Many factors caused the U.S.-Dakota War.

In the 1860s, more and more settlers

were flooding into Minnesota.

Game animals were getting scarce,

and there was growing competition between

Dakota people and Euro-Americans

hunting for meat.

Crops had been poor in 1861,

and the Dakota had little food

stored for the winter.

They were starving because they were

not allowed to go off the reservation to hunt.

So when the game left for the plains,

they had nothing left.

The payments the Dakota had been promised

from selling their land to

the U.S. government were late.

Traders were nervous,

and many of them cut off

credit to Dakota hunters.

A government agent refused to distribute food

to the Dakota and although Dakota farmers

shared food with their relatives, it wasn’t enough.

When the US government who made a pact with us,

will not live up to its agreement,

we have to then defend ourselves.

Our ancestors fought for our survival.

They had to go to war to fight for survival.

If they wouldn’t have fought,

we would have all just died.

We would have starved to death.

On August 17, 1862,

four hungry Dakota hunters killed five

white settlers at Acton Township, Meeker County.

Some Dakota seized that moment to declare war on

the whites who would not keep their promises and

to reclaim their homelands.

In the early morning hours of August 18,

they went to war.

The Indians attacked the wrong people.

They should have attacked

the federal government and the fort.

But they didn’t.

The Indians attacked unarmed whites

defenseless, generally peace-loving people.

Over the next six weeks,

a series of attacks, raids, and battles

in the Minnesota River valley and beyond

left thousands dead, wounded,

captured, and displaced.

What if a foreign country was

encroaching onto your land?

Would you retaliate or would you

keep moving and let them take your land?

We need to see

the minds of the Dakota in saying

that, "We are warriors."

During the war,

Dakota people and settlers alike had seen

their homes and families torn apart.

The trauma didn’t end when the fighting stopped

38 Dakota men were hanged in the largest

mass execution in U.S. history.

Months dragged into years of imprisonment,

destitution, displacement, and death.

Nine of our family were sent to Fort Snelling.

Then the rest escaped.

There must have been

a lot of them that died there.

And what happened to them?