For a few moments Miles dismounted to stand among the ruins of the post—now nothing more than a few charred timbers sticking from the new snow like blackened broken bones jutting from a wound, an iron stove broken and turning to rust, and the fort cemetery. Nelson removed his hat and silently mouthed the words of a short prayer as he stared at all those faded, graying, faceless wooden headboards leaning a’kilter between earth and sky.
With the crossing of the frozen Missouri at the Hawley ford complete, the column was immediately faced with a new predicament. On the south side of the river the banks rose like an abrupt wall before them.
At first Miles tried hitching a double team of twelve mules to one of the nearly empty wagons to get his supplies up the bluffs. Yet the animals could not struggle up the sharp-pitched trail. Left with little choice, the soldiers emptied the wagon beds once more, then removed the boxes from their running gear—so box, running gear, and small loads of supplies could be dragged up on ropes by the men working in concert with the mule teams. Even as cold as it was, what with the way the wind blustered at the top of the bluffs, the soldiers sweated their way through the lion’s share of that day and into the coming of night.
By ten P.M. the battalion finally settled into their bivouac on the top of the prairie, high above the Missouri River among the pine and cedar that provided a little windbreak to their cookfires, where juicy slabs of venison roasted, in a spot the foot-sloggers affectionately named Camp Elevation.
As twilight deepened into night, the pickets were the first to spot some fires glowing on the north side of the river.
“In the morning,” Miles told William Jackson, “I want you to find out if that is friend or foe.”
“I think your captain—the one my brother Robert took to Carroll City.”
Miles nodded glumly. “Yes, I suppose you’re right, Jackson. What with the reports of Sitting Bull being far to the east of us, it’s not very likely that he’s camped over yonder, is it? Not when he’s eluded me a second time in as many months.”
Nelson was morose enough that night that he found it hard to sleep—thinking and rethinking how Sitting Bull had outsmarted him not just once, but twice now—brooding how chasing the Hunkpapa was like chasing after wisps of winter smoke. Close enough to smell his prey, near enough to see, perhaps, but nothing to grab hold of—not a damned thing in your hand once you opened it.
At dawn the next morning the men found the view glorious from that lofty plateau above the rugged Missouri Breaks. Everywhere ran the deepest of ravines and coulees, perpendicular bluffs and cotton-topped ridges, every landform striated with varicolored sandstone and draped in winter white. Here and there long borders of pine and cedar in emerald-green threaded across the landscape. Far to the northwest rose the snowcapped Little Rocky Mountains, while to the south and west in the cold, clear winter air stood the magnificent splendor of the Judith and Moccasin Mountains, beyond them the ever loftier Snowy range.
On south by east Miles led his column, trudging through the ankle-deep snow and icy drifts along the twisting ridgetop above the aptly named Crooked Creek before the column was forced into the valley to cross and recross the creekbed many times during the day. Curious deer bounded up along both sides of the march as the men continued downstream. Late in the afternoon of the fourth Captain Bennett’s ? Company finally rejoined Miles, having crossed the Missouri upriver that morning. Camp was made that night where the men could find shelter from the wind.
Late the following morning of the fifth, Miles reached the mouth of Crooked Creek in the lush, timbered, grassy valley of the Musselshell River. While hunting details were sent out, Miles dispatched the Jackson brothers to press upstream to determine the best route while the colonel saw the column across the thick ice on the Musselshell.
Early in the afternoon the half-breed scouts delivered their disappointing news to a frustrated Miles. Because of the ruggedness of the country and the snow depth they had encountered farther up the Musselshell, the soldier column would have to turn back to the Missouri. Once on the south bank, they would then continue along the river until reaching the mouth of Squaw Creek.
