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specialagentartemis · 24 days ago

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Some good things happening at the local level: Land Back edition

The Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians purchased back 2,000 acres of deeply historically significant land in Oregon, the site of both a massacre of Native people at the hands of the US army, and the site of a treaty signing that established a temporary truce and reservation. (Posted Jan 21, 2025)

The property was purchased directly from the previous landowner. The Nature Conservancy preserves a conservation easement on the land. The Siletz will continue to work closely with the Nature Conservancy and the BLM across the properties in the region to emphasize conservation and restoration. “To me, land back means, in its purest form, its return of lands to a tribe,” Kentta [citizen of the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians and the tribal council treasurer] said. “This is through purchase, and a significant amount paid out for the purchase. So for us, that is regaining of land back, but it's not a settlement or apology for things that happened in the past.”

The Tule River Tribe in California is moving forward with a plan to buy back 14,673 acres of rivers, forests, ranchland, and wetland in a conservation project partnering with The Conservation Fund, the Wildlife Conservation Board, and various California conservation organizations. It's set to move into Tule River control (or at least co-management? unclear to me) sometime this year. (Posted January 8, updated January 10, 2025)

Charmaine McDarment, chairwoman of the Tule River Tribal Council, said in a press release that the tribe appreciates help in restoring ancestral homelands. “As the climate crisis brings new pressures to address the effects of environmental mismanagement and resource degradation, the Tribe’s partnership with WCB is an important example of building relationships based in collaboration and trust. “The tribe remains committed to supporting co-stewardship efforts and fighting to ensure that disproportionate harms to Native American lands, culture, and resources are resolved in a manner that centers and honors Native American connections to ancestral lands.”

Illinois lawmakers voted to move Shabbona Lake State Park to the management of The Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation. The Illinois governor has a lot on his plate right now, but is expected to sign the bill into law. (Posted January 14, 2025)

The state House approved SB 867, which would transfer Shabbona Lake State Park to the Prairie Band Potawatomi. The bill now heads to Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker for his signature. The land transfer hinges on an agreement that the tribe continue to operate the property as a park, still open to the public. Final details will be established in a forthcoming land management agreement between the state and tribe. Prairie Band Potawatomi Chairman Joseph “Zeke” Rupnick said the bill’s passage was a “meaningful step” toward righting a historic old wrong. The land was originally part of the tribe's 1,280-acre reservation in northern Illinois. During Chief Shab-eh-nay's visit to family in Kansas, the land was unlawfully auctioned off, violating federal requirements for Congressional approval of tribal land sales. The tribe has sought to reclaim the land for nearly two centuries.

A Wabanaki food sovereignty group secured a no-strings-attached land deal to buy 245 acres of farm and forest in Maine, to focus on local, traditional, and sustainable foods. (Posted January 19, 2025)

What sets this purchase apart is that the land transfer comes without conservation easements. These easements, which frequently accompany land returns or transfers, are often well-meaning. However, they can inhibit Indigenous stewardship by preventing practices such as prescribed burning, subdivision, or particular kinds of zoning for buildings or infrastructure. A coalition of 12 organizations and several private donors helped secure the land for Niweskok [a nonprofit collective of Wabanaki farmers, health professionals, and educators] without easements, giving the Wabanaki nonprofit sovereignty over the property, according to Heather Rogers, Land Protection Program director for Coastal Mountain Land Trust. Her organization has helped finance the Goose River purchase through fundraising and advocacy efforts. “The land trusts had to approach it with humility - there are other ways to care for land that can end up with better outcomes, and I think we have all come to that realization,” Rogers said. “I think now that we've done it once, I think we would be open to doing it again that way.”

Conservation, food sovereignty, water management - a few hundred acres here, a thousand acres there, there is movement to put lands back in tribal control, which is a human rights win as well as an ecology/conservation one. This is mostly happening at state and even private levels, and is something to continue advocating for, pushing for, donating to, and finding out if you have any local movements advocating for this kind of thing near you and calling state-level lawmakers and representatives about.

#Land Back #Indigenous rights #conservation #ecology #US politics #current events

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zvaigzdelasas · 7 months ago

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[ThePrint is Indian Private Media]

Speaking to ThePrint minutes after Hasina left Bangladesh, Yunus, who has been charged by the Hasina government in over 190 cases, said, “Bangladesh is liberated… We are a free country now.”

