Tour Entertains Eads Babe Ruth Tournament Players Including Team From Lamar
By Mike Bowen, co-author, We Found the Lost Sand Creek Site
Over 25 years before Chuck and Sheri Bowen discovered the Lost Sand Creek Site, Chuck presented his first Sand Creek tour in the summer of ‘70.
He was not aware at the time of the massive discovery he and Sheri would make in the ‘90s. He also wasn’t yet aware that the Sand Creek Battle Ground monument, that once stood at the National Park Service Sand Creek site, may have marked the wrong location. The Bowens were made aware in ‘93 about the likelihood that Black Kettle’s village and Sand Creek battleground were further up the creek from the monument.
From our book:
Bill and Tootie Dawson bought the traditional Sand Creek site in 1965 from our neighbor Levi Rutledge. Perhaps an attempt to help get my mind off the tragedy of losing my brother, Bill asked me if I would be interested in leading a tour sometime between the end of July and the first of August at his place on Sand Creek. I accepted and asked for the help of Sheri, her sister, and our friend, Mary. We used our journalism class skills to make a newspaper as if reporting breaking news to tell the Sand Creek story. The tour was organized to entertain the baseball players in the upcoming Babe Ruth tournament in Eads. This experience proved invaluable for Sheri and me.
We Found the Lost Sand Creek Site
The Babe Ruth tournament was held in Eads, CO Thursday, July 30 – Sunday, August 2, 1970, and the Sand Creek tour was offered for the baseball players. Lamar, Las Animas and La Junta had teams in the tournament. Notable players for Lamar included Greg Harms, Harry Eisenhauer, Jr., David Vickers and John Northrup. See the picture below that shows results from the tournament.
Chuck led the tour with Sheri’s assistance. He graduated high school just a few months prior.
They provided tour guests with handouts made from the newspaper created by Chuck, Sheri, Sheri’s sister Barbara and their friend, Mary.
The location of that tour was at the bluff where the National Park Service Sand Creek site is located. The massacre story claims that Black Kettle’s village was camped below this bluff. However, no period artifacts have been found there. If that story was true, that area would be littered with bullets, cannonball shell fragments, kettle fragments, arrowheads, knives, and much more.
Fred Werner, an experienced archaeologist, meticulously searched that area multiple times in the late 80s and early 90s, and he only found modern items including barbed wire, fence staples, soda can tabs, and bailing wire. He never found a single period artifact. Another experienced archaeologist, Larry Finnell, accompanied Werner on multiple searches. Larry operated a metal detector business and found an extensive number of artifacts at the Summit Springs site near Sterling, CO. Werner wrote about his experience searching that site in his book, The Sand Creek Fight.
No bullets, no battlefield. No village artifacts, no village.
The massacre story hinges on that location under the bluff. It claims that the Indians didn’t see the soldiers approaching and had no advanced warning. George Bent, who was a Cheyenne Dog Soldier (Warrior), said that they did have an advanced warning when another warrior, Little Bear, saw the soldiers way off in the distance as a long black line, at least two miles away. See the full account in our book. This advanced warning gave the Indians time to start fleeing the village.
Since the Indians actually could see the soldiers in the distance, it means they weren’t hidden below a bluff. They were, however, camped in a place where they were lower in elevation than the soldiers were when they arrived at the ridge. The soldiers turned off the lodgepole trail en route to Sand Creek and this took them along the top of a ridge where they could be seen by the Indians. This ridge took them to the bluff where the monument sat. Even though the Indians weren’t camped there, it is still quite significant to the Sand Creek story. It’s the place where the soldiers first saw the Indian village, verified by artifacts and Irving Howbert’s account.
The village was about two miles up the creek from that bluff, per the discovery of village related artifacts Chuck and Sheri Bowen found on the Bowen family ranch. They discovered multiple tipi sites that were spread out over a few miles. George Bent said that Indians would tether their horse near their tipi, so that would require extra space (Bent to Hyde 12-21-1905). He also said their villages were two to three miles long (Bent to Hyde 5-3-1906). There were very few battle related artifacts found in the village as most of the Indians fled. Most battle related artifacts were found above the village. Detailed maps of artifacts found at the Lost Sand Creek Site are in our book, We Found the Lost Sand Creek Site.
The artifacts tell a very different story than the massacre claim. The artifacts clearly show there was a running battle. They were found scattered over several miles in multiple directions and not in a small clustered area. Most of the artifacts were about two to three inches deep. It is hard to defend a story that is at odds with the physical evidence. We’re always told to trust the science. Why aren’t we told to trust the science with Sand Creek? Trusting the science is always pushed unless it doesn’t help the narrative. Artifacts do not lie. They provide us the clarity to better understand where events took place at the Sand Creek event. Many running battle locations were found and some were found miles up the creek from the village site. If the soldiers truly snuck up on the Indians, there’s no way they could get miles up the creek. They wouldn’t get up the creek very far at all. The massacre story claims the Indians were killed as they came out of their tipis. The artifacts show that didn’t happen—they show multiple areas of skirmishes or running battle locations.
We’re certainly not defending a massacre against defenseless women and children—we’re debunking it. The massacre story is based on oral history which cannot be verified. The running battle story by Irving Howbert and other soldiers is verified by the physical evidence.
For anyone wondering why we don’t use the massacre moniker when discussing Sand Creek, it’s because of the physical evidence and most that were there didn’t call it one or were conflicted on what to call it. That was the case with George Bent. In the letters he wrote to historians about his Cheyenne life and time at Sand Creek, he referred to Sand Creek as a battle more than he called it a massacre. The artifacts reveal a fight between warriors and soldiers.
The massacre story needs that bluff for a dramatic backdrop, but this isn’t a movie—it’s real life. The story is intended to tug at the heartstrings and create an emotional reaction. We shouldn’t allow emotions to cloud our minds from truth.
We need to preserve accurate history. When it’s not preserved, it’s not taught honestly. We don’t have a dog in this fight. We’re about telling the truth.
Learn more in our book. Click the Buy the Book tab at the top right of the page.
Let’s pursue truth and share the truth. Truth wins.
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