In the corner of Kansas on the way to Haigler Nebraska you will find a roadside monument at a place called Cherry Creek.
I was out on an adventure with my sister in law that day, we were just going to places we haven't been. I didn't expect to find another remnant of the massacre that the Cheyenne and Arapaho faced at Sand Creek in Colorado. Today is the 150th anniversary of that tragic day so I thought I would share these images.
This is where the Cheyenne and Arapaho fled to after the Sand Creek Massacre.
It's hard to imagine that people "knew" exactly what places they were going to in these massive plains. But, they did. Now all that is left is a stereotypical monument to the generic Indian of the Plains.
I have been to the site of the Washita Massacre. I have not been to Sand Creek. I don't like visiting massacre sites.
Here is some more information on the Cherry Creek camp from the Kansas Travel website. The images above were taken in June.
The names of those who found there way there after the atrocity are posted.
From the Smithsonian.com - you can read "The Horrific Sand Creek Massacre Will Be Forgotten No More" I noticed people posting these links on my Facebook feed this morning.
Here is a Wall Street Journal Piece on the Massacre: My Great-Great- Grandfather and An American Indian Tragedy
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If you stop at these little known sites, Kansas leaves it's guest logs in mailboxes. Which I wasn't aware of this until we found this site.
We had found the Kidder Massacre site and were looking for the Arikaree breaks that day.
Yet, how can you understand the place or area that a people lived on if you've never experienced it? If you've never felt it's vastness?
Yet, the names live on. The people are gone, but the names of those people who at one time lived on the land continue through place names.
Yet look at the emptiness that you still find on the plains in 2014.
Eastern Colorado looks much like Western Kansas, the High Plains leading up to the mountains.
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