These are off my video camera so apologies for lack of crispness.

The first video frame is of Deer Medicine Rock itself. Deer Medicine Rock currently sits on Jack Bailey’s farm just on the north side of the Northern Cheyenne Rez on the road from Lame Deer. His family has owned the land since about 1878.

Floyd Clown, Doug War Eagle, and Don Red Thunder, all of the Clown family, scraped together the gas money to go see Crazy Horse’s carving of his vision of his death. It is at the Deer Medicine Rock Sun dance grounds. The three had never been to the sun dance grounds but had only heard of it and Crazy Horse’s carving in stories that their grandfather, Ed Clown, had told them. Jack Bailey, who has seen literally thousands of visitors at his farm who come to see Deer Medicine Rock, greeted them. They told him they were there to find Crazy Horse’s death vision and that it was on the belly of a rock that was shaped like an owl. After all these years, and Jack is in his 70s, nobody had noticed or commented that the rock in question looked like an owl. But indeed it does.

On the belly of the owl is carved the story of his death. This was new to Jack who had always heard the Cheyenne version saying it was a priest that was talking to the Indians. But after this particular visit he doesn’t believe that anymore. In shot one Doug points out how the horse hooves are standing up. That means life or he was alive at the beginning of the carving.

In the next part of the carving their are two spear like objects entering Crazy Horse’s self portrait about the liver and kidney area. This represents the stab wounds inflicted by the bayonet.

As we study the drawing further, Doug points out a sign within the carving that he would be betrayed or that it would happen behind his back. We also see the first horse hoof laying sideways just underneath the two spears.

In this portion of the drawing we see a long line of horse hooves laying down. This means he lost his life. Standing on top of the horse hooves is a white man with a hat. This is what the Cheyenne thought was a priest. But the Clown family says this is Dr McGillicuddy, the doctor that tried to save his life. To the right of the man with the hat is another figure standing directly in the fallen horse hooves. He represents Little Big Man according to the family.

And here’s a picture of Dr McGillycuddy blown up from a group photo taken at Camp Robinson in 1877. I stumbled on this earlier this year. Notice the hat and the coat.

In the last part of the carving is the private who stabbed Crazy Horse. Although it is tough to make out due to the light and some of the carving is shallower than other parts, the private is on a parallel line with Little Big Man.

This is just a little closer look at the private with a line representing a bayonet.

Back on Deer Medicine Rock here is a calendar documenting their stay. The circle represents a day. The line divides the circle into day and night. There are six lines drawn from the circle. This means they camped at the Sun Dance ground for six days. Doug War Eagle is the source.

Here’s another drawing on Deer Medicine Rock that pertains to their family. I wasn’t able to include this picture in the documentary as I seem to have more info than room on my DVDs. Maybe I’ll switch sides and write a book (lol). This is supposed to be Bear With Horns. He was mortally wounded at the Battle of the Little Bighorn and was kept alive for four days with ‘bear medicine’ and died at Slim Buttes. The bear is considered the healing animal for the Lakota. It is the animal that lead them to their medicines. When a bear was sick and it showed in his feces, then they would follow to see what roots he would dig up to cure himself. This would cue the Lakota to use the same medicine on themselves. So inside Bear With Horns is another bear. It represents the bear medicine given to him by a medicine man who had followed a wounded bear and knew what medicine would keep him alive, albeit temporarily.

This next picture is just Rosebud Creek for all of you who have never seen it. A beaver decided to ham it up for my video camera.

And finally here is what the Little Big Horn River area looks like in the early morning. I took this shot just after dawn on June 25. I thought it interesting because I had never read anyone talking about the morning mist when looking off at the village from the Crow’s Nest.

For those who wish to visit Deer Medicine Rock you have to call Jack Bailey first. He’s been an outstanding caretaker of this treasure and if his family ever sells the land I would hope the state or feds would step in to purchase the Deer Medicine Rock area. When I have more time I’ll post Ernie LaPointe’s stories and pictures off the video from the Smithsonian.

— Brock

Yellow Nose counting coup with the flag he captured from Long Hair’s soldiers. (Take a look at his short hair!)

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

This is a photograph by E. B. Snell: Wolf Road, Cheyenne/Sioux, brother of Man on the Cloud.

— Grahame Wood

There were several men called Whirlwind in Cheyenne history. The man in the Snell photo and in the 1872 photo must be Old Whirlwind (ca.1823-1891), a Southern Cheyenne chief of the Peneteka faction of the Hevhaitaneo (Hair Rope) band, in reservation times situated west of Watonga, Oklahoma, on the North Canadian River. (See John H. Moore, “The Cheyenne Nation”)

His son was called Young Whirlwind; maybe he wears the war-bonnet in the last photo.

There also was a warrior named Little Whirlwind among the Northern Cheyenne. 

Here is the 1872 photo of Whirlwind:

Here’s another, a rather impressive looking Whirlwind, obviously not the same Cheyenne?