It was there that the going became even tougher. Not only were the teams and wagons breaking through the thin ice crusting every little shaded slough, but now some of the men were forced to use spades and picks to carve a crude road out of the side of a bluff for their wagons, while the rest of the soldiers unloaded those wagons and hauled on their backs what supplies they had left them up the steep sides of the bluff like a team of industrious ants at a country-fair picnic. Other men somehow persuaded the balky mules to pull the wagons up the precarious slopes by sheer muscle and rope power alone. It took the last of them until after sundown to reach the top of the prairie once more—putting no more than seven short miles behind them for the day.
On the sixth the men dropped down into more solid terrain in the Squaw Creek drainage, realizing that their forage for the wagon stock was running desperately low. Miles overheard a lot of the grumbling as both officers and enlisted men worried with the darkening skies, knowing that they weren’t prepared to sit out any more bad weather, realizing that another snowstorm just might do them in.
Shortly past midday on the seventh, Miles brought his command into sight of the Black Buttes rising just beyond the grassy, wooded valley of Big Dry Creek. Here the Jackson brothers returned with more depressing news for the colonel. They had discovered evidence that Snyder’s battalion had been there—and gone. From the swath cut through the thick, tall buffalo grass, it was clear that Snyder’s four companies had already turned southeast from the Buttes and were making for the cantonment.
That night as the wind howled and smelled of snow, Nelson Miles trudged through the camp where there was little cheer and not nearly enough firewood. While the men did what they could to clear away more than a foot of snow, the temperature continued to plummet. It was clear his soldiers were weary of the march, exhausted after the superhuman effort to cut roads and haul wagons up the sheer face of the ridges, hungry and tired and depressed in spirit.
As the first few icy flakes danced through the air, Miles decided he could ask no more of his men.
Come morning, he would lead them back to the Tongue River.
Chapter 7
2-7 December 1876
Yellowstone Kelly didn’t end up finding Miles on Crooked Creek in those two days that Captain Snyder had allotted him. That night of the thirtieth he slept cold and alone before starting back for the battalion in the gray light of dawn that first day of December.
On the second Kelly led the battalion out at first light, pushing south by east for the valley of the Big Dry, where Snyder abandoned a wagon because of a broken axle and worn-out mules. Herding the balky animals on with his little column, the captain pressed the men to put as much country behind them as they could, what with the dwindling rations and forage staring them in the face.
Over those next three days the mules and men visibly slowed their pace not only due to the deepening snow and rugged nature of the country, but to their worsening health as well. The march dragged slower and slower until Snyder grew extremely alarmed that he would not be able to force-march the men and animals all the way back to the cantonment.
“Kelly—grain up the best pair of horses we have,” the captain told the scout on the fifth. “Pick another man sure to make it with you …”
“Just in case one of us doesn’t, Captain?”
Snyder nodded. “We still don’t know where the hell Sitting Bull is, and you two might run right into a pack of them. I want … These men all need one of you to make it back to our base.”
“What do you want me to tell them at the post?”
“Just to send back with you all that they can spare in the way of rations for man and beast, Kelly.” Then the captain’s hollow eyes began to mist over as he held out his hand. “I wish you God’s speed.”
He shook Snyder’s hand and smiled in that bushy, unkempt
beard. “Don’t you worry none now, Captain. I won’t need any luck. You just keep an eye out for me on the skyline. I’ll get those supplies for you. Don’t you worry none about that.”
Leading his two orderlies, four mounted soldiers, thirteen wagon drivers, and ninety-three foot soldiers, Lieutenant Frank D. Baldwin and his scout, Vic Smith, had backtracked uneventfully with his weakening mules all the way to Fort Peck, where on the afternoon of 6 December he learned from his advance scout, Johnny Bruguier, that the Hunkpapa were camped no more than fifteen miles east of the agency on Porcupine Creek, north of the Missouri. Although the sun would soon be setting, Baldwin immediately decided to press on.
His quarry was within reach. No more than a matter of miles and hours now. If he could only be the one to capture Sitting Bull—
What a feather in his cap that would be!
“I want you to carry word to General Miles,” he instructed the half-breed as he scribbled out a hurried message.
If I thought you could arrive here in time I would wait … but [I] am afraid the chance will be lost. … I shall start this evening and endeavor to reach the main camp in time to pitch in early in the morning.