“We were an occupied country as long as she (Hasina) was there. She was behaving like an occupation force, a dictator, a general, controlling everything. Today all the people of Bangladesh feel liberated.”[...]

Yunus was convicted by the Hasina-led government in January for violating the country’s labour laws and is currently out on bail.[...]

Yunus, founder of the pioneering microfinance system that lifted millions of poor out of poverty in Bangladesh, ruled out any role in active politics. “I’m not the kind of person who would like to be in politics. Politics is not my cup of tea,” he maintained.

Currently in Paris, he said he would soon return to Bangladesh and continue to work for the people the way he did earlier.[...]

“I will continue with my work in a more free environment that I didn’t have during the regime of Sheikh Hasina because she was always attacking me. I will continue, devote myself to the things I could not do before,” he said.

Earlier in the day, coming down heavily on the Hasina-led government, Yunus had in a separate interview with ThePrint demanded that she resign immediately.[...]

He added that unlike the US, India has played a “major role” as far as Bangladesh is concerned.

“I don’t know what role they are playing now in this scenario and what role they will play in the upcoming situation,” he told ThePrint.[...]

The Nobel Laureate said that with Hasina no longer calling the shots in Dhaka, things have changed in Bangladesh and he is not sure what role opposition parties including former PM Khaleda Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) will play in the current scenario.

He added that the BNP was silent so far because they have been under attack all along. “Now in a free country, how they emerge, how they decide their policies and actions, if there is an election, what role they will play in the elections, how they perform in the elections, is not very clear as of now.”

[Dhaka Tribune is Bengali Private Media]

The coordinators of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement have announced an outline for an interim government headed by Nobel Laureate Dr Muhammad Yunus.

This information was conveyed in a video message by key coordinators of the student movement, Nahid Islam, Asif Mahmud, and Abu Bakar Mazumdar, at 4:15am on Tuesday.[...]

The army chief also mentioned that he would soon meet with representatives of students and teachers.

He expressed confidence that the situation would return to normal soon and sought all-out cooperation from people of all classes and professions, including students, regardless of party affiliations and opinions.

5 Aug 24

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whencyclopedia · 20 days ago

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Chief Joseph (Eastman's Biography)

Chief Joseph (Heinmot Tooyalakekt, l. 1840-1904) was the leader of the Wallowa band of the Nez Perce Native American nation, who, in 1877, resisted forced relocation from his ancestral lands in the Wallowa Valley of northeastern Oregon and led his people on a 1,170-mile (1,900 km) flight toward Canada in hopes of asylum with Sitting Bull (l. c. 1837-1890).

The flight of the Nez Perce under Chief Joseph, a running battle in which he defeated US forces in every engagement, is known as the Nez Perce War, and newspaper accounts of the day, often hostile to Native American efforts to preserve their lands, were remarkably sympathetic to Chief Joseph's cause. When he and his people were a mere 40 miles (64 km) from the Canadian border, they were surprised by a US cavalry attack and forced to surrender.

Although the treaty between the Nez Pearce and the US government stipulated their relocation to a reservation in Idaho, briefly holding them in Montana Territory, they were instead quickly sent to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and held as prisoners of war before being shipped to Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma), and finally to the Colville Indian Reservation in the state of Washington.

Chief Joseph spent the rest of his life appealing to US officials for the return of the lands of the Nez Perce in the Wallowa Valley, but his requests were denied. He is said to have died of a broken heart on the reservation in Washington on 21 September 1904.

In 1968 the US Post Office issued a stamp in his honor and memorial statues of Chief Joseph have been raised in many of the western states of the USA, but the lands of the Nez Perce have never been returned to them and there has never been any official acknowledgment of the outright theft of those lands by Euro-Americans.

Flight of the Nez Perce and Key Battle Sites of 1877

United States Department of Agriculture-Forest Service (Public Domain)

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The following account is taken from the 1939 edition of Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains (1916) by the Sioux physician and author Charles A. Eastman (also known as Ohiyesa, l. 1858-1939), republished in 2016. Eastman interviewed Chief Joseph in 1897 and prepared the following, which, as he said, was authenticated by General Nelson A. Miles, one of his former adversaries. The following has been edited for space, but the full account is below in the External Links section.

