Fetterman Fight 1866: A Winkte's Prophecy and Metzger's Battered Bugle

Got something to say to this podcast? Send a voicemail, and you might hear yourself on the next episode!

Fort Phil Kearny stood on the Bozeman Trail on land the 1851 treaty had guaranteed to the Crow, though by 1866 an alliance of Lakota, Northern Cheyenne and Northern Arapaho controlled the Powder River country. Colonel Henry Carrington's garrison faced constant attacks while building the fort, and in November Captain William J. Fetterman arrived with a Civil War record and a reputed boast that 80 men could ride through the Sioux nation, despite guide Jim Bridger's warnings about the finest light cavalry in the world. Red Cloud built consensus for a plan to lure soldiers out and destroy them, with Minneconjou leader High Backbone directing the field using mirrors, animal calls and blankets, and akicita warrior societies keeping young men hidden until the signal.

On December 21 Fetterman pulled rank to lead 81 men to relieve a wood train, after Carrington twice ordered him not to pass Lodge Trail Ridge. Decoys including Crazy Horse drew the column over the crest into the Peno Creek valley, the cavalry under Lieutenant George Grummond ran nearly a mile ahead, and more than a thousand warriors rose from the snow in white blankets. The episode weighs three theories for crossing the ridge, from a flanking attempt to pride to Grummond's charge. Every soldier died within about 20 minutes. Carrington, relieved of command, spent his life blaming Fetterman, and within two years the forts were abandoned and the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 met the alliance's demands.

• Before the battle a Lakota winkte rode four passes along a ridge and announced catching more than a hundred soldiers.
• Civilians James Wheatley and Isaac Fisher fought with Henry repeating rifles until their ammunition ran out.
• Autopsy and Lakota oral history credit American Horse with killing Fetterman by a knife wound, not a suicide pact.
• Bugler Adolph Metzger fought with his bugle until it was shapeless, and warriors covered his body with a buffalo hide.
• John Portugee Phillips rode 236 miles through a blizzard and reached a Christmas ball at Fort Laramie.