Dakota War of 1862

Previous treaties The eastern Dakota were pressured into ceding large tracts of land to the United States in a series of treaties negotiated with the U.S. government and signed in 1837, 1851 and 1858, in exchange for cash annuities, debt payments, and other provisions. The treaties of Traverse des Sioux and Mendota committed the Dakota to live on a 20-mile (32  km) wide reservation centered on a 150 mile (240 km) stretch of the upper Minnesota River. During the ratification process, however, the U.S. Senate removed Article 3 of each treaty, which had defined the reservations. In addition, much of the promised compensation went to traders for debts allegedly incurred by the Dakota, at a time when unscrupulous traders made enormous profits on their trade. Supporters of the original bill said these debts had been exaggerated. Encroachments on Dakota lands and funds , Dakota chief When Minnesota became a state in 1858, representatives of several Dakota bands led by Little Crow traveled to Washington to negotiate about implementing the existing treaties. Instead, the Sioux lost the northern half of the reservation along the Minnesota River in the resulting 1858 Dakota Treaty. This loss was a major blow to the standing of Little Crow in the Dakota community. Two years after statehood, the settler population in Minnesota, meanwhile, had grown to 172,072 in 1860 from just 6,077 in 1850. The land was divided into townships and plots for settlement. Logging and agriculture on these plots eliminated surrounding forests and prairies, which interrupted the Dakota's annual cycle of farming, hunting, fishing and gathering wild rice. Hunting by settlers dramatically reduced populations of wild game, such as bison, elk, deer and bear. This shortage of wild game not only made it difficult for the Dakota in southern and western Minnesota to directly obtain meat, but also reduced their ability to sell furs to traders for additional supplies. Most land in the Minnesota River valley was not arable, and hunting alone could no longer support the Dakota. The Dakota became increasingly discontented over their losses: land; non-payment of annuities, because the Indian agents were late with the U.S. government annuity payments owed to the eastern Dakota; and famine following crop failure. The traders refused to extend credit to the tribesmen for food, in part because the traders suspected the payments might not arrive at all due to the American Civil War. Day also accused Clark Wallace Thompson, Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Northern Superintendency, of fraud. Negotiations On August 4, 1862, an incident occurred when 800 Dakota warriors arrived at the Upper Sioux Agency in the northwestern part of the reservation and broke into a warehouse containing sacks of flour. Two companies of Minnesota volunteer infantry, commanded by Lieutenants Timothy Sheehan and Thomas Gere, were at the agency to keep order when the yearly annuity distribution took place. Sheehan's company moved to stop the looting after the warriors had removed 100 sacks of flour, but bloodshed almost occurred when a warrior tried to seize a soldier’s gun, which discharged during the scuffle. Sheehan subsequently ordered his men to fall back, realizing the warriors were only seeking food, not combat. The Dakotas ceased looting when Gere aimed a howitzer at the warehouse door, forcing the warriors to pull out of the gun’s range. This allowed Sheehan to post a 15-man detachment at the warehouse entrance. Sheehan then appealed to Indian Agent Thomas Galbraith to distribute food to the Dakotas. Galbraith at first refused, citing that food, goods, and money were always distributed together, and that making concessions to the Dakota would make them harder to control, but he finally agreed to distribute two days’ worth of flour and pork, under the condition that the warriors leave and only the chiefs return, unarmed, for a council the next day. At the meeting of the Dakota, the U.S. government, and local traders, the Dakota representatives asked the representative of the government traders, Andrew Jackson Myrick, to sell them food on credit. His response was said to be, "So far as I am concerned, if they are hungry let them eat grass or their own dung." But the context of Myrick's comment at the time, early August 1862, is historically unclear. Another version is that Myrick was referring to the Dakota women, who were already combing the floor of the fort's stables for any unprocessed oats to feed to their starving children, along with a little grass. The effect of Myrick's statement on Little Crow and his band was clear, however. In a letter to General Sibley, Little Crow said it was a major reason for commencing war: "Dear Sir – For what reason we have commenced this war I will tell you. it is on account of Maj. Galbrait [sic] we made a treaty with the Government a big for what little we do get and then cant get it till our children was dying with hunger – it is with the traders that commence Mr A[ndrew] J Myrick told the Indians that they would eat grass or their own dung."On August 16, 1862, the treaty payments to the Dakota arrived in St. Paul, Minnesota, and were brought to Fort Ridgely the next day. They arrived too late to prevent violence. ==War==

