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PREFACE
PREFACE
The writing of history requires three operations: (I) The collection of facts; (II) The classification and arrangement of facts; (III) The presentation and discussion of facts. I have collected the facts related in this book from every source open to me. These sources may be divided into two groups: (1) Published and (2) unpublished, matter. The published matter includes (a) official records; (b) books, and (c) magazine or other ephemeral articles. The unpublished matter includes (a) letters and
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PREFACE
PREFACE
It will be noticed that this book differs from others of the American Fights and Fighters Series , and especially its immediate predecessor, “Indian Fights and Fighters,” in that I am not the author of all or most of it. In response to a request for contributions from participants in the Modoc and Nez Percé wars, numerous papers were submitted, all of such high value, not only from an historic but from a literary point of view as well, that I had not the presumption to rewrite them myself—not ev
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CHAPTER ONE The Powder River Expedition
CHAPTER ONE The Powder River Expedition
Since the United States began to be there never was such a post as Fort Philip Kearney, commonly called Fort Phil Kearney. [3] From its establishment, in 1866, to its abandonment, some two years later, it was practically in a state of siege. I do not mean that it was beleaguered by the Indians in any formal, persistent investment, but it was so constantly and so closely observed by war parties, hidden in the adjacent woods and the mountain passes, that there was little safety outside its stockad
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CHAPTER TWO The Tragedy of Fort Phil Kearney
CHAPTER TWO The Tragedy of Fort Phil Kearney
To summarize the first six months of fighting, from the first of August to the close of the year, the Indians killed one hundred and fifty-four persons, including soldiers and citizens, wounded twenty more, and captured nearly seven hundred animals—cattle, mules, and horses. There were fifty-one demonstrations in force in front of the fort, and they attacked every train that passed over the trail. As the fort was still far from completion, the logging operations were continued until mid-winter.
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CHAPTER THREE The Thirty-two Against the Three Thousand
CHAPTER THREE The Thirty-two Against the Three Thousand
Red cloud, who had been one of the subchiefs of the Sioux, gained so much prestige by the defeat and slaughter of Fetterman’s men that he became at once the leading war chief of the nation. [16] The angry braves, flushed with conquest and eager for blood, hastened to enroll themselves by thousands in his band. Fort Phil Kearney had been in a state of siege before: it was more closely invested now than ever. Contrary to their usual avoidance of the war-path in cold weather, throughout the long an
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CHAPTER FOUR Personal Reminiscences of Fort Phil Kearney and the Wagon-Box Fight
CHAPTER FOUR Personal Reminiscences of Fort Phil Kearney and the Wagon-Box Fight
As I was a member of the Carrington Powder River Expedition of 1866, I take the liberty of sending you a short sketch of happenings about Fort Phil Kearney. Being actively engaged with others for some two years in making the history of that place, I think that the account may be of interest. I left Fort Leavenworth early in the spring of 1866. At Fort Kearney, Nebraska, we found Col. Carrington and a part of his command, consisting of several companies of the Eighteenth Regular Infantry. Early i
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CHAPTER FIVE Forsyth and the Rough Riders of ’68
CHAPTER FIVE Forsyth and the Rough Riders of ’68
No one will question the sweeping assertion that the grittiest band of American fighters that history tells us of was that which defended the Alamo. They surpassed by one Leonidas and his Spartans; for the Greeks had a messenger of defeat, the men of the Alamo had none. But close on the heels of the gallant Travis and his dauntless comrades came “Sandy” Forsyth’s original “Rough Riders,” who immortalized themselves by their terrific fight on Beecher’s Island on the Arickaree Fork of the Republic
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CHAPTER SIX The Journey of the Scouts and the Rescue of Forsyth
CHAPTER SIX The Journey of the Scouts and the Rescue of Forsyth
Trudeau and Stillwell, the first pair of scouts despatched by Forsyth with the story of his desperate situation on Beecher’s Island, left their commander about midnight on the evening of the first day of the attack. The Indians had withdrawn from the immediate vicinity of the river and were resting quietly in the camps on either side, although there were a number of warriors watching the island. The men bade a hasty good-by to their comrades, received their captain’s final instructions, and with
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CHAPTER SEVEN A Scout’s Story of the Defense of Beecher’s Island
CHAPTER SEVEN A Scout’s Story of the Defense of Beecher’s Island
By great good fortune I am permitted to insert here a private letter to me from Mr. Sigmund Schlesinger, the Jewish boy referred to in Chapter Six, which, as it contains an original account of the defense of Beecher’s Island from the standpoint of one of the participants, is an unique document in our Western historical records:—C.T.B. For several days we had been following an Indian trail so broad that it looked like a wagon-road. Those in our command experienced in Indian warfare told us that w
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CHAPTER EIGHT Carpenter and His “Brunettes.”[39]The Fight on Beaver Creek
