Trumpet on the Land: The Aftermath of Custer's Massacre, 1876

“Pretty plain to me, General,” Grouard replied before he turned away with Big Bat.

Pourier said nothing as he slid back down the creek bank and returned to the mouth of the ravine.

Frank called to the Sioux in their own tongue, “You will not be killed if you come out now.”

“Why don’t you come in and get us, Grabber!” was the bold reply. “Come in and get us with your soldiers!”

“Seems they know your voice good, Frank,” Pourier said, poking an elbow in Grouard’s rib.

Against Crook’s orders some soldiers answered the courageous Sioux taunt with rifle fire directed into the ravine. It took some perilous minutes before officers silenced those guns and ordered their men back so the negotiations could continue.

“You think maybe these soldiers kill us by mistake?” Pourier wondered. “Maybe they shoot us in the back—they want those Sioux so bad, eh?”

Ignoring Bat, Grouard again pressed his offer.

“This is how you tell us to surrender?” came the loud voice from the ravine.

“It was a mistake!” Bat hollered in Lakota.

“Is that the other trader’s son out there?” demanded the angry voice in the ravine. “The one who came with Grabber bringing soldiers to destroy our camps, to kill our women and children?”

Grouard told them, “The soldier chief wants to let your women and children come out before they are killed.”

The warrior replied, “But you send bullets to prove the lie in your words.”

“No—the soldier guns are quiet now,” Grouard answered.

“We do not worry about the soldier guns, Grabber. Very soon Crazy Horse will be here to take every one of those guns from your soldiers!”

Grouard turned and slid back down the slope with Pourier. At the bottom he signaled Crook with a shrug. The frustrated general waved his arms, shouting his command. In turn his officers ordered their men to resume their bombardment of the ravine.

“By Jupiter,” Crook grumbled to his staff, “when will those Sioux see just what will happen if they don’t surrender?”

Bat hunkered low on the cold ground with Grouard while the renewed barrage continued, wishing he had a cup of hot coffee. After more than an hour the general again called a stop to the noisy siege. As the gunfire died off, Crook asked his half-breed scouts to take up negotiations once more. While Grouard started talking to the hostiles again, Pourier crept up the slope, inching along the edge of the ravine on his belly beneath the thick brush, hoping to get himself a look at its occupants.

Suddenly, to his surprise, right below Bat huddled a woman who muttered as if she was talking to herself.

Leaping down the side of the coulee, Pourier found her very frightened, shivering with cold and painted with sticky mud. Although she immediately lunged away from him, Bat spoke softly to her.

“Come with me. Meet the soldier chief. See that he will not harm you if you surrender now.”

For a moment more her wild, wide eyes held abject fear. But when she began to babble, pleading for her life, tears streaming from her eyes, Bat knew he had convinced her. If he could get one of the Sioux out safely, the rest would come as well.

Slowly he reached for her muddy hand when the brush behind her parted. Through the branches appeared a warrior with a pistol in his hand, pointed at Pourier. Between the two of them huddled the squaw.

Bat grabbed the woman’s hand, whirling her around, shoving her in a heap toward the warrior. As he dived to get out of the woman’s way, the warrior yelped in anger, finding himself suddenly without his pistol. Pourier had ripped it from his enemy. Now Bat had them both covered. The woman argued with the man, but he said nothing. Only his hate-filled eyes spoke volumes.

While the half-breed debated with himself how he was to get his two prisoners out of the ravine without the soldiers shooting them all, a very old woman appeared from the brush. Under her arm was a young girl he supposed could be no more than nine or ten summers. Grandmother and granddaughter were both splattered with mud and blood and gore.

Pourier quickly motioned with a pistol barrel, pointing to the mouth of the ravine. “Go. We show you now the soldier chief is a man of his word. Honor. He will not kill those who surrender.”

Near the brushy mouth of the coulee Pourier ordered his captives to halt. Then he hollered so the soldiers could hear. “Get me General Crook!”

“Who the hell is that in there?”

“Pourier!”

“The scout?”

“Yes—get me General Crook!”

“How the hell did you get in there with the goddamned hostiles?”

“It don’t matter—just get me Crook. I come out if I talk to him!”

“C’mon out, Bat!”

Relief flooded over him. It was the general’s voice. “I got some prisoners for you, General. Some of those what wanna give up.”

Cautiously he pushed through the brush into the open, his chest hammering like a steam piston as he looked at all the muzzles of those rifles and pistols pointed his way. But Crook was there, extending his hand. Urging him on.