The Battle of the Platte Bridge , also called the Battle of Platte Bridge Station, on July 26, 1865 was the culmination of a summer attack by the Lakota Sioux and Cheyenne Indians against the United States soldiers. In May and June the Indians raided the army and railway stations over the vast swaths of Wyoming and Montana. In July, they assembled a large army, estimated by Cheyenne George Bent soldiers to number 3,000 soldiers, and descended upon the Platte Bridge. The bridge, across the North Platte River near Casper today, Wyoming, is guarded by 120 soldiers. In an engagement near the bridge, and another against a wagon train guarded by 28 soldiers a few miles away, the Indians killed 29 soldiers while suffering at least eight people were killed.
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The slaughter of the Sand River in Colorado in November 1864 catalyzed the insurgency among the Central Highlands Indian tribes. Around 4,000 BrulÃÆ'Â © Lakota, Southern Cheyenne, and Southern Arapaho, including about 1,000 warriors, moved north from Colorado and Kansas to join their northern families in the Powder River Country from the future states of Wyoming and Montana. Along the way they raided the ranches and train wagons, gained huge amounts of looting, and fought with soldiers in Julesburg, Mud Springs, and Rush Creek.
With the arrival of spring 1865, their horses restored strength after a long winter, the Lakota and Cheyenne decided to attack along the North Platte River during the summer. Messages were sent to Sitting Bull and Hunkpapa Lakotas in North Dakota and Montana and Hunkpapa agreed to attack Fort Rice in North Dakota simultaneously. In the opinion of historian Stephen E. Ambrose, the plan is the closest to Lakota and Cheyenne who once came to "integrated unified attack movement."
As a military force, Indians have serious weaknesses. "Only in the middle of summer and early winter can they increase the great power, and even then they can not hold their fighters together for longer periods of a week or ten days." The Indians had few guns and little ammunition, and their basic weapons, bows and arrows, were virtually useless against a well-fortified or powerful foe. The Indians had no command structure; Individual Indian soldiers simply follow who they want and fight only when they hope and they take the attack mainly to get the horse and to win personal honor, rather than collectively. Their fatal mistake was that they "can not turn the battle into a campaign." In addition, the Indians are divided among themselves. Only a few Arapaho participated in the war, and about 1,500 Lakota, mostly Brulà © beneath the Spotted Tail, had taken a peaceful residence at Fort Laramie in the Spring of 1865. The Lakota family living near the fort were known as "laramie shoes."
The US Army also has weaknesses. Soldiers opposed to the Lakota and Cheyenne are Civil War ambassadors or "Yankee-promoted" - Confederate soldiers captured by Unity who agree to fight Indians on the border in exchange for their freedom. With the Civil War that subsided in the spring of 1865, the soldiers wanted to get out of the army and were not enthusiastic about the Indians. Many soldiers left or threatened the rebellion.
Maps Battle of Platte Bridge
Initial meeting
Deer Creek Station. Blood Cheyenne/White mixed George Bent joined the war feast of 100 Cheyenne, divided roughly the same between the northern and southern branches of the tribe. Heading south from their camp on the Powder River, Cheyennes reaches North Platte, 28 miles east of the Platte River Bridge, near Glenrock today, Wyoming, on May 20. Two US cavalry companies, consisting of about 100 people, are stationed at Deer Creek Station.
About 25 of the Cheyenne met and fought with four soldiers about three miles upstream from the station. Cheyenne was pushed back. Another band attacked a group of seven soldiers, killed one, and arrested 26 horses. The soldiers claim to have killed five Indians in this battle. As is often the case, the Indian story is substantially different. Bent says Cheyenne waded through the flooded North Platte River and shocked the soldiers at Deer Creek Station, who refused to get out of their fortifications. After exchanging fire with the soldiers and not suffering the victims, the Indians left the attack and again crossed the North Platte with their stolen horses. According to official army reports, 25 soldiers who depend on tracing Indians to the river, but can not cross because of the high water. Bent, on the other hand, says the soldiers live in their fortress and do not pursue the Indians. Before returning north to their villages, Cheyenne visited the Platte River Bridge, exchanged several shots with soldiers guarding the bridge, and attacked an army-guarded train, catching 250 donkeys.
The raid by Lakota took place on May 26 at Sweetwater Station and St Mary's Station, west of the Platte Bridge, which prompted soldiers to close the Oregon Trail to civilian traffic on May 30.