The Nez Perce tribe of Indians, like other tribes too large to be united under one chief, was composed of several bands, each distinct in sovereignty. It was a loose confederacy. Joseph and his people occupied the Imnaha or Grande Ronde valley in Oregon, which was considered perhaps the finest land in that part of the country.

When the last treaty was entered into by some of the bands of the Nez Perce, Joseph's band was at Lapwai, Idaho, and had nothing to do with the agreement. The elder chief in dying had counseled his son, then not more than twenty-two or twenty-three years of age, never to part with their home, assuring him that he had signed no papers. These peaceful non-treaty Indians did not even know what land had been ceded until the agent read them the government order to leave. Of course, they refused. You and I would have done the same.

When the agent failed to move them, he and the would-be settlers called upon the army to force them to be good, namely, without a murmur to leave their pleasant inheritance in the hands of a crowd of greedy grafters. General O. O. Howard, the Christian soldier, was sent to do the work.

He had a long council with Joseph and his leading men, telling them they must obey the order or be driven out by force. We may be sure that he presented this hard alternative reluctantly. Joseph was a mere youth without experience in war or public affairs. He had been well brought up in obedience to parental wisdom and with his brother Ollicut had attended Missionary Spaulding's school where they had listened to the story of Christ and his religion of brotherhood. He now replied in his simple way that neither he nor his father had ever made any treaty disposing of their country, that no other band of the Nez Perces was authorized to speak for them, and it would seem a mighty injustice and unkindness to dispossess a friendly band.

General Howard told them in effect that they had no rights, no voice in the matter: they had only to obey. Although some of the lesser chiefs counseled revolt then and there, Joseph maintained his self-control, seeking to calm his people, and still groping for a peaceful settlement of their difficulties. He finally asked for thirty days' time in which to find and dispose of their stock, and this was granted.

Joseph steadfastly held his immediate followers to their promise, but the land-grabbers were impatient, and did everything in their power to bring about an immediate crisis so as to hasten the eviction of the Indians. Depredations were committed, and finally the Indians, or some of them, retaliated, which was just what their enemies had been looking for. There might be a score of white men murdered among themselves on the frontier and no outsider would ever hear about it, but if one were injured by an Indian— "Down with the bloodthirsty savages!" was the cry.

Joseph told me himself that during all of those thirty days a tremendous pressure was brought upon him by his own people to resist the government order. "The worst of it was," said he, "that everything they said was true; besides"—he paused for a moment— "it seemed very soon for me to forget my father's dying words, 'Do not give up our home!'" Knowing as I do just what this would mean to an Indian, I felt for him deeply.

Among the opposition leaders were Too-hul-hul-sote, White Bird, and Looking Glass, all of them strong men and respected by the Indians; while on the other side were men built up by emissaries of the government for their own purposes and advertised as "great friendly chiefs." As a rule, such men are unworthy, and this is so well known to the Indians that it makes them distrustful of the government's sincerity at the start. Moreover, while Indians unqualifiedly say what they mean, the whites have a hundred ways of saying what they do not mean.

…the whites were unduly impatient to clear the coveted valley, and by their insolence they aggravated to the danger point an already strained situation. The murder of an Indian was the climax and this happened in the absence of the young chief. He returned to find the leaders determined to die fighting. The nature of the country was in their favor and at least they could give the army a chase, but how long they could hold out they did not know. Even Joseph's younger brother Ollicut was won over. There was nothing for him to do but fight; and then and there began the peaceful Joseph's career as a general of unsurpassed strategy in conducting one of the most masterly retreats in history.

Chief Joseph and Family c. 1880

F. M. Sargent (Public Domain)

This is not my judgment, but the unbiased opinion of men whose knowledge and experience fit them to render it. Bear in mind that these people were not scalp hunters like the Sioux, Cheyenne, and Utes, but peaceful hunters and fishermen. The first council of war was a strange business to Joseph. He had only this to say to his people:

"I have tried to save you from suffering and sorrow. Resistance means all of that. We are few. They are many. You can see all we have at a glance. They have food and ammunition in abundance. We must suffer great hardship and loss." After this speech, he quietly began his plans for the defense.

