But less than a day after he arrived in the capital, McBride was stabbed twenty times, a murder described by newspapers as “the most brutal in crime annals in the District.” McBride’s killing was a clear message that white friends to the Osage were not safe either, a fact emphasized when an attorney with a lead on the case was flung from a moving train. ... and then you might as well pack your bag. Beginning in 1921, at least two dozen Osages were murdered by gunfire, stabbing, poisoning or explosives, but the number may have greatly exceeded that as there were many other Osage deaths that occurred under suspicious circumstances. Another of the murderers shrugged off his actions by offering the explanation “white people in Oklahoma thought no more of killing an Indian than they did in 1724.”. Actually the Plains culture lasted only about two hundred years. Oil revenue for the the Osage in the year 1923 totals over $30 million. Desperate, the Osage appealed to a new federal agency who may be able to save them — the FBI. 29-year-old William Stepson, who had been a healthy and athletic man, fell ill and died within a matter of mere hours. are less than six feet in stature, and very many of them six and a half, and others seven feet. Wikimedia CommonsA depiction of the Osage by painter George Caitlin. Library of CongressThe Osage Council and tribal representatives in Washington D.C. Hale and Ramsey were later convicted of Roan’s murder, and Burkhart accepted a plea deal for the murder of Smith. The tribe first encountered Europeans in the form of French fur traders in the late 17th century and initial relations proved beneficial to the Osage. The Osage Indian murders were a series of murders of Osage people in Osage County, Oklahoma, during the 1910s–1930s; newspapers described the increasing number of unsolved murders as the "Reign of Terror," lasting from 1921 to 1926. And when you look at the ages, it appears few died simply of old age. He gathered information. Osage ancestors had farmed for hundreds of years along the Ohio River before they, like so many other Native groups, moved out to the Great Plains in the early 1600s. Chief Big Heart ensured that the wealth of the Osage would stay only among tribe members. By 1923, the Osage were earning over $30 million dollars from leases and royalties a year, an amount equating to around $400 million dollars today. How many Osage murders might there possibly have been? But many bigoted settlers conspired to usurp the tribe’s wealth through bureaucracy, marriage, and ultimately murder. Three of the dozens of Osage tribe members who were killed in a vicious plot for oil wealth. White soon proved to be more than up to the task. :) There are two ways you can go. The tribe was relocated yet again to Oklahoma, where the Osage Nation is still today. Another alternative is if you can telnet on Internet or have WWW access you could search the University of Tulsa Library catalog (LIAS). Did You Know? The Reign of Terror was a frightful time for the Osage people. . Originally broadcast April 17, 2017. Between 1920 and 1925 there were more than 60 mysterious or unsolved murders in Osage County, all dealing with Osage headright holders. A depiction of the Osage by painter George Caitlin. Burkhart was eventually pardoned by Oklahoma Governor Henry Bellmon in 1965. Getty / BettmanThe horrifying death of Rita Smith helped finally trigger a federal investigation into the Osage murders. As one chief remarked in 1928, “Some day this oil will go and there will be no more fat checks every few months….then I know my people will be happier.”. Though the bureau estimated that there were twenty-four Osage murders, the real number was undoubtedly higher. “Killers Quotes” Discussion Board This module’s discussion board is unique because it is organized into 9 thematic threads You've reached the end of your free preview. Some families instigated their own private investigations, which often ended in the deaths of those involved. Mollie Burkhart’s mother died two months later to a suspect poisoning. Anna would be merely one of the first victims in a five-year-long Reign of Terror that would run from 1921-1926 and claim the lives of dozens (and possibly hundreds) of Osage men, women, and children. 1918-1931 10. The wealth that had saved the Osage from starvation had also damned the tribe because of the immense avarice amongst white settlers who surrounded them. Henry Roan, a young Osage, was murdered via gunshot. This equal share was called a headright. He was very close to the Osage and tried to stop the killers. Envy for and racism against the Osage ran deeper than snarky newspaper headlines. Further, not every family received justice in the investigation, but each one did receive a bill for the FBI’s troubles. Osage County, Oklahoma Tourist Information Office. . In 2017, New Yorker staff writer David Grann publishedKillers of the Flower Moonabout the Osage Murders. In March of 1922, Mollie’s sister Rita was killed alongside her husband and white servant by a bomb planted under their house. During the 1920s, a rash of ‘mysterious’ deaths of Osage with access to oil money occurred. Murders, bombings, poisonings, investigations, cover-ups, and layers upon layers of corruption allowed the murders to continue until the nascent organization of the FBI finally investigated and solved some of the murders. But ultimately their devious activity would catch up with them. They finally sent in agents from the newly-created Bureau of Investigation. Since the discovery of large oil deposits beneath the land of Osage Native Americans in Oklahoma, the tribe had become