Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee2007

Charles Eastman:
My dear Senator Dawes, as I believed you sincere in asking me to keep you informed, I write you again in an appeal for your assistance. With no medical equipment here worthy of the name and understocked in medicines, there has been little reason for the sick to risk the journey to the agency for treatment. I bought a horse and a wagon with my own salary and have just now returned from the several weeks in the villages. It is a mistake to trust the official reports. Measles, influenza and whooping cough have ascended from hell all at once. My own assistant's child has been taken. The agent here, Royer, has no experience and even less inclination to help these people. Of equal concern is the epidemic of hopelessness that has overtaken the reservation. That the Sioux would bear the wretched taste of cod-liver oil for the ounce of spirits contained in the bottle is, to me, the whole of their experience in a nutshell. I no longer deny them. Many here fear a return to the old ways. The prophesy of a Paiute shaman called Wovoka has spread from tribe to tribe faster than a telegraph signal, rekindling old superstitions among the Sioux and old apprehensions among the whites who are sure to mistake desperation for hostility. As conditions worsen, the church can provide little solace beyond a Christian burial. Sincerely yours, Charles Eastman.