1. Sheridan to Terry, telegrams, August 13, 1877, and Terry to Howard, August 14, 1877, folder: Nez Perce War, box 3, Sladen Family Papers.

2. Miles to Doane, August 3, 1877, Baird Papers.

3. Doane's army career, including his work with the Crow scouts, is detailed in Bonney and Bonney, Battle Drums and Geysers, 71-87.

4. Terry, "Report," 506-7.

5. First Lieutenant George W. Baird to Doane, August 12, 1877, Baird Papers.

6. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 507-8. See also Army and Navy Journal, April 30, 1878.

7. Howard to Sturgis, August 25, 1877, entry 897, box 1, part 3, 1877, U.S. Army Continental Commands.

8. Colonel Samuel D. Sturgis report, December 5, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 508; and Bonney and Bonney, Battle Drums and Geysers, 76-77.

9. Howard, "Report," 616.

10. Howard's orders to Cushing are in ibid.

11. Sherman to Sheridan, August 29, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File.

12. Terry, "Report," 506.

13. Sherman to Howard, August 29, 1877, roll 5, Nez Perce War, 1877, Division of the Missouri, Special File.

14. Sherman to Sheridan, August 31, 1877, item 5542, roll 338, Nez Perce War Papers.

15. Howard, "Report," 617-18.

16. U.S. Senate, Letter from the Secretary of the Interior . . . 1872, 1-2; "Report on the Yellowstone National Park," 841; and Chittenden, Yellowstone National Park, 175-76. For the background and history of Yellowstone National Park, see Aubrey Haines, Yellowstone Story; Bartlett, Yellowstone; Aubrey Haines, Yellowstone National Park; and Beal, Story of Man in Yellowstone.

17. August 3, 1877, letter, in Sheridan and Sherman, Report, 33. The statement about native beliefs was untrue. Indians were not afraid of the park's hot springs, but thanks to Sherman's statement and others like it (from Euro-Americans who did not know the truth), Yellowstone National Park has been plagued by that misconception ever since. Historian Lee H. Whittlesey, letter to author, May 1995. Confirming this view, at least one aged Nez Perce recalled that his people had used the hot springs for cooking food during their passage in 1877. Kearns, "Nez Perce Chief," 41.

18. Sherman to McCrary, August 19, 1877, in Sheridan and Sherman, Report, 35.

19. Sherman to McCrary, August 29, 1877, ibid., 37.

20. Ibid.

21. Gibbon, "Wonders of the Yellowstone"; and Gibbon, "Rambles in the Rocky Mountains," 312-36, 455-75 (reprinted in Gibbon, Adventures).

22. Gibbon to Howard, August 26, 1877, entry 395, 141-42, part 3, Letterbook, January 1870-April 1879, U.S. Army Continental Commands.

23. The sole substantive Nez Perce account that is known to date is that of Yellow Wolf, given to L. V. McWhorter early in the twentieth century. Yellow Wolf, however, as will be seen, was part of a group of warriors that splintered off from the main column and traveled north, so that his recollections are limited in explaining the extent of movement of the principal assemblage. See McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 170-80; and Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land. The primary first-person non-Indian account that posits the locations of the Nez Perces through much of their passage through the park is that of Fisher, in charge of the Bannock scouts, as contained in Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher." A typescript of Fisher's original journal, which contains slight differences in wording and phrasing from the published version, is Fisher, Journal, Idaho State Historical Society. A reminiscent account of some value is in Woodward, "Service of J. W. Redington" which contains not only Redington's recollections of his days in Yellowstone working with Fisher, but verbatim excerpts from period tabloids covering his experiences.

For a sampling of recent thinking regarding the route of the Nez Perces through Yellowstone based partly on the above materials but with widely divergent results, see Goodenough, "Lost on Cold Creek"; and Lang, "Where Did the Nez Perces Go?".

24. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 270-71.

25. For details of the course of the Bannock Trail and its many divisions, see Replogle, Yellowstone's Bannock Indian Trails, 22-30. See also Aubrey Haines, Yellowstone Story, 1:27-29; and Aubrey Haines, "Bannock Indian Trails."

