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If I was a Pawnee, I'd Sioux, I mean sue!

posted 7 years ago by MAGolding (1096)
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How do movies depict the Pawnees and their history?

In the 1963 movie The Raiders a group of Texans are broke in 1867 and want to drive their cattle north to sell at a railroad town. Movies give the impression that Texas was all cattle ranches and there weren't any other industries except ranching.

So they drive their cattle north and then they are raided by "Jayhawkers", the name for pro Union guerrillas from Kansas during the Civil War. Guerrillas still fighting the war 2 years after it is over.

So they head to the west and try to cross through "The Nations", the lands of the Five Civilized Tribes in the eastern part of the Indian Territory, modern Oklahoma. So this means that the "Jayhawkers", pro Union guerrillas somehow still operating 2 years after the war, are raiding east of Oklahoma in Arkansas or Louisiana, two former Rebel states where nobody would give them any support.

But the Indians demand too high a price for letting the Texans drive their herd through Indian land.

So the Texans head west of "the Nations" to the western part of the Indian Territory, which is modern Oklahoma, despite it being Pawnee territory. And the Pawnees raid their cattle drive like wild and hostile Indians.

In 1867 the Pawnees lived in a reservation in Nebraska, which they sold and moved to a new reservation in Indian Territory in 1874. Of course the Pawnees could have raided into the western part of Indian Territory in 1867, but so could any other tribe of plains Indians like the Comanches, Kiowa, Kiowa Apache, Southern Cheyenne, Arapaho, etc. It made no sense to call western Indian Territory Pawnee territory in 1867, or assume that the Pawnees would be more likely to attack there than any other tribe.

Similarly the movie Little Big Man (1970) changes the novel and has Jack Crab's wagon train attacked by Pawnees instead of by the same band of Cheyenne that adopted him. It was very rare for plains Indian tribes to attack wagon trains that early anyway.

In Dances With Wolves (1990) the Pawnee are portrayed as powerful and sinister Indians who terrorize the weaker Sioux, a reversal of the historic relationship where the more powerful Sioux victimized the Pawnee.

In Pawnee (1957) the hero has been raised by Pawnees since he was a boy. Settlers are passing through Pawnee territory in wagon trains and the Pawnees go in the warpath and fight a spectacular battle, unrecorded by history, with the cavalry. The wagon train era began in the 1840s and if the setters are headed far west to Oregon or California the fictional date should be in or before 1869 when the transcontinental railroad was completed.

But in reality the Pawnees do not seem to fought the Americans very often. In 1865 the Pawnee Battalion of scouts and allies was formed that fought hostiles Indian tribes alongside the US army on and off until 1877. In the 1850s it wasn't very likely that Pawnees would have attacked Jack Crab's wagon train, in 1863 the Pawnees would mostly attack the Sioux in revenge for Sioux raids on them, and in 1867, the fictional date of The Raiders (1963), the probability of being attacked by Pawnee raiders would be very low and nobody would expect to be attacked by Pawnees.

So considering the lies the movies tell about the Pawnees, I have to say that if I was a Pawnee I'd Sioux! I mean sue.

[–] MAGolding (1096) 7 years ago

I just saw The Command (1954) about 10-13-2017. Company D of the Seventh Cavalry is returning to fictional Fort Stark somewhere on the plains, and at the fictional town of Cashman's encounters infantry under Colonel Janeway, who orders them to accompany his soldiers and the civilian wagon train he is escorting through dangerous Indian lands to the fictional Paradise River, where the troops will join General Cook's command and the civilians will on to their destination I guess.

Eventually a vast horde of hostiles follows The Command, launching attacks at will. The hostiles are greatly encouraged by news of the recent Battle of little Bighorn, putting The Command in July or August 1876, I guess, and it looks like the protagonists will reach Paradise instead of Paradise River.

The hostiles include Arapaho and Cheyenne, long time allies by 1876 and also allied to such often hostile tribes as the Sioux, the Comanche, Kiowa, and Kiowa-Apache. All these tribes were often hostile to the US. The hostiles also included Fox and Sac, two tribes that merged to form the Sac and Fox Nation long before 1876, and either the Omaha or the Otoe, I couldn't hear exactly. It doesn't make much sense for Fox, Sac, and Omaha or Otoe to go on the warpath in 1876, unless the Little Bighorn has convinced them the Sioux will win and drive Americans off the Plains.

And the 6th hostile group mentioned is the Pawnee. When Janeway hears that he says that Pawnees can't be that far west, not that Pawnees are valuable allies of the USA.

So The Command is another movie Pawnees would Sioux if they could.