Dry Creek. With the Oregon Trail closed for traffic, the Indians turned their attention south to the Overland Trail. On June 2, Fort Halleck, near the current Mount Elk, Wyoming learned of the Indian attack on the stage station in the west. He sent 32 soldiers to investigate and find three abandoned platforms and all their employees hiding at Sulfur Springs Station, eighty miles west of Fort Halleck. The soldiers return civil servants to their station and leave detachments to guard each station. The Indians robbed the stations again and stole most of their cattle, leaving the soldiers on foot.
Meanwhile, the Indians tried to lure the army at Platte Bridge Station to ambush. On June 3, they opened fire on Station and Lieutenant Colonel. Peston B. Plumb, the 11th Kansas Cavalry, and 22 soldiers united to pursue them. Near Dry Creek, the soldiers were ambushed by 60 Indians, but were rescued by twenty additional cavalry that came out to help them. Two soldiers were killed and they claimed to have killed an Indian. The bridge builder, an elderly civilian named Louis Guinard, disappears. A boot containing the legs was found several months later.
Sage Creek Station. On June 8, about 100 Indians attacked Sage Creek Station, west of Fort Halleck near Saratoga, Wyoming today. The five soldiers and 2 civilians at the station ran out of ammunition and attempted to flee eight miles west to Pine Grove Station with the Indians in pursuit. Five of them were killed. Indians continued to attack in the area, killing two civilians but focusing on releasing their livestock station stagecoach.
Yellowstone River Basin. Far north on the Yellowstone River basin in Montana, on June 9, Lakota (probably Hunkpapa) killed a Colonel Smith from the 14th Wisconsin Regiment. Next, they killed eleven people near Fort Benton on the Missouri River.
Almost every day attacks on remote outposts, postal station and wagon train continue throughout June to early July. Several additional troops and civilians were killed, assaults reached as far south as the South Platte River near Julesburg, Colorado.
Moonlight Error
In response to the attack, the commander at Fort Laramie, Colonel Thomas Moonlight, led a large army of 500 cavalry out of the fort to search and punish the rogue Indians. He returned to the fortress May 19, after not finding an Indian. In the words of a soldier, Moon Light "is hunting them in the opposite direction from where their trail leads."
On May 26, 1865, Moonlight hung two small Oglala leaders, Two Faces and Black Feet. A white woman, Lucinda Ewbanks, and her little boy were found living in the sad condition among Oglala bands. They had been kidnapped by Cheyenne almost a year earlier and sold to Oglala Two Face and Black Foot bands. The moonlight commanded the two Oglalas to depend. George Bent and others tell the story differently. Bent said the Oglala redeemed the woman from Cheyenne and took him into the castle as a peace movement. However, Moonlight captures and hangs them, an act that Ny protested. Ewbanks. Experienced civilians in the castle warned of Moonlight's impact. Their bodies, and the body of a Cheyenne, were left hanging from gallows for months so that all visitors could see the fortress.
On June 3, soldiers feared that 1,500 Lakota, mostly Brulao, and Arapaho living near Fort Laramie, may become hostile, deciding to move them about 300 miles east to Fort Kearny in Nebraska. The Indians protest that Fort Kearny is in their traditional enemy territory, Pawnee. In addition, they were worried, on the grounds, there would be no food for them at Fort Kearny. The soldiers insist and the Indians, with escort of 138 cavalry under Captain William D. Fouts, leave Fort Laramie on June 11. The ill-treatment of soldiers against Indian women and children caused the Lakota to turn hostile. The young Oglala, the Mad Horse, slipped into the camp on the night of June 13 and persuaded the Indians to flee the soldiers. The next day, near the current Morrill, Nebraska, most Indians refuse to accompany the army and start crossing the North Platte River, aided by Crazy Horse and a group of Oglalas on the other. Trying to stop them, Fouts and four soldiers were killed.
Informed about the disaster, Moonlight left Fort Laramie with 234 cavalry to chase the Indians. He traveled so fast that many of his subordinates had to return because their horses were spent. On June 17, near the present Harrison, Nebraska, Lakota raided his horse and freed him from most of his remaining horses. Moonlight and many of his men had to walk 60 miles back to Fort Laramie. He was severely criticized by his soldiers for drunkenness and not installing his horses. On July 7, Moonlight was released from his command and deployed out of the army.
The Platte River Bridge is the main crossing point of the North Platte River for the emigrant wagon train traveling to Oregon and Bozeman Trails. The Indians especially want to stop traffic on the Bozeman Line that leads to the heart of their hunting area. The bridge was built in 1859 and nearly 1,000 feet long and 17 feet wide. On the south side of the river are military posts and fortresses, run by 100 soldiers, a dozen or more armed civilians, some Shoshoni watchers, and the Overland Telegraph Company offices. The soldiers are low in ammunition.
