instrumental to some extent in placing them in their position of fancied security,
he took advantage of their inapprehension and defenseless condition to gratify the
worst passions that ever cursed the heart of man. It is thought by some that desire
for poiitical preferment prompted him to this cowardly act; that he supposed that
by pandering to the inflamed passions of an excited population he could recommend
himself to their regard and consideration. Others think it was to avoid being sent
where there was more of danger and hard service to be performed ; that he was willing
to get up a show of hostility on the part of the Indians by committing himself acts
which savages themselves would never premeditate. Whatever may have been his
motive, it is to be hoped that the authority of this government will never again be
disgraced by acts such as he and those acting with him have been guilty of commit-
ting. . . . The truth is that he surprised and murdered, in cold blood, the unsus-
pecting men, women and children on Sand Creek, who had every reason to believe they
were under the protection of the United States authorities, and then returned to
Denver and boasted of the brave deeds he and the men under his command had
performed. . . .
' ' In conclusion, your committee are of the opinion that for the purpose of
vindicating the cause of justice and upholding the honor of the nation, prompt and
energetic measures should at once be taken to remove from oflSce those who have
thus disgraced the government by whom they are employed, and to punish, as their
crimes desei-ve, those who have been guilty of these brutal and cowardly acts. ' '
By midsummer of 1865, a reaction of public sentiment in Colorado
concerning "the Sand Creek affair" had set in, and which was cultivated by
some partisan leaders for political effect. The feeling between those who
now denounced the "battle" as a wanton massacre and condemned all who
had been engaged in it, and those who held it to have been justified and
defended Chivington and his men against having such a stigma placed upon
them, became personal and of intense bitterness. It affected business rela-
tions and invaded the circles of social intercourse; and in the Statehood
movement of that year it became a political question. Most intense partisan
animosities now were engendered, and the matter became a leading issue.
The Republicans placed in their platform a plank strongly condemning all
HISTOEY OF COLOEADO 487
who assailed those who were responsible for Sand Creek ; Ijut, not content with
this, the more extreme of Colonel Chivington's defenders held a convention
and nominated a Sand Creek ticket for State officers upon a Sand Creek
platform.
At no time did Colonel Chivington attempt to evade or lessen his
responsibility for "the Sand Creek affair."" When he returned to Denver at
the end of the campaign he asserted his belief, and in which some of his
officers coincided, tliat it had saved Colorado from a devastating invasion by
a horde of the plains Indians, and that it would cause all the hostile tribes
now to sue for peace. He also expressed his conviction that Indians, to be
fought successfully, must be dealt with harshly; and that one crushing,
merciless blow, sparing neither age, sex nor condition, would prove to be
the more merciful method of warfare lapon them, after all; that such were
the only methods that Indians could and would understand and heed, and
that in the end his way of fighting them would save not only hundreds or
thousands of white people from frightful forms of death, but would be less
destructive of Indian life, if that were worth considering, than any other.
However, Colonel Cliivington"s responsibility for the tragedy caused
him to be regarded with extreme aversion by more and more of the people
of Colorado, as time went on, and clouded all the after-years of his life.
Sand Creek also was a persistent factor among the circumstances that lim-
ited the political career of Governor Evans to his term as Chief Executive
of the Territory, although he was in no manner directly answerable for it.
As I have already said, he went from Denver to Washington early in Octo-
ber (186-4) and did not return to Colorado until the following April. It
is most probable that he had had not an inkling of Colonel Chivington"s
intention to make an opportunity for putting into practice his theory of
warfare against Indians.
But Colonel Chivington's "example"" at Sand Creek had no such effect
upon the Indians as that which he had anticipated. News of the tragedy
was spread among them with remarkable swiftness, and infuriated them to
the highest pitch. All the roving tribes of the plains were drawn together
more closely than ever before, and, bent upon extreme vengeance, their war-
riors sallied forth as hornets swarm out to attack the disturber of their
nest. Before the end of December they were in full possession of the cen-
tral plains from the eastern border of the Colorado settlements to the edge
of the more tliickly peopled parts of Kansas and Nebraska ; had made the
routes of travel between the Missouri Eiver and the mountains trails of
blood and fire, and every detachment of troops that had been guarding them
was penned within its stockade and dared not venture out. Many of the
stage-stations had been destroyed, their keepers killed, and the stage-com-
pany's livestock driven off; more than one hundred miles of the overland
telegraph line liad been wrecked, and from beyond the parts of Kansas and
Nebraska mentioned above all communications with the East now were cut
off. The uprising was becoming the most formidable ever made by the
American Indians.
