Roger L. Nichols – författare

Drawing upon a vast array of primary and secondary sources, Roger L. Nichols traces the changing relationships between Native peoples and whites, from colonial times to the present.

Major Stephen H. Long of the United States Army was the most important government-sponsored explorer in the decade after the War of 1812. He led three major and several minor expeditions up the Mississippi, Missouri, and Arkansas rivers and the Red River of the north, as well as exploring the central and southern Plains, the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains, and the Great Lakes. His campanions included engineers, cartographers, Naturalists, ethnologists, and artists, and they gathered a wealth of scientific, military, and artistic data about the interior of North America. For years Long's expeditions have been overlooked or misunderstood; here for the first time they are placed in the context of American scientific development.

Widely used in university courses on Native American history through five editions, The American Indian: Past and Present has been thoroughly revised to present an up-to-date view of Indian heritage. This timely anthology brings together pieces written over the last thirty years - most published in the past decade - that represent some of the best scholarship available.The readings offer a broad overview of indigenous peoples of North America from first contact to the present, showing how Indians relied on their cultural strengths and determination to retain their independent identities. These essays trace the ever changing situations of Indians as both tribes and individuals. They bring readers through Native victory and military defeat, relocation, mandatory acculturation, and militant protests to the present era of self-determination, when the meaning of Native identity is sometimes hotly debated.Editor Roger L. Nichols has selected the new readings and organized the collection to reflect a balance of time periods, geographic areas, and historical and political topics for the student's first exposure to American Indian history. He also includes suggestions for further reading and study questions as aids to those interested in learning more about the subjects covered.A fresh update to a valuable classic, The American Indian: Past and Present remains an accessible resource for undergraduates and a flexible and authoritative set of readings for the instructor.

This concise survey, tracing the experiences of American Indians from their origins to the present, has proven its value to both students and general readers in the decade since its first publication. Now the second edition, drawing on the most recent research, adds information about Indian social, economic, and cultural issues in the twenty-first century. Useful features include new, brief biographies of important Native figures, an overall chronology, and updated suggested readings for each period of the past four hundred years.The author traces tribal experiences through four eras: Indian America prior to the European invasions; the colonial period; the emergence of the United States as the dominant power in North America and its subsequent invasion of Indian lands; and the years from 1900 to the present. Nichols uses both Euro-American sources and tribal stories to illuminate the problems Indian people and their leaders have dealt with in every generation.

During the century following George Washington's presidency, the United States fought at least forty wars with various Indian tribes, averaging one conflict every two and a half years. Warrior Nations is Roger L. Nichols's response to the question, ""Why did so much fighting take place?"" Examining eight of the wars between the 1780s and 1877, Nichols explains what started each conflict and what the eight had in common as well as how they differed. He writes about the fights between the United States and the Shawnee, Miami, and Delaware tribes in the Ohio Valley, the Creek in Alabama, the Arikara in South Dakota, the Sauk and Fox in Illinois and Wisconsin, the Dakota Sioux in Minnesota, the Cheyenne and Arapaho in Colorado, the Apache in New Mexico and Arizona, and the Nez Perce in Oregon and Idaho. Virtually all of these wars, Nichols shows, grew out of small-scale local conflicts, suggesting that interracial violence preceded any formal declaration of war. American pioneers hated and feared Indians and wanted their land. Indian villages were armed camps, and their young men sought recognition for bravery and prowess in hunting and fighting. Neither the U.S. government nor tribal leaders could prevent raids, thievery, and violence when the two groups met. In addition to U.S. territorial expansion and the belligerence of racist pioneers, Nichols cites a variety of factors that led to individual wars: cultural differences, border disputes, conflicts between and within tribes, the actions of white traders and local politicians, the government's failure to prevent or punish anti-Indian violence, and Native determination to retain their lands, traditional culture, and tribal independence. The conflicts examined here, Nichols argues, need to be considered as wars of U.S. aggression, a central feature of that nation's expansion across the continent that brought newcomers into areas occupied by highly militarized Native communities ready and able to defend themselves and attack their enemies.

Repeated clashes between American fur traders and the Plains Indians following the War of 1812 lent urgency to demands that the United States government protect its territory in the West. To remedy the situation, Secretary of War John C. Calhoun planned a military occupation of the upper Mississippi and Missouri River valleys through a cordon of army posts stretching from Green Bay on the Great Lakes west to Montana. Calhoun projected a troop movement, called the Yellowstone Expedition, that grew from one expedition to three - the Missouri, the Mississippi, and the Scientific Expeditions. The Missouri Expedition, described in this volume, was the first venture to implement Calhoun's plan.During the summer of 1818 the expedition, under the command of Colonel Thomas A. Smith, traveled up the Missouri River in keelboats to Cow Island, near present-day Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, where a winter camp was built. Defiant bands of American Indians robbed the soldiers of horses, guns, boats, and food, also attacking white traders and messengers along the river. In February 1819, Calhoun appointed Colonel Henry Atkinson, the most experienced officer of the Rifle Regiment, to the command. By summer the troops continued upriver to Council Bluffs, where they built Cantonment Missouri.Expedition surgeon John Gale's account of the Missouri Expedition captures the color and excitement of exploration while revealing the grinding effort and stark hardship of army life in the early nineteenth century. Editor Roger L. Nichols, who established the authorship of the journal, includes expedition letters and military orders to enhance Gale's authentic narrative.

