Hungate Massacre - Kiowa, Colorado

I've ridden past it dozens of times and never noticed it. At about 25 miles into my favorite training ride out from Parker through Elizabeth towards Limon, Kiowa is a friendly little stop that offers shade and a respite from the winds that can rip across this part of the state.

Taking a closer look around after getting a notification from Google's Field Trip app, I found a monument - set there in 1939 - to a mystery still being investigated, but which kicked off a series of events critical in the early settlement of Colorado, the Hungate Massacre.

Most of us know the tragedy of the Sand Creek Massacre, where in November 1864, Union soldiers in the then Colorado Territory brutally attacked and slaughtered a camp of Cheyenne and Arapaho Native Americans in reprisal for a series of raids against early white settlements.

What I didn't know is that those raids, particularly the crossing of the threshold from livestock and supply theft into violence happened near this now-quiet little town.

While there are great, detailed write ups available online by Jeff Broome that I highly recommend reading if you want to know more, the interesting bit is what continued investigations are unearthing that shed greater light on what may have actually transpired versus what the common history of the day has been.

The short of the story is that in late spring and early summer of 1864, Cheyenne and Arapaho raiding parties were actively resisting against the continued expansion of settlements in and around Denver. Most involved theft and harassment, but they were increasing in scope and intensity. Then, on June 11, a Native American raiding party killed the Hungate family, burning their house and mutilating the bodies of both Nathan (29 yrs) and Ellen (25 yrs) and their two children, Laura (3 yrs) and Florence (5 months). Nathan's body was found about a mile from the burned-out house, while Ellen, Laura and Florence's bodies were found less than 100 yrds from the house, each scalped and found with their throats cut.  The bodies were taken and put on display in Denver, causing public outrage at the perception that the raiding party had killed Nathan as he rushed to save his family.

The event kicked off a series of increasing outrage and deadly reprisals that, ultimately, led to the ordering by Gov Evans for Colonel Chivington to muster volunteers for a federal raid on the Native American camps in Southeastern Colorado now known as the Sandcreek Massacre.

What made this particular raid turn deadly is what lies at the heart of more recent investigations. In the early 2000s, metal detection surveys (pictured right from the kclonewolf.com website) of the homestead showed a large number of bullets and weapons that have caused some historians to question the original understanding that Nathan was rushing to respond to the murder of his family and, instead, that the horrific turn of events might have originated from Nathan having shot and killed one of the raiding party during their efforts to take supplies and the Hungate's livestock. The reason that very few raids prior to this time had been non-violent was that a robust system of compensation in the territories existed for material losses by settlers to theft existed. Most often, thefts happened, losses were reported and compensated for as almost a cost of doing business as a settler in the territory.  However, because of the positioning and finds, it is now believed that the family attempted to fight the raiding party from within the house following the shooting, where the raiding party then set fire to the structure and the family was killed while having to make the awful decision to either face their death outside or inside.

The Hungate murders didn't cause Sandcreek, but they do appear to have signified a level up on the early relations between early settlers and the Native Americans.  The summer of 1864 and subsequent raids and violence all boiled to a point where something on the order of the Sandcreek Massacre could happen. Horrific on all sides, but fascinating how small events contribute, how rumors obscure truth and how even 250 years later, history continues to evolve so that we can get a better understanding of our past.

Kiowa today... little sleepier than the early days

my favorite rest spot on my long rides out east from Parker...