94 WHITES FOUND KILLED BY INDIANS. 



and that this is his first scout. Ef that be the case it puts 

 a mighty onsartin look on the whole thing, and twixt you 

 and me gentlemen, he'll be mighty lucky ef he gits through 

 all right." * 



Again the sagacity of the scout had predicted cor- 

 rectly, for some time afterwards the dead bodies of 

 the Lieutenant and his whole party of ten sol- 

 diers and an Indian guide were found frightfully dis- 

 figured and stuck full of arrows, by General Custer 

 and the force sent in pursuit. The event took place 

 in July 1867, near Beaver Creek in Nebraska, and 

 General Custer thus describes the scene: 



" We observed buzzards floating in the air ; a rank stench per- 

 vaded the atmosphere, and hastening to the spot a sight met our 

 gaze which even now makes my blood curdle. Within a limited 

 circle were the mangled bodies of poor Kidder and his party, 

 hacked and disfigured beyond recognition. Every one scalped, 

 and his skull broken, except the Sioux chief Red Bead (their guide) 

 whose scalp had been removed and thrown down by his 

 side, in accordance with a custom prohibiting Indians wearing 

 the scalp of one of their own tribe. Some of the bodies lay 

 in piles of ashes, showing that the savages had put them to 

 death by the terrible tortures of fire. The sinews of the 

 arms and legs had been hacked off and the features so 

 defaced that it would be impossible to recognise one of the 

 victims. Each body was stripped, and pierced with from 

 12 to 50 arrows left sticking in them. The details of the 

 fearful struggle will never be known, yet the surrounding 

 circumstances satisfied us that Kidder and his men fought 

 as only men can fight when the watchword is 'victory or 

 death '."f 



There can be little doubt that the party had been 



* My Life on the Plains, or Personal Experiences with Indians, by 

 General Geo. A. Custer, U.S.A., 1875, P- 74- 

 f Ibid., p. 77. 



