Editing Colorado Territory (section)

===Colorado War between the U.S. and the Indians of Cheyenne and Arapaho===
{{Main|Colorado War}}
In 1851, by the [[Treaty of Fort Laramie (1851)|Treaty of Fort Laramie]], the United States acknowledged the [[Cheyenne]] and [[Arapaho]] tribes control, in the Colorado area, of the Eastern Plains between [[North Platte River]] and [[Arkansas River]] eastward from the [[Rocky Mountains]]. The Fort Laramie Treaty, in Article 2 of the treaty, did allow the U.S., government to build roads, military and other posts on Indian lands. If these roads could be used by U.S. citizens to lawfully pass through the Indian territories was not stated but apparently implied since the U.S. government bound itself to protect Indian nations against depredations by U.S. citizens. The treaty did not grant any rights for the erection of posts or settlements by U.S. civilians. Since this treaty was enacted before the railroads had come and before the finding of gold in the region, few whites had ventured to settle in what is now Colorado. By the 1860s, as a result of the [[Colorado Gold Rush]] and [[Homestead Act|homesteaders]] encroaching westward into Indian terrain, relations between U.S. and the [[Native Americans in the United States|Native American]] people deteriorated. On February 18, 1861, in the [[Treaty of Fort Wise]], several chiefs of Cheyenne and Arapaho supposedly agreed with U.S. representatives to cede most of the lands, ten years earlier designated to their tribes, for white settlement, keeping only a fragment of the original [[Indian reserve|reserve]], located between Arkansas River and [[Big Sandy Creek (Colorado)|Sand Creek]]. This new fragment was assigned in severalty to the individual members of the respective tribes with each member receiving {{convert|40|acre|m2}} of land. The United States, by the Fort Wise Treaty, wished to have the Indians settle the new reservation as farmers. The U.S. agreed to pay the tribes a combined total of $30,000 per year for 15 years and in addition to provide a lumber mill, one or more mechanic shops, dwelling houses for an interpreter, and a miller engineer. See Article 5 of the Fort Wise Treaty.

A good part of their co-nationals repudiated the treaty, declared the chiefs not empowered to sign, or bribed to sign, ignored the agreement, and became even more belligerent over the 'whites' encroaching on their hunting grounds. Tensions mounted when Colorado territorial governor [[John Evans (Colorado governor)|John Evans]] in 1862 created a home guard of regiments of Colorado Volunteers returning from the [[American Civil War|Civil War]] and took a hard line against Indians accused of theft. On August 21, 1864, a band of 30 Indians attacked four members of the Colorado Cavalry as they were rounding up stray cattle. Three of the members made it back to the stockade at Franktown, Colorado, but the fourth man failed to return. This man, Conrad Moschel, was found a few days later having been shot with a firearm and pierced with an arrow, and had been scalped in the manner of the Cheyenne. This offensive action by the warring Cheyenne further enraged the U.S. people of Colorado. After several minor incidents in what would later come to be designated as the [[Colorado War]], in November 1864, a force of 800 troops of the Colorado home guard, after heavy drinking, attacked an encampment of Cheyenne and Arapaho at [[Big Sandy Creek (Colorado)|Sand Creek]], murdering between 150 and 200 Indians, mostly elderly men, women and children. This [[Sand Creek Massacre]] or 'Massacre of Cheyenne Indians' led to official hearings<ref>{{cite book|url=http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=moa;idno=ABY3709.0003.001;rgn=full%20text;view=toc;cc=moa|publisher=University of Michigan Digital Library Production Service|title=United States Congress Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, 1865 (testimonies and report)|date=11 May 1865 }}</ref> by the [[United States Congress Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War]] in March and April 1865. After the hearings, the Congress Joint Committee in their report on May 4, 1865, described the actions of Colonel [[John Chivington]] and his Volunteers as "foul, dastardly, brutal, cowardly" and:
{{cquote|It is difficult to believe that beings in the form of men, and disgracing the uniform of United States soldiers and officers, could commit or countenance the commission of such acts of cruelty and barbarity as are detailed in the testimony, but which your committee will not specify in their report.}}
Nevertheless, justice was never served on those responsible for the massacre; and nonetheless, the continuation of this Colorado War led to expulsion of the last Arapaho, Cheyenne, [[Kiowa]] and [[Comanche]] from the Colorado Territory into [[Oklahoma]].