Iron Shell

Iron Shell
Thukíha Máza
Iron Shell (image copyright 1900)
Brulé Sioux leader
Personal details
Bornc. 1816
Died1896
ChildrenHollow Horn Bear
ParentSicangu Chief Bull Tail

Iron Shell (Lakota: Thukíha Máza; c. 1816 – 1896) was a Brulé Sioux chief. He initially became prominent after an 1843 raid on the Pawnee, and became sub-chief of the Brulé under Little Thunder.[1] He became chief of the Brulé Orphan Band during the Powder River War of 1866-1868.

After the Sioux broke the United States wagon train of gold payments for the civil war, he signed the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, and settled within the Great Sioux Reservation. He lived the remainder of his life on what is now known as the Rosebud Indian Reservation. (The Great Sioux Reservation was broken up by the US in 1889, and divided among five smaller reservations.) Hollow Horn Bear was the son of Iron Shell.

  1. ^ Bettelyoun, Susan Bordeaux, and Waggoner, Josephine (1998). With My Own Eyes: A Lakota Woman Tells Her People's History, p. 154. University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 0-8032-6164-0.