Sitting Crow - Blackfeet / Sioux (Lakota)

Sitting Crow 1822-25?-1885-86?

Census materials indicate that Sitting Crow was born about 1822. The earliest mentions of him I've so far located are related to the DeSmet peace mission to the non-treaty Hunkpapas in spring 1868. Sitting Crow was a member of Fr DeSmet's escort, indicating that he was a member of the pro-treaty element of the Sihasapa (Blackfoot Sioux). He's not mentioned in the records of the peace commissions of 1865-67. According to one of the 1868 documents he was a member of the Sihasapa chapter of the Strong Hearts (Chante Tinza) warrior society. By 1868 the Strong Hearts had been a key articulator of an anti-USA, non-treaty isolationist agenda for a generation. Sitting Crow's adoption of a pro-treaty stance is one indication of a dramatic shift in Sihasapa attitudes during the mid-60's, which saw a majority of this Lakota tribal division move away from isolationism.

Sitting Crow signed the treaty of 1868 at Ft Rice in July. Agencies were established on the new Great Sioux Reservation, including the Grand River agency in fall 1868 (subsequently relocated to Standing Rock). I've not made an exhaustive study of Grand River documents, but Sitting Crow is noted as one of the resident headmen there in spring 1870 (he isn't mentioned in a fall 1869 document which lists leaders at GR). Thereafter he seems a fixture at Grand River-Standing Rock. The Alex Gardner shot (on left) shows that he was one of the three Sihasapa leaders on the Grand River delegation to Washington in 1872, along with Used As Their Shield (or Grass, father of John Grass), and Iron that Drives Off (Maza Wanapeya - probably not a golfing allusion). He was resident at Standing Rock as a leader of his band through the Great Sioux War, though it is highly likely that younger band members including relatives (and namesakes?) joined the non-treaty bands during the spring-summer of 1876 and so were present at the Litttle Bighorn. He remained a Sihasapa headman at Standing Rock through the 1880s, but then I lose sight of him...

--Bray M. Kingsley

Source: Little Big Horn Associates: http://lbha.proboards12.com (by member: kingsleybray, Mar 19, 2007)