In San Francisco, Virus is Contained but Schools Are Still Closed

[David Lockmiller]

The two charges have been made against President Abraham Lincoln by the Renaming of Schools Panel:

1) Dakota 38

2) Massacre of Cheyenne and Arapaho people by the U.S. Army

The Sand Creek massacre (also known as the Chivington massacre, the battle of Sand Creek or the massacre of Cheyenne Indians) was a massacre of Cheyenne and Arapaho people by the U.S. Army in the American Indian Wars that occurred on November 29, 1864, when a 675-man force of the Third Colorado Cavalry, under the command of U.S. Army Colonel John Chivington, attacked and destroyed a village of Cheyenne and Arapaho people in southeastern Colorado Territory, killing and mutilating an estimated 70–500 Native Americans, about two-thirds of whom were women and children. The location has been designated the Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site and is administered by the National Park Service. This was part of a series of events known as the Colorado War and was preceded by the Hungate massacre.

For 157 years, a Colorado governor’s order to kill Native Americans remained on the books. Not anymore.

Throughout 1864, tensions escalated between White settlers and Native Americans on the Colorado frontier. So John Evans, the territory’s second governor, made a proclamation in June of that year, telling “friendly Indians of the Plains” to report to outposts like Fort Laramie and Camp Collins for safety and protection.

Two months later, Evans issued a decidedly darker order, authorizing all citizens of the territory to “kill and destroy, as enemies of the country, wherever they may be found … hostile Indians.”

Those proclamations led to the Sand Creek Massacre in November of that year, when U.S. troops slaughtered hundreds of Arapaho and Cheyenne — including women, children and the elderly — after several tribal chiefs went out to greet them and as dozens of other Native Americans tried to flee.

Afterward, soldiers butchered their bodies and paraded them in public.

For 157 years, Evans’s orders remained on the books.

Not anymore. On Tuesday (8-17-2021), Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) signed an executive order rescinding Evans’s proclamations.