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Year 508 (DVIII) was a leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Venantius and Celer (or, less frequently, year 1261 Ab urbe condita). The denomination 508 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events[link]

By place[link]

Europe[link]

• Clovis I establishes Paris (Lutetia) as his capital. He also makes Roman Catholicism the official religion of the Frankish Kingdom.
• All the rivers in England are frozen for more than two months.^[1]

Births[link]

• Theodora, future wife of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I (d. 548)
• Xiao Ji
• Emperor Yuan of Liang

Deaths[link]

• Geraint Llyngesog ab Erbin, King of Dumnonia (historicity doubtful)
• Yuan Xie
• Yujiulü Futu

References[link]

This article or section contains close paraphrasing of one or more non-free copyrighted sources. Ideas in this article should be expressed in an original manner. More details may be available on the talk page. (January 2012)

Bloody Knife
Bloody Knife
Born	ca. 1840 Dakota Territory
Died	June 25, 1876(1876-06-25) Montana
Place of Burial	Red Cloud Cemetery Pine Ridge, South Dakota
Allegiance	United States of America
Service/branch	United States Army
Years of service	1868–76
Rank	Scout
Unit	7th U.S. Cavalry
Battles/wars	American Indian Wars Battle of the Little Big Horn

Bloody Knife (Sioux:Tamena Way Way or Tamina WeWe; Arikara:Nes I Ri Pat or Nee si Ra Pat; ca. 1840 – June 25, 1876) was an American Indian who served as a scout and guide for the U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment.^[1][2] He was the favorite scout of Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer and has been called "perhaps the most famous Native American scout to serve the U.S. Army."^[2]

Bloody Knife was born to a Hunkpapa Sioux father and an Arikara mother around 1840. He was abused and discriminated against by the other Sioux in his village because of his mixed race background, in particular by Gall, a future chief. When Bloody Knife was a teenager, he left his village with his mother to live with the Arikara tribe. His brothers were killed during a Sioux raid led by Gall in 1862. Bloody knife found employment as a courier and hunter for the American Fur Company and later served under Alfred Sully before scouting for George Custer on several military expeditions. He died from a bullet wound to the head on June 25, 1876 during the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

Early life[link]

Bloody Knife was probably born between 1837 and 1840 in Dakota Territory, although his exact birth date and birthplace are unknown.^[1][2] His father was a Hunkpapa Sioux and his mother a member of the Arikara tribe, also known as the Ree. He lived with his father's tribe during his early childhood. Since he was of mixed blood, and the Sioux were traditional enemies of the Arikara, he was often discriminated against and treated poorly by the other Sioux. Consequently, he developed a hatred for the Sioux tribe and a feud evolved between him and a Sioux named Gall. Sitting Bull, who had a close friendship with Gall, also abused Bloody Knife. When he was about fifteen, Bloody Knife and his mother left his father and the Sioux to return to the Arikara at an American Fur Company trading post called Fort Clark, which was located close to modern day Stanton, North Dakota on the Upper Mississippi River.^[1]

While living at Fort Clark, Bloody Knife was in constant danger. Arikaras who wandered too far from the fort were often attacked by Sioux war parties. Despite his partial Sioux ancestry, Bloody Knife was attacked and ambushed by Gall and several other Hunkpapas during a trip to visit his father. They beat him severely, stripped him, spat on him, mocked him and hit him with coup sticks and musket ramrods. In the fall of 1862, two of Bloody Knife's brothers were killed, mutilated, and scalped by a Sioux war party led by Gall. Their bodies were left to be eaten by wolves.^[2][3][4][5] During his time at Fort Clark, Bloody Knife worked delivering mail to other forts in Missouri and to Fort Totten in North Dakota. The Sioux killed several men on these routes, however, Bloody Knife almost always delivered the mail on time.^[1]

First years as a scout[link]

