LaPointe has described this lineage publicly without providing an exhaustive family tree — he is appropriately protective of family details that belong to the family. The Smithsonian’s research verified the lineage through documentation rather than through LaPointe’s public disclosures.
The question of whether LaPointe is the “only” or “closest” descendant is one that the 2021 study’s published accounts have addressed carefully. LaPointe is described as the closest living lineal descendant — a specific legal determination made under the National Museum of the American Indian Act — but “closest living lineal descendant” does not mean “only descendant.” His sisters — Marlene Little Spotted Horse Andersen, Ethel Little Spotted Horse Bates, and Lydia Little Spotted Horse Red Paint — share the same relationship.
LaPointe has also noted that Sitting Bull’s descendants, broadly understood, are more numerous than the small group of siblings who have been the focus of the repatriation proceedings. The specific legal category of “closest living lineal descendant” governs which family members have the primary legal standing to make repatriation decisions and to control access to Sitting Bull’s genetic material — but it does not mean that the extended family ends with LaPointe and his sisters.
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## The 1953 Exhumation: A Contested and Unresolved History
The history of what happened to Sitting Bull’s remains after his burial at Fort Yates in 1890 is one of the more tangled and contested episodes in a story full of contested episodes.
For more than sixty years, Sitting Bull lay buried in a military cemetery at Fort Yates on the Standing Rock Agency grounds in North Dakota. The burial site was not well maintained. Other graves from the same cemetery were moved over the decades as the Army reduced its presence in the region. By the early 1950s, Sitting Bull’s grave had become neglected.