One Had To Die

One Had To Die

Duel to Death Between Two Indians at Standing Rock Agency.

In Full Panoply of War Crooked Neck and Shaven Head Ended a Feud – Rifle Against Shotgun.

A duel to the death between two human beings, a duel planned and prepared for and not a suddenly precipitated conflict, is a peculiarly thrilling and awful spectacle, one that chains the attention of the beholder and binds him fast by the horrible fascination of it. Such a duel took place between two Indians at the Standing Rock agency many years ago, and the man who witnessed it has not yet forgotten the smallest detail of that sanguinary fight.

It was beef killing day at the agency in the year 1876, but a few weeks after the Custer massacre. Long point, on the eastern bank of the Missouri, opposite Fort Yates, was covered with a kaleidoscopic crowd of Sioux, to whom the butchery of six score huge steers strongly appealed.

At that day and date the Indians were allowed to shoot a fortnight's supply of cattle themselves. Later soldiers were detailed for the work in order to abate cruelty to the animals and danger to all residents within the radius of a mile.

On the morning in question it was evident to the agent and his employees, whose presence at the killing was necessary to secure a proper allotment of the beef as between tribes and families, that something more than usually exciting was affecting the Indians. There were four tribes of Sioux at Standing Rock – Lower Yanktonnais, Upper Yangtonnais, Uncapapa and Blackfeet – and generally these mixed together without thought of tribal relations or jealousies, as do nationalities on Broadway, New York. This day, however, the Uncapapas and the Blackfeet were divided and even to the inexperienced eye were hostile.

Having finished the distribution of the divided carcasses and sick with sights, sounds and smells that told of nothing but brutality and savagery, the agent was about to take a boat across the Missouri when sundry fierce war whoops bade him pause on top of the corral fence and look interestedly whence they came and where, a hundred yards away, fully 400 Indians, men, women and children, were rapidly operating into two groups, with a lane fifty feet wide between them.

Into the head of this lane danced a bronzed figure, thrusting aloft a double barreled shotgun and yelling at the top of his voice. At the foot appeared a quieter but no less ferocious warrior armed with a Winchester rifle of the old magazine type, caliber 45.

How were they dressed?

Not at all, unless you call a coup feather each, some dabs of yellow, green and blue paint on hair parting, cheek bone and breast and a very much abbreviated and visibly soiled breechcloth a toilet. Their wonted garb had been hastily doffed.

By this time the farmer of the agency, Waldrof by name and an old stager on the plains, had climbed to a seat beside the agent and in a rather uninterested tone said:

"Guess them fellers intends to do some shootin' to kill. There's been bad blood 'tween 'em for moron a year. Now they're going to try to let some of it out."

"I conceive it to be my duty to put a stop to this outrage," was the agent's comment. "Why, bless my soul! It's murder!"

"I conceive it to be my duty," retorted the farmer, "to purvent any sich durn fool proceedin' 'ceptin' you're plum anxious to furnish the corpse yourself."

As the farmer, to emphasize his protest, seized the agent's arm in an unshakable grasp, the only thing remaining was to watch the proceedings with such composure as could be vouchsafed to one who had left the Atlantic seaboard but a few short weeks before. While the conversation between the farmer and the agent was proceeding the Indian opponents had been dancing forward and back along the lane and across it in zigzag fashion, for all the world as if they were "setting to partners" in an old fashioned contra dance.

The man with the shotgun was named Crooked Neck, and he was a Blackfoot, while his opponent, an Uncapapa, usually called Shaven Head, was a noted scout in the employ of the government and appeared on the rolls as Ususuppi (Good Toned Metal). Their hostility grew out of the fact that Shaven Head had stolen Crooked Neck's favorite wife, and the immediate outbreak arose out of what some of Shaven Head's people claimed was an unfair allotment of beef.

Of the two Shaven Head looked far the more dangerous, while Crooked Neck did the most yelling. Possibly the latter felt his disadvantage. His ten gauge was loaded with buckshot rammed hard enough to scatter at the end of the hundred yards more or less that separated the fighters, but he only had two shots as against the fifteen Shaven Head had at his command in the barrel or the magazine of his Winchester.

Suddenly Shaven Head stopped capering, drew his rifle to his shoulder, fired and missed. While he was throwing a cartridge from magazine to barrel Crooked Neck ran toward him to within eighty yards and let fly with one barrel. He got results. As is usual with the Sioux, Shaven Head wore his hair in two long cues, one resting in front of each shoulder. One of these was amputated close to the scalp by Crooked Neck's shot, and a tiny stream of blood that soon showed itself on Shaven Head's breast proved that the skin at least had been abrased.

Again the yelling and the dancing, accompanied, be it well understood, by the yells of spectators whose savage blood was fairly boiling with excitement. The shrieks of the squaws held a peculiarly appalling note, and high above the unmusical clamor could be heard the long continued scream of the bone of contention, the wife Shaven Head had stolen from his opponent.

Crooked Neck now had but one shot left. If he missed he was at the mercy of his antagonist, and mercy, strained or unstrained, had no part in Shaven Head's makeup. The shotgun fighter seemed to redouble his activity and beyond question made of himself an exceedingly difficult target. Three times the Winchester spoke apparently without effect, although later it was discovered that one bullet had gone through the upper muscles of Crooked Neck's left leg. Of course Shaven Head was doing some ground and lofty steps on his own account, thus disarranging his aim.

The end came suddenly. Shaven Head pretended to stumble and fell partially forward. Instantly Crooked Neck fired his remaining barrel, but fired it at the air. The Uncapapa had side stepped in a fashion that would have made Corbett green with envy.

Seeing that he had missed, Crooked Neck turned to run, but after him in long leaps came his foe. Two shots in quick succession, and Crooked Neck was on the ground a corpse. The fatal bullet went through his brain, and he was shot from the rear, a detail, by the way, which gave his friends little concern.

If these duelists had been white the spectacular part of the affair would have ended with the death of one or other of the contestants. Not so with the savage Sioux. Before any one could have counted five the victor had reached the body, placed his foot thereon and struck it with the barrel of his rifle.

This was the "coup," or final blow that completed Shaven Head's triumph and made him truly conqueror.

Probably with foreknowledge of what was coming the spectators ceased their yells as soon as Crooked Neck fell, and after delivering the "coup" Shaven Head set up his chant of victory.

No notice was taken of the affair either by the military or the civil authorities.