Battle of Sugar Point

Battle of Sugar Point
Part of the American Indian Wars
Ojibways in a canoe on Leech Lake, 1896.
Date October 5, 1898 Location Leech Lake, Minnesota Result Chippewa victory
Belligerents
Chippewa	United States
Commanders and leaders
Bugonaygeshig	John M. Bacon Melville C. Wilkinson †
Strength
19	80
Casualties and losses
none	7 killed {including 1 Indian Policeman shot by mistake} 14 wounded

The Battle of Sugar Point, or the Battle of Leech Lake, was fought on October 5, 1898 between the 3rd U.S. Infantry and members of the Pillager Band of Chippewa Indians in a failed attempt to apprehend Pillager Ojibwe Bugonaygeshig ("Old Bug" or "Hole-In-The-Day"), as the result of a dispute with Indian Service officials on the Leech Lake Reservation in Cass County, Minnesota.

Often referred to as "the last Indian Uprising in the United States", the engagement was also the first battle to be fought in the area of the United States known as the Old Northwest since the Black Hawk War in 1832. It is sometimes considered to be the last battle fought between Native Americans and the U.S. Army.

The last Medal of Honor issued during the Indian Wars was awarded to Private Oscar Burkard of the 3rd US Infantry Regiment.

The main issue between the Pillagers and Indian Service officials was the frequent arrest of tribal members on minor charges and transporting them to federal courts far from the reservation for trial. Frequently, these charges involved the sale and consumption of alcohol on the reservation, banned by federal law. Witnesses to criminal acts were also transported.

Harvesting of dead-and-down timber by local logging companies also caused considerable resentment. Although the logging companies paid for the timber they harvested, the value was often underestimated and payments were frequently late. In addition, some unscrupulous loggers purposely set fire to healthy trees in order to damage them and pass them off as dead timber.

A Pillager, Bugonaygeshig, was among those protesting the business practices of the logging companies on the reservation in early 1898. However, when he and Sha-Boon-Day-Shkong traveled to the nearby Indian village of Onigum on September 15, they were seized by U.S. Deputy Marshal Robert Morrison and U.S. Indian Agent Arthur M. Tinker as witnesses to a bootlegging operation and were going to be transported to Duluth (Bugonaygeshig had previously testified at another bootlegging trial in the port city on Lake Superior five months earlier). As the two were being led away, several Pillagers attacked Morrison and Tinker allowing Bugonaygeshig and Sha-Boon-Day-Shkong to escape custody and return to their homes on Sugar Point.

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