MEDALS OF HONOR
20 soldiers got the Medal of Honor for a massacre in 1890. Hegseth says they deserve it.
USA TODAY
In 1890, the U.S. Army herded hundreds of Lakota Sioux Americans into a clearing near Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota, ordered them to hand over their weapons, and then opened fire, killing as many as 300 people, around half of them women and children.
The 20 soldiers who were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor – the highest military honor – for their role in the massacre will keep that award, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Sept. 25.
“We salute their memory, we honor their service, and we will never forget what they did,” Hegseth said in a video statement posted to X.
The Defense Department announced a review of those 20 medals in July of 2024, the results of which were never publicly released. The 5-expert panel was tasked with putting together a recommendation for the president.
But Hegseth said the review had already reached a conclusion last October that “these brave soldiers” should keep their medals, and that Lloyd Austin, the then-defense secretary, “chose not to make a final decision.”
“Under my direction,” Hegseth said, those soldiers “will keep their medals, and we’re making it clear that they deserve those medals.”
The Pentagon said it did not have anything to add to Hegseth’s comments.
‘Brutal, cold-blooded massacre’
In the late 19th century, indigenous Americans put up a final push against being forced into reservations. Already, the population faced immiseration and the ravages of diseases like influenza and whooping cough.
In the last days of 1890, the Army intercepted Miniconjou Lakota Chief Big Foot, who sent word he and the 350 people with him would hand over their weapons. After nearly 500 U.S. soldiers surrounded the group, they began an aggressive hunt for weapons. Most were handed over, but one “young man of very bad influence,” as he was described by a Sioux witness, discharged his weapon.
The Army opened fire, killing between 250 and 300 people, according to historian estimates. Some two dozen U.S. soldiers were killed – most by friendly fire, historians later found.
Half-frozen bodies left outside were pushed into a mass grave at the site after several days passed. A memorial now stands at the site.
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee – Book Review
Dee Brown’s Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is a searing, meticulously researched account of the systematic displacement and destruction of Native American tribes in the late 19th century. Published in 1970, the book shattered romanticized myths of the American West and gave voice to the silenced stories of Indigenous resistance, resilience, and tragedy.
Brown’s narrative unfolds chronologically, beginning with the Navajo Long Walk and culminating in the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890. Each chapter centers on a different tribe—Cheyenne, Sioux, Apache, Nez Perce—highlighting their leaders, treaties, betrayals, and battles. The book’s power lies in its use of primary sources, including speeches, letters, and eyewitness accounts, which lend authenticity and emotional depth to the historical record.
Rather than portraying Native Americans as passive victims, Brown emphasizes their agency, courage, and heartbreak. Figures like Sitting Bull, Geronimo, and Chief Joseph emerge not as relics of folklore but as flesh-and-blood leaders navigating impossible choices.
Stylistically, Brown writes with clarity and restraint, allowing the facts to speak for themselves. His tone is mournful but never melodramatic, and the cumulative effect is devastating. The title itself—Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee—evokes both grief and reverence, a poetic lament for a culture nearly extinguished.
This book remains a landmark in historical literature, not just for its content but for its impact. It helped reshape public understanding of American history and inspired generations to confront uncomfortable truths about colonization, racism, and national identity.
Mingo 31 is the name of a small beer bar I owned from 1978 to 1983.
Patrons included Judges, lawyers, trades people, ex-cons, criminals, and women. Judges passed out in booths, parolees checked their guns, I placed them under the counter for retrieval at closing time, thieves coming in to sell goods recently stolen for huge discounted prices. Safeway always supplied some of them with every cut of meat available, beef steaks, pork, chicken, fish.
They had a lucrative enterprise until the police began coming in to ask questions. Then, they disappeared.
Seemed everyone was snorting lines. Cocaine was the hot item, sold in one gram dark glass bottles for $100.00.
A young man, Indian, came in on a regular basis and we got acquainted and had several interesting conversations about the white and Indians. He began bringing a book with him and read a chapter or two while sipping beer from a 12 ounce mug. BURY MY HEART AT WOUNDED KNEE by Dee Brown. I read a chapter.
Next day I was at Barnes & Noble to buy a copy.
As children growing up in SW Missouri, close to the Oklahoma border, we were bussed to an Indian school in Wyandotte, Oklahoma, for what purpose escaped me at the timePerhaps, we were witness to the generosity of our government, educating savages. We may have been in grade five or six.
Upon reflection, after reading several historical works, I realized we were groomed to think kindly towards the government’s genocide of indigenous people. Further, the keepers of the key were distancing the American Indian from his land, customs, history. Washing his brain, if you will.
After reading Dee Brown’s book I was sick. Published in 1970. My purchase was 1978. After 47 years, I am still saddled and saddened with thought of the inhumane treatment that befell the American Indian at the hands of our government and its assassin, the U.S. Army.