Black Elk, a Lakota youth also known as Haka Sappa, was only 13 years old when he took part in the 1876 Battle of the Little Bighorn. During the fierce fighting, he displayed considerable courage, even taking a soldier's scalp. As the second cousin of the war leader Crazy Horse, Black Elk held a unique position from which to observe the unfolding conflict.
He witnessed the chaos and ferocity of the clash as Lakota, Cheyenne, and Arapaho warriors overwhelmed the Seventh Cavalry under Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer. Black Elk’s firsthand recollection offers a rare window into this decisive episode in American history, as no white combatant survived the engagement.
Crazy Horse, a steadfast chief, had already bested General Crook’s troops at the Battle of the Rosebud earlier that day. It was said he could have destroyed the soldiers entirely if he had summoned more fighters from the villages and set a morning ambush, as the troops had camped in darkness after the earlier fight.
Earlier that year, Crazy Horse had repelled cavalry who attacked their Powder River village on a bitterly cold March morning during the moon of the snow blind. From there, he went west to the Rosebud, where he again drove back attacking soldiers before finally moving to the Valley of the Greasy Grass, ancestral land where his people wished only for peace.
Two days before the battle, the Sioux established their camp along the southern edge of the Greasy Grass valley before midday. The village was immense, its tepees too many to count. To the south and upstream were the Hunkpapas, followed by the Oglalas, Miniconjous, San Arcs, Blackfeet, and Cheyennes, with the Santees and Yanktons furthest north.
On the east, the Greasy Grass flowed, swollen by melted snow from the Big Horn Mountains, with trees lining its banks. From a nearby hill, one could see the mountains to the south and west. Across the river, bluffs and hills rose, cut by gullies. To the west, lower hills provided pasture and protection for countless ponies.
The day before the battle, Black Elk was preparing to swim with friends when a medicine man named Hairy Chin called him to the tepee of Rattling Hawk, a warrior wounded in the hip at the Rosebud. Five other boys joined him and were asked to become bears for a healing ritual.
As Hairy Chin’s power stemmed from a bear dream, he painted Black Elk’s body and face yellow, added black stripes beside his nose, tied his hair like bear ears, and placed eagle feathers on his head. During this, Black Elk remembered his vision and suddenly felt as if he was lifted from the earth.
In that moment, he understood more than words could convey and became convinced that misfortune was drawing near. A sense of dread settled over him. The other boys had been painted completely red, each adorned with real bear ears at the top of their heads.
Hairy Chin, wearing an authentic bear pelt, began to sing. At the doorway, the sacred herbs were rejoicing. Two women entered, positioning themselves on either side of the wounded Rattling Hawk, one carrying a vessel of water, the other holding a bundle of herbs.
While the herbs and water were offered to Rattling Hawk, Hairy Chin continued his chanting. Then they handed the wounded man a red cane, and immediately he stood up. Leaning on the sacred staff, Rattling Hawk followed the two women out of the lodge. The boys, disguised as little bears, danced around him, growling as part of the ritual.
Afterward, Hairy Chin crawled out on all fours, looking remarkably like a bear. Rattling Hawk’s limp lessened, and though he was not able to fight the next day, he soon regained his strength. The boys then went to the river to wash the paint from their bodies after the ceremony.
When they returned, the villagers were dancing and sharing stories of bravery from the recent battle at the Rosebud. As dusk approached, the boys were given the task of bringing the horses closer to camp. By the time they finished, night had fallen, and the celebrations continued around the fires.
At sunrise, Black Elk’s father woke him and told him to help graze their horses. He instructed the boy to tie a long rope to one of the horses so it would be easier to catch and thus secure the rest. He stressed the need for alertness, warning him to keep watch over the camp and return the horses quickly in case trouble arose.
Several boys tended their horses together until midday when the heat became unbearable. They decided to cool off in the river, and a cousin kindly offered to watch the horses while they swam. As Black Elk rubbed grease on his skin, a strange sense of unease came over him, as though disaster was about to strike.
Despite this, he joined the others at the water’s edge. To the west of the camp, many people were busy digging turnips, and a large group was already swimming. By the time his cousin brought the horses down to drink, they had been in the water for a long while, the sun’s heat still relentless.
All at once, the voice of the crier echoed through the nearby Hunkpapa camp. “The soldiers are coming. They are charging. The soldiers are coming.” The alarm swept from camp to camp, reaching even the Santees and Yanktons. The Oglala crier repeated the warning, his tone growing more frantic with each call.
