The last of the horse wars: intertribal, cross-border warfare in southern alberta and northen montana territory, 1878-1893

• Main Author: Marsh, Christopher
• Other Authors: Colpitts, George
• Format: Master Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: Graduate Studies 2012
• Subjects: Native American Studies; Canadian Western History; Native History; Canadian-United States Borderlands; Kainai (Blood Indians); A'aninin (Gros Ventres Indians); North West Mounted Police; Intertribal Warfare; Early Reserve Era; assiniboine; Nakota
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11023/182; https://doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/28228

From 1883 until the autumn of 1889, Canadian Kainai (Blood Indians) waged cross-border warfare against American A’aninin (Gros Ventres) and Nakota (Assiniboine) of the Fort Belknap Agency in northeastern Montana. Enmity between these indigenous plains peoples had carried over from hostilities at the end of buffalo days and was perpetuated due to a strong continuity of warrior and equestrian culture in the 1880s, which endured despite efforts of the Canadian Dominion Government to “civilize” their Blackfoot wards through Christianity and agriculture. The few historians who have studied this little known conflict have emphasized the success of the North West Mounted Police (NWMP) in ending it. However, this thesis will demonstrate that NWMP efforts were often ineffective and the reasons behind the Kainai decision to end the hostilities were complex, encompassing environmental change and an independent modification of cultural ethos. This thesis illuminates this conflict, its causes, and its resolution.