Federal officials said Wednesday that a National Park Service historic site memorializing the more than 200 Native Americans killed by U.S. troops in Colorado 158 years ago would significantly expand.
Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced that the Sand Creek Massacre Historical Site would expand an additional 3,478 acres.
She added that it'd provide people opportunities to learn about the massacre of Cheyenne and Arapaho in November 1864 by a volunteer U.S. Cavalry regiment, the Associated Press reported.
“It is our solemn responsibility at the Department of the Interior, as caretakers of America’s national treasures, to tell the story of our nation," Haaland said in a news release. "The events that took place here forever changed the course of the Northern Cheyenne, Northern Arapaho, and Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes. We will never forget the hundreds of lives that were brutally taken here – men, women, and children murdered in an unprovoked attack. Stories like the Sand Creek Massacre are not easy to tell, but it is my duty – our duty – to ensure that they are told. This story is part of America’s story.”
Located near Eads, Colorado, the historic site commemorates the Nov. 29, 1864, attack when the troops came onto the sleeping encampment of 750 Native Americans along Sand Creek and killed more than 230 Cheyenne and Arapaho, most of them women, children, and the elderly.
According to the Associated Press, the attack was ostensibly retaliated against Native American raids on white settlers.
The site was established in 2007.