WARNING: This story contains disturbing details about residential and boarding schools. If you are feeling triggered, here is a resource list for trauma responses from the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition in the U.S. In Canada, the National Indian Residential School Crisis Hotline can be reached at 1-866-925-4419.
Stewart Huntington
ICT
The Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska is ready to bring Samuel Gilbert and Edward Hensley home after more than a century.
The tribe filed a federal lawsuit last month against the U.S. Army, demanding return of the remains of the two boys more than 100 years after they died at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania.
The suit, filed Jan. 17 in federal court in Virginia, came after the tribe received notice in December that the U.S. Office of Army Cemeteries had denied the tribe’s request for the remains to be returned under the federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, or NAGPRA.
For Winnebago tribal leaders, the case resonates beyond their nation.
“The traditional name for the Winnebago people is ‘Ho-Chunk,’ which translates to ‘the big voice,’“ Winnebago chairwoman Victoria Kitcheyan said in a statement. “And as we have always done, we will use our voice to hold our federal partners accountable for undermining NAGPRA and diluting the protections it guarantees to all Tribal Nations.
“Many leaders before us fought for that law and we will carry the battle forward.”
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The two boys were taken from their Nebraska homes and shipped to the notorious Carlisle school, the flagship institution of the U.S. government’s boarding school era that sought to strip Native children of their lifeways and assimilate them into the dominant society.
The boys arrived together at Carlisle on Sept. 7, 1895, for what were expected to be five-year terms at the school.
Gilbert, who was 19, died about six weeks later, on Oct. 24, 1895, of what school officials said was pneumonia. Hensley, 17, stayed for almost four years, mostly working off-site for local families, known as “patrons,” before he also died of pneumonia on June 29, 1899, according to school archives.
Both boys are buried in marked graves in the school cemetery, which is run by the Army on the grounds of the now-shuttered boarding school, records indicate.
In October, the tribe asked the Army to return the remains under the NAGPRA law, which was passed in 1990 in an effort to thwart the dehumanizing robbery, desecration, and general exploitation of Native American burial sites and human remains.
The Army refused, citing its own strict next-of-kin protocols for repatriation of remains.
“As a mother and grandmother, I stand for Samuel and Edward, knowing that their parents and grandparents were never able to properly bury them and send them on their final journey,” said Sunshine Thomas-Bear, the Winnebago tribal historic preservation officer and the tribe’s NAGPRA representative.
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At least 177 other children died and were buried at Carlisle before the U.S. government shut down the school, which was plagued by reports of children’s deaths, physical and emotional abuse, and rampant financial corruption.
An Army spokesperson said that it has “previously returned 32 children to their families from … Carlisle and has the necessary documents to return an additional 30” by 2025.
But the Army still maintains NAGPRA does not apply. The Winnebago suit, filed in the U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Virginia, seeks to change that.
“The goal is the return of two of the tribe’s children who died during and as a result of their time at Carlisle,” said Native American Rights Fund staff attorney Beth Wright, Laguna Pueblo, who is one of the lawyers representing the tribe. “And the Winnebago tribe seeks to bring the boys back pursuant to NAGPRA.”
The Army has given several reasons over many years why it believes NAGPRA doesn’t apply, including its own next-of-kin rules. That stipulation has proved to be a difficult burden for tribes seeking return of remains of children who died as long as a century ago or longer.
Family records are sometimes non-existent, and the sometimes very young children left no descendents. Carlisle records show that both of Hensley’s parents were dead, and that he was the ward of a woman named Julia Prophet, who was not otherwise identified.
In September, the Army bent a little toward the tribal position when it made concessions long sought by tribes for the disinterment and repatriation of Amos LaFromboise and Edward Upright, two other boys who died at Carlisle.
Related stories:
—A final journey home from Carlisle
—‘Our children came home with moccasins’
The one-time agreement struck with the Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate Tribe of South Dakota and the Spirit Lake Tribe in North Dakota allowed the remains of the two boys to be turned over to the care of their tribes and allowed the tribes to “perform any requisite ceremonies.”
But the Army insisted the agreement did not constitute an agreement that NAGPRA – and all of its provisions – applies.
That stubborn recalcitrance leaves one of the Winnebago’s attorneys scratching his head.
“Why would the Army take the chance of irritating the tribes when it’s so clear that what should happen here is a respectful, collaborative process?” asked Greg Werkheiser from the Cultural Heritage Partners law firm, which is working with NARF on the lawsuit.
“I think what emerges for me is that, past is prologue,” Werkheiser said. “The U.S. Army has, over its entire existence on the territory of tribal nations in this country, attempted to exert control in every possible way – active and passive – over Indigenous tribes. And in my view, this is continued evidence of that, of how hard it is for them to give up that pattern.
“One would hope that the Army would not want to have an extended fight over this, but would take this as a wake-up call and work with the … Winnebagos and get this resolved quickly and adjust their protocols moving forward.”
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