How the West Was Lost — Season 1, Episode 4: The Only Good Indian, is a Dead Indian
Documentary • 45 min • 2 seasons, 13 episodes
Episode synopsis
No Native American tribes suffered more than the Cheyenne and the Arapaho when Union soldiers from the Civil War spilled over into the West and attacked these groups and others. In 1861 the Cheyenne and Arapaho accepted, in exchange for the vast land they once occupied, a small reservation in Southeastern Colorado, the Sand Creek Reserve. There were few buffalo on the reservation and without them, the Indians could not survive. A series of battles broke out, with Black Kettle leading his Cheyenne against the ambitious Col. John Chivington, his rival and enemy. This episode visits Sand Creek and other battlefields from the conflict and talks to ancestors of the warriors.
About How the West Was Lost
The history of 19th-century America is the story of struggles between settlers moving west and Native Americans trying to hold on to their ancestral territories. The clash between lifestyles and land rights forged a new land and unified an American culture, but in the process a venerable way of life was destroyed. Follow the Cherokee, Dakota, Lakota, and Nez Perc as they fight to keep their homelands.