Incident in Acton and aftermath published by Whitney's Gallery, St. Paul, Minn. This photo is actually "Mixed Bloods" who were rescued by non-hostile Dakota. The girl in the foreground wrapped in the striped blanket is Elise Robertson, the sister of Thomas Robertson, a mixed blood who acted as an intermediary between the hostile and non hostile Dakota and the whites. On August 17, 1862, four young Dakota men on a hunting trip killed five settlers near a settlement in Acton Township, Minnesota. or liquor. By daybreak, Little Crow ordered an attack on the Lower Sioux Agency to take place that morning. Killing was suspended for a time while the attackers turned their attention to raiding the stores for flour, pork, clothing, whiskey, guns, and ammunition, allowing others to flee for Fort Ridgely, fourteen miles away. A total of thirteen clerks, traders, and government workers were killed at the agency; another seven were killed as they fled; ten were taken captive; and approximately 47 people escaped. Throughout the day, Dakota war parties swept the Minnesota River Valley and near vicinity, killing many settlers. Numerous settlements including the townships of Milford, Leavenworth and Sacred Heart, were surrounded and burned and their populations nearly exterminated. Captives During the chaos of the initial attacks, some Dakota tried to warn their friends at the Lower Sioux Agency to flee. Spencer then became one of the few white men taken captive during the war; the rest of the captives were predominantly women and children. Of the white women and girls who were taken captive over the course of war, up to 40 were between the ages of twelve and forty. By that evening, a thunderstorm dampened the warfare, preventing further Dakota attacks. Regular soldiers and militia from nearby towns (including two companies of the 5th Minnesota Infantry Regiment, then stationed at Fort Ridgely) reinforced New Ulm. Residents continued to build barricades around the town. The Dakota attacked Fort Ridgely on August 20 and 22, 1862. Although the Dakota were not able to take the fort, they ambushed a relief party from the fort to New Ulm on August 21. The defense at the Battle of Fort Ridgely further limited the ability of the American forces to aid outlying settlements. The Dakota raided farms and small settlements throughout south central Minnesota and what was then eastern Dakota Territory. State military response On August 19, 1862, Minnesota Governor Alexander Ramsey asked his long-time friend and political rival, former Governor Henry Hastings Sibley, to lead an expedition up the Minnesota River for the relief of Fort Ridgely, and gave him an officer's commission as Colonel of Volunteers. Sibley had no previous military experience, but was familiar with the Dakota and the leaders of the Mdewakanton, Wahpekute, Sisseton and Wahpeton bands, having traded among them since arriving in the Minnesota River Valley 28 years beforehand as a representative of the American Fur Company. Militia units under Sibley's command to Fort Ridgely: • Captain William J. Cullen's mounted St. Paul Cullen Guards • Captain Joseph F. Bean's company "The Eureka Squad" • Captain David D. Lloyd's company organized in Rice County • Captain Calvin Potter's company of mounted men • Captain Mark Hendrick's battery of light artillery • Captain J.R. Sterrett's company of mounted men raised at Lake City Defense along southern and southwestern frontier On August 28, Governor Ramsey sent Judge Charles Eugene Flandrau to the Blue Earth country to secure the state's southern and southwestern frontier, extending from New Ulm to the northern border of Iowa. Flandrau organized a line of forts, garrisoned by soldiers under his command, at New Ulm, Garden City, Winnebago, Blue Earth, Martin Lake, Madelia and Marysburg. Encounters in early September Raids in Central Minnesota After suffering defeats in the Minnesota River Valley, Little Crow split off from the main force and moved north into central Minnesota. On September 3, 1862, a detachment of the 10th Minnesota Infantry was attacked by Little Crow at the Battle of Acton and fell back to the fortified town of Hutchinson. Unsuccessful sieges of the stockaded towns of Hutchinson and Forest City followed on September 4, but the Dakota left with many spoils including captured horses. Battle of Birch Coulee , by Paul G. Biersach (1845–1927)|left On August 31, while Sibley trained new soldiers and waited for additional troops, guns, ammunition and food, he sent a group of 153 men on a burial expedition to find and bury dead settlers and soldiers, and ascertain what had happened to Captain John S. Marsh and his men during the attack at Redwood Ferry. The company included members of the 6th Minnesota Infantry Regiment and mounted men of the Cullen Frontier Guards, as