On the Border with Crook

by John Gregory Bourke

The Crow scouts with whom I was had gone but a short distance when shots were heard down the valley to the north, followed by the ululation proclaiming from the hill-tops that the enemy was in force and that we were in for a fight. Shot after shot followed on the left, and by the time that two of the Crows reached us, one of them severely wounded and both crying, “Sioux! Sioux!” it was plain that something out of the common was to be expected. There was a strong line of pickets out on the hills on that flank, and this was immediately strengthened by a respectable force of skirmishers to cover the cavalry horses, which were down at the bottom of the amphitheatre through which the Rosebud at that point ran. The Shoshones promptly took position in the hills to the left, and alongside of them were the companies of the Fourth Infantry, under Major A. B. Cain, and one or two of the cavalry companies, dismounted.

The Sioux advanced boldly and in overwhelming force, covering the hills to the north, and seemingly confident that our command would prove an easy prey. In one word, the battle of the Rosebud was a trap, and “Crazy Horse,” the leader in command here as at the Custer massacre a week later, was satisfied he was going to have everything his own way. He stated afterwards, when he had surrendered to General Crook at the agency, that he had no less than six thousand five hundred men in the fight, and that the first attack was made with fifteen hundred, the others being concealed behind the bluffs and hills. His plan of battle was either to lead detachments in pursuit of his people, and turning quickly cut them to pieces in detail, or draw the whole of Crook’s forces down into the cañon of the Rosebud, where escape would have been impossible, as it formed a veritable cul de sac, the vertical walls hemming in the sides, the front being closed by a dam and abatis of broken timber which gave a depth of ten feet of water and mud, the rear, of course, to be shut off by thousands of yelling, murderous Sioux and Cheyennes. That was the Sioux programme as learned that day, or afterwards at the agencies from the surrendered hostiles in the spring of the following year.

While this attack was going on on our left and front, a determined demonstration was made by a large body of the enemy on our right and rear, to repel which Colonel Royall, Third Cavalry, was sent with a number of companies, mounted, to charge and drive back. I will restrict my observations to what I saw, as the battle of the Rosebud has been several times described in books and any number of times in the correspondence sent from the command to the journals of those years. The Sioux and Cheyennes, the latter especially, were extremely bold and fierce, and showed a disposition to come up and have it out hand to hand; in all this they were gratified by our troops, both red and white, who were fully as anxious to meet them face to face and see which were the better men. At that part of the line the enemy were disconcerted at a very early hour by the deadly fire of the infantry with their long rifles. As the hostiles advanced at a full run, they saw nothing in their front, and imagined that it would be an easy thing for them to sweep down through the long ravine leading to the amphitheatre, where they could see numbers of our cavalry horses clumped together. They advanced in excellent style, yelling and whooping, and glad of the opportunity of wiping us off the face of the earth. When Cain’s men and the detachments of the Second Cavalry which were lying down behind a low range of knolls rose up and delivered a withering fire at less than a hundred and fifty yards, the Sioux turned and fled as fast as “quirt” and heel could persuade their ponies to get out of there.

But, in their turn, they re-formed behind a low range not much over three hundred yards distant, and from that position kept up an annoying fire upon our men and horses. Becoming bolder, probably on account of re-enforcements, they again charged, this time upon a weak spot in our lines a little to Cain’s left; this second advance was gallantly met by a counter-charge of the Shoshones, who, under their chief “Luishaw,” took the Sioux and Cheyennes in flank and scattered them before them. I went in with this charge, and was enabled to see how such things were conducted by the American savages, fighting according to their own notions. There was a headlong rush for about two hundred yards, which drove the enemy back in confusion; then was a sudden halt, and very many of the Shoshones jumped down from their ponies and began firing from the ground; the others who remained mounted threw themselves alongside of their horses’ necks, so that there would be few good marks presented to the aim of the enemy. Then, in response to some signal or cry which, of course, I did not understand, we were off again, this time for good, and right into the midst of the hostiles, who had been halted by a steep hill directly in their front. Why we did not kill more of them than we did was because they were dressed so like our own Crows that even our Shoshones were afraid of mistakes, and in the confusion many of the Sioux and Cheyennes made their way down the face of the bluffs unharmed.

From this high point there could be seen on Crook’s right and rear a force of cavalry, some mounted, others dismounted, apparently in the clutches of the enemy; that is to say, a body of hostiles was engaging attention in front and at the same time a large mass, numbering not less than five hundred, was getting ready to pounce upon the rear and flank of the unsuspecting Americans. I should not forget to say that while the Shoshones were charging the enemy on one flank, the Crows, led by Major George M. Randall, were briskly attacking them on the other; the latter movement had been ordered by Crook in person and executed in such a bold and decisive manner as to convince the enemy that, no matter what their numbers were, our troops and scouts were anxious to come to hand-to-hand encounters with them. This was really the turning-point of the Rosebud fight for a number of reasons: the main attack had been met and broken, and we had gained a key-point enabling the holder to survey the whole field and realize the strength and intentions of the enemy. The loss of the Sioux at this place was considerable both in warriors and ponies; we were at one moment close enough to them to hit them with clubs or “coup” sticks, and to inflict considerable damage, but not strong enough to keep them from getting away with their dead and wounded. A number of our own men were also hurt, some of them quite seriously. I may mention a young trumpeter—Elmer A. Snow, of Company M, Third Cavalry—who went in on the charge with the Shoshones, one of the few white men with them; he displayed noticeable gallantry, and was desperately wounded in both arms, which were crippled for life; his escape from the midst of the enemy was a remarkable thing.

