Indian Fights and Fighters: The Soldier and the Sioux

by Cyrus Townsend Brady

I had a Spencer carbine which had been sent me by the company for trial. With it I shot down an Indian, who fell and lay within thirty yards of the corral. He was not dead, and I afterward talked with him through Grover. He said his name was Little Crow, and mentioned the name of his father, whom Grover said he knew. He was young—about eighteen. I asked him why they attacked us. He said because we came on their creek. He told where their camp was, so that one week from that day, which was Sunday, October 18th, 1868, I found them with my own regiment, the Fifth, had a fight lasting two days and two nights, and drove them out of Kansas.

While the fight was going on our soldiers showed great bravery. While inside the wagon corral they would rush from one side to the other, wherever the Indians appeared, so as to fire at them. Their officers did not seem to keep them in their places, and, after it was over, I reprimanded them for not commanding their men. After the Indians were repulsed we went around and rearranged the wagons, got out sacks, cracker-boxes, etc., fixed breastworks in anticipation of another attack, and then sat down and ate our lunch.

It was two o’clock. Our soldiers wanted to scalp the dead Indians, of whom about ten were lying too near the corral for their friends to carry off. We prevented this till, while we were going around the corral rearranging, the soldiers got the chance to scalp them. Two were lying wounded when two soldiers approached them; one drew his bow and sent an arrow through the thighs of one of the men. The arrow passed through the fleshy part of one thigh and entered the other and stopped against the bone. It had to be cut in two to extract it. Years after, at Fort Leavenworth, a first sergeant showed me an arrow-head with the point marred, and said he was that man.

The other wounded Indian had a pistol, and shot the other soldier in the calf of his leg. These were the only men we had hurt. It was then that there was some talk of abandoning the wagons and going direct for the railroad. With the wagons, we had, of course, to go by routes over which wheeled vehicles could travel. I do not recall whether Captain Graham advocated this, but there would have been no impropriety in his stating his views to me. Any officer can talk to his commander, and I had been giving orders from time to time directly to him and his men. We sat there eating our lunch and talking with each other and the wounded Indian who lay in front of us, when he made a motion with his hand back toward me. I asked Grover what he meant. He said, “He wants you to go away; says his heart is bad.” This pleased me very much. I had been watching the Indians, who had fallen back to some rising ground nearly a mile off. They were moving about, pow-wowing, and, I supposed, preparing for a new attack. They seemed to be diminishing in numbers, but I thought they were trying to get around to some place where they would have a better chance at us. I really did not expect to get out of that fix. If those Indians had had sufficient resolution, being seven to one, they ought to have used us up. When the wounded Indian made this motion, I took it to mean that he knew they were giving up. He could see them as well as we could, and knew better what they were doing. I suppose that those who remained were the friends of the dead, waiting for us to go.

I gave orders to reload the wagons and move out. Some of the Indians followed us for several miles, but did not again attack.

Colonel Carpenter did not offer the command to me at the first attack in the morning, nor did I decline it. I was exercising the command all the time. One of the articles of war provides that “when troops join and do duty together the highest in rank of the line of the army shall command the whole, and give the orders needful for the service,” and I could not have avoided the responsibility.

The foregoing narrative shows that I was not a “passive spectator,” nor did I “refrain from advice or suggestion,” nor from giving orders as required.

I, no doubt, said that I was a guest, and did not interfere unnecessarily; but my long experience on the plains and with Indians rendered it incumbent on me to exercise my judgment.

Eugene A. Carr,

Brevet Major-General and Congressional Medallist.