GARDNER, Alexander (1821-1882), photographer. Albumen photograph of council meeting at Fort Laramie, showing multiple commissioners with Arapaho and Cheyenne leaders. May 1868.

9 1/2 x 12 3/4 in. albumen photograph on original 14 x 19 in. mount. Gardner's imprint and "Scenes in the Indian Country" printed on mount below image. Penciled caption to lower right margin. Featured tribal leaders include Spotted Bear, Old Man Afraid of His Horses, Big Mouth, and Pawnee Killer. US representatives include General William S. Harney, General William T. Sherman, General Alfred H. Terry, Senator John B. Sanborn, General C.C. Augur, J.B. Henderson, Nathanial G. Taylor, and Samuel F. Tappan. The subjects are gathered in council in a tented structure, with the Native representatives sitting on the ground and the US commissioners seated on wooden crates and boxes.

Published in Katz, Mark D. Witness to an Era: The Life and Photographs of Alexander Gardner (p. 245).

After a deadly ambush of Captain William Fetterman's troops by a group of more than 2,000 Sioux along the Bozeman Trail in December of 1866, the United States initiated plans for a treaty conference purposed to "establish peace, define tribunal boundaries, and provide mechanisms for civilizing the Indians," as well as to hold the tribes collectively accountable to American laws. (Katz, 238). The result was the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie conference, which consisted of a series of meetings between US officials including peace commissioners and military representatives, and leaders of the Arapaho, Northern Cheyenne, Crow, and Brule, Oglala and Miniconjou Dakota, to negotiate the terms of the Treaty that would guarantee the Lakota ownership of the Black Hills in the Wyoming Territory and end Red Cloud's War. Alexander Gardner, working for the Indian Peace Commission, was the only photographer present at the Fort Laramie Treaty conference. Gardner arrived at Fort Laramie from Washington on 24 April and made photographs between late April and early May 1868.

The conference brought together delegations of several tribes, including women and children, who lived in encampments during their stay at Fort Laramie. Gardner recorded daily life in those encampments along with the negotiations themselves, capturing activities like the distribution of gifts, the slaughter of cattle, women performing household chores, and even children playing. (Nottage, James. "A Treaty in His Lens: Alexander Gardner Photographs Fort Laramie, 1868.")

Gardner departed from the conference with around two hundred negatives, half of which were approximately 8 x 10 in. views, which would be published as "Scenes in the Indian Country," like the example offered here. Journalist Raymond J. DeMallie noted that the immense value of these images lies not only in their documentation of the commissions, but in their being the "earliest surviving photographic records of the Indians of the Northern Pains taken in their own territory." (Katz, 245).

The Larry Ness Collection of Native American Photography

This lot is located in Cincinnati.