The main plan of campaign was to engineer a successful retreat into Montana and there form a junction with the hostile Sioux and Cheyenne under Sitting Bull…

It was decided that the main rear guard should meet General Howard's command in White Bird Canyon, and every detail was planned in advance, yet left flexible according to Indian custom, giving each leader freedom to act according to circumstances. Perhaps no better ambush was ever planned than the one Chief Joseph set for the shrewd and experienced General Howard. He expected to be hotly pursued, but he calculated that the pursuing force would consist of not more than two hundred and fifty soldiers. He prepared false trails to mislead them into thinking that he was about to cross or had crossed the Salmon River, which he had no thought of doing at that time. Some of the tents were pitched in plain sight, while the women and children were hidden on the inaccessible ridges, and the men concealed in the canyon ready to fire upon the soldiers with deadly effect with scarcely any danger to themselves. They could even roll rocks upon them.

In a very few minutes the troops had learned a lesson. The soldiers showed some fight, but a large body of frontiersmen who accompanied them were soon in disorder. The warriors chased them nearly ten miles, securing rifles and much ammunition, and killing and wounding many.

The Nez Perces next crossed the river, made a detour, and recrossed it at another point, then took their way eastward. All this was by way of delaying pursuit…

Chief Joseph US Postage Stamp

National Postal Museum (CC BY-NC-ND)

Meanwhile General Howard had sent a dispatch to Colonel Gibbons, with orders to head Joseph off, which he undertook to do at the Montana end of the Lolo Trail. The wily commander had no knowledge of this move, but he was not to be surprised. He was too brainy for his pursuers, whom he constantly outwitted, and only gave battle when he was ready. There at the Big Hole Pass he met Colonel Gibbons' fresh troops and pressed them close.

He sent a party under his brother Ollicut to harass Gibbons' rear and rout the pack mules, thus throwing him on the defensive and causing him to send for help, while Joseph continued his masterly retreat toward the Yellowstone Park, then a wilderness. However, this was but little advantage to him, since he must necessarily leave a broad trail, and the army was augmenting its columns day by day with celebrated scouts, both white and Indian. The two commands came together, and although General Howard says their horses were by this time worn out, and by inference the men as well, they persisted on the trail of a party encumbered by women and children, the old, sick, and wounded.

It was decided to send a detachment of cavalry under Bacon, to Tash Pass, the gateway of the National Park, which Joseph would have to pass, with orders to detain him there until the rest could come up with them. Here is what General Howard says of the affair. "Bacon got into position soon enough, but he did not have the heart to fight the Indians on account of their number." Meanwhile another incident had occurred. Right under the eyes of the chosen scouts and vigilant sentinels, Joseph's warriors fired upon the army camp at night and ran off their mules. He went straight on toward the park, where Lieutenant Bacon let him get by and pass through the narrow gateway without firing a shot…

However, this succession of defeats did not discourage General Howard, who kept on with as many of his men as were able to carry a gun, meanwhile sending dispatches to all the frontier posts with orders to intercept Joseph if possible. Sturgis tried to stop him as the Indians entered the Park, but they did not meet until he was about to come out, when there was another fight, with Joseph again victorious. General Howard came upon the battlefield soon afterward and saw that the Indians were off again, and from here he sent fresh messages to General Miles, asking for reinforcements.

Joseph had now turned northeastward toward the Upper Missouri. He told me that when he got into that part of the country he knew he was very near the Canadian line and could not be far from Sitting Bull, with whom he desired to form an alliance. He also believed that he had cleared all the forts. Therefore, he went more slowly and tried to give his people some rest. Some of their best men had been killed or wounded in battle, and the wounded were a great burden to him; nevertheless, they were carried and tended patiently all during this wonderful flight. Not one was ever left behind.

Statue of Young Chief Joseph

Visitor7 (CC BY-SA)

It is the general belief that Indians are cruel and revengeful, and surely these people had reason to hate the race who had driven them from their homes if any people ever had. Yet it is a fact that when Joseph met visitors and travelers in the park, some of whom were women, he allowed them to pass unharmed, and in at least one instance let them have horses.