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

There was an 84 year-old Long Chin in the Darlington Cheyenne census in 1887.

In Life of George Bent, he makes reference to the Dog Soldiers and Spotted Tail‘s Brules trading with Little Gerry in 1863, noting that Long Chin was a leader of the Dog Soldiers and there’s a footnoted reference to the fact that Gerry married one of (the Cheyenne) Long Chin’s Sioux nieces… He was also an uncle of Bent.

— Grahame Wood

His name was variously translated as Lame White Man, Walking White Man, Crippled White Man, or Broken White Leg. The Sioux called him Bearded Man or Moustache (which hints at the unusual presence of facial hair). Therefore author Richard Hardorff suggests that Lame White Man may have been a captive of white descendants.

Another Cheyenne name for him was Mad Hearted Wolf or Rabid Wolf, for in battle he was always out in front, “fighting as fiercely as a maddened wolf” (as Peter Powell stated).

His wife was called Twin Woman and he had two children: Red Hat and Crane Woman.

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

Chief Lame White man was 37 years old when he died and left behind a widow and two daughters. He is credited with encouraging the warriors to resist the “soldier” excursion into Calhoun Coulee in which the warriors initially fled at their approach. Contrary to the work published by Dr. Marquis who stated that Two Moon led the Cheyennes at the Little Bighorn, Wooden Leg says it was Lame White Man.

A Southern Cheyenne, Lame White Man had been with the northern branch for so long that he and his wife and children were considered to be part of the Northern Cheyenne. He was also referred to as Walking White. In the heat of battle he received mortal wounds and succumbed to these wounds on Custer Ridge. His body was subsequently mistaken as a “Ree” scout for the soldiers and, as a result, scalped by the infuriated Sioux warriors.

Lame White Man was also known as “White Man Cripple” and “Walking White Man.” His martial prowess when battling the “White Man” was so prodigious that his contemporaries honored him with names that signified what happened to “White” soldiers when they came face to face with him. Their intestinal fortitude became so meager that they could offer no more resistance than a cripple or were inclined to walk away rather than fight.

— Realbird

Henry Roman Nose and Wife

Henry Roman Nose was quite a prominent man in late nineteenth century Cheyenne affairs. He was one of the Cheyenne prisoners sent to Fort Marion in April 1875 and later attended Carlisle. He worked as a blacksmith at the Darlington Agency before going into business on his own account. Roman Nose State Park, Oklahoma, is named after him.

— Gary

I looked through the pages of “People of the Sacred Mountain” by Father Peter Powell. He listed the Northern Cheyenne Chiefs in 1876 and who of them was at the Little Bighorn in detail.

The traditional 44 Cheyenne Chiefs were chosen in a ceremony after a Sun Dance in 1874. This “Renewing of the Chiefs” took place normally every ten years. For the first time the Northern Cheyenne elected their own Council of Chiefs independent of the Southern branch of the tribe. The following Cheyennes were chosen in 1874:

Old Man Chiefs:
Little Wolf, Northern Suhtai and Sweet Medicine Chief
Morning Star (a/k/a Dull Knife), Head Chief of the Omisis
Old Bear, Omisis
Black Moccasin (a/k/a Limber Lance)

Council of the Forty-Four:
Box Elder, Head Chief of Northern Suhtai
American Horse, Northern Suhtai
Black Wolf, Northern Suhtai
Black Eagle, Head Chief of Northern Scabby
Little Chief, Little Chief’s band of Lakota/Cheyenne
&
Turkey Leg, (Young) Spotted Wolf, Old Wolf, Black Moccasin (a/k/a Iron), Bald Bear, White Dirt (a/k/a Powder), White Head (a/k/a Gray Head), Old Crow, Strong Wolf (a/k/a Big Wolf), Plum Man, Magpie Eagle, Crazy Head, Black Crane, Medicine Bear, Medicine Wolf, Twin, Standing Elk, Spotted Elk, Living Bear, Black Bear, Cut Foot, Broken Dish (a/k/a Calfskin Shirt) and some others.

The great majority of these Chiefs were at the Little Bighorn in 1876.

Only Morning Star/Dull Knife, Turkey Leg, Spotted Elk, Standing Elk, Living Bear, and Black Bear remained at the agency that year. Little Wolf arrived shortly after the battle and was harangued badly by the Lakotas.

In addition to the Chiefs all of the thirty headmen of the Northern Cheyenne warrior societies were probably present at the Little Bighorn, with the exception of Little Wolf, head chief of the Elkhorn Scrapers.

Elkhorn Scraper:
Lame White Man
Wild Hog
Broken Jaw
Crow-Split-Nose
Tall White Man
White Hawk
Left-Handed-Shooter
Goes-After-Other-Buffalo
Plenty Bears
Wolf Medicine

Kit Foxes:
Last Bull
Two Moon
Bear-Who-Walks-On-A-Ridge
Wrapped Hair
Plenty-of-Buffalo-Bull-Meat
Little Horse
Sits-Beside-His-Medicine
Mosquito
Rattlesnake Nose
Weasel Bear

Crazy Dogs:
Old Man Coyote
Strong Left Hand
Little Creek
Snow Bird (a/k/a White Bird)
Crazy Mule
Iron Shirt
Black Knife
Beaver Claws
Red Owl
Crow Necklace

The most important holy men in the Little Bighorn village were Coal Bear (Keeper of the Sacred Hat), Box Elder, and White Bull (Ice).

