Dog-Soldiers in Camp
The dog-soldiers were the police force, or regular army, of the chief of the band or tribe. Each body of dog-soldiers had its chief, and he acted often upon his…
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From Memoirs of a White Crow Indian by Thomas H. Leforge, 1928.
It was against the law for any one willfully to chase game directly toward a moving band of people; a worse offense if the people were encamped. If such act were done, the presumption was that it had been willful, not accidental. A heavy burden of proof was put upon the defendant if he should claim innocent intent. Even if this result unintentionally ensued from any particular person’s activity, this one had a penalty inflicted upon him.
I joined one time in mischievously chasing some buffalo into a camp. The animals tore up several tepees in their wild and indiscriminate efforts to get away into the open country. We sportive young men—two Indians and myself—dodged away and came into the camp from another direction; but we were found out.
The dog-soldiers conducted us out and informed us we were to remain a certain distance outside of the camp’s boundaries for the period of one moon—one month. It was a distressing penalty; but we stayed out. We should have received much worse treatment had we violated the order. We often hungered for food as well as for society. A few times our sweethearts slipped out at night and placed food where we could find it, but they too were watched and were subject to penalty if discovered, so this could not be depended upon as a regular comfort to us. In addition to our ostracism, our people had to pay fines by gifts to other people, particularly to the families whose lodges had been damaged. My adopted father had to give away many ponies as a consequence of my indiscretion. I never again entered upon any such adventure.
The dog-soldiers were the police force, or regular army, of the chief of the band or tribe. Each body of dog-soldiers had its chief, and he acted often upon his own initiative. Even the individual dog-soldiers occasionally took measures of law enforcement without waiting for orders. But they all were under the general direction of the tribal or subordinate chief.
These policemen enforced all camp rules or rules of the march. They restrained anxious ones who might rush prematurely forward when a body of hunters was stalking game. They held back, likewise, whatever warriors in time of battle might put the general plan out of adjustment by hasty or inconsiderate action in an effort to gain personal glory or advantage. In every way the dog-soldiers were the immediate directors of conduct.
Such dog-soldier bands were a feature of every tribal organization among the old plains Indians. The Sioux, the Cheyennes, the Arapahoes, the Piegans, the Shoshones, all of the tribes that I knew, had them. Historians have written of these tribal policemen, used for internal government, as though they were fraternal organizations or warrior organizations, such as the Elk Warriors or the Crazy Dog Warriors of the Cheyennes, or the Kit Fox or the Red Stick societies of the Crows.
Some writers have made reference to “dog-soldier bands” as having been the most desperate and fierce and bloodthirsty of all the old plains raiders. It seems the term “dog-soldier” hit the writers’ fancy as implying the utmost of wild ferocity, so the orderly home policemen had attributed to them, especially, many of the gory deeds done by the Indians who resisted the movement of emigrants across the plains.
In fact, though, any certain dog-soldier might have been either ferocious or gentle, either a great warrior or one whose mental make-up inclined him to peaceful life.
Anyway, that was the Crow Indian dog-soldier situation.
Leforge, Thomas. Memoirs of a White Crow Indian, The Century Co., 1928.
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