878 



THE GHOST-DANCE RELK.IuN 



[EMI. ANN. H 



civilization that although there were two or three salaried missionaries 

 at the agency not one went out to say a prayer over the poor mangled 

 bodiesof these victims of war. The Catholic priests had reasons for not 

 being present, as one of them, Father Craft, was lying in the hospital 

 with a dangerous wound received on the battlefield while bravely admin- 

 istering to the dying wants of the soldiers in the heat of the encounter, 

 and the other, Father Jutz, an old man of 70 years, was at the mission 

 school 5 miles away, still attending to his little flock of 100 children 



Fig. 80— Survivors of Wounded Knee— Marguerite Zitkala-noni (1891). 



as before the trouble began, and unaware of what was transpiring at 

 the agency. 



A long trench was dug and into it were thrown all the bodies, piled 

 one upon another like so much cordwood, until the pit was full, when 

 the earth was heaped over them and the funeral was complete (platec). 

 Many of the bodies were stripped by the whites, who went out in order 

 to get the . " ghost shirts," and the frozen bodies were thrown into the 

 trench stiff and naked. They were only dead Indians. As one of the 

 burial party said, " It was a thing to melt the heart of a man, if it was 



