derived from a map furnished by General Connor. They traveled fifty miles directly west, over a country impassable for trains, crossing thirty-five miles from my camp on Powder River the bed of a stream about the size of the latter-named river with an equally extensive valley, and fifteen miles farther west ascended the side of a mountain and passed North westwardly around its west base into the valley of a smaller stream, all of these agreeing precisely with Tongue River, Panther Mountain, and Rosebud Creek as laid down on General Connor's map. They reported Tongue River, where they struck it, to contain abundance of water standing in its bed, with indications that above it was running. In the valleys and on Panther Mountains they found barely enough grass to forage their own horses. They found no depot of supplies, neither any indications of any one having been there before them. Panther Mountains were simply masses of red volcanic rock, and possessed not the slightest sign of vegetation. The Tongue River Valley was barren of grass, the bends of the stream were heavily timbered, and the bottoms were covered with prickly pear, sage brush, and grease wood. Upon the reception of this report I ordered the rations reduced to less than one-half, and decided that having fully satisfied myself that General Connor had not gone to Panther Mountains, and without hauling corn for his stock could not pass down the valley of Tongue River, it was my best policy to move toward rations, keeping the country in direction of Tongue River as thoroughly scouted as possible for the purpose of finding him or any of his scouting parties who might be in search of my command.

Whilst in the act of communicating my intentions to Colonel Walker, Sixteenth Kansas, then at my headquarters, a report was brought in that the Indians had attacked the herders herding stock a mile distant from camp and had driven off some of the animals. I immediately started in person to satisfy myself of the correctness of the report, as hitherto there had been no sign of Indians seen in this vicinity. On arriving near the scene of the attack I discovered the Indians to be in force, numbering some 400 or 500, and immediately ordered out the entire command, save sufficient to guard camp, to re-enforce the small party already in pursuit. The advance engaged the Indians and succeeded in recapturing most of the captured stock. Captain Rowland, Second Missouri Light Artillery, with a party of seven men, reached the ground first and pressed the Indians closely, killing a number of them. Whilst pursuing one of these detached parties another band of about forty-five suddenly dashed upon them from a ravine to their right, and killed or mortally wounded all of the party, with the exception of Captain Rowland himself. The main body of the command reaching the scene of action, the Indians fell back out of sight more rapidly than with out broken-down horses we could pursue. The result was a loss of 4 men killed and 2 mortally wounded. I estimated the damage done the Indians to be twenty-five killed and a very large number wounded. We also captured some ponies and killed a great many. The greatest bodies seen were in the direction of the Little Missouri River, and the most of them retreated along trail through the "Bad Lands," which led me to believe that they had come from that direction. During the afternoon a column of smoke was seen distinctly rising toward the mouth of Powder River. Knowing that there were hostile Indians in my neighborhood I felt satisfied there was a large body of warriors or a village on the Yellowstone. The smoke was evidently a signal made by Indians, or else General Connor, unable