After working for the American Fur Company, Bloody Knife accompanied Brigadier General Alfred Sully in 1865 as a scout on his Sioux expedition. Bloody Knife proved useful to the group of Galvanized Yankees, prisoner soldiers from the Confederate States Army who served the Union in the America West instead of serving time in a prisoner-of-war camp at Fort Berthold. He also worked as a messenger, helping the troops to communicate with other military units in the area, which was still mainly controlled by the Sioux. In late 1865, Bloody Knife met with Captain Adams Bassett of Company C, Fourth U.S. Volunteer Infantry, whom he told that Gall had recently arrived near Fort Berthold, that Gall was not peaceful and had killed white men along the Missouri River. Bassett sent a lieutenant with a platoon and Bloody Knife to capture Gall or kill him if he would not surrender. Bloody Knife led the soldiers to the Hunkpapa village, south of the fort where Gall was staying. The men attempted to arrest Gall upon arrival, but when he tried to escape he was bayoneted and forced to the ground, and was twice stabbed with bayonets. Soon afterwards, Bloody Knife intended to shoot Gall in the head, but as he prepared to shoot, the officer in command knocked Bloody Knife's gun away from Gall's face and claimed Gall was already dead. Bloody Knife was furious with the officer, with whom he exchanged heated words before leaving. Gall survived the incident and become a Sioux war chief.^[1][2][5]

Pictured above, to the far left, kneeling is Bloody Knife next to George Custer, seated in the center^[6]

In 1866, President Andrew Johnson authorized the formation of a force of Indian scouts when he signed the Indian Scout Enlistment Act.^[7] In May 1868, Bloody Knife enlisted at Fort Stevenson with the US Army's Indian scouts as a corporal. Bloody Knife became addicted to alcohol, which could have led to his desertion in September 1868. In 1872, however, he was promoted to a lance corporal.^[1] Aside from Fort Berthold, Bloody Knife also served at Fort Buford, Fort Rice, and Fort Lincoln. In 1872, he was involved in the Yellowstone Expedition. The next year, at Fort Rice, he met George Armstrong Custer, the two became friends and Custer admired Bloody Knife's talents as a scout.^[2] Although Bloody Knife he is said to be have been insolent towards and ridiculed whites, his ridicule of Custer's marksmanship amused Custer. Custer occasionally gave Bloody Knife rewards, such as a silver medal inscribed with Bloody Knife's name that Custer ordered from Washington.^[4] Bloody Knife quickly became Custer's favorite scout.^[1] On the next Yellowstone Expedition, Bloody Knife joined Custer and fought against the Sioux.^[2] Bloody Knife helped to discover an abandoned Sioux village which he estimated to have held 1,000 warriors. The group followed the trail, which led them to a battle at Yellowstone.^[1]

Black Hills Expedition[link]

In 1874, Bloody Knife took part in the Black Hills Expedition, which included over a thousand men, geologists, infantry, cavalry, two miners, several reporters, and sixty-five Arikara scouts.^[6] Shortly before the beginning of the expedition, the Sioux attacked the Arikara village at Fort Berthold, killing five Arikaras and one Mandan. One of Bloody Knife's sons was killed in the attack and another scout, called Bear's Ears or Bear's Eye, lost a brother in the same attack.^[9][10] Bloody Knife blamed the death of his son on Gall.^[11] Many of the Arikara on the expedition wanted to avenge the attack and when they found signs of a band of Sioux in the Black Hills, they began to sing war songs and adorned their horses and themselves with war paint. Custer was not interested in solving tribal feuds and ordered the scouts not to attack any Sioux unless fired upon first.^[9][10] Bloody Knife and twenty-five other Arikaras were sent out for more scouting and found a small camp of five lodges. The scouts waited for Custer to arrive with his interpreter, Louis Agard, before taking any action. Although some reports suggested the presence of thousands of warriors in the hills preparing to attack, and most of the expedition thought that a fight would occur soon, Bloody Knife discovered a group of only twenty-seven Oglala Sioux, who had been cutting lodgepoles and hunting in the Black Hills and intended return to the Red Cloud Agency, one hundred miles south of their location. The group had no knowledge of the soldiers in the area and all but one Oglala ran away when Agard and some of the scouts approached them.^[10]

On August 7 1874, Bloody Knife encountered a grizzly bear roughly seventy-five yards from where Custer was searching for a campsite. Custer, having had a lifelong dream of killing a grizzly bear,^[12] shot the bear twice with his Remington rifle, hitting it in the thigh, and Bloody Knife and William Ludlow helped kill it. Bloody Knife put his knife into the bear's jugular vein to ensure its death. The bear was an old male with broken teeth, covered in scars,^[13] and weighed 800 pounds (360 kg).^[12] Though Custer took credit for the kill, some believe that the fatal bullet was fired by Bloody Knife.^[14]

