blanketed with snow which, when the sunlight falls upon them, accentuates their convolutions. At night the stars sparkle like diamonds in the frosty air. The blazing camp fire, around which the shivering soldiers huddled, intensified the surrounding gloom. Essential as was the warmth to their very being, it was still a signal that might have been read for miles and invited destruction. During the scout, as it was called, the soldiers often saw in the distance single Indians scuttling over the prairie, but seldom more than one at a time, although there were trails, made by the dragging lodge poles, leading in every direction. It did not matter that the troops feared to separate to follow these several trails, for upon them the capture or killing of the lone wanderers would have served no good purpose. One night a band of Indians rushed through the camp, discharging guns, breaking tent ropes, and pulling up pegs; but they were gone--swallowed by the darkness--before the soldiers recovered from their surprise.
(JUNE, 1869) After the suppression of the
rebellion, the trans-Missouri plains began to fill with
settlers. A pressing Indian question arose. The policy of
removing the Indians to reservations as rapidly as the
extension of civilization required was adopted, but for a
time the task of controlling them seemed impracticable, and,
despite aggressive military measures, the prairies became
infested with predatory bands of savages who made frequent
raids upon the defenseless settlers, stealing horses,
killing cattle, murdering men, and carrying women into
captivity. |
of the Indians went to the reservations set apart for all of these roving bands, certain of them, under the leadership of Pawnee Killer, The Whistler, Tall Bull, and Little Wound refused to go. They were joined by straggling members of the Cheyenne tribe, which had been driven south in the winter of that year. In June, 1869, an expedition commanded by Major General E. A. Carr, of the Fifth cavalry, marched into the Republican valley to clear it of the marauding outlaws. The command comprised eight companies of regular cavalry, and three companies of Pawnee scouts under Major Frank North. Striking a promising trail they followed for two days along the Republican and then turned north. After a pursuit of twenty miles in that direction on the last day, the savages were overtaken on the headwaters of the Republican. After a desperate battle of several hours, the Indians, comprising Sioux and "Dogsoldiers," renegades from various tribes, led by Tall Bull, a Cheyenne, were completely routed. Fifty-two of them, including Tall Bull, were killed. One of two white women, captured by these Indians some time before on the Saline river in Kansas, was rescued by the soldiers, but the other was killed by her captors during the progress of the battle. Nine hundred dollars, nearly all of a sum of money found in the camp, was given to the liberated woman. More than one hundred mules, three hundred horses and colts, a large quantity of powder, and about five tons of dried buffalo meat were captured. The mules and horses were distributed among the soldiers and scouts.7 It was hoped that this chastisement would have a salutary effect, but instead it thoroughly aroused the 7The expedition comprised eight companies of the Fifth cavalry and three of Pawnee scouts--fifty in each company. It started from Fort McPherson on the 9th of June. On Sunday, July 11, the command marched northward twenty miles and surprised the Indians at their village in the |
hostility of the Indians. A few weeks after this battle the Buck party was wiped out of existence, and the Daugherty party miraculously escaped a like fate. However, this northwest corner of Colorado. General Carr called the battle-field Summit Springs because a fine spring of water was found on an adjacent sand-hill. The names of the two captured women were Mrs. Susannah Alderdice and Mrs. Wiechel. Tall Bull was keeping them as his wives and shot them both rather than to risk their being rescued. The soldiers and scouts captured about fifteen hundred dollars in gold, nine hundred dollars of which was given up and presented to Mrs. Wiechel. Under date of January 26, 1914, the adjutant general of the United States army (George Andrews) advises me that a pamphlet entitled "Record of Engagements with Hostile Indians within the Military Division of the Missouri from 1868 to 1882," compiled at the headquarters of that division in 1882, contains the following: "July 11 (1869), the main village was completely surprised on 'Summit Springs,' a small tributary of the South Platte, in Colorado. Seven troops of the Fifth cavalry and three companies of mounted Pawnee scouts charged the village which, with its contents, was captured