"Guided by myths of golden cities and worldly rewards, policy makers, conquistador leaders, and expeditionary aspirants alike came to the new world in the sixteenth century and left it a changed land. Came Men on Horses follows two conquistadors--Francisco Vázquez de Coronado and Don Juan de Oñate--on their journey across the southwest. Driven by their search for gold and silver, both Coronado and Oñate committed atrocious acts of violence against...

John Simpson Smith (1810-1871) counted among his acquaintances Indianchiefs and United States presidents. He was a fur trapper, a trader for Charles Bent, and a recognized spokesman for the Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians, with whom he lived much of his life. He served as interpreter for major treaty negotiations and accompanied three delegations of chiefs to Washington, D.C. to visit Presidents Fillmore, Lincoln, and Grant. He was in Black Kettle's...

"Few people who cross the Great Plains today recollect that for centuries the land was a battleground where Indian nations fought one another for their own survival and then stood bravely against the irrepressible forces of white civilization. Even among those aware of the history, Plains Indian conflicts have been seen largely in terms of American conquest. In this readable narrative history, well-known Indian historian Stan Hoig tells how the native...

"Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer was victorious in only one engagement against the American Indians€: the Battle of the Washita. Eight years before the Little Bighorn, Custer marched his men through heavy snows to attack a village of Cheyenne Indians under Chief Black Kettle, the most peaceful of the Cheyenne leaders. The Indians did not consider themselves to be at war and were taken by surprise by the dawn attack. Over one hundred men,...