Inhumanity of man against man is hard to believe

DL: When the Dakota families were marched either through or around New Ulm in route to Fort Snelling, they have stories as well, about having boiling hot water thrown on them, bricks thrown at them. Some of them died because of the violence of the settlers. They might step forward and say those acts were unforgiveable. So where does that leave us? You telling us that what they did against the settlers was unforgiveable and standing up and saying what you did against women and children, who were forcibly marched and had nothing to do with this war, that’s what was unforgivable. So where does that leave us today?

GG: It goes back to what I’ve said three times already. That inhumanity of man against man is hard to believe. I think the evidence supports the fact that the Indians did not come through New Ulm, that they came around New Ulm. That the women and the other settlers who knew they were passing by went out and threw things at them. I doubt boiling water, but that’s possible. Threw things at them and hurt them and may have killed a couple, that is entirely possible. I am inclined to believe it. The timing was bad here because it just so happened that on the very day that they passed by, New Ulm was digging up the dead that had been buried here on Minnesota Street. So I’d be one of the last ones to say that if I’d been there that I would have stayed home. I wouldn’t have stayed home.