He told me that he gave strict orders to his men not to kill any women or children. He wished to meet his adversaries according to their own standards of warfare, but he afterward learned that in spite of professions of humanity, white soldiers have not seldom been known to kill women and children indiscriminately…

The Bittersweet valley, which they had now entered, was full of game, and the Indians hunted for food, while resting their worn-out ponies. One morning they had a council to which Joseph rode over bareback, as they had camped in two divisions a little apart. His fifteen-year-old daughter went with him. They discussed sending runners to Sitting Bull to ascertain his exact whereabouts and whether it would be agreeable to him to join forces with the Nez Perces. In the midst of the council, a force of United States cavalry charged down the hill between the two camps. This once Joseph was surprised. He had seen no trace of the soldiers and had somewhat relaxed his vigilance.

He told his little daughter to stay where she was, and himself cut right through the cavalry and rode up to his own teepee, where his wife met him at the door with his rifle, crying: "Here is your gun, husband!" The warriors quickly gathered and pressed the soldiers so hard that they had to withdraw. Meanwhile one set of the people fled while Joseph's own band entrenched themselves in a very favorable position from which they could not easily be dislodged.

General Miles had received and acted on General Howard's message, and he now sent one of his officers with some Indian scouts into Joseph's camp to negotiate with the chief. Meantime Howard and Sturgis came up with the encampment, and Howard had with him two friendly Nez Perce scouts who were directed to talk to Joseph in his own language. He decided that there was nothing to do but surrender…

Even now, he was not actually conquered. He was well entrenched; his people were willing to die fighting; but the army of the United States offered peace and he agreed, as he said, out of pity for his suffering people. Some of his warriors still refused to surrender and slipped out of the camp at night and through the lines. Joseph had, as he told me, between three and four hundred fighting men in the beginning, which means over one thousand persons, and of these several hundred surrendered with him.

His own story of the conditions he made was prepared by himself with my help in 1897, when he came to Washington to present his grievances. I sat up with him nearly all of one night; and I may add here that we took the document to General Miles who was then stationed in Washington, before presenting it to the Department. The General said that every word of it was true.

In the first place, his people were to be kept at Fort Keogh, Montana, over the winter and then returned to their reservation. Instead, they were taken to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, and placed between a lagoon and the Missouri River, where the sanitary conditions made havoc with them. Those who did not die were then taken to the Indian Territory, where the health situation was even worse.

Joseph appealed to the government again and again, and at last by the help of Bishops Whipple and Hare he was moved to the Colville reservation in Washington. Here the land was very poor, unlike their own fertile valley. General Miles said to the chief that he had recommended and urged that their agreement be kept, but the politicians and the people who occupied the Indians' land declared they were afraid if he returned, he would break out again and murder innocent white settlers! What irony!

The great Chief Joseph died broken-spirited and broken-hearted. He did not hate the whites, for there was nothing small about him, and when he laid down his weapons he would not fight on with his mind. But he was profoundly disappointed in the claims of a Christian civilization. I call him great because he was simple and honest.

Without education or special training, he demonstrated his ability to lead and to fight when justice demanded. He outgeneraled the best and most experienced commanders in the army of the United States, although their troops were well provisioned, well-armed, and above all unencumbered. He was great, finally, because he never boasted of his remarkable feat. I am proud of him because he was a true American.

#History #ChiefJoseph #NezPerce

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mapsontheweb · 7 months ago

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Regions of Current Age Pakistan before Invasion of Alexander

Alexander the Great's military campaigns in the Indus Valley (modern-day Pakistan) involved significant engagements with local territories, kingdoms, and their rulers. In 329 B.C., Alexander conquered Qandhar and encountered Indian tribes for the first time, marking the beginning of his interactions with the complex political landscape of the area. By 327 B.C., he had crossed the Hindukush Mountains, capturing key fortifications such as Astes Fort and massacring 7000 Indians at Massaga of Assakenians. His conquest continued with the siege and capture of Aornos in December of the same year.

During his campaigns, Alexander encountered various powerful entities in the region. The Buddhists, particularly in Sind, were influential, with prominent temples in Multan and Alore. Despite the power of the Buddhist monks, the Brahmins played a significant role in resisting Greek advances, inciting rebellion among local rulers such as Sambus. This resistance led to notable conflicts, including the defeat of Poros in 326 B.C. and the collapse of the Mallians in 325 B.C. The Greek conqueror’s interactions with these local powers highlight the complex and multi-faceted nature of the region's political dynamics.

