Sitting Bull
1831–1890 1 entry
Biography
Sitting Bull, in Lakota Tatanka Iyotake, was a Hunkpapa Lakota leader and holy man who led his people’s resistance to the United States. Born around 1831 near the Grand River, in today’s South Dakota, he became known as a fearless warrior and was later chosen as a leader of the Lakota bands who refused to live on reservations. In June 1876, shortly after he had seen in a vision the defeat of the soldiers, Lakota and Cheyenne warriors defeated George Custer’s cavalry at the Little Bighorn.
Hunted by the army, he led his followers into Canada in 1877, but hunger forced them back, and in 1881 he surrendered at Fort Buford in Dakota Territory. After two years as a prisoner he lived on the Standing Rock Reservation, and in 1885 he toured for four months with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West show. In December 1890, fearing that he would join the Ghost Dance movement, the authorities sent Indian police to arrest him, and he was killed in the struggle that followed. He is remembered as a symbol of the Lakota’s refusal to give up their freedom.
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