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

“Yes,” he nodded, gazing down at his son. “Crook told those chiefs that the army would wipe out all those who failed to come in. And he said he would do it with the help of the young men he had just rounded up and brought back to the agency. That’s when Crook made it plain he was counting on the chiefs to convince their warriors to become scouts for him in the coming campaign.”

“When you got back, I remember your saying Crook would be taking hundreds of mercenaries north with the column to help him find the hostiles still with Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull.”

“From Spotted Tail’s and Little Wound’s bands Crook has enlisted a small army of Sioux and Cheyenne who will be going after their own kind,” Donegan replied with a doleful wag of his head. “Hard to believe that so many would volunteer to hunt down their own kind still out there in the wild country … especially two of the warriors we captured from American Horse’s village at Slim Buttes in September.* But they were the first to sign up.”

“There’ll be some good come of them going along, Seamus,” she said quietly. “Of that I’m certain.”

He gazed down into the red face of that sleeping infant, saying, “I certainly hope so, love.”

“All the good we do will one day be victorious,” Sam explained, hopeful his coming and going would one day be at an end. “At long last we are finally treating the friendly Indians better than we have cajoled and coddled the stubborn ones who mean us no goodwill.”

“Ah, how right you are, pretty one!” he answered. “Too long the agents have been cowed by the belligerent chiefs and haughty warriors, trying to win over the hostiles with gifts and pleadings, while the agency bands have been neglected as they come close to starving, given only thin blankets with the arrival of every winter.”

“What did Crook have done with all those ponies Mackenzie captured?”

“The North brothers and their Pawnee are bringing them over—likely should get here tomorrow. The stronger ones the quartermaster will turn into remounts for the campaign.”

“I pray to God you won’t have to eat another horse as long as you’re with Crook’s army.”

“My pretty—somewhere south of Slim Buttes, I vowed I’d only sit on a horse from now on—swearing on my mother’s grave that I’d never again take a bite out of one!”

She laughed softly in that way of hers that made his heart leap an extra beat, ever since that first night he had laid eyes on her down in the panhandle of Texas. Looking down at the infant now, he saw so much of the boy’s mother in the child’s face—the kindness, the openness to expressing a wide tapestry of emotions, a ruddy glow that could come only from an earnest spirit.

Seamus continued, “After seeing to the quartermaster’s needs, Crook will give the scouts their pick of the rest. And what’s left will be sold on the market for what they’ll bring.”

“You said they were all a pretty sorry lot.”

“Aye, Sam—they’ve already had a tough go of it this fall—and the real weather hasn’t even poked its head over the hills to the north.”

“And the guns? What about all the weapons Mackenzie’s men took from the Sioux?”

“They’ve been put under lock in a warehouse at Camp Robinson. Crook’s not sure yet what he’ll do with all the guns: whether he’ll come up with a value for them and pay the Indians, or give them back to the Indians who prove they can remain our allies against the hostiles in the Powder River country.”

She pulled the blankets up under her chin. “Weapons were taken from all the tribes?”

“No. Red Cloud’s Bad Face band was surprised to find out that the Arapahos and the Cut-off Sioux of Spotted Tail were allowed to keep their guns.”

“It wasn’t the first surprise Crook’s given them,” Sam added. “And I sure hope it won’t be the last.”

“Listen to you,” Seamus marveled. “Talking just like a soldier’s wife.”

“Well, I am, aren’t I?”

He grinned at her. “I suppose you are at that, Sam.” Then his eyes came back to rest on the infant cradled across his left arm as Samantha struck a lucifer and lit the solitary oil lamp in the darkening room as twilight began to fade. “The more I’ve thought about things ever since riding with Mackenzie into those camps, I find myself in agreement with what Crook wrote to Sheridan after he had his meeting with the chiefs at Camp Robinson.”

“What did the general say to Sheridan?”

“That old Red Beard said he feels that Mackenzie’s success is the first gleam of daylight we have had in this whole business. So now we must get about the matter of putting to rest what’s left of the hostile bands.”

Disarming the Indians at

Standing Rock.

THE INDIANS

Latest from Standing Rock.