The conditions in Colorado were those of a panic. The store of provi-
sions, which, already depleted, now ran lower and their prices rose higher
and higher as they dwindled, while the winter had developed into one
of great severity. Tlie Third Regiment of Colorado Cavalry, the prin-
cipal service of which had been rendered in the Sand Creek campaign, hav-
4-^8 HISTOEY OF COLORADO
ing been mustered out, Acting Governor Elbert, late in December, issued
a call for sis companies of mounted volunteers to meet the emergency, each
to consist of sixty men, and the organizaiton to be commanded by Colonel
Shoup, formerly of the Third Cavalry. But the bitter denunciations of "the
Sand Creek affair" in the East was one of the causes that deterred men from
volunteering again to fight Indians. Eesponses to Elbert's call were slow,
and it appeared that failure was to attend this attempt to organize a force
for self-defense.
On January 4th (1865), Colonel Thomas Moonlight, of the Eleventli
Eegiment of Kansas Volunteer Cavalry, succeeded Chivington in command
of the District of Colorado. The Legislative Assembly then being in ses-
sion. Colonel Jloonlight I'ecommended that the Territorial militia-law be
so amended as to provide pay, bounties, and compensate for horses for Ter-
ritorial volunteers. A bill to that effect was introduced into the Assembly,
but notwithstanding the reasonableness of its provisions the Assembly hag-
gled over for nearly two weeks, without having come to an agreement.
Colonel Moonlight now proclaimed martial law in the Territory, and which
was to continue in force until the volunteers called for were enlisted and
organized. All business and occupations except that of dealing in the dimin-
ishing supply of necessities, were suspended. So the mines were closed and
every other industry stopped.
Governor Elbert now made a new requisition, which called for seven
companies instead of six, apportioned as follows: Arapahoe County, two
companies; Gilpin, two; Jefferson, one; Clear Creek, one; the seventh to
be furnished jointly by Boulder, Weld, and Larimer Counties. Colonel
Moonlight's drastic methods soon produced the desired results. As it was
known that a lack of volunteers would be made up by a draft, the quotas
were enrolled within a month, and placed under the command of Samuel E.
Browne, who had led forth a company of militia in the previous summer.
In the meantime t]je Indians had devastated the highway between
Denver and Julesburg, and death and destruction now marked its course.
The glare from burning buildings had been visible from Denver at night,
and the tales told by refugees now agitated that community by day. The
men, women, and children who had harbored in these stations and had
not sought and found safety by timely flight had fallen victims to savage
fury. Provisions had advanced to famine-prices in all the Colorado towns;
flour, for example, was selling in Denver for fifty dollars per barrel. In
a report sent from Denver on February 2d by Colonel Moonlight to Gen-
eral Grenville M. Dodge, who had, in the previous month, been placed in
command of the Department of Missouri, which included the District of
Colorado, with instructions to reopen lines of communication, the former
said:
"The Indians are bold in the extreme. Tliev bave burned every ranch between
Jiiiesburg and Valley Station, and nearly all the property at latter place; driven off
all stock, both public and private. These Indians are led by white men, and have
complete control of all the country outside my district, so that I am hemmed in.
' ' The weather has been very severe here for nearly three weeks ; the thermometer
30 degrees below zero, with quite a fall of snow on the ground. . . .
"Fort Lyon is being rapidly fortified, so that 200 men can defend it against
2,000 Indians. Militia companies are being organized all over the settled parts of
the country (under penalty of being pressed into service) to defend the frontier set-
tlements southward. . . . The Indians now are determined to make it a war of
HISTORY OF COLORADO 439
extermination and nothing short of 5,000 men can make it extermination for them.