On July 20, Indian leaders made their final decision to launch an attack on the bridge. The soldiers gathered and headed south from the mouth of Crazy Woman Creek on the Powder River. The Platte River Bridge is 115 miles south. Soldiers are the greatest Bent ever. He estimates the number of 3,000 people. War leaders including Red Cloud, Old Man Afraid Of Horses and his son, Young Man, are afraid of his horses, Roman Nose, Dull Knife, Crazy Horse, and others. The march was "perfectly arranged" with undisciplined youths who were constantly being checked by soldier societies like Crazy Dogs and Dog Soldiers.
On July 24, Indian soldiers camped in a small creek a few miles from Platte Bridge. Spies spotted the area and the next morning the Indians advanced on foot to the bridge, behind the hilltop and on foot, leading their horses to avoid throwing a cloud of dust. A group of ten trusted fighters, including the Mad Horse, tried to persuade soldiers from the fortress to cross the bridge and chase them to the hill where the Indians were hiding. But excited young fighters appeared on the horizon, ruining the ambush, and scared the soldiers away. Apparently the Mad Horse, Cheyenne was named the High Riding Wolf, and other bait, disgusted with the failure of their ambush, crossed the river, and ran through two groups of soldiers, doing little damage but sending soldiers rushing back to the fort. High Back Wolf killed. The next morning, July 26, the Indians again tried unsuccessfully to persuade the soldiers out of their fortress to ambush; Charles Bent, George's brother, was among the decoys.
Meanwhile, before dawn on July 26, a detachment of 14 people from Company I, the 3rd US Volunteer Infantry led by Captain Adam Smith Leib, was escorted by First Lieutenant Henry C. Bretney and six (some accounts say 10) Company G forces , 11th Ohio Volunteer Cavalry, arrives from Sweetwater Station on the way to Fort Laramie for long overdue supplies and payroll. Their arrival brought the complement from station to 120 soldiers. They found the station with 50% guard duty and bullet printing.
Leib advised the station commander, Major Martin Anderson of the 11th Kansas Cavalry, that he had previously passed a small train containing five wagon carts pulled back from Sweetwater to Laramie, 14 teams escorted by 11 enlisted men from Kansas to 11th. Knowing that the train was coming the next morning, the officers at the post discussed sending relief forces to drive out Cheyenne and Lakota fighters, so train trains could come safely. Leib and Bretney suggested to march immediately. but Anderson decided to wait during the day. Bretney, who had successfully led G Company on February 13 when his captain, Levi M. Rinehart, had been accidentally killed by a drunken policeman during a small battle, unrelated to Anderson. Arriving at Platte Bridge on July 16, Kansan replaced Bretney as the postal commander and ordered Company G to move to Sweetwater Station, escorting the same wagon train that is now back from there. In addition, Kansas's 11th Cavalry will perform a march to Fort Kearney on or about August 1 to resign.
After the reveille, the four officers of Anderson refused to lead the relief forces and some put themselves on the list of sick to avoid the task. The 20th Annual Lieutenant of the Year 20 Caspar W. Collins of Company G 11th Ohio Volunteer Cavalry, on his way back to his company farther west from the details of remuneration at Fort Laramie, had arrived the previous afternoon with an ambulance letter and was ordered by Anderson to lead the aid. Bretney had no authority to refuse the order but advised Collins to refuse it. Instead Collins borrowed a Bretney pistol and was given a ride from a regimental band.
At dawn, many Indians were observed by the guards in the surrounding hills observing the station. At 7:00 am, a larger army crossed the river to the east of the station and just up from the range of the rifle, with a snuff of a garrison. Collins and a small detachment of 25 people from 11 Kansas across the Platte Bridge took a walk, then formed into a fours fours column and drove west along the northern edge by running to drive out the hostile Indians. Behind him, a 30-person contingent from the US to-3. V.I. and the 11th companion of the Ohio Volunteer Cavalry crossed the bridge on foot as a support troop for Collins, forming a line of battle after they watched 400 Cheyenne emerge from the sand dunes and arroyo between them and Collins.