26. John Shively gave his age as sixty-two in March 1887, when he filed for losses incurred from his experience with the Nez Perces ten years earlier. By all accounts, he must have appeared older than his age. Frank D. Carpenter, one of the Radersburg tourists, called him "the most wretched looking specimen of humanity I had ever seen." Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 68. See, John Shively claim, no. 4049, entry 700, Claim for Indian Depredations, U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. Shively's accounts appear in the Bozeman Times, September 13, 1877; Deer Lodge New North-West, September 14, 1877; and Helena Daily Independent, September 12, 1877. See also Shively's narrative in Stanley, Rambles in Wonderland, 175-79.

27. See the concerned accounts, as follows: Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 270; McWhorter, Hear Me, 435; McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 170-71; "Yellow Wolf's Story," in Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 275; and "Shively, Guide for the Nez Perces," in ibid., 281.

28. See Norris, The Calumet, 250, for a close-to-contemporary description of this site.

29. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 272-73; Bozeman Times, September 30, 1877; and McWhorter, Hear Me, 436-37 .

30. Hayden, "Yellowstone National Park"; and "Sketch of the Yellowstone Lake and . . . Upper Yellowstone River." Pelican Creek was named in 1864. Whittlesey, Yellowstone Place Names, 119.

31. Deer Lodge New North-West, September 14, 1877; and Bozeman Times, September 13, 1877. On being informed that they were on the Yellowstone, Shively recalled, "there was more rejoicing among them than among the children of Israel when they first viewed the Promised Land." Bozeman Times, September 13, 1877.

32. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 274.

33. Boise, Idaho Tri-Weekly Statesman, September 20, 1877. An abbreviated version of the dispatch is in Howard to Commanding Officer, Fort Ellis, September 2, 1877, entry 897, box 1, part 3, 1877, U.S. Army Continental Commands. Private Irwin had been discharged on July 17 on surgeon's certificate of disability. Regimental Returns . . . Second Cavalry, August 1877, roll 166.

34. Portland Daily Standard, September 30, 1877.

35. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 274.

36. Ibid., 275.

37. Lake District Ranger John Lounsbury, telephone communication with author, April 25, 1995.

38. It should be noted that Scout John W. Redington said that he reached Fisher on the morning of September 4 by traveling "up Pelican creek" on the third and passing through an "awful stretch of down timber." In an article published in 1933, fifty-six years after the events, Redington recalled that on the morning of September 4, Fisher "took me up to the top of a ridge, from which we could look across a deep canyon and see the Nez Perce camp on the next ridge." Redington, "Scouting in Montana," 58. In a statement made in 1934, Redington said that he and Fisher "surveyed the camp in the next valley." Woodward, "Service of J. W. Redington," 5.

39. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 275.

40. See Goodenough, "Lost on Cold Creek," 26, 28.

41. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 275.

42. Shively carefully prepared a brush shelter, then stole away in the night, heading northwest for Baronett's bridge. He was guided by Soda Butte and the North Star. He reached Bozeman on September 5. Deer Lodge New North-West, September 14, 1877.

43. Quoted in Kearns, "Nez Perce Retreat," 36.

44. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 276.

45. Fisher's manuscript journal is slightly different, but just as imprecise, stating that the scouts encountered "the enemy's trail" at "a point where it [East Fork] formed a junction with another Stream [Cache Creek?] betwixt the Stream we followed down [Miller Creek?] and Soda Butte Creek. They [the Nez Perces] then turned South of East following up this middle stream." Quoted, without bracketed inserts, in Lang, "Where Did the Nez Perces Go?," 27. Discussion of the likelihood that the Nez Perces had separated into two or more groups (perhaps by bands) is in Lang, "Where Did the Nez Perces Go?," 28.

46. This course would have put the Nez Perces on what was essentially the last leg of the main Bannock Trail leading out of the park to Clark's Fork River. See Replogle, Yellowstone's Bannock Indian Trails, 30.

47. The cattle belonged to James C. Beatty, who grazed the animals in the area of the East Fork of the Yellowstone in exchange for providing milk to the park superintendent. Goodenough, "Lost on Cold Creek," 29; and Bozeman Times, September 2, 1877.

48. Fisher, "Journal of S. G. Fisher," 276.

49. Bozeman Times, September 13, 1877; and Deer Lodge New North-West, September 14, 1877.

50. Historian Aubrey L. Haines staked the site of the camp in 1962 as based on the substantiation of Jack Ellis Haynes, who had been present in 1902 when the Cowans identified the site for Park Engineer Hiram M. Chittenden. Aubrey L. Haines, letter to author, August 23, 1995. Haines marked the site on the copy of Hague, Atlas, Geology Sheet XX, in the Yellowstone National Park Research Library, Mammoth, Wyo.

51. Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 97.

52. Cowan and Arnold said that they were encouraged to start for home by "one of the Indians who told them that they need apprehend no danger, as they were friends to the white man, and he would himself escort the party safely by all of the band, and they could then proceed without molestation toward home. They were, however, soon surrounded by about seventy-five or one hundred warriors who told them that it would not be safe to travel that road as there were some bad Indians behind who would probably meet them . . . [and] that their only safe plan would be to turn back and go with them; that they would protect them from the bad Indians." Bozeman Times, September 27, 1877. Yellow Wolf, who was one of the warriors who initially approached the tourists, said that he tried to explain that the Indians were "double-minded," or of mixed temperament, toward the whites, and that Cowan's party had insisted upon seeing Chief Joseph. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 174 n. 4.

53. Cowan, "Reminiscences," 168. Yellow Wolf indicated that the "other Indians" the rearguard of the train supposedly composed of hotheadstook over at this point. "They did not listen to anybody. Mad, those warriors took the white people from us." McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 175. Yellow Bull said that "they were young men from Lapwai, who had joined us after the fighting began." Yellow Bull account in Curtis, North American Indian, 8:167.

54. Carpenter met Looking Glass and described him thus: "Looking Glass is a man of medium height, and is apparently forty-five years of age, his hair being streaked with grey. He has a wide, flat face, almost square, with a small mouth running from ear to ear. His ears were decorated with rings of purest brass, and down the side of his face hung a braid of hair, adorned at the end with brass wire wound around it. The ornament worn by him, that was most conspicuous, was a tin lookinglass, which he wore about his neck and suspended in front. . . . He wore nothing on his head and had two or three feathers plaited in his back hair." Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 103.

55. When Carpenter met this individual he thought he was White Bird. Ibid., 104.

56. Boise, Idaho Tri-Weekly Statesman, September 18, 1877.

57. Bozeman Times, September 27, 1877.

58. Boise, Idaho Tri-Weekly Statesman, September 18, 1877.

59. Bozeman Times, September 27, 1877. The Nez Perces said later that the man who shot Cowan was Umtillilpcown. Duncan MacDonald, "The Captives Attacked," excerpt from 1879 series in the Deer Lodge New North-West, in Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 216.

60. Cowan, "Reminiscences," 171.

61. The man who confronted Frank Carpenter was Red Scout. Duncan MacDonald, "The Captives Attacked," excerpt from 1879 series in the Deer Lodge New North-West, in Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 216.

62. Ten years later, Arnold filed a claim for loss of property valued at $305. Andrew J. Arnold claim, no. 4185, November 1887, entry 700, Claim for Indian Depredations, U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs.

63. George F. Cowan, born in Ohio in 1842, had served in the Civil War in the Wisconsin volunteer infantry. Great Falls Tribune, December 26, 1926.

64. Yellow Wolf, who was with the main caravan when the trouble erupted on the back trail, remembered that "it was the bad boys killing some of the white men." McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 176.

65. Cowan, "Reminiscences," 172.

66. Ibid., 173.

67. Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 129. Philetus W. Norris wrote in 1883: "In the open pines of the summit, just east of the lake, is the remains of Chief Joseph's corral in 1877." Norris, The Calumet, 260.

68. Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 135.

69. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 177. In Joseph [Heinmot Tooyalakekt], "An Indian's Views," 427, Joseph is quoted as saying of the three captives, "They were treated kindly. The women were not insulted." Frank Carpenter, however, through the veiled language of the time strongly hinted that Emma Cowan and Ida Carpenter had been abused during their captivity. See Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 133, 155.

70. One of those who accompanied the Cowan-Carpenter group from the park was the inimitable John B. ("Texas Jack") Omohundro, erstwhile army scout, showman, and colleague of William F. ("Buffalo Bill") Cody, who had been guiding some Englishmen (the Earl of Dunraven and Dr. George Kingsley) around "Wonderland," but had headed to Mammoth on learning of the presence of the Nez Perces. Omohundro gave the papers a ridiculous yarn about Frank Carpenter being tied to a tree "to be burned, when he was recognized by Joseph, his father having formerly been a trader among the Nez Perces, and by order of that chieftain was, with the two ladies, released." Cheyenne Daily Leader, September 12, 1877.

