Alfred Sully

RelationsFather, Thomas Sully, painter
Son-in-law, Tipi Sapa (Black Lodge), a leader of the Yankton/Dakota band of the Great Sioux Nation
Descendant, Ella Cara Deloria, Vine Deloria, Jr.

Alfred Sully (May 22, 1820 – April 27, 1879), was an American military officer who served in the United States Army during the Mexican-American War and the American Indian Wars. He served as Brevet Brigadier General in the Union Army during the American Civil War but was removed from command by John Gibbon and charged with dereliction of duty for failure to suppress a mutiny by the 34th New York Infantry Regiment. He was found innocent of the charges and sent to the Dakota Territory to serve in the Sioux Wars. After the Civil War, he served as major in the regular Army and continued to fight in the Indian Wars including the Nez Perce War and out of Fort Dodge, Fort Harker and Fort Vancouver. He served as Superintendent of Indian Affairs for Montana in 1869 and as colonel of the 21st Infantry Regiment in 1873.

Early life and education

Sully was the son of the portrait painter, Thomas Sully, of Pennsylvania.^[1] Alfred graduated from West Point in 1841.^[2] Sully, like his father, was a watercolorist and oil painter.^[3]

Career

He served in the Mexican-American War in 1846.^[2] Between 1849 and 1853, he served as chief quartermaster of the U.S. troops at Monterey, California, after California came under American jurisdiction. He created a number of watercolor and some oil paintings reflecting the social life of Monterey during that period.

Sully headed US troops out of Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas, in June 1861 as captain and occupied the city of St Joseph, Missouri, declaring martial law. Violent secessionist uprisings in the city during the early Civil War prompted Sully's occupation.

American Civil War

Sully was commissioned colonel of the 1st Minnesota Volunteer Infantry on February 3, 1862. He led his regiment during the Peninsula campaign, and sustained a minor wound at Glendale. He led a brigade at the Seven Days Battle and the Battle of Fredericksburg.^[4] Sully was promoted to brigadier general on September 26 and led a brigade in the II Corps during the Battle of Chancellorsville.

On May 1, 1863, he was removed from command by his division commander, Brig. Gen John Gibbon after failing to suppress a mutiny by the 34th New York when several of its companies refused to fight on the grounds that their two-year enlistment term was about to expire. Gibbon attempted to have Sully court-martialed for dereliction of duty, although a court of inquiry found him innocent of these charges. After the charges were dropped, he was sent West to the Dakota Territory to serve in the Sioux Wars.

Sioux Wars

On September 3, 1863, at the Battle of Whitestone Hill, his troops destroyed a village of some 500 tipis that lodged Yankton, Dakota, Hunkpapa and Sihasapa Lakota. Warriors, along with women and children, were killed or captured. The troopers' casualties were small.^[4][5]

On June 28, 1864, in response to the killing of his science officer and topographical engineer, Captain John Feilner, while conducting a field survey, Sully ordered the heads of those Indians believed responsible hung from poles on a hill overlooking the Missouri River.^[6][7]

In July 1864, Supply lead the 30th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment to build Fort Rice for use as a base of operations for expeditions against the Sioux.^[8]

A pioneer woman named Fanny Kelly was kidnapped by the Sioux and Sully led troops to re-capture her.^[9] On July 19, 1864, Sully left Camp Rice with about 3,000 troops along the Missouri River. The caravan also included emigrants who sought the protection of U.S. troops. On July 23, Sully left the emigrants and approximately 800 troops near the Heart River and continued the expedition.^[10] At the Battle of Killdeer Mountain, he led two brigades of soldiers, approximately 2,200 men, and attacked a village of several Sioux tribes totaling 8,000 people near a hilltop in the Killdeer Mountains. The Sioux defenders included Sitting Bull, Gall, and Inkpaduta.^[9] The Sioux warriors repeatedly charged the U.S. troops but were repelled by gunfire.^[11] The U.S. troops fired upon the village with artillery, took possession of the hilltop,^[12] and drove the remaining Sioux into the badlands near the present-day Theodore Roosevelt National Park.^[9]

Sully regrouped and led his troops through the badlands in order to reach the Yellowstone River for resupply.^[13] Sully described the badlands as "Hell with the fires put out."^[14] The Battle of the Badlands was fought from August 7, 1864 to August 9, 1864, when the column of Sully's troops was repeatedly attacked by the Sioux. The U.S. troops suffered 9 deaths and the Sioux suffered 100. The U.S. troops pushed the Sioux into Montana which ended the fighting in the Dakota Territory.^[13]