Slit-eyed, Bruguier asked, “Soon the Bear Coat takes the rope from my neck, right?”
For a moment Frank studied the half-breed’s face, feeling almost sad for the man who was wanted for murder among the white people, a man who had just turned his back on the Indians who had taken him in as one of their own.
“Yeah,” Baldwin replied. “You’ve done what you promised you would a few days back. Now the general will do what he said he would—since you’ve told me exactly where I’ll find Sitting Bull.”
As the shadows lengthened, Baldwin watched Bruguier and scout Billy Cross mount up and head west with his message to Miles that he was about to engage the Hunkpapa. Then the thirty-four-year-old veteran of the Civil War went against the strong feelings of his officers and prepared for his assault on the Sioux.
“All due respect, sir,” said Second Lieutenant David Q. Rousseau, “we don’t know what size of opposing force we’re going to confront.”
Baldwin bristled at the criticism from the West Pointers. He glared at the rest in turn. “What say the rest of you?”
“Permission to speak honestly?” asked Second Lieutenant Frank S. Hinkle.
“Permission, Mr. Hinkle.”
“Considering the condition of the men and the weather, not knowing the strength of our enemy”—and then he paused—“I would recommend we send out scouts first, sir.”
Baldwin boldly asked them, “Do any of you agree with me that we should strike before Sitting Bull’s village slips away
None of the other three officers spoke up.
“Very well, then,” Baldwin sighed. “You have your orders. We’re going after the Hunkpapa—tonight.”
In the next hour he had his men unhitch the wagon teams and off-load eighteen thousand rounds for the Springfields onto his mule train. In addition he supplied a hundred rounds to be carried by every one of his 112 men. After putting his last three bags of oats for the mules in the packs, he issued two days’ rations for the men to carry in their haversacks suspended over their shoulders.
By eight P.M. the lieutenant climbed back into his saddle, formed his foot soldiers into column, and headed east in the dark, forcing their way through more than two feet of snow. If he managed to make good time crossing that winter wilderness, his three companies could attack the Hunkpapa camp sometime just after dawn.
As a young man from Michigan, Baldwin had enlisted in the Union Army in 1861 and quickly won a commission. He had served in Sherman’s campaigns down in the Carolinas and in Georgia. At one point he was captured by the Confederates, held for a time at Libby Prison in Richmond, then was released in a prisoner exchange. He went back to active service, fought on, was captured and released a second time.
After Appomattox a restless Baldwin was assigned to various stations in the west until he found a home with the Fifth Infantry and Nelson A. Miles. Time and again during the Red River War against the southern tribes, he served Miles as chief of scouts, winning numerous commendations for gallantry, and received several brevet promotions. It was Baldwin’s gutsy wagon-train raid on Gray Beard’s camp at McClellan Creek that secured the release of the two youngest German sisters in November of 1874.
But even that would pale compared to the glory to be heaped on the shoulders of the man who captured Sitting Bull. How proud his Alice would be of him, though she had repeatedly begged him to leave the army. Yet in Baldwin flickered the same desire that burned bright in Miles. Not to mention all those hopes and dreams Frank committed to the pages of his shirt-pocket diary every day.
As cold stars twinkled overhead, the men trudged through snow some two feet on the level, an icy crust scraping and gouging their shins. On into the deepening darkness they struggled, following the Missouri down to the mouth of Milk River. In the starry darkness about seven miles east of the agency on the Fort Buford Road the column suddenly confronted several small bands of friendlies frightened by Sitting Bull’s swelling village and the arriving soldiers, hurrying now toward Fort Peck.
Baldwin grew elated at the prospect of finding the Hunkpapa camp on the north side of the Missouri. As they marched on through the night, the freezing air carried with it the faint hint of woodsmoke. The hostile camp could not be far now.
Baldwin was certain he would soon be staring Sitting Bull in the eye.
* * *
“The soldiers are near!”
