Next morning the former Morgan men saw at firsthand the savage results of a hostile Indian raid. They were among the first to reach the smoking ruins of the William Eubanks ranch.* “We found the bodies of three little children,” Captain Palmer recorded, “who had been taken by the heels by the Indians and swung around against the log cabin, beating their heads to a jelly. Found the hired girl some fifteen rods from the ranch staked out on the prairie, tied by her hands and feet, naked, body full of arrows and horribly mangled.”5
At adjoining ranches they discovered similar scenes of death and desolation. Farther along the trail they came upon an abandoned wagon train. “The teamsters had mounted the mules and made their escape,” but the Cheyennes had ripped off wagon covers and strewn goods all along the road.
Ironically, one of the minor depredations committed by the Indians must have reminded the Morgan men of the day they were captured at Buffington Island, Ohio. When the Confederates had discovered they were surrounded, they scattered their stolen booty recklessly, spinning out bolts of cloth in long streamers across an Ohio wheat field. Now, a year later on a Nebraska prairie, they saw similar bolts of cloth unwound by Indians beside an abandoned wagon train.
By this time troops summoned from nearby posts and stations were arriving to restore order along the trail, and Captain Palmer and his 60 cavalrymen continued their march westward. At Fort Kearney, Captain Jacob Humfreville, commanding Company K, was waiting to take the new arrivals into the 11th Ohio Cavalry.†
Captain Humfreville’s Company K was headquartered at Fort Laramie until the autumn of 1864, then was moved west to Fort Halleck, a stage-line post at the base of Elk Mountain. The winter was a bitter one, with severe blizzards and violent winds. On February 17, a sergeant and a private of Company K were frozen to death near Bear Creek. Post duties were light, however, and Arapahos in the neighborhood were temporarily peaceable. The Indians camped around the fort and drew rations occasionally from the quartermaster.
One of the Ohio boys, Private Charles Adams, later recalled how the Arapahos would gather on a long bench outside post headquarters. “Any one could sit with them and smoke,” he said. “I often smoked with them. They considered it a grand insult if anyone sat with them and refused to smoke. … They had a long stem pipe—did not put it in the mouth but against the lips. They would commence at the right of the line, take a few puffs and pass to the next without turning their heads.”6
Soldiers at Fort Halleck also were fascinated by the Arapaho children’s grasshopper roasts. “When they had a bed of hot coals and ashes, they would make a place and put the hoppers in and cover them up. This would burn the wings and legs off and when they got hot they would pop like corn. When they were roasted to suit them, the children would sit around and rake the hoppers out with sticks and appear to enjoy them as much as peanuts.”7
With the arrival of spring, most of the Arapahos dismantled their tepees and went away. By summertime they had resumed their old habits of raiding stage stations for livestock.
In June 1865, Captain Humfreville sent a detachment of K Company up to Sage Creek to help pacify these hostiles. During a running fight on June 8, George Bodine and Perry Stewart were killed, William Caldwell wounded. “The Indians hate red-haired men,” Charles Adams noted. “Bodine’s hair was very red. He had fourteen arrows in his body.”8
Whether by chance or design, the two Ohio companies selected by General Connor to accompany him on the Powder River Expedition were E and K. Toward the end of June, Connor ordered the scattered detachments of these companies to assemble at Fort Laramie. On the Fourth of July an order was issued permitting the sutler to let the men have whiskey without an order from the officers. According to Private Adams, the result was “a free for all drunk.”
For a month the Ohio companies camped at Laramie with other units of Connor’s column awaiting supplies from Fort Leavenworth. No supplies had arrived by August 1, but Connor could wait no longer. He had organized his punitive expedition in three columns, their movements timed so that all would arrive simultaneously on Rosebud River in the heart of the hostile Indian country. The rendezvous date was September 1. Two Missouri regiments under Colonel Nelson Cole were moving westward from
Omaha, and Colonel Samuel Walker’s 16th Kansas Cavalry had to be set in motion to avoid a mass mutiny.‡
Leaving the stage and telegraph lines in the care of the 3rd, 5th, and 6th U.S. Volunteer Infantry, Connor started north with a limited reserve of ammunition and no rations except hardtack. But in his column were the best cavalrymen then soldiering in the West. He also had Captain Frank North’s Pawnee Scouts, Captain E. W. Nash’s Omaha Scouts, and seven excellent guides, including Jim Bridger and Mitch Boyer.