71. This account of the Radersburg party's encounter with the Nez Perces is compiled from the following materials: Bozeman Times, September 27, 1877; Boise, Idaho Tri-Weekly Statesman, September 15, 18, 1877; Helena Daily Herald, August 27, 1877; New York Herald, September 18, 1877; Cowan, "Reminiscences," 178-85; Albert Oldham account in Forest & Stream undated clipping, scrapbook 4208, 124, Yellowstone National Park Research Library, Mammoth, Wyo.; Frank Carpenter's account in Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 91-186; Oldham's account in ibid., 201-5; George F. Cowan's account in ibid., 206-16; A. J. Arnold's account in ibid., 217-31; McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 173-77; Topping, Chronicles of the Yellowstone, 213-15; Chittenden, Yellowstone National Park, 152-62; Walgamott, Reminiscences, 44-47; and Aubrey Haines, Yellowstone Story, 1:222-27. In 1888, both Cowan and Oldham filed depredations claims against the Nez Perces for their losses. Cowan claimed $3,910 for the theft of his horses and property and damages to himself, while Oldham claimed $2,011 for "property stolen &c., personal injuries." George Cowan claim, no. 4186, entry 700, and Albert Oldham claim, no. 4187, entry 700, Claim for Indian Depredations, U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. The Cowans revisited the park in 1882 and 1901 and, during the latter tour, helped identify places significant to the routes of the Nez Perces and Howard's army in 1877. Topping, Chronicles of the Yellowstone, 215; and Chittenden, Yellowstone National Park, 162 n.

72. Ben Stone's account in Bozeman Avant Courier, September 6, 1877.

73. Weikert, "Journal of the Tour," 159. Hiram M. Chittenden, an early park engineer and historian, examined the site of the Helena group's camp and commented as follows: "The camp site on Otter Creek was well chosen for defense, but its natural advantages were absolutely ignored by the party. It was a triangular knoll between the forks of the stream, and some twenty feet above them. It commanded every approach, and with the slightest vigilance and intelligent preparation, could have been made impregnable to the . . . Indians who attacked it. But while the camp was properly pitched in a little depression back of the crest, the men themselves all staid back where the view around them was entirely cut off. They kept no guard, and were, therefore, in a worse position than if actually out in the open plain below. The Indians approached under cover of the hill, climbed its sides, and burst over its crest directly into camp before any one suspected their presence." Chittenden, Yellowstone National Park, 165. For a fairly contemporary description of this site, see Norris, The Calumet, 265.

74. Before dawn on August 26, Emma Cowan, Frank Carpenter, and Ida Carpenter, released the previous day by the Nez Perces, passed by the Helena party's camp and could hear somebody chopping wood. Fearful of being captured again by the Nez Perces, they kept moving north toward Tower Fall. Cowan, "Reminiscences," 171.

75. Irwin later came under criticism for what he apparently told the Nez Perces about tourists in the park. Because he was still in uniform (he said he had brought it from the Black Hills), Irwin told the tribesmen that he belonged to one of the excursion parties. "His sole motive in his talk and movements were to preserve his own life, which is a natural impulse." Bozeman Times, September 20, 1877.

76. McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 177.

77. Stone's account in Bozeman Avant Courier, September 6, 1877.

78. John Stewart's account in Bozeman Avant Courier, September 27, 1877.

79. In 1887, Leslie N. Wilkie and Leander Duncan claimed $675.75 for items taken by the Nez Perces, including horses, pack saddles, a cooking outfit, an ax, various wearing apparel, and fishing tackle. "List of articles stolen from Leslie N. Wilkie and Leander Duncan." Andrew Weikert also filed a claim for "property stolen or destroyed and injuries." Andrew Weikert claim, August 1877, no. 4189, entry 700, Claim for Indian Depredations, U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs.

80. One contemporary secondary account stated that this incident occurred "on the plateau between Blacktail [Deer] creek and Gardiner [sic] river," an area now designated Blacktail Deer Plateau. Topping, Chronicles of the Yellowstone, 217.

81. Weikert, "Journal of the Tour," 171.

82. This account of the Helena party is drawn from the following sources: Weikert, "Journal of the Tour," 153-74; Stone's accounts in Bozeman Avant Courier, September 6, 13, 1877; Frederic J. Pfister's account in Bozeman Times, August 30, 1877; John Stewart's account in Bozeman Avant Courier, September 27, 1877; Cowan, "Reminiscences," 178; Chittenden, Yellowstone National Park, 163-66; and Aubrey Haines, Yellowstone Story, 1:220-31.