and burned. Fifty-two Indians were killed, an unknown number wounded, and seventeen captured, among the killed being 'Tall Bull,' the chief of the band. Two hundred and seventy-four horses, one hundred and forty-four mules, quantities of arms and ammunition and about $1,500 in United States money were among the most important items of the extensive captures. So perfect was the surprise and so swift the charge over a distance of several miles, that the Indians could do little but spring upon their ponies and fly, and the casualties to the troops were only one soldier wounded, one horse shot, and twelve horses killed by the hot and exhaustive charge. * * * " The adjutant general adds: "It appears from the official records that General Carr left Fort McPherson, Nebr., June 9, 1869, with the organizations that fought the engagement at Summit Springs. Tall Bull was chief of a tribe of Cheyenne Indians." General C. C. Augur, commander of the department of the Platte, in his report--dated October 23, 1869--to the commander of the Military Division of the Missouri, said: "More than a year ago, when 'Spotted Tail' went to the reservation set apart for all these bands, certain of them, under the leadership of Pawnee Killer, The Whistler, Tall Bull, Little Wound, and others, refused to go." "When the Cheyennes were driven south last winter, Tall Bull and a few other prominent head soldiers joined these bands on the Republican, and it is these irregular and straggling bands that have committed all the depredations in Northern Kansas and Southern Nebraska during the past year. It was determined, therefore, to act aggressively upon these bands, and to endeavor to drive them from this country and force them to their reservations. The assignment of the Fifth cavalry to my department fortunately gave me the means of doing this, and at the same time looking after other exposed points in the department. With this view, the expedi- |
seems to be the last time that the Indians resisted the military in this part of Nebraska. Though both the Sioux and the Pawnee hunted here for three or four years afterwards,8 the settlers suffered no serious losses, except by the famous Cheyenne raid of 1878. tion commanded by Brevet Major General E. A. Carr, major Fifth Cavalry: was organized and started into the Republican country early in June.' (Report of the Secretary of War, 2d Sess. 41st Cong., p. 71.) Major Frank North commanded the Pawnee scouts in the Summit Springs campaign; and he has left a full account of the battle in the 12th chapter of his memoirs, "A Quarter of a Century on the Frontier." He states that the expedition struck the Republican "near the mouth of Dog Creek." The context indicates that the creek in question was the Prairie Dog. The next incident related occurred while the command was in camp "near the mouth of Turkey Creek". "A few days after the command had left this camp" it was "scouting along the Beaver and Prairie Dog creeks;" and soon after, having moved westward up the Republican, it camped on the Black Tail Deer Fork. One of the rather numerous Turkey creeks of this part of Nebraska enters the Republican near the eastern boundary of Furnas county, at a point about a day's march west of the mouth of the Prairie Dog, and Deer creek enters the Republican about sixteen miles miles farther west. Mr. Cordeal, who has lived in Red Willow county many years, writes that he cannot find any trace of an affluent of the Republican called Dog creek in that part of the state. So it seems that the expedition did not march directly south to the Republican, but southwest instead. A Colton map published in the same year shows a Beaver creek entering the Medicine creek in Frontier county, and a later map shows another entering the Republican from the south in range 24 west; but it is not likely that either of these streams was referred to in the reports of General Carr's campaign. On the third of August, 1869, General C. C. Augur, commander of the department of the Platte, issued an order--number 48--highly commending General Carr and his command for their conduct in the campaign in which he specially mentions Corporal John Kyle of Company M and Sergeant Mad Bear of the Pawnee scouts for bravery and gallant conduct. (Major North's memoirs, p. 146.) The Nebraska legislature, at its sixth session, on the 23d of February, 1870, passed a resolution of thanks for General Carr, Major North and their command for their services in the campaign, "by which the people of the state were freed from the ravages of merciless savages." (Laws of Nebraska 1870-71, p. 50.)--ED. 8 The famous treaty of April 29, 1868, with the Sioux, acknowledged their right to hunt along the Republican river. They relinquished the right in the treaty of June 23, 1875. (Eighteenth Report Bureau of American Ethnology, pt. 2, p. 882.) Such hunting as the Pawnee may have done in the same territory until they were removed from their reservation to Indian Territory in 1876, was by sufferance and without legal right.--ED. |