During the Black Hills Expedition, several wagons became stuck at a bank. Custer asked whose fault the delay was and a scout named Charley Reynolds blamed Bloody Knife for the incident. Custer drew his revolver and fired shots in the two scouts' direction. Bloody Knife and Reynolds hid behind some trees. Bloody Knife then told Custer, "It is not a good thing you have done to me; if I had been possessed of madness too, you would not see another day." Custer replied, "My brother, it was the madness of the moment that made me do this, but it is now gone. Let us shake hands and be friends again." Bloody Knife agreed and shook Custer's hand.^[15]

While most Indian scouts earned $13 a month, the same amount of pay as the troops received, Custer arranged a job for Bloody Knife with the quartermaster as a guide, where he earned $75 ($1,541 at today's prices) per month.^[3][11] On November 30, 1874, Bloody Knife was discharged as a private,^[1] and for his efforts in the Black Hills Expedition, he received an additional $150 for what was called his "invaluable assistance".^[2]

Death at The Battle of Little Bighorn[link]

In 1876, during the Little Bighorn campaign, Bloody Knife repeatedly tried to warn Custer there were too many Indians to fight. Consequently, he ignored Custer's plea to stay out of the battle. By some accounts, before the battle began, Bloody Knife signaled to the sun with his hands, "I shall not see you go down behind the hills tonight."^[4]

Bloody Knife was assigned to Major Marcus Reno, who had a command of 140 soldiers, at the Battle of the Little Bighorn on June 25, 1876. During the battle, Custer directed Bloody Knife and the other Arikara and Crow scouts to drive off the herds of Indian ponies in the Sioux camp. Reno and his men retreated into woodland near the river, and Bloody Knife was shot in the head and killed while mounted on his horse.^[1][7] Reportedly, Bloody Knife was standing next to Reno, who had motioned for Bloody Knife to approach him so he could ask Bloody Knife what the Indians would do when his command began to move away from their village. Bloody Knife's blood and brain spattered onto Reno's face. Reno was traumatized and began to panic, then enacted a series of frantic actions and many of his troops died.^[1][16] Bloody Knife was one of three Arikara scouts assigned to Reno to die during the battle; the others were Little Brave (also known as Bear's Trail or Little Soldier) and Bobtail Bull.^[17] The US Army suffered a huge defeat.^[18]

Bloody Knife's corpse had been mutilated by the Sioux. According to Bloody Knife's sister, her daughters had found his body on the battlefield, and unaware that it was the body of their uncle, cut off his head and took it to the Hunkpapa village where it was displayed on a pole.^[19] When she saw the head and recognized it as that of her brother, Bloody Knife's sister was horrified.^[20] According to David Humphreys Miller, an interviewer who talked with many of the participants and witnesses from the battle, she cried out: "Gall has killed him at last!" However, other accounts do not mention Gall nor the sisters' reactions at their discovery of the head's identity..^[4] Bloody Knife's body was buried on June 27 1876 by Colonel John Gibbon's troops on the battlefield. A scalp was found in an empty Sioux lodge by one of Gibbon's men and the Arikara identified it as that of Bloody Knife, having recognized the gray streaks in the hair.^[1][2]

On April 14, 1879, Bloody Knife's widow, She Owl, arrived at Fort Berthold. She told Thomas Ellis, an agent at the fort, that she was "the sole and only legal representative of said Bloody Knife," and wished to receive money that he was owed for his services. In 1881, she received $91.66 in wages from the US Government.^[4]

Legacy[link]

Bloody Knife and She Owl had several children. One of their sons was supposedly murdered by his own wife in 1904. Their daughter died very young and was buried at Fort Buford. Her grave marker claims that she died on December 28, 1870 from "disease".^[1] Following his death at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, the remaining Arikara scouts composed a song in Bloody Knife's honor.^[2] In the 1991 television mini-series Son of the Morning Star, Bloody Knife is portrayed by Sheldon Peters Wolfchild.^[21]

References[link]

External links[link]

Biography portal

• "Bloody Knife". Find a Grave. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=11195846. Retrieved 2009-03-08.