With the end of the Civil War, Sully's commission as a brigadier general expired and he reverted to the rank of major in the regular army. From June to September 1867, he served in the Idaho Territory and fought in the Nez Perce War.^[15] In September 1868, Sully led 500 men out of Fort Dodge and into Indian territory to punish "hostiles" responsible for raids into Kansas. However, the troops were ambushed and became exhausted hauling heavy wagon trains through dense countryside. The troops returned to Fort Dodge unsuccessful and Sully took the blame for the failure.^[2]

In November 1868, Sully and George Armstrong Custer led troops into Indian territory. The two disagreed on the military strategy of the expedition but agreed to construct Fort Supply in what is now Oklahoma. The two leaders continued to fight over who should have command on the expedition. The issue was resolved with the arrival of General Philip Sheridan who selected Custer to lead and sent Sully to Fort Harker.^[2]

In 1869, Sully was appointed Superintendent of Indian Affairs for Montana. In 1873, he was appointed colonel and given command of the 21st Infantry Regiment.^[2] Despite frequent bouts of ill health, he continued to serve in the U.S. Army until his death at Fort Vancouver, Oregon, on April 27, 1879. The cause of death was ruled to be an aortic hemorrhage due to complications from an esophageal ulcer. Sully was interred in Laurel Hill Cemetery in Philadelphia.^[16]

Personal life

Sully was married three times.

During his service as Quartermaster in Monterrey, California, he married María Manuela Antonia Jimeno y de la Guerra, the 15 year old granddaughter of the California military officer and ranchero, Jose de la Guerra y Noriega. The family initially objected to the marriage since Sully was Protestant and not wealthy and the couple eloped. The family eventually accepted the marriage and granted Sully a tract of land in California. The couple had a son together,^[17] however, soon after childbirth, Manuela died in 1852 from eating poisoned fruit, possibly from a rejected suitor. Less than three weeks after the death of his wife, his newborn son, Thomas, was accidently strangulated.^[17][18]

From September 1856 through May 1857, Sully was posted to Fort Pierre, Nebraska Territory (now South Dakota). He met and, by Sioux tribal custom, married a young French-Yankton girl of the Yankton Sioux tribe. With this marriage, Sully became the son-in-law of Saswe, a.k.a. François Deloria (Saswe being the Dakota pronunciation of François), a powerful Yankton medicine man and chief of the "Half-Breed band".

In 1869, Sully married Sophia Henrietta Palmer in Manhattan, New York.

Descendants

Sully's daughter by his Yankton Sioux wife, Mary Sully, was known as Akicita Win (Soldier Woman).^[19] She married Rev. Philip Joseph Deloria, an Episcopal priest, a.k.a. Tipi Sapa (Black Lodge), a leader of the Yankton/Nakota band of the Sioux Nation.^[20] Tipi Sapa is featured as one of the 98 Saints of the Ages at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., as the first Dakota Christian minister to his own people.^[21] Among their descendants are Yankton Sioux Ella Deloria, an ethnologist, and her nephew Vine Deloria, Jr., a scholar, writer, author of Custer Died for Your Sins.^[22]

References

Citations

Sources

• Kingsbury, David L. (1898). Sully's Expedition Against the Sioux in 1864.
• Michino, Gregory F. (2003). Encyclopedia of Indian Wars: Western Battles and Skirmishes, 1850-1890. Mountain Press Publishing Company. ISBN 978-0-87842-468-9.

Further reading

• Barth, Aaron L. "Imagining a Battlefield at a Civil War Mistake: The Public History of Whitestone Hill, 1863 to 2013." The Public Historian, Vol. 35, No. 3, pp. 72–97, University of California Press, August 2013. ISSN 0272-3433, electronic ISSN 1533-8576.
• Beck, Paul Norman. "Columns of vengeance : soldiers, Sioux, and the Punitive Expeditions, 1863-1864" Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, May 17, 2013. ISBN 978-0806143446
• Clodfelter, Micheal. "The Dakota War: The United States Army vs the Sioux, 1862-65". McFarland Publishing Co. February 1, 1998. ISBN 978-0786404193
• Deloria, Vine, Jr. "Singing for a Spirit: A Portrait of the Dakota Sioux." Clear Light Publishing (August 1, 1999). ISBN 978-1574160253
• Sully, Langdon. "No Tears for the General: The Life of Alfred Sully, 1821-1879" American West Publishing Co. (1974). ISBN 978-0910118330
• Williams, Paul. The Dakota Conflict and Its Leaders, 1862-1865 - Little Crow, Henry Sibley and Alfred Sully. McFarland & Company, Inc. (2020). ISBN 978-1-4766-8069-9

External links

• Pictures of Alfred Sully
• Portrait of Alfred Sully, a Cadet at West Point, 1839, by his father Thomas Sully
• Alfred Sully Papers. Archives at Yale in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.