Campfire Stories of Indian Character 539 



Almost daily for months had I ridden beneath this bluff 

 and would readily have sworn not even a mountain goat 

 could ascend to its summit; but, hidden away in an angle of 

 the cliff lay a slope accessible to footmen, and this the 

 Indians knew and sought. 



Just below this slope Vroom brought the rear guard to 

 bay, and a brief, desperate engagement was fought. The 

 Indians succeeded in holding the troops in check until all 

 but those fallen under the fire of Vroom's command were 

 able to reach the summit. 



Here on this slope, fighting in the front ranks of the rear 

 guard, the "Princess," Dull Knife's youngest daughter, was 

 kiUed! 



Further pursuit until daylight being impossible, the 

 troopers were marched back into the garrison. 



By daylight the hospital was filled with wounded Indians, 

 and thirty-odd dead — bucks, squaws, and children — lay 

 in a row by the roadside near the sawmill, and there later 

 they were buried in a common trench. 



At dawn of the tenth, Captain Wessells led out four troops 

 of cavalry, and, after a couple of hours' scouting, found that 

 the Indians had followed for ten miles the summit of the 

 high divide between White River and Soldier Creek, travel- 

 ing straight away westward, and then had descended to the 

 narrow valley of Soldier Creek, up which the trail lay plain 

 to foUow through the snow as a beaten road. 



Along this trail Captain Vroom led the column at the 

 head of his troop. Next behind him rode Lieut. George A. 

 Dodd, then a youngster not long out of West Point, and 

 later for many years recognized as the crack cavalry 

 captain of the army. Next behind Dodd I rode. 



Ahead of the column a hundred yards rode Woman's 

 Dress, a Sioux scout. 



For seventeen miles from the post the trail showed that 



