On the Border with Crook

by John Gregory Bourke

General Crook informed the Indians that they were being led astray by “Crazy Horse’s” folly, and that they must preserve order in their own ranks and arrest “Crazy Horse.” The chiefs deliberated and said that “Crazy Horse” was such a desperate man, it would be necessary to kill him; General Crook replied that that would be murder, and could not be sanctioned; that there was force enough at or near the two agencies (“Crazy Horse” had removed from Red Cloud to Spotted Tail) to round up not only “Crazy Horse,” but his whole band, and that more troops would be sent, if necessary; he counted upon the loyal Indians effecting this arrest themselves, as it would prove to the nation that they were not in sympathy with the non-progressive element of their tribe.

General Crook had started for Camp Brown to superintend in person the massing of the troops who were to head off Chief “Joseph,” but when Sheridan heard of the threatening look of things at the Nebraska agencies, he telegraphed to Crook under date of September 1, 1877: “I think your presence more necessary at Red Cloud Agency than at Camp Brown, and wish you to get off (the Union Pacific Railroad train) at Sidney, and go there.” Again, under date of September 3, 1877: “I do not like the attitude of affairs at Red Cloud Agency, and very much doubt the propriety of your going to Camp Brown. The surrender or capture of ‘Joseph’ in that direction is but a small matter compared with what might happen to the frontier from a disturbance at Red Cloud.” ... Agent Irwin, who had assumed charge of affairs at Red Cloud Agency, was a faithful and conscientious representative of the Indian bureau; he did all in his power to assist in breaking down the threatened uprising, and showed a very competent understanding of the gravity of the situation.

“Crazy Horse” broke away during the night of the 3d of September, but was unable to get away from the column in pursuit, whose work may perhaps be best described in the language of General L. P. Bradley, Ninth Infantry, commanding the district of the Black Hills, which embraced the posts of Laramie, Fetterman, Robinson, and Sheridan.

“General Crook left here on the morning of the 4th, and, under his instructions, I sent out a strong force about 9 o’clock of that date to surround ‘Crazy Horse’s’ village, about six miles below the post. The column consisted of eight companies of the Third Cavalry, and about four hundred friendly Indians. The Indian scouts were under Lieutenant Clarke; the other Indians under chiefs ‘Red Cloud,’ ‘Little Wound,’ ‘American Horse,’ ‘Young Man Afraid of His Horses,’ ‘Yellow Bear,’ ‘Black Coal,’ ‘Big Road,’ ‘Jumping Shield,’ and ‘Sharp Nose.’ The cavalry were under the command of Colonel Mason, Third Cavalry. When the command reached the site of the village, they found it had broken up in the night, and most of it had disappeared. A part of the lodges returned to the agency of their own accord and joined the friendly bands, a large number were overtaken by the friendly Indians and brought back, and a few went to the Spotted Tail Agency. ‘Crazy Horse’ escaped alone and went to the Spotted Tail Agency, where he was arrested the same day by friendly Indians and was brought here under guard of Indians on the 5th instant. My orders from General Crook were to capture this chief, confine him, and send him under guard to Omaha. When he was put in the guardhouse he suddenly drew a knife, struck at the guard, and made for the door. ‘Little Big Man,’ one of his own chiefs, grappled with him, and was cut in the arm by ‘Crazy Horse’ during the struggle. The two chiefs were surrounded by the guard, and about this time ‘Crazy Horse’ received a severe wound in the lower part of the abdomen, either from a knife or bayonet, the surgeons are in doubt which. He was immediately removed, and placed in charge of the surgeons, and died about midnight. His father and ‘Touch the Clouds,’ chief of the Sans Arcs, remained with him till he died, and when his breath ceased, the chief laid his hand on ‘Crazy Horse’s’ breast and said: ‘It is good; he has looked for death, and it has come.’ The body was delivered to his friends the morning after his death. ‘Crazy Horse’ and his friends were assured that no harm was intended him, and the chiefs who were with him are satisfied that none was intended; his death resulted from his own violence. The leading men of his band, ‘Big Road,’ ‘Jumping Shield,’ and ‘Little Big Man,’ are satisfied that his death is the result of his own folly, and they are on friendly terms with us.”

The chiefs spoken of in General Bradley’s telegram an accompanying “Crazy Horse” were: “Touch the Clouds,” “Swift Bear,” and “High Bear.” All accounts agree in stating that “Crazy Horse” suddenly drew two knives, and with one in each hand started to run amuck among the officers and soldiers. “Little Big Man,” seeing what he had done, jumped upon “Crazy Horse’s” back and seized his arms at the elbows, receiving two slight cuts in the wrists while holding his hands down. Here, there is a discrepancy: some say that the death wound of “Crazy Horse” was given by the sentinel at the door of the guard-house, who prodded him in the abdomen with his bayonet in return for the thrust with a knife made by “Crazy Horse”; others affirm that “Little Big Man,” while holding down “Crazy Horse’s” hands, deflected the latter’s own poniard and inflicted the gash which resulted in death. Billy Hunter, whose statement was written out for me by Lieutenant George A. Dodd, Third Cavalry, is one of the strongest witnesses on the first side, but “Little Big Man” himself assured me at the Sun Dance in 1881 that he had unintentionally killed “Crazy Horse” with the latter’s own weapon, which was shaped at the end like a bayonet (stiletto), and made the very same kind of a wound. He described how he jumped on “Crazy Horse’s” back and seized his arms at the elbow, and showed how he himself had received two wounds in the left wrist; after that, in the struggle, the stiletto of the captive was inclined in such a manner that when he still struggled he cut himself in the abdomen instead of harming the one who held him in his grasp. “Little Big Man” further assured me that at first it was thought best to let the idea prevail that a soldier had done the killing, and thus reduce the probability of any one of the dead man’s relatives revenging his taking off after the manner of the aborigines. The bayonet-thrust made by the soldier was received by the door of the guard-house, where “Little Big Man” said it could still be seen. I give both stories, although I incline strongly to believe “Little Big Man.”

