This art print is printed on acid-free paper that will last a hundred years, and is double matted in neutral colors chosen to compliment the print, yet match any decor.

Each art print is backed with cardboard, ready to frame, and is enclosed in a plastic bag for protection.

This art print measures approximately 5 x 7 inches, including the mat. The mat pictured is representative and the one you will receive may vary. If you are ordering multiple prints, we will try to match mat colors, when available.

The inscription on this wisdom art print reads:
We do not want riches, but we do want to train our children right. We do not want riches, we want peace and love.
~RED CLOUD

This item can be shipped internationally, but additional postage may apply.

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Red Cloud (Makhpiya-Luta) lived from 1822-1909. As a warrior and a statesman, Red Cloud's success in confrontations with the United States government marked him as one of the most important Lakota leaders of the nineteenth century.

Beginning in 1866, Red Cloud orchestrated the most successful war against the United States ever fought by an Indian nation. The army had begun to construct forts along the Bozeman Trail, which ran through the heart of Lakota territory in present-day Wyoming to the Montana gold fields from Colorado's South Platte River.

As caravans of miners and settlers began to cross the Lakota's land, Red Cloud was haunted by the vision of Minnesota's expulsion of the Eastern Lakota in 1862 and 1863. So Red Cloud launched a series of assaults on the forts, most notably the crushing defeat of Lieutenant Colonel William Fetterman's column of eighty men just outside Fort Phil Kearny, Wyoming, in December of 1866. The garrisons were kept in a state of exhausting fear of further attacks through the rest of the winter.

Red Cloud's strategies were so successful that by 1868 the United States government had agreed to the Fort Laramie Treaty. The treaty's remarkable provisions mandated that the United States abandon its forts along the Bozeman Trail and guarantee the Lakota their possession of what is now the Western half of South Dakota, including the Black Hills, along with much of Montana and Wyoming.

The peace, of course, did not last. Custer's 1874 Black Hills expedition again brought war to the northern Plains, a war that would mean the end of independent Indian nations.

For reasons which are not entirely clear, Red Cloud did not join Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull and other war leaders in the Lakota War of 1876-77. However, after the military defeat of the Lakota nation, Red Cloud continued to fight for the needs and autonomy of his people, even if in less obvious or dramatic ways than waging war.

Fearing the Army's presence on his reservation, Red Cloud refrained from endorsing the Ghost Dance movement.

Throughout the 1880's Red Cloud struggled with Pine Ridge Indian Agent Valentine McGillycuddy over the distribution of government food and supplies and the control of the Indian police force. He was eventually successful in securing McGillycuddy's dismissal.