Spotted Eagle (Womblee Gleska)
aka Two Eagle

This carved emu egg honors the Sans Arc Lakota (Sioux) war chief known as Spotted Eagle. 

Spotted Eagle was a supporter of Sitting Bull  and joined him in defending the last of their lands. He joined Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull in the 1872 Battle of Arrow Creek.  He and Fast Bear/Circle Bear led the Sans Arc Lakota at Little Big Horn.  After the battle, he entered Canada with Sitting Bull, who hopped to bring their lost cause before the English government.  On May 7, 1897  Northwest Mounted Police, led by Major James M. Walsh, approached the camp near Pinto Horse Butte, 280 miles north of the Little Bighorn.   They were met by Spotted Eagle, who remarked that they were the first white men to dare approach Sitting Bull's camp so unconcernedly.  During the following meeting, Walsh asked why they had come to Canada.  Spotted Eagle said they had been forced to cross the medicine line to protect their women and children from the Long Knives. 

He and a small group of his once large tribe eventually wound up at the Cheyenne River Agency, near the Cherry Creek and Cheyenne River.  We do not know when he died or even his age, but he is listed as a chief in 1926 at the Cheyenne River Agency.

One item that has survived the time is a war club owned by Chief Spotted Eagle.  It is currently in the Keppler Collection but on lone to the National Museum of the American Indian.  The war club is 50.5  inches long and 9 inches wide.  The sides are decorated with brass tacks and 3 government issue knives inserted at one end made it an even more formidable weapon.