The old trading fort offered little resistance to the 316 Indian attack, and the handful of troops within it very little more. Being soldiers they were treated to the Indians’ first attention. An overwhelming horde of picked warriors was sent to deal with them, and, by the end of the second day, the massacre and sacking of the post were accomplished.
In this way a large reinforcement was added to the party threatening Beacon Crossing. Intoxicated with their first success the whole army rushed upon the unfortunate township. And all the more fierce was the onslaught for the reason that the attack was made up of rival tribes.
The Rosebuds had wiped out the troops, and, in consequence, the men of Pine Ridge, fired by jealousy, advanced like a raging torrent mad with the desire for slaughter. Utterly unprepared for such rapid movements, the men at the Crossing, unorganized, hardly realizing what had happened, fell easy victims.
The township, like the fort, was wiped from the fair face of the budding prairie-land. The horrors of the massacre were too terrible to be dealt with here. Every man, woman, and child now living in the country has heard the tales of that awful week. Few people escaped, and those only by taking to the Black Hills, where they suffered untold privations from want and exposure.
Having thus disposed of the two principal centres from which interference might spring, the Indians proceeded to devote themselves to the individual 317 settlers upon the prairie. Not a farm escaped their attention. North and south, east and west, for miles and miles the red tide swept over the face of the plains, burning, sacking, murdering.
A track of blood was left behind them wherever they went. Charred monuments marked the tombs of hardy settlers caught in the red flood; where peace and prosperity had so recently reigned, now were only ruin and devastation.
With each succeeding day the horror grew. The northern Indians threw in their lot with their warlike Sioux brothers, and all the smaller and more distant tribes, numerically too weak for initiative, hastened to the bloody field of battle. The rebellion grew; it spread over the country like a running sore. The Bad Lands were maintaining their title.
At first the news that filtered through to the outside world was meagre, and devoid of reliable detail. Thus it happened that only a few troops were hurried to the scene of action. It was not until these, like the handful at the fort, had served to swell the roll of massacre, and the fact became known that the northern posts, where large forces were always kept in readiness, were cut off from all communications, that the world learned the full horror that had befallen the Indian territory of Dakota.
Through these days the one place to hold out against the fierce onslaught of an overwhelming foe was the fortified farm of White River. But it was in a desperate plight. 318
So far only the foresight of the defenders had saved them. The vast strength of the stockade and the inner earthworks, hurriedly thrown up at the last moment, and the unswerving devotion of the little band of settlers within its shelter, had formed a combination of stout resistance. But as the time passed, and each day brought with it its tally of casualties, the position became more and more desperate.