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56 Counties: The Exile of Dull Knife and Little Wolf

Chiefs Dull Knife and Little Wolf, Perilous Pursuit by Stan Hoig
Chiefs Dull Knife and Little Wolf, Perilous Pursuit by Stan Hoig

Two years after the Battle of the Little Bighorn, the U.S. government decided to force 1,000 members of the Northern Cheyenne tribe, led by Chiefs Dull Knife and Little Wolf, to move to Oklahoma, even though they were not involved in the battle. After a year down south, they had lost nearly 100 members of their tribe to disease and starvation.

After their request to return to the land they had been promised in a treaty just three years earlier, Little Wolf and Dull Knife decided to go north anyway, leading their people over 800 miles in a remarkable journey, eluding thousands of U.S. Army soldiers—and it could have easily been avoided.

This month's episode features the music of Little Jane and the Pistol Whips.

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