VICTORY over Fetterman may have been sweet for the Indians, but the fort itself was still there, as were two others: Fort Reno and Fort C. F. Smith, all three in the heart of country that the Sioux felt was their own. Throughout the winter of 1866â67 the Indians kept a certain pressure on these forts, but, after Fetterman, the soldiers were cautious; about all the Sioux could do was make it difficult for them to gather firewood. To Red Cloud and the other Indian leaders the very presence of these forts was intolerable. In July of 1867, with Crazy Horse and a large force of warriors, Red Cloud attacked a kind of mini-fort that had been set up on the edge of the Bighorns, where wood could be cut in abundance. This little encampment, under the command of a Captain Powell, had only about forty men, but the wagons had been pulled into a tight circle and fortified with boxes stacked in and under them. The battle that ensued was thus called the Wagon Box Fight. The Indians picked off a few woodcutters, but the charge against the mini-fortfailed. The soldiers were good marksmen, with plenty of ammunition. Had the Indians tried hitting the little troop from two sides at once, they might have overwhelmed them, but they didnât try that, and Captain Powell could not be induced to come out and play, as Fetterman had been. The Indians lost several warriors and the army regained a certain amount of face.
In the fall of 1867 General Sherman made a whirlwind tour of the prairies. He went up the Missouri and talked with Sitting Bullâs people, parleyed with Spotted Tail in Nebraska, hurried south to Kansas, where he talked with the southern Cheyennes, the Arapahos, the Comanches, and the Kiowas, and then came back to Fort Laramie to talk, he hoped, with the Oglalas. Hurrying up and down the plains in pursuit of a general peace, Sherman preached farming, telling the Indians that it was finally time to give up the chase. The Indians were neither impressed nor persuaded. They hemmed and they hawed.
The peace commissioners, in approaching the Oglalas, caused a bit of awkwardness by asking for Red Cloud by name; in their eyes the struggle for the Powder River had become his war. To the Sioux and the Cheyennes, it was not that simple. The âwarâ had consisted of a number of skirmishes and a few battles, some of which Red Cloud fought in and some of which he didnât. He was neither the first Indian nor the last to discover that popularityâor at least prominenceâwith the whites was apt to complicate relations back home.
To the Sioux and the Cheyennes the struggle for the Powder River was their war, not Red Cloudâs, who at this point, though a respected war leader, was not a Big Belly or a man with any special moral authority. Their most respected man was still Old Man Afraid, and it was he who finally journeyed to Fort Laramie to talk with Sherman and the peace commissioners. Old Man Afraid agreed to nothing, but he did let the dignitaries know that peace was not likely until the forts along the Powder River were removed, a step the government was not willing to takeânot yet. General Sherman, who had talked to Indians all the way from the Missouri to the Arkansas, went home well aware that he had made few converts to the farming lifeânor would he while the buffalo still roamed.
In March of the next year, though, General Grant ordered the abandonment of Fort C. F. Smith, Fort Reno, and Fort Phil Kearney. The battle for the Bozeman had become a stalemate. General Sherman was as convinced as ever that all the Indians would become, in time, what Chief Justice John Marshall had called them long before: domestic dependent nations. But Sherman also recognized that he could not immediately subdue these Indians by military means. The armyâs resources, whether of men or money, were not unlimited; the three little forts were soaking up money while producing nothing but aggravation.
The result of this
In the fall of 1867 General Sherman made a whirlwind tour of the prairies. He went up the Missouri and talked with Sitting Bullâs people, parleyed with Spotted Tail in Nebraska, hurried south to Kansas, where he talked with the southern Cheyennes, the Arapahos, the Comanches, and the Kiowas, and then came back to Fort Laramie to talk, he hoped, with the Oglalas. Hurrying up and down the plains in pursuit of a general peace, Sherman preached farming, telling the Indians that it was finally time to give up the chase. The Indians were neither impressed nor persuaded. They hemmed and they hawed.
The peace commissioners, in approaching the Oglalas, caused a bit of awkwardness by asking for Red Cloud by name; in their eyes the struggle for the Powder River had become his war. To the Sioux and the Cheyennes, it was not that simple. The âwarâ had consisted of a number of skirmishes and a few battles, some of which Red Cloud fought in and some of which he didnât. He was neither the first Indian nor the last to discover that popularityâor at least prominenceâwith the whites was apt to complicate relations back home.
To the Sioux and the Cheyennes the struggle for the Powder River was their war, not Red Cloudâs, who at this point, though a respected war leader, was not a Big Belly or a man with any special moral authority. Their most respected man was still Old Man Afraid, and it was he who finally journeyed to Fort Laramie to talk with Sherman and the peace commissioners. Old Man Afraid agreed to nothing, but he did let the dignitaries know that peace was not likely until the forts along the Powder River were removed, a step the government was not willing to takeânot yet. General Sherman, who had talked to Indians all the way from the Missouri to the Arkansas, went home well aware that he had made few converts to the farming lifeânor would he while the buffalo still roamed.
In March of the next year, though, General Grant ordered the abandonment of Fort C. F. Smith, Fort Reno, and Fort Phil Kearney. The battle for the Bozeman had become a stalemate. General Sherman was as convinced as ever that all the Indians would become, in time, what Chief Justice John Marshall had called them long before: domestic dependent nations. But Sherman also recognized that he could not immediately subdue these Indians by military means. The armyâs resources, whether of men or money, were not unlimited; the three little forts were soaking up money while producing nothing but aggravation.
The result of this
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