Bridger may have offered suggestions in the drafting of Connor’s first general order, August 2, but it also reveals the general’s shrewd understanding of cavalry requirements, the strengths and weaknesses of horses and men:
The following rules will be observed in this command.
No galloping of horses on the march will be allowed, and officers will see that the utmost care is taken of the animals.
Horses will not be saddled in the morning until Boots and Saddles is sounded at these Head Quarters.
Horses will be brought inside the lines at sundown, or when stable call is sounded, and securely hobbled and tied.
On the march, when a halt is made, officers will see that the girths of the saddles are loosened, bridles taken off, and the horses allowed to graze.
In case of night attack, the troops will surround their horses, and if the enemy is not close up to the horses, and cannot be seen, the men will lie or kneel down so as not to make a mark for the enemy.
No man is to remain behind, or quit the ranks for any purpose whatever, without permission from the Captain, or Officer commanding his company.
Officers are never to give permission to any man to quit the ranks, excepting on account of illness—or some other absolutely necessary purpose.
Officers must be particularly attentive to prevent the men from going out of the ranks for water. When this is required the column will be halted. The canteens must be filled before starting.
Whenever the bugles sound the Halt for the head of the column, the call will be repeated by the bugles along the line.
Firing of arms on me march or in camp, without orders, is strictly prohibited. When arriving at camp in the afternoon, the horses will be allowed to run with the lariats on about fifteen minutes to give them an opportunity to roll before being hobbled.
The Officer of the Day will accompany the guard on the march, and will see that the train is kept well closed up.
This order will be read to every company in the command.9
After some difficulty in crossing the Platte, Connor’s troops moved swiftly northward. On August 14, they camped on Powder River, and Connor ordered the first timbers cut for construction of a permanent fort, which for a short time bore his name, then was changed to Fort Reno. While scouting this area on August 21, Captain Marshall’s Company E ran into a band of Indians; in the sharp skirmish which followed they killed two of the enemy. Next day Connor detached from his forces both Ohio companies, a company of 7th Iowa Cavalry, the Indian scouts, and two six-pounder guns, and started on a forced march into the Tongue River Valley.
They reached the Tongue August 28 and camped. Late in the evening, the Pawnee Scouts came in to report a hostile Arapaho village of 250 lodges down the valley. Connor immediately ordered a night march.
Captain Henry Palmer, who had brought the Morgan men west from Fort Leavenworth and was accompanying this expedition as quartermaster, rode in the advance with Frank North’s Pawnee Scouts. He was the first man to sight the hostile village.
Just before me lay a large mesa … all covered with Indians’ ponies, except a portion about one-half mile to the left, which was thickly dotted with Indian tepees full of Indians. … General Connor then took the lead, rode his horse up the steep ba
nk of the ravine, and dashed out across the mesa as if there were no Indians just to the left; every man followed as closely as possible. At the first sight of the general, the ponies covering the tableland in front of us set up a tremendous whinnying and galloped down toward the Indian village, more than a thousand dogs commenced barking and more than seven hundred Indians made the hills ring with their fearful yelling.10
Charles Adams, riding with K Company, said that Connor made a short speech to the men just before the charge:
Should we get in close quarters [Connor instructed them] the men should group in fours and stay together and use their guns as long as possible and under no circumstances use their revolvers unless there was no other chance. We were told to make every shot count, and be sure to leave one shot for ourselves and rather than fall into the hands of the Indians to use it as it would be preferable to falling in their hands. I have wondered how many would have taken their lives. I thought then and still think if I had gotten in a tight place and had one shot left I would have tried to get an Indian then take my chances. …
As we neared the village the command divided, some turning to the right, others to the left. The Indians had some of their tepees down and packs on their ponies and some of the ponies were so heavily packed that when they tried to run the packs pulled them over and they could not get up.
