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Original 4.25 x 6.5 cabinet photo of Crow King, also known as Medicine Bag That Burns, in a stoic, front-facing pose, wearing a bone hairpipe breastplate beneath a U.S. Army–issue coat, with a single feather in his hair, taken circa 1880 by David Francis Barry, a pioneering photographer of the American West. Identified on the mount in ink, "Crow King," and further annotated on the reverse, "Little Big Horn Veteran." Also stamped on the reverse in ink, "D. F. Barry, Photographer." In fine condition, with very slight fading and soiling.
Crow King, a Hunkpapa Sioux war chief, was a prominent leader during the Battle of the Little Bighorn and one of Sitting Bull’s principal war chiefs. He played a decisive role in the fighting, helping drive Reno’s troops out of the valley and across the river before leading approximately eighty warriors in a sustained assault against Custer’s forces on Calhoun Hill and Finley Ridge. Attacking from the south throughout the battle, Crow King and his band contributed to the encirclement of the 7th Cavalry alongside leaders such as Crazy Horse and Gall. Two of his brothers were killed in the conflict.
Following the battle, he remained a key figure within Sitting Bull’s circle, serving as a band chief during the Lakota exile in Canada from 1877 to 1880. He ultimately surrendered at Fort Buford in the Dakota Territory in the autumn of 1880, when this portrait was taken.
The Western Americana auction of Jochen Zeitz.
