Also known as Cinti Maza. Also known as (?) Puti.
6 The nationality of
Dewey Beard was Oglala Lakota Sioux.
6,5 Also known as Putinhin.
5 Also known as Iron Tail. Also known as Wass Maza. Dewey Beard was born in 1857.
4 He was the son of
(?) Horn Cloud and
(?) Yellow Leaf. Conflicting evidence states that Dewey was born at along the Niobrara River in 1861.
2,1 And yet another source states that his was also listed with a birthdate in 1864.
6,5,7 He married
Unknown (?) after 1882.
Cinti Maza (Iron Tail), my chief, Buffalo Bill Show. [between 1880 and 1890?]. Western History/Genealogy Department, Denver Public Library
Dewey Beard was war in 1891 at
Wounded Knee Massacre, Wounded Knee Creek, Shannon Co., South Dakota, USA; "Another Wounded Knee survivor was Horn Cloud's brother, Dewey Beard - who lost his wife and 10-day old child in the slaughter. Six months after the bloodbath, Beard - who also survived the Battle of the Little Big Horn - entered the Pine Ridge Indian Agent's office with a revolver, fully intent on killing the man he considered responsible for the death of his family and friends."But at that point in time he decided it wasn't necessary to kill that Indian agent," Little Finger explained. "He realized that there was no need for recrimination, there was no need for retribution."Little Finger attributed Beard's change of heart to an insight into the traditional spiritual beliefs of the Lakota. Beliefs that One Horn, Big Foot and the rest of the Flying River Band shared - among which is the certainty that there is a place in the heavens and a place on Earth where there is peace, and in that place of peace is the act of forgiveness.
Dewey Beard's account of the Wounded Knee Massacre as told to his granddaughter Celene Not Help Him.
I was raised by Dewey and Alice Beard after the death of my father. I remember these things [the Massacre], my grandfather told me to listen close and remember so that I can tell these things someday.
My grandfather Dewey Beard, also known as Iron tail, Wasee Maza. He was the last Survivor of the Little Bighorn and also the 1890 Wounded Knee Massacre. At Wounded Knee he lost his father, mother, two brothers, a sister, his wife and son. He and his four brothers, Joseph Horn Cloud, Daniel White Lance, Frank Horn Cloud and Earnest Horn Cloud, survived.
M grandfather was 27 years old at the time of the Wounded Knee Massacre, he died in 1956 at the age of 98. His father, Horn Cloud, was one of the six to be killed with Chief Big Foot. His mother, Brown Leaf Woman, was shot in the back into the stomach and killed. His sister, Pretty Enemy, was among the ones shot in the ravine. His two brothers, William and Sherman, his wife, Wears Eagle, were shot in the breast, and his son, Wet Feet, was found with his mother, still alive, nursing on his dead mother----he died later.
He said, :The day before we were tired and cold and hungry. When we ran away from Standing Rock, after they killed Sitting Bull, we don't eat that good and we don't sleep that good.
"We made a short stop at Red Water Creek. We built a fire to make some tea for Chief Big Foot. he drank a little bit, but he said he didn't feel like eating, he was really sick." They started out and camped at Red Elk Springs. That's where they spent the overnight.
"By noon we packed everything up and headed out for Pine Ridge. We got to Porcupine Butte. Just then, two of the scouts came back and said 'Alert' or get ready for trouble because we spotted some horseback riders. They were white soldiers and Indians.
"A white man came over and talked toBig Foot. 'Are you Big Foot? We're looking for you,' said the soldier. 'Can you talk?' They asked him, 'When we get to Pine Ridge we want you to put down 25 guns.' He [Big Foot] said he could do that." All the soldiers came around them and then, there was two wagons that came along. It looked like they were really heavy, he said. "Some more came and just before we got to Wounded Knee we got the news that there were Hotchkiss guns all around them, two on each side." They surrendered and the soldiers took them to Wounded Knee.
