Native American Girl

“ The Indian (was thought) as less than human and worthy only of extermination. We did shoot down defenseless men, and women and children at places like Camp Grant, Sand Creek, and Wounded Knee. We did feed strychnine to red warriors. We did set whole villages of people out naked to freeze in the iron cold of Montana winters. And we did confine thousands in what amounted to concentration camps. ”
—Paul Wellman, The Indian Wars of the West, 1934
• Civil War
Many Native Americans served in the military during the Civil War., the vast majority of whom siding with the Union. By fighting with the whites, Native Americans hoped to gain favor with the prevailing government by supporting the war effort. They also believed war service might mean an end to discrimination and relocation from ancestral lands to western territories. While the war raged and African Americans were proclaimed free, the U.S. government continued its policies of assimilation, submission, removal, or extermination of Native Americans.