Bloody Hand

By: Matt Braun

Narrated by: Alex Boyles

He found a people who needed his courage.

Born a slave, Jim Beckwith forged his own path to freedom as a mountain man. But when a wealthy trading company owner offered to pay him to live among the Crow Indians, Beckwith accepted the deal - and discovered another way of life that changed him forever.

He fought a battle that had to be won.

Here in the Wind River Mountains, amidst blood feuds and blood brothers, he became Bloody Hand, a man sworn to take a hundred scalps - and destined to become the People’s greatest warrior - in a life-or-death struggle that shaped the fate of a nation.

©1975 Matthew Braun (P)2020 Blackstone Publishing

It was the way!

Jim Beckwith, mulatto, mountain man, and Crow warrior. The year is roughly in the 1830s. The Rocky Mountain fur trade was past its height and trappers were warned to avoid entering into Crow lands. Willaim Ashley, who hired trapper brigades, made a compact with Beckwith to educate the Crows and bring them to the next rendezvous. Accepting the agreement, Beckwith made his way to the Crow camp with a plan to integrate himself into their culture. In the following months, Beckwith gained recognition as a fierce and cunning warrior, to the point where Strikes Both Ways adopted the black man as his grandson. As his reputation grew, he became known as Bloody Hand, in that he had killed an enemy with his bare hands. The people of the Crow Nation call themselves the Apsáalooke: Children of the Large Beaked Bird, also spelled Absaroka. Their historical homelands extended across a large area that included parts of present-day Montana, Wyoming, and South Dakota. The Hidatsa-Crow originally lived in the Ohio country, migrating through northern Illinois, western Minnesota, and into the Red River Valley. In this tale, they call themselves the Sparrow Hawk people of the Absaroka. At the rendezvous, things did not go as Ashley had planned. Jim Beckwith was no longer a subject to be ordered around. Beckwith or Bloody Hand, contracted a new deal with Ashley, benefiting both himself and the Sparrow Hawk people. Afterward, he and the Dog Soldiers who accompanied him rode for home. With some difficulty, Bloody Hand fulfilled his contract with Ashley, at once feeling free of the man. Bloody Hand continued his rise in dominance and recognition but like all good things, must come to an end. One battle too many sent Bloody Hand and a small group of Dog Soldiers away from the People and onto a course of vengeance. I enjoyed this story very much. The Beckwith character was quite believable if you accept the notion that his medicine protected him. The culture of the Crow people and the warring between tribes was very interesting. Sweetwater was a gem of a girl and Pine Leaf was a hoot. I’ll keep an eye out for more tales by this author.

Not sure where the author obtained his history, bu

The author very obviously used "Hollywood History" when describing nearly all animal behavior and Native American customs. It is pretty annoying to listen to / read passages that are so blatantly wrong, but have come to be accepted as truths because of movies, etc.(ie, camp dogs were notoriously bad alarms once they were asleep, carnivores only take down the weak and sick, etc) I know these are minor points of issue and do not impact the plot, but they are a distraction.
A HUGE distraction is how the author CONSTANTLY refers to the main character as "the black man" instead of his names! I'm not a politically correct person, but "the black man" is used at over three times the rate as the character's actual name - the title of this book!
Don't even get me started on the "romance" or "sex" scenes in this book! Sophmoric at best - clumsily written, completely unnecessary where they were included.
The overall storyline

and writing style (aside from the previously addressed issues) were pretty good. Probably well above average for today's western genre.