Chaos, Disorder, and Disgust

As the attack moved toward the northernmost Cheyenne and Arapaho encampments, tribal members tried to escape while artillery shells exploded overhead. Within the first hour, the soldiers' command and control broke down, and soldiers indiscriminately attacked any Cheyenne or Arapaho they encountered. Captain Silas Soule recalled that there was no organization among the troops and that they became a mob, each man acting on his own. An Arapaho survivor remembered the camp crier warning the people to wake up and scatter as soldiers attacked and the big guns fired, while people fled in terror, running north. Not all of Chivington's soldiers approved of the killing. Private Isaac Clarke and other artillery crewmen were so enraged by the murder of Indians by the 3rd Regiment's "100 Day Men" that their officers struggled to keep them from turning their artillery on those soldiers. Second Lieutenant Joseph A. Cramer testified that as Indians ran up the creek, the whole command moved forward and took positions that suited them, with no general organization and no one to command.

Colorado · United States