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of their fate that they contemplated the opening of roads. The Sioux took a decided stand, and in very plain terms alluded to the consequences if the whites persisted in opening the road through the Powder river country, declaring that that section constituted the only hunting-grounds they had left, and that they would defend them. It was by this route that it was proposed to open communication with the upper settlements in the far west. The construction of the Platte railroad now obviated the necessity of passing through the Powder river country, and it was determined by the Commissioners to comply with the wishes of the Indians by abandoning that section entirely..

Early in 1868, in compliance with this action of the Commission, the General of the army gave the necessary orders for the evacuation. This surrender of territory, in compliance with the wishes of the Indians, was immediately construed into a compulsory evacuation, and even while the public stores were being removed the tribes along the route of march began open depredations. These raids were carried on as low down as the railroad and into Colorado.

The Commissioners had now withdrawn and returned to Washington to make their report. They had, it is true, made "treaties," and their fulfilment was confidently anticipated. Meanwhile the northern Indians gloried in what they considered a triumph. Runners were at once dispatched to communicate with the tribes in the south, to inform them of the success of their demands for the surrender of their hunting-grounds, and advising a warlike attitude, which they declared would lead to the abandonment of the Smoky Hill country.

There is no question, that, had the Commission acted on the principle of yielding nothing that had once been accomplished and contented themselves with making no new demands, except to secure the railways from attack, the result would have been different. The Indian, naturally enough, interpreted the action of the Commission to fear, because it was a part of his training to recognize such influences as the only way to bring about concessions.

CHAPTER V.

THE MASSACRES ON THE SALINE AND THE SOLOMON-WAR INAUGURATED-PREPARATIONS FOR THE CONTEST SHERIDAN ATTEMPTS PEACEABLY

TO CHECK THE TRIBES IN THE SOUTH.

NTIL midsummer unusual quiet prevailed in the south. Most of the Indians had withdrawn from the vicinity of the military posts to more remote and inaccessible regions. A party of two hundred Cheyennes, four Arrapahoes and twenty Sioux, for sometime in camp on the Pawnee, north of the Arkansas, suddenly took the war path, as they asserted, against the Pawnee Indians. The movements of the savages were watched with suspicion. They had retired west of the Fort Dodge road, and with great ceremony performed the first step to a great undertaking, making "medicine." About the twelfth of August, this same party appeared in the valley of the Saline north of Fort Harker. The settlers unprepared for such a visit, treated the visitors with great kindness, hoping to dissuade them from the execution of any evil intentions they might have in view. But the savages soon threw off their guise of friendship and stood forth in their real attitude. They inaugurated their depredations by assuming a dictatorial manner. The next step was to force their way into the cabins. They now commenced to pillage and murder, and committed every form of outrage upon men, women, and children.

Two days later the same force visited the settlements on the Solomon, destroyed the houses, drove off stock, killed thirteen men, and perpetrated other barbarities. The band now broke up into detachments and scattered over the country, some moving off towards the north, along the Republican, while

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the main party commenced depredations along the line of the Smoky.

Intelligence of the conduct of the Indians on the Saline and Solomon was conveyed, by the fugitive settlers, to Fort Hårker. The garrison was at once put in condition for active service. As a hasty means of relief to the settlements, Lieutenant Colonel Beuteen, was ordered out with one company of the 7th cavalry. On August fourteenth, he arrived at Spillman's creek, while the Indians were attacking. His unexpected appearance so alarmed the savages that they took to flight, thus sparing the lives of the settlers at that point.

The news of the outbreak was at once communicated to General Sheridan who was at his head-quarters at Fort Leavenworth. With his customary celerity of action, he resolved to take the field and inaugurate a series of movements in hopes of punishing the offenders. Fort Harker on the line of the · Kansas Pacific railway, was selected as the point for head-quarters in the field, removing soon after to Fort Hays, farther west. Thither the Commanding General repaired by special train. Reports were constantly coming in of other depredations. An attack was made on a Mexican train, at Pawnee fork, above the Cimmaron crossing, and a war-party of savages appeared in the vicinity of the town of Sheridan, at the terminus of the railroad; the Denver stage coaches were pursued and acts were committed which could not be misconstrued. Up to this time but two tribes, the Cheyennes and Arrapahoes, were known to have taken up the hatchet.

