A
FTER THE DEATH
of Conquering Bear, the Sioux decided that the Fort Laramie area was too uncomfortable. Some of the chiefs still wanted to stay close, in order to get the yearly annuities the government had promised them in the 1851 treaty. But most of the chiefs and warriors called such men Loaf About the Forts or Laramie Loafers. To their way of thinking, the freedom of the plains was preferable to a dependence on handouts.
But they also knew that there would be more soldiers coming. The river of settlers seemed to grow in force each year, and it was only natural to assume that more and more soldiers would come to protect them. So, following the buffalo would serve two purposes—it would allow them to live as they had always lived, and it would also keep them away from the Holy Road. Warriors, especially the young ones, were still fond of raiding the wagon trains, and would make long trips for that express purpose. The chiefs tried to stop them, but since the Sioux had no centralized authority, each man was expected to decide such things for himself.
Curly and his family traveled south, in a band
led by the great Brule war chief, Spotted Tail, who was Curly’s uncle. Their purpose was to attack the Pawnee, steal some horses, and put the Grattan situation behind them.
But when they finally found a Pawnee village, it was deserted. In order to salvage the long trek, Spotted Tail decided to shift his attention to the Omahas. It would not be as rewarding as hitting the hated Pawnee, but it was better than nothing.
When they finally found an Omaha camp, they struck at once. Curly was in the raid, putting himself to the final test as a Sioux warrior. So far, he had hunted animals, but never killed a human being. In the Sioux custom, killing was less important than touching, or counting coup. It was, in fact, a more significant achievement to confront a living enemy and touch him with an extended lance or bow or, best of all, the bare hand. Such a feat would get one’s praises sung in the village. It entitled the warrior to wear a feather in his hair as well—the more coups, the more feathers.
With Hump and Lone Bear, Curly was looking forward to the battle. Hump, being older, had already counted his first coup. Curly hoped to join him soon. He looked up to the older warrior, and wanted to be like him. He was goaded, too, by the vision, which he still kept to himself. He had not even told Little Hawk of his dream.
When the assault began, the Omahas scattered in every direction. They had been taken completely by surprise, and warriors ran into the trees, trying to mount their horses while waging a desperate rear-guard action.
On his first pass through the Omaha village,
Curly narrowly missed a running man with the tip of his bow, leaning far out over the left side of the pony in his effort. On the second pass, there was some resistance. Some of the Omaha warriors had managed to recover from the surprise, and were beginning to loose volleys of arrows in the general direction of the advancing Sioux.
Just beyond the village, a thick band of brush paralleled the creek on which the camp had been established, and Curly caught a glimpse of movement in the leaves. Aiming quickly, he launched an arrow, heard it strike, and heard a groan. He knew he had hit his target, and jumped from his pony, knife in hand, to take his first scalp.
Crouching as he entered the brush, he swept branches aside with one forearm, holding his knife ready in the other hand. At first, he saw nothing. There had been no further sound from the thick undergrowth, and he was beginning to think that after all, he had missed altogether.
The sounds of battle behind him faded away, the war whoops of Sioux and Omaha both faint, as he concentrated his attention on the possible danger just ahead.
Just as he was about to give up, he saw a swatch of color, cloth of some kind, and plunged through the intervening brush, his knife waving back and forth in front of him.
He saw the body then, lying on its stomach, and he dropped to one knee. Grabbing his target by the shoulder, he yanked the body over, grabbed a fistful of long black hair, and froze. It was a woman, a young woman, he had killed. And pretty. She reminded him of his sister, and he turned away
then, trying not to smell the blood, trying to blot out the bright red stain on the side of her dress, where the shattered shaft of his arrow protruded like broken bone.
His stomach churned, and he bent over. He tried to stop it, but he was powerless, and the churning erupted into a spew of vomit. He gagged, choking on the bitter bilge. Coughing and sputtering, he backed away from the body, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He could see the glitter of the blade in front of him, and shoved the knife back into its sheath. Movement behind him spun him around. He found himself staring into the eyes of another Sioux, Horned Owl, a friend of Hump’s.
