Page:The Indian Dispossessed.pdf/164

 by a party of drunken United States soldiers in the fall of 1863 upon a small number of this tribe, while making their way to their reservation and home from a friendly visit to a neighboring tribe, the Omahas, by which seven of them lost their lives and considerable property, would have been considered, in a civilized community, as a sufficient cause for retaliating upon their murderers or their relatives, especially if no effort was made to indemnify the sufferers, by the Government who had permitted its soldiers to perpetrate such wrongs."

Among the murdered were three women, a little girl, and an infant. Their supplementary treaty provided for the payment of damages to the relatives of the deceased.

Not many Indian tribes have had praise so heaped upon them. In 1869 their number is given as 768. The agent reports:

"The Ponca Indians are in no way addicted to drinking or gambling, neither will they spend their money for whisky. They fully understand the use of money, and will use it to the very best possible advantage. I am fully of the opinion that if their annuity were paid to them in money, they would use it more judiciously for their comfort than it could possibly be used for them in the purchase of goods. The Poncas are the most peaceable and law-abiding of any of the tribes of Indians. They are warm friends of the whites, and truly loyal to