Sitting Bull

Hunkpapa Sioux Leader and Medicine Man

SITTING BULL, Sioux chief, born about 1837. He was the principal chief of the Dakota Sioux, who were driven from their reservation in the Black Hills by miners in 1876, and took up arms against the whites and friendly Indians, refusing to be transported to the Indian territory. In June, 1876, they defeated and massacred Gen. George A. Custer's advance party of Gen. Alfred H. Terry's column, which was sent against them, on Little Big Horn River. They were pursued northward by General Terry.

Sitting Bull, with a part of his band, made his escape into British Territory, and, through the mediation of Dominion officials, surrendered on a promise of pardon in 1880. In July and August, 1888, in a conference at Standing Rock, Dakota, he influenced his tribe to refuse to relinquish Indian lands.

He died in 1890 when followers tried to rescue him from the reservation police.

Signed and dated in the bottom right corner of Custer's portrait "drew 2007"