Preface
On December 28, 1890, on the Lakota Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, a detachment of the U.S. 7th Cavalry intercepted an armed band of Lakota led by Chief Spotted Elk and forced them to camp near Wounded Knee Creek in southwestern South Dakota.
On the morning of December 29, supported by four Hotchkiss guns, the troops went into the camp to disarm the Lakota. A scuffle over the weapons resulted in a firefight, which escalated into the wholesale slaughter of approximately 350 Lakota, the vast majority of them women and children. The corpses of fleeing women and children were found shot as far as two miles from the fighting.
The Army suffered twenty-nine dead and thirty-five wounded—most of them from their own bullets and shrapnel. Twenty Medals of Honor were awarded after the battle.
Although a handful of minor skirmishes continued for almost two more decades, the battle that became known as the Wounded Knee Massacre was the last major conflict of the Indian Wars.