Sand Creek Massacre Site: An Environmental History
Michell E, Langfield J, Colorado State University - Department of History. 2007. Sand Creek Massacre Site: An Environmental History. Fort Collins, Colorado
This environmental history does not refight the massacre. It does, however, proceed on the premise that history is not made by people acting on an inert stage. As such, the narrative defines the site and its physical and spiritual significance within a wider history of conflict between two cultures that had very different philosophies and practices over what land meant and how it should be used. As noted in George Bent's reminiscence, humans were not the only players on the field that day. The landscape was clearly important in the unfolding of the massacre, but on an even broader scale, the interplay of Plains inhabitants and the environment in the preceding decades, even centuries, is crucial to understanding the history of the region and the escalating tension between Indians and Anglo-Americans that ultimately led to the tragedy at Sand Creek. The preconditions for the massacre to occur depended on the actions of people, and throughout history humans have perpetually been in competition with not just each other, but also with other life forms, for the always limited resources of their habitat. The Sand Creek massacre was one such consequence of the intertwining conflict amongst different peoples and between them and their environment.
- Type
- Unpublished Report
- Authors
- Michell, Elizabeth; Langfield, Julia; Colorado State University - Department of History
- Date of Issue
- 2007-01
- Units
- SAND
- Keywords
- agriculture: cattle, agriculture: farming and irrigation, and Treaties, Arapahos, Bison, Brief history of the massacre, Cheyenne migration into the Arkansas River Valley, Cheyennes, droughts and floods, Ecology, FIRE, Food, Grass, high plains grasslands, Hydrology, Overland migration through the Arkansas River Valley, Sand Creek Massacre site before 1864, soil and vegetation, surrounding environment, The Creek, Timber, Trees, winter camps