well as teams and teamsters sent to bury the dead, accompanied by approximately 20 civilians who had asked to join the burial party. In the early morning hours of September 2, 1862, a group of 200 Dakota men surrounded and ambushed their campsite, kicking off a 31-hour siege known as the Battle of Birch Coulee, which continued until Colonel Henry Hastings Sibley finally arrived with more troops and artillery on September 3. The state military suffered its worst casualties during the war, with 13 soldiers dead on the ground, nearly 50 wounded, and more than 80 horses killed, Attacks in northern Minnesota and Dakota Territory Farther north, the Dakota attacked several unfortified stagecoach stops and river crossings along the Red River Trails, a settled trade route between Fort Garry (now Winnipeg, Manitoba) and Saint Paul, Minnesota, in the Red River Valley in northwestern Minnesota and eastern Dakota Territory. Many settlers and employees of the Hudson's Bay Company and other local enterprises in this sparsely populated country took refuge in Fort Abercrombie, located in a bend of the Red River of the North about south of present-day Fargo, North Dakota. Between late August and late September, the Dakota launched several attacks on Fort Abercrombie; all were repelled by its defenders, including Company D of the 5th Minnesota Infantry Regiment, which was garrisoned there, with assistance from other infantry units, citizen soldiers and "The Northern Rangers". Pope also requested "two or three regiments" from Wisconsin. In the end, only the 25th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment arrived on September 22, and was sent to defend temporary military posts along the "Minnesota frontier". Many enlisted soldiers who had been furloughed until after harvest were quickly recalled, and new recruits were urged to enlist, furnishing their own arms and horses if possible. Battle of Wood Lake The final decisive battle of the war took place at the Battle of Wood Lake on September 23, 1862, and was a victory for the U.S. forces led by Colonel Henry Hastings Sibley. Following the arrival of more troops, guns, ammunition and provisions, Sibley's entire command had departed Fort Ridgely on September 19. According to one estimate, he had 1,619 men in his army, including the 270 men of the 3rd Minnesota, nine companies of the 6th Minnesota, five companies of the 7th Minnesota, one company of the 9th, 38 Renville Rangers, 28 mounted citizen guards, and 16 citizen-artillerists. Sibley planned to meet Little Crow's men on the open plains above the Yellow Medicine River, where he believed his better organized, better equipped forces with their rifled muskets and artillery with exploding shells would have an advantage against the Dakota with their double-barreled shotguns. Meanwhile, Dakota runners were reporting Sibley's movements every few hours. Chief Little Crow and his soldiers' lodge received word that Sibley's troops had reached the Lower Sioux Agency and would arrive at the area below the Yellow Medicine River around September 21. On the morning of September 22, Little Crow's soldiers' lodge ordered all able-bodied men to march south to the Yellow Medicine River. While hundreds of soldiers marched willingly, others went because they had been threatened by the soldiers' lodge headed by Cut Nose (Marpiya Okinajin); they were also joined by a contingent from the "friendly" Dakota camp who sought to prevent a surprise attack on Sibley's army. Upon learning that the army had thrown up breastworks to fortify the campsite, Rattling Runner (Rdainyanka) and the leaders of the "hostile" Dakota soldiers' lodge finally agreed that it would be unsafe to attack that night, and planned to attack Sibley's troops when they were marching on the road to the Upper Sioux Agency early in the morning. Not waiting for orders or permission, Major Abraham E. Welch led 200 men from the 3rd Minnesota with a line of skirmishers to the left and the right following in reserve. They advanced to a point 300 yards beyond the stream, when an officer rode up to Major Welch with instructions from Colonel Sibley to fall back to camp. Welch obeyed reluctantly and the men of the 3rd Minnesota retreated down the slope towards the stream where they would sustain most of their casualties. Once the 3rd Minnesota had retreated across the creek, they were joined by the Renville Rangers, a unit of "nearly all mixed-bloods" under Lieutenant James Gorman, sent by Sibley to reinforce them. On the extreme left, Major Robert N. McLaren led a company from the 6th Regiment around the south side of the lake to defend a ridge overlooking a ravine, and defeated a Dakota flanking attack on the other side. The captives included 162 "mixed-bloods" (mixed-race) and 107 whites, mostly women and children, who had been held hostage by the "hostile" Dakota camp, which broke up as Little Crow and some of his followers fled to the northern plains. In the nights that followed, a growing number of Mdewakanton men who had participated in battles quietly joined