in 1889, porcupine undertook a long journey to visit wovoka in nevada. wovoka was the prophet of the new ghost dance religion. porcupine believed that wovoka was the messiah who would save the indians and rid the continent of the white men. porcupine returned to preach the new religion to the cheyennes and began baptising converts into his church. the ghost dance spread throughout the plains tribes. the u.s. army suppressed the ghost dance because of settler concerns that it would lead to a new indian uprising. while the cheyenne did not suffer tragedy on the scale of the sioux at wounded knee, porcupine could only perform the dance in secret from 1890 onwards. in 1900 he was imprisoned for attempting to revive the religion.