John D. McDermott – författare

From 1860 to 1890 the United States military engaged in war after war with the indigenous peoples of the West. Although numerous treaties recognized the rights of individual tribes, the U.S. government often did nothing to stop settlers from expanding into Indian territory. Some Indians fled, and others attempted to coexist with the newcomers, but many fought against the loss of homelands and traditional ways of life. Superior numbers, organization, and technology benefited the United States, yet Indian resistance was often skillful, heroic, and tenacious. This informative work serves as a guide to the battlefields and fits the episodes into the larger historical drama. John D. McDermott, who has spent a lifetime researching the events, discusses the equipment, organization, and lifeways of the combatants. He explains circumstances underlying the encounters and analyzes the significance of events. This detailed guide also leads students, tourists, and history buffs to monuments, parks, museums, and other sources of information about the wars.

On August 9, 1854, U.S. Army lieutenant John L. Grattan led a detachment of twenty-nine soldiers and one civilian interpreter to a large Lakota encampment near Fort Laramie to arrest an Indian man accused of killing a Mormon emigrant's cow. The terrible series of events that followed, which became known as the Grattan Massacre, unleashed the opening volley in the First Sioux War - and marked the beginning of a generation of Indian warfare on the Great Plains. All Because of a Mormon Cow tells, for the first time, the full story of this seminal event in the history of the American West. Where previous accounts of the Grattan Massacre have made do with limited primary sources, this volume includes eighty contemporary, annotated accounts of the fight and its aftermath, many newly discovered or recovered from obscurity. Recorded when the events were fresh in their narrators' memories, these documents bring a sense of immediacy to a story more than a century and a half old. Alongside the voices heard here - of the Indian leaders Little Thunder and Big Partisan, of Mormons from passing emigrant trains, and of government officials charged with investigating the massacre, among many others - the editors include a substantial and thorough introduction that underscores the significance of the Grattan Massacre in all its depth and detail. All Because of a Mormon Cow offers a better understanding even as it evokes the drama of a highly controversial episode in the history of relations between Indians and non-Indians in the American West.

The year 1865 was bloody on the Plains as various Indian tribes, including the Southern Cheyenne and the Southern Sioux, joined with their northern relatives to wage war on the white man. They sought revenge for the 1864 massacre at Sand Creek, when John Chivington and his Colorado volunteers nearly wiped out a village of Southern Cheyenne and Arapaho. The violence in eastern Colorado spread westward to Fort Laramie and Fort Caspar in southeastern and central Wyoming, and then moved north to the lands along the Wyoming-Montana border.

The year 1865 was bloody on the Plains as various Indian tribes, including the Southern Cheyenne and the Southern Sioux, joined with their northern relatives to wage war on the white man. They sought revenge for the 1864 massacre at Sand Creek, when John Chivington and his Colorado volunteers nearly wiped out a village of Southern Cheyenne and Arapaho. The violence in eastern Colorado spread westward to Fort Laramie and Fort Caspar in southeastern and central Wyoming, and then moved north to the lands along the Wyoming-Montana border.

A celebrated warrior who led his people to victory on the battlefield, Red Cloud was also a skilled diplomat who transitioned the Oglala Sioux to reservation life. In Red Cloud: Oglala Legend, John D. McDermott examines Red Cloud’s early years, his rise to prominence, and his struggle to protect his people from cultural domination.McDermott goes beyond Red Cloud’s War to focus on the Oglala chief’s time as a statesman. Chronicling the chief’s diplomatic trips to the United States capital, the author examines the changes in Red Cloud’s vision of armed resistance and his long-term strategy for maintaining Oglala life and culture. Through negotiation, passive resistance, and selective integration, Red Cloud worked to defend his people’s interests in the face of change.As the only American Indian leader to win a war against the United States Army, Red Cloud is a larger-than-life figure in the history of the West. McDermott adds new layers to the story of the chief, illuminating his early youth and worldview through little-used sources.Red Cloud: Oglala Legend is the fourth book in the South Dakota Biography Series, which highlights some of the state’s most famous residents.