The soldier said that they were going to camp there overnight. He said "After you put up your tipi and get ready, we will give you rations." Since Big Foot was really sick, he agreed to stop there for the night. So, they all got their rations and built fires and were cooking. After they ate, that's when they told Grandpa Horn Cloud to go to Big Foot's tent.
"This is what I remember. Someone tapped on the tipi door. An Indian soldier [scout] peeked in. 'After you get done, I want you to go to where Big Foot is staying.'''
He [my grandfather] got his coat on and went out, going towards where Big Foot's tent was.
On the way a white soldier started to push him around really mean. He turned around and looked up at the white soldier. Then he remembered what Big Foot had told him, to be humble.
When Big Foote told Grandpa Horn Cloud that, he said that he could barely hear him. Big Foot was sick with pneumonia. When he passed the Badlands, he started to have a hemorrage. He lost s lot of blood. He was really getting sick. He told them not to start any trouble. He said there were lots of children and lots of old people, there were more woman than men, so he asked that they be humble. "Humbel yourself," he said.
He [Grandfather] remembered that as he was walking, he [the white soldier] said something to him in English, he didn't understand and asked one of the Indian soldiers what he said. "Don't pay any attention to him," the Indian soldier said. He [my grandfather] went into Big Foot's tent and Big Foot was glad to see him. He said, "Good you came over. That's good, come and sit down." Already Iron Eyes, Spotted Thunder and a few others were there. There were six of them all together and they started talking.
Just then, my grandfather's little brother, Joe Horn Cloud Jr., came in. Grandfather Big Foot told Joe, "Can you go and tell one of the soldiers to fix along the bottom of the tent? It's really cold. They've got a really big stove here, but I think it [the tent] is about two feet off the ground."
Grandpa Beard told me, "They wouldn't let us go to sleep. All night they tortured us by gunpoint. They asked us who all was in the battle of Little Big Horn, the battle with Custer. We can't tell anything----so we told them we don't know. They were saying things to us in English, but we can't tell them what we don't know. Besides, the interpreter is not that good," he said. "Maybe he tells them something else or is afraid to say anything
"One of the six men sitting there almost went to sleep. That's when the soldier poked him really hard with his gunbarrel. We all looked and we didn't like how they treated him, but he said remember be humble. So, he told us not to sleep.
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"The next morning we went back to our tents and ate. They [the soldiers] called for a meeting. They said, 'All of you get out and go to the center and bring your guns. Do it fast so that you get done, we'll head out to Pine Ridge.'''
Joe Horn Cloud Jr. said he went to talk to his grandfather and was coming back when one of the white soldiers said, "Little boy, you're too little to be out here. Go back to your tent and stay with your mother. All of these soldiers have hot stomachs."
Then a guy came along, his name was Black Hawk. He can't hear good but he could talk. He pointed out at his gun in the area. He said, "Look at my gun. Ever since I got it, I don't shoot two-leggeds. I only shoot four-leggeds to feed my family. I hate to part with it. It's the only way I feed my family."
Then he [Grandfather] said, down where the soldiers were staying around, a voice from there and their flag went down and they started firing. While the firing was going on, Grandfather stood up and ran to where his father and Big Foot was.
He said they were the first ones to die. One leaned sideways, the other had his face down. He saw it was no use and he went back to the tipi and ran to his wife. There was no one there at camp. His horses were running around. Some were still tied down and were pulling hard. He was standing there when he saw a man. He was trying to say brother-in-law. He was shot and his jaw was hanging. He was trying to talk but his tongue was hanging too. He was trying to get help for his wife.
He helped him to take her to the dry creek towards the west. He said he didn't know what happened to her. He kept running.
He saw a woman holding up her shawl like it could shield against the bullets. He thought he saw a black cloth hanging in front of her, and then he realized it was her braids, shot off and was hanging loose in front of her.
He saw a mother, with a baby in her arms. He took the baby, "Come on let me help you." He saw a woman, she took the baby and lay down on it and played dead. He kept on going, he saw his brother Daniel who called for him to stop. His brother was limping and he went to help him.