The squaws, papooses, dogs, and ponies all ran to save themselves. The women and children would run to the white men for protection, knowing they would receive no favors from the Pawnee Scouts. … The Indians ran to a high point and tried to rally but could not stand long before our carbines. We ran them four or five miles when our horses began to tire and we gave up the chase11
Captain Humfreville of Company K admitted the fight was not a complete victory. “After eleven o’clock we were on the retreat, followed by the Indians, who fired upon us the entire night. … Never have I seen troops undergo such hardships as we experienced during the forty hours of this march and battle.”12
The soldiers suffered several casualties. Captain Palmer said,
One of our men, a member of the 11th Ohio Cavalry, formerly one of John Morgan’s men, a fine looking soldier with as handsome a face as I ever saw on a man, grabbed me by the shoulder and turned me about so that I might assist him in withdrawing an arrow from his mouth. The point of the arrow had passed through his open mouth and lodged in the root of his tongue. Having no surgeon with us a higher grade than a hospital steward, it was afterwards within a half hour decided that to get the arrow out from his mouth, the tongue must be, and was, cut out. The poor fellow returned to camp with us, and this late date I am unable to say whether he lived or died.13
This unfortunate Galvanized Yankee was identified by Charles Adams as “Ed Ward, alias John Johnson, a member of Company K.”§ Private Adams also described the incident somewhat differently: “The arrow had gone through his lip and tongue and in his jawbone a half inch. He was off his horse and hold of the arrow with both hands trying to pull it out. I went on and when we came back, he had pulled the shaft off leaving the spear in his mouth which was so tight they had to get some kind of pullers to get it out.” 14(Ed Ward, alias John Johnson, recovered, and was mustered out with his company a year later.)
As soon as the village was cleared and a few howitzer charges were fired after the retreating Arapahos, buglers sounded recall. One man had been killed, seven wounded. Enemy casualties were estimated at 63. Three hundred horses and ponies, 200 tepees, and immense quantities of pemmican and buffalo robes had been captured. “We found many things in the villages that had been taken from emigrants. One found a buckskin poke with $40 greenbacks in it.”15 Connor ordered tepee coverings and buffalo robes heaped in piles and burned.
In accordance with the plan of operation, the column was to move next against more formidable Sioux and Cheyenne encampments farther north, But Connor must first unite with Colonel Cole’s Missouri cavalry and Colonel Walker’s Kansas cavalry, somewhere on the Rosebud.
On the morning of September 1, the advance troops heard a cannon shot, but no one could be certain from which direction the sound came. As this was the day fixed for a rendezvous of the three columns, Connor ordered Captain Marshall to take E Company and 20 of the Pawnee Scouts and make a rapid reconnaissance toward the Rosebud in search of Cole and Walker.
After a four-day circuit, E Company rejoined the column. They had found no signs of the other forces. Next day, September 6, Connor decided to turn back over the route he had come in order to find grass for his horses. On September 7 he went into camp to restore his mounts, and the following morning sent out two scouting parties in search of the missing columns. Captain North and the Pawnees moved toward Powder River; Captain Humfreville and Company K, north toward the Rosebud.
K Company started out in a heavy rain which turned to snow. By the time they reached the Rosebud the storm had become a blizzard. They found no sign of human beings, red or white, and horses and men were exhausted when they returned to Connor’s camp September 1116
A few hours later the Pawnees rode in with an ominous report. They had discovered several hundred dead horses undoubtedly belonging to Cole’s command. Some of the animals had been shot, others appeared to have frozen to death on the picket line. All were in an emaciated condition.