Everyone rushed to secure their horses, and Black Elk’s family was lucky to have theirs close at hand. His elder brother, astride a sorrel horse, galloped toward the Hunkpapas. Black Elk was mounted on a buckskin. When his father heard his brother shout and saw him ride off without his pistol, he hurried over, instructing Black Elk to retrieve the weapon and bring it back at once.
Black Elk took the firearms, mounted his pony, and chased after his brother. Just past the Hunkpapa camp, a thick cloud of dust billowed up as the Hunkpapas, many still wet from the river, rushed about in alarm. Through the haze, the soldiers appeared on their powerful horses, looking tall and formidable as they fired their guns.
His brother, revolver in hand, shouted for him to turn back. There was a patch of dense timber just beyond the Hunkpapa camp where some warriors were gathering. His brother headed that way, and Black Elk followed. Women and children were already fleeing downstream in large numbers.
When they reached the timber, many Hunkpapas had already gathered there, and the soldiers were shooting above them, bullets striking the trees and causing leaves to fall. The women and children kept running. Warriors rode in on their horses, and the village below was a scene of dust, shouting, and thunder.
In the woods and outside the Hunkpapa camp, they all shouted, “Be brave. Don’t act like a woman.” The defenseless were gasping for breath. It was around this time that Gall stepped in to stop the Hunkpapas from retreating.
Black Elk stayed in the woods for a while, reflecting on his vision. It filled him with a deeper sense of destiny and made him feel that the army would be defeated and that his people were beings of thunder. Suddenly, a loud shout rose above the dust: “Crazy Horse is coming.”
The arrival of Crazy Horse was announced by the sound of eagle bone whistles and the wild cries of Hokahi, like the wind howling coming from the north and west. The valley darkened with dust and smoke, filled with shadows, shouts, pounding hooves, and gunfire.
To his left, Black Elk heard the soldiers’ horses, their iron shoes clattering as they retreated into the brush, with gunfire breaking out everywhere. The horses finally burst through the thickets, and he found himself in the midst of chaos as men and horses moved in and out, heading upstream and shouting, “Hurry, move fast.”
They were all mixed together in the confusion as the soldiers ran upstream. Black Elk didn’t see much, but he did witness a Lakota warrior charging a soldier who stood his ground and fought bravely. The Lakota seized the soldier’s horse by the bridle, but the soldier shot him with a revolver.
Being small, Black Elk couldn’t push through to where the soldiers were, so he didn’t kill anyone. Everything was dark and confusing with too many people in front of him. Soon the soldiers and many Lakotas were crowded into the river, and he found himself in the water for a while. Men and horses were tangled together, fighting in the river, making it sound like hail was falling.
After they came out of the water, people began stripping the dead soldiers of their clothing and putting it on themselves. One soldier on the ground was still moving. A Lakota rode up and said to Black Elk, “Boy, get down and scalp him.”
Black Elk got off his horse and started to scalp him. The soldier’s hair was short, and his knife was blunt. The soldier was grinding his teeth, so Black Elk shot him in the forehead and then took his scalp.
Many of the fighters were chasing the soldiers up a hill on the far side of the river while the rest of the people moved downstream. On a distant rise above the Santee camp, a thick cloud of dust hung in the air with warriors weaving in and out of it like swallows, and the sound of gunfire was constant.
Black Elk decided to show his mother the scalp he had taken. On his way, he spotted a striking young woman among a group of warriors heading into the fray. She sang out, “Brothers, now your friends have come. Be brave. Be brave. Do you wish to see me taken captive?”
As he passed through the Oglala camp, he noticed Rattling Hawk sitting alone in his lodge holding a gun and singing a mournful song: “What can you do, brothers, that I cannot do?”
When he reached the women on the hill, they were all singing and making tremolo calls to encourage the warriors fighting across the river. His mother gave a special tremolo just for him when she saw the scalp he brought her.
He stayed there for a while with his mother, watching the dust swirl on the hill across the river. Riderless horses emerged from the cloud. Many boys his age and younger were there with their mothers and sisters, and they asked him to join them at the fight. They mounted their ponies and set off.
