Chief Big Foot led his band from the Standing Rock Agency at Red Cloud's request, and had become very ill. Big Foot's Lakota were confined to a valley at Wounded Knee, surrounded by US troops and haunted by Hotchkiss artillery on the tops of the hills. The Hotchkiss guns were aimed to strafe the entire encampment.

Sitting Bull had been killed, and a massive forced exile was taking place. The gathered Plains Indians found comfort in the Ghost Dance that winter of 1890. The US troops and government grew afraid of the ceremony, unable to remember the same words of peace taught in their own religions. On December 29^th, after a drunken night of celebrating Red Cloud and Big Foot's confinement, weary soldiers were ordered to remove all of the Lakotas weapons.

Almost all of the guns were piled in the center of a circle. The soldiers watched on from the outside of the circle. Some soldiers broke into the tipis and lodges of the Lakota, destroying their property in a vain attempt to call a cooking pot "a weapon." Big Foot, in his sickened state, was ordered outside.

Some said that Black Coyote held onto his weapon, underneath his clothes. Many agreed that Black Coyote was rather mad. Perhaps Black Coyote showed his gun, or intended to put it on the pile after making a display of protest.  There was a minor struggle over the gun, which was never used on a human - only to shoot rabbits for food.

A gun shot was heard.

The sound of one gunshot became immediately the sound of a thousand. The Native peoples were killed at the closest range, trapped like the Whites trapped the buffalo. Women and children were killed just as quickly. Some were able to escape, only to die of wounds or in the blizzard that followed the Massacre. People were shot as they ran away, and women with children in their arms met with a bayonet if they stumbled. Big Foot was killed. The Ghost Dancers were killed. The prophecy and treaties were killed. Five or six out of every seven person died as a result of one of America's greatest atrocities.

Many US soldiers were also killed. They had shot each other in crossfire.

A blizzard followed the Massacre. Then, as quickly as it came, the storm left. Soldiers formed parties to bring in, plunder, and bury the bodies of the Ghost Dancers. Ghost Shirts could bring in a living wage when shown at Expositions. Some survivors were found and taken for treatment at Pine Ridge.

Dr. Charles Eastman was one of those searching for the sick and dying. He heard the sound of a crying infant, and followed the sound to the frozen female body. He and another man chipped away to dislodge the corpse from the ground, rolled it off, and discovered a little girl infant. She had survived under this body for four days. Perhaps it was her mother's final, intentional act on the earth.

We have never known for certain her mother or father's names. But she came to be called Zintkala Nuni, or Zintka Colby.