At Medicine Lodge Creek in 1867, as many as 15,000 Apaches, Kiowas, Comanches, Arapahos, and Cheyennes gathered with a seven-member peace commission escorted by U.S. soldiers to conduct one of the nation's largest peace councils. The American Indian nations selected this traditional ceremonial site for the nearly two-week council. Chiefs Satanta, Little Raven, and Black Kettle gave speeches, held ceremonies, and entered negotiations. They produced three treaties that reduced the size of each of their lands and allowed for the construction of railroads and eventual settlement.
"I come to say that the Kiowas and Comanches have made with you a peace, and they intend to keep it. If it brings prosperity to us, we of course will like it the better."
—Satanta, Kiowa chief
Some chiefs signed the treaties without popular support; others misunderstood the agreements and later renounced them. When the agreements failed, the government responded with force. Thirteen months later Cheyenne Chief Black Kettle died in an attack by the Seventh Cavalry at Washita Creek, Oklahoma.
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