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| Sitting bull was born around 1831 on the
Grand River at a place the Sioux nation called "Many Catches",
for the number of food storage pits they had dug there. As a child he
was given the name Tatanka-Iyotake, meaning buffalo bull sitting
intractably on its haunches. He lived up to this name throughout his
life.
As a young man he became a leader of the Strong Heart Warrior Society, he was later a distinguished member of the Silent Eaters, a group concerned with tribal warfare. He fought his first battle at the age of fourteen in a raid at the Crow. In June, 1863 he had his first encounter American soldiers. In 1864 he fought U.S. troops again at the Battle of Killdeer Mountain. In 1865 he led a siege against fort rice, a fort built on Indian land. In 1868 he became the head chief of the Sioux Nation. After his tribe was put on a reservation in the Black Hills, that was supposed to be restricted from whites, gold was found in them in 1876. Sitting Bull and his warriors tried to fight for their land, but his tribe was driven out by miners and prospectors. They settled in the valley of the Little Bighorn river. In June 1876 Custer's advanced party of General Alfred H. Terry's, 7th Calvary, attacked Sitting Bull's tribe at the valley of the Little Bighorn River. The 7th Calvary was out numbered and defeated and massacred by the Sioux warriors. They were later pursued northward by General Alfred H. Terry. After that Sitting Bull and part of his band escaped to British territory. In 1880 he couldn't feed his family and surrendered on promise of pardon. On July 19,1881 he was sent to prison as a prisoner of war. On May 10,1883 Sitting Bull rejoined his family and tribe at the Standing Rock Reservation. He was however allowed to leave the reservation to join Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, where he earned fifty dollars a week for riding once around the arena, plus the money he earned for signing autographs. In 1888 he influenced his tribe to refuse to relinquish Indian lands. He was later shot and killed on December 15,1890 when one of his followers tried to rescue him from reservation police. He was buried at Fort Yates in North Dakota, then in 1953 his remains were moved to Mobridge, South Dakota Where his grave is marked with a granite shaft. We will always remember him as a Hunkpapa Lakota chief and a Sioux nation holy man.
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