83. It is not known if this was the same body of warriors that struck the Helena tourists or an altogether different group. According to Yellow Wolf, he was with the party that later struck Mammoth and Henderson's Ranch. While it is possible that this group had nothing to do with the earlier raid, available Nez Perce sources unfortunately provide little that might clarify the matter. Historian William L. Lang concluded that the bodies of warriors that hit Henderson's Ranch and the Helena party were different and that the men involved in the former incident made their way up the Yellowstone and forded the river at Tower Fall before passing up the East Fork (Lamar) to rejoin the main Nez Perce assemblage. Lang, "Where Did the Nez Perces Go?," 17, 24.

84. Gibbon to Assistant Adjutant General, Department of Dakota, October 18, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 522.

85. Private William H. White claimed to have been riding in advance with some of Doane's scouts when they came on the ongoing action at Henderson's. White rode back to the column and told the officers what was happening, but they did nothing. "No direct relief went from any of the soldiers to the white men being attacked. But the ordinary course of movement of the entire body brought them nearer to the scene. By this undesigned means the Indians were frightened away." William White, Custer, Cavalry, and Crows, 136-37.

86. Yellow Wolf was with the group that killed Dietrich: "I shot at him, but I missed. At the same time he makes for his gun, but the next Indian by me, shot him before he could reach his gun. Then we go into the house and we take everything we could, especially in clothes." McWhorter, Hear Me, 439. However, in McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 177, Yellow Wolf stated that Naked-footed Bull only winged Dietrich and identified Yettahtapnat Alwum (Shooting Thunder) as the man who killed him by shooting him in the stomach. Yellow Wolf also cited a skirmish with the soldiers near the hotel at about dusk, but other sources do not bear this out. See McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, 178-79. For background on Dietrich, see Whittlesey, Death in Yellowstone, 134-35.

87. Hugh Scott, Some Memories of a Soldier, 62.

88. In later years, Hugh Scott believed that his presence at Mammoth Hot Springs in the wake of the attack on Henderson's ranch convinced the Nez Perce leadership not to head out of the park by that route. In 1913, the then General Scott wrote that Joseph had told him after the surrender that "my [Scott's] rapid advance with 10 men at Mammoth hot springs & chase of his advance guard or rather scouts . . . made him think I had a strong force behind me and he turned off at the Mud Geysers, crossed the Yellowstone there below the lake, went up Pelican Creek & East Fork, then down Clarks Fork, crossing the Yellowstone about 100 miles nearer Gen. Miles at Fort Keogh [sicTongue River Cantonment]. . . . Had the 7th Cav messenger had 100 miles more to take Miles the news he would have gotten across the [British] line [or to the buffalo grounds if that was still an objective]. Miles would never have caught him." Scott to Walter M. Camp, September 22, 1913, folder 23, box 1, Camp Papers, BYU. See also Hugh Scott, Some Memories of a Soldier, 65. In fact, the date (August 31) conforms with the main camp's likely presence along the upper East Fork, rather than the ford near Mud Volcano. The Nez Perces also told Scott "that before such change of plan [in their route] they had not intended going to Canada; before that they had intended going only as far as the buffalo country." Scott to Camp, January 11, 1914, folder 1, box 2, Camp Papers, BYU.

89. Ben Stone's account in Bozeman Avant Courier, September 13, 1877; Bozeman Times, September 6, 1877; Weikert, "Journal of the Tour," 174; Hugh Scott, Some Memories of a Soldier, 61-63; Topping, Chronicles of the Yellowstone, 217-18; McWhorter, Hear Me, 438-41 (which has confused the sequence of events); Aubrey Haines, Yellowstone Story, 1:232-33; Aubrey Haines, "Burning of Henderson's Ranch"; and Mark Brown, "Yellowstone Tourists and the Nez Perce." A purported account by Ben Stone of unknown derivation and suspected veracity, complete with affected Negro dialect (Stone was black), is provided by Frank Carpenter in Guie and McWhorter, Adventures in Geyser Land, 194-95. Kenck and Dietrich were the first Euro-Americans known to be killed by Indians in the area constituting the national park since 1839, when Piegan tribesmen killed five fur trappers near present Indian Pond. Whittlesey, Death in Yellowstone, 131-32.

