The American West from 1840-1895 saw the movement of white settlers westward and the decline of Native American tribes. The Plains had an extreme climate that made farming difficult with little rain and resources. Plains Indians like the Sioux lived nomadic lifestyles centered around buffalo hunting. Early pioneers faced many hardships on wagon trains west while Mormons fled religious persecution and established Salt Lake City. The Gold Rush of 1849 drew many prospectors but little gold was found. Ranching and cattle drives dominated the late 1800s until the development of barbed wire and railroads. Conflicts arose as groups competed for land, culminating in the Wounded Knee massacre of 1890 that largely ended Native American resistance.

1. The American West
1840 - 1895

2. The Plains
• Extreme Weather:
• W – windy
• I – isolated
• T – treeless
• C – cold
• H - hot
• Short Grass
• Desert-like
• Hard to farm
• Not much rain
• Not many trees and resources
• A lot of storms and tornados
• Settlers thought it was inhabitable

3. The Plains Indians
• Native Americans
• Polygamists - everyone looked after
• Lived in Tribes, within Tribes
• were bands - each had a chief
• Counting Coup - Warfare
• Laws but not punishments
• Buffalo uses: Clothes,
• Food, Shelter, Tools, Religion
• Horses – Currency
• Nomadic
• Believed no one could own land

4. The White Settlers
• Thought that:
• Indians were savages
• Land should be tamed
• Mainly Christian
• Arrogant
• Closed minded
• Humanitarians – People who believed that Indians
should be negotiated with not killed
• Exterminators – People who believed that Indians
could not be reasoned with and should be killed
• Manifest Destiny - Felt it was there God given
duty to spread across the land and farm it

5. The Mountain Men
• Originally trapped animals and sold their fur
• Over 3,000 Mountain men roamed America
• Rendezvous - bought + sold things + drunk
• Worked out best routes for white settlers to travel
• Brought back stories to the east about the west
• Found undiscovered land
• Often died young
• Led a very Lonely life
• Very Dangerous
• Guided people west

6. The Pioneers
• First to head west
• Many people died
• Bad weather
• Very dangerous
• Took months by wagon
• There was a lot of disease
• Some groups even ate each other
• They went because they wanted a better life
• Many people didn’t have horses (pulled it by hand)

7. The Mormons
• A Religion hated by many
• Practised Polygamy
• Called normal people ‘Gentiles‘
• 1830 - New York – J.Smith accused of being a fraud
• 1837 – Kirtland, Ohio – Mormon bank collapsed
• 1838 - Missouri – Accused of stirring up trouble with
Indians and they freed slaves (not liked by people)
• 1842 - Illinois – People scared that they’d take over
(J.Smith ran for President + he was like a dictator)
• J.Smith was shot and B.Young took over
• Settled successfully in Salt Lake City in Utah

8. The Miners
• Also called the 49ers (gold rush was in 1849)
• People got Gold Fever – Blinded by their greed
• Claim Jumping – Saying you found the gold first
• The gold was found on sacred Indian land
• The journey was also very hard
• Everyone came from everywhere
• Crime bad in the mining towns
• Personalities + cultures clashed
• Fights over the gold
• Not much gold found

9. The Homesteaders
• They settled on the plains
• 1862 – Homesteader act
• Problems and Solutions –
• Water shortages = Water Pumps
• Weather extremes = No solution
• Fuel = Used dried buffalo dung
• Supplies = Railways were built
• Ploughing = Sod Buster invented
• Protecting crops = Barbed wire
• Growing crops = Red Turkey Wheat
• 1874 – Barbed wire and water pump invented

10. Cattle Ranching + Cowboys
• Peaked between 1867 – 1880
• Open range – Area of land where cattle roam free
• Railhead towns – Towns at the end of the railroads
• Ranchers – People who owned ranches + cattle
• Texas longhorns – Cross breed of cattle
• Long drive – herding + moving cattle
• Cattle Barons – Bigger Ranchers
(pushed out smaller ranchers)
• 25% of cowboys where ex-slaves
• Life of a cowboy – Lonely + dangerous
• Cattle industry fell when the price of beef fell

11. Conflict
• Johnson County War – 1892 =
Between the homesteaders and cattlemen (cattle
ate h.s. Crops + h.s. accused of rustling cattle)
• Little Crows War – 1862 =
Sioux tribe attacked food supply wagons because
they were starving on their reservation
• Sand Creek Massacre – 1864 =
Cheyenne tribe had same problems as the Sioux,
except 450 Indians were murdered by US army
• Red Cloud’s War – 1865 =
A new trail went through Indian land, breaking the
Fort Laramie Treaty. A few Indian tribes trapped
the army and forced them to sign a new treaty

12. The Destruction of the Indians
• Battle of Little Bighorn – 1876 =
(also called Custer’s last stand) General Custer
didn’t listen to orders and so his army was
surrounded + killed by Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull
• The Battle of Wounded Knee – 1890 =
The Indians ghost dance told them that they would
win but the US army took disarmed the Indians and
opened fire killing over 250 Indians. It was all over.
• Separation – Moved the Indians away from the east
• Concentration – Confined them to certain bits of land
• Reservation – Keeping them in very small areas
• Destruction – Killing the buffalo (Indians couldn’t live)

13. Key People and Groups
• John L O’Sullivan – Said the words Manifest Destiny
• George Catlin – Painted and observed the Indians
• Joseph Smith – Invented the Mormon Religion
• Brigham Young – Second Mormon Leader
• Jim Bridger – Famous mountain man
• John Sutter – discovered the gold first
• John Iliff- The first rancher
• Joseph McCoy – Promoted the railways
• The Goulds, Donners and Sagars – Pioneers
• Charles Goodnight + Oliver Loving – Cattle ranchers
• Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse + Red Cloud – Indian Chiefs