Alexander's campaign in the southern Punjab in 326 B.C. was marked by the defeat of the Malli and Oxydraki principalities, followed by the liberation of the rivers Hydaspes, Acesines, and Indus. His naval fleet, consisting of 2000 warships, played a crucial role in these operations. The submission of Musicanus, the chief of upper Sind, who paid homage to Alexander to avoid destruction, further exemplifies the mix of military might and diplomatic engagements that characterized Alexander's approach. The appointment of Peithon as the Governor of Sind and the dispatch of Krateros with an army via Bolan Pass were strategic moves to consolidate Greek control over the region.

The period following Alexander's departure saw significant turmoil. In 325 B.C., revolts in Patala and other regions, such as the rebellion of Sambus and Musicanus, were brutally suppressed. Alexander's forces, led by his generals, employed severe measures, including mass executions and enslavement, to quell these uprisings. The death of Philippus, the Satrap of Upper Sindhu Valley, due to internal jealousy among Greeks and Macedonians, underscores the tensions within Alexander’s administration. These events reveal the fragile nature of Greek control and the persistent resistance from local rulers and populations.

Alexander's death in 323 B.C. marked a turning point, as his empire was divided among his generals. Despite the fragmentation of his empire, Sind continued to be governed by Peithon, reflecting the lasting impact of Alexander's conquests on the region. The strategic and administrative decisions made during his campaigns had enduring effects, shaping the political landscape of Sind and its neighboring territories. Alexander's legacy in these regions is a testament to the complex interplay of military conquest, local resistance, and administrative governance that defined his rule.

#maps #pakistan #4th century bc

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city-of-ladies · 3 months ago

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"As in previous wars, women aided both Mexican and foreign troops during the French Intervention. Some women fought alongside their male counterparts, while others looked at French troops as employers and marriage partners. The invasion by France started when Spain, England, and France occupied the customshouse in Vera Cruz in 1861-1862 in order to collect revenue to pay claims against Mexico. The French decided to stay in Mexico and create a new French empire in America. It was not until 1867 that the Mexicans were able to expel them.

Ignacia Reachy distinguished herself in the ranks. Reachy, who was born in Guadalajara about 1816, started a women's battalion to defend the city against the French. Col. Antonio Rojas gave her a pair of riding boots while Colonel Gonzalez presented her with the uniform of a second lieutenant. She left Guadalajara to join the Army of the East. Her friend Gen. Ignacio Zaragoza put her in the Second Division under Gen. Jose Maria Arteaga. She fought well in the Battle of Acultzingo on April 28,1862. Reachy was captured by the French while covering the retreat of General Arteaga. After a year in prison she escaped and presented herself to Arteaga for more combat duty. She became a commander of the Lancers of Jalisco and continued to fight with great valor until killed in action in 1866. Reachy's story shows that there were soldiers and even some officers who welcomed women in the ranks.

Soldaderas were part of the successful Mexican forces that defeated French forces in Puebla on May 5, 1862. Every year the battle is re-created by the Zacapoaxtla Indians to commemorate the event. Yet by a strange twist of fate, only men are allowed to play all the roles, including those of the soldaderas. Each man "carries on his back a doll to represent a baby, and a small basket with food and water." The men dressed as soldaderas and carrying rifles also take part in the fighting. An antecedent for this "men only" ritual battle re-creation goes back to Mexica times when the Cihuacoatl (Snake Woman) or war chief had to dress in women's clothing when entering cities recently conquered. The continuation of this ritual shows that some native groups dominated by patriarchal views still distort woman's role in warfare."

Soldaderas in the Mexican Military: Myth and History, Elizabeth Salas

#ignacia reachy #soldaderas #history #women in history #women's history #historyedit #warrior women #female soldiers #mexico #mexican history #second french intervention in mexico #19th century #latinoamerica #anticolonialism

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therealslimshakespeare · 6 months ago

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Marcella Ryan LeBeau is a member of the Two Kettle Band of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe and lives in Eagle Butte, South Dakota. Her Lakota name is Wigmuke Waste Win (Pretty Rainbow Woman) Her great-grandfather, Chief Joseph Four Bear (Mato Topa), signed the Fort Laramie Treaty in 1868. Her grandmother, Louise Bear Face, was related to Rain In The Face who took part in the Battle of the Little Horn.

