It’s October 1903 in eastern Wyoming and two groups of Oglala Sioux from the Pine Ridge Reservation were gathering medicinal plants, shooting some small game and, according to some accounts, hunting deer and antelope as well.
They were reported to the Weston County sheriff as potential poachers.
By then, 27 years had passed since the conflicts at the Little Big Horn and 13 years since Wounded Knee. What followed has been widely called “a stain” on Wyoming’s history and the state’s “last blood-spilling fight” between the tribes and white residents.
A U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1896 had ruled that state game law superseded any treaties with Native Americans, meaning they were forbidden from hunting game without proper state licenses.
And when locals reported that natives were in the area hunting, Weston County Sheriff William Miller got a warrant on Oct. 22, 1903, to arrest any alleged “John Doe and Richard Roe” and went after them.
The Newcastle Times reported Oct. 30, 1903, that he took men with him.
The expedition would end in bloodshed the next day, Halloween, and seven killed, including Miller and an 11-year-old Oglala boy named Peter White Elk, who was the first death.
“Last Thursday, word reached here that several bands of Indians were scattered through the country of the Black Thunder basin, some 70 miles from Newcastle and were unlawfully killing antelope and cattle,” the newspaper reported. “One witness said he could under oath say that he had passed five carcasses of steers killed by gunshot wounds in the country the Indians were hunting.”
Miller’s mission led to what some have labeled as the Battle of Lightning Creek and the last battle between natives and whites in the state. When the shooting was over, the sheriff and another member of the posse were dead as were five Native Americans.
One of the leaders of the Oglala, Charles Smith, had already had a run in with Miller in 1901 over hunting.
Smith, 37, had attended Carlisle School and spoke English well. He was carrying an official pass from Pine Ridge Indian Agent John Brennan that allowed him and those with him to seek medicinal plants.
A third group of natives in five wagons had already been arrested and jailed in Newcastle, but they were freed after it was proven they had just been traveling home from a visit to the Crow Reservation.
The Meeting
On Oct. 30, Miller and his deputies located Smith, aka Eagle Feather, and a group of natives on Dry Cheyenne Creek in Converse County, and he informed him that he had a warrant and that his group was to follow the sheriff back to Newcastle.
According to an account in the Newcastle paper and testimony by a deputy, Smith had an antelope in his possession. How accurate newspaper accounts at the time were has been disputed.
“For more than three years he had openly defied Sheriff Miller and had several times sent word that he couldn’t be arrested,” the newspaper reported. “When all the braves were assembled, Mr. Miller read the warrant and requested them to submit peacefully. Smith then spoke up and said he would not go Newcastle.”
An account by natives said Eagle Feather had no antelope — but several had cattle and deer hides, and many had deer meat and some mutton.
Eagle Feather let the sheriff know that he was not following him back to Newcastle, but that they would head back to the reservation. There is the possibility he understood the sheriff was out his jurisdiction.
Miller had also gone to the second group and had a meal at its leader’s camp.
William Brown, whose father had been a U.S. Army captain and his mother Indian, was out in the field and returned as the sheriff had finished eating.
Library of Congress records show Brown told U.S. Attorney for the District of Wyoming Timothy Burke in an official statement that he agreed to go with the sheriff, but never saw a warrant. Brown apparently planned to show his reservation pass if needed to avoid potential trouble.
“I was willing to surrender,” Brown said he told a few other men in his group that the “white man is here for us and as I have the pass, I am willing to go with him.”
Brown testified Miller told him, “I will be back in the morning.”
Brown, White and only a few others were known to speak English.
When preparations for leaving camp were made, the Newcastle paper alleges that some of the Indians got off their horses with guns in their hands.
When the sheriff and his men left, a deputy D.O. Johnston testified later in court that the Native American men were on horses and armed. The Indians kept traveling toward the reservation and did not follow them on the road to Newcastle.
Boy Was First To Die
Miller decided to seek reinforcements and went to a nearby ranch to gather up other men, including John Owens, a “noted Indian fighter,” the Newcastle paper reported.
When the now 13-member group learned the natives were headed down Lightning Creek, they set up positions along the creek to meet them.
Johnston testified in court that Miller and Owens were in the lead positions along the creek and that they stuck up their hands and said something to the effect: “Hold on, surrender. You are prisoners.”
Johnston said an Indian on horseback then fired at Owens.
Native accounts are different.
Oglala Hope Clear, 18, testified under oath to the U.S. attorney that on the day of the shooting she and two boys were ahead of the wagons in Eagle Feather’s group driving loose ponies. They came to a gate on the trail.
“I got off my horse to open the gate and then I saw the white men aiming their guns at me,” she said. “I started back to the wagons as fast as I could go.”
Clear said the white men were not on horses and were shooting from the ground.