Connor was now greatly concerned over the fate of the Cole and Walker columns. He dispatched numerous scouting parties into the Powder River Valley, and at last on September 19, Captain North and his Pawnees found both Cole and Walker and their surviving troops. The cavalrymen were all on foot and near starvation, some offering the Pawnees as much as $5.00 for a single hardtack biscuit. For days the two combined columns had been under constant harassment by Sioux and Cheyennes, suffering severe casualties, and had been floundering about the Powder River country completely lost. Connor described them “as completely disgusted and discouraged an outfit of men as I ever saw.”17
The demoralization of these two columns of the expedition led the Fort Kearney Herald to comment later: “Whether the command of 1600 men failed to proceed to the appointed rendezvous from the gross incompetence of its commanders or insubordination among the troops is a question upon which the public is at present in the dark.”18
To recuperate his forces, Connor returned to the permanent base which bore his name only to receive on September 24 orders from his department commander relieving him of his command. The Powder River Expedition was ended. For the Morgan men it had been a campaign more arduous than any they had ever experienced under their dashing Kentucky commander.19
The Galvanized Yankees in Companies E and K, 11th Ohio Cavalry, now returned to Fort Laramie. When they arrived there early in October, they learned that supplies so sorely needed for the expedition had arrived from Leavenworth during their absence.
For the following year they continued to serve as cavalry adjuncts to U.S. Volunteer Infantry detachments guarding stage and telegraph lines across the Plains. In July 1866 they were mustered out. A quarter of a century later some of them may have attended one of the grand reunions of the regiment in Columbus, Ohio, and heard Governor William McKinley tell them they could take pride in being veterans of the last state volunteer regiment to be mustered out of service.20
*See pages 33-34 for the story of Luanda Eubanks.
†Company K’s Descriptive Book lists five Southern-born soldiers, two from Kentucky, and 25 foreign-born, Irish, German, etc. If all 60 of Captain Palmer’s party were Morgan men, they must have been scattered through several companies of the regiment, used false names and places of birth, or remained as unassigned recruits.
‡The Kansans claimed their enlistments ended with the Civil War’s termination, and became so obstreperous that artillery had to be turned on them to enforce order.
§At least four “Wards” were enrolled in Morgan’s regiments, any one of whom might have been Ed Ward. The K Company Descriptive Book states “John Johnson’s” age in 1865 as 20, his birthplace as Hamilton,
Ohio. Hamilton was only a few miles north of the Kentucky border, and a few Ohioans and Indianans with Southern family ties are known to have served with Morgan. The place of birth given by Ward also could have been false.
X
Blizzard March
IN AUGUST 1864 WHEN Colonel Charles Dimon’s 1st U.S. Volunteer Infantry Regiment was en route to the Missouri River forts, a battalion of four companies was detached at Chicago and sent to the Minnesota district. Settlers in that area were still fearful of a repetition of the bloody Indian massacres of 1862, and General Pope assigned the companies to four different forts.
For a year, A Company served at Fort Abercrombie, F at Fort Wadsworth, G at Fort Ripley, and I at Fort Ridgely. All were under command of Lieutenant-Colonel William Tamblyn. This was a most uneventful period of service for these men. Aside from occasional messenger duties between forts, they spent most of the year performing monotonous garrison chores. Although they lived fairly comfortably and suffered no tragic losses from scurvy, they also missed the exciting adventures of their comrades along the Missouri.
In July 1865, Lieutenant-Colonel Tamblyn was ordered to begin assembling his companies at Fort Snelling for mustering out. Company I arrived there first, and on July 30, Captain Richard Musgrove, the commanding officer, began preparing his final rolls. “A week or so later,” he wrote, “I presented the completed rolls to the mustering officer, when I was surprised to be informed that … a telegram received during the night from General Pope … had directed our muster-out to be suspended, and that my company and the other three companies of our battalion be retained in the service until further orders. Some of my men were sorely disappointed, but made no trouble.”1