Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/276

 strip of country, extending, either as a reservation or a hunting ground, clear to the Big Horn Mountains. By that treaty they had been promised one school for every thirty children, but no schools had yet been established under it. Reports of the fabulous richness of the gold mines in the Black Hills had excited the cupidity of the whites and the distrust of the red men. The latter knew only too well, that the moment any mineral should be found, no matter of what character, their reservation would be cut down; and they were resolved to prevent this, unless a most liberal price should be paid for the property. The Sioux had insisted upon the abandonment of the chain of posts situated along the line of the Big Horn, and had carried their point; but, in 1874, after the murder of Lieutenant Robertson, or Robinson, of the Fourteenth Infantry, while in charge of a wood-chopping party on Laramie Peak, and their subsequent refusal to let their agent fly the American flag over the agency, General John E. Smith, Fourteenth Infantry, at the head of a strong force, marched over to the White Earth country and established what have since been designated as Camps Sheridan and Robinson at the agencies of the great chiefs "Spotted Tail" and "Red Cloud" respectively. In 1874, General Custer made an examination of the Black Hills, and reported finding gold "from the grass roots down." In the winter of that year a large party of miners, without waiting for the consent of the Indians to be obtained, settled on the waters of Frenchman, or French, Creek, built a stockade, and began to work with rockers. These miners were driven about from point to point by detachments of troops, but succeeded in maintaining a foothold until the next year. One of the commands sent to look them up and drive them out was the company of the Third Cavalry commanded by Brevet Lieutenant-Colonel Guy V. Henry, which was caught in a blizzard and nearly destroyed. In the early months of 1875, a large expedition, well equipped, was sent to explore and map the Black Hills and the adjacent country. The main object was the determination of the auriferous character of the ledges and the value of the country as a mining district; the duty of examination into these features devolved upon the geologists and engineers sent out by the Department of the Interior, namely, Messrs. Janney, McGillicuddy, Newton, Brown, and Tuttle. The military escort, consisting of six full companies of the Second and Third Cavalry, two pieces of artillery, and several