Buddy received his honorable discharge from the Marine Corps just about the time a government bullet killed him. He is buried on the hill by the ditch, joining the ghosts of all the other Sioux killed at Wounded Knee. His headstone says: "Two thousand came to Wounded Knee in 197 3. One stay
. . . . . . . .
n April 27, Buddy Lamont, a thirty-one-year-old Oglala Sioux, an ex-marine Vietnam vet and only son, was shot through the heart and died instantly duri~g a heavy firefight. Buddy was shot in an abandoned house next to the commu-nity center. I guess a sniper in one of the fed bunkers had pinned him down. He lost patience and ran out of the building, drawing more fire, possibly so he could shoot back, and just when he was coming out of the building he was hit. Again the medics were shot at. Again the relatives coming out with his body were arrested a
As heart breaking at this is, it goes to show the pattern in which this Government in it's entirety, then or today, do nothing but hurt people.
His wife was kept overmght m Jatl. She wanted him buried at Wounded Knee, for which he had given his life, but Wilson and. the ~overn~enr,, would not allow it "because he was not a Pme Ridge Sioux. In the end Crow Dog buried him on his own land in the Indian manner, with the pipe and Grandfather Peyote.
💔 Just so broken.
Our men shot at the copter and that started a firefight which lasted almost two hours. Frank Clearwater had ar-rived the day before with his pregnant wife Morning Star. She was Apache and he was Cherokee. He was resting on a bed inside the church when a bullet crashed through the wall and smashed into his head. When it became known that one of our brothers had been badly hurt we used the two-way radio to ask the marshals for a cease-fire. They promised to hold their fire and two of our men and some nurses went up the hill to get him. They were waving a white flag. T~e nurses wore arm bands and had a red cross painted on thelf helmets, but they were immediately shot at by the marshals
Her account of what happened is such tragedy. I cannot fathom a word that is appropriate in this drop of my stomach in reading what these people went through. Casualties isn't a clear enough description. There is no humanity to a loss that great. From false pretenses no less.
Two of our men were killed at Wounded Knee and many were seriously wounded. On the other side no one was killed and only one marshal badly wounded. For all I know he might have been caught in the feds' own crossfire.
The first thing when one travels via google land is a Wiki page that calls this Siege, 'Wounded Knee Incident." Written as if these folks were numbers. Such coldness and foolishness that aligns within that page entirely.
Some of the most memorable events at the Knee were the two air-drops. The first airlift dropped four hundred pounds of food into the perimeter-powdered milk and Similac for the children, dried beans, flour, rice, coffee, tea, sugar, bak-ing soda, and cigarettes, as well as bandages, antibiotics, and vitamins. The single plane came in very low. It almost got caught on a telephone wire, but managed to duck under it and come in for a hard landing on the road close to the trading post. As soon as it touched down, everybody ran up and unloaded it.
If only people would've listened. Having goods air dropped was a relief after reading their rations had been slowly depleting. Good people exist, somewhere out there.
The talks always came around to which came first, the chicken or the egg. The government negotiators said: "Dis-arm and surrender, then we'll consider your grievances." Always we replied: "Let's talk about our grievances first, then we'll disarm and come out." Crow Dog proposed a compromise. Instead of surrendering our arms outright, we would stack them all inside the tipi while the negotiations went on.
One small step for woman, one giant leap for Native kind.
On March 12, 1973, a big day, Wounded Knee declared itself a sovereign territory of the independent Oglala Nation. Anybody of goodwill, In-dian or white, could become a citizen. Whatever one might say about AIM, it was never racist.
I am unsure of AIM and their reputation because of so much media. Mostly negative so I can only assume they were doing something right.
He came up to me while I was doing dishes and held out his hand. He had a sour face. He said, "Hello, I'm George McGovern." I just looked at him and said, "So what," turned around, and went on scrubbing dishes
I wish I had known her. Though my battle was far different I think I would've liked her a lot. I had my moment of openly flipping off former Vice President Dick Cheney. She was far more patient than I. There is so much to learn from her even after she's gone. Like that of Annie Mae.
Our South Dakota senators Abourezk and McGovern were among them. Abourezk was supportive, which ruined his chances to run for a second term. McGovern was not. He is a great liberal anywhere but in South Dakota, because being friendly with activist Indians would cost him his reelection
More proof politics is, pardon my language, bullshit! Running a country should not be a popularity contest. This country has never had common sense. It's sad and angering. But I also feel so alien. I don't fit in both places and feel as though I have no place to be angry. Like when other's feel angry about what's happened to me. I feel like it's stolen from me when it happens. I don't ever want another human to feel that ever. It leaves me conflicted and in search again for what the appropriate response is.
She caught the general's eye.
Before all else: EW! Back to the program here, this excerpt shows the brutality. It also shows just how buried media and the US refuses to acknowledge it did wrong in any way whether in past or even now. It took me a few searches to find anything on this story of the brothers. It's discouraging.
Oddities among our warriors were two brothers, Charles and Robert. They were great-grandsons of General George Armstrong Custer,
After some research in "Brave Hearts: Indian Women of the Plains; Chapter 10, Monaseta: Custer's Captive "Wife' " Author Joseph Agnito elaborates that there may actually be some doubts and questions if they truly are George Custer's great grandchildren.
The feds could not see our men at night, but the dogs would smell them. It was a Vietnam vet, one of our few white brothers at the Knee, who told us how to fix those mutts. The thing to do was to have some pepper in your pocket and to urinate in one place and stomp and rub your feet in it
It was not a stand, ever. It was war. A war that was necessary but because this government decided to keep on with a charade of still enslaving whole race of human-beings. Sadly, it is still happening.
