"Blackfeet Agent Young reported that the Blackfeet people would require an increased food ration because of the extraordinarily rapid disappearance of the tribal buffalo herds. In 1862 the northern buffalo herds were estimated at over 4,000,000, but by 1881 they were nearly gone due to the whiskey trade and commercial demand for buffalo hides in eastern markets. The Indian Office operated on the belief that as soon as the buffalo disappeared, it would be easier to change the Indians economy. The Army tactic is to destroy the Indian's food supply to pacify the Indian tribes. However, there was no contingency plan for a reciprocal increase of food supply to match the growing dependence of the Blackfeet Indians on government rations.
Monthly Agency Reports of Agent Young
May, 1880, Agent Young, Report for April; frost left ground, ox team put to plowing, twice as much ground broken as last year. Indians working. "I had the gratification of seeing Big Brave between the handles of the plow doing fair work, when I first proposed this altered mode of life two years since, he then said he was a "warrior" his business was to hunt and fight." Indians camped near in large numbers, drain on supplies, much displeased at being brought back by soldiers from the hunt, in such inclement weather, on false charges of whites on Indian depredations."
-The Sacred Buffalo Vision by Robert J. Juneau and Robert C. Juneau
pg.26
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