August 18, 1862
On this day, 13-year-old Mary Schwandt’s family was killed in the opening salvo of Minnesota’s Dakota War. It was the beginning of a lifelong friendship between Mary (right) and the Dakota woman who saved her life.
The Schwandt family had immigrated from Germany in 1858, settling near present-day Sacred Heart, Minnesota, in the Spring of 1862. Mary was working for the J.B. Reynolds family at a ferry landing across the Minnesota River when the Schwandt farm was attacked. Taken captive while trying to escape with the Reynolds, the young German girl was spared when 23-year-old, Snana, (Ringing Sound) traded a pony for her.
The first wife of Andrew Good Thunder, Snana (right) was grieving the loss of her own seven-year-old daughter, Lydia, who had died just six weeks earlier. According to Mary Schwandt’s own account, after paying the young girl’s captor with a pony, Snana concealed her under buffalo robes in her house and dressed her in Dakota clothing.
The Good Thunders, early converts to Christianity, were reportedly responsible for saving a number of frontier families during some of Minnesota’s darkest days. Good Thunder was a leader of the Mdewakanton Dakota and fast friend of Epis
copal Bishop, Henry Whipple (right). The bishop, a native New Yorker, spent much of his adult life advocating for Native Americans.
While history records this day as the beginning the “Great Sioux Uprising,” the roots of the conflict were more than a decade old. The treaty of 1851 sandwiched several bands of the Dakota into a 20-mile-wide strip of land along the Minnesota River, far too small for the population. Annuities would give the Dakota money to buy supplies from agency warehouses when game was scarce, the government promised. Like most treaties with the Native Americans, however, Washington often delayed payments or turned the money over to shady traders who claimed it was owed them as back payment.
When crops failed that summer, the Sissetowan and Wahpeton Dakota successfully negotiated for food with the Upper Sioux Agency at present-day Granite Falls. On August 15, the Mdewakanton and the Wahpekute bands asked for the same consider
ation at the Lower Sioux Agency at Morton. Their request was rejected. Next the Dakota met with the representative of the government traders, Andrew Jackson Myrick (left). Myrick’s warehouse was well stocked and the Dakota asked to buy food on credit. “If they are hungry, let them eat grass,” Myrick replied.
Two days later, four hungry young Dakota men, returning from an unsuccessful hunt, stole several fresh eggs from a farmer. The skirmish that followed left the farmer and his family dead.
Anticipating retaliation, Dakota chief, Little Crow (right), reluctantly struck the first blow, attacking settlers the next day. Some Dakota welcomed the war, while many were opposed to the violence. Agent Andrew Jackson Myrick at the Lower Sioux Agency was the first to die. He was scalped and his mouth stuffed with grass.
In the ugly six weeks that followed, both sides reigned terror on their victims and hundreds died. It was all over by the end of September. Most Dakota fighters surrendered following the Battle of Wood Lake in present-day Yellow Medicine County.
A total of 303 Native Americans were convicted of murder and various other crimes and sentenced to death. President Abraham Lincoln, however, commuted the sentences of 264.
Mass hanging in Mankato
The day after Christmas, 38 Dakota men were hanged at Mankato, some innocent of participating in the violence. The event still stands as the largest mass execution in the nation’s history. The remaining prisoners were held for nearly four years at Fort McClellen, Iowa, near Davenport.
Meanwhile some 1,600 Dakota women, children and elderly men were held in an internment camp at Pike Island, Fort Snelling, near St. Paul. Following their release, members of the Dakota bands were expelled from the state and relocated to Lakota lands in South Dakota and Nebraska.
Pike Island encampment
Snana and Good Thunder separated in 1865. He returned to Minnesota but Snana refused. She was relocated to the Santee Reservation near present-day Niobrara, Nebraska, remarrying and taking the name Maggie Brass. She died in 1908 at 68 and is buried in the Santee cemetery. Not forgotten in Minnesota, however, her name is inscribed on a state monument at Morton, along with Good Thunder’s and four other Dakota who helped spare an unknown number of settlers.
Following the war, Mary Schwandt was reunited with her brother, August, her only other family member to survive. She married St. Paul businessman, William Schmidt, and after living in Oregon
for several years, the couple returned to St. Paul.
She and Snana-Maggie Brass (right) both authored memoirs.”I want you to know” Schwandt wrote, “that the little captive German girl you so often befriended and shielded from harm, loves you still for your kindness and care.”
Andrew Good Thunder settled in Morton, donating land and funds to establish St. Cecilia’s Episcopal Church, in honor of Bishop Whipple’s wife.
In the final irony, the treaty money had reached St. Paul two days earlier and was sent to Fort Ridgely the following day. Arriving August 17, it was too late to stop the war.
Fort Ridgely State Park and musuem, 72158 County Road 30, Fairfax, Minnesota, in an important spot for its significance in the history of the Dakota War and the state’s geology. Built in 1853, the post community was home to 300 military members and civilians. The museum, administered by the Minnesota Historical Society, is open Friday through Sunday from Memorial Day through Labor Day weekend.
The cemetery and the grounds are open daily from 8 to 10 for self guided tours. The park also offers a variety of recreational opportunities including hiking and horse trails, paved bike paths, camping and picnic areas as well as a playground and visitor center.
Snowshoe and cross-country ski trails are open during the winter.For more information, go to dnr.state.mn.us/Fort Ridgely State Park, e-mail fortridgely.statepark@state.mn.us or call 507-426-7840 Thursday through Sunday, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m during the summer months.
© Text Only – 2018 – Headin’ West LLC – All photos – public domain or fair use.