CHAPTER EIGHT Carpenter and His “Brunettes.”[39]The Fight on Beaver Creek
Carpenter had performed a very commendable thing in his march of over one hundred miles in two days for the relief of Forsyth. And it is marvelous that he had been able to find him in that vast expanse of country. He received high praise for it, which he fully deserved; but the battle which, with his black comrades, he fought three weeks later, elicited still more praise. The fight was one of the prettiest and most typical of any in our Indian campaigns; and I am fortunate in being able to give
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CHAPTER NINE A Further Discussion of the Beaver Creek Affair
CHAPTER NINE A Further Discussion of the Beaver Creek Affair
When General Carpenter’s account of the fight on the Beaver Creek was published serially, General Carr took exception to it in a public letter to the editor of the periodical in which it appeared. I am permitted by the editor to make extracts from this letter, which, with my own comment and General Carpenter’s rejoinder, appear as follows: I do not think that General Sheridan sent orders for my escort to go under command of Colonel Carpenter. I know that, after waiting with General Sheridan at F
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CHAPTER TEN The Battle of the Washita
CHAPTER TEN The Battle of the Washita
A fighter of fighters and a soldier of soldiers was that beau sabreur of the American Army, George Armstrong Custer, “Old Curly” to his men, “The White Chief with the Yellow Hair,” or, more briefly, “Long Hair” to the Indians. From Bull Run to Appomattox his career was fairly meteoric. Second lieutenant in the Army of the Potomac at twenty-one, fresh from West Point, a brigadier-general at twenty-three, a major-general at twenty-four, and commander of the third cavalry division, which, in the si
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CHAPTER ELEVEN Carr and Tall Bull at Summit Springs
CHAPTER ELEVEN Carr and Tall Bull at Summit Springs
General Eugene A. Carr, in command of the Fifth Cavalry, did some brilliant skirmishing and fighting in 1868–9 western Kansas and Colorado. His most notable exploit was the surprise of Tall Bull’s camp. Next to Black Kettle, Tall Bull was probably the most vicious and diabolical of the Indian raiders in these two states. Carr, with five troops of the Fifth Cavalry and with W. F. Cody (Buffalo Bill) as chief guide, learning where Tall Bull’s camp was, marched one hundred and fifty miles in four d
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CHAPTER ONE With Crook’s Advance
CHAPTER ONE With Crook’s Advance
Late in 1876 the government determined that thereafter all Indians in the Northwest must live on the reservations. For a long time the Interior Department, to which the management of Indian affairs was committed, had been trying in vain by peaceable means to induce them to do this. The Indians were at last definitely informed that if they did not come into the reservation by the first of January, 1876, and stay there, the task of compelling them to do so would be turned over to the War Departmen
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CHAPTER TWO Ex-Trooper Towne on the Rosebud Fight
CHAPTER TWO Ex-Trooper Towne on the Rosebud Fight
I am afraid that any attempt on my part to comply with your request will be a very feeble attempt to describe to you the Battle of the Rosebud, which took place on June 17th, 1876. There are many men living who participated in that battle who can describe more fully and more comprehensively than I the details of that day. However, I will do my best. On the 16th day of June, 1876, General Crook with his command was camped on the Tongue River awaiting the arrival of three hundred Crow and Shoshone
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CHAPTER THREE The Grievance of Rain-in-the-Face
CHAPTER THREE The Grievance of Rain-in-the-Face
Having thus disposed of the most formidable column, Crook’s, in so summary and so effective a manner, the Indians under their able leadership turned their attention to Custer and Gibbon. Before the Little Big Horn campaign is discussed, however, in order the better to understand the most terribly dramatic episode in the most disastrous of our Indian battles, it will be necessary to go back a little and take up the thread of the discourse later. The country watered by the Yellowstone and its affl
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CHAPTER FOUR The Little Big Horn Campaign
CHAPTER FOUR The Little Big Horn Campaign
To return to the spring of 1876. When the column which Custer was to have commanded moved out, Custer led his own regiment, while Major-General Alfred H. Terry was in personal command of the column. I give the reason in the words of General George A. Forsyth in a recent letter to me: “For some reason Custer, one of the most splendid soldiers that ever lived, hated General Belknap, the Secretary of War. He was a good hater, too. When General Belknap was imprisoned and undergoing trial Custer wrot
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CHAPTER FIVE The Last of Custer
CHAPTER FIVE The Last of Custer
It will be necessary, in order clearly to comprehend the complicated little battle, to treat each of the three operations separately, and then see how they were related to one another. As Reno’s men trotted down the valley, they saw, some distance ahead of them and to the right across the river on a line of high bluffs, Custer attended by his staff. The general waved his hat at them encouragingly, and disappeared over the brow of the hill. That glimpse of Custer, standing on that hill with outst
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CHAPTER SIX One of the Last Men to See Custer Alive
CHAPTER SIX One of the Last Men to See Custer Alive
