Summary Of Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee

In Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Dee Brown presents the Indian point of view of the conflict caused by westward American settlement during the late nineteenth century. The book is meant to be a counterpoint to the historical portrayal of Native Americans as warmongering savages. It also depicts the American government and citizens not as heroic practitioners of Manifest Destiny, but selfish oathbreakers who were willing to take by force what wasn’t theirs. Brown’s writing illustrates how history is indeed written by the victor by telling the past through the eyes of a defeated people. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee also emphasizes the prejudice felt during the late 1800s against non-whites and which continues to be a problem in contemporary

society.
Brown begins with a brief history of Native American first encounters with white settlers. These interactions ended in Native American deaths and foreshadow the rest of the book. In particular, the themes of Indians being punished for wrongs they haven’t committed and broken promises by the American government appear early and frequently. Brown’s tone is frank; he relates events but makes no condemnations for cruel actions by either Indians or whites. This objectivity makes the book more powerful because the matter-of-fact treatment of unending prejudice and persecution represents the lack of reaction from most Americans during the nineteenth century. White Americans didn’t care that the natives were being slaughtered to make western expansion possible and the Indians’ objections went unvoiced. The absence of support for the Native Americans from white Americans accentuates how unfair government policies were and impacts the reader because there is little to redeem Americans’ behavior. Instead, discriminatory event after event intensifies anger over the unjustified torment the Native Americans experienced. Impartial narration also keeps readers from accusing the author of being biased or dramatizing history. In addition, the use of quotes at the beginning of chapters and primary sources such as letters and journal entries throughout the book provide multiple perspectives that together form a more holistic picture of the period. An example would be how a white man’s conscience to take responsibility for a girl whose mother he killed was overruled because he feared his wife wouldn’t want to adopt the girl (303).
Part of Brown’s comprehensive approach is his analysis of the motives that drove white settlers and the American government to force the Native Americans off their lands.

While the lust for gold and land is understandable, he also explains the effect of political maneuverings. For instance, Governor Evans of Colorado was inclined to incite war with the Cheyenne and Arapaho because settlers “wanted to avoid the military draft of 1864 by serving against a few poorly armed Indians rather than against the Confederates farther east” (79). Regional politics increasingly came into play as the government back east was more focused on preserving the union. This can also be seen in Lincoln’s disagreement with Minnesota’s sentencing of 303 Santees to be hanged. Another competing government faction Brown points out is “the so-called Indian Ring” which took advantage of the Indian Bureau (188). Consisting of political higher-ups, as well as Indian agents, who profited off of goods meant for the Indians, the Indian Ring helped remove Donehogawa from his position as Commissioner of Indian Affairs. In doing so, the Indians lost an ally in the government who understood their views and treated them fairly. Yet another interest group Brown refers to as pressing for the relocation of natives is the Big Horn Association. The group consisted of miners, a trade who Brown suggests were behind anti-Indian efforts in many parts of the west. In fact, miners even convinced the government to drive the

Sioux out of the sacred Black Hills despite a treaty that “prohibited entry of white men without the Indian permission” (276). Indeed throughout the book, Brown analyzes the effects of financially motivated factions on government’s Indian policies. Rather than solely attributing territorial clashes to an enlarging population, he acknowledges white settlers provoked and lied to have an excuse to separate Native Americans from their rich lands.
One of Brown’s most effective devices is his use of irony. He does so by contrasting white claims of savage Indian behaviors with horrifying actions undertaken by those same whites. The army and government condoned the practice of scalping Indians and even offered bounties for their scalps. Yet scalping is traditionally considered a ‘barbaric’ Indian practice. However, Lieutenant James Connor and half-breed Robert Bent both described Indian bodies “whose privates had been cut out” by American soldiers at Sand Creek (90). Such heinous acts contrast with the American view of whites as civilized Christian people taming savages. The correlating descriptions from members of both sides prove Americans were not righteous crusaders. Perhaps the most powerful use of irony appears at the very end of the book. After several hundred Indians were killed by white (Christian) soldiers at Wounded Knee, the survivors are taken to a church where a banner reads: “PEACE ON EARTH, GOOD WILL TO MEN” (445). The bold letters drive home the sad hypocrisy that several Native Americans reference in quotes included throughout the book: Americans spoke often of peace, but rarely practiced it.
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee presents a forceful and well-crafted message.

However, a few structural changes could benefit readers. Brown introduces the various Indian tribes and their ranges on pages nine through twelve, yet includes no maps. Pictures of various figures are included throughout, but there are no maps to accompany the movements of Native American groups as white settlers encroach. Diagrams would visually express the dramatic reduction of land available to the Native Americans which readers unacquainted with the landscape cannot mentally picture. Additionally, it was unnecessary for Brown to introduce some of the Indian chiefs as youths on the aforementioned pages. It does not benefit the reader to hear that at the beginning of the Civil War Crazy Horse was “too young to be a warrior” (10). Several of these characters do not play major roles until the middle or end of the book, so it is confusing to introduce a mass of characters the reader does not know or care about. These descriptions detract from the flow of the book as they are tangential. Brown could simply skip these introductions as he repeats them later on as he focuses on particular tribes. Despite these minor flaws, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is a moving and eye-opening work that is worth the read and the

tears.