the "friendly" Dakota at Camp Release; many did not want to spend winter on the plains and were persuaded by Sibley's earlier promise to punish only those who had killed settlers. A few weeks prior to the execution, the convicted men were sent to Mankato, while 1,658 Natives and "mixed bloods", including their families and the "friendly" Dakota, were sent to a compound south of Fort Snelling. Rebuffed by leaders of other tribes and accompanied by a dwindling number of his own followers, Little Crow eventually returned to Minnesota in late June 1863. He was killed on July 3, 1863, near Hutchinson, Minnesota, while gathering raspberries with his teenage son, Wowinape. The pair were seen by Nathan Lamson and his son Chauncey, who had been out hunting. Lamson and Little Crow exchanged fire, and Little Crow was mortally wounded by a ball in his breast. Upon the request of Little Crow's grandson, Jesse Wakeman, his remains were removed from display in 1915, and finally returned to the family for burial in 1971 by historical archaeologist Alan Woolworth. Wakeman noted on that day that the treatment of Little Crow's remains had "rankled" him and his people more than the way he had been killed. Chief Standing Buffalo led his band to the northern plains and Canada, where they wandered for nine years. After his death in an encounter with Gros Ventre in Montana, his son took the band into Saskatchewan. There they were ultimately given a reserve, where these northern Sisseton have stayed. == Aftermath ==

Trials Trials were held from 28 September 1862 and were completed by 3 November 1862. Trials were conducted by the military for 400-odd Dakota men, 303 were found guilty and were sentenced to death. By the time of their release, one-third of the prisoners had died of disease. The survivors were sent with their families to Nebraska. Their families had already been expelled from Minnesota. During their incarceration at Camp Kearney, the Dakota prison within Camp McClellan, Presbyterian missionaries attempted to convert the Dakota to Christianity and have them abandon their native cultural and spiritual beliefs and practices. In 1864, change of command at the camp allowed for a more lenient approach to the Dakota. In addition to providing for their own needs, the prisoners also sent blankets, clothing, and money to their families who had been forcibly exiled to the Crow Creek Reservation in South Dakota, and stayed in touch with them by mail. In April 1863, the U.S. Congress abolished the reservation, declared all previous treaties with the Dakota null and void, and undertook proceedings to expel the Dakota people entirely from Minnesota. The State issued a bounty of $25 per scalp () on any Dakota male found free within the boundaries of the state to ensure their removal. The only exception to this legislation applied to 208 Mdewakanton, who had remained neutral or assisted white settlers in the conflict. In May 1863, the surviving 1,300 Dakota were crowded aboard two steamboats and relocated to the Crow Creek Reservation, in Dakota Territory. At that time the place was stricken by drought making habitation difficult. In addition to those dying during the journey, more than 200 Dakota died within six months of arriving, many being the children. Firsthand accounts Until 1894, most published accounts of the war were told from the point of view of European-American settlers and soldiers who had taken part in the war, and to a lesser extent, the women who had been taken captive. Many of these first-person narratives tended to focus on victim accounts of atrocities committed during the war. The first published narrative of the war told from the point of view of a Dakota leader who had fought in the uprising was compiled by historian Return Ira Holcombe in 1894. Holcombe interviewed Chief Big Eagle with the help of two translators. The narratives reflect a spectrum of views on the conflict, representative of factions within the Dakota community. The daughter of Mr. Schwandt, enceinte [pregnant], was cut open, as was learned afterward, the child taken alive from the mother, and nailed to a tree. The son of Mr. Schwandt, aged thirteen years, who had been beaten by the Indians, until dead, as was supposed, was present, and saw the entire tragedy. He saw the child taken alive from the body of his sister, Mrs. Waltz, and nailed to a tree in the yard. It struggled some time after the nails were driven through it! This occurred in the forenoon of Monday, 18th of August, 1862. The formerly favorite steamer, Florence," he wrote, "arrived at our levee on Tuesday; but instead of the cheerful faces of Capt. Throckmorten and Clerk Gorman we saw those of strangers; and instead of her usual lading of merchandise for our merchants, she was crowded from stem to stern, and from hold to hurricane deck with old squaws and papooses – about 1,400 in all – the non combative remnants of the Santee Sioux of Minnesota, en route to their new home…. The Dakota have kept alive their own accounts of events suffered by their people. Continued