As the United States fought the Civil War in the early 1860s, the country's western frontier was simultaneously the site of significant and deadly military campaigns. The Dakota campaign against the Sioux was greater in scope, intensity and bloodshed than almost all other Indian battles fought in the West.
The Minnesota War of 1862 and the Dakota War of 1863-1865 were significant U.S. victories, but did not temper the passions of the Sioux to preserve their people and land or the desires of the whites to settle the frontier. The wars pushed the Teton Sioux into a long-term resistance that would end only at Wounded Knee in 1890.
Micheal D. Clodfelter, a Vietnam veteran, has also written Warfare and Armed Conflicts: A Statistical Reference to Casualty and Other Figures, 1500-1999 (2d ed., 2002) and Vietnam in Military Statistics (1995). He lives in Lawrence, Kansas.
