The Sioux Uprising

The Sioux Uprising

God works in mysterious ways.

THE LAND of southern Minnesota belonged to the Sioux Indians, but the pioneers wanted it for themselves. Therefore, in 1851 the government purchased the land for several hundred thousand dollars down, with the rest to be paid to the individual Indians as an annual annuity.

The Sioux barely survived the winter of 1861–1862 because of a poor corn crop the previous summer. When they came to the Indian agency to receive their annual annuities, they were told that the funds hadn’t arrived. With no funds, the Indians could not buy the food and goods that had arrived. The delay continued for weeks. Finally on Friday, August 15, one of the traders was heard to say, “So far as I am concerned, if they are hungry, let them eat grass.” The Sioux were enraged.

The annuity money arrived in St. Paul the next day, but it didn’t get to the first Indian agency until the following Monday. By then it was too late.

On Sunday, August 17, 1862, four Indians entered a home in Acton, Minnesota, and shot and killed four white settlers. The four Indians then ran to their chief, Little Crow, and asked him to lead them in a war against the white man. Little Crow agreed, not because he thought they could win, but because of the Sioux hatred of the white man and his Christianity.

Within four weeks the Indians had killed hundreds of whites throughout Minnesota while thousands more fled to the safety of the forts. The governor of Minnesota raised an army to put down the revolt.

About seventeen hundred Sioux warriors were imprisoned, and initially an order was given to hang three hundred of them. However, President Abraham Lincoln reduced this number to thirty-eight. They were hung on the day after Christmas 1862, in Mankato, Minnesota, while the other Sioux prisoners watched. It was the largest mass execution in American history.

Up to this point a few Sioux had become Christians, but the majority hated the white man’s religion. The Sunday following the execution, Dr. Thomas Williamson, a Presbyterian missionary to the Sioux, held an outdoor service in the yard of the Mankato prison as the prisoners stood in foot-deep snow. He preached about God’s plan for saving men from eternal death. That day a marvelous work of grace began in the prison.

Dr. Williamson spent the winter teaching and preaching to the Sioux prisoners. Soon the prisoners began to sing and pray together every morning and evening. Hundreds who had refused to listen to the gospel before eagerly listened. The work of God’s Spirit continued throughout the winter. At the first baptismal service in the spring, three hundred were baptized.

Another group of prisoners were imprisoned in Fort Snelling near Minneapolis, with their wives and children and additional Sioux families camped outside the fort. Dr. Williamson’s son John, another Presbyterian missionary, began meeting with interested Sioux in a tepee among the families camped there. Within a few months the group grew to hundreds who met together in the garret of a warehouse to learn more about Jesus. A similar awakening occurred within the Fort Snelling prison itself.

In the spring of 1863 the Mankato prisoners were taken to a prison in Davenport, Iowa. With only a few exceptions all professed to be Christians. Every morning and evening they sang and prayed together.

In 1866 the prisoners at Davenport were released and taken along with the Sioux from Fort Snelling to settle in Niobrara, Nebraska. They had prayed that God would remove their chains, and God had answered. John Williamson accompanied the Sioux to Niobrara, and every morning and evening they continued to meet for prayer and praise, reading the Bible and rejoicing in what God had done for them.

Reflection

The Sioux Uprising was the culmination of the hatred of the white man and his Christianity. But God in his infinite wisdom made the uprising the means of their salvation. The uprising is a picture of how everyone comes to God. By nature we are his enemies—until he brings us to himself.

For since we were restored to friendship with God by the death of his Son while we were still his enemies, we will certainly be delivered from eternal punishment by his life.

Romans 5:10