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Jun 24, 2019 · Weldon left the reservation just weeks before Sitting Bull’s death and became a footnote in history. Her painting was hanging in Sitting Bull’s cabin on Dec. 15, 1890. On that morning a gunfight broke out when Indian agency police came to arrest him, and Sitting Bull and others were killed.
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- HISTORY Vault: Native American History
In the late 1880s, Weldon was vilified as a harpy who was in love with Sitting Bull. Both she and the Lakota leader would meet tragic fates.
When Caroline Weldon arrived at the Standing Rock Reservation in 1889, she attracted attention. The Sioux people who lived there hadn’t invited her. The white settlers who lived nearby didn’t understand why she wanted to go there. She herself was on the run from life as a social outcast in the East, her young son in tow.
But as she approached the encampment of Lakota leader Sitting Bull, she was confident in her mission: to help save the Sioux people from a government that wanted to take away their land and their way of life.
The Last of the Sioux
Weldon’s mission did not succeed, and she soon became a social pariah for her attempts to help the Sioux people. As the events that would ultimately end Sitting Bull’s life began to swirl, Weldon acted as his secretary and advocate, agitating for better treatment of Native Americans during a time in which bigotry against people like the Sioux was not just socially acceptable, but written into federal law.
“Weldon was one of the only white people of her time of either gender who not only had the right political view of Native American rights, but also gave her life to work for those rights,” says Eileen Pollack, author of Woman Walking Ahead: In Search of Catherine Weldon and Sitting Bull. The book, which details Weldon’s doomed, self-appointed mission to help Sitting Bull and the Sioux, was adapted into Woman Walks Ahead, a historical drama released in June 2018.
From Comanche warriors to Navajo code talkers, learn more about Indigenous history.
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Swiss, American. Caroline Weldon (born Susanna Karolina Faesch; December 4, 1844 – March 15, 1921) was a Swiss-American artist and activist with the National Indian Defense Association. Weldon became a confidante and the personal secretary to the Lakota Sioux Indian leader Sitting Bull during the time when Plains Indians had adopted the Ghost ...
Sep 25, 2019 · Weldon left the reservation just weeks before Sitting Bull’s death and became a footnote in history. Her painting was hanging in Sitting Bull’s cabin on Dec. 15, 1890. On that morning a gunfight broke out when Indian agency police came to arrest him, and Sitting Bull and others were killed.
Jun 29, 2018 · But the story of the painting, which plays a much smaller role in the real history of Sitting Bull and Weldon than it does in the movie, is actually a window into a pivotal moment in American history.
Feb 24, 2021 · By Courtney Campbell | February 24, 2021. Caroline Weldon shocked the world when she moved to the Dakota Territory intent on helping Chief Sitting Bull and the Sioux fight for their rights ...
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Sitting Bull ( Lakota: Tȟatȟáŋka Íyotake [tˣaˈtˣə̃ka ˈijɔtakɛ]; [4] c. 1837 – December 15, 1890) [5] [6] was a Hunkpapa Lakota leader who led his people during years of resistance against United States government policies. Sitting Bull was killed by Indian agency police on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation during an attempt to ...
