Red Cloud's War - Treaty of Fort Laramie

Treaty of Fort Laramie

Despite the military successes in the Hayfield and Wagon Box Fights, the U.S. government increasingly sought a peaceful rather than a military solution to Red Cloud's War. The successful completion of the transcontinental railroad took priority, and the Army did not have the resources to defend both the railroad and the Bozeman Trail from Indian attacks. The military presence in the Powder River Country was both expensive and unproductive, with estimates that 20,000 soldiers might be needed to subdue the Indians.

Peace commissioners were sent to Fort Laramie in the spring of 1868. Red Cloud refused to meet with them until the Army abandoned the Powder River forts, Phil Kearny, C. F. Smith, and Reno. In August 1868, Federal soldiers abandoned the forts and withdrew to Fort Laramie. The day after the soldiers left the forts, the Indians burned them. The Bozeman Trail was closed for all time.

Red Cloud did not arrive at Fort Laramie until November. He signed the Treaty of Fort Laramie of 1868, which created the Great Sioux Reservation, including the Black Hills. The reservation included all of South Dakota west of the Missouri River. Northern Arapaho representatives also signed the treaty. The treaty declared the Powder River country as "unceded Indian territory", as a reserve for the Indians who chose not to live on the new reservation, and as a hunting reserve for the Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho. The treaty also accorded the Indians continued hunting rights in western Kansas and eastern Colorado. Most importantly, the treaty specified what Red Cloud sought: "no white person or persons shall be permitted to settle upon or occupy any portion" of the Powder River country "or without the consent of the Indians first had and obtained, to pass through" the Powder River country.