some of the wealthiest people in the world. Osage, original name Ni-u-kon-ska (“People of the Middle Waters”), North American Indian tribe of the Dhegiha branch of the Siouan linguistic stock. Congress pressured the Osage to sell their Kansas lands with the 1870 Treaty of Drum Creek. Most of these government-appointed money managers sought only to siphon off what wealth they could for themselves. They were a formidable people, as painter George Caitlin once described them as “at their full growth, . Largely Forgotten Osage Murders Reveal A Conspiracy Against Wealthy Native Americans. He consequently sent former Texas Ranger Tom White to head the investigation. What they uncovered was more malicious than they initially assumed. She then reached out to the National Archives staff who worked with these records, and together they found more than 3,000 documents relating to the Osage murders. “They’re scalping our souls out here,” one embittered Osage reportedly lamented. The name Osage is an English rendering of the French phonetic version of the name the French understood to be that of the entire tribe. The horrifying death of Rita Smith helped finally trigger a federal investigation into the Osage murders. But with the arrest of William K. Hale it all stopped. Non-Osages were able to inherit an Osage headright, and this was the motive for the Reign of Terror. Now they were forced to lease land from the tribe in order to mine the black gold under the reservation property. How many Osage murders might there possibly have been? (The deaths of some alleged victims who lacked discernable wounds were simply ascribed to \"indigestion,\" \"peculiar wasting illness[es],\" or \"causes unknown.\") The killings subsided after the arrest of William K. Hale in 1926. They found the system of guardians was grossly corrupted. Martin Scorsese is teaming up with Leonardo DiCaprio on Killers of the Flower Moon, the story of a formative FBI investigation into murders of Native American Osage tribespeople in 1920s Oklahoma. Call our toll-free information line if you need assistance or would like to verify information on this page: 1-800-320-8742. Though the bureau estimated that there were twenty-four Osage murders, the real number was undoubtedly higher. They had servants, many of whom were white,” wrote David Grann, author of Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI. Osage mineral lease royalties were paid to the tribe, who then distributed it equally to each allottee. The bureau closed its investigation after catching Hale and his henchmen. The undertaker later discovered a bullet hole in the back of her head. A trial document connecting the various murders back to the ringleader of the murder spree. The Osage tribe originally inhabited the area that is today Western Missouri along the Ohio River. One Osage World War I veteran said, “I fought in France for this country, and yet I am not even allowed to sign my own checks.”. Library of CongressAn Osage camp in Oklahoma. There’s a non-Osage family named Vaughan. Next, read about Chief Big Heart’s granddaughter, Maria Tallchief, who became a world-famous ballerina. It was thereafter applied to all members of the tribe. However, the rocky land onto which the Osage had been pushed held a tremendous secret: beneath the supposedly worthless soil lay “some of the largest oil deposits in the United States.”. The American public became fascinated by the Osage whom they intolerantly labeled “red millionaires.” Indeed, all of the money in the world could not erase racist stereotypes, as one newspaper wryly stated: “That lament, ‘lo the poor Indian,’ might appropriately be revised to ‘Ho, the rich redskin.”. More than two dozen members of the Osage tribe had been shot, stabbed, beaten and bombed in one of the bloodiest crime sprees in American history. It began in the early 1920s, a time that should have been a prosperous one. The relentless greed which had driven the white settlers had backfired on them tremendously. Jump to comments section Print this page. By the early 20th century, the oil rush instigated a flood of intermarriages where white men wanted a taste of the Osage wealth. Then, check out some stunning photos of the Crow Tribe in the early 20th century. The bureau closed its investigation after catching Hale and his henchmen. They are at the same time well-proportioned in their limbs and good-looking.”. Although some of the appointed guardians were honest men who genuinely did their best for their “wards,” they were few and far between. Getty / BettmannAnna Brown was one of the first victims of the Osage killing spree. Anna’s immediate family included her sisters, Mollie Burkhart and … The Osage Council and tribal representatives in Washington D.C. Anna Brown was one of the first victims of the Osage killing spree. But at least some at the bureau knew that there were many more homicides that had been systematically covered up, evading their efforts of detection. The Osage were convinced not only that they were being systematically murdered, but that the local authorities were in on the sinister plot. 01/26/05. Then local whites began targeting the tribe. The discovery of oil on their land had turned the Osage from being on the brink of starvation to “the wealthiest people per capita in the world.”