southeast looking northwest.