“The bluffs around at sunrise were covered with Indians to the number of 500 to 600, and fighting was commenced by their charging down over the plain.”
Hundreds of warriors charging at dawn on a group of U.S. soldiers fulfills every Hollywood cliché of the “Wild West.” Add to this that the fighting occurred along a creek named “Bonepile,” and surely this battle took place on a Los Angeles soundstage. Fanciful as they sound, however, the events on a hot August morning in 1865, 10 miles south of present Gillette, Wyoming, were very, very real.
In 1863, as the Civil War raged in the east, prospectors in present western Montana discovered gold. Miners flocked to the valleys around Virginia City, Montana Territory, and in just three years extracted $30 million worth of gold. But getting to Montana was not easy, and would-be miners’ eagerness for wealth started a race to develop faster routes.
Hoping to capitalize on the gold fever, Iowans proposed a route west following the Niobrara River across northern Nebraska Territory. Cutting hundreds of miles off the existing Platte River Road, the proposed route held the advantage—at least from an Iowa resident’s perspective—of moving the primary “jumping off” point from Omaha to Sioux City, Iowa. Iowa representatives convinced Congress to authorize $50,000 for a road-building expedition. But like the more infamous Bozeman Trail, this new route still had a problem. It passed through Wyoming’s Powder River Basin, prime hunting ground promised by treaty to Native tribes.
To lead the Niobrara-Virginia City Road Building Expedition, Iowa Congressman Asahel W. Hubbard picked James A. Sawyers. The dark-haired, 6-foot-4, Tennessee-born Sawyers served in the Mexican-American War before coming to Sioux City in 1857. He rejoined the Army at the outbreak of the Civil War, and as a lieutenant colonel commanded the Northern Border Brigade. The unit disbanded in late 1864 and Sawyers was discharged from military service.
Now a civilian, Sawyers commanded a party of 196 civilian men—including his brother Newell Sawyers—and 81 wagons. Initially, Rep. Hubbard promised James Sawyers a military escort of 200 cavalry troops. However, the Army only provided 118 men of the 5th U.S. Volunteer Infantry.
When Sawyers petitioned for further assistance, he received an additional 25 men from Company B, 1st Battalion Dakota Cavalry.[1] The military escort fell under the command of Capt. George W. Williford. A native of Illinois, Williford joined the Army at the beginning of the Civil War. The 29-year-old Williford clashed with Sawyers whom he believed “incompetent.” In turn, 41-year-old Sawyers thought Williford “fainthearted.”
As the expedition traveled west across Nebraska following the Niobrara River—roughly the route of today’s U.S. Route 20—they marveled at the endless prairie. Sawyers, a devout Presbyterian, ordered the expedition to halt every Sunday to observe the Sabbath, a welcome rest from the task of digging stuck wagons out of the loose Nebraska Sandhills. Departing the Niobrara River at Rush Creek—30 miles east of present Chadron, Nebraska—they traveled northwest, first finding the White River and then the Cheyenne River which they followed into the “sterile country” of eastern Wyoming. With the Black Hills visible to their north, Sawyers’s party found the Belle Fourche River on Aug. 4 and from there traveled westward towards the Powder River Basin.
At the same time Sawyers’s civilian expedition made its way into Wyoming, the U.S. Army launched its own Powder River Expedition. As a punitive measure for the tribes’ July 26, 1865 attack on Platte Bridge, Brig. Gen. Patrick E. Connor was ordered by General Grenville M. Dodge to “make vigorous war upon the Indians and punish them so that they will be forced to keep the peace.”
News of Connor’s expedition reached Sawyers on Aug. 1 through Lieut. Daniel M. Dana. Williford had sent Dana to Fort Laramie to retrieve supplies—an action that grated on Sawyers, as he blamed the low Army supplies on Williford. Initially, news of Connor’s expedition seemed irrelevant to Sawyers, as he intended to reach the Powder River by traveling north of the Pumpkin Buttes while Connor, traveling on the Bozeman Trail, skirted the buttes to their south.
Traveling north of Pumpkin Buttes, Sawyers made camp along a “stagnant” Caballo Creek on Aug. 9, 1865. There, Sawyers encountered the great mineral wealth Campbell County is known for today, seeing “large quantities of first-rate bituminous coal… I should think it almost inexhaustible.”
From the coal-laden campsite, Sawyers’s men traveled another 32 miles westward. Scouts found the Powder on Aug. 11, but reported the “very bad lands” made terrain impassable for the wagons. In addition, the party suffered from dry conditions. The expedition’s engineer, Lewis H. Smith, wrote in his diary, “not much water for cahattle which are suffering from want therof. ” Facing these hardships, Sawyers decided to turn the expedition around. They would return to Caballo Creek and make for the Powder on the south side of Pumpkin Buttes.
