This book portrays stories from the Dakota War of 1862 from a familial perspective that has been lacking in multiple other publications surrounding this piece of history.
I think this book did a great job of addressing multiple issues that have been "untold stories" for too long.
Frankly, I'm livid that Lincoln gets this reputation as being Honest Abe and a "do-good" human in American History when he signed execution orders for the largest execution at the hands of the US government EVER. Yes, he granted clemency to the majority of the Dakota people in the original order, but as a lawyer, he would have 100% known that all of the trials were total shit to begin with.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the University of Iowa Press for allowing me access to the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

What an absolutely fascinating book. Much to my own disappointment, I don’t know much about the history of the West, or at least anything more West than say, Arkansas. So much of my study of American history is centered around the East, but that does such a disservice to the rich histories surrounding Native American narratives, and I’m so glad I was given a chance to broaden my perspectives and historical knowledge in being approved for this book. Clemmons is a skilled writer who brings forth a gorgeous blend between the personal lives of the Hopkins family and their contribution to not just to the history of the Dakota but to American history, too. Highly recommend!

I started reading this and as much history that there is,I am sorry I did not finish because I am just not interested in this subject! I am sure It's a great story !!

Yet another genocide to be racked with guilt over. What frontier America did to the Dakota tribe was savage, uncivilized extermination. It must have been extremely difficult for Linda M Clemmons to research the painful past of her ancestors; her book covers 1862-1869 and incalculable suffering. The Dakota were harassed, humiliated, raped, dehumanized in the press and at large, separated from their loved ones, subjected to starvation, cruelty and deadly illnesses, lied to and about, dragged away to uninhabitable lands, enslaved and ultimately annihilated with overwhelming military force and firepower. And then after they were dead, their bodies were desecrated. I don't understand how these "God-fearing" frontier people could live with themselves.

The hysteria surrounding and obscuring the genocide, mistrials, executions, and exile of the Dakotans is nauseating in its similarity to what keeps happening again and again the world over. The irony of the Americans ridiculing the Dakotans as inferior and unintelligent, as the Indians learn English, reading, writing, and are bilingual. Despite President Lincoln's clemency (his executive order reduced the number of hangings from 303 to 39) and the so-called restitution offered survivors in 1891, this book is profoundly depressing. "The only offense of which many of them appear to have been guilty, is that of being Sioux Indians."

This is an interesting book, written solely from the perspective of the Dakota Indian tribe. I certainly learned a lot about the 1862 Dakota-US war and the tragic aftermath. Clearly there were a lot of actions to be thoroughly ashamed about, and it is right that people should be aware that such atrocities were perpetrated by the US government officials.

The book is well written, although there is a little repetition in parts. It cleverly has a family at the core, but portrays much wider events as well as how they affected the family itself.

At the end I was rather dismayed to learn that not only were the tribes wanting the return of desecrated bodies of ancestors - which is part of their culture and totally understandable - but also they want artefacts returning. Without detracting from the horror they endured, it seems to me that after 150 years it is time to accept that the plains full of bison to hunt have gone, their life as it was has irrevocably changed and the tribes should be looking how they can integrate and take their place within the modern United States.

Books like this should help America to accept and acknowledge guilt for past crimes, but also help the the tribes to draw a line and move on, keeping their culture but finding their own place in the world.

Thank you to NetGalley and the University of Iowa Press for allowing me access to the ARC in exchange for an honest review.