Throughout history people have inhabited the shores of the Missouri River. Earth lodge villages of Arikara tribes lined the bluffs along the river in this area in the 18^th century. The Arikara were gradually displaced by the more nomadic Lakota people. It is this mix of Arikara villages and Lakota encampments that the Lewis and Clark expedition encountered upon reaching this region on September 19^th, 1804. Their journals are filled with vivid descriptions of the area and its inhabitants.

During the first part of the 19^th century, the history of this area was one of exploration and trading by European traders and explorers. Trading posts and military forts were soon established as non-Indian people began arriving by steamboat up the Missouri River.

In 1863 the United States government established Fort Thompson eight miles upstream of the small tributary stream called Crow Creek. Fort Thompson was one of several military forts built in this region at that time. Fort Thompson was named for Clark W. Thompson, the fort’s first superintendent. Fort Thompson also served as the headquarters for the Crow Creek Agency. The Crow Creek Agency was created as a “repository” for American Indians in the aftermath of the Dakota-United States Conflict of 1862 in the neighboring State of Minnesota.

During the Dakota-United States Conflict of 1862, hundreds of Minnesota settlers were killed and homes destroyed during an uprising by certain bands of Dakotas. Much can be said and has been written about the circumstances and cause of the conflict that won’t attempt to be addressed here. The end result however was the hanging of 38 Dakotas and the imprisonment and subsequent extradition of all American Indians within the State of Minnesota, whether they had any involvement in the uprising or not. The Santee Dakota prisoners were sent to a prison camp and eventually to forced internment at the newly created Crow Creek Agency at Fort Thompson. 

A dedicated Christian missionary, Mr. John P. Williamson accompanied the Santee Dakotas on their steamboat trip up the Missouri River to the Crow Creek Agency. Mr. Williamson gave this account of the trip, “As they look on their native hills for the last time, a dark cloud is crushing their hearts.  Down they go to St. Louis thence up the Missouri to Crow Creek.  But this brings little relief… The shock, the anxiety, the confinement, the pitiable diet, were naturally followed by sickness…Thirteen hundred Indians were crowded like slaves on the boiler and hurricane decks of a single boat, and fed musty hardtack and briny pork, which they had not half a chance to cook, diseases were bred which made a fearful havoc during the hot months, and the thirteen hundred souls that were landed at Crow Creek on June 1^st, 1863, decreased to one thousand.”

This marked the beginning of three years of great suffering at Fort Thompson. Mr. Williamson further recorded,” For a time a teepee where no one was sick could scarcely be found, and it was a rare day when there was no funeral.  So were the hills soon covered with graves. The very memory of Crow Creek became horrible to the Santee’s, who still hush their voice at the mention of the name.”

(The out of print book, “John P. Williamson, Brother of the Sioux”, is an excellent historical book about this time period.  Mr. Williamson was used in a very powerful way to save the lives of thousands of Dakotas during this time period. He and his family were also significant in the creation of a written Dakota language, the writing of many of the Dakota language hymns that we still sing every week, and the spreading of the Gospel among the Dakota people. He left a legacy of great Christian revival among the Dakotas of eastern South Dakota, and his example of dedicated service and love is still noted and honored among Dakota Christians today.)

Winnebagos from Minnesota were also moved to the Crow Creek agency at this time. During these early years other bands of Dakota including Brules, Two Kettles, Yanktons, and Yanktonais joined the Santees at the Crow Creek Agency. After three horrific years of suffering the Winnebagos and most of the Santee Dakotas were relocated to reservations further downstream to what is now northeastern Nebraska. Later the Brules and some other tribes were resettled on what is now the Lower Brule Reservation. What remained on what would become the Crow Creek Sioux Reservation were several various bands of Dakotas.  The last band to settle at the Crow Creek Agency was a group of Yanktonai Dakota led by their Chief, Drifting Goose. Drifting Goose and his people migrated off and on to the reservation for many years, until finally reluctantly resigning themselves to the Crow Creek Agency in 1883.

Over the coming decades many hardships confronted those on the Crow Creek Sioux Reservation. Broken treaties, diminished reservation borders, encroachment by non-Indian homesteaders, introduction of alcohol, and general loss of an entire way of life, are a few of the tragic events. Eventually the federal government would construct a series of large hydropower and flood control dams on the Missouri River, including Big Bend Dam at Fort Thompson. The result of the dam construction was the flooding and loss of the only well wooded areas on the reservation, the lush Missouri River shoreline. Even the community of Fort Thompson was moved from its original location to higher plains north of the old town site.

Much rich history is associated with this area and the people who live here. What is written here only “scratches the surface”.  If you are interested in more information on the history of the area, please contact us.  We try to collect any historical information as we come across it, and will happily pass it on.