On the Border with Crook

by John Gregory Bourke

“We made the other party of soldiers (i. e., Reno’s) cross the creek and run back to where they had their pack-train. The reason we didn’t kill all this (Reno’s) party was because while we were fighting his party, we heard that more soldiers were coming up the river, so we had to pack up and leave. We left some good young men killed in that fight. We had a great many killed in the fight, and some others died of their wounds. I know that there were between fifty and sixty Indians killed in the fight. After the fight we went to Wolf Mountain, near the head of Goose Creek. Then we followed Rosebud down, and then went over to Bluestone Creek. We had the fight on Rosebud first, and seven days after, this fight. When we got down to Bluestone, the band broke up.”

Lt. Faison. Capt. Roberts. Geronimo. Capt. Maus. Capt. Bourke. Mayor. Strauss.
Lt. Shipp. Gen. Crook. Charles Roberts.
Antonio Besias.
CONFERENCE BETWEEN GENERAL CROOK AND GERONIMO

From the bands surrendering at Red Cloud and Spotted Tail agencies, many relics of the Custer tragedy were obtained. Among other things secured was a heavy gold ring, surmounted with a bloodstone seal, engraved with a griffin, which had formerly belonged to Lieutenant Reilly of the Seventh Cavalry, who perished on that day. This interesting relic was returned to his mother in Washington.

The total number of Indians surrendering at these agencies (Red Cloud and Spotted Tail) was not quite four thousand five hundred, who made no secret of the fact that they had yielded because they saw that it was impossible to stand out against the coalition made by General Crook between the white soldiers and their own people; the terrible disaster happening to the Cheyenne village had opened their ears to the counsels of their brethren still in those agencies, and the alliance between the Cheyennes and the whites proved to them that further resistance would be useless. They surrendered, and they surrendered for good; there has never been another battle with the tribes of the northern plains as such; work of a most arduous and perilous character has been from time to time performed, in which many officers and brave soldiers have laid down their lives at the behest of duty, but the statement here made cannot be gainsaid, and will never be questioned by the honest and truthful investigator, that the destruction of the village of “Dull Knife,” and the subsequent enlistment of the whole of the northern Cheyennes as scouts in the military service, sounded the death-knell of Indian supremacy for Nebraska, Wyoming, both the Dakotas, and Montana.

Crook took up the tangled threads of Indian affairs at the agencies with his accustomed energy, intelligence, coolness, patience, and foresight gained in an experience of almost twenty-five years. The new surrenders were ignorant, timid, sullen, distrustful, suspicious, revengeful, and with the departure of the Cheyennes for the Indian Territory, which took place almost immediately after, began to reflect more upon the glories of the fight with Custer than upon the disaster of November. This was the normal state of affairs, but it was intensified by the rumors, which proved to be only too well founded, that Congress was legislating to transfer the Sioux to another locality—either to the Missouri River or the Indian Territory. A delegation was sent down to the Indian Territory to look at the land, but upon its return it reported unfavorably.

“Crazy Horse” began to cherish hopes of being able to slip out of the agency and get back into some section farther to the north, where he would have little to fear, and where he could resume the old wild life with its pleasant incidents of hunting the buffalo, the elk, and the moose, and its raids upon the horses of Montana. He found his purposes detected and baffled at every turn: his camp was filled with soldiers, in uniform or without, but each and all reporting to the military officials each and every act taking place under their observation. Even his council-lodge was no longer safe: all that was said therein was repeated by some one, and his most trusted subordinates, who had formerly been proud to obey unquestioningly every suggestion, were now cooling rapidly in their rancor towards the whites and beginning to doubt the wisdom of a resumption of the bloody path of war. The Spotted Tail Agency, to which “Crazy Horse” wished to belong, was under the supervision of an army officer—Major Jesse M. Lee, of the Ninth Infantry—whose word was iron, who never swerved from the duty he owed to these poor, misguided wretches, and who manifested the deepest and most intelligent interest in their welfare. I will not bother the reader with details as to the amount of food allowed to the Indians, but I will say that every ounce of it got to the Indian’s stomach, and the Indians were sensible enough to see that justice, truth, and common honesty were not insignificant diplomatic agencies in breaking down and eradicating the race-antipathies which had been no small barrier to progress hitherto. General Crook had been specially fortunate in the selection of the officers to take charge of Indian matters, and in such men as Major Daniel W. Burke and Captain Kennington, of the Fourteenth Infantry, and Mills, of the Third Cavalry, had deputies who would carry out the new policy, which had as one of its fundamentals that the Indians must not be stolen blind. The Sioux were quick to perceive the change: less than twelve months before, they had been robbed in the most bold-faced manner, the sacks which were accepted as containing one hundred pounds of flour containing only eighty-eight. When delivery was made, the mark of the inspecting and receiving officer would be stamped upon the outer sack, and the moment his back was turned, that sack would be pulled off, and the under and unmarked one submitted for additional counting.

Those two agencies were a stench in the nostrils of decent people; the attention of honest tax-payers was first called to their disgraceful management, by Mr. Welsh, of Philadelphia, and Professor Marsh, of New Haven. After a sufficiently dignified delay, suited to the gravity of the case, a congressional committee recommended the removal of the agents, and that the contractor be proceeded against, which was done, and the contractor sentenced to two years in the penitentiary.

Two other officers of the army did good work in the first and most trying days at these agencies, and their services should not be forgotten. They were Lieutenant Morris Foote, of the Ninth, and Lieutenant A. C. Johnson, of the Fourteenth Infantry. Lieutenant William P. Clarke, who had remained in charge of the Indian scouts, kept General Crook fully posted upon all that “Crazy Horse” had in contemplation; but nothing serious occurred until the fall of the year 1877, when the Nez Percé war was at its height, and it became necessary to put every available man of the Department of the Platte at Camp Brown to intercept Chief “Joseph” in his supposed purpose of coming down from the Gray Bull Pass into the Shoshone and Bannock country, in the hope of getting aid and comfort. “Crazy Horse” had lost so many of his best arms at the surrender, and he felt that he was so closely watched, and surrounded by so many lukewarm adherents, that it would be impossible to leave the agency openly; and accordingly he asked permission to go out into the Big Horn on a hunt for buffalo, which permission was declined. He then determined to break away in the night, and by making a forced march, put a good stretch of territory between himself and troops sent in pursuit.

Including the band of “Touch the Clouds,” which had surrendered at Spotted Tail Agency some time before the arrival of “Crazy Horse” at Red Cloud, and the stragglers who had preceded him into the latter agency, “Crazy Horse” reckoned on having about two thousand people to follow his fortunes to British America, or whithersoever he might conclude to go. When his purposes became known his arrest was made necessary. General Crook hurried to Red Cloud Agency, and from there started over towards Spotted Tail Agency, intending to have a talk with “Crazy Horse” and the other chiefs; but when about half-way our conveyance was stopped by a Sioux runner—“Woman’s Dress”—who said that he had been sent by “Spotted Tail” and the other Indians to warn General Crook that “Crazy Horse” had unequivocally asserted that he would kill General Crook in the coming council, if Crook’s words did not suit him. Crook returned to Red Cloud Agency and summoned all the chiefs, including “Crazy Horse,” to a conference; “Crazy Horse” paid no attention to the message.