The first shot hit the horse a boy next to her was riding. The boy, Peter White Elk, started running and was shot in the back of the head and killed. He was 11 years old.
Clear said she never saw a man make a motion to halt and did not hear any words before the shooting started.
She said bullets went through her shawl and dress and hit her horse.
Her father, Gray Bear, and another man named Black Kettle, started shooting back. She testified Eagle Feather was in the rear of the group and came galloping up, but did not shoot.
Clear’s mother, Takes The Rope, testified Eagle Feather’s rifle was in his scabbard and she never saw him take it out.
Both women, with Eagle Feather’s wife, tried to escape. Eagle Feather’s wife was shot. Another 65-year-old native Last Bear, 65, was shot in the back with the bullet coming out above his hip bone. Both survived.
Gray Bear and Black Kettle were killed. Eagle Feather also was shot — he survived a night and was later found covered in frost by Clear and her mother, who chose not to flee. They built a fire to warm him.
Deputies came and took him to a cabin where Miller lay, where Eagle Feather died.
Official statements by Brown and others who were part of his group all say that it was the whites who began shooting.
Most in his group turned their wagons and tried to flee, according to their testimony. Many abandoned their wagons and goods and took to horses to try and get back to the reservation.
Posse Pursuit
When news of the bloody and deadly fight reached Douglas, Wyoming, the Converse County sheriff formed a posse, and authorities were notified in Newcastle and South Dakota.
Brown said the group was shot at in the dark by a posse of deputized Wyoming lawmen in Edgemont, South Dakota. While he was among those who escaped and successfully made it back to the reservation, 19 others — nine men and 10 women did not.
An Oglala named David Broken Nose testified under oath to the U.S. attorney that he did not initially know anything about who the white men were or about the alleged warrant, and that he could not speak English.
He, too, said the group only shot prairie dogs and small game, acknowledging some of the group may have traded for deer meat and hides.
Broken Nose said the whites began the shooting and that he didn’t shoot back because he wasn’t expecting trouble. Also, his gun was in the bottom of his wagon. He said he turned the wagon around and tried to get away.
After the shootout, he was among those arrested in Edgemont and taken back to Douglas for trial on murder charges.
He said his wife gave birth to a child days after the shooting and was “compelled to ride horseback all the way after the shooting.”
“It was very bad for her,” he said. “I don’t believe the child is going to live and my wife is not very much better. The child was handled very roughly on account of being on horseback.”
An Oglala named Fool Heart, 58, told the U.S. attorney that he was with Brown’s group and had shot two deer as well as bought two others from white men. He said he was also part of the expedition to get prairie chickens and other small birds.
“I get those birds to make arrows and sell them,” he said. “And there is some kind of dirt up there that we make paint out of.”
Both Fool Heart and another Oglala, High Dog, emphasized they did not want a fight and that when they encountered the posse in Edgemont, willingly surrendered their weapons and went back to Douglas.
Women and children were released to Brennan, but the native men were set for trial.
Preliminary Hearing
During a preliminary examination on the murder charges, it became clear that there was not specific evidence to charge any of the nine with the deaths of the lawmen.
“The nine Indians held here on charge of murder of sheriff and deputy in Wyoming were acquitted,” Brennan telegraphed the commissioner of Indian Affairs in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 14, 1903. “Will take Indians home on the train tomorrow.”
In a report to the U.S. attorney general, U.S. Attorney Burke outlined reasons the entire episode was off track.
He said Miller’s warrant for “John Doe” and “Richard Roe” were for two persons and that he was trying to make arrests outside his jurisdiction of around 25 men, in addition to women and children.
Burke wrote there was no clear evidence at the time of arrest that showed any of the Indians had broken a law in the state. He said if they were guilty of violating game laws by taking the untanned hides of animals, they should have been charged with a misdemeanor in the county where the offense was committed.
“I cannot believe that anything is to be gained by further prosecution,” he wrote. “For were proceeding to be had against either party, the proper application of the rule of reasonable doubt would acquit the accused.”
Contact Dale Killingbeck at dale@cowboystatedaily.com
Left: The Casper Morning Star on Feb. 17, 1957, showed a Lusk doctor examining what was described as the skull of Lightning Creek Oglala leader Charles Smith. Center: The Grand Encampment Herald newspaper in Carbon County printed coverage of the 1903 battle. Right: The Newcastle Times newspaper in Newcastle, Wyoming, reported the death of Weston County Sheriff William “Billy” Miller. (Courtesy Newspapers.com) 
The Washington, D.C., newspaper The Evening Star had the Lightning Creek fight on its front page. (Courtesy Newspapers.com) 
The Washington Post had a story on its front page on Nov. 2, 1903 about the Lighting Creek fight. The battle stirred Washington due to concerns about a new native uprising. (Courtesy Newspapers.com)
Dale Killingbeck can be reached at dale@cowboystatedaily.com.
