At the time of Crook’s Big Horn and Yellowstone Expedition, Lieutenant Charles Morton served as regimental adjutant to Lieutenant Colonel William B. Royall, Third Cavalry. By 1914, when he was frequently corresponding with researcher Walter M. Camp, Morton had risen to the rank of brigadier general. In a letter the old soldier wrote to Camp on August 19, 1914, Morton included a poem composed shortly after the Battle of Slim Buttes which he credited to an unidentified officer of the Fifth Cavalry, a bit of rhyme that shows how some of Crook’s soldiers steadfastly despised their general, no matter the march of time.
At Slim Buttes, neath the noonday sun,
After the “Third” the fight had won,
Came Crook and pack-train on the run,
To jump the captured property.
Then rose a wild and piercing yell
That rent the air like sounds from hell.
And shots mid herds and pickets fell,
Stampeding Crook’s sagacity.
The skirmish thickens, “Fight, men, fight!”
One buck has fallen on the right.
Wave, George, thy flag in wild delight,
And snort with mule stupidity.
Tis done. The ration fight is o’er.
Two hundred purps lie sick and sore.
And ponies’ flanks are gushing gore
To stimulate humidity.
Too few are left who care to tell
How starved men fought and ponies fell;
But “Crook was right,” the papers yell,
To George’s great felicity.
On the twenty-fourth of October, 1876, upon officially disbanding the Big Horn and Yellowstone Expedition, General George Crook—the target of so much derision and outright hatred from his soldiers, the object of so much admiration among those he led into battle and forced to keep going until the end of their “horse-meat march”—addressed himself to his officers and men in General Orders No. 8:
In the campaign now closed [I have] been obliged to call upon you for much hard service and many sacrifices of personal comfort. At times you have been out of reach of your base of supplies in most inclement weather, and have marched without food and sleep—without shelter. In your engagements you have evinced a high order of discipline and courage; in your marches wonderful powers of endurance; and in your deprivations and hardships patience and fortitude.
Indian warfare is of all warfare the most dangerous, the most trying, and the most thankless. Not recognized by the high authority of the United States Congress as war, it still possesses for you the disadvantages of civilized warfare with all the horrible accompaniments that barbarism can invent and savages can execute. In it you are required to serve without the incentive to promotion or recognition—in truth, without favor or hope of reward.
The people of our sparsely-settled frontier, in whose defense this war is waged, have but little influence with the powerful communities in the East; their representatives have little voice in our national councils; while your savage foes are not only the wards of the nation, supported in idleness, but objects of sympathy with large numbers of people otherwise well informed and discerning.
You may, therefore, congratulate yourselves that in the performance of your military duty you have been on the side of the weak against the strong, and that the few people on the frontier will remember your efforts with gratitude.
All too few in this country, in this day and time, stop in their seventy-mile an hour, sixteen-hour workdays to give thought to those of that dramatic but bygone time … those who sacrificed so much.
Both red and white.
TERRY C. JOHNSTON
Slim Buttes, S.D.
September 9, 1994
TERRY C. JOHNSTON
1947-2001
TERRY C. JOHNSTON was born on the first day of 1947 on the plains of Kansas and lived all his life in the American West. His first novel, Carry the Wind, won the Medicine Pipe Bearer’s Award from the Western Writers of America, and his subsequent books appeared on bestseller lists throughout the country. After writing more than thirty novels of the American frontier, he passed away in March 2001 in Billings, Montana. Terry’s work combined the grace and beauty of a natural storyteller with a complete dedication to historical accuracy and authenticity. He continues to bring history to life in the pages of his historical novels so that readers can live the grand adventure of the American West. While recognized as a master of the American historical novel, to family and friends Terry remained and will be remembered as a dear, loving father and husband as well as a kind, generous, and caring friend. He has gone on before us to a better place, where he will wait to welcome us in days to come.
If you would like to help carry on the legacy of Terry C. Johnston, you are invited to contribute to the
Terry C. Johnston Memorial Scholarship Fund
c/o Montana State University-Billings Foundation
1500 N. 30th Street
Billings, MT 59101-0298
1-888-430-6782
For more information on other Terry C. Johnston novels,
visit his website at
http://www.imt.net/-tjohnston
send e-mail to
tjohnston@imt.net
or write to
Terry C. Johnston’s West
P.O. Box 50594 Billings, MT 59105
TRUMPET ON THE LAND
A Bantam Book / February 1995
All rights reserved.