He saw his mother standing and singing, she was waving a pistol, she told him to take it, she was dying. He cried and helped her sit down. He kept going, he was getting dizzy so he sat down. He felt like he couldn't get up, he looked down and saw he had been shot again, in the lap.
My grandfather was shot in the back, it went through to his lung in the first volleys of gunfire. He was again shot it the right calf and in the hip. He was coughing blood. He had lost a lot of blood, he could hear someone singing a death song. Whenever someone moved, the soldiers shot them.
"I was badly wounded and pretty weak too. While I was lying on my back, I looked down the ravine and saw a lot of women coming up and crying. When I saw these women, girls and little girls and boys coming up, I saw soldiers on both sides of the ravine shoot at them until they had killed every one of them," said Dewey Beard in his testimonial on the massacre.
Dewey Beard ran to the hills with other band members to escape the shooting. He went into the hills and sang a death song for Chief Big Foot.
He was covered with frozen blood. He saw some men on horseback he thought were soldiers. They said Kola, friend, are you Indian? He said "Yes, I'm Indian. "They asked him what he was doing, he told them he was dying. They told him he was not going to die, and took him to a farmhouse and built a fire and gave him a set of their clothes so he could change from the clothes frozen to his wounds. The wound on his lung started to bleed, they dressed it the best they could and went to Pine Ridge Agency.
They took him to Alex Merrival's cabin. He was an uncle of my grandfather. He and his wife were crying, they already had 21 people in the house, other people who had escaped the massacre.
I would like to tell you one thing. In the Indian way, men and their mother-in-laws never speak to each other. They did this out of deep respect. When those soldiers buried everyone they killed, men women and children, in a mass grave, they showed no respect, not for them or their beliefs.
They just threw them in there any old way, just so their frozen bodies would fit. My grandfather told me that one man was wounded, he would have lived if they got him help, but they buried him anyway. Even a boy and a baby were buried alive by them soldiers.
The above story are excerpts from statements by Celene Not Help Him, a Wounded Knee Survivor Descendant presented at the September 25, 1990, hearing before the Senate Select Committee on Indian Affairs. "
Wounded Knee Remembered.
http://thefirstamericans.homestead.com/WoundedKneeRemembered1.html.
1,8,9,10,4 He married
(?) Chief Woman before July 1, 1892.
6,5,7 Dewey was listed as the "Head of the Household" on the US Indian Census Rolls at
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, Medicine Root District, Shannon Co., South Dakota, USA, on July 1, 1892.
6 Dewey was listed as the "Head of the Household" on the US Indian Census Rolls at
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, Medicine Root District, Shannon Co., South Dakota, USA, on June 30, 1894.
6 He married
Alice (?) in 1895.
2 Dewey was listed as the "Head of the Household" on the US Indian Census Rolls at
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, Medicine Root District, Shannon Co., South Dakota, USA, on June 30, 1895.
7 Dewey was listed as the "Head of the Household" on the US Indian Census Rolls at
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, Medicine Root District, Shannon Co., South Dakota, USA, on June 30, 1904.
2 He resided at
Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, Kyle, Shannon Co., South Dakota, USA, before 1955.
He died in November, 1955.
8 He was buried in November, 1955 at
St. Stephen's Catholic Cemetery, Kyle, Shannon Co., South Dakota, USA; "Fox Belly saw them prepare the body for burial. They washed him with herbs and fixed his hair the traditional way. The casket was made of wood and covered with a velveteen gray cloth. The service was held at St. Stephen's Catholic Church, north of Kyle.
Robert Lee, a friend and longtime reporter for the Rapid City Journal, was given Beard's peace pipe at the giveaway afterward. ''It was a very quiet ceremony, and they loaded the coffin on the back of a pickup to the open grave,'' Lee said. ''As soon as that first shovel of dirt hit that coffin, the women started keening.''
"...His grave at St. Stephen's Cemetery is unmarked."
9 
(F)
(M)