. A Byte Out of History Murder and Mayhem in the Osage Hills. At one point, he thought he had gathered enough evidence. There were many who were silent, including law enforcement, reporters, and members of the community, who allowed the murders to prevail. In exchange for hunting animal pelts, they received guns and powder from the French, which in turn allowed the Osage to become the most powerful tribe in the region. Between 1921 and 1926, at least 24 members of the Osage Indian Nation in Oklahoma were brutally murdered. Found: In May 1921, the badly decomposed body of Anna Brown—an Osage Native American—in a remote ravine in northern Oklahoma. There are hundreds and hundreds.” Charles Whitehorn The Osage then numbered some 5,500. Osage historian Louis Burns said, “I don’t know of a single Osage family that didn’t lose at least one family member because of head rights.” A federal agent who investigated the reign of terror on the reservation said, “There are so many of these murder cases. It has gone on to become an award-winning book, and is reportedly being adapted in a movie directed by Martin Scorsese. 1923 seems to have been a particularly bad year. There was a total of 16,425 reported homicide cases in the U.S. in 2019. In 1906, thanks to the clever negotiation skills of Chief Big Heart, Congress ratified the Osage Allotment Act that guaranteed mineral rights of Osage territory to tribe members only, meaning that the now-valuable reservation land could only be inherited, not bought, thus keeping the fortune within the tribe entirely. There was justice in some cases, but not many. 24? At the time Hale, originally from Texas, was considered to one of the most prominent citizens of the area. The fortunes of the Osage began to change with the Louisiana Purchase and the arrival of American settlers. Despite attempts at negotiating treaties with the United States to preserve their property rights, the Osage were pushed farther and farther west as the Americans encroached deeper into their territory. The Bureau was new and required good publicity, he thus hoped that the newspaper frenzy surrounding the killing spree would bring in just that. Wikimedia CommonsA trial document connecting the various murders back to the ringleader of the murder spree. When I spoke to a former Osage chief, he told me why so many American Indian nations were being galvanized by Standing Rock and showing up there: because it is the same fundamental issue. are less than six feet in stature, and very many of them six and a half, and others seven feet. A headright was hereditary, passing to the immediate legal heir of the deceased allottee. It seems the commonly reported dates for the Osage Reign of Terror might not be accurate. The Department of Justice could no longer turn a blind eye to the systematic murder of the Osage, dubbed the “bloodiest chapter in American crime history.”. . The “Osage Reign of Terror” saw the deaths of at least 24 Osage. Osage County, Oklahoma Tourist Information OfficeChief Big Heart ensured that the wealth of the Osage would stay only among tribe members. The Osage tribe originally inhabited the area that is today Western Missouri along the Ohio River. In 1925, to prevent another Reign of Terror, the United States Congress passed a law prohibiting non-Osages from inheriting headrights of tribal members possessing more than one-half Osage blood. But with the arrest of William K. Hale it all stopped. The tribe decided to seek help from a higher authority and sent Barney McBride, one of the rare white oilmen who worked to help the Osage rather than to exploit them, as a representative to the capital. After centuries of abuse and broken promises at the hands of the United States government, the Osage were wise enough to know they had to move quickly to make the most of their miraculous good fortune. And, of course, in the event of Burkhart’s death, Hale would have been next in line. Bureau Director J. Edgar Hoover, meanwhile, wanted to reinvent the FBI. Hale was tried four times before a Federal District court finally convicted him in 1929. The theory gained more credence after two more tribe members dropped dead in similarly sketchy circumstances over the next few months. Library of CongressA pair of Osage women in 1921. “They lived in mansions and had chauffeured cars. They had initially been allotted only the least-arable land in the territory and the food supplies promised failed to materialize. The oil boom was in full swing, and the Osage people were prosperous due to ownership of mineral rights. The investigations went nowhere, but the killings did not stop. What might the true length be? _____ Pales next … A native of Greenville, Texas, Hale, the s… The Osage Indian Murders were a series of murders of Osage Indians in Osage County, Oklahoma in the early 1920s, called the "Reign of Terror" by newspapers. The tribe was finally settled in an area spread between present-day Kansas and Oklahoma in 1865. Hale was sentenced to life in prison on January 27, 1929, and served only 18 years of his sentence before being paroled in 1947. In contrast to the French, the Americans were not interested in trading with the Osage, but rather in taking the tribal lands for themselves. Many of the crimes were committed by the victims loved ones, especially amongst those in intermarriages. It emerged in the late 1700s as a result of tribes being pushed eastward by American pioneers. They were a formidable people, as painter George Caitlin once described them as “at their full growth, . Between 1920 and 1925 there were more than 60 mysterious or unsolved murders in Osage County, all dealing with Osage headright holders. The Osage were the wealthiest people in the country, which in turn attracted opportunists trying to take over their wealth. Warrant for William K. Hale, January 22, 1926. They both had been shot, but the local law enforcers were largely amateurs not equipped to deal with serious crimes.