by 1864-1898 Indian War Veterans: Memories of Army Life;Campaigns in the West
About fifty of us were assigned to Company A, Thirtieth Infantry, to be stationed at Fort Kearney, to which point we started about December 1, encountering all kinds of weather, including blizzards, etc…. At Fort Kearney we were drilled from 4 to 6 hours each day in manual, evolution, and target practice. We had occasional skirmishes with the Indians in small detachments.
On the 22nd of February, [1868, ] I was made deaf in my left ear by the firing of national salute with brass cannon. In the early spring of’ 68 we were divided up into small detachments and stationed along the Union Pacific Railroad to prevent depredations of Sioux and Cheyennes, which were sometimes appalling. I was put in charge of a detachment of ten men at Plum Creek where we had some thrilling experiences. We were kept moving westward to those points where trouble was most expected, but as the U. P. was now completed, our movements were mostly by train and not so irksome. In the late fall of’ 68 we built Fort Fred Steele where the U. P. crosses the north fork of Platte River. While hauling logs from Elk Mountain our wagon train was attacked by Indians who captured about eighty of our mules. About fifty of us were mounted and recaptured nearly all the mules and thirty-six ponies besides, after a chase of fifty miles. Later on two men were killed and their bodies terribly mutilated near [present] Rawlins. In charge of a detachment of twenty mounted men, I chased thirty-five Indians about ten miles in a running fight, receiving two wounds and my horse three, but fortunately none was serious.
While yet at Fort Steele in the spring of’ 69, my company was transferred to Company H, Fourth Infantry, at the time of consolidation of the regular army. We went to Fort D. A. Russell, near Cheyenne, in July,’ 69, where I received a knife wound while arresting an undesirable citizen at a gambling hall in Cheyenne. About September 1, a detachment of us were sent to build a fort afterwards named Fort Fetterman. After the fort was finished in the severe winter of’ 69 and’ 70, I was put in charge of a detail of twenty mounted men to carry the mail half the distance between Forts Fetterman and Laramie. Owing to exposure to rigid weather, lack of vegetables in our diet, and other contributory agencies, a number of our men contracted scurvy and scrofula. It was my misfortune to develop the latter in the spring of’ 70, which grew worse until my discharge at Fort Fetterman, September 15, 1870….
A Reality of Warfare (By Samuel H. Bently, formerly of Troop I, Fifth U. S. Cavalry. From Winners of the West, February, 1925)
I saw two years of hard service, enlisting at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, on January 25, 1870, to serve five years in the Regular Army. I was discharged at Fort D. A. Russell, Wyoming, on February 19, 1872, for disabilities. I served in Troop I, Fifth Cavalry, being with Colonel [sic] William F. Cody, known as “Buffalo Bill,” for two long years. Our fights were chiefly with the Sioux Indians, although the Pawnees gave us a good deal of trouble. On one of our campaigns I saw a cottonwood stump, seven feet in height, where the Indians had tied a soldier and burnt him up. I saw his head, and picked up some buttons that came off of his blouse, showing that he was a soldier. We always put one cartridge where we could get it, for if we were captured by the Indians we knew what our fate would be, and rather than this we would far rather shoot ourselves.
A Skirmish at Heart River, Dakota, 1872 (By John W. Jenkins, formerly first sergeant, Company G, Sixth U. S. Infantry. From Winners of the West, May, 1925)
In 1872, several companies of the Eighth, Ninth, Seventeenth, Twentieth, and Twenty-second U. S. infantry was sent as an escort to the surveyors of the Northern Pacific Railway from St. Paul to Puget Sound. We left Fort Rice, Dakota Territory, early in July, 1872, under command of Brevet Major General David S. Stanley, Colonel of the Twenty-second, and went as far as the mouth of the Powder River. Little of note occurred going out, but coming back was different. We practically fought our way back.
In the afternoon during our first days camp on the Powder River, Colonel Stanley ordered a shot from our 6[-pounder] Napoleon field gun as a signal for Major Eugene Baker, who with a battalion of the Second U. S. Cavalry was intending to connect with us at this point. The shot did not bother Major Baker, but it did excite a band of redskins that was secreted in a cottonwood grove into which Stanley’s 6-pound shell found its way, and spread abroad amongst the bushes. In a few minutes, more Indians had piled out of that grove than we could shake a stick at, and [they] headed for the open country where they could see whether any more iron works were coming their way.
