A long journey

Little Chief, Little Plume and Horse arrived together at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in 1881, about two years after it was founded by Lt. Richard Henry Pratt, a Civil War veteran known for his strict, regimented management style.

While he was serving, Lt. Pratt guarded a group of Native American prisoners of war in St. Augustine, Fla., and sought to prove that they could assimilate to EuropeanAmerican culture. Feeling he had been successful, he later convinced the Bureau of Indian Affairs to allow him to open the Carlisle Indian School.

His theory was a simple one: Remove the children from their Native American cultures and provide them with vocational training, and they would assimilate into European-American life.

“Kill the Indian, save the man,” he once said.

At the time, it was a progressive idea. Today, it’s recognized as one of many sources of historical trauma.

The school educated more than 10,000 Native American children from about 50 tribes across the country before it closed in 1918.

Around the time Little Chief, Little Plume and Horse left home, their chiefs held a council, according to a letter written by an agent who helped coordinate their enrollment at the school. The letter quoted Little Chief’s father, Chief Sharp Nose, as saying, “We give our children to the Government to do as they think best in teaching them the right way.” Archivists at Dickinson College, which holds many records from the school, suggest the letter should be treated with a degree of caution since it wasn’t written directly by the chief himself, but rather by an agent.

Details of the boys’ trip are scarce. They arrived in a group of 15 children — 13 boys and two girls, most Northern Arapaho but some Shoshone. Their trip took 11 or 12 days. Frank Vitale IV, with the Dickinson College archives, suspects the children likely traveled by rail based on the transportation available at the time, but they also could have spent some time on a boat.

Little Chief was 14 and stood 4 feet, 10½ inches tall. Horse was 11 and slightly taller. Little Plume, the youngest of the three whose remains are being excavated, was 9.

They arrived on March 11, 1881. Archivists have found a single photo of them — probably taken after their arrival at the school. They wore traditional clothing, likely one of the last times they would do so before school officials would replace theirattire with a military-style uniform. Their long hair, which in many Native American cultures is cut only during times of grief, likely was chopped into a strict, short, military style of the era.

The three likely were separated shortly after their arrival, part of a theory that it would be easier to keep them from speaking their traditional language or reverting to their culture if they were separated.

“It’s as isolating as it gets,” said Jim Gerencser, an archivist at Dickinson.

Generally speaking, students who attended the school during that era were required to convert to Christianity. They might have participated in a group baptism at a church in Carlisle. They were required to speak English and to choose an English name on arrival.

Little Chief became Dickens Nor. Little Plume became Hayes Vanderbilt Friday. Horse became Horace Washington.

They likely were separated into units, with other students serving as their leaders. Punishments for breaking the rules were strict and sometimes included beatings.

Mark Soldier Wolf, another elder in the Northern Arapaho tribe, said he heard a story of a teacher who beat a student who couldn’t pronounce the word “grapes” because his dialect didn’t have the letter “r” in it.

“We endured it,” he was told of the beatings.

Heading home

Infectious disease spread frequently around the school because the children, who came from many different areas, suddenly encountered