' ' Major Wynkoop informed me from Fort Lyon that many warriors were on
the headwaters of the Smoky Hill and intended attacking all the settlements as
well as Denver. Provisions, owing to the transportation lines being cut off, are at
an exorbitant price, as well as labor and forage. ' '
I shall not dwell at length upon the horrors and other events of that
memorable winter, nor upon those that followed in that prolonged Indian
War, which cost so heavily in life, property, and money. Under the vigor-
ous policy of General Dodge, who was widely known and greatly respected
by the Indians, telegraphic communications were restored before the mid-
dle of February, and by the end of that month the stage-line upon the
Platte River Trail had resumed operations. After this had been accom-
plished and troops distributed along that course of travel. General Dodge
turned his attention to the district of the Arkansas River ; and, ere the com-
ing of summer, the Santa Fe Trail had been made passable. Most of Col-
orado's emergency volunteers had been employed in guarding the stage
route and telegraph line, between Denver and Julesburg, in which duty they
served until near the end of April, when they returned to Denver and were
disbanded.
The collapse of the Southern Confederacy enabled the Federal Gov-
ernment to transfer a large force of seasoned soldiers into the Far West
for service against the Indians of the plains, and a number of stockaded
military posts and smaller stations were built and garrisoned by these
troops. But the policy now was to hold what had been recovered and to
keep open the lines of communication, rather than to make aggressive war
upon the tribes — the reverse of that under which General Dodge had pro-
ceeded. This afforded the Indians frequent opportunities to fall upon
wagon-trains and stage-coaches, at points between the places where troops
were stationed, and then make off over the rolling plains before pursuit
could be attempted. Therefore, during the spring and summer of 1865,
coaches, and the trains of freighters and emigrants, repeatedly were at-
tacked and frequently with shocking results. There were instances in
which all the passengers in a coach, all the men in a company of freighters,
and all those in a party of emigi-ants, were killed; and the women and
children of the latter whose lives were spared were carried into captivity.
Although the Indians had threatened, in the previous winter, presently
to descend in large numbers upon the Colorado communities, they made
no attempt to do so; nor was any town in the Territory ever attacked by
them. Their preferred method of warfare was that of raiding the more
exposed situations, moving quickly and striking here and there where the
odds were likely to be in their favor. The celerity of their movements, the
suddenness of their appearance and disappearance, made them most diffi-
cult enemies to overcome, even with a force greatly outnumbering them.
In October, 1865, most of the hostile tribes participated in a treaty
of peace, one of the provisions of which excluded them from the State of
Kansas, thus practically dividing their country and interposing between
the two parts a broad belt of forbidden land. Professing not to have under-
stood that the treaty contained such a provision, the tribes that had been
parties to it repudiated the agreement and resumed hostilities in the next
year. But it is not improbable that they had pretended to make peace
430 HISTOEY OF COLORADO
merely for the purpose of gaining time for recuperating and for replen-
ishing their equipment for further fighting.
Their maraudings in the central parts of the plains country in 1866,
while frequent, were not so serious as those of the previous year, and travel
to and from Colorado was not nearly so dangerous. But in the spring of
186? they again dashed out and began attacking coaches and wagon-trains,
killing the keepers of stage-stations, burning the buildings, and appropriat-
ing the stage company's draft animals to their own uses. During the
month of May, that part of the northern route between the plains and
Salt Lake City was blockaded to ordinary travel; a stage-station between
Denver and Julesburg was sacked and burned ; three others next east of
Julesburg likewise were destroyed and their inmates slain; and similar
work of destruction of life and property had been done upon a long stretch
of the Arkansas Eiver Trail.
The Federal Government now had prepared for aggressive and more
extensive military operations against' all the hostile tribes. Three expedi-
tions were organized for a cooperative movement; one, under General
Hancock, was to proceed from the Missouri Eiver across the plains south of
the Platte: another, under General Augur, was to move west through the
country north of that river; and the third, under General Terry, was to
go into the Iv"orthwest.
