Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/288

 poured into the national treasury four hundred millions of dollars in dividends and wages.

On the 1st of March, 1876, after a heavy fall of snow the previous night, and in the face of a cold wind, but with the sun shining brightly down upon us, we left Fetterman for the Powder River and Big Horn. Officers and men were in the best of spirits, and horses champed eagerly upon the bit as if pleased with the idea of a journey. We had ten full companies of cavalry, equally divided between the Second and Third Regiments, and two companies of the Fourth Infantry. The troops were under the immediate command of Colonel Joseph J. Reynolds, of the Third Cavalry, Brevet Major-General. His staff officers were Lieutenants Morton and Drew, both of the Third Cavalry, acting as adjutant and quartermaster, respectively.

General Reynolds divided his forces into battalions of two companies each, one pack-train being attached to each of the mounted battalions, the infantry remaining with the wagons.

These battalions were composed as follows: "M" and "E," Third Cavalry, under Captain Anson Mills; "A" and "D," Third Cavalry, under Captain William Hawley; "I" and "K," Second Cavalry, under Major H. E. Noyes; "A" and "B," Second, under Major T. B. Dewees; "F," Third Cavalry, and "E," Second, under Colonel Alex. Moore, of the Third Cavalry; "C" and "I," Fourth Infantry, under Major E. M. Coates, of the same regiment. Assistant Surgeon C. E. Munn was medical officer, assisted by A. A. Surgeon Ridgeley and by Hospital Steward Bryan. The subordinate officers in command of companies, or attached to them, were Captains Egan and Peale, of the Second Cavalry, and Ferris, of the Fourth Infantry; Lieutenants Robinson, Rawolle, Pearson, Sibley, Hall, of the Second Cavalry, and Paul, J. B. Johnson, Lawson, Robinson, and Reynolds, of the Third Cavalry; Mason, of the Fourth Infantry.

There were eighty-six mule-wagons loaded with forage, and three or four ambulances carrying as much as they safely could of the same. The pack-train, in five divisions of eighty mules each, was under the supervision of Mr. Thomas Moore, Chief of Transportation, and was assigned as follows: MacAuliffe, to the 1st Battalion; Closter, to the 2d; Foster, to the 3d; Young, to the 4th; De Laney, to the 5th.

The advance of the column was led by Colonel Thaddeus H.