over the problems with the Sioux.
“I’m one glad sonuvabitch the army’s finally getting around to taking care of those red bastards,” grumbled the older of the pair, pushing some long greasy hair out of his eyes as he turned to spit into a crude corner fireplace.
“’Bout time too,” the other agreed with a nod. He was busy removing a thick crust of dirt and animal fat from beneath his fingernails. “Mebbeso them redbellies’ll stop bothering the good Injuns and turn out for some good once the government can make ’em into farmers.”
The following morning one of the trader’s sons led Kelly down to the bank to show him where the three Sioux families had crossed to reach the north side, although the recent snow had blotted out any sign of just where they had ended up going from there.
Staring at the river, disgusted to find that the water and slush were even deeper than they had been at sundown the day before, Kelly asked the boy, “How you figure the ice?”
Without speaking a word the youth touched fingertips to his lips and shook his head.
“Don’t speak no English, eh?” Then Kelly looped the hackamore back over the horse’s head, which freed both his hands to sign his question this time.
Watching the scout’s hands carefully, the boy grinned and nodded, then pointed at the ice.
“I don’t have me no idea what
But as quickly the youth signed that he was volunteering to lead Kelly across the softening ice.
“No,” and Luther emphatically wagged his head. “I can’t let you do that. Better for me to go out there and take care of myself—don’t care to be responsible for no one else.”
He turned the boy slightly and pointed up the bank to the stockade. “Now, go. Go on back to your folks.”
Letting the horse have a good lead on its rope, Kelly stepped down into the several inches of icy slush that washed past his ankles. The ice had indeed softened, but the water was clear, and he now had enough morning light to see down through the water and scum to the ice itself, detouring here and there around a thin patch. By the time he neared the south bank, the others were stomping out their fire, having saddled their horses when they saw Kelly returning.
He glanced up at the sky and nodded to the trio as he brought the skittish horse to a halt. “Weather looks to fair up today. Let’s see how much ground we can cover to catch up to that Captain Snyder’s bunch.”
“How long you figger to sit here watching ’em?” William Jackson asked his brother, Robert.
“As long as there’s a good show.”
William settled beside his brother on the side of the bluff and laid his army rifle across his legs. Together the scouts watched the struggles of the soldiers on the riverbank below. “Think they’ll ever get us all across?”
Robert shrugged. “Maybe by spring.”
The two Blackfoot half-breeds born and raised in the far Upper Missouri region had been watching the officers and soldiers with growing amusement and sometimes consternation over the last two days. Twice each day the pair went out to scout in this direction or that, looking for sign of the Lakota camps, to read the wind for smoke, the ground for travois trails, and to see if they could sight anything of Captain Snyder’s battalion coming in from the south, or Bennett’s outfit returning from Carroll City to the northwest.
But much of the time they sat and watched the growling, grumbling, frustrated army officers struggling to fight the Missouri—a river cold enough to kill a man in mere seconds, but not yet frozen solid again to attempt a crossing with laden wagons. Why, it was turning out to be some of the best entertainment they’d had in a long time: witnessing Soldier Chief Miles argue with his lieutenant named Baldwin.
Then, on Monday morning, the twenty-seventh, following Sunday’s disastrous attempts at crossing the river, Baldwin’s men finally did accomplish the improbable and managed somehow to string their line of ropes completely across the river to the south bank.
Now Miles gave the order to the rest of his officers. “Prepare your companies! We’re going across!”
The big raft that had stranded Miles and Baldwin for most of Sunday was manned with the first dozen courageous soldiers. They pushed off, to the buoyant cheers of the rest. Every man on the raft pulled their craft into the Missouri’s current, hand over hand on that inch-thick lifeline connecting them to both banks. Away from the bank, as the river grew all the stronger and the ice floes became all the larger—that rope might as well have been a strand of spider’s silk.
The dozen were no more than a third of the way across the Missouri, steadying themselves, straining to keep control of the unwieldy raft against the chunks of ice colliding with their craft, when an unusually large piece bobbed to the surface upstream, spun around slowly, and began making its way for them. While the men on the raft grunted their exertion, those on shore cheered their efforts to pull themselves out of the way in time.
Then the ice struck with a terrible clatter, spinning itself and the raft around, to strike the raft on the opposite side before it started to creep and screech its way upon the raft as the soldiers scrambled, hanging on to the rope with their cold, frozen hands, shoving frantically at the block of ice with their feet.
To William Jackson the whole scene was comical in a way—to watch those soldiers fighting to keep that huge block of ice off the raft, struggling against the current that sought to shove it atop their raft. Comical indeed, had it not been that the lives of those twelve men could well be in forfeit at any moment.
Then, suddenly, the long raft gave a shuddering twist, its end dipping into the river as three of the men were left swinging helplessly from the rope, their legs dangling in air; the huge chunk of ice the size of a freight wagon groaned against the timbers, sliding off the raft.
As quickly the raft righted itself; the men on board lunged this way and that, slipping and falling in their struggles to bring it back under the shore-to-shore rope while others lunged out with their arms to grab hold of their comrades dangling from the line. Upstream more ice appeared, and the warnings were given from most every throat on shore. Then Baldwin himself was in the river up to his knees at the north bank, waving for all he could, signaling the raftsmen to turn about and return before lives were lost.
The dozen need no special urging. They pulled and groaned, struggling to haul themselves back to the north bank, where cheers erupted. But in the midst of the celebration Miles immediately went to Baldwin’s shoulder, giving suggestions about how he would accomplish the crossing if it were up to him, offering advice on making changes in the raft’s design, becoming the sort of nuisance that made William and Robert chuckle as they continued to watch the comic opera for the rest of that afternoon.
In the end no further attempts were made to reach the south bank that Monday, but by twilight Miles turned away from Baldwin in frustration and ended up the day by calling together his own crew to begin construction on a raft of his own design.
At dawn on Tuesday the men continued their raft building as more snow began to fall. The surgeon reported that the thermometer had dipped to three below through the night, but the heavy layer of snow clouds helped the air rise above freezing by late afternoon.
Near midmorning the impatient colonel sent one of his staff with Robert Jackson and instructions to ride up the snowy road toward Carroll City to make contact with Captain Bennett’s command. Later, despite the rising river and the increasing danger of large ice floes, Miles launched his raft. After a supreme test of muscle, might, and courage, the soldiers reached the south bank and deposited four of their number with orders to scout up Squaw Creek for sign of the hostiles.
On the twenty-ninth the combined efforts of Miles and Baldwin succeeded in getting no more than two loads of soldiers across the river with their rations and ammunition. After all that time and all that effort, fewer than fifty men built their fires, boiled their coffee, and prepared for the long winter night on the south side of the Missouri.
That evening beneath a cold, frigid sky twinkling with a million points of light, a courier arrived with word from Lieutenant Russell H. Day, garrisoned at Fort Peck with a contingent of messengers from the Sixth Infantry. From the way the general stomped and fumed there around his roaring fire, it was clear to William that the news was not good.
“Damn it all!” Miles bellowed to his officers and those gathered within hearing. “Appears that Sitting Bull’s pulled a fast one on us!”
