.

The Indians that were killed were scalped, and we appropriated their
arms and equipment. Then, after catching the horses, we made our way
into the Post. The soldiers had heard us firing, and as we entered the
fort drums were beating and the buglers were sounding the call to fall
in. The officers had thought Satanta and his warriors were coming in to
capture the fort.

That very morning, two hours after General Hazen had left, the old
chief drove into the Post in an ambulance which he had received some
months before from the Government. He seemed angry and bent on
mischief. In an interview with Captain Parker, the ranking officer, he
asked why General Hazen had left the fort without supplying him with
beef cattle. The captain said the cattle were then on the road, but
could not explain why they were delayed.

The chief made numerous threats. He said that if he wanted to he could
capture the whole Post. Captain Parker, who was a brave man, gave him
to understand that he was reckoning beyond his powers. Satanta finally
left in anger. Going to the sutler's store, he sold his ambulance to
the post-trader, and a part of the proceeds he secretly invested in
whisky, which could always be secured by the Indians from rascally men
about a Post, notwithstanding the military and civil laws.

He then mounted his horse and rode rapidly to his village. He returned
in an hour with seven or eight hundred of his warriors, and it looked
as if he intended to carry out his threat of capturing the fort. The
garrison at once turned out. The redskins, when within a half mile,
began circling around the fort, firing several shots into it.

While this circling movement was taking place, the soldiers observed
that the whole village had packed up and was on the move. The mounted
warriors remained behind some little time, to give their families an
opportunity to get away. At last they circled the Post several times
more, fired a few parting shots, and then galloped over the prairie to
overtake the fast-departing village. On their way they surprised and
killed a party of woodchoppers on Pawnee Fork, as well as a party of
herders guarding beef cattle.

The soldiers with the wagon I had opportunely met at the crossing had
been out looking for the bodies of these victims, seven or eight in
all. Under the circumstances it was not surprising that the report of
our guns should have persuaded the garrison that Satanta's men were
coming back to make