My brother was with us at Wounded Knee. He walked out one night to get food and ammunition and got busted
She discusses her family, her bro, fighting with her. And then getting stopped and stripped of all his weapons by government idiots. But as she goes on she tells of the fondness she has for him. They must've been very close.
Annie Mae taught me a lot. She could make some-thing out of nothing. She made nice meals with seemingly no provisions except dried beans and yellow peas. After I gave birth she made a tiny Wounded Knee patch for little Pedro. She was older than I and already a mother, divorced from a husband whose heart was not big enough for her. Annie Mae found among us Sioux an Indian culture her own tribe had lost. She was always saying, "If I'm going to die, I'm going to die. I have to die sometime. It might as well be here where I'd die for a reason." She had a premonition that her militancy would bring her a violent death, and in this she was right. She had heard the call of the owl.
More admiration of Annie Mae. My heart hurts to see what did become of her. You can almost feel only a very small fraction of her heart breaking when talking about this. Mary didn't have to share that painful memory. Nor what she was told about Annie Mae having that premonition.
Annie Mae gave these women a piece of her mind and I took her side.
I find myself cheering as I go on reading this chapter! I certainly look forward to reading the book as a whole. She shows her humor, her determination through her eyes and in this dictation of brilliance.
"Pie Patrol."
I love how sarcastic she is. I'm very happy to read that she too, writes in the same manner in which she speaks. Makes for more a conversational like read.
Also these "loud-mouth city women" kind of remind of the native version of the Kardashians.
Knee was getting to know Annie Mae Aquash,
Quote in it's entirety... "One of the good things that happened to me at Wounded Knee was getting to know Annie Mae Aquash"
This statement actually marks two very remarkable things. First, her statement of meeting another great, strong woman and appreciating the gravity of her situation she still sought the good out of hell.
Secondly, Anna Mae Aquash. If people do not know who she is, they need to. she was a Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq First Nations native. She moved to the US to help in the fight with her brothers and sisters in AIM during the 60's and 70's. Sadly she was brutally murdered during The Siege of Wounded Knee and found off a highway and it took many weeks as told via various internet resources, to identify her body. I hope her spirit is at rest.
(A saying found on the internet, not sure if it's true that I felt epitomizes the feeling of this amazing woman) "I am an Indian all the way and always will be. I'm not going to stop fighting until I die, and I hope I am a good example of a human being and of my tribe." But even in death, she still fights.
One of the good things that happened to me at Wounded
For some reason this website has a special hate for my computer or vise-versa. Please see below this for full context. "One of the good things that happened to me at Wounded Knee . . ."
some of the men did not like her
This goes alongside the bottom notation. All because she was good with a gun. I feel that said a lot considering the context in which was discussed in class today. (5-10-18) I understand that female gender presence changes forms and roles in various cultures. However in America there is so many diverse sub-cultures that one doesn't always live and label like the rest of the country. Something that's always important to remember and respect.
safety while she covered them
Not only the perspective of a person in a wartime situation, but a woman on the front lines
Gray Fox's wife
Another bad ass woman!
During a firefight there was one young woman in particular who held off seven marshals while some of the men got behind shelter. All she had was an old pistol. She used that to scare them off.
This perspective from Mary Crow Dog is that of a unique one. She not describes the physical surroundings but she gives them substance and a human face. Unlike the cold "factual" descriptions of historians bred from modern American society. In regards to my wording of "factual" there are various connotations now days. Facts, something that accurately depicts the events that occurred. But, "facts" as they are called can be presented in the first person terminology or in a cold, emotionally sterile way. Not this. This has heart.
As the siege went on our women became stronger. One bunker was held by a married couple. When the hus-band was hit by several bullets, the wife insisted on holding the position alone. Women "manning" a bunker got into a two-way radio argument with some marshals.
More proof that Gender is important, but not in the typical american sense. Though it was devastating for her to lose her forever person, she still kept on. It was her way to cope. But the only way to tell was to be inside her head.
old Cheyenne saying: "A nation is not lost as long as the hearts of its women are not on the ground."
I am unsure what exactly it means. Is it really an old Cheyenne saying or was she just messing with the reader? Where would the best source be to find it? I was seeking the great wise internet only to find many sources. Not all were Cheyenne.
One day Dennis found an old stovepipe and attached a thing to it that looked like a gunsight. We set it up and started a rumor that we had acquired a rocket launcher
BAAHAAHAA!!! I'm sorry, this is funny. It has to be noted, I understand the seriousness of the issue but it helps someone like me to see the humor and the irony of just what they did. They played the feds for the fools they were.
While we were relaxed, as Indians usually are
Was this an inside joke? A play on racial stereotypes to break from a serious subject?
The trouble was that they had a hard time finding the right kind of ammo to fit their oddball weapons, some of them real antiques that should have been in a museum.
Reason the weapons were so old and should belong in a "museum"? Well it was because that's exactly where they got them. The town of Wounded Knee was taken over. Among a few of the buildings one was a grotesque example of what one would call a museum. Though limited, they still fought.
men came out of their bunkers from time to time to fill their pockets with bullets
Interesting point to keep in mind as we go later in the text.
The "why" answer to the men needing the bullets is from the title of this chapter. Wounded Knee's rightful property and mass grave site of many indigenous, from a Battle of Wounded Knee in 1890. In 1973 a group of Lakota Natives was taking their land back which is why The Siege is the name that does not appropriately describe what happened. However, compared to the horrific discovery I made when searching Google instead of UWGB's online resource, is much more descriptive.
Victoria 137 - 143