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

Left to right.: Tangle Hair, Wild Hog, Strong Left Hand, George Reynolds (interpreter), Old Crow, Noisy Walker, Porcupine, Blacksmith

• Tangle Hair, a half-Sioux by birth, was a dog soldier headman
• Wild Hog, a headman of the Elkhorn Scraper warrior society, was the leader of all the warriors in Dull Knife’s band during the flight to the North
• Strong Left Hand, also known as Strong Left Arm or simply Left Hand, was a headman of the Crazy Dog warrior society and was at the Little Bighorn
  
• Noisy Walker or Noisy Walking (not the son of White Bull) or Old Man was a mature Northern Cheyenne dog soldier warrior
• Old Crow or Crow was a council chief who had a bad reputation because he had scouted for the soldiers when Dull Knife´s village was destroyed in 1876
• Porcupine (1847-1929) was also a mature dog soldier warrior, he was the son of White Weed, an Arikara and a Lakota woman, but was married to a Northern Cheyenne woman. He was later a Ghost Dance teacher and a council chief (see P. Powell)
• Blacksmith was an older warrior

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

The photographs of the Cheyenne prisoners were sold by the firm of Leonard & Martin of Topeka, Kansas, presumably the original photographers. (J. H. Leonard and his partner H. T. Martin).

Here is another version of the same individuals:

— Ephriam Dickson

Here is the same group with some of their women and children in a studio setting. I just recently saw this photograph in a German translated version of “Life of George Bent”. It is interesting, I think, because it shows a rather young George Bent (interpreting at this trial), who looks more like an Indian here than in other photos with mustache.

Note that Old Crow, as one of the 44 council chiefs of the Cheyenne the highest ranking member of this group, sits in the center:

Front row, left to right: Old Crow´s son, Wild Hog´s daughter. Second row, sitting: Porcupine, Old Crow´s wife, Old Crow, Wild Hog. Back row, standing: Old Crow´s daughter, Noisy Walker, Strong Left Hand, George Bent, Blacksmith, Tangle Hair, Wild Dog´s daughter.

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

Fort Robinson outbreak, Frank Leslie's Illustrated, Feb. 15, 1879.

— Grahame Wood

Here are possibly three men from the photographs made at the trial in Kansas, pictured in later years:

Porcupine:

Tangle Hair:

Old Crow:

Strong Left Hand, the Elkhorn Scraper chief, ca, 1890 in Montana:

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

By De Lancy Gill, 1913

Charles Milton Bell

By Charles Milton Bell (Two Moons, second from left, American Horse, third from left)

By Richard Trossel, 1907

By Richard Trossel, 1907

Two Moons addressing council, by Joseph K. Dixon

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

Early L.A. Huffman Photo

Two Moons by Burbank, 1896

— Grahame Wood

Shown here are some of the Cheyenne chiefs present at the Little Bighorn battle, from left to right:

Sits in the Night; Red Cherries; Brave Wolf; Two Moons; American Horse; Buffalo Hump; Spotted Wolf; Old Wolf.

According to Frink/Barthelmess in “Photographer on an Army Mule” the photo was made at a council with General Nelson A. Miles at Lame Deer in 1889.

Two Moons was the spokesman of the Cheyenne at this council. I guess that Buffalo Hump is Bull Hump, son of Dull Knife. Spotted Wolf (or Young Spotted Wolf) and Old Wolf were both members of the 1873 delegation to Washington.

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

This was taken at Little Bighorn in 1909.

— Grahame Wood

Two Moons’ grave in Busby, Montana:

— Diane Merkel

The Indian holding the star-spangled banner on the right of Two Moons (on his left) looks like Laban Little Wolf.

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

Two Moons at Little Bighorn

A different view of the 1909 shot:

Taken by Joseph Kossuth Dixon, 1909

— Grahame Wood

Wanamaker photo:

Two Moons and Major McLaughlin dated circa 1900:

— Henri/”apsalooka”

By Dixon

This photo is also in Powell’s “People of the Sacred Mountain”. It was made in 1908 at a great gathering in the valley of the Little Bighorn. Two Moons and other Cheyennes along with representatives of other tribes assembled some thirty years after the battle. Wooden Leg also described the gathering in Marquis’ book about him.

— Dietmar Schulte-Möhring

— Henri/”apsalooka”

By Edgar S. Paxson from 1902

— Agnes

Two Moons (left, facing the camera) and other Cheyennes at the Little Bighorn monument.

Two Moons by Joseph Henry Sharp. Painted at Lame Deer, Montana

— Grahame Wood