Overview

The 1862 Dakota conflict, which encompassed perhaps the greatest massacre of whites by Indians in American history, is filled with emotional drama, irony, tragedy, cowardice, and heroism. The drama engulfed thousands of people and the dimension of individual experiences can be overwhelming. Previous attempts to sort out the stories and place the events in a coherent chronological and geographical order have been unsuccessful. Award-winning author Gregory F. Michno’s Dakota Dawn: The Decisive First Week of the Sioux Uprising, August 1862 provides the uprising with an essential clarity and life that readers will find refreshing and invigorating. Dakota Dawn focuses in great detail on one week in August 1862, a great paroxysm of destruction when the Dakota succeeded, albeit fleetingly, in driving out the white man. Some 600 white settlers were killed in the Sioux Uprising, the great majority of the innocent victims slaughtered in the most shocking manner. Nowhere else in the West was there a record of such sustained attacks on a fort (Ridgely) or a town (New Ulm). In addition to important secondary studies, Michno’s work is based upon 2,000 pages of primary sources including recollections, original records, diaries, newspaper accounts, and other archival records. One seldom-used resource is the Indian Depredation Claim files. After the Uprising, settlers filed nearly 3,000 claims for damages in which they itemised losses and set forth their experiences. These priceless documents paint firsthand slices of the life of a frontier people, their cabins, tools, clothes, crops, animals, and cherished possessions. Many of these claims have never been incorporated into a book, allowing Michno to more fully expound on various episodes and correct previous misconceptions.

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9781932714999

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Reviews

...breath-taking detail... provides a fascinating insight into frontier life at the time. --Robert M. Utley, Award-winning author and former Chief Historian for the National Park Service Miniature Wargames ...provides a detailed account of the massacre. The events are organized by location rather than chronologically. This approach allows for continuity within the discussion of the members of a community that either escaped or were killed. To help the reader follow along with the violence in each community, Michno includes several maps at the beginning of the book. These maps are indispensable in understanding the events in the context of the area... a good description of the 1862 uprising. The reader gets a better understanding of Indian/white relations and why the Indians were forced to defend their lifestyle. --Robert M. Utley, Award-winning author and former Chief Historian for the National Park Service Collected Miscellany Greg Michno has immersed himself in the sources documenting the Minnesota Sioux uprising of 1862. This is new terrain for him, but he brings his usual skills in research and narrative presentation to present an outstanding history of this significant event. --Robert M. Utley, Award-winning author and former Chief Historian for the National Park Service Armchair General This superb new book by today's best Indian Wars historian examines the bloody first week of the conflict that killed more whites and Native Americans than any other in the Western Indian Wars. --Jerry Morelock, Editor Armchair General In Dakota Dawn, Gregory F. Michno expertly chronicles one of the bloodiest weeks in American history--the appalling opening days of Minnesota's 1862 Dakota Indian Outbreak. His is a powerful interpretation of immediate horrific tragedy laced with implications for future Indian-white relations throughout the West. Michno's history is always thorough, riveting, and enlightening. --Jerome A. Greene, author of Beyond Bear's Paw: The Nez Perce Indians in Canada, and Indian War Veterans: Memories of Army Life and Campaigns in the West, 1864-1898

In Dakota Dawn, Gregory F. Michno expertly chronicles one of the bloodiest weeks in American history--the appalling opening days of Minnesota's 1862 Dakota Indian Outbreak. His is a powerful interpretation of immediate horrific tragedy laced with implications for future Indian-white relations throughout the West. Michno's history is always thorough, riveting, and enlightening. --Jerome A. Greene, author of Beyond Bear's Paw: The Nez Perce Indians in Canada, and Indian War Veterans: Memories of Army Life and Campaigns in the West, 1864-1898 This superb new book by today's best Indian Wars historian examines the bloody first week of the conflict that killed more whites and Native Americans than any other in the Western Indian Wars. --Jerry Morelock, Editor Armchair General Greg Michno has immersed himself in the sources documenting the Minnesota Sioux uprising of 1862. This is new terrain for him, but he brings his usual skills in research and narrative presentation to present an outstanding history of this significant event. --Robert M. Utley, Award-winning author and former Chief Historian for the National Park Service ...breath-taking detail... provides a fascinating insight into frontier life at the time. --Miniature Wargames ...provides a detailed account of the massacre. The events are organized by location rather than chronologically. This approach allows for continuity within the discussion of the members of a community that either escaped or were killed. To help the reader follow along with the violence in each community, Michno includes several maps at the beginning of the book. These maps are indispensable in understanding the events in the context of the area... a good description of the 1862 uprising. The reader gets a better understanding of Indian/white relations and why the Indians were forced to defend their lifestyle. --Collected Miscellany

Author Information

Award-winning author Gregory F. Michno is a Michigan native and the author of three dozen articles and ten books dealing with World War II and the American West, including Lakota Noon; Battle at Sand Creek; The Encyclopedia of Indian Wars; The Deadliest Indian War in the West; and Circle the Wagons. Greg helped edit and appeared in the DVD history The Great Indian Wars: 1540-1890. He lives in Longmont, Colorado, with his wife Susan.

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