The Commanding General at his head-quarters at Fort Harker saw plainly that all peaceable efforts to secure the return of the refractory bands to order were fruitless. His only course was a resort to force. On the twenty-fourth of August, he accordingly issued a general order which served as a declaration of war. By the middle of September, the Indians in hostile numbers had made their appearance in all parts of the Department west of Fort Riley, north as far as the Platte river, to the Arkansas in the south, and westward into Colorado. The lines

of travel demanding protection were the Kansas Pacific railway, for a distance of over two hundred miles, the stage routes, and lines of travel from the terminus of the railroad to Denver, nearly two hundred miles, and into New Mexico, over four hundred miles. Besides these the settlements on the Saline, the Solomon, the Republican, and the Smoky Hill, needed some means of defence, while the posts of Forts Riley, Harker, Hays, and Wallace, along the railroad, Forts Lyon and Bascom in the west, Forts Dodge, Larned, and Zarah on the Arkansas, with an outpost at the mouth of the Little Arkansas, and Forts Arbuckle and Gibson, in the Indian Territory, required suitable garrisons. To meet these demands upon the military force of the Department, the Commanding General had, as his whole available strength, nine companies of the seventh cavalry, eight companies of the tenth cavalry, eleven companies of the third and parts of the fifth and thirty-eighth regiments of infantry, a total of about twelve hundred cavalry and fourteen hundred infantry. After the distribution of this force in guarding the railroad, garrisoning the different posts, and protecting the settlements, the only force for duty in the field, consisted of eleven companies of cavalry, seven of the seventh and four of the tenth, making eight hundred men. Early in the preceding spring, Grierson had been sent with four companies of the tenth cavalry to Fort Gibson. The garrison at Fort Arbuckle was also strengthened by an increase of two companies of infantry. With this insignificant force, available for field duty, that is eight hundred cavalry, active hostilities were commenced. The country over which the savages roamed up to this time, covered an area of at least two hundred miles from north to south, or from the Republican to the Arkansas, and almost five hundred miles from east to west, or from Fort Riley to the Rocky mountains. The country was entirely in a state of nature, and supplies were only to be conveyed, by the tedious process of wagon transportation, at immense distances. The Indians familiar with these vast stretches of plain, and moving from place to place on his hardy pony, was not easy to find and when found

was even more difficult to overtake or bring to an engagement, except with great odds in his favor.

The troops were hastened into the field, and scouting parties were sent in all directions. Colonel Forsyth (Sandy), with fifty scouts moved to the Republican on the north; Sully, towards the Cimmaron, and North Fork of the Canadian on the south, Graham conducted an expedition in the direction of Denver; Penrose pursued a party from Fort Lyon. Owing to the increasing magnitude of the war, a regiment of volunteers from the State of Kansas, was recruited by Governor Crawford, upon the authority of General Sheridan. By the latter part of September, the savages had killed eighty persons. The frontiers were now entirely abandoned by the settlers. A reinforcement of seven companies of the fifth cavalry was brought from the east, a corps of scouts was organized, and preparations were made to accumulate a large store of supplies at the principal forts.

In order to make an effort to keep the other wild tribes in peaceable relations, the Commanding General met some of the leading warriors of the Arrapahoes, and about ten days later, also, met a few of the chiefs of the Kiowas, Comanches and Apaches. The savages withdrew promising to return. They kept their promises of peace by inaugurating a general attack along the line of the Arkansas. This attack was led by the Cheyennes and Arrapahoes, assisted by war-parties from the bands which had then but recently expressed in the most solemn form, their pledge of friendship. It was evident now to the satisfaction of all that the Indians were bent upon a war, and there was no alternative but to fight them.

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