Horned Owl looked past him, and Curly stepped sidewise, trying to get between the warrior’s gaze and the body of the young woman. But he was too slow. Horned Owl saw what had happened, and broke into a grin.
Then, his nose twitching in comic exaggeration, he said, “Weak stomach, Curly?” He laughed and turned away. Curly stood there for a long moment, ashamed to go out into the open. There was no prohibition of killing women, but it made Curly sick, and he wondered whether it was right, law or no. He would have to ask his father.
The battle was already over. The Omaha had abandoned the field, and everything they owned except the few horses and weapons they had managed to grab in their flight. Curly jumped back on his pony and rode toward the main body of Sioux. Already, Horned Owl was circulating among them, telling them of Curly’s achievement. The warriors who knew grinned at him, some lifting their hair
and making a slashing motion across their foreheads, then giving vent to piercing whoops.
It was tempting to run, but Curly knew he could only postpone, not avoid, the teasing. Better to endure it now. The sooner he put it behind him, the sooner he could live it down.
After the raid, Spotted Tail decided that it would be a good idea to head north, and establish a winter camp near the Black Hills. All the way back, Curly was teased unmercifully by the older warriors. Hump tried to ease the pain, but Curly faced it head-on, letting the men say what they wanted. Part of him thought they were right. What had happened was funny. But part of him believed that he had been right to be revolted. The young woman had done no one any harm.
Had he known who he was shooting at, he realized, he might not have loosed the arrow. It would have been easier then to hide from the truth, because no one would have known, but he would have had an unanswered question eating at him. Such a question, and the uncertainty it bred, could get him killed.
Unknown to Spotted Tail or his people, things were changing fast. The government had appointed a new agent to the Sioux. Thomas S. Twiss was a West Point graduate with white whiskers worthy of a prophet, and a passion to see the Indian troubles resolved quickly and, by his own limited lights, fairly.
At the same time, a new military commander had been appointed by Jefferson Davis, the Secretary of War. William S. Harney was a giant of a man at six feet four inches. A gifted athlete, he
was the fastest man in his command, and was known to challenge all comers, red and white alike, to footraces. On at least one occasion, he had challenged an Indian warrior, who had been convicted of some minor offense, to a race, promising him a hundred-yard lead, and that if the warrior won, Harney would spare him the punishment the warrior had earned by his conduct. The race took place on a frozen lake. At the last minute, Harney gaining with every stride, the wily brave spotted a section of thin ice, veered toward it, and Harney followed. The big man’s greater weight plunged him into the freezing waters. Harney lost the race. And kept his word.
But he was known for his intolerance for nonsense. He didn’t like fancy talk or unnecessary regulation. Given a job, he wanted to do it his way, with no interference from his superiors. More often than not, he got it done.
Now, in the aftermath of the Grattan massacre, he was expected to punish the Sioux. Anxious to avoid bloodshed, Twiss sent out runners, demanding attendance at a council at Fort Laramie. At the same time, the chiefs were advised to move their people south of the Platte River or face the army’s wrath.
Harney assembled a command of seven hundred men at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas and began his march to Fort Laramie, following the Oregon Trail. He intended to inflict heavy damage on any Sioux he encountered along the way. Once at Laramie, Harney planned to turn northeast, and follow the road to Fort Pierre in Dakota Territory.
When Spotted Tail arrived in the vicinity of the
Bluewater River a little more than a hundred miles from Fort Laramie, he found a village led by Little Thunder, a Brule chief. Little Thunder was widely considered to be a friend of the whites, but he was a powerful and courageous man, and Spotted Tail and his warriors decided to join the group. A large herd of buffalo was nearby, and the warriors managed to bring down huge numbers, enough to provide food for the whole winter.
Curly managed four kills on his own, and his hunting success enabled him to get over the embarrassment of the Omaha raid. Besides, with so much work dressing and drying the meat and preparing the hides, drying and tanning them, there was little time for anyone to tease him. By spring, he hoped, it would all be forgotten.
