To the editor:

Curtis Dahlin’s address to the New Ulm Junior Pioneers (” ‘A political agenda instead of facts,’ ” Oct. 24) merits a response.

We respect Mr. Dahlin’s expertise as the author of several books and articles on the US-Dakota War. However we feel that his representation of the Minnesota Historical Society (MNHS) reflects a misunderstanding of our approach to the history of the conflict. It is true that MNHS has worked to build better relations with the Dakota communities who have long called Minnesota home. It is also true that our interpretation of the events of the war and its aftermath has evolved over time to include Dakota perspectives. This evolution reflects the discovery of new historical evidence and an acknowledgement of changing perceptions of the war since the 1860s. Such interpretive changes are part and parcel of interpreting history.

The events of 1862 and 1863 still have the capacity to shock. By 1862, Dakota people had endured decades of broken treaty promises. Crop failures, combined with actions of corrupt traders, led to starvation on the Dakota reservations. In a desperate attempt to preserve their sovereignty, Dakota warriors attacked settlements throughout the upper Minnesota River Valley. They indiscriminately killed more than 450 settlers and drove away tens of thousands more. The atrocities committed by some set the stage for early interpretations of the conflict. Pioneer newspapers and political leaders used disparaging and racist terms to describe Dakota people and called for their extermination or exile from Minnesota. These calls helped fuel a second stage of the conflict, in which more than 1,600 Dakota people, mostly women, children, and the elderly, were forcibly removed from their reservations and secured in a stockade near Fort Snelling.

In the spring of 1863 steamboats carried away more than 1,200 to distant reservations. Uncounted hundreds of Dakota noncombatants died from disease and neglect. Others, including many more noncombatants, died during conflicts with the military in 1863 and 1864.

For nearly 100 years, the story of the US-Dakota War told by MNHS reflected the perspective of the settlers who endured the war’s early days. Since the 1960s, new understandings of the motivations that drove the Dakotas to war have led to new interpretations of the conflict. Our understanding of the war continues to deepen as we uncover new historical evidence and incorporate new perspectives. The addition of Dakota voices to the sobering accounts of surviving settlers has led to more holistic interpretations of the war. Today, MNHS interprets the causes and consequences of the war as a complex tragedy for all involved. The war disrupted the lives of settlers and Dakota people alike, claiming loved ones, upending a sense of security and stability, and leaving behind lingering trauma. Dakota people today are still recovering from the long-term exile sparked by the 1862 war, and from the long period of cultural devastation that followed.

These conclusions, and others we may draw in the future, are necessarily provisional because our understanding of the past is always in motion. As historians we are constantly seeking new evidence, asking new questions, and considering new perspectives. In so doing, we continue to create a more inclusive, reflective, and empathetic history of all Minnesotans.

Bill Convery

St. Paul

— Bill Convery, PhD, is the director of Research and MacMillan Fellow, Minnesota Historical Society