A geneticist who wished to prove a man was a famed Native American tribal leader's great-grandson was asked to attend a séance to seek permission from the late chief's spirit to test a lock of hair.
In an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com, Danish evolutionary geneticist Eske Willerslev, the man who confirmed the relationship, says he was asked by Ernie LaPointe, 73, to test a lock of Sitting Bull's hair, but not before LaPointe insisted he take part in a Native American ritual to verify his intentions.
'I told [Willerslev] to come to my home on December 15, 2007 when we will hold a ceremony,' LaPointe told DailyMail.com during a phone interview, referring to a conversation he had with the Dutch geneticist.
'We need to find out if your intentions are noble and then you can ask Sitting Bull yourself.'
The ceremony took place in LaPointe's South Dakota basement and involved a medicine man, drummers and singers who conjured up the spirit of the late chief of the Lakota tribe.
The medicine man sat in the middle of a circle with Sitting Bull's lock of hair and wool leggings and began shaking a rattle-like instrument in the pitch-black room.
LaPointe said he told Sitting Bull's spirit that Willerslev wanted to use the items to perform a DNA test to prove their lineage.
'I tried to explain it is another way of connecting myself and my sisters to him,' he said.
'He told me 'If I told people you are my grandson that is all they need to know,' but his spirit allowed Willerslev to conduct the testing.'
While this was happening, a blue, green light appeared in the middle of the room that startled the Dutch geneticist.
'The light started moving around the room and it came to me and moved all around my body,' Willerslev told DailyMail.com over the phone.
'I am a natural scientist, so I thought it was the medicine man running around with a light.
'It struck my face and then disappeared. After the ceremony I asked Ernie what the light was and he told me it was Sitting Bull's spirit.'
The medicine man told Willerslev that Sitting Bull said for him to take three inches of the hair and LaPointe must burn the rest.
'I have known about my ancestors through my mother who would tell me stories about them when I was four or five years old,' said LaPointe.
'I knew Sitting Bull was my great-grandfather, but I never thought anything about him being famous. When I began telling my story, 99 percent of historians and professors didn't believe me.'
Science may have confirmed that Ernie LaPointe (pictured), 73, is Sitting Bull's great-grandson, but the famed Native American leader of the Lakota tribe may have returned from the grave to help prove the point
DailyMail.com can not independently verify the claims of lights at the ceremony, as no footage or pictures were taken. However, DailyMail.com spoke to LaPointe and Willerslev separately and their stories matched.
LaPointe was confirmed to be the late chief's great-grandson last month, but the journey began when Willerslev started work on the lock of hair shortly after the 2007 ceremony.
First, a thick layer of arsenic – a common way to preserve such artifacts – had to be removed from Sitting Bull's black hair that was still in a braid from when it.
'When you looked at [the lock of hair], it looked like it was just cut from his head,' LaPointe said after the arsenic was removed from the artifact.
In an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com, Danish evolutionary geneticist Eske Willerslev (pictured), the man who confirmed the relationship, asked LaPointe to perform DNA testing on a lock of Sitting Bull's hair, but not before LaPointe insisted he take part in a Native American ritual to verify his intentions
LaPointe was part of a DNA study that extracted DNA from a lock of Sitting Bull's hair and matched it to that from his modern-day relative
LaPointe was given a pair of wool leggings (pictured) that belonged to Sitting Bull. He hopes to return the clothing back to his great-grandfather's remains
'Eske [Willerslev] had to remove the arsenic and then wait for technology to improve before he was able to extract all the DNA out.'
However, the piece of hair was so small that it was nearly impossible to extract enough DNA for an analysis.
Only a Y chromosome could be taken from the hair, which is passed from the father to the son.
Sitting Bull's son, Crow Foot, was killed alongside his father on December 15, 1890 and only his daughters had children.
Eventually, Willerslev and his team were able to extract autosomal DNA, which contains the segments of DNA the person shares with everyone to whom they are related, from Sitting Bull's hair.
Half of a person's autosomal DNA is inherited from their father