Mr. Theodore W. Goldin, of Janesville, Wisconsin, formerly a trooper of the Seventh Cavalry, now Chairman of the Republican State Central Committee of Wisconsin, was the last, or perhaps the next to the last, man to see Custer alive. He has prepared an account of his personal experiences in the battle, which is one of the most interesting of the contributions that have been made to this volume. His description of the death of Hodgson is splendidly dramatic, as is his story of the brief conversat
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CHAPTER SEVEN The Personal Story of Rain-in-the-Face
CHAPTER SEVEN The Personal Story of Rain-in-the-Face
Note. —It is rare, indeed, to get the Indian side of a story in so clear, so connected, and so dramatic a form as is the following account of the Battle of the Little Big Horn from one who played a great part in it and in the events that led up to it. This is a unique document in our records, and is inserted here by kind permission of Mr. Thomas. It originally appeared in Outdoor Life , Vol. XI., No. 3, for March, 1903. Its accuracy and fidelity to fact are so attested as to be beyond question.—
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CHAPTER EIGHT Two Interesting Affairs
CHAPTER EIGHT Two Interesting Affairs
Before entering upon a detailed description of the larger events of the campaign after the Battle of the Rosebud and Little Big Horn, two smaller affairs are worthy of mention. One, though nothing but a skirmish, was of great importance in determining the final result. The other well illustrates something of the adventurous life and perilous duty of a soldier in Indian warfare. On Saturday, July 15, 1876, the Fifth Cavalry, under General Wesley Merritt, was marching toward Fort Laramie, under or
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CHAPTER NINE The First Success
CHAPTER NINE The First Success
After the defeat of General Custer, and the successful retreat of the Sioux and Cheyennes from the Little Big Horn, the government hurried reinforcements into the field, and ordered Crook and Terry to press the pursuit of the Indians with the greatest vigor. It was not, however, until nearly a year after the disaster on the Little Big Horn that the Sioux war was concluded, and it was not until after the Indians had met with several crushing defeats and had been pursued until they were utterly ex
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CHAPTER TEN A Decisive Blow
CHAPTER TEN A Decisive Blow
Crook now gave over the pursuit, and returned to Fort Fetterman to organize a winter campaign. This expedition was one of the best equipped that ever started on an Indian campaign. It contained all arms of the service, with an abundance of everything necessary to success. To follow its marches to the Big Horn Range would reveal little of interest; but late in November it was learned, from a captured Cheyenne, that the principal Cheyenne village was located in a cañon through which flowed one of
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CHAPTER ELEVEN Miles’ Great Campaigning
CHAPTER ELEVEN Miles’ Great Campaigning
Now let us turn to Miles and his men. General Miles was ordered to march his command up the Yellowstone to the mouth of the Tongue River, and establish a temporary post or cantonment there for the winter. He was an officer in whom great confidence was reposed, and from whom much was to be expected. He had as brilliant a record in the Civil War as Custer, and had practically fought one decisive battle in the closing campaign on his own responsibility, with splendidly successful results. He was a
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CHAPTER TWELVE What They Are There For A Sketch of General Guy V. Henry, a Typical American Soldier
CHAPTER TWELVE What They Are There For A Sketch of General Guy V. Henry, a Typical American Soldier
The most thankless task that can be undertaken by a nation is warfare against savage or semi-civilized peoples. In it there is usually little glory; nor is there any reward, save the consciousness of disagreeable duty well performed. The risk to the soldier is greater than in ordinary war, since the savages usually torture the wounded and the captured. Success can only be achieved by an arduous, persistent, wearing down process, which affords little opportunity for scientific fighting, yet which
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APPENDIX A. Being a Further Discussion of General Custer’s Course in the Little Big Horn Campaign.[112]
APPENDIX A. Being a Further Discussion of General Custer’s Course in the Little Big Horn Campaign.[112]
Whether General Custer did, or did not, obey General Terry’s orders; whether these orders were, or were not, well considered, and such as could be carried out; whether, if General Custer did disobey General Terry’s orders he was warranted in so doing by the circumstances in which he found himself, are questions of the deepest interest to the student of military matters and the historian thereof. I presume the problem they present will never be authoritatively settled, and that men will continue
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APPENDIX B Further Light on the Conduct of Major Reno
APPENDIX B Further Light on the Conduct of Major Reno
After the publication of the Custer article censuring Reno, my attention was called to the following editorial, which appeared in the Northwestern Christian Advocate , of September 7, 1904: General George A. Custer was and will always be regarded as one of the most brilliant officers of the United States Army. His career abounds in romantic interest; and his death, together with that of every officer and soldier fighting with him, was one of the most tragic and memorable incidents in Indian warf
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