But the subjection of the red men of the plains proved to be a long
and costly task, that was beset by many troubles; and the Indians found
time and opportunity, while evading the forces of Hancock and Augur, to
continue their slaughters and pillagings along the courses of the Platte
and Arkansas Elvers. However, in that year and in the next, they were
pursued and hunted relentlessly by these and other troops, and compelled,
tribe by tribe, to sue for peace, until, at the end of the spring of 1869, the
last roving band was subdued, after five years of continuous warfare.
When the tracks of the Union Pacific and Kansas Pacific railways
had been extended bej'oud the well-settled parts of the sections they trav-
ersed, it became necessary to assign detachments of troops to the duty of
protecting the constructors of these roads as they progressed farther west-
ward. The Indians realized the menace to their future that was signified
by these iron trails, and at every chance to do so picked off one or more
of the railway builders.
The Arapahoes and southern Cheyennes, having been closely pressed
in the summer of 1867, in a treaty made with them in October, of that
year, consented to give up their reservation in Colorado in exchange for one
in the northern part of what is now the State of Oklahoma. Their re-
moval thither, which was not effected without the application of some force,
freed Colorado of plains Indians. In the summer of 1868, these tribes,
having been joined by other hostile bands, again took to the war-path and
entered upon a series of ravages in the western and southwestern parts of
Kansas. About the middle of August, some of the Arapahoes and Chey-
ennes, whose leaders carried letters "to whom it may concern," that had
been given them by the commissioners who had negotiated the treaty with
their tribes in the previous year, certifying to the good standing to which
the Arapahoes and Cheyennes had been restored by the treaty, entered
eastern Colorado and began attacking isolated settlers. Several of the lat-
ter, located on Bijou Creek, and others on Kiowa Creek, in what is now our
HISTORY OF COLORADO 431
Elbert County, including a woman and a young boy, were killed, while
their buildings were burned and their livestock a}3propriated. In the
meantime, a detachment from these pillagers, numbering seventy or eighty,
who had been hovering around Colorado City, the citizens of which had
been deceived by their "credentials" and apparent friendliness, had ad-
vanced, by way of the Ute Pass, into the South Park, to see if they might
find some of their old enemies, the Utes. Having suprised a party of these,
of which they killed three or four, the raiders returned to the foot-hills
by another route. They now collected all the horses and other livestock
they could gather in the neighborhood of Colorado City and made off with
the animals over the plains. A few days later, another party, probably
from the band that had wrought the bloody work on Bijou and Kiowa
creeks, ransacked the valley of Monument Creek, killing several of its
settlers and running off as much livestock as could be managed. Coinci-
dent with the depredations to the southward of Denver, a small group of
hostile Indians of unknown identity made a dash into the southeastern
part of Larimer County, where they killed three white men and seized a
large drove of horses, with which they made their escape eastward.
These unexpected and startling events created a profound excitement
in the settled parts of Colorado. As the Territory had no troops of its
own, and was almost destitute of public arms and ammunition, appeals for
Federal military assistance were telegraphed to General Sheridan, whose
headquarters were at Fort Hays, in western Kansas. But Sheridan had
no soldiers to spare, nor had the commandants of other military posts on
the Kansas frontier. In the evening of August 38th, a volunteer company
of fifty mounted men was formed in Denver, and before daybreak in the
next morning, led by Major Jacob Downing, the organization set out for
the head of Bijou Creek. A smaller company, formed at Colorado City,
also had moved in the same direction. But the Indians, with their plunder,
succeeded in making their way back into southwestern Kansas without an
encounter with these pursuers, and never again returned to Colorado.
The indomitable Black Kettle, at the head of a large number of his
Cheyennes in this renewal of hostilities, was killed, together with about
one hundred of his followers, on the Washiti River, by General Custer's
troops, late in November, of that year.
In the summer of 1868, Brevet-Colonel George A. Forsyth, of the Reg-
ular Arm3^ and serving under General Sheridan, in western Kansas, or-
ganized a company of scouts, which consisted of fifty hardy and experi-
enced men, for service against the Indians whom Sheridan was then fight-
ing. Other officers of the company were First Lieutenant Frederick H.
