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A Review of the Spotted Hawk Case.

Philadelphia: Indian Rights Association, 1898. 8vo, self wrappers. 14 pp.

A thorough review of the facts, including excerpts of sworn statements from two Native people, in a case one scholar has called “an American Indian Dreyfus Affair.”

On April 28, 1897 a white sheep herder named John Hoover was shot while tending his flock on the banks of the Tongue River, on the outskirts of the Cheyenne Reservation in Montana. Shortly thereafter a Cheyenne man, Whirlwind (AKA David Stanley), confessed to the crime and was only spared from the gallows by the intervention of the local Indian Agent. Whirlwind was thereafter immune from prosecution despite the truthfulness of his confession. The prosecutors, not able to see the murder of a white man go unpunished, promised Whirlwind a reward should he name the “true” perpetrators. Two other Cheyenne Men, Little Whirlwind and Spotted Hawk, were then falsely implicated and then convicted. Vigorous campaigning on behalf of the men by the Indian Rights Association saw their respective sentences overturned by gubernatorial pardon and court order respectively. The present pamphlet was published by the IRA as part of their efforts on behalf of the wrongly convicted men. It reprints statements from two Cheyenne defense witnesses, and also a letter from the celebrated writer Hamlin Garland who visited the Cheyenne Reservation shortly after the men’s arrest and developed a personal commitment to their cause.

CONDITION: Good, small closed tear running through the first four pages, upper wrapper bears the stamp of the Essex Institute.

Item #2823

Price: $375.00