There was plenty of ammunition among the savages, and they were as well armed as the soldiers. There were still many buffalo in the country of the red men, and of food and clothing they had abundance. Their women and children were with them. Their ponies were many. Their warriors numbered several thousand. And, realizing that they were now encircled and enveloped by their hated enemies, they determined to make a last, desperate resistance to the power of the Government, which had determined, late in 1876, that thereafter all Indians in the Northwest must live upon the reservations.
"God made me an Indian, but not a Reservation Indian," Sitting Bull had said.
"The Great Spirit has told me that I shall defeat the whites," Crazy Horse had added.
Thus, stimulated with a just pride in their own strength and resources, the Sioux retreated to the region of the Big Horn mountains, determined to retain their independence, and to drive off the whites. They were patriots fighting for the soil which they had been born upon. They fought gamely, desperately, mercilessly; until beaten in detail by the superior ability of the whites, they at last were forced to a peaceable life upon the Government reservations.
General Reynolds soon found the Indians. Under fire from a band of warriors upon the hills, his men charged upon the camp of Crazy Horse and drove the redskins to a high bluff. While shot at very heavily by the warriors, the soldiers began to destroy the tepees. The fire from the followers of Crazy Horse grew more and more accurate. In spite of a stout resistance by the troopers, the redskins began to push them very hard. They soon had found the range of the camp, and many of the cavalrymen went down before their accurate aim. Suddenly Reynolds ordered a retreat—so suddenly that the bodies of several of his men were left behind to the fury of the Sioux, while one wounded man, it is said, was abandoned to an awful fate among the hostiles.
As is always the case when white men move back before red, the followers of Crazy Horse grew more and more bold as the whites withdrew. It was bitterly cold—so cold that the soldiers suffered intensely from the zero weather. Following the example of Crazy Horse, the red men made a vigorous attack upon Reynolds' force, and, by a bold and impetuous advance, succeeded in recapturing seven hundred of their own ponies which the troopers were driving before them. After this they seemed to be satisfied with their actions, and, apparently unmindful of the freezing temperature, rode quietly and joyously back to their own camp. All the honors were with Crazy Horse, and he was the hero of the western plains.
What General Crook said when Reynolds returned is not worthy of repetition, for he was the commanding officer of this expedition against the Sioux and was hastening to the assistance of that officer with his infantry and wagons. It was a disgraceful affair from the viewpoint of the Americans, but in the camp of the Sioux there was dancing and song. "The Great Spirit is upon our side," chanted the warriors. "We shall drive the palefaces into the land of the setting sun. We shall again sleep in peace upon the prairie." But they could not read the signs aright.
At Fort Fetterman, Wyoming, nine hundred cavalrymen and three hundred infantry were soon in motion against the Indians. Crook was in command of this, the most efficient force which had ever been sent against the Sioux. He was an officer of large experience, and so, on May 29th., 1876, began the advance, before the weather was too hot for campaigning. Past the ruins of old Fort Phil Kearney marched the dusty column; past the beetling cliffs of the mountains; the great stretches of glorious prairie covered with variegated wild flowers and the bleaching skulls of buffalo; on through the deep defiles and coulies of the numerous crystal streams which rippled through this glorious plateau, until, on June 9th., the army encamped upon the south side of the Tongue River. Here a message was received from Crazy Horse, which said:
"If you cross my river, my warriors will take your scalps. Go back into your own country and leave me and my children alone."