Autograph letter signed by Eugene Allen Dye. Mellette, Dakota Territory [South Dakota], 16 July 1886. 5 pages, 4to. 

Eugene Allen Dye (1854-1896) was originally from Chautauqua County, New York, and immigrated to South Dakota sometime after 1880, where he worked as a school teacher and became the first superintendent of public instruction in the Dakota Territory. 

In this extensive letter, he writes to a friend with details of "a most interesting trip among the Sioux Indians." He gives the itinerary, leaving from Pierre and traveling along the Missouri to Ft. Sully which he describes as "one of the most beautiful places I ever visited. Everything that Uncle Sam's money could do to beautify & make pleasant has been done."

After a "splendid breakfast with the soldiers, who were not only soldiers but gentlemen," they traveled to a location near Ft. Bennett, "where the Indians were encamped." After eating, he writes of his impressions of the Sioux, his prejudices unconcealed: "We finally went to see them. The sight was not the most pleasing. Those red devils eat everything except the hide and contents of the paunch, Squaws would fight over guts. They eat their fill of guts, liver &c. while the carcass of the cattle are warm. A squaw will put one end of a gut in her mouth and with her fingers force as much of the contents out as possible and chew till filled. They are lower than the whelps that follow them around. This government may do all they may to make human beings out of them but it will be to no purpose."

His unvarnished commentary continues regarding the Indian School at Ft. Bennett: "The young Indians do fine work but when they leave school and go back to the tribe they speak their own language & in short time no one would suspect that they ever saw a school room. Their dress consists of greasy loose blankets and garments principally. A few have been more tidy and have preserved in quite good condition the clothes given by [the] government. There are too, quite a number of "squaw men" - specimens of humanity in white skins who marry squaw & live at the expense of government same as Indians. Some of this class are quite wealthy. We satisfied our entire desire to see Sioux Indians and recrossed the river resolving that we enough for all time to come."

Originally established as the Cheyenne River Agency in 1869, Fort Bennet became a focal point of the Ghost Dance Uprising in 1890, just a few years after Dye made his visit.  

A uniquely detailed, if voyeuristic, letter describing the Sioux.   

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