90. Scott claimed that Doane had initially directed Lieutenant Charles C. DeRudio to lead the scout, but that "DeRudio flatly refused to go." Camp Manuscript Field Notes, 181, Camp Papers, BYU.

91. Hugh Scott, Some Memories of a Soldier, 63. A more detailed description of Scott's scouting technique is in Camp Manuscript Field Notes, 181, Camp Papers, BYU.

92. One reference to this incident stated that it occurred near the head of Little Blacktail Deer Creek and that Leonard and Groff had fought off the attackers from a point of rocks by the trail. Topping, Chronicles of the Yellowstone, 219.

93. For Doane's background, see Heitman, Historical Register and Dictionary, 1:375. While noted for his regional explorations (he authored Journals of Yellowstone Exploration of 1870 and Snake River Explorations of 1876-77) as well as for his work with the Crow scouts, Doane received heavy criticism from the Crow agent, George W. Frost, and Major James S. Brisbin, Second Cavalry. The former complained that Doane had exceeded his authority and that the Crows harbored "a very bitter feeling against him," while Brisbin said that Doane "consorted with squaws and he and his men greatly demoralized the Crow camp." Frost to Brisbin, October 10, 1877, with Brisbin's endorsement, October 21, 1877, entry 107, box 3, part 3, "Letters and Telegrams Received by District of the Yellowstone Headquarters, September 1877-April 1878," U.S. Army Continental Commands.

94. Quoted in Bonney and Bonney, Battle Drums and Geysers, 83.

95. Quoted in ibid., 83-84.

96. Hugh Scott, Some Memories of a Soldier, 68.

97. Phinney, Jirah Isham Allen, 99.

98. Gilbert to Assistant Adjutant General, Department of Dakota, October 2, 1877, in Secretary of War, Report . . . 1877, 561; Hugh Scott, Some Memories of a Soldier, 67-69; Camp Manuscript Field Notes, 183, Camp Papers, BYU; Bozeman Times, September 6, 1877; Phinney, Jirah Isham Allen, 97-100; Grinnell, Hunting at High Altitudes, 60, 62; Topping, Chronicles of the Yellowstone, 218-19; Bonney and Bonney, Battle Drums and Geysers, 84-86; and "Charles Champion Gilbert," in Warner, Generals in Blue, 173-74. In an incident of Gilbert's march, Scout Jirah Isham Allen was directed to help several dismounted Seventh Cavalry troopers in fording streams on the way to camp. He found that their sabres so hampered them when afoot that he ordered the men stick them in the ground and leave them, an action for which he was chastised for disarming the soldiers. Jirah Isham Allen, Letter.

99. Howard, "Report," 618.

100. Howard to Commanding Officer, Fort Ellis, August 29, 1877, in ibid.

101. General Field Order No. 6, in ibid., 619.

102. Mason to wife, August 29, in Davison, "A Century Ago," 13.

103. Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," 72-73. In his report, Howard stated that Oldham was found on August 28, while Buck, writing many years after the events, stated that Oldham was found on the thirtieth. The date of August 29 was given by Mason in a letter written on that day.

104. Howard, "Report," 620.

105. Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," 76. In 1923, Henry Buck relocated Howard's camp on Nez Perce Creek, about one mile above its mouth. "I pointed out . . . the ground occupied by our wagon train, next, the infantry camp, and above that the cavalry." Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," Appendix B, 7.

106. In 1923, Henry Buck visited the 1877 trail below Mary Mountain, reporting that "in places the old road was quite visible showing the remains of corduroy laid across swampy places. In one instance the wreckage of a bridge over a small stream was still in evidence." Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," Appendix B, 8.

107. Henry Buck revisited this site in 1923, noting that at that date a signboard nailed to a tree specified the spot as the place where the Nez Perces deliberated regarding the fate of the Cowan party. Buck stated that "this spot was also the place where the command made camp on the night of August 31st." Ibid.

108. William F. Spurgin (1838-1907) served from Indiana during the Civil War and afterwards saw duty with the Freedmen's Bureau, which Howard headed. He rose to the rank of brigadier general in 1902, in which year he retired. Heitman, Historical Register and Dictionary, 1:913. The skilled laborers comprised fifty-two frontiersmen organized as a company of engineers. Armed as infantry, they brought their own horses and received three dollars per day plus rations. Chittenden, Yellowstone National Park, 170.

109. Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," 83.

110. The approximate route of Howard's road is in Hayden, "Yellowstone National Park."

111. New York Herald, September 18, 1877.

112. Henry Buck in 1923 stated that in 1877 "on account of so much sulphur present we christened this 'Sulphur Mountain,' but this is several miles west of what is now called 'Sulphur Mountain.'" Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," Appendix B, 10. Buck was probably talking about present Highland Hot Springs. Historian Lee H. Whittlesey, telephone communication with author, May 1995.

113. Henry Buck,"Nez Perce Indian Campaign," 87-88. In 1921, Henry Buck traveled his 1877 route through Yellowstone National Park. He and his son climbed the ridge where the "beaver slide" enabled the wagons to descend. Wrote Buck: "We counted ten trees rope burned that will ever give evidence as long as the trees may stand of the spot where we took our slide down five hundred feet." Henry Buck,"Nez Perce Indian Campaign," Appendix A, 5. Unfortunately, the fires of 1988 in Yellowstone evidently destroyed the rope-burned trees that remained from the "beaver slide." Lake District Ranger John Lounsbury, communication with author, Yellowstone National Park, June 5, 1994.

114. Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," 89.

115. Ibid. Evidence of the cutting of timber for Spurgin's road is still present in the area of Cascade Creek. Historian Aubrey L. Haines, letter to author, August 23, 1995.

116. Pollock to wife, September 2, 1877, in Pollock, Grandfather, Chief Joseph and Psychodynamics, 97. Scout John W. Redington recalled years later: "We had a rather hungry time in Yellowstone Park, but found plenty of wormy trout to fill up on. Tobacco was all out, but chewers found something just as good by cutting out the pockets where they had carried tobacco and chewing the rags." Redington, Letter.

117. Howard, "Report," 620.

118. Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," 88.

119. First Lieutenant Robert H. Fletcher to Second Lieutenant Charles A. Worden, September 4, 1877, entry 897, box 1, part 3, 1877, U.S. Army Continental Commands. The white scout Thomas H. Leforge said that he met with Looking Glass and assured him that he would try and dissuade the Crows from helping to intercept the Nez Perces on their way through the reservation. Marquis, Memoirs of a White Crow Indian, 128. See also Francis Haines, Nez Perces, 263.

120. Henry Buck, "Nez Perce Indian Campaign," 90-98. Spurgin was cited "for conspicuous and arduous service in advance of the column which pursued the hostile Nez Perce Indians, from Kamiah, Idaho, to the Yellowstone River, commanding the pioneer party." U.S. Army Gallantry and Meritorious Conduct, 78. In August 1962, historian Aubrey L. Haines and Wayne Replogle traced 1,237 feet of Captain Spurgin's road from Hayden Valley to the Yellowstone Canyon. For a description of the road's appearance at that time, see Aubrey Haines, "Retracement of Spurgin's road"; and letter, Haines to author, August 24, 1995. Vestiges of Spurgin's road are still evident along the north side of Dunraven Pass and on the flat where Carnelian Creek joins with Tower Creek. Lake District Ranger John Lounsbury, letter to author, June 4, 1995; Historian Aubrey L. Haines, letter to author, August 23, 1995.

Spurgin reached Fort Ellis on September 15. After a few days, he refitted his wagons and started down the Yellowstone to meet Howard. He reached a point 120 miles below Fort Ellis when orders directed his return to that post. At Fort Ellis, Spurgin discharged his engineers and journeyed back to Lewiston, Idaho, via stagecoach, train, and steamer. He wrote his parents in Indiana; "I lost 27 pounds this summer. My clothes are all too large." Letter in Greencastle Banner, December 6, 1877.

121. Deer Lodge New North-West, September 14, 1877; and Lang, "Where Did the Nez Perces Go in Yellowstone?," 24.

122. Howard to Cushing, September 8, 1877, in Howard, "Report," 620.

123. Boise, Idaho Tri-Weekly Statesman, September 29, 1877.

124. Information about Howard's course through the park is from Howard, "Report," 620-22; New York Herald, October 1, 1877; Connolly, Diary, August 30-September 6, 1877; Sutherland, Howard's Campaign, 38-39; Jocelyn, Mostly Alkali, 255; Chittenden, Yellowstone National Park, 170-73; Howard, My Life and Experiences, 293-94; and Davison, "A Century Ago," 13-15.