I did not learn until nightfall that at the same time they made the charge just spoken of; the enemy had also rushed down through a ravine on our left and rear, reaching the spring alongside of which I had been seated with General Crook at the moment the first shots were heard, and where I had jotted down the first lines of the notes from which the above condensed account of the fight has been taken. At that spring they came upon a young Shoshone boy, not yet attained to years of manhood, and shot him through the back and killed him, taking his scalp from the nape of the neck to the forehead, leaving his entire skull ghastly and white. It was the boy’s first battle, and when the skirmishing began in earnest he asked permission of his chief to go back to the spring and decorate himself with face-paint, which was already plastered over one cheek, and his medicine song was half done, when he received the fatal shot.

Crook sent orders for all troops to fall back until the line should be complete; some of the detachments had ventured out too far, and our extended line was too weak to withstand a determined attack in force. Burt and Burroughs were sent with their companies of the Ninth Infantry to drive back the force which was congregating in the rear of Royall’s command, which was the body of troops seen from the hill crest almost surrounded by the foe. Tom Moore with his sharpshooters from the pack-train, and several of the Montana miners who had kept along with the troops for the sake of a row of some kind with the natives, were ordered to get into a shelf of rocks four hundred yards out on our front and pick off as many of the hostile chiefs as possible and also to make the best impression upon the flanks of any charging parties which might attempt to pass on either side of that promontory. Moore worried the Indians so much that they tried to cut off him and his insignificant band. It was one of the ridiculous episodes of the day to watch those well-meaning young warriors charging at full speed across the open space commanded by Moore’s position; not a shot was fired, and beyond taking an extra chew of tobacco, I do not remember that any of the party did anything to show that he cared a continental whether the enemy came or stayed. When those deadly rifles, sighted by men who had no idea what the word “nerves” meant, belched their storm of lead in among the braves and their ponies, it did not take more than seven seconds for the former to conclude that home, sweet home was a good enough place for them.

While the infantry were moving down to close the gap on Royall’s right, and Tom Moore was amusing himself in the rocks, Crook ordered Mills with five companies to move out on our right and make a demonstration down stream, intending to get ready for a forward movement with the whole command. Mills moved out promptly, the enemy falling back on all sides and keeping just out of fair range. I went with Mills, having returned from seeing how Tom Moore was getting along, and can recall how deeply impressed we all were by what we then took to be trails made by buffaloes going down stream, but which we afterwards learned had been made by the thousands of ponies belonging to the immense force of the enemy here assembled. We descended into a measly-looking place: a cañon with straight walls of sandstone, having on projecting knobs an occasional scrub pine or cedar; it was the locality where the savages had planned to entrap the troops, or a large part of them, and wipe them out by closing in upon their rear. At the head of that column rode two men who have since made their mark in far different spheres: John F. Finerty, who has represented one of the Illinois districts in Congress; and Frederick Schwatka, noted as a bold and successful Arctic explorer.

Crook recalled our party from the cañon before we had gone too far, but not before Mills had detected the massing of forces to cut him off. Our return was by another route, across the high hills and rocky places, which would enable us to hold our own against any numbers until assistance came. Crook next ordered an advance of our whole line, and the Sioux fell back and left us in undisputed possession of the field. Our total loss was fifty-seven, killed or wounded—some of the latter only slightly. The heaviest punishment had been inflicted upon the Third Cavalry, in Royall’s column, that regiment meeting with a total loss of nine killed and fifteen wounded, while the Second Cavalry had two wounded, and the Fourth Infantry three wounded. In addition to this were the killed and wounded among the scouts, and a number of wounds which the men cared for themselves, as they saw that the medical staff was taxed to the utmost. One of our worst wounded was Colonel Guy V. Henry, Third Cavalry, who was at first believed to have lost both eyes and to have been marked for death; but, thanks to good nursing, a wiry frame, and strong vitality, he has since recovered vision and some part of his former physical powers. The officers who served on Crook’s staff that day had close calls, and among others Bubb and Nickerson came very near falling into the hands of the enemy. Colonel Royall’s staff officers, Lemly and Foster, were greatly exposed, as were Henry Vroom, Reynolds, and others of that part of the command. General Crook’s horse was shot from under him, and there were few, if any, officers or soldiers, facing the strength of the Sioux and Cheyennes at the Rosebud, who did not have some incident of a personal nature by which to impress the affair upon their memories for the rest of their lives.

The enemy’s loss was never known. Our scouts got thirteen scalps, but the warriors, the moment they were badly wounded, would ride back from the line or be led away by comrades, so that we then believed that their total loss was much more severe. The behavior of Shoshones and Crows was excellent. The chief of the Shoshones appeared to great advantage, mounted on a fiery pony, he himself naked to the waist and wearing one of the gorgeous head-dresses of eagle feathers sweeping far along the ground behind his pony’s tail. The Crow chief, “Medicine Crow,” looked like a devil in his war-bonnet of feathers, fur, and buffalo horns.