Seminar: Lakota Ghost Dance Shirt (1892)
Published: 12 October 2018
October 2018
Location: Kelvingrove Museum
For centuries the identities of Native American peoples throughout North America were tarnished with stereotypical views of savagery and brutality. These depictions dominated the public imagination, particularly throughout the 19th century, which has now come to be recognized as the ‘Transitional Period’. This era saw the U.S government pursue an official policy of ‘detribalization’ and land-hungry white settlers sought access to Nation domains. As a result, in 1851 the US Congress passed the Indian Appropriations Act. This Act authorized the creation of reservations which were intended to ‘save’ Indigenous communities from assimilation, however such segregated land caused tensions to increase drastically throughout the late 19th century. As reservation borders were being devised, a gold rush happened in the Dakota Territory which greatly impacted the sacred lands of the Sioux and Cheyenne tribes of the area. In an 1892 convention headmaster of the Carlisle Indian Institute, Colonel Richard Henry Pratt, stated residential schools were working to “Kill the Indian, Save the Man”. This excerpt sheds light onto the language used surrounding Indigenous nations. Spirituality is the nucleus of Indigenous identity, whilst Nations throughout North America are distinctly different in their beliefs and practices, each community is linked through a holistic worldview which is shared throughout Indigenous Nations.
The Sioux Ghost Dance was a spiritual movement which evolved from the devastation experienced by Indigenous communities, the dance was practiced throughout the Plains Indians tribes of the West. Practicing the Ghost Dance was believed to protect what was left of Lakota identity as so many traditional practices had been banned by the U.S government and seen as a dangerous threat to the ideals of white civilization. The Sioux peoples who practiced the Ghost Dance made sacred shirts which they believed would save them from the weaponry of the white man. The Ghost Dance however is often linked to Lakota/Sioux resistance and the white American’s fear of a Native American or ‘Indian’ uprising. In December 1890, after decades of rising tensions and hostility, the U.S Cavalry massacred a large party of Lakota people including Ghost Dancers, at Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota. An estimate of 150 Lakota lives were lost during this massacre, many of which were thought to have been women and children.
Across the Atlantic ocean in Great Britain at this time, the iconic Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show was touring and came to Glasgow in 1892. George Crager travelled with the show as a Lakota interpreter and he wrote a letter dated 1892 offering his ‘Collection of Indian Relics’ to Glasgow Museums. The Glasgow Museums purchased a Lakota Ghost Dance Shirt from Crager in the year 1892 which was believed to have been taken from the body of a Ghost Dance warrior at Wounded Knee Creek. The shirt is said to have the remnants of the warriors blood and holes which do not suggest natural decay, but rather the destruction of bullet holes. A century later, descendants of the Lakota nation who had been massacred requested Kelvingrove Museum to return the Ghost Dance shirt to the Lakota Nation in South Dakota. In 1999 the shirt was returned to the Lakota and Marcella le Beau who is a descendent of Rain in the Face, a noted Lakota warrior, was involved in the negotiations. Beau then made a replica of the original Ghost Dance shirt and gifted it to Kelvingrove Museum when the original, which holds significant spiritual value, was returned to her people. The original shirt displayed bald eagle feathers around the neckline, however the replica Ghost Dance shirt has ring-necked pheasant feathers as the bald eagle is now a protected species.
Consider the following questions:
- Was it the right decision to return the original Ghost Dance shirt to the Lakota Nation in 1999? Why?
- How does the presence of a replica of a historical objetc, which is currently on display at the Kelvingrove Museum, affect our learning and understanding of history?
- Where are morals and ethics situated in the debate surrounding historical collections and the framework of museums?
First published: 12 October 2018