The Great Sioux War recounts the conflict of 1876–1877 between the United States and Lakota and Northern Cheyenne communities defending the Black Hills and surrounding country. It explains the breakdown of treaty protections after the discovery of gold and the federal demand that non-reservation bands report to agencies.
The book follows the campaigns of Crook, Terry and Gibbon, the battle of the Little Bighorn and the winter pressure that forced many groups to surrender. It places the famous battlefield within a wider war over land, subsistence and sovereignty.
