Great Secrets of Our National Parks
Some of the best findings by accidental anthropologists and studied experts.
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By: TW Editors 06/01/2008
Sand Creek, CO
Finding Sand Creek
“The site of that historic [Sand Creek] affair has not been marked. If it were possible, we, as a nation, doubtless had rather the event could be forgotten,” stated Walter M. Camp, at an annual meeting for the Order of the Indian Wars of the U.S. on January 17, 1920.
For some of you lovers of Western history, the Sand Creek Massacre may seem to have long been a part of our national story. Yet the Sand Creek Massacre site was indeed one of our nation’s greatest secrets, and we were finally given the tools to pinpoint its location when Congress passed Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell’s act in 1998.
That year, the National Park Service, the State of Colorado and the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes started working together to locate the massacre site. Jerome Greene and Douglas Scott recorded this story in their book, Finding Sand Creek: History, Archeology and the 1864 Massacre Site.
The lore confirmed the site was real, yet the physical proof was lacking, until that fateful May, 135 years after the massacre had taken place. Crews near the South Bend of Sand Creek pulled out of the soil shattered plates and hide scrapers belonging to the Cheyenne and Arapaho, and fragments of weapons that had been used to kill many of them on November 29, 1864.
That day came because the project’s leading historian Jerome Greene had combed through maps, diaries and firsthand accounts by Indians and the military. Based upon his research, he identified the massacre site as one mile north of the area most had thought was the site. When leading archaeologist Douglas Scott led his crew out there, they would ultimately uncover more than 400 material objects—the proof the National Park Service needed to affirm this was indeed the massacre site. As a result of this team study, Sand Creek gained status as a national historic site in 2000.
Although it took us more than a century to mark it, America has not forgotten Sand Creek, Mr. Camp.
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