The disappearance of the Buck surveying
party in the summer of 1869 is one of the mysteries of the
plains. The party, consisting of twelve men, under the
leadership of Nelson Buck, started from Fort Kearny for the
Republican country in the latter part of July. Application
had been made to the military authorities for arms, but for
some reason these were not furnished. After the party had
proceeded for some distance, Mr. Buck directed two of its
members to return to Fort Kearny and there await fulfillment
of his requisition. The others proceeded on their way, and,
so far as is known, nothing was seen or heard of them
again. |
aggressors in the direction of the Beaver, took their horses and rations, destroyed two wagons, and killed five of them, the remainder escaping. The story told by the squaw is corroborated in the account of an inquiry made by an employee of the government who was in charge of the agency to which the Sioux returned after their summer's campaign through the Republican valley. From an interview with Spotted Tail9 it was gathered that the Indians, some time in the month of August, attacked a party of about twelve surveyors near Beaver creek, and succeeded in killing six. The balance of the party retreated and entrenched themselves. Subsequently the Indians attacked them, but were repulsed with a loss of three killed. Spotted Tail reported that he did not know what became of the other whites, but thought they may have been killed by another band of savages. Another Indian told of the killing of eight whites on the Beaver and the escape of three others, of whose subsequent fate he did not know. This party had one wagon, which was run into the creek. Still another account of the affair is that, while Pawnee Killer's band was crossing the hills south of the mouth of Red Willow creek, on their way to the Beaver, they discovered a party of six white men with a team. A charge was made in which three Indians were killed. The whites finally gained the timber on Beaver 9Spotted Tail, or Sentegaleska, was chief of the Brulé Sioux who were settled at an agency on Beaver creek--now in Sheridan county--in 1874. By virtue of a protest by the state of Nebraska that they were trespassers on her soil, they were removed in 1877. (Laws of Nebraska 1875, p. 338; History of Nebraska, v. 3, p. 369.) The location was also called Camp Sheridan, because 9 detachment of soldiers was kept there to restrain the Indians who were inclined to hostility. Spotted Tail had the reputation of being go loyal to the whites as almost to imply his disloyalty to his own people; but probably he deserves the benefit of the doubt and to be credited with wise and impartial statesmanship. Dr. George L. Miller, editor of the Omaha Herald, in its weekly issue of September 4, 1874, said: "He is the truest friend of the white man and of peace on these borders that ever lived."--ED. |
creek, where they made a stand. The Indians, in the meantime, had increased their force to two hundred warriors. Frequent and desperate charges were made on the white men during the entire afternoon, and about sunset the last of the six was killed and scalped. Pawnee Killer, who led the fight in person, said the whites were very brave, and that many of his warriors were wounded. The three Indians killed were buried in trees on the south side of the Republican, just above the mouth of Red Willow creek. While these accounts, in some respects, seem irreconcilable, there can be little doubt that they are of the same affair. As the Buck party was the only party of white men in this vicinity at that time, and as all of its members disappeared, we are bound to believe--unless we concede that these stories are pure fabrications--that they were the victims of the tragedy recorded. Search for the bodies was made in the fall of 1869, but without avail. Recent investigation leaves no room for question that the last stand of the whites was made at a place on the banks of Beaver creek in Red Willow county, but where their bones lie now, no one knows. It was probably after the massacre of
the Buck party when, on the twenty-first day of August,
1869, W. E. Daugherty, who was in the field with a party of
surveyors, had an encounter with the Indians. About six
o'clock in the morning a small band of savages dashed into
the surveyors' camp, shot one of their horses and stampeded
the rest, which, however, were soon recaptured. The whites,
realizing that they were in the vicinity of a large body of