That shot opened the ball. From that [point] on until our return to Fort Rice, we were annoyed with the red pests. Actual engagements were frequent. Rosebud, Powder River, O’Fallon’s Creek, Little Heart Butte, and Heart River, and the latter will be remembered by those who were there until their dying day. Companies C and F, Seventeenth Infantry, under command of Major Robert E. A. Crofton, were dispatched homeward a week in advance of the main command in order to conserve the supplies which were running low, and incidentally to sweep the path of the red pests. [Scout] Charley Reynolds, with half a dozen Santee Indian scouts, accompanied us. These were in advance of us and were waiting for us when we came up to Heart River for the night camp. It was an ideal camp for wood, water, and grass, but a natural death trap, a basin entirely surrounded by tall bluffs through which the river cut from northwest to southeast, and narrow gorges along the river.
A few minutes after entering camp, several deer were seen to emerge from the northeast gorge, and First Lieutenant Eben Crosby, Seventeenth Infantry, my company commander (who left one of his arms on the battlefield of Chancellorsville), a famous marksman and idolized by all his men, approached the major for permission to go and get some of those deer. The major refused his request on the grounds that he (Crosby) had been detailed for officer of the day. Crosby turned away grieved and downhearted and the major called him back and said, “Mr. Crosby, if you still desire to go in pursuit of deer I will take your place as officer of the day, and you may go.” Crosby brightened up, thanked his superior, and with a smile started off at a trot. The last we ever saw of our beloved officer alive was when he disappeared through the gorge following the course of the deer that had preceded him.
Eight o’clock came that night, but Crosby did not. A trumpeter was sent to the top of the bluffs to sound all the familiar calls, but no response came. A fire was kindled, but poor Crosby came not to its welcome light. Breakfast was ordered ready by daylight, that a detail might go in search of the officer. As we ate our breakfast between daylight and sunrise, we heard several shots and our men cheered and exclaimed, “There’s Crosby. We will have venison for supper.” Some ran out of their tents to look, and behold, the rim of the bluffs as far as the eye could reach was covered with the red hell hounds, howling and yelling, riding back and forth like mad. The major ordered the men not to shoot, that it might be a friendly hunting party, that there were no hostiles in the vicinity.
After the Indians had settled themselves for grim work, one of them signaled for a talkfest. The major called the interpreter and told him to meet the gentleman of copper tint and find out what his wishes were, whether for peace or war, suggesting he could have his choice. The interpreter returned with the wishes of the red gent, which were that we evacuate the camp immediately, leaving everything just as it was, to take nothing away but one day’s rations. No guns, ammunition, or extra clothing. We were then sixty miles from Fort Rice. The major smiled and remarked, “Generous, wasn’t he? We’ll leave him something, however, some bones of his braves to bleach on those hills. Here, bugler, sound the call to arms.”
The words had hardly lost their sound until the Springfields were barking, and the red skunks on the bluffs were beginning to show signs of being disturbed. Here was a soldier. Every inch of that six feet was game to the core. I went to the cook fire to get a cup of coffee. Emanuel Gearing was our second cook and was measuring out coffee. A sniper among the Indians sent a bullet through the visor of his forage cap as he poured out my coffee, and it dropped into the camp kettle. He dropped the dipper and disappeared immediat
ely. I looked around to see what went with him as I thought he had been hit. I saw the broad soles of his government shoes sticking out of his tent door. He had dived headlong into the tent and lay prone on the ground and seemed to be so well satisfied with his position that no amount of coaxing could get him to come out. And there he remained until the Indians were gone.
