On March 30, 1891--less than four months after the military suppression of the Lakota Ghost Dance at Wounded Knee, South Dakota--twenty-three Lakota Sioux imprisoned at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, were released into the custody of William F. Cody. -Buffalo Bill, - as Cody was known, then hired the prisoners as performers. Labeled -hostiles- by the federal government, the Lakotas would learn to play hostiles before British audiences in 1891-92 as part of the Wild West's second tour of Britain.In Hostiles? Sam A. Maddra relates an ironic tale of Indian accommodation--and preservation of the Ghost Dance, which the Lakotas believed was a principled, restorative religion. To the U.S. Army, their religion was a rebellion to be suppressed. To the Indians, it offered hope in a time of great transition. To Cody, it became a means to attract British audiences. With these Lakotas, the showman could offer dramatic reenactments of the army's conquest, starring none other than the very -hostile Indians- who had staged the recent -uprising- in South Dakota.Cody's narrative of conquest is generally rejected, but few people even today question whether the Lakotas had twisted the original Ghost Dance into a violent resistance movement. Drawing on sources previous historians have overlooked, Maddra shows the fallacy of this view. Appended to this volume are five of Short Bull's narratives, including a new translation by Raymond J. DeMallie of a 1915 interview.
390 Banana Points