Marcella served as a nurse in WWII becoming a 1 st Lieutenant in the Army Nurse Corps. The army service took her from the USA to Wales, England, France, and Belgium. Since receiving the French Legion of Honor Award on June 6, 2004, in Paris France, on the occasion of the 60th Anniversary of D-Day, Marcella has been requested to participate at many Veterans’ events, speaking of her military experience in World War II. Marcella served one term as District 5 council representative for the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe. She is also honored to speak to the youth at elementary, high school, and college venues when she is invited.

In 1992 and 1995 Marcella and her son, Richard went to Glasgow, Scotland with interest in the return of the Ghost Dance Shirt that was taken from Wounded Knee in 1890. After negotiations, the ghost shirt was returned by the Kelvin Grove Museum. George Craeger, with the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show, sold some artifacts to the museum and donated a Ghost Shirt. It’s now held at the Heritage Cultural Center at the South Dakota Historical Society in Pierre, South Dakota.

After retiring as the Director of Nursing from the Indian Health Service in Eagle Butte, Marcella, and her granddaughter, Bonnie opened a machine quilting shop located in Eagle Butte. They make a variety of quilts. The main feature of their shop is the star quilt frequently used by the Lakota people for honoring and naming ceremonies, memorial give-aways, etc. which are traditional of this area’s native people.

Marcella having raised a family of eight children is an advocate for the Lakota language and culture, youth, veterans, elderly, upholding treaties, and wellness.

Credit: text & photos from wisdomoftheelders.org

#Lu Smith #inspo #wwii #army nurse corps #first nations #wwii history #those who can

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newsfromstolenland · 1 year ago

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I don't think white people realize how recently interracial marriage was not allowed, and how long prejudice against it continued (or continues)

canada has never specifically had legal bans on interracial marriage, but the KKK would proselytize against interracial marriage:

Unlike the United States, Canada had no blatant laws banning interracial marriage. But while the stigma was more informal in this country, it could be just as terrifying. As Backhouse describes in her 1999 book, Colour-Coded: A Legal History of Racism in Canada, 1900-1950, much of this terror was at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan. In 1927, Klansmen congregated in Moose Jaw, where they burned a 60-foot cross and lectured a large crowd on the risks of mixed-race marriage.

They would also kidnap people to prevent said marriages:

Three years later, on Feb. 28, 1930, some 75 Ku Klux Klan men dressed in white hoods and gowns marched into Oakville, Ont., and burned another massive wooden cross. They had arrived to intimidate Isabel Jones, a white woman, and her fiancé, Ira Junius Johnson, a man presumed to be black but later found to be of mixed Cherokee and white descent. The woman's mother had summoned the KKK to separate them.

The Klansmen kidnapped Jones, 21, and dumped her off at the Salvation Army, where they would keep surveillance on her for days from a car parked outside. In front of the couple's home, they burned a cross and threatened Johnson. During the invasion, the police chief recognized many of the Klansmen as prominent business owners from Hamilton as they plucked off their hoods to shake his hand.

This continued into the late 30s and the 40s, and often involved law enforcement:

Four months pregnant and eating breakfast with her fiancé in their pyjamas at their Toronto home, 18-year-old Velma Demerson was confronted by her father and two police officers. Demerson's father had sicced the cops on his daughter for what was scandalous behaviour at the time: Demerson, a white, unmarried woman, was living with a Chinese man, Harry Yip, and was carrying his child. Under the Female Refuges Act, Demerson was deemed "incorrigible and unmanageable" and incarcerated for nine months at Toronto's Andrew Mercer Reformatory for Women, where she was locked in a seven-foot-by-four-foot cell.

source for all

This was all within my grandparents' lifetimes. And the harassment and KKK and police involvement continued well into the 60s and 70s.

And there was the extremely confusing system of whether or not Indigenous people lost their "Indian status" based on who they married, which was all based on gender and blood quantums. This was under the Indian act, and you can read about the marriage discrimination in it here.

And it never really ended, not socially.

My parents got together as an interracial couple in the 80s. My mom's aunt (that's the white side of the family) refused to attend their wedding. In the 90s they got pulled over by a cop who asked if my dad was keeping my mom in his car against her will.

Just a few months ago a white woman refused to believe that my mom is my mom, because that would mean my mom fucked a brown person and that couldn't be right! My mom is so pretty, surely she didn't have to settle for a brown immigrant!

