After Little Bighorn, General John Pope announced that he would deal with the Sioux "as maniacs or wild beasts, and by no means as people with whom treaties or compromises can be made." In Colorado, Colonel John M. Chivington, a former minister, slaughtered 150 Cheyenne who had gone to the governor for protection. Most were women and children. Chivington called it "an act of duty to ourselves and civilization ." But the Indians didn't want his civilization. As a Minnesota chief put it, they just wanted to keep their way of life. He said: "The whites were always trying to make Indians give up their life and live like white men—go to farming, work hard, and do as they did—and the Indians did not know how to do that, and did not want to. If the Indians had tried to make the whites live like them, the whites would have resisted. The Indians wanted to go where they pleased and when they pleased; hunt game wherever they could find it, sell their furs to the traders, and live as they could."

That was how the tribe of the Nez Perce felt, too. Their land—which was where today Idaho, Washington and Oregon come together—held lush valleys, grassy prairies, steep mountains, and canyons that seemed to have been cut by a giant's steam shovel . The Nez Perce shared that land with elk, deer, antelope, rabbits, fowl, and mountain goats—and with bears, wolves, foxes, and coyotes. Fish, especially the high-jumping salmon, splashed in their streams. The Nez Perce were mighty hunters, and known for their strong bows. When horses arrived in their region, they became skilled riders. They befriended the outsiders from the East who began to pass through their land. And until gold was found on their land in 1860, it was easy to cultivate peace. But then miners couldn't be kept away . Some Nez Perce signed treaties to give up their land, but others wouldn't do it. One of them was the father of the greatest Nez Perce of them all, Chief Joseph . He counseled his son, "Stop your ears whenever you are asked to sign a treaty selling your home."

President Grant tried to solve the problem; he set aside a section of land "as a reservation for the roaming Nez Perce Indians." Settlers weren't allowed on the land. But that didn't stop the miners and homesteaders. They defied the President. They moved onto the land. Chief Joseph, whose real name was Hin-mah-too-yah-laht-ket—"Thunder Rolling in the Mountains"—told his people to be patient. He knew it would be dangerous to fight the white settlers. In 1876, the government sent three commissioners to persuade Chief Joseph to move from his land to another reservation. He would not agree. Instead he said: "Understand me fully with reference to my affection for the land. I never said the land was mine to do with it as I chose. The one who has the right to dispose of it is the one who has created it. I claim a right to live on my land, and accord you the privilege to live on yours ."

But the commissioners had no patience. The Indians must go, and quickly, they said, even though the weather was bad. One frustrated, angry young Indian, whose father had been murdered by white settlers, killed some of the white men. Now the whites had a reason to call the Indians savages. Now they could attack. But the Nez Perce fought back. Then the Indians raced for a place where they thought they would be free—Canada. It turned out to be a 1,000-mile journey. Joseph led his small band brilliantly, though most were children and old people. They fought in their mountains, they fought in their valleys, they fought in their canyons, they fought on their plateaus. Everywhere they were outnumbered and outgunned. Over and again they outwitted their pursuers. But they were fighting the telegraph as well as an army. Fresh troops were summoned by wire. Finally, just thirty miles from Canada, facing new soldiers, the Nez Perce were surrounded . On October 5, 1877, Chief Joseph made this surrender statement: "I am tired of fighting. Our chiefs are killed. The old men are dead. The little children are freezing to death. My heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands I will fight no more forever ."

Promises were made to Chief Joseph, but they were never kept. Those who wanted Indian land told false stories. The Nez Perce were sent to an empty plain; most sickened and died. Chief Joseph pleaded for justice: "The earth is the mother of all people, and all people should have equal rights upon it," he said. "You might as well expect the rivers to run backward as that any man who was born a free man should be contented when penned up and denied liberty to go where he pleases ."

The time would come, as Chief Joseph wished, when there was one government and equal rights for all men and women of every color and background. Chief Joseph's words would help bring that time. But it would be too late for most of the Nez Perce.

Once again, listen to Chief Joseph: "Let me be a free man—free to travel, free to stop, free to work, free to follow the religion of my fathers, free to think and talk and act for myself—and I will obey every law, or submit to the penalty."

In 1890 there was a final massacre of Indians at a place in the West called Wounded Knee . Under the authority of President Benjamin Harrison, thousands of troops were sent into South Dakota, where a large group of Sioux Indian men, women, and children were gathered for worship. On December 29 a confrontation erupted . The Sioux leader American Horse was an eyewitness . He later testified: "[The soldiers] turned their Hotchkiss guns upon the women who were in the lodges. Women fleeing with their babies were killed together, shot right through. Little boys [were] ... butchered ."

In the bitter cold of early January a local newspaperman arrived and photographed the aftermath of the massacre. His camera recorded the scene as a mass grave was filled with the bodies of more than 250 Native American men, women, and children . It was the end of the Indian wars.

The Indian story should have been different. There could have been respect and honesty between the peoples. There could have been strong laws to prevent unfairness and brutality. Even those, like the Christian missionaries, who meant to help the Native Americans, usually ended up destroying the tribes because they didn't respect the native cultures. They were sure their way of life was better than the Native American way. When Chief Joseph died on September 21, 1904, the doctor listed the cause of death as "a broken heart."