Post by Spirit of the Owl Woman on Dec 16, 2008 17:15:26 GMT -5
Wedding Dresses
Wincincala First Communion
THE GAGE AND TRAVERSIE WEDDING DRESSES
From Timberlake Historical Society
The story of the wedding dresses and most of the other items in this display begins in 1873 when Charles. H. Gage married Wi~cih~ca~la (pronounced Wincincala, meaning Pretty Girl). At that time Charles Gage was a young post trader at Fort Bennett on the southeast corner of the reservation set aside for the Sans Arc, Two Kettles, Minnekoujou and Blackfoot bands of Lakota.
According to their daughter, the late Fannie LaPlante, Wi~cih~ca~la was 14 years old when Charles asked for their daughter. The arrangements must have been made by Wi~cih~ca~la’s uncle, The Leaf, who accepted a horse and outfit along with some grub money for the hand of the young girl. After they were married Mr. Gage took her to his “good home” to live.
Wi~cih~ca~la’s parents are believed to have been Broken Leg and Bracelets. Wi~cih~ca~la had a sister who may have been her twin who was later known by Wi~cih~ca~la’s children as Blind Grandma and a brother, Medicine Horse, who ended up on the Pine Ridge Reservation.
Charles Gage was born in New York City in 1847. He enlisted in the army on July 23, 1868. Records show that he was discharged the following year. By 1870 he was working as a post trader at Fort Randall in Dakota Territory. He went on to be postmaster at White Swan on the Rosebud reservation. While there he met and married an Indian girl named White Face Woman. They had one child, a girl named Harriet Marion Gage, born on February 22, 1872. While at White Swan, Gage received notice that he had been appointed to be the postmaster at Cheyenne Agency (Fort Bennett).
When Wi~cih~ca~la went to live with Charles she became known as Mary or simply Mrs. Gage. According to Fannie, her father employed a Negro woman as housekeeper. “This woman taught Mom how to cook and survive all other things,” wrote Fannie.
Wi~cih~ca~la’s first child, a son named Parker Gage, was born on December 18, 1873. Their first daughter, Anna Catherine, was born on April 18, 1875.
According to Dennis Moran, by the time she was 18 Wi~cih~ca~la had two children and was handling customers and trade at her husband’s store. Moran referred to her as “Mrs. Gage” in his account of those years.
In the spring of 1877 Charles Gage and Dennis Moran and others were sent up river by steamboat to establish a trading post near where the Custer fight had occurred in Montana. The steamboat took them up the Missouri River and down the Yellowstone River and as far as the mouth of Porcupine Creek on the Powder River.
A second daughter Fannie was born on August 12, 1877 while the family was at that location on the Crow Agency.
According to Fannie’s account, her father did not like the conditions in Montana and arranged to send his wife and three children back to Fort Bennett. He hired four white men to accompany his family. Their mode of transportation was a flat boat.
Charles and some Indian scouts came overland on horseback. They arrived about two months later. The Negro servant woman was waiting for them at the little cottage when they returned.
According to Fannie, her father put up a store and bought a hotel at Fort Sully, not far from Fort Bennett, where they all moved to in 1879.
In August of 1879, Charles Gage was killed in runaway horse accident. According to published accounts of the accident, he courageously saved the two children who were with him at the time before he was trampled and dragged to death. Wi~cih~ca~la had just turned 21.
Mrs. Gage and her children continued to live at their “homestead” on the Little Cheyenne River across the river from the agency for several years.
At that point Wi~cih~ca~la married “The Irishman” Richard Dunn and according to Fannie sold the “homestead” and moved onto the reservation.
She and Richard Dunn had a son, Ambrose “Smokey” Dunn, born in 1887. The marriage certificates and first born in union certificate indicate that Wi~cih~ca~la (Annie) and Richard Dunn were married in the church on September 14, 1891.
The wedding dresses that are on display, along with most of the other items in this display, belonged to descendants of Charles Gage and Wi~cih~ca~la. They help tell the story of their family and the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation.
In 1895 Anna Gage married Andrew Traversie, the oldest son of Paul Traversie and Mary Bruguier. Paul’s father and mother were Augustus Traversie and Felicette Scar Arm (Picotte) DuSant. Mary’s parents were Theophile Bruguier and Blazing Star (Fires The Cloud Woman) War Eagle.
In 1897 Parker Gage married Amelia Rose Traversie, the daughter of Ambrose “Gus” Traversie and Catherine Mary Benoist. Ambrose was Paul’s brother.
In 1895 Fannie married Charles “Charlie” LaPlante, the son of Louis LaPlante, Sr. and Nancy Garreau.
The above information was taken from a short history of her folks written by Fannie LaPlante late in her life and a biography of Charles H. Gage compiled by his great-grandson, Arlon B. Gage, in 2000.