The Indians had hidden a large group of soldiers near the bridge and above the hilltop, perhaps as many as a thousand Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho. Collins pushed his detachment into two lines and commissioned the first group to emerge, only to find himself so outnumbered. He then orders to retreat to the bridge by breaking through Cheyenne behind him. At the same time, another large army, from Lakota, rushed to the bridge from the south. The battle line on the bridge held Lakota at bay with volley fire until 21 of 26 troops with Collins, all wounded to some extent, struggled through it. Five were killed, including Collins, who was injured in the hip and shot in the forehead with arrows while trying to help the wounded soldiers.
Bretney in anger returned to the castle and accused Kansas kepengengaan officers when Anderson refused to allow greater power and howitzer to try another aid. Anderson put Bretney captured and handed the post defense to Leib, who had a garrison throw a hole and dug a gunhole to protect the howitzer at the southern end of the bridge. Disagreements also occur among Indians. Mitchell Lajeunesse, a reconnaissance of mixed blood for soldiers, ventured out of the station right after the battle. He observed the Cheyenne who accused the Lakota of being a coward for not capturing the Platte Bridge and preventing the fugitives of the soldiers on the north side of the river. Soldiers of two tribes almost came to blows.
In the morning the attacking force destroyed a thousand feet of telegraph wire in the line to Fort Laramie before Anderson thought to ask for reinforcements, then drove from the details of 11 soldiers sent to fix it, killing another policeman. The two Shoshone Scouts were paid to take messages asking for reinforcements to the next telegraph station in the east, but the fighting was over and the Indians had left before help arrived.
Battle of the Red Buttes
Sergeant Amos J. Custard was in charge of five carriages and 25 men coming from west to Platte Bridge Station. He was warned by a 30-person patrol from the 11th Cavalry of Ohio that many Indians were in the area. The Ohioans hide behind a breastworks made of carriages. Custard refuses to take shelter with the Ohioans, saying "We have the South, where the fighting is done, and we know how to do it." He and his men and his wagon went on to a point about five miles from and inside the view of the Platte Bridge Station where he heard the sound of station cannons and fighting near the bridge. Custard sent Corporal James A. Shrader and four policemen to investigate. They were cut and chased by a hundred Cheyenne led by a brother of Roman Nose, the Left Hand, who was killed in a run. Finally Shrader and two people walked to the station.
In the wagon train, with a large number of Indians approaching, Custard arranged the carts to the cage near the bank of the river and defeated the first irregular attack. Indian leaders, including Roman Nose, arrive and take over. Roman Nose and others ride their horses at high speed in a circle around the wagon train with the goal of attenuating army ammunition. That was accomplished, the Indians advanced, most of them on foot, and raided the train, killing 22 soldiers in the cage. One team worker fled.
US soldiers' accounts claimed that the carriages were forced into a hole where they stayed for four hours, using fire from Spencer's rifle to ward off attacks until large groups closed down on foot and flooded the defenders, killing all. George Bent, a participant, said the fight lasted less than half an hour. He gave a very high admiration to the soldiers who briefly fought 1,000 Indians. Bent said eight Indians were killed in the fighting and many were wounded. In contrast, in the fight with Collins, the Indians had suffered "almost no harm."
Aftermath
A day after the battle, the Indian army broke into small groups and broke up. Some remain near the Oregon Trail to rob but most return to their village in the Powder River state to hunt their summer buffalo. Indians lack the resources to keep troops on the ground for long periods of time. The achievements of the Indians, given that perhaps the largest Indian army ever assembled in the Great Plains, is somewhat lacking. The planned attack on Fort Rice in North Dakota is useless.
Army casualties near 29th Platte Station were killed, including Lt. Collins, with at least ten serious injuries. Historian Robert Utley estimated the combined Indian casualties in July action around Platte Bridge Station when 60 were killed and 130 wounded. That seems a very high estimate. George Bent says only 8 Indians were killed in Red Butte and that the Indians suffered several casualties near the Platte bridge. Indians do not like to take casualties in offensive actions, usually withdraw if they face tough resistance.
The Army officially changed the name of Platte Bridge Station to Fort Caspar in honor of Collins, using the name he gave to distinguish the post of a fortress in Colorado named after Collins's father.
Although they did not realize it then, the Indians were lucky because they quickly decided the campaign at Platte Bridge. Troops of more than 2,000 soldiers, ordered by General Patrick E. Connor launched against them. The Powder River Expedition, as it is called, will penetrate into the heart of their country in August. At that time, most of the soldiers who had participated in the Battle of the Platte Bridge returned to their camp and rested as well as their horses. They managed to fend off Connor.
References
External links
- Map of the Battles of Platte Bridge 1865
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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