As they rode down toward the river, they saw gray horses with empty saddles stampeding into the water. When they reached the mouth of a ravine that led up into the bluffs where the fighting was still going on, they crossed the Greasy Grass. By the time they arrived, most of the soldiers had fallen, many already dead, though a few were still alive.
More boys had gathered by then, and they rode around shooting arrows at the remaining soldiers. Black Elk found one soldier writhing with arrows in him and tried to take his coat, but a man pushed him aside and claimed it for himself.
Then he noticed something shiny hanging from the soldier’s belt. He pulled it free, a round, bright yellow object that was very beautiful. He put it on as a necklace. At first, it ticked, but then it stopped. He wore it around his neck for a long time before he figured out what it was and how to make it tick again.
After that, the women gathered together, and they climbed to the top of the hill. There, gray horses lay dead, some stacked on top of soldiers and soldiers on top of horses. They didn’t see many of their own fallen as they had already been taken away, but many of their people had been killed or wounded.
No one seemed to know which soldier was Pinhanska, and Black Elk did not see him. He saw one soldier raising his arms and groaning, so he shot an arrow into his forehead, causing his limbs to jerk.
He noticed some Lakotas trying to help another Lakota. When he got closer, he saw it was Black Wasiku, the brother of Chase in the Morning. He had been shot through the right shoulder, and the bullet was lodged in his left hip. He had been hanging off his horse when he was hit.
Black Wasiku was his cousin, and both his father and Black Elk’s father were so angered by his wounding that they went and killed a soldier, mutilating his body. The soldier was large, and the flesh looked tempting, but they did not eat it.
There was a young boy, even younger than Black Elk, who asked him to scalp a soldier for him. He did, and the boy ran off to show the scalp to his mother.
Most of the warriors forced the remaining soldiers back to the hill where their pack mules were. After a while, Black Elk grew tired of searching the area. The stench of blood was overpowering, and he lost interest in it. He returned home with a few others.
He felt no remorse. He was satisfied. The soldiers had come to harm them and their families, and this was their land. When he was hiding in the brush with the Hunkpapas and heard the first shots, he sensed this would happen. He believed his people were linked to the thunder beings from his vision and that the soldiers were foolish to come there.
That night, everyone in the village stayed awake. The following morning, another group of warriors returned to the hill where the soldiers were positioned, and those who had kept watch there overnight came back to camp. Black Elk and his mother went along.
They could see the horses and pack mules up on the hill, but the soldiers had created strong defenses. At the bottom of the hill, on the western side of the Greasy Grass, there were some bulberry bushes. A larger boy named Round Fool was circling the bushes.
When they asked what he was doing, he replied, “There’s a white man in that bush.” Indeed there was. The man had hidden there when the other soldiers retreated to the hilltop and had remained there all night.
They began shooting arrows at him, and it felt similar to hunting a rabbit. He moved from one side of the bush to the other while they ran around, firing their bows at him. At one point, he cried out, “Ow!” Eventually, they set the grass around the bushes on fire, and he emerged running. Some of the warriors killed him.
After they climbed the back of the hill where some of their men were positioned, they looked over. They couldn’t see the soldiers who were lying in their fortifications, but they could see the horses and pack mules, many of which were dead.
When they went back down and crossed the river again, some soldiers shot at them, hitting the water. It was nearly evening when Black Elk and his mother returned to camp at a gallop.
By then, their scouts had reported that more soldiers were approaching upstream, so they decided to break camp. Before nightfall, they were packed and began moving up the Greasy Grass toward Wood Louse Creek in the Big Horn Mountains.
They traveled through the night following the Greasy Grass. Black Elk’s mother placed some puppies into the pony drag that he and his two younger brothers rode in. The puppies kept trying to escape, so he spent much time putting them back in the drag, which meant he got little sleep.
By dawn, they reached a small, dry creek, made camp, and ate heartily. The meat had streaks of fat in it. By noon, they departed again and arrived at Wood Louse Creek at the mountain’s base, where they established their camp.
There, a man with serious injuries began to convulse and repeatedly said, “Janini, Janini.” No one knew what he meant. He eventually died, and they named that place the camp where Janini died.
That evening, everyone became alarmed and began shouting, “The soldiers are coming.” Black Elk looked over and saw what looked like troops heading their way, but it was just some of their own men dressed in soldiers’ uniforms. They were only having fun.
The scouts reported that the soldiers hadn’t pursued them and that they were safe now. Throughout the camp, large fires burned and victory dances continued all night.