Disc 1
In the years following the American Civil War, a hard-fought Sioux resistance to western expansion, led by warrior and healer Sitting Bull, seemed to have accomplished the impossible: a treaty in which the United States gave the Sioux control of their territory for all time. However, the potential to harvest the riches of the western plains, especially gold, soon proved more important to the nation than honoring the treaty. Sitting Bull Part 1 and 2
This two-part episode of Chiefs chronicles the life and legacy of a remarkable native leader that the U.S. government regarded as a stubborn and dangerous obstacle. |
Disc 2
The Trial of Poundmaker
For two days in August 1885, Plains Cree leader Poundmaker sat shackled in a Regina, Saskatchewan courtroom. He was accused of participating in a rebellion against the Queen's Canadian government. Administrators in the Indian Department, including Sir John A. Macdonald (Canada's first prime minister), saw the Cree leader as an agitator and assumed the Cree were in complete collusion with the louis Riel rebellion
The Black Hawk War
While an immense statue of Black Hawk overlooks the Mississippi River, near the homeland of Sauk and Fox nations, his descendants were forced to move from their original lands to the Indian territory of Oklahoma. As the Sauk of today relate, the violent conflict that finally erupted around Black Hawk in the spring of 1832 spelled the end of the Sauk resistance to removal and nearly wiped out their people. |
Disc 3
The World Of Joseph Brant
Joseph Brant was born in 1742 in what is now New York State's Mohawk Valley. His traditional Mohawk name was Thayendanegea, meaning 'two sticks bound together in strength.' This name would be symbolic of Brant's twin ambitions: to be a power broker between Indian and English societies, and to satisfy his thirst for power, recognition and eminence.
Pontiac's Rebellion
Pontiac was a chief of the Ottawa tribe and part of the Algonquin Confederacy centered in North America's Great Lakes. He enjoyed a peaceful and mutually respectful relationship with the French. This harmonious situation changed when the British defeated the French on Quebec's Plains of Abraham in 1759 (The Seven Years War). The British were confident of their supremacy on the frontier, but Pontiac proved them wrong. His remarkably successful rebellion forced the British to reverse their policies and , through the Royal Proclamation of 1763, created a vast Indian sovereign territory.
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