“Crazy Horse” was one of the great soldiers of his day and generation; he never could be the friend of the whites, because he was too bold and warlike in his nature; he had a great admiration for Crook, which was reciprocated; once he said of Crook that he was more to be feared by the Sioux than all other white men. As the grave of Custer marked high-water mark of Sioux supremacy in the trans-Missouri region, so the grave of “Crazy Horse,” a plain fence of pine slabs, marked the ebb.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE MANAGEMENT OF THE INDIAN AGENCIES—AGENT MACGILLICUDDY’S WONDERFUL WORK—CROOK’S REMAINING DAYS IN THE DEPARTMENT OF THE PLATTE—THE BANNOCK, UTE, NEZ PERCÉ, AND CHEYENNE OUTBREAKS—THE KILLING OF MAJOR THORNBURGH AND CAPTAIN WEIR—MERRRITT’S FAMOUS MARCH AGAINST TIME—HOW THE DEAD CAME TO LIFE AND WALKED—THE CASE OF THE PONCAS—CROOK’S HUNTS AND EXPLORATIONS; NEARLY FROZEN TO DEATH IN A BLIZZARD—A NARROW ESCAPE FROM AN ANGRY SHE-BEAR—CATCHING NEBRASKA HORSE-THIEVES—“DOC” MIDDLETON’S GANG

After Doctor Irwin the Indians at Red Cloud had as agent Doctor V. T. MacGillicuddy, whose peculiar fitness for the onerous and underpaid responsibilities of the position brought him deserved recognition all over the western country, as one of the most competent representatives the Indian Bureau had ever sent beyond the Missouri. Two or three times I looked into affairs at his agency very closely, and was surprised both at the immense amount of supplies on hand—running above a million pounds of flour and other parts of the ration in proportion—and the perfect system with which they were distributed and accounted for. There were then eight thousand Indians of both sexes at the agency or on the reserve, and the basis of supplies was either Pierre, in Dakota, on the Missouri, or Sidney, Nebraska, on the Union Pacific; the former two hundred and the latter one hundred and twenty-five miles distant. MacGillicuddy was kept on the go all the time from morning till night, and managed to do the work of twenty men. His salary was the munificent sum of twenty-two hundred and fifty dollars per annum. I could not help saying to myself that this man was carrying upon his shoulders the weight of a force equal to one-third the United States Army; were he in the army, MacGillicuddy would have been a major-general, surrounded by a high-priced staff, dividing the work and relieving him of nearly all care; he would have had three aides-de-camp, too frequently his own relations, each getting from the Government a better salary than the agent of this great concourse of savages was receiving. MacGillicuddy was expected and required to keep his wards at peace, feed and clothe them in health, see that they received proper medical attendance while sick, encourage them in habits of industry, especially farming and cattle-raising, prepare all kinds of accounts for the information of his bureau, and in his moments of leisure instruct the aborigines in the Catechism and Testament. In this matter of Indian agents, as in all that pertains to Indian affairs, the great trouble is that the American people have so little common sense. Let the salaries paid to agents be raised to such a standard that the position will be an inducement for first-class men to consider, and there will not be so much trouble in getting an honest administration, if there should be coupled a good-conduct tenure, subject to the approval of some such organization as the Indian Rights Association. Civil Service Reform may well be introduced in the Indian service.

Of the other services rendered by General Crook while in command of the Department of the Platte there is no room to speak. Much of the highest importance and greatest interest happened under his administration, and it is needless to say that all which devolved upon him to do was done well, done quietly, done without flourish of trumpets, and without the outside world learning much about it. In the line of military operations, there was the trouble with the Cheyennes who broke out from the Indian Territory during the summer of 1878, and fought their way across three military departments to the Tongue River, where they surrendered to their old commanding officer, Lieutenant William P. Clarke, Second Cavalry. There was the nipping in the bud of the outbreak among the Shoshones and Bannocks, principally the latter, led by “Tindoy” and “Buffalo Horn,” both of whom were personally well known to Crook, who used his influence with them to such advantage that they remained at peace until the aggressions of the whites became too great and drove them out upon the war-path. These Indians did not, properly speaking, belong to General Crook’s department, but lived on the extreme northwestern corner of it in a chain of almost inaccessible mountains in central Idaho. There was the Ute outbreak, dating back to inadequate rations and failure to keep pledges. The Utes were not of Crook’s department, but it was a battalion of the Third and Fifth Cavalry and Fourth Infantry, which moved out from Rawlins, Wyoming, under Major Thornburgh, Fourth Infantry, to save the agency and the lives of the employees; and, after poor Thornburgh had been sacrificed, it was Merritt’s column which made the wonderful march of one hundred and sixty miles in two and a half days to rescue the survivors in the “rat-hole” on Milk River.