The Battle of Sugar Point

On this point along Leech Lake, on the fifth and sixth of October, eighteen ninety-eight, the United States Army fought what many historians call the last battle between Native Americans and federal troops. It began with an attempt to arrest a Pillager Ojibwe man named Bugonaygeshig, known as Hole in the Day, over a liquor dispute and years of broken timber payments and contested logging on the reservation. When soldiers of the Third Infantry came ashore, a recruit accidentally fired his rifle.

Ojibwe men watching from the trees and brush opened fire in return. Six soldiers died, including Major Melville Wilkinson, along with an Indian policeman. Not a single Ojibwe fighter was killed.

No formal treaty followed. The dispute that sparked it all simply faded, leaving this quiet shoreline as the site of an ending few people noticed at the time.