Want of water and “excessive” 90-degree heat continued to plague the expedition on Aug. 13. Around noon, 19-year-old teamster Nathaniel Hedges traveled a few miles ahead of the main body to scout for water. Finding water at Bonepile Creek, Hedges began watering the horses when he was attacked by a group of Cheyenne warriors lying in wait. Fellow teamster Albert Holman remembered “seven arrows had penetrated his breast; a bullet hole was in his cheek and several in his body. His head had been scalped, leaving bare the entire skull.”
After the Cheyennes killed Hedges, Sawyers reported they made a “dash on our herd and stampeded and drove off eight cavalry horses.” Fighting back, Sawyers’s men wounded at least one Cheyenne and bought themselves enough time to continue another 10 miles, hoping to reach Caballo Creek. But darkness closed in, making travel impossible and Sawyers’s men corralled on top of a small knoll. That night, 5th U.S. Volunteer Infantryman John Colby Griggs wrote in his diary, “no one allowed to sleep tonight” for fear of Indian attack.
The next day, they used wood from one of the old wagons to construct a crude coffin for Hedges and buried him in an unmarked grave. The men used their wagons to form a rudimentary fortification and dug rifle pits on top of the knoll. To keep watch, they set up pickets on nearby hill tops. While Pvt. Ulrick Jarvis of the Dakota Cavalry manned a picket, a group of 12 to 15 Cheyennes sneaked up on him. Fortunately for Jarvis, he heard the warriors and escaped. Scampering down the hill, Jarvis fired warning shots to alert the main expedition. With the warriors hot on his heels “with the speed of the wind,” Jarvis made it back to safety, losing only his hat. Throughout the day, the Cheyenne attempted to run off the expedition’s livestock and each time Sawyers’s men successfully fought them off. According to Griggs, 10 Native warriors were killed, while Sawyers lost no one this day.
The next morning, Aug. 15, Sawyers wrote, “the bluffs around at sunrise were covered with Indians to the number of 500 to 600, and fighting was commenced by their charging down over the plain and shooting into the corrall.” After the initial ambush, Sawyers’s men had time to dig foxholes, corral the wagons and set up their two 12-pound mountain howitzers; Sawyers proudly noted his men could repulse each charge of the Native warriors. After two days of this fighting, the Cheyennes realized further fighting would not be successful, and they called for peace.
Sawyers began negotiations with the tribe with Cheyenne George Bent interpreting. In exchange for a wagon load of supplies, the Native Americans agreed to allow Sawyers safe passage. This agreement, however, didn’t please everyone. The rivalry between Sawyers and Captain Williford flared, because some of the soldiers did not feel it was right to “buy off the hostiles.” In his own report, Sawyers noted, the military escort “were discontented with this treaty, but were restrained by the majority from fighting.”
Peace did not last long. Sawyers next reported that Pvts. Anthony Nelson and John Rouse of the Dakota Cavalry “ventured out” among the Cheyenne, possibly to trade with the Indians. An argument broke out and “in the melee,” the privates “were shot.” In response, Sawyers’s men opened fire with their howitzers and killed several of the Indians’ ponies.
Sawyers’s men recovered Nelson’s body, but couldn’t find Rouse, leading Holman to speculate he was still alive and, “perhaps from fear of the same treatment, the Mexican [Rouse] had joined [the Cheyenne].” Griggs was also certain Rouse had deserted: “there were no doubt entertained by the cavalry that he had deserted to the enemy.”
A salvo fired from the two howitzers bought Sawyers’s men some space and they moved from Bonepile Creek to return to Caballo Creek. Sawyers sent out a scouting party to determine Gen. Connor’s location and see if the Army would send relief. In his report, Sawyers notes Williford was growing “faint hearted,” and pressing to abandon the expedition and make for the safety of Fort Laramie.
From the evenings of Aug. 16 through Aug. 18, they remained corralled at Caballo Creek. During this time, the Cheyennes made occasional runs for the livestock. Sawyers’s scouting party returned on Aug. 19. Having ridden 150 miles in 50 hours, they reported Gen. Connor had crossed the Powder River with a large expedition. More important to Sawyers, the Cheyenne were moving north, leaving the road south of Pumpkin Buttes clear.