Sitting Bull scrambled to his feet at that first cry from outside, but he was barely standing when his lodge door was thrust aside and in leaped his adopted brother.
“Jumping Bull!”
“My brother,” the warrior said breathlessly, “forgive my discourtesy.”
His eyes quickly darted around the crowded circle. In this lodge, as in every lodge and every tent the Hunkpapa bands still possessed, the people were hunkered close this winter. And in the last few days even more had come to stand with Sitting Bull as it became clear the soldiers were once more come to raid and burn and kill. Just three suns ago, ten-times-nine more lodges had joined the growing camp.
Sitting Bull asked, “Do you bring this alarm of soldiers?”
“Yes,” Jumping Bull replied, pulling his hands from the two wool-blanket mittens and rubbing them over the fire. “The soldiers—they must know where we are. They are marching right for us.”
“The one you trusted,” growled Lame Red Skirt from the far side of the fire. “Big Leggings.”
“Yes,” Sitting Bull said dolefully. “I should have let you kill him when he came among us.”
Jumping Bull whirled on Lame Red Skirt. “You were an old woman ready to surrender when Sitting Bull was standing alone against the Bear Coat. Your anger at Big Leggings does nothing to help us now, Lame Red Skirt!”
Sitting Bull watched the words strike the war chief like a quirt lash across the cheek. Lame Red Skirt’s eyes flared, but the Bull put out a hand to motion him to keep his seat. “Tell me where the soldiers are.”
“South,” Jumping Bull declared, his eyes coming back from the humiliated war chief. “They are near the mouth of the Milk River.”
“How is it you know this?” Black Moon demanded.
“At sundown last night the soldiers talked with Big Leggings at the agency.”
“Were you there?” Lame Red Skirt asked.
“No, but some Yanktonais were,” Jumping Bull said. “They came in search of me, found me out hunting, then told me the soldiers were marching—even now into the dark of night.”
“That never means any good will come of the next few days,” Sitting Bull commented quietly. His fingers slowly played up and down one braid.
“I went to see for myself, brother,” Jumping Bull continued. “In the dark at the agency, and bundled in my blanket coat, I must have been taken by the soldiers as one of their own scouts. I came up behind the wasi
cu, rode past the long string of their walk-a-heaps, and even passed right by the soldier chief leading them this way.”
Suddenly Sitting Bull was decisive. “Let there be no delay! Tell everyone we are leaving. Now! Take down the lodges and tents. Men must ready their weapons to protect the women and children if the soldiers find us while we escape in the dark.”
Already the chiefs were moving from his lodge with the Bull’s instructions. In minutes the covers were slipping from the lodgepoles and the travois attached to rib-gaunt ponies were loaded with what the Hunkpapa still possessed.
In less time than it takes for a hungry man to eat his breakfast, the warrior bands who owed allegiance to Sitting Bull had slipped away from the mouth of Porcupine Creek, following the east bank of the Milk toward the frozen Minisose.
There in the predawn darkness of 7 December they planned to cross to the south bank a few at a time, horses and dogs, women, children, and old ones first. As the temperature had continued to drop over the last few days, new ice had formed on the river. For now the black of night rumbled with the muffled sounds of frightened children crying, women wailing their despair at being driven from their homes once more, and old men resolutely chanting their strong-heart songs to give courage to the young ones who would cover their retreat.
Those sounds seemed to be swallowed by the cold, clear night, buried beneath the creak and groan of the new snow as it strained beneath the weight of so many hooves, so many moccasins.
As the warriors took up positions in the timbered breaks overlooking the crossing so they could delay the soldiers sure to come … the first of the Sitting Bull band stepped out of the skeletal trees, onto the icy Minisose River, and began to flee south toward the rugged, broken countryside, into the darkness, into a frightening unknown once more.
“Why the hell didn’t any of you say anything?” Frank Baldwin demanded, feeling his gorge rise.
Wolf Mountain Moon: The Battle of the Butte, 1877 tp-12 Page 9