Review of The Great Sioux Uprising: Rebellion on the Plains, August-September 1862 By Jerry Keenan

Authors

Paul N. Beck, Wisconsin Lutheran CollegeFollow

Date of this Version

Spring 2005

Document Type

Article

Citation

Great Plains Quarterly Vol. 25, No. 2, Spring 2005, pp. 127-28.

Comments

Copyright 2005 by the Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Abstract

With only eighty-nine pages of text, Jerry Keenan's The Great Sioux Uprising was not meant to be the definitive work on the Minnesota's Dakota War of 1862, but rather an overview of the conflict for the general public. As such, the book is a worthy effort. Keenan, the author of several volumes dealing with the Indian wars in the West, adequately covers the issues and events of the war.

Keenan, writing in an easy, reader-friendly style, first gives brief biographical sketches of the various individuals involved in the conflict, followed by a good general overview of the various reasons for the coming of the war. Its key battles and events, including the largest mass execution in U.S. history, are all addressed. Keenan concludes by commenting on how the uprising eventually led, in 1863 and 1864, to further fighting in the Dakota Territory with the Lakota Sioux and by offering suggestions on touring the battle sites today.

The Dakota War of 1862 did have an impact on the history of the Great Plains. In an effort to punish those Santee Sioux who fled Minnesota after the failed uprising, the army mounted expeditions into the Dakota Territory to engage them in battle. The Lakota Sioux aided their brethren and ended up at war with the United States. This conflict merged with the larger war being fought all across the Great Plains following the 1864 massacre at Sand Creek. Armed conflict between the Sioux and the United States would continue, off and on, for more than a decade following the uprising.

Like earlier works on the war, Kenneth Carley's The Sioux Uprising of 1862 (1961) and Duane Schultz's Over the Earth I Come (1992), Keenan's is a book written for a general audience. This important conflict still deserves a more serious in-depth study delving more deeply into the social, economic, and political ramification of the uprising. Still, Keenan should be commended for authoring a good synopsis of the Dakota War of 1862.

The Great Sioux Uprising is part of the Battleground America Guides Series, which highlights various battles in American history for general students interested in military history.