Unknown to Sawyers, events from Connor’s expedition triggered the northward movement of the Cheyenne. On Aug. 13—the same day the Cheyennes killed Hedges at Bonepile Creek—Connor’s Pawnee scouts, led by Capt. Frank J. North, spotted another group of Cheyenne warriors at Crazy Woman Creek. A skirmish ensued in which North’s horse was shot out from under him and several Cheyennes were wounded. North’s men followed the Cheyennes northeast down Crazy Woman to the Powder River, catching up on Aug. 16. The Cheyennes mistook North’s Pawnees for a party of Cheyenne warriors—possibly the Cheyenne harassing Sawyers. North and his scouts attacked the Cheyenne village and killed 24 Native Americans, including George Bent’s stepmother, Yellow Woman.
With the Cheyenne moving north, Sawyers and his party marched south of the Pumpkin Buttes unmolested. They reached the Powder River and camped one mile south of the newly established Fort Reno on Aug. 24. Sawyers and Williford could now contact Gen. Connor. Connor ordered Williford to remain at Reno to assume command of the post, while his men were to be mustered out of service with the end of their enlistments. As a replacement, Connor ordered the 6th Michigan Volunteer Cavalry escort Sawyers on north up the Bozeman Trail.
Sawyers’s expedition continued north, crossing Crazy Woman Creek on Aug. 26. They reached Clear Creek by present Buffalo, Wyoming on Aug. 28 and passed by Lake De Smet on Aug. 29, unaware that a battle was underway 40 miles to the north.
On Aug. 28, Connor’s Pawnee scouts, along with guide Jim Bridger, saw smoke from an Arapaho village on the horizon. The next morning, Aug. 29, near present Ranchester, Wyoming, Connor’s men took Black Bear’s village by surprise. During the Battle of Tongue River, two of Connor’s men were killed and six wounded while the Arapaho lost between 35 and 63, including many women and children. As with Capt. North’s fight with the Cheyenne on Crazy Woman Creek, Connor’s battle with the Arapaho had ramifications for Sawyers’s expedition.
Sawyers’s party, meanwhile, made its way along the Bozeman Trail to the Tongue River, and on Aug. 31 Sawyers reported that Capt. Osmer F. Cole from the 6th Michigan escort was “surrounded and killed by Indians while scouting ahead.” The next day, Arapahos attacked the rear guard and teamster James Dilleland and emigrant E.G. Merrill were both shot and mortally wounded.
On Sept. 2, Sawyers’s party once again woke to the sight of Indians surrounding their camp with between 250 and 300 Arapahos around them. Under a white flag, Sawyers met with the Arapahos. The two parties agreed to send three men each to find Gen. Connor. The Arapahos hoped Connor would return the ponies his men stole in the raid on their village and Sawyers’s men hoped to convince Connor to send reinforcements.
For nearly two weeks, Sawyers’s expedition remained at Tongue River near present Dayton, Wyoming, in a kind of standoff with the Arapahos. Complicating matters, the members of the expedition knew they would lose the military escort if they pressed on, as the 6th Michigan had orders from Gen. Connor not to cross the Bighorn River some 50 miles ahead. Fearing the loss of the escort, the civilian party refused to travel any farther. With Sawyers’s leadership in disarray, the civilian men voted to remove him from command, despite his protest that they were acting “impulsively.”
It seems likely that the seeds of the rebellion were planted in the expedition’s makeup, as Sawyers struggled to maintain overall command of a mix of civilians and soldiers. This was highlighted in the first half of the journey in the feud between Sawyers and Williford. Now, Sawyers lacked the authority to order the 6th Michigan onward, setting the stage for the civilians in the expedition to question his leadership and remove him from command.
With Sawyers no longer in charge, the party voted to turn around and head back south to Fort Reno. As they were beginning their return, Company L, 2nd California Cavalry under Capt. Albert Brown arrived as a relief party sent by Gen. Connor —and the Arapahos departed.
Upon learning of the mutiny against Sawyers, Captain Brown wished to have the mutineers executed for their crime. According to Sawyers, he “begged” Brown “not to kill them” as there were too few men already. There may also have been a question of legality for such a harsh punishment—the mutineers were civilians, not soldiers. While the mutineers were spared, Captain Brown’s threats were enough to restore Sawyers to leadership.
With order and Sawyers restored, the expedition pressed on toward Montana Territory. They reached the Bighorn River on Sept. 19. As with the 6th Michigan, the 2nd California Cavalry were under orders not to proceed farther. However, Capt. Brown provided a seven-man detail, under Sgt. James Youcham, to escort Sawyers to Virginia City. After crossing the Bighorn, the party continued along to the Yellowstone River without incident and reached Virginia City on Oct. 12, 1865.