Saline River

In early August 1867, troops from the U.S. 10th Cavalry, among the earliest Buffalo Soldiers to see documented action, clashed with opposing forces along the Saline River. The fighting took place on August 2, some 25 miles northwest of Fort Hays, Kansas.

Prelude

By the summer of 1867, officials realized that Union Pacific tracks being laid across Nebraska would arrive at Fort Laramie ahead of the Kansas Pacific Railway's own line. Denver's citizens, eager for a rail link of their own, pushed for a change of course, and so the Kansas Pacific's planned path shifted away from the Republican River toward the Smoky Hill River instead. The Cheyenne and Kiowa, who held claims to buffalo hunting grounds across western Kansas, viewed this shift as an intrusion on their territory, and they responded with widespread raids against both the railroad crews and settlers now situated along the altered route.

On August 1, a band of Cheyenne fighters led by Tall Wolf, son of Medicine Arrows, struck a group of railroad laborers at Campbell's Camp in what is now eastern Ellis County, killing them. At the time, Fort Hays was barely established, existing as little more than a bivouac, and Cpt. Henry Clark Corbin, being the officer with narrow seniority there, ordered Cpt. George Augustus Armes to head to the camp. Armes took with him 47 troopers from Company F of the 10th Cavalry. Arriving late in the afternoon on August 1, Armes discovered the bodies of the workers who had been killed at Campbell's Camp. He pushed northward in immediate pursuit of the attackers, but before long he turned back toward the camp to call for additional troops.

Battle

On the morning of August 2nd, Armes pressed on with 34 troopers, having left four men behind stricken with cholera along with a handful of guards and messengers, and no additional forces joined him. He picked up the fresh trail of hostile warriors heading north out of Campbell's Camp toward the Saline River. The column pushed several miles west along the river's course, only to find itself encircled by roughly 400 mounted Cheyenne fighters. In response, Armes arranged his men into a hollow square, an infantry formation adapted for the cavalry, keeping the horses sheltered at its core. Judging the terrain unfavorable, he directed his men southward toward Fort Hays, all the while keeping the square intact as they moved.

The fighting stretched across eight hours, consuming roughly 2,000 rounds fired in defense and covering fifteen miles as the square inched forward. Only when the soldiers reached high ground within view of the fort did the Cheyenne finally break off and pull back. Company F, having received no additional support throughout the ordeal, finished a thirty hour patrol that covered 113 miles in total, closing with a ten mile ride east into Fort Hays. Remarkably, the unit suffered just a single combat death. Reflecting on the episode afterward, Captain Armes remarked that it was astonishing his men had avoided complete destruction. He went on to praise his officers, citing their steady dedication and calm under enemy fire.

Aftermath

Captain Armes remained determined to find what he believed was the principal Indian encampment along the Solomon Folks, hoping to recover the great quantity of stolen horses he assumed were kept there. His recovery, however, left him unfit to sit a saddle for roughly two weeks, and once he rose from bed rest he could do little more than travel by personal carriage along the line, offering encouragement to the men building the railroad. Only after two weeks had passed and he regained the ability to ride did he finally move his command toward the Solomon Folks, joining forces with the 18th Kansas Volunteer Cavalry. This advance brought them into contact with far greater numbers of Indians, sparking both the Battle of Prairie Dog Creek and the first engagement at Beaver Creek. Though the toll in casualties stayed low, American and Kansas troops pulled back to the rail line as autumn and winter set in, and this apparent retreat failed, for the moment, to discourage either the Cheyenne or the Kiowa.

Within a month of these events the Medicine Lodge Treaty was signed, though it would not hold for long. Genuine pacification of Indian resistance in the state, and lasting protection for the railroad's construction, came only with Sheridan's winter campaign of 1867-68, crowned by the fight at Washita River. Conflict did not end there; further battles erupted after 1868, among them the clash near Sterling, Colorado, remembered as Summit Springs, and another near Cheyenne, Oklahoma. Yet the violence along the upper forks of the Kansas River had finally run its course.

Kansas would see one more such clash, on September 27, 1878, remembered afterward as the Battle of Punished Woman's Fork, or alternatively the Battle of Squaw's Den Cave, marking the final Indian battle fought within the state.