Indians, decided to go to the nearest place on the Platte
river where they could secure arms and ammunition for the
purpose of equipping themselves, so as to be prepared to
resist an attack. They had not proceeded far until they were
sur- |
rounded by about one hundred and seventy-five Indians. Knowing them to be hostile, and that it would be useless to try to escape, the surveyors concluded to stop and to make the best defense they could. They turned their horses loose, and while the Indians were pursuinig the animals the whites sought to entrench themselves. Daugherty himself has left the following description of the battle: "As soon as they got the stock they surrounded us and fought us in Indian style all day. Fortunately, none of us was seriously hurt, though one of the men was slightly wounded in the forehead by a glancing shot, and my brother was disabled for duty by the explosion of a cartridge in his face, which blinded him so he could not see for nearly the whole day. We disabled several of their horses and know that we shot twelve Indians, three of whom we know were killed--two of them lay in our sight all day, they not venturing to take them away until dark. Although their bullets rained around us all day like hail, not a man flinched, nor do I think one felt the least despondent. About dark they ceased firing and seemed by their actions to be stationing sentinels in squads at different points, sounding as though the main body was stationed at a point about one hundred and fifty rods southwest of us, in a ravine. About dark we commenced digging with more energy to make them believe we intended to stay there; but at half past nine o'clock we left our little fort by crawling on our bodies about a mile, which we thought extremely dangerous, as the moon shone and it was almost as light as day, and we expected to crawl upon the Indians every moment. But we did not, and as soon as we had left a ridge of land between us and the Indians we skedaddled the best we could and arrived safely at the river the next day. I lost the entire outfit, not excepting anything. My brother and two other men are now out with a party of cavalry helping to rescue a part of our outfit." This fight, is believed to have taken place in southern Chase or northern Dundy county; but, as has been said, it is not known exactly where it occurred. |
The incidents that have been recounted
have a passing interest, because nothing that has to do with
men is without interest; but they left no permanent mark
upon the land, and were it not for the fact that we find in
the dust-covered volumes of our libraries recital of their
occurrence we would not, to-day, know they had happened. 10 A transcript of this diary is in the library of the Nebraska State Historical Society.--ED. |
over the prairies. A tent was the only shelter for the men, while the horses were tied on the lee side of the wagons. A number of hunters were caught in the fearful storms, and the explorers passed many of them eastward bound, loaded with meat. They suffered from the severe cold, as few of them were prepared for it. None had tents, and only a part of them had sufficient food. Mention is made of one party that had nothing to eat but corn and meat and so substituted parched corn for bread. The Buck party gave them a few quarts of beans and sent a pot of coffee to their camp, receiving in return a stock of buffalo meat. In another party there was a man who had been lost on the prairies in the storm and was badly frozen. He had been found accidentally as he was in his last sleep. Once, when storm bound, for lack of a stove the men filled a camp kettle with coals, and stood, shivering, over it. Two of them extemporized a checker board on the end of a cracker box, and at that game whiled away the hours. The almost daily program was to arise about four o'clock in the morning, breakfast, feed their horses and be on their way as soon as it was light enough to see. Sometimes they camped at noon for lunch, and sometimes they pushed on till night. Sometimes the weather compelled them to lie by for a few hours. Game was plentiful, and when they were in the western country not a day passed that they did not see buffaloes, deer, elks, antelopes and wild turkeys. On the twenty-second day of November they reached Red Willow creek, and for several days camped on its banks. They selected a site for a town, and every member of the party chose a claim. To show of what stuff these men were made, I quote from the diary: I take spade and stakes and go out to plant peach pits and bulbs found in my carpet bag and wend my way to selected homestead, select the ground and shovel off the snow spade up a trench about ten feet long, plant in tulip |
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