Gloria Hazell-Derby
I have been asked to tell my Story, and so today I will do so. It is long so part will be here and part will be on a separate web page.

I am English, I first came to America in 1981 with my, then, husband and 4 children. This is a long story that surpasses 35+ years.

My ex taught computer languages at a college in NJ, and his students often came round for extra tuition and one day a young student gave me a book and said 'I think you should have this.' The book was Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee, that book changed my life in ways I could never have imagined.

Reading through the book in the next few weeks I became, as most of you probably have if you have read it, sad, angry, completely insensed and confused as to how anyone could treat other human beings, as the Natives of America had been treated through the years. One thing that most of you probably wouldn't have felt though was recognition of a photo in that book, not just of the photo but of the person themselves. That photo took me around to many reservations during the following years. That photo was of Wambditanka, Big Eagle, a sub chief in 1862, who was imprisoned in Davenport in 1862 for 2 years.

As we lived near to Princeton back then I went to the library at the Uni a few times to check out the history of the 1862 Dakota Uprising as it was called back then, and so much rang true with me and I had no idea why. Of course there really wasn't a lot to read as the history is sort of kept quiet. (As you probably know). So every time my husband had a few days off work we would travel out west, searching for history. We went to Santee, Lower Sioux and Upper Sioux, Flandreau, Sisseton, Crow Creek, Lower Brule, and of course Pipestone.

In Santee I met a wonderful elder, who said he was a 'handsome Isante', I said he was and we got on fine. He had to have been in his 90's, he had a great sense of humor and he remembered. I wish I had met him a bit later down the line because at that time I was not used to the Dakota accent, and so probably lost a lot of what he said because he spoke and laughed at the same time, I can see heads nodding! I never recorded anything, just took notes and wished later that I had used a recording device. However it was a start Big Eagle had been sent to Santee after his prison time was up.

In Flandreau I found the book 'Mary and Me' and a museum who allowed me to look through old documents, and I found Big Eagle again. He had been one of the Dakota from Santee who started the Rez in Flandreau. As I said this all happened after he was released from Davenport. So I had to back track. I went to the Lower Sioux and immediately felt I knew the area, it was like coming home. I went to where the 'Uprising' began, and could hear voices in a field however there was no-one there. I found out later that was where the Dakota had got together before they attacked the town. For ages (I mean years) I couldn't go into the warehouse there that is still standing. It scared me. When I did eventually go in, it was OK, but by then I knew the story.

Continued HERE