Major General John Pope to Abraham Lincoln, November 11, 1862

SAINT PAUL, MINN., November 11, 1862.

His Excellency ABRAHAM LINCOLN,

President of the United States:

Your dispatch of yesterday received. Will comply with your wishes immediately. I desire to represent to you that the only distinction between the culprits is as to which of them murdered most people or violated most young girls. All of them are guilty of these things in more or less degree. The people of this State, most of whom had relations or connections thus barbarously murdered and brutally outraged are exasperated to the last degree, and if the guilty are not all executed I think it nearly impossible to prevent the indiscriminate massacre of all the Indians – old men, women, and children. The soldiers guarding them are from this State and equally connected and equally incensed with the citizens. It is to be noted that these horrible outrages were not committed by wild Indians, whose excuse might be found in ignorance and barbarism, but by Indians who have for years been paid annuities by Government, and who committed those horrible crimes upon people among whom they had lived for years in constant and intimate intercourse, at whose houses they had slept, and at whose tables they had been fed. There are 1,500 women and children and innocent old men prisoners, besides those condemned, and I fear that so soon as it is known that the criminals are not at once to be executed that there will be an indiscriminate massacre of the whole. The troops are entirely new and raw, and are in full sympathy with the people on this subject. I will do the best I can, but fear a terrible result. The poor women and young girls are distributed about among the towns bearing the marks of the terrible outrages committed upon them, while daily there are funerals of those massacred men, women, and children whose bodies are being daily found. These things influence the public mind to a fearful degree, and your action has been awaited with repressed impatience. I do not suggest any procedure to you, but it is certain that the criminals condemned ought in every view to be at once executed without exception. The effect of letting them off from punishment will be exceedingly bad upon all other Indians upon the frontier, as they will attribute it to fear and not to mercy. I should be glad if you would advise me by telegraph of your decision, as the weather is growing very cold and immediate steps must be taken to put all in quarters.

 JNO. POPE,

Major-General.

SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series I, Volume 13 (Serial No. 19), p. 788