I know this post is long but I think that you should read this. I see people crack jokes about interracial marriage a lot, but I doubt many Canadians know its history on this land.

#mine #cdnpoli #canada #history #interracial marriage #racism #marriage

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scotianostra · 3 months ago

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On 26th November 1917 Elsie Inglis, the Scottish doctor, nursing pioneer and suffragette, died.

Every Scot out there should read this with pride, Elsie Inglis and the other Scottish doctors and nurses faced prejudice and the horrors of war, but they did not flinch in what they saw as their duty.

Born in India in 1864, she was the daughter of John Inglis, a chief commissioner in the Indian civil service. She studied medicine at Dr Sophia Jex-Blake’s newly opened Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women and was one of the first women in Scotland to finish higher education, although she was not allowed to graduate. She went on to complete her training under Sir William Macewen at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary.

On the outbreak of WWI Elsie approached the War Office with the idea of either women-doctors co-operating with the Royal Army Medical Corps, or women's medical units being allowed to serve on the Western Front. The authorities were less than helpful and it is reported that an official said to her "My good lady, go home and sit still".

Despite attempts to repress her efforts—and those of many other women—to contribute, Elsie did not “sit still”. Instead, she persevered, setting up the Scottish women’s hospitals, which were all-female units that played a vital role with Britain’s allies, including the French, the Belgians and, particularly, the Serbs.

Elsie was 50 when war broke out and she defied British Government advice by setting up field hospitals close to the frontlines. She travelled to France within three months of the outbreak of war, and the all female staffed, Abbaye de Royaumont hospital, containing some 200 beds, was in place by the end of 1914. That was followed by a second hospital, at Villers Cotterets, in 1917. Tens of thousands were helped by the hospitals she set up in France, Serbia, Ukraine and Romania, acting with the support of the French and Serbian Governments.

Prior to that, Elsie was a strong advocate of women’s rights and a leading member of the suffragette movement in Scotland, playing a notable role in the establishment of the Scottish women’s suffrage federation in 1906. She fought energetically against prejudice and for the social and political emancipation of women, and had already made a huge impact in Edinburgh by working in some of the poorest parts of the city with women and babies who were in desperate need of help. Selflessly, she often waived the fees of patients who could not afford to pay.

Politically, Elsie was a staunch campaigner for votes for women, and her involvement in the suffragette movement prompted her to raise money to send out to female doctors, nurses, orderlies and drivers on the frontline. She recorded many great achievements, including setting up 14 hospitals during the war—staffed by 1,500 Scottish women, all volunteers. Most notably, Elsie raised the equivalent of £53 million in today’s money to fund greatly needed medical care for those on the frontline. Her efforts reached across the waters on another level, attracting volunteers from New Zealand, Australia and Canada. As I am sure everyone would agree, that showed fierce independence and capability from women who were well ahead of their time.

By 1917 Inglis knew she had cancer, and by the end of September was unable to work as a surgeon she sent a telegraph home saying, ‘Everything satisfactory and all well except me.’ Inglis and her unit landed in Newcastle and the following day, 26 November 1917, in the presence of her sisters, Inglis died.

In Edinburgh the response was huge and the streets were lined with people as her body was returned to the city. While there was no Victoria Cross for her at home, in Serbia she was the only woman to receive the Order of the White Eagle and is remembered by the nation every year in a ceremony at the memorial fountain built in her honour.

Before her body was interned in Dean Cemetery, Inglis’s body lay in state in St Giles’ Cathedral. The SWH continued its work for the duration of the war, sending out more units and raising money for the work. Remaining funds were used to establish the Elsie Inglis Memorial Maternity Hospital in Edinburgh in July 1925.

Pics are of Elsie, the "Hospice" on the Royal Mile, not a hospice in today's sense of the word, it was a maternity hospital set up in 1904 run exclusively by women, The Elsie Inglis Maternity hospital at Abbey Hill replaced this in 1925, the third pic is an engraving at Walker Street Edinburgh, where she had a surgery.

There has been talk of erecting a statue of Elsie, in my opinion she certainly deserves, there are too few statues honouring strong women like her, you can find details on the link below.

#scotland #scottish #history #edinburgh #doctor #strong woman #sufferage

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