As the gunfire stopped and smoke cleared on a freezing Colorado prairie, November 29, 1864, a young Cheyenne woman ventured forth from her tipi.
At first, Mo-chi watched as her people reacted to the surprise attack. Not able to comprehend what had happened, Mo-chi stood shivering in the cold aftermath. She carefully walked among the dead bodies of her tribe, shaking with fear and horror. She found the body of her husband, Standing Bull, and pressed on through tears of grief and horror. Finally, she found the body of her father. Her grief turned to anger.
Mo-chi seized her dead father’s Hawken rifle, a previous gift from a grateful white man, and pledged revenge. On that fateful day, as the Cheyenne village smoldered in death and ruin, sadness, anger, and revenge smoldered in Mo-chi.
Mo-chi would become the first female Cheyenne warrior. Cheyenne oral history records her declaration for war: "This day, I vow revenge for the murder of my family and my people. This day, I declare war on veho – white man. This day I become a warrior and a warrior I will be forever.”
The oral history further records: “Many that survived Sand Creek later died at the Lodge Pole River on an early snowy morning. It was foretold that after Sand Creek there would be no rest and peace for the Cheyenne for they knew to survive it meant to fight and fight and be killed or kill to live.
“According to the Old ones, the survivors followed the creek north from the slaughter, approximately four miles, then headed northeast, some forty miles, to the head waters of the Smoky Hill River, known by our people as the Bunch of Trees River. They were welcomed into the camp of a group of Dog Soldiers, where they were fed, clothed, and their wounds tended to. The Dog Soldiers sent out Wolves, (scouts) to search for others who may have been lost or wounded along the river trail. Mo-chi remembered it as the worst night of her life.”
Several chiefs and pipe bearers left the camp to carry the war pipe to the Northern Arapaho on the Republican River and the Lakota on the Solomon River, as well as the other Sioux camps.
George Bent, who was half Cheyenne, the son of Owl Woman and the trader William Bent, and his brother-in-law, Edmond Guerrier, eagerly joined the pipe bearers on their journey to the other Indian camps. All agreed with the Cheyenne and smoked the war pipe. War had been declared. An agreement was made that all the tribes would gather at Cherry Creek, the tributary that flows into the south fork of the Republican River. There, they would plan a war strategy.
“At Cherry Creek, it is said, everything changed. Everything was decided by our people,” recalled John L. Sipes, Mo-ci's great-great grandson.
Meanwhile on the South Platte River early in 1865, Indian scouts stationed on the hill sent a signal, by sunlight reflected from a mirror, to warriors below. This was a sign for the warriors to advance toward the settlement of Julesburg. With the soldiers away in pursuit of the decoys, the remaining warriors were at their leave to plunder the area.
As the victorious warriors made their way back toward the hills following the great raid at Julesburg, the women came out of the hills with the extra ponies and loaded the goods onto them. Then several of the women, led by Mo-chi, gathered the captured horses. With Mo-chi in the lead, the women led the animals back to the hills and the Cheyenne camp.
Arriving at the camp, Medicine Water turned his prize horse loose with Mo-chi’s herd. It was their first meeting. From this time forward, the two forged an inseparable bond, bound by sorrow and revenge, eventually entwined by love, family, and the Cheyenne spirit of loyalty and endurance.
“During the Moon of the Strong Wind, the attack of Julesburg took place,” according to Cheyenne Oral history. “The Old ones taught young Medicine Water to respect his elders, to be peaceful with others and to learn to make arrows for possible war.”
Cheyenne stories also tell us, “Within the village were a few women warriors, like Mo-chi. They had their own way to prepare for battle. All the while keeping the lodge, having babies, paying attention to passing on the traditions. Mo-chi sang her own songs, painted her own war shield, made her own medicine, all taught to her by the Old ones.”
Medicine Water, Mi-Huh-Heu-I-Nup, named for his father, was a well-respected Cheyenne warrior, as was his father, once the headsman of the Crooked Lance Dog Soldiers. The fifth of six sons born to Medicine Water and Old Yellow Hair, he was born in 1835 in the Yellowstone Country.
Medicine Water and his brothers became members of the Bowstring Cheyenne Warrior Society and later, were also noted chiefs of the society. Two of his brothers, Earrings and Alights-On-Cloud, were killed by the Ho-Nehe-Taneo-O (Wolf People or Pawnee) in 1852, on the South Loup River in south-central Nebraska.
Near the Solomon Fork, some fifty miles west of Waconda Springs, Alights-On-Cloud had led his war party into battle with the Pawnees, wearing his metal armor under his clothing. It was a gift from his father in 1844. He had traded horses with the Arapaho for it. The elder Medicine Water, as headsman of the Crooked Lance Dog Soldiers, had worn the shirt in many fights against the Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache during the Wolf Creek battle in Oklahoma in 1838 before giving it to his son.
“Following [his father’s death], Medicine Water proved his right to be chief to the most courageous and loyal society of warriors; the Cheyenne Bowstring Warrior Society,” according to John L. Sipes, Mo-ci's great-great grandson.
As the leader of the respected Cheyenne Bowstring Warrior Society, and with fierce devotion to the Cheyenne way of life, Medicine Water was determined to exact revenge for his people killed at Sand Creek. Mo-chi would be at his side as that revenge reined up and down the South Platte River.
Linda Wommack can be reached at lwomm3258@aol.com
