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…showed last 75 words of 1574 total…died. An Indian may well have fired the first shot, but the battle soon turned into a one-sided massacre, as the white soldiers turned their new machine guns on the Indians and mowed them down. The Allotment Act of 1887 or Dawes Act, was legislation that converted communally owned Indian reservation lands into individually owned parcels. Excess acreage was sold to white settlers. Enactment contributed to the further decline of tribal populations, traditions, and well being.