1865

Colonel Chivington is relieved of command of the Military District of Colorado. His term of military service ends and he returns to civilian life. Under post-Civil War amnesty, criminal charges from future investigations could not be filed against him.

The War Department established a military commission to investigate the events at Sand Creek. A Special Joint Committee was established to investigate the “present condition of the Indian tribes and their treatment by the civil and military authorities of the United States.” In Congress, The Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War condemned Chivington’s actions and calls for the removal of Evans as governor of the Colorado Territory.

United States officials persuaded a handful of Cheyenne and Arapaho Chiefs to meet on the Little Arkansas River in Kansas and negotiated a new treaty. The government effectively assumed responsibility for the Massacre by committing to compensate those who lost property at Sand Creek. While Bent family members were granted lands south of the Arkansas River, the reparations to most other descendants have never been paid.

1867

As white expansion continued into the occupied West, local tribes fight desperately to maintain their livelihood and hunting grounds. At Medicine Lodge Creek in Kansas, another treaty with the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes relinquished claims to lands within Kansas including the traditional Smoky Hill hunting territory.

1868

Nearly four years to the day after he survived the Sand Creek Massacre, on November 27, 1868, the 7th US Cavalry under Lieutenant Colonel George Custer, launched a surprise attack on Chief Black Kettles Village on Washita Creek in what is now Oklahoma. Approximately 30 to 60 Cheyenne were killed including Chief Black Kettle. In accordance with the total war policy, Custer killed or stole the tribe’s pony and mule herds and ordered the burning of the Cheyenne lodges, destroying their winter supply of food and clothing.

1887

With the buffalo nearly wiped out, the Colorado plains were transformed to accommodate cattle ranching and Native peoples were pushed into confinement. In 1887, Congress passed the Dawes Act to distribute reservation lands into 160-acre holdings and force Indians to give up communal claims on reservation lands. Tribal religion and cultural practices are outlawed, tribal government eliminated, and reservation lands reduced by over 60%. Tribes are reduced to utter dependence on the U.S. government.

1890

The U.S. Army’s 7th Cavalry surrounded a band of Ghost Dancers under Lakota Sioux Chief Big Foot near Wounded Knee Creek in southwestern South Dakota. When fighting broke out, the heavily armed troops massacred over 200 Lakota. This was the last major confrontation with the Plains Indians and considered the end of the Indian Wars.

1909

The Sand Creek Massacre was redefined as a “battle” among many others in the list of engagements on Colorado’s Civil War monument in front of the State Capitol.

1950

The mischaracterization of the massacre by the State of Colorado was highlighted again when the Colorado Historical Society placed the current Sand Creek “Battleground” marker on the site of the massacre.

2000

The Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site Establishment Act was authorized by Congress on November 7, 2000. Among other charges, the act assured that the National Park Service would protect and preserve the landscape of the massacre site and interpret the associated cultural values to enhance public understanding of the massacre and assist in minimizing the chances of similar incidents in the future.

2007

The Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site opens to the public on June 1, 2007.

2014

On the 150th anniversary of the massacre in 2014, then Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper apologized to the Sand Creek ancestors.

2020

Across the country, movements aimed to address racial injustice rise and take action. In Denver, the Civil War monument at the Capitol was toppled. Almost immediately conversation began to replace the monument with one honoring the Sand Creek Massacre.

2021

Colorado Governor Jared Polis signed Executive Order B 2021 002 rescinding the 1864 proclamations by Territorial Governor John Evans warning that “all hostile Indians would be pursued and destroyed.” While the proclamations never became law, they were superseded by the Colorado Constitution, United States Constitution, and Colorado criminal code when Colorado became a state, they had remained on the books and had never been rescinded.