conflict After the expulsion of the Dakota, some refugees and Dakota men made their way to Lakota lands. Battles between the forces of the Department of the Northwest and combined Lakota and Dakota forces continued through 1864. In the 1863 operations against the Sioux in North Dakota, Colonel Sibley, with 2,000 men, pursued the Dakota into Dakota Territory. Sibley's army defeated the Lakota and Dakota in four major battles: the Battle of Big Mound on July 24, 1863; the Battle of Dead Buffalo Lake on July 26, 1863; the Battle of Stony Lake on July 28, 1863; and the Battle of Whitestone Hill on September 3, 1863. The Dakota retreated further, but faced Sully's Northwest Indian Expedition in 1864. General Alfred Sully led a force from near Fort Pierre, South Dakota, and decisively defeated the Dakota at the Battle of Killdeer Mountain on July 28, 1864 and at the Battle of the Badlands on August 9, 1864. The following year Sully's Northwest Indian Expedition of 1865 operated against the Dakota in Dakota Territory. Conflicts continued. Within two years, settlers' encroachment on Lakota land sparked Red Cloud's War; the US desire for control of the Black Hills in South Dakota prompted the government to authorize an offensive in 1876 in the Black Hills War. By 1881, the majority of the Sioux had surrendered to American military forces. In 1890, the Wounded Knee Massacre ended all effective Sioux resistance. Bounties In reaction to raids by Dakota in southern Minnesota, on July 4, 1863 Governor Ramsey ordered the State adjutant general, Oscar Malmros to issue General Orders No. 41 initiating "volunteer scouts" who, providing their own arms, equipment, and provisions, patrolled from the town of Sauk Centre to the northern edge of Sibley County. In addition to being paid two dollars a day, $25 bounties were offered for Dakota male scalps. On July 20, the original bounty order was amended to limit it to "hostile" men, instead of all Dakota males and scalps were no longer required. A bounty of $75 a scalp was offered to those not in military service; the amount was increased to $200 by Henry Swift Minnesota's new governor on September 22, 1863. A total of $325 was paid out to four people collecting bounties. Descendants of the 38 Dakota killed, and their people, also remember the warfare and their people being dispossessed of their land and sent into exile in the west. During the uprising the New Ulm Battery was formed under militia law to defend the settlement from the Dakota. That militia is the only Civil War era militia remaining in the United States today. Repudiation of Ramsey's speech and apology to Dakota people On August 16, 2012, Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton issued a proclamation calling for a Day of Remembrance and Reconciliation for the 150th anniversary of the Dakota War and also repudiating Governor Alexander Ramsey's calls for the Dakota people to be either exterminated or driven from the state when he addressed the Minnesota state legislature in September 1862; flags were also ordered to be flown at half-staff statewide. Dayton declared, among other things, that "The viciousness and violence, which were commonplace 150 years ago in Minnesota, are not accepted or allowed now." The Minnesota Historical Society owned approximately 115 acres of land while the state government owned near 114 acres. About the return of their lands, Lower Sioux President Robert Larsen said, "I don't know if it's ever happened before, where a state gave land back to a tribe. [Our ancestors] paid for this land over and over with their blood, with their lives. It's not a sale; it's been paid for by the ones that aren't here anymore". ==Monuments and memorials==

• Camp Release State Monument commemorates "the surrender of a large body of Indians and the release of 269 captives, mostly women and children" on September 26, 1862. The monument credits "the signal victory over the hostile Sioux at Wood Lake by Minnesota troops under command of General Henry H. Sibley." Listed in the National Register of Historic Places. • Birch Coulee Battlefield in Morton, Minnesota features self-guided trails including historical markers telling the story of the battle from the perspectives of Captain Joseph Anderson for the U.S. and Chief Big Eagle (Wamditanka) for the Dakota. The Birch Coulee State Monument honoring the officers and soldiers of the 6th Minnesota, the Cullen Frontier Guards and other detachments is approximately two miles away. • Faithful Indians' Monument, adjacent to the Birth Coulee State Monument, erected in 1899 to honor "full-blood" Dakota who had remained "unwaveringly loyal and who had saved the life of at least one white person." • Henderson Monument, dedicated to the memory of five members of the Henderson family. Erected in 1907 by the Renville County Pioneers, it was originally located in Beaver Falls Township, where they were killed. Moved to its current location near Morton by the Renville County Historical Society in 1981. • Radnor Erle Monument, in the Morton Pioneer