There was an overhanging bluff opposite camp that afforded shelter from the enemy fire. Charley Reynolds made for that, and Sergeant Johnson with about twenty men of Company C ran across the river and followed him, zig-zagging the bluff until within a couple of rods of the crest, when they halted for a fresh supply of wind. The reds discovered them and such a yell and such scampering would be hard to describe. In less time than it would require to tell it there wasn’t an Indian to be seen. Reynolds and Johnson went “over the top” but there was little to be seen when they got there. Away toward sunset could be seen some black specks bobbing up and down. The squaws were far behind, screaming, howling, and lambasting their ponies, their travois bounding up and dropping off a dead buck and then was pandemonium let loose. The scene was so pitiful that the boys refrained from shooting into them. Now that the war was over, our attention was again turned to the search for Lieutenant Crosby. Sergeant John Massena and a detail of six men were sent out. In about two hours they returned with the mutilated body of the lieutenant. The law forbids that I use the necessary words to describe the condition of his person. The work was done principally with knives, and occurred too near our camp to burn him. They knew where we were….
The Yellowstone Expedition of 1873 (By William Foster Norris, formerly second lieutenant, Company E, Ninth U. S. Infantry. From Winners of the West, September, 1938)
I was commissioned a second lieutenant of infantry in the Regular Army in June, 1872. I joined my regiment in the fall of that year at Omaha Barracks, since known as Fort Omaha. It long ago lost its military character, being superseded by Fort Crook, which became and still is [1938] the headquarters of the department. I was fortunate in my regiment and its commanding officer, as well as [in] the company to which I was assigned. Brevet Major General John H. King[, colonel Ninth Infantry, ] was a fine specimen of the old-time army officer. I can see him now, as with stately tread he walks from the adjutant’s office, after guard mount, to [the] commanding officer’s quarters situated at the center of the row of officers’ quarters. The regimental adjutant, First Lieutenant Leonard Hay, an officer worthy of his chief, was a calm, quiet, reticent man, with whom few, if any, would be on intimate terms, but by whom all who knew him, highly respected. As I remember them both, he closely resembled his famous brother[, John Hay], then known as a literary celebrity, but who since acquired wider fame as one of the authors of the Life of Abraham Lincoln and a distinguished diplomat. The captain of the company, Captain Edwin Pollock, was an energetic, ambitious officer, thoroughly devoted to his profession. I wish I could meet him again to tell him of my appreciation of his courtesy and consideration, but he was killed by an untimely accident after my retirement from the service. The first lieutenant subsequently became colonel of a regiment, was wounded during the Boxer Rebellion, and subsequently was stationed in Manila, where he died shortly before he would have retired from active military service.
My first active military service was during the winter of 1872 at Omaha Barracks. It was a pleasant winter; the duties were light, there being no work at that time excepting the routine work of the garrison, such as serving in turn as officer of the guard or officer of the day. The young officers spent much of their leisure time in Omaha where we were so fortunate as to enjoy the society of the Nebraska metropolis…. In the spring of 1873, an expedition was sent to protect a party of engineers engaged in making a survey of a projected route of the Northern Pacific Railroad from the Missouri to a point on the Yellowstone River. Such protection was necessary as the route lay over the plains infested by hostile Indians, principally Sioux and Northern Cheyennes. Several companies from the Barracks, including my own, were sent to join the expedition, which was to assemble at a point on the Missouri River. I think it was Fort [Abraham] Lincoln, one of the frontier posts in what is now the state of North Dakota.
Our command marched from the Barracks to the Missouri River, where we embarked on the Steamer Josephine, which was to convey us safely up the river to Fort Lincoln. It seemed a hard task for the little steamer to force its way upstream against the current of the mighty river. Every now and then we would run on a sand bar or against a snag, at which times the nigger would be called upon to lift us off the sandbar or over it, as the case might be. The nigger appeared to be a little engine which did its work admirably and successfully, as we arrived safely at our destination despite sandbars and snags.
At Fort Lincoln, the entire force was consolidated, consisting of the railroad engineering party under [former] General Thomas Rosser, an ex-Confederate officer. The Seventh Cavalry, or part thereof, was under Brevet Major General Custer, lieutenant colonel. The entire command was under Colonel David S. Stanley. The expeditionary force was quite large for those days, numbering some fifteen hundred men, infantry and cavalry. There was a long baggage train of six-mule teams loaded with supplies for the command, as it was necessary to take our food with us. This consisted largely of boxes of hardtack, as the meat supply, consisting of several hundred beef cattle, marched along in rear of the column. We had an oversupply of hardtack, part of which may have afforded nourishment to our foes, as a large number of boxes were taken from the wagons during the expedition and piled snugly away in a sequestered place, but not so concealed as to be safe from the eyes of the red men who were very fond of this particular brand of bread.