Most of the work was done by the women, and many of the warriors headed out again to raid along the Oregon Trail. They had not gotten news of Harney’s advance, or the size of his force. Even if they had, the young hotheads, still preening themselves on the success of the Grattan affair, would not have given it a second thought. They were, after all, Sioux warriors, good enough to stand up to anybody, red or white.
Curly was out hunting when a messenger from Agent Twiss reached Little Thunder’s camp. The chief, knowing that there was still much work to be done on the buffalo meat, that the hides still had to be tanned, and that if the work were not done immediately, the food and skins would spoil, was not willing to go.
“Tell the Agent Twiss that I am not unfriendly,” Little Thunder told the runner. “But my people
have much work to do. We cannot come for many weeks. When the work is finished, we will come to Fort Laramie.”
The messenger, knowing that this was not what Twiss wanted to hear, insisted. “If you do not come right away, you will be considered hostile,” he told the chief. “Any soldiers who find you will have the right, even the duty, to make war on you.”
“But we are not enemies,” Little Thunder argued.
“I only know what I am told,” the messenger said, watching the chiefs face as he waited for his words to be translated.
But Little Thunder would not budge. The messenger went away only with the chiefs promise to come in within three months. When the messenger reached Fort Laramie, the news upset James Bordeaux, who sent a messenger of his own. He knew Little Thunder, liked him, and wanted to avoid bloodshed, which he believed to be inevitable if Harney should stumble on the Brule camp. But Little Thunder still refused to come in early.
The camp was not a large one, and with so many warriors out hunting or raiding the Oregon Trail, fewer than one hundred warriors were left to defend the village. But Little Thunder wasn’t concerned, since he knew he had nothing but peaceful intentions.
On September 2, Harney reached the Bluewater River. His scouts found Little Thunder’s camp, which was still peaceably going about the business of preparing for winter. Seeing an opportunity to make a point, a chance to vent some of the frustration building on the long, arduous and, so far,
uneventful march, Harney drew up a plan of attack.
As far as he knew, the Indians had no idea they had been discovered. Regular scout runs kept him apprised of comings and goings while he deployed his troops. He had significant numbers of cavalry, infantry, and artillery. With his adjutant, Philip St. George Cooke, he went over every angle again and again.
“Captain,” he said, “I know what happened to Grattan. I won’t have that happen here.”
“I don’t think we have to worry about anything like that, General,” Cooke said. “We have twenty times the men. We are much better armed and, frankly, a lieutenant is hardly your equal in strategy and tactics, General.”
“Don’t you bullshit me, Phil. That’s not what I mean, and you damn well know it. I want to make sure the Sioux get the message. If we hit them hard, bloody their noses, they’ll think twice before they hit another wagon train. There’s a lot we can teach these red rascals, but first we have to get their attention. I mean to do just that tomorrow.”
The general then proceeded to outline his plan, and gave Cooke command of a sizable cavalry unit. Cooke was to move his troops around to the far side of Little Thunder’s village. Harney hoped to provoke a reckless retreat, which would bring the disorganized warriors under Cook’s guns.
The troops moved out before dawn, but secrecy was critical to the plan’s success. Accordingly, Cooke took his men on an elaborate detour, making a very wide loop to avoid being spotted. Once he had gotten past the village, he had to double back to take up his position on the top of a steep bluff.
At dawn, Harney’s troops were very near Little Thunder’s camp. But Cooke was not yet in position. At almost the same moment, a small band of warrriors stumbled on Harney and his force, raced back to the village, and alerted the chief.
Little Thunder immediately mounted his horse and rode out to meet the general, Spotted Tail beside him carrying a white flag. Harney was grateful for the chance to delay his attack, knowing that it would be likely to fail unless Cooke was in position.
“I do not wish to fight you,” Little Thunder told the general. “Agent Twiss sent for me and my people, and I told him that I would come in to Fort Laramie as soon as we were done preparing our food and hides for the winter. We need the food or we will starve. Without the buffalo robes, my people will freeze to death.”