moderate travel, and at some of the camps they had remained several days. Here they left signs of dressing great numbers of buffalo and deer skins, and pieces of broken tableware, cups and saucers, plates, &c., scraps of calico, and other goods were found about the camps. At one place a newly made grave was found. The body was exhumed. It was that of a child two or three years old, well and tastefully dressed. The grave was dug with a spade, and a vault made similar to graves prepared by the whites, which a board at the head. Captain Fosset, of the old Frontier Regiment, was in advance of Captain Totten on the trail. On the night of the 7th of January Captain Totten received information by express from Captain Fosset that he (Fosset) was within a few miles of the Indian encampment, and urging him to join him before daylight next morning. Tottty-five miles in the rear. He pressed forward, joining Fosset early in the day on the 8th. Fosset and his men were in the saddle within three miles of the Indian camp when Totten arrived. The two commands halted but a few minutes, during which a brief conversation was had between the two commanders, after which, without any formation of a line of battle, without any preparation, without any inspection of the camp, without any communication with the Indians or inquiry as to what tribe or party they belonged to, without any knowledge of their strength or position, the command "forward" was given, and a pell-mell charge was made for three miles. Captain Fosset, with the Confederate forces, charged toward the right of the encampment, and Totten, with the State forces, charged the left and center. Owing to the roughness of the route and the distance to the camp, the men were strung out for probably a mile or more, those having the best horses dashing into the camp first and others as they came up.

The attack was a surprise. The Indians were generally in their wigwams. No fire was made by the Indians until after they were fired upon and some of them killed. They showed no disposition to fight. The women were screaming about the camp, some of them in plain English declaring they were friendly. After the first few guns were fired by our men the Indians fell back into the ravines and brush in rear of the camp and opened a fire upon our men with the most deadly effect. In a very few minutes about fifteen of Totten's men (four of them officers) were killed and about as many wounded. The Indians were completely sheltered and Totten ordered his men to fall back. A scattering fire was kept up until late in the evening, when our forces retired, bringing off their wounded and leaving their dead on the field. A very heavy snow fell that night, and the command moved very slowly back toward the settlements. What part was taken by Captain Fosset, after the separation of the commands when the charge was ordered, is unknown to me, except by rumor, as I have seen no one who was with him in the charge. I cannot learn that he attacked the camp at all. He seems to have had a fight, a sort of running fight, over the Indians' horses, which were in a valley above the camp when the charge was made, for he lost some five men killed and a number wounded. He also, it is reported, lost nearly all the horses which he had taken from the Indians-recaptured. Some days after the battle Captain Totten, with a squad of men, returned to ascertain the movements of the Indians and to bury the dead. He found the camp abandoned by the Indians, evidently in haste, immediately after the battle. They had not buried their own dead, and our men lay as they had fallen on the field-none of them scalped. Captain Totten reports that they