Gold is Found: Bears Belly

The expedition then moved on and eventually found evidence of the gold they were secretly sent to find. Red Angry Bear, one of the Arikara scouts, found gold deposits floating in a spring where he sought to refill his water canteen. He placed his hands in the water, collected the gold flakes, and used them to decorate his bridle. Looking closely in the water, he could see more extensive gold deposits inside the spring and left to tell the other Arikara scouts to come to get some gold to decorate their bridles, too. The Arikara had an obviously different relationship with gold than the white soldiers, using it for decoration but little else, trading gold-infused crafts but not placing much value on the mineral itself.

Bears Belly and others went to the spring Red Angry Bear told them about and found the gold as easily as he did, reaching into the fresh water to gather the gold and even scratching at the larger deposits of gold within to loosen more material for decoration.

As they worked the gold deposits in the spring, flecks of gold attached to the scouts’ arms, glittering about their bodies in an unaware fashion. The Arikara didn't think it essential to tell Custer or the other soldiers about their discovery because it wasn’t crucial to their goal. Their expedition was supposed to wander the Black Hills and defeat the Sioux. The Indian scouts weren’t informed of the main reason for the expedition that Custer led. Had they been told, the scouts would have done their job.

When the scouts returned to camp with freshly decorated bridles and arms and legs glowing with the shiny yellow flecks of gold splattered haphazardly about them, the other soldiers noticed and began to ask questions, first through hand signals and then through an interpreter.

The news made its way to Custer, who walked over to the scouts to investigate himself. Looking at their harnesses, Custer asked the Arikara where they got the gold for their horses that also shined brightly on themselves. Bears Belly and the other Arikara scouts happily led him to the spring where they found the gold deposits, not knowing the excitement that would soon follow. As the soldiers hurried up to the spring, they grabbed bits of gold they saw freely resting in the water. Custer accompanied them and dismounted, telling his men to step aside. He saw what he was sure was gold and knew there had to be more under the ground surrounding the spring. Custer ordered his soldiers to block off the area surrounding the spring and to do some preliminary digging.

Uninterested in the extra work the soldiers were doing and not commanded to do anything else by Custer, the Arikara went to their camp to rest, satisfied with their haul of gold decorating their horses’ bridles. Time passed, and Bears Belly and the other Arikara were later pleased to see Custer himself stride into their camp carrying a small cloth full of gold, which he lay down and opened in front of them. He smiled and said to the Arikara, “You scouts have found this which is money and you shall have your share. You shall have it like this,” (Libby 169) as he held a handful of small pebbles of gold, allowing bits to fall out between his fingers into the fine mound of gold below.

Bears Belly and Strikes Two say Custer threw gold in handfuls before each scout, giving them a taste of the share they would obtain as a finders fee. Custer could have kept everything for himself and his men, but he made a point to share some of the gold with those who found it, even though they were Indians. Other white soldiers and leaders most likely would have kept the gold for themselves, looking down upon the Indians that accompanied them as simple tools to be used for their greater endeavors.

Custer, though, was a complex man who both devalued and valued the Native peoples of the land, making friends among some of them and treating them with respect and honor while mainly using them as a stepping stone to get the power and acclaim he so desired through their defeat.

The Cavalry soldiers didn’t fully mine the area, lacking the time and resources to make a concerted effort to obtain all the gold possible. Still, Custer found what he came in search of and wanted to return immediately to write and send his reports to his superiors and the larger public. Custer had his men lay out marking stones to find the area again in the future, happily dreaming about the coming riches.

After hearing many reports of gold filling the land of the Lakota Sioux, Custer finally found proof of gold in the Black Hills. He quickly sent a messenger to telegram a note to General Alfred Terry of his find: “Gold has been found at several places, and it is the belief of those who are giving their attention to this subject that it will be found in paying quantities. I have on my table forty or fifty small particles of pure gold in size averaging that of a small pin head, and most of it obtained today from one panful of earth,” (Robinson 413). The army's goal was confirmed, and the second phase was soon to begin. They found where the gold was, and now they had to remove the Indian threat despite existing treaties protecting the area as Indian land.

Custer returned to Fort Abraham Lincoln on August 22nd and promptly submitted his expedition reports. After being read and disseminated among the U.S. military leadership, Custer's reports were released to the public in newspapers across America. They told of the wonderful and exciting discovery of such unused and pristine land among the Indians. His words would enrapture a populace interested in the Wild West and facing severe economic downturns.

With the advent of this news about the beautiful land that held untold riches, many gold miners and those seeking fortunes began to make their way westward, eventually forming gold boom towns such as Deadwood, where they mined for gold illegally on Indian territory with the tacit support of the United States government.

The location wasn't safe because the Lakota Sioux wanted to maintain the land given to them by treaty and violently responded when confronted with miners and other interlopers. So, the United States government sought to quell the furor by corralling the Sioux and placing them in newly defined territories, or reservations, away from the whites profiting off the gold in the land. Two years after this expedition, Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer was sent on his final expedition to do just that with his Arikara scouts.

This article is part of a larger series on Bears Belly. Find the other entries here.