Fort Phil Kearny To the Oglala Sioux Chiefs, Red Cloud and Crazy Horse, Fort Phil Kearny, located north of present-day Buffalo, Wyoming, was indeed the "Hated Fort on the Piney [Creek]". It had been sited in the center of their best hunting grounds. Game of all kinds - buffalo, elk, deer and antelope - was very abundant there and life was good for the nomadic Plains Indian tribes. However, military and civilian traffic on the still new Bozeman Trail was on the increase, causing the game to be reduced in numbers and to be scattered from the area. Additionally, the Sioux had never given their permission for the siting of the forts but rather the soldiers just came and took what they wanted. The stage was set for violent conflict. The year was 1866. The preceding few years saw a number of important national events that led to the building of the Bozeman Trail forts. In 1862, rich, placer gold deposits were discovered in western Montana. In 1863 the Bozeman itself was first used and in 1865 the Civil War ended, freeing up many soldiers for duty in the West. In addition, the U.S. Treasury sorely needed the gold input to the nation's money supply, and the Bozeman Trail was the immigrant miners' shortest and fastest route to the gold fields. Moreover, the country as a whole was very definitely in a "Manifest Destiny" mood for the U.S. to expand from ocean to ocean. Accordingly, in the spring of 1866, federal commissioners met with a large numbers of Sioux and Cheyenne at Fort Laramie, in southeastern Wyoming, to negotiate a new treaty. While these talks were in progress, a military wagon train and column of some 700 soldiers, under the command of Colonel Henry B. Carrington, came through on their way to establish forts along the Bozeman Trail. The Native Americans were understandably furious and one conference participant was quoted as saying "Great Father sends us presents and wants new road, but white chief goes with soldiers to steal road before Indian says yes or no!" Colonel Carrington and his men did establish three forts. Fort Reno (southern Johnson County, north of Kaycee), Fort Phil Kearny (northern Johnson County and north of Buffalo) and Fort C. F. Smith (southern Montana near the Yellowtail Dam on the Big Horn River). The Indians began immediately to harass these forts and the civilian and military traffic between them to such an extent that this route would eventually become known as the "Bloody Bozeman." However, Fort Phil Kearny, established on the banks of Piney Creek, would be the primary focus for their most numerous and intensive attacks. Because of their fear of the fort's howitzers, the Indians did not attack it directly but rather commenced a guerilla-type of hit-and-run campaign. These attacks were directed at the fort's stock - horses, mules and cattle - that had to be taken to graze outside of the fort's walls and also at woodcutter parties sent to secure timber, some miles distant, needed for the building of the fort and its various structures. Such hostile activity was unrelenting. From July 26 to December 21, there were a total of 51 hostile attacks at Fort Phil Kearny, or about one every three days. As each attack occurred, the military would respond by sending out rescue parties of Cavalry and Infantry where upon the hostiles would retreat. Soon the Indians, under Red Cloud and Crazy Horse, began to prepare ambushes at some distance from the fort and then try to lure the rescue parties into following them out of sight of the fort and beyond the range of the howitzers. They were eventually to succeed in a very dramatic manner. Two of these ongoing series of battles were to be major enough to be named - The Fetterman Fight and the Wagon Box Fight - and to have significant, long lasting consequences. The Fetterman Fight - On December 21, 1866, a young and impulsive Captain William J. Fetterman allowed his rescue party to be decoyed out of sight of the fort against explicit orders to the contrary from Carrington. All 81 men in Fetterman's command were ambushed and killed in less than 30 minutes by a very large group of Sioux, Cheyenne and Arapaho. This loss was most serious, as it comprised some forty-percent of Carrington's total force. This very early defeat of a sizable military force at the hands of the northern Great Plains tribes came as a major shock to the federal government and to the general populace in the East. There really had been no accurate information or even a well based estimate as to the actual number of Indians in the region. Carrington's force had been judged adequate for any possible challenge. A serious reassessment would now begin. Wagon Box Fight - The ongoing need for lumber at the fort resulted in a group of woodcutters and their soldier escorts camping overnight several miles from the fort where the timber was located. On August 2, 1867, a very large force under Red Cloud attacked that camp of 26 soldiers and six civilians. The white men took cover inside an oval made from the wagon boxes they'd removed from their wagons. Such a procedure was routine because it allowed the stripped wagons' running gear to more effectively move the logs about in the logging area. The resulting makeshift "stockade" was then used as a corral for the animals at night. The battle was very intense but the soldiers and civilians were able to hold off the massed warriors until additional force from the fort arrived. It was a shipment of new breech-loading Springfield rifles that had just recently arrived at the fort and their initial use, along with the men's bravery, that prevented a second major defeat. The breechloaders that could fire much more rapidly than the usual muzzleloaders took the Indians completely by surprise. They should've easily defeated the small white man force but they did not. It was their first encounter against such a weapon and would completely change the tactics of warfare for them. Fort Phil Kearny and the other two Bozeman trail forts would last for a total of only two years. They were abandoned by the Treaty of 1868 and burned shortly thereafter by the Native Americans. Red Cloud and his Oglalas, the Cheyennes and the Arapahos had "won." They had driven the white man from their hunting grounds. As time would subsequently prove, however, their victory would last for less than a decade. Fort Phil Kearny was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1963. Portions of the Fort and of the Fetterman and Wagon Box Battlefields are included within its boundaries. It is located off Interstate I-90, exit 44, between Buffalo and Sheridan, Wyoming. It is also a State Historic Site, open May through November, and administered by the Wyoming State Parks and Historic Sites. |
