John H. Monnett,
ed. Eyewitness to the Fetterman
Fight: Indian Views. Norman, University of Oklahoma
Press, 2017. 248 pp. ISBN: 978-0806155821.
http://www.oupress.com/ECommerce/Book/Detail/2189/eyewitness%20to%20the%20fetterman%20fight
As with
most battles and massacres of the Plains Indian Wars, the historical memory of the
Fetterman Fight on December 21, 1866 seldom includes
Indigenous perspectives and interpretations. John H. Monnett
addresses this predicament through an edited synthesis of Lakota and Northern
Cheyenne eyewitness accounts, to reexamine the traditional narrative of this
battle. Early twentieth-century ethnographers and historians characterized the defeat
of Captain William J. Fetterman's command of nearly
eighty soldiers near Fort Phil Kearny in northern Wyoming as a disaster that resulted
from Fetterman's disobedience and arrogance. Monnett sheds light on this misconception, arguing instead
that the fight was one of the most strategic Indigenous victories on the
Northern Plains. Since there were no survivors of Fetterman's
command to remark on their experience or Fetterman's
frame of mind, scholars previously relied on scant documentary evidence and the
maligned impressions of non-participants at Fort Phil Kearny. Until the
expansion of ethnohistory in the 1970s, historians
did not consider Native sources of historical memory as valid forms of history.
Monnett provides an avenue for these Lakota and
Northern Cheyenne voices to not only broaden the
context, but to reclaim the Fetterman Fight's historical
narrative.
Monnett defines the purpose of his work as
both historical and methodological. Through the accounts of Joseph White Bull,
Fire Thunder, American Horse and others, the alliance of Lakota, Northern
Cheyenne, and Arapaho warriors denoted careful strategizing, knowledge of the
geography, and tactical skill. Monnett emphasizes
that these communities of the lush Powder River region had legitimate reason to
defend their accessibility to the ecosystem, hunting ranges, and trade (Monnett 8). For the Lakota, maintaining control over this
contested space had been crucial since acquiring the basin from the Crow in
1857. Older, secondary literature eschews this critical understanding of intertribal
relations and the culture of Plains Indian warfare. Monnett
restores this cultural significance through his assembly of Lakota and Northern
Cheyenne perspectives to reveal how the Fetterman
Fight had implications regarding both the land and successive generations. Best
resonated in the words of Bill Tallbull, a grandson
of a warrior in the battle, the Lakotas and Northern Cheyennes "were fighting for their families and their
future" (137). Preserving the memory of family members and tribal leaders involved
in the Fetterman Fight meant memorializing their
legacy as both a personal feat and defenders of the community.
From a
methodological standpoint, the impressive arrangement of eyewitness accounts enables
readers to interact with the sources in their raw form and approach the
production of history from an ethnohistorical
perspective. Monnett situates his collection of published
and unpublished interviews with historical context and his own scrupulous
interpretations and critiques for guidance. In each testimony, he is cautious
not to overshadow the strength of Indigenous narrations with his own voice.
Furthermore, Monnett warns the reader to be conscious
of the interviewer's positionality in these accounts.
Whether ethnographers embellished the oral histories for audience appeal or used
the knowledge of their Native subjects for personal advancement, Monnett addresses this predicament of validity in Native
testimonies with an approach of transparency. Best exemplified in John G. Neihardt's interview of the Oglala warrior, Fire Thunder, Monnett provides both the original transcription and how it
appeared in Black Elk Speaks. In
doing so, Monnett offers an important lesson in
linguistic floridity and manipulation by non-Native interviewers. He emphasizes
the importance of this skill again in other, more ambiguous accounts where it
is especially challenging to extrapolate the veracity from the interviewer's
embellishment. In total, the diverse array of Lakota and Northern Cheyenne
accounts develops an organic consistency aided by Monnett's
cross-examinations and corroborations.
The
mystery surrounding the roles of Red Cloud and Crazy Horse in the Fetterman Fight become a critical subject of inquiry for Monnett. The Fetterman Fight took
place in the middle of Red Cloud's War (1866-1868), a broader series of armed
conflicts between the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho alliance against
the U.S. government on the Northern Plains. In Plains Indian historiography and
popular memory, Red Cloud and Crazy Horse are some of the most familiar figures,
but their exact roles in the Fetterman Fight seemed
to be at a historical impasse. In the Oglala Lakota testimonies, most
interviews attest Red Cloud's presence at the battle, whereas the Minneconjou Lakota and Northern Cheyenne accounts claim
that he was absent. As for Crazy Horse, the accounts provided by Eagle Hawk,
American Horse, and Rocky Bear all testify to his presence near the battle site
(85). Monnett clarifies that although Red Cloud's and Crazy Horse's positions cannot be fully
confirmed, it is likely that they participated in some way. What is most
significant, Monnett concludes, is the iconic value
of Red Cloud and Crazy Horse as leaders in the resistance against U.S. settler
colonialism.
While these
speculations about Red Cloud and Crazy Horse are plausible, one wishes that Monnett further explained the consequences of their
representations in the secondary literature. As Monnett
himself proclaims, the Fetterman Fight had an
alliance of at least 1500 Native warriors defending their families, communities,
and livelihood. Perhaps another interpretation of the disparities regarding Red
Cloud and Crazy Horse might suggest that the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and
Arapaho peoples represented in this history understood their alliance to be
predicated on collective agency.
Joseph White Bull and others noted the democratized nature of this
alliance, with all participants having personal and communal reasons to
participate in the battle. As Monnett's argument in Eyewitness
to the Fetterman Fight encourages, the
traditional narratives of such events must be reassessed to acknowledge those whose
voices lack representation. It will be up to the younger generation of ethnohistorians to answer these intriguing considerations Monnett presents.
John H. Monnett's thoughtfully crafted assembly of Native voices
adds an untold dimension of the Fetterman Fight and
reminds readers of the necessity of Indigenous agency in historical production.
For the Lakota, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapaho warriors in the battle, the
trivial details of the battle were not as important as the main objectives of
their fight: securing their communities and defending the Powder River Country.
Monnett's fifteen-year commitment to the study of the
Fetterman Fight culminates with Eyewitness to the Fetterman Fight, which
engages students and scholars of ethnohistory to reimagine both the narrative and the craft.