There are a number of accounts dealing with the actual story of Chief Joseph and his people. O'Dell draws heavily upon these sources and stays close to them. Essential to the book's existence are two eyewitness accounts compiled by Lucullus V. McWhorter: Yellow Wolf: His Own Story (the recollections of Chief Joseph's nephew) and Hear Me, My Chiefs! (based on eyewitness accounts on both sides) as well as Chief Joseph's Own Story (1925), which he told on his trip to Washington D.C.

The story of Chief Joseph is only one of many cases of fatal confrontations between the U.S. Army and the Indians. The prototype is probably Custer's Battle at the Little Bighorn, which has been the subject of several often conflicting accounts, including Evan S. Connell's Son of the Morning Star (1984), a highly colored retelling by his wife, and the massacre at Wounded...