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Excerpt from Wooden Leg: A Warrior Who Fought Custer

Interpreted by Thomas B. Marquis

Published in 1931

For years after the Sand Creek Massacre, U.S. soldiers and Indian warriors met in dozens of battles and skirmishes across the Plains region, with neither side gaining a decisive advantage. Eastern newspapers mocked the American forces for their inability to capture the relatively small bands of Indians who were causing so much trouble. The final conflict between these two forces came in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Sacred ground to many of the Plains tribes, the Black Hills had been protected by many treaties over the years. However, General George Armstrong Custer (1839–1876) led an expedition into the Black Hills in 1874 to protect white settlers who believed that there might be gold in the region. When gold was found, tens of thousands of fortune seekers and settlers...