Location
War Within War: Lincoln and the US-Dakota War of 1862
In early 1862 a federal investigator cautioned President Lincoln that mass corruption within Minnesota’s system of Indian Agencies would lead to disaster if left unchecked. The president, consumed by the battle to preserve the Union, ignored the warning. When the U.S.-Dakota War broke out eight months later, Lincoln told Minnesota’s governor Alexander Ramsey, “Attend to the Indians… Necessity has no law.” The war and its aftermath—U.S. victory, Dakota internment, the largest mass hanging in American history and the forced removal of the Dakota from their homelands—solidified Minnesota’s place in the Union, even as it set the stage for the Indian Wars to come, and tragically altered the lives of thousands of Dakota people for generations to come. With Dr. David Nichols, author of Lincoln and the Indians: Civil War Policy and Politics .
- Reservations required. Call 651/259-3015 or visit www.minnesotahistorycenter.org/forum to reserve seats.
- $14 general/$10 MHS members.
