men were out of rations, though they had been able to obtain enough buffalo meat to keep from starving.  As for the horses, since they could get no grass, about seven hundred of them had already perished from starvation and exposure.  Provisions and guides were immediately sent out to the regiment, but before the relief could reach Crawford his remaining horses were pretty much all gone, though the men were brought in without loss of life.  Thus, the regiment being dismounted by this misfortune at the threshold of the campaign, an important factor of my cavalry was lost to me, though as foot-troops the Kansas volunteers continued to render very valuable services till mustered out the next spring.

CHAPTER XIV.

A WINTER EXPEDITION—­HERDS OF BUFFALO—­WOLVES—­BLIZZARDS—­A TERRIBLE
NIGHT—­FINDING THE BODIES OF ELLIOTT’S PARTY—­THE ABANDONED INDIAN
CAMPS—­PUSHING DOWN THE WASHITA—­THE CAPTURED CHIEFS—­EVANS’S
SUCCESSFUL FIGHT—­ESTABLISHING FORT SILL—­“CALIFORNIA JOE”—­DUPLICITY
OF THE CHEYENNES—­ORDERED TO REPAIR TO WASHINGTON.

A few days were necessarily lost setting up and refitting the Kansas regiment after its rude experience in the Cimarron canyons.  This through with, the expedition, supplied with thirty days’ rations, moved out to the south on the 7th of December, under my personal command.  We headed for the Witchita Mountains, toward which rough region all the villages along the Washita River had fled after Custer’s fight with Black Kettle.  My line of march was by way of Custer’s battle-field, and thence down the Washita, and if the Indians could not sooner be brought to terms, I intended to follow them into the Witchita Mountains from near old Fort Cobb.  The snow was still deep everywhere, and when we started the thermometer was below zero, but the sky being clear and the day very bright, the command was in excellent spirits.  The column was made up of ten companies of the Kansas regiment, dismounted; eleven companies of the Seventh Cavalry, Pepoon’s scouts, and the Osage scouts.  In addition to Pepoon’s men and the Osages, there was also “California Joe,” and one or two other frontiersmen besides, to act as guides and interpreters.  Of all these the principal one, the one who best knew the country, was Ben Clark, a young man who had lived with the Cheyennes during much of his boyhood, and who not only had a pretty good knowledge of the country, but also spoke fluently the Cheyenne and Arapahoe dialects, and was an adept in the sign language.

The first day we made only about ten miles, which carried us to the south bank of Wolf Creek.  A considerable part of the day was devoted to straightening out matters in the command, and allowing time for equalizing the wagon loads, which as a general thing, on a first day’s march, are unfairly distributed.  And then there was an abundance of fire-wood at Wolf Creek; indeed, here and on Hackberry Creek—­where I intended to make my next camp—­was the only timber north of the Canadian River; and to select the halting places near a plentiful supply of wood was almost indispensable, for as the men were provided with only shelter-tents, good fires were needed in order to keep warm.