Beecher, of the Third Regiment of United States Infantry, and Acting
Assistant Surgeon J. H. Mooers, unattached.
The evening of the 16th of the following September found Forsyth
and his men encamped on the Arickaree, or Middle, Fork of the Republican
River, and in a locality some fifteen miles to the southward of the present
town of Wray, the county seat of Yuma County ; and to which place they
had followed a fresh trail which appeared to be that of a large body of
Indians. Here, in the next morning, they were surprised by the appear-
ance of nearly a thousand Indians — men, women, and children — upon the
bluff-like opposite bank of the Arickaree, under the leadership of the north-
ern Chevenne chieftain, Roman Nose, who had been taking a very active
43-? HISTORY OF COLORADO
part in the Indian War since its beginning. A number of the warriors
immediately attacked the scouts from rather a long range, whereupon
Forsyth moved his men onto a small and low island of sand in the river,
opposite their camping place, and on each side of which there was a stream
about fifteen feet wide and six inches deep. After gaining the island some
of the men protected themselves in shallow pits scooped out in the sand,
and others behind the bodies of their horses, some of which presently went
down under the Indians' fire.
The most remarkable conflict that ever occurred in warfare against
American Indians now followed. The disparity of numbers between the
assailants and the assailed, the desperate situation, heroic courage, phy-
sical fortitude and endurance of the latter, entitles their defense to a place
in the category of the world's historic struggles in which small companies
of men successfully resisted enemies who outnumbered them many fold,
and finally triumphed over them. Forsyth and his scouts held their posi-
tion until the forenoon of the ninth day thereafter; and in the meantime
daily were targets for their besiegers. On the first day, when they drove
back with their deadly rifles several charges made by a large company of
the Indians fighting as cavalry, Forsyth received three severe wounds,
which disabled him, but did not prevent him from directing and hearten-
ing his men throughout the siege; and toward the evening Lieutenant
Beecher was killed. While Surgeon Mooers was examining Forsyth's
wounds he was fatally shot, dying from the injury on the second day after.
Also on the first day, Roman Nose was killed as he was leading one of the
charges upon the island.
In the night of the first daj-, two of the scouts. Jack StilwcU and
Pierre Trudeau, having volunteered to attempt to go to Fort Wallace for
help, succeeded in leaving the island and eluding the Indians. On the
second day, the latter tried to surprise Forsyth's men, but were discovered
and driven back. They now suspended direct efforts to take the island,
and settled down to starve out the beleaguered scouts. The condition to
which the white men became reduced, especially those who were wounded,
may be imagined. As their supplies ran lower, they began to eat the flesh
of their horses that had been killed ; and water could be obtained only by
digging holes in the island sand. In this situation, growing worse day
by day, they remained until the arrival of relief. To delay its putrefac-
tion, flesh of the horses was buried in the sand, but presently this expedient
failed. On the third day, the larger part of the savage host departed, but
left behind a force sufficient to maintain the siege and to dispose of the
suffering and starving white men when these no longer could resist. In
the night of that day, two more of the scouts started upon an errand similar
to that of Stilwell and Trudeau, lest the latter might have been prevented
from reaching Fort Wallace. Throughout the days of misery for those of
the men who were still alive upon the island, the remaining Indians
watched it closely and used their rifles whenever they saw a chance to hit;
and those upon whom they fired did likewise. In the morning of the ninth
day, the besiegers again made an attempt to charge upon the refuge of the
weakened scouts, but suddenly withdrew and disappeared. A few hours
later, a troop of the Tenth United States Cavalry appeared and relieved
Forsyth and his devoted band. Those who had gone to obtain succor had
succeeded in reaching Fort Wallace.
HISTOEY OF COLORADO 433
Lieutenant Beecher, Surgeon Mooers and three of the scouts were
dead; one of the latter lay mortally wounded, and seventeen of the others
were more or less severely wounded. In consequence of the surgeon's
death, the condition of the %vounded had been rendered more serious by
lack of the attention he could have given them. Colonel Forsyth fully
recovered from his injuries, and further distinguished himself in the Eeg-
.ular Service.
In September, 1898, a monument commemorating this exceptional