Pawnee Woman's Grave

The plaque's 69 dead is the reservation's own count. The Pawnee agent, Burgess, reported 20 men, 39 women and 10 children killed, so most of those lost were women and children, like the woman buried here and her child. Army officers had counted 63 just after the battle. In 2013 a fourth-grade class at Randolph Elementary in Lincoln, led by teacher Thomas Pargett, noticed that the Massacre Canyon marker gives the hunting party as 700 and this one as 350, and wrote to History Nebraska, which considers this later plaque the more accurate.

What the plaque says

Pawnee Woman's Grave The Republican Valley was the center of one of the major buffalo ranges of the Great Plains. It was a favorite hunting ground of several Indian tribes. Pawnee, Sioux, Oto and Cheyenne spent much time here as late as 1874. These tribal hunts, however, created problems, for they brought together tribes traditionally at war. The major encounter in this region was the Battle of Massacre Canyon, fought on August 5, 1873. It took place twenty-five miles west of here near present Trenton. A thousand Sioux warriors surprised and defeated a Pawnee hunting party of 350 men, women and children, killing 69 of them. The Pawnee retreated to this vicinity, where they mourned their dead throughout the night. One survivor was a severely wounded Pawnee woman, whose child had been killed in the battle. A home- steader found her a few miles upstream and brought her here to Indianola, a frontier settlement estab- lished in 1872. The woman was cared for by the settlers until she died a few days later. A crude coffin was prepared, and she was buried on the banks of Coon Creek. Her body was reburied here in 1975 by the community during the American Revolution Bicentennial Year. Representatives of the Pawnee Indian Tribe took part in the ceremony. Bicentennial Ladies Group Nebraska State Historical Society

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Senator George Norris State Historic Site — 11 mi
  The McCook house George W. Norris kept as his home base for forty-two years, given to the state with its furniture by his wife Ellie, by the senator who wrote the lame-duck amendment.

More markers nearby

• Indianola POW Camp — 0.3 mi
• Mallalieu University — 6.3 mi
• George William Norris, 1861-1944 — 11 mi
• Frontier County, Stockville — 21 mi