During the nineteenth century, the U.S. military fought numerous battles against American Indians. These so-called Indian wars devastated indigenous populations, and some of the conflicts stand out today as massacres, as they involved violent attacks on often defenseless Native communities, including women and children. Although historians have written full-length studies about each of these episodes, Massacring Indians is the first to present them as part of a larger pattern of aggression, perpetuated by heartless or inept military commanders.In clear and accessible prose, veteran historian Roger L. Nichols examines ten significant massacres committed by U.S. Army units against American Indians. The battles range geographically from Alabama to Montana and include such well-known atrocities as Sand Creek, Washita, and Wounded Knee. Nichols explores the unique circumstances of each event, including its local context. At the same time, looking beyond the confusion and bloodshed of warfare, he identifies elements common to all the massacres. Unforgettable details emerge in the course of his account: inadequate training of U.S. soldiers, overeagerness to punish Indians, an inflated desire for glory among individual officers, and even careless mistakes resulting in attacks on the wrong village or band.As the author chronicles the collective tragedy of the massacres, he highlights the roles of well-known frontier commanders, ranging from Andrew Jackson to John Chivington and George Armstrong Custer. In many cases, Nichols explains, it was lower-ranking officers who bore the responsibility and blame for the massacres, even though orders came from the higher-ups.During the nineteenth century and for years thereafter, white settlers repeatedly used the term 'massacre' to describe Indian raids, rather than the reverse. They lacked the understanding to differentiate such raids - Indians defending their homeland against invasion - from the aggressive decimation of peaceful Indian villages by U.S. troops. Even today it may be tempting for some to view the massacres as exceptions to the norm.By offering a broader synthesis of the attacks, Massacring Indians uncovers a more disturbing truth: that slaughtering innocent people was routine practice for U.S. troops and their leaders.

This concise survey, tracing the experiences of American Indians from their origins to the present, has proven its value to both students and general readers in the two decades since its first publication. This third edition, drawing on the most recent research, adds information about Indian social, economic, political, and cultural issues in the twenty-first century, including tribal sovereignty, the Keystone XL Pipeline, and the controversial legacy of Indian boarding schools.The author traces tribal experiences through four eras: indigenous America prior to the European invasions; the colonial period; the emergence of the United States as the dominant power in North America and its subsequent invasion of Indian lands; and the years from 1900 to the present. Useful features include brief biographies of important Native figures, an updated chronology, and suggested readings for each period of the past four hundred years. Nichols uses both Euro-American sources and tribal stories to illuminate the problems Indian people and their leaders have dealt with in every generation.

"Shootin' - Lynchin' - Hangin'," announces the advertisement for Tombstone's Helldorado Days festival. Dodge City's Boot Hill Cemetery sports an 'authentic hangman's tree.' Not to be outdone, Deadwood's Days of '76 celebration promises 'miners, cowboys, Indians, cavalry, bars, dance halls and gambling dens.' The Wild West may be long gone, but its legend lives on in Tombstone, Arizona Deadwood, South Dakota and Dodge City, Kansas. In Tombstone, Deadwood, and Dodge City, Kevin Britz and Roger L. Nichols conduct a tour of these iconic towns, revealing how over time they became repositories of western America's defining myth. Beginning with the founding of the communities in the 1860s and 1870s, this book traces the circumstances, conversations, and clashes that shaped the settlements over the course of a century. Drawing extensively on literature, newspapers, magazines, municipal reports, political correspondence, and films and television, the authors show how Hollywood and popular novels, as well as major historical events such as the Great Depression and both world wars, shaped public memories of these three towns. Along the way, Britz and Nichols document the forces - from business interests to political struggles - that influenced dreams and decisions in Tombstone, Deadwood, and Dodge City. After the so-called rowdy times of the open frontier had passed, town promoters tried to sell these towns by remaking their reputations as peaceful, law-abiding communities. Hard times made boosters think again, however, and they turned back to their communities' rowdy pasts to sell the towns as exemplars of the western frontier. An exploration of the changing times that led these towns to be marketed as reflections of the Old West, Tombstone, Deadwood, and Dodge City opens an illuminating new perspective on the crafting and marketing of America's mythic self-image.

Completely updated and expanded, Black Hawk and the Warrior's Path is a masterful account of the life of the Sauk warrior and leader, and his impact on the history of early America. The period between 1760 and 1840 is brought to life through vivid discussion of Native American society and traditions, Western frontier expansion, and US-Native American politics and conflictsUpdates include: 1 new map, 8 new images, a revised bibliographic essay incorporating the latest research, a timeline, and 8 concise, reorganized chapters with key terms and study questionsAccessibly written by a noted expert in the field, students will understand key themes and find meaningful connections among historical events in Native American and 18th century American history