Monuments Roadside Parking Area, four miles north of Morton, Minnesota, along U.S. highway 71. Erected in 1907 as a memorial to Erle, who was killed on August 18, 1862, saving his father's life. • Schwandt State Monument, in Renville County, Minnesota, on County Road 15 near Timms Creek. Erected in 1915 to memorialize six members of the Schwandt family and one family friend who were killed. The granite monument was erected by the Minnesota Valley Historical Society on the site of the old ferry landing, on the north side of the Minnesota River, There is a roadside marker located on a bluff above the site along state Highway 19 between Morton and Franklin, Minnesota. The artwork at the base was created by New Ulm artist Anton Gag. It originally stood in a grassy plot near the site of the mass execution of 38 Dakota men, but was moved in 1965 to the other side of a gas station, facing the main bridge into town. where it had been half-buried under sand. The park features a 67-ton statue of a buffalo by local sculptor Tom Miller and a large boulder with a quote from the late Dakota spiritual leader, Amos Owen. Next to the monument, the Acton Incident historical marker – updated by the Minnesota Historical Society in 2012 – serves as a memorial to the five settlers who were murdered by four teenage hunters, on the eve of the U.S.–Dakota War of 1862. • Guri Endreson-Rosseland State Monument in the Vikor Lutheran Cemetery near Willmar, Minnesota. Dedicated to Mrs. Guri Enderson-Rosseland, who survived an attack at her home, and, in the following days, traveled the countryside assisting wounded settlers. • White Family Monument, near Brownton, Minnesota. All four members of the White family were killed on September 22 at their home on Lake Addie. The monument stands near the site of their home. • Lake Shetek State Park monument, to 15 white settlers killed there and at nearby Slaughter Slough on August 20, 1862 • A stone monument with a plaque was erected in 1929 near the spot in Meeker County where Little Crow (Taoyateduta) was killed by Nathan Lamson. • West Lake Attack monument, in Lebanon Lutheran Cemetery, Peace Lutheran Church, New London, Minnesota. Dedicated to 13 white settlers of the Broberg and Lundborg families killed on August 20, 1862. • Several memorial rides have taken place over the years since the executions. In 2012, for the 150th anniversary of the executions, the Dakota and Lakota memorial ride led by Jim Miller (Dakota) rode on horseback from Brule, South Dakota, reaching Mankato on the day of the anniversary. ==In popular media==

• In the Laura Ingalls Wilder novel, Little House on the Prairie (1935), Laura asks her parents about the Minnesota massacre, but they refuse to tell her any details. • Frederick Russell Burnham begins Scouting on Two Continents with a description of his house being burned by the Dakota in 1862 while the baby Frederick survives hidden in a basket of corn husks in a field • The uprising plays an important role in the historical novel The Last Letter Home (1959) by the Swedish author Vilhelm Moberg. It was the fourth novel of Moberg's four-volume The Emigrants epic. These were based on the Swedish emigration to American and the author's extensive research in the papers of Swedish emigrants in archival collections, including the Minnesota Historical Society. • These novels were adapted as the Swedish films The Emigrants (1971) and The New Land (1972), both directed by Jan Troell. The latter film particularly portrays the period of the Dakota Wars and the historical mass execution. Stephen Farber of The New York Times said "its portrait of the Indians is one of the most interesting ever caught on film" and this is "an authentic American tragedy". • Poet Layli Long Soldier's poem "38" is about the massacre and was first published in Mud City Journal and later collected in her 2017 book Whereas. • In 2007, Minnesota House of Representatives member Dean Urdahl published his historical fiction novel Uprising about the events of 1862, followed by the sequels Retribution in 2009 and Pursuit in 2011. • The Lost Wife, an historical fiction book published in 2023, recounts the story of a woman who travels west, marries, and tries to flee with her children when the uprising begins. Several works were completed that marked the 150th anniversary of the mass execution: • The This American Life episode "Little War on the Prairie" (aired November 23, 2012) discusses the continuing legacy of the conflict and mass executions in Mankato, Minnesota, marking the 150th anniversary of the events. • Dakota 38 (2012) is an independent film by Silas Hagerty, which documents the annual long-distance, commemorative horseback journey, led by Jim Miller (Dakota), by a group of Dakota, Lakota, and their supporters in honor of the ancestors. In 2008 the event was filmed as they rode from Lower Brule, South Dakota, over 330 miles to reach Mankato, Minnesota on the anniversary of the mass execution. They made the ride and the film "to encourage healing and reconciliation." ==See also==