Spotted Tail

Chief Spotted Tail

Denver Public Library/Bridgeman Images

Quick Facts

Significance:

Brulé Lakota Tribal Chief

Place of Birth:

Present Day South Dakota

Date of Birth:

1823

Place of Death:

South Dakota

Date of Death:

August 5, 1881

Place of Burial:

Rosebud, South Dakota

On March 8, 1866, Sinte Gleska (Spotted Tail) arrived at the fort bearing the remains of his daughter, Mni Akuwin (Brings Water Home Woman), to be laid to rest on a ridge overlooking Fort Laramie. While traveling to Fort Laramie to meet with commissioners to negotiate an honorable peace his daughter died of tuberculosis in the Powder River County.
Below is Colonel Henry Maynadier's account of the burial of Mni Akuwin: Some days since I received a messenger from [Sinte Gleska], head chief of the Brule Sioux, saying that his daughter had died on the way here and had begged her Father to have her grave made with the whites... wishing to do him honor... I rode out with several officers, and met him half way between the fort and the Platte... I conducted him to the Fort and my headquarters. [I told the Chief] Everything should be prepared to have her funeral at sunset, and as the sun went down it might remind him of the darkness left in his lodge when his beloved daughter was taken away; but as the sun would surely rise again, so she would rise, and someday we would all meet in the land of the Great Spirit. The chief exhibited deep emotions during my remarks, and tears fell from his eyes... for some time he could not speak. After taking my hand he commenced with the following eloquent oration: This must be a dream for me to be in such a fine room... have I been asleep during the last four years of hardship and trial and am dreaming that all is to be well again, or is this real? Yes, I see that it is, the beautiful day, the sky blue, without a could, the wind calm and still to suit the errand I come on and remind me that you have offered me peace.
Preparations were then made for the funeral... just before sunset the body was carried to the scaffold, followed by her father and mother and other relatives, with the chaplain, myself, and Officers and many of the soldiers of the garrison, and many Indians. Amid profound silence... the Chaplain delivered a touching and eloquent prayer... the hour, the place, the solemnity, even the restrained weeping of her mother and aunts, all combined to affect any one deeply.
Mni Akuwin, born in 1848, witnessed the Grattan fight in 1854 and was present in Little Thunder's camp on Blue Water Creek when it was attacked by General Harney in 1855. Over the years, Mni Akuwin became fascinated with the way of the wasicun and reportedly spent hours sitting in front of the Sutler's Store watching the activity and military pageantry at Fort Laramie. Near death, she requested that her father take her to the fort to be buried near her extended grandfather, Chief Smoke, who had died in 1864. Her body reposed at Fort Laramie until June 20, 1876, when her father returned, collected her remains and took them to his agency near the Black Hills. At bequest of her family, remains of Mni Akuwin were returned to Fort Laramie on June 25, 2005, where they are now interred.