A Cold Day in Hell: The Dull Knife Battle, 1876

“As much as I know about a lot of this country, the stretch of ground just north of the Tongue River here is known only to the Sioux and maybe some Cheyenne,” Luther explained. “Back in sixty-eight when I came to this country, it was already given over to the tribes by treaty. Not a man do I know who has come to this country and lived to tell his story.”

“As I suspected, Kelly,” Miles replied soberly. “But you know something of what’s downriver?”

“I was there three summers back, with Grant Marsh and General Forsyth.”

“You don’t say?” the colonel asked approvingly. “We’re here with orders to make a fall and winter campaign of it, Kelly.”

Luther watched Miles sip at his coffee, then said, “Captain Randall filled me in with all that he could, General.”

Miles rose from his canvas stool and got to his feet, one of the few men who stood as tall as Luther Kelly. “What say you to employment as a government scout?”

For a moment he hesitated. “When I’m not scouting for you, am I free to hunt for myself?”

Miles stroked the bear’s paw. “By all means!”

Luther saluted. “Then I suppose you’ve got yourself a scout, General.”

“You’re not regular army anymore, Kelly,” Miles replied, holding out his big hand. They shook. “Now you’re chief scout for the District of the Yellowstone.”

In those blackest hours just before dawn this cold autumn morning, with Miles and his soldiers coming along somewhere behind them, Luther and Billy Cross ran across a recent Indian camp. While the ashes in the many fire pits had grown cold, the ground beneath was nonetheless still warm.

“Perhaps no more than a day now,” Luther said quietly.

“Cheyenne camp here too,” the half-breed added, pointing to the small patch of ground cleared in an orderly circle. “Lakota always pitch lodges here and there, where they want. But this circle open to the east … it show some Cheyenne come with Sitting Bull too.”

Since the two of them were so far ahead of the column by that time, Luther decided they could rest for an hour back in the brush. After awaking, they were up and in the saddle again as the sun peeked over the bare horizon blanketed with nothing but brown and yellowed grasses. For all their hunting, Luther and Billy didn’t see a wagon or a war pony, either one, all that long, dusty day.

At sundown they made their own fireless camp and rolled up in their blankets as the temperature began to drop. Somewhere behind them the soldiers would be making their bivouac, Luther ruminated as he fell into a fitful, uneasy sleep.

At twilight that night, in fact, Miles finally halted the men so they could make coffee, their first real stop since leaving Tongue River that morning. After the choking dust kicked up by all those hooves and bootees, the quiet of the high plains night settled around them with a cold grip as the men huddled around a hundred tiny fires. But there would be little rest until he knew what had happened to Otis’s supply train. In half an hour the colonel had the regiment up and moving once more.

Miles was anxious, straining to know what lay out there in the unknown. Sensing perhaps his date with Sitting Bull, and destiny.

The Glendive Road led the regiment into the moonless black of that night, probing across the broken, rugged ground until the colonel finally stopped them at one A.M. They had been at it over twenty hours already.

“The men can rest here for a few hours” Miles told his weary officers. “As soon as there’s enough light to march, we’ll be pushing on.”

The Fifth Infantry had just put thirty hard Montana miles behind them.

Chapter 8

18–20 October 1876

Late from the Indian Raids

in Wyoming.

THE INDIANS

Troublous Times in Wyoming.

CHEYENNE, October 17.—The body of Private Fasker of K company, Second cavalry, was brought into Hunton’s ranch yesterday. It was not mutilated but was stripped of all clothing. In the fight Messers. McIlvain and McFalan, of China Rock, each had a horse shot under them, and the latter received a slight flesh wound in the right shoulder. The Indians were armed with Sharp’s improved rifles, caliber 40, a number of shells being brought in by Sergeant Parker. H. D. Lilly, who came into camp from the cattle round-up, reports twenty head of horses stolen by Indians from Searight’s ranch last night, and Ashenfelter, a ranch-man who started from Georges’ ranch yesterday for Searight’s, has not arrived, and it is supposed he has been killed. A large band of Indians are believed to be in the mountains, and more raids are hourly looked for in this direction. A party is now organizing to go in search for Ashenfelter. A train just in to the telegraph camp near Custer reports seeing Indians between that place and Red Canyon. The line will reach Custer tomorrow night.