Our camp was very large and my chief was in the fullness of his command. Some of the Ogallallahs had joined us before and with the Cheyennes we were nearly fifteen hundred lodges. We made no effort at concealing our trail. We moved in a body, and where we went we left a broad and dusty road. We trailed leisurely up the Yellowstone to the mouth of the Rosebud and up the Rosebud to the head of a small creek which emptied into Greasy Grass Creek (a stream which the whites call the Little Big Horn) at a point where there was plenty of wood and good grazing.
The chief as he looked down upon this valley said: “It is good. We will camp here,” and to this they all agreed. It was indeed a beautiful place. I was but a lad, but I remember that beautiful scene, finer than anything in all our own lands. Hunting parties were at once sent out to find the buffalo, and some of the chief’s “Silent Eaters” mounted the hills to spy backward on our trail.
The hunters reported the country clear of foes and buffalo near, and as the spies brought no news of invaders the people threw off all care. With feasts and dances they began to celebrate their escape from the oppressor. We were beginning the world anew in this glorious country.
One day in midsummer—I remember it now with beating heart—just in the midst of our preparation for a dance, the cry arose: “The white soldiers—they are coming! Get your horses!”
I remember clearly the very instant. I was sitting in my father’s lodge, painting my face for the dance, when this sound arose. The shouting came from the camp of The Gall, whose lodges stood at the extreme south end of the circle. From where I stood I could see nothing, but as I ran up the west bank to find my horse I detected a long line of white soldiers riding swiftly down the valley from the south. They came like a moving wall and the sun glittered on their guns as they reloaded them. Before them the women and children were fleeing like willow leaves before a November wind.
My heart was beating so hard I could scarcely speak. I was but a boy and had never seen a white soldier, yet now I must fight. All around me were hundreds of other young men and boys roping, bridling, and mounting the plunging ponies.
As we came sweeping back my father passed us, leading the white horse of the chief, and as we came near the headquarters tent the chief came out wearing a war-bonnet and carrying his saddle. This he flung on his horse, and when he was mounted my father and his guard surrounded him and they rode away. My father took my horse and I saw neither him nor the chief till night. I heard that he tried to check the battle, but the young men of Chief Gall’s camp had routed the enemy’s column before he reached there and the soldiers were spurring their horses into the river and dashing up the hills in mad effort to get away.
The camp was a mighty whirlpool of confusion. The women were taking down the lodges, weeping and singing, the old men and boys were roping the horses together, and the ground was covered with a litter of blankets, saddles, pouches, and other things which escaped notice or seemed unimportant, and all the time we could hear the rapid cracking of the guns and it seemed as if we were all to be killed. No one knew how many soldiers there were. All seemed lost, our shining, peaceful world about to be shattered and destroyed.
I ran to catch another horse, and when I was mounted and once more in sight of the valley it was almost deserted. The women and children were all gathered in throngs on the west bank, straining their eyes toward the cloud of smoke which marked the retreat of soldiers to the southeast, singing songs of prayer and exaltation.
Suddenly a wild cry arose, and looking where an old woman pointed, I saw on the bare crest of the hill to the east a fluttering flag. A moment later four horsemen appeared, then four more, and so in column of fours they streamed into view, a long line of them.