Piegan of the Blackfoot Tribe

The Piegan Indians are one of the three major Blackfeet tribes -- the Blood, the Blackeet, and the Piegan. Ancestral Homeland: Southern Alberta near Calgary; and near Browning, Montana

Brief Timeline

 * 1700: tribal enemies were the Shoshone or Snake
 * The Piegan forced the Flathead and Kootenai west of the Rockies
 * 1750: French traders came in contact with the tribe, traders at Cumberland House, in 1774 traders from Buckingham House of the Hudson's Bay Company in 1780
 * 1780-81: Smallpox epidemic
 * 1821: Fort Benton constructed
 * 1837 and 1869-1870: Smallpox epidemics
 * 1851: Treaty of Fort Laramie
 * 1855: Treaty with the Blackfeet Nation - Lame Bull's Treaty
 * 1870: January 22, Piegan village attacked by U.S. cavalry, killing 174
 * 1873: July 5, Blackfeet reservation established and divided in thirds- Fort Belknap Reservation, Blackfeet Reservation and________
 * 1883: rations short and many die at Fort Shaw and Fort Belknap
 * 1883-1884: about a fourth of Piegan starved to death.

Brief History
The population of the Piegan Tribe in 1800 was about 3,000. In 1996, it was approcimately 18,000.

Additional References to the History of the Tribe

 * Frederick Webb Hodge, in his Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, gave a more complete history of the Piegan tribe, with estimations of the population of the tribe at various time periods.

Treaty

 * 1855 Treaty with the Blackfeet

Important Web Sites

 * Piegan Blackfeet Tribe Wikipedia