Shortly after disembarking, we set out on our march to the distant Yellowstone. The gentle, undulating plains presented but little serious obstacles to our progress. It was a trackless route, I suppose never before traversed by a wagon train. Occasionally we came to the dry bed of a stream which caused some trouble in descending the steep bank on one side and ascending on the other. Sometimes a wagon would upset or have to be unloaded, but as a rule the column marched on and on day after day, with but little interruption from such mishaps and none at all from our Indian antagonists. I recall one of the mule drivers who gained my lasting respect, which has continued for the half century to the present day. I saw him drive his six mules without an oath or ejaculation unless it was an encouraging word to his team, who were pulling with all their might and all together the heavily loaded wagon up the side of one of the dry beds. I well remember his asking the soldiers who stood on each side not to shout at the mules, and silently, without whip, or more than gently urging, this well-trained team did its duty to the utmost. This humble mule driver taught a much needed lesson by his example to all observing officers as well as soldiers and more than all to his fellow teamsters.
It was a weary, dreary, monotonous march over the dry and arid plains. As the season advanced, the days became intensely hot. The plains lent themselves to heat. There was no carpet of green grass beneath our feet, no trees, no running streams, no cooling breeze. The ground in places was white with alkali, the grass dry and scant. Instead of trees and familiar bushes, there were acres and acres of sagebrush, which was in complete harmony with its environment…. One of the discomforts of our long march arose from lack of water. The canteen with which the men went out in the morning would be emptied long before making camp at the close of the day’s march. It was hard on the men but much harder on the poor animals, especially when we went into a dry camp at night. On these occasions, which very rarely happened, the camp was not literally dry, but the water was so impregnated with alkali as to be undrinkable by man or beast. It was pathetic to hear the animals eagerly give voice in their different ways as they saw the pool of water ahead where we were to camp, but it was still more pathetic to hear them express their disappointment when upon plunging their heads into it, they were unable to drink. It was distressing to hear the mournful lowing of the cattle, the b
raying of the mules, the neighing of the horses—a chorus of discordant protest from the unfortunate animals who, after traveling all day without water, were denied a drink at night.
Officers and soldiers were prohibited from wandering from the marching column as no man’s life was safe outside of military protection. One day two civil employees went to the Yellowstone River, evidently tempted by the attractions of abundant water and shelter under the trees fringing the stream. Their bodies were found transfixed with arrows, showing how they met with their death. Such were existing conditions when we were astonished to see approaching in the distance a wagon drawn by one horse. As it drew nearer, it proved to be a covered wagon surmounted by a cross. In the vehicle was a single driver arrayed in a black robe. He came up to the command which was halted, descended and conversed a while with the higher officers, re-ascended to his seat and drove on out into the plains in the midst of the hostile Indians with as little concern as he would have driven along the streets of St. Paul or Minneapolis. I mention these cities, as I remember he was a Jesuit priest from Minnesota.
As we watched this lonely man drive away over the plains in the midst of hostile savages, unarmed and unprotected except by the symbol surmounting his carriage and his own reputation and clerical garb, I thought it one of the most notable examples of heroism that I ever saw. This was three years before the Sitting Bull War, during which occurred the battle known as the Custer Massacre. Fifty years takes us far back in the history of the northwestern plains, but early as it was we were too late to see the vast herds of buffalo that formerly fed upon the nutritious grass that bears their name. The buffalo grass was there, but few of the noble animals were left. Grim mementos were strewn over the plains, as the massive skulls of the slaughtered animals were long in decomposing. We saw only one herd, but what a shadow was the few scattered animals we beheld at a distance of the vast herds that a few years before shook the earth with their multitudinous tread, extending in every direction as far as the eye could reach. [See the recollection below of William D. Nugent.]