Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee

Bury my heart at Wounded Knee
Deep in the Earth
Cover me with pretty lies
Bury my heart at Wounded Knee

One of my favourite songs by Buffy Sainte-Marie is 'Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee' from 1992, a powerful latter day protest song, a truth song that harks back to what happened in the American West in the late 1800s and is still happening in modern day America. The disasters wreaked on native Americans for gold are now happening for uranium and other precious metals.

I took advantage of being in hospital to finish reading the book of that name by Dee Brown. It was first published in 1970 and is still being re-published. The book is subtitled, 'An Indian History Of The American West' and is based on official documents and archived material, referenced throughout and quoting eye-witness accounts wherever possible. It's a difficult read. It's shameful and heartbreaking. The people who ruled America over the period of this book (1860-1890) had the arrogance and power to commit much to paper and that is the source of much of Mr Brown's material. The title is taken from a poem called 'American Names' by Stephen Vincent Benet.

It tells of planned genocide, of assassinations, of treaties broken time and again, of people forcibly moved from land wanted by miners, of herds of buffalo killed and left to rot in the plains, of children slaughtered ... It also tells of a proud people who know they will die but still try to protect their peoples and the land, tales of bravery, of Buffalo-Calf-Road-Woman who rode out in a hail of bullets to save her brother from ambush, of Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse.

Crazy Horse died on 5 September 1877. While escaping from a reservation and heading to join Sitting Bull in Canada, Crazy Horse's parents took his bones and heart and buried them near Chankpe Opi Wakpala, the creek called Wounded Knee. Wounded Knee was also the scene of a massacre of a band of Sioux at Christmas 1890.

The final quote in the book is under a photo of Red Cloud in old age, hair silver and long, face lined and mouth turned down. He says, "They made us many promises, more than I can remember, but they never kept but one: they promised to take our land, and they took it."

'Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee' is one of two books Buffy Sainte-Marie recommends people read to understand the history of native Americans. The other is 'Indian Givers' by Jack Weatherford, subtitled, 'How The Indians Of The Americas Transformed The World', another academic and referenced book that attempts to explain how the discovery of the Americas changed the world. It's a fascinating read.

One of the disturbing things about all this is that history keeps repeating itself and those in power have still to learn the lessons of the past. People are still being forcibly moved between reservations in America as land is wanted for mining and treaties and laws broken. I was both pleased and saddened to come across the blog by Brenda Norrell about the uranium mining in the Black Hills (I blogged about this and the 'Broken Rainbow' DVD last year). The blog included a link to a previously censored article about an interview with Buffy Sainte-Marie from 1999 in which she talks about her own censorship and her song 'Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee'. You should read both the article and the blog and I thank Brenda for publishing both.

How can I understand what the issues really are with my cosy life thousands of miles away in London? I can't. But I can be aware of them thanks to Buffy. I should be wandering round New York today, waiting for Monday to see Buffy in concert at the Highline Ballroom, and possibly meet her again after the concert. Instead I'm sitting at the table in my bay window with the sun streaming in and the trees moving in the South London breeze having filled up with painkillers for the morning. And Buffy is singing 'Starwalker', a song of hope for all generations and all peoples.