Patrick Connor attacked an Arapaho village on Tongue River, killing 63 warriors, many women and children, and largely destroying the settlement. Then, during a Peace Conference held in Fort Laramie in the summer of , troops arrived as talks were underway.
Red Cloud and other tribal leaders declared their unhappiness with the invasion into their lands and gathered their strength to strike back. Through most of , the Bozeman Trail was reopened and could be used, but only with permission and usually with military escort protection. With the gold running out, most of the traffic on the trail were merchants providing the necessary goods and services needed by the miners.
While the forts were relatively safe, the guerilla attacks by the Arapaho, Lakota, and Cheyenne were a known danger. There is evidence that Captain Fetterman and the party going out Fort Ellis for the last wood run of the season feared trouble. However, while they were alert for the small-scale raids they had experienced before, the military was unprepared for the scale and tactics used by Red Cloud and his warriors that day. On December 21, , 81 soldiers were lost in the Fetterman Fight, or the Battle of thein-the-Hands.
Carrington that he spent his entire life trying to rebuild his reputation. However, times were changing.
A year later, four trains with a total of wagons and 1, people traveled the Bozeman Cutoff to the Montana goldfields. This journey was basically without incident, except for the Townsend group.
Guides John Richard, Jr. Captain Townsend gave the Indians food, but refused to let them travel along with the train. When one of the emigrants turned up missing, Townsend sent a small force out to look for him.
They found that the Indians had killed the man, and a fight followed. However, the emigrants had the upper hand as they were well armed with repeating Henry and Spencer rifles. Three emigrant men and thirteen Indians were killed in the battle, but the train then continued on to its destination without further incident. According to historian Susan Badger Doyle, the true emigration period of the Bozeman Trail lasted only from Doyle observed that the emigrants didn't necessarily have the perception that the Indians would make their journey hazardous.
Most seemed to believe that the land was their due right and that the Indians would be overrun and would either disappear or be pushed aside. In , Nelson Story, who had become wealthy prospecting in the Montana goldfields, sought a way to provide beef for the burgeoning mining camps.
He bought cattle in Texas and despite the threat of Indian attacks, drove his herd of 3, head north on the Bozeman Trail.
He was accompanied by a wagon train hauling groceries into the Gallatin Valley. However, trouble arose when they arrived at the construction site of Fort Phil Kearny near present Story, Wyo. Henry B. Carrington was in command at the fort, one of the three forts being built that year to protect travelers on the trail. One dark night Story and his cowboys rounded up his cattle and left. Doyle also notes that by , the trail became primarily a military transportation road. As for Bozeman, after only one season of guiding he retired from the business.
He settled at the gate of the Gallatin Valley, founding Bozeman, Mont. Three years later he was killed while traveling along the Bozeman Trail. Smith on April 19, to see if they could land a government contract for flour from their flour mill in Bozeman. On the way an unexpected encounter with five Piegan Indians ended with Bozeman killed and Cover wounded. On Nov. After the Army departed, the Indians burned the forts, and the Bozeman Trail was officially closed.
The route was used again in , however, when troops under Gen. Today, the Bozeman Trail corridor is still a major north-south travel route, with an interstate highway replacing the wagon and horseback trails. Those who travel the trail can still see the grand, surrounding country and imagine how lush, pristine and full of promise the environment must have appeared to travelers who saw a new horizon on each day of their journey.
Ruts of the wagon road, located on public land near the Fetterman Monument in northern Wyoming can be viewed easily and provide contemporary evidence of the early day travel. There are also markers and historical interpretative signs at many other sites along the trail route. Doyle, Susan Badger. Hebard, Grace Raymond and E. Reprint, Glendale, Calif. Clark Company, For a drive along a remote, scenic route that closely follows more than 40 miles of the original Bozeman trail, take exit from Interstate 25 at Kaycee, Wyo.
Follow Wyoming Highway east for Turn left—north—and follow the Sussex Road, which turns to dirt after a few miles. Follow the Sussex Road 5. Continue north for about 1. Under the leadership of Oglalla Lakota chief Red Cloud, raids and ambushes were carried out against soldiers, civilians, supply trains and anyone else brazen enough to attempt the trail. These attacks culminated in three famous incidents. The Fetterman Fight, in December , which saw an army detachment of 79 soldiers and 2 civilians led by Captain William Fetterman lured from Fort Phil Kearney and utterly destroyed within a few miles of the fort.
On August 1, , the Hayfield Fight, where 19 soldiers and 6 civilians detailed for guard and hay cutting duty were attacked. Under siege for over 8 hours they managed to hold off hundred warriors until help arrived.
The Wagon Box Fight, where a detachment of 31 soldiers sent out to guard a team of wood cutters, was encircled, yet fought off numerous attacks over a five hour period from hundreds of warriors. Abandonment and Failure Continued raids and skirmishes were the rule that proved peace was a rare and evasive exception. Life guarding the trail was a combination of tension, monotony, and loneliness. Low morale led to numerous desertions, soldiers on the verge of mutiny and even cases of insanity , at the most isolated outpost, Fort C.
With few if any emigrants using the trail, the army sequestered behind fortress walls and tribes showing few signs of easing up on attacks, the United States government decided to pursue a peace policy.
A presidential proclamation was issued to abandon the forts. The Bozeman Trail was history. For the first time, the United States government had lost a war.
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