From April through October 1870, Company C of the 2nd U.S. Cavalry garrisoned Camp Bingham, a temporary military post northeast of here on the Little Blue River, to protect nearby settlements from Indians. On May 15, Sergeant Patrick J. Leonard and Privates Heath Canfield, Michael Himmelsbach, Thomas Hubbard, and George W. Thompson were sent to search for lost horses on Spring Creek. Near this spot on May 17, the five soldiers were attacked by about fifty Indians. After a two-hour skirmish in which Hubbard was wounded and the cavalrymen's horses were killed, the Indians withdrew. When a report of the skirmish reached Secretary of War William W. Belknap, he ordered Medals of Honor presented to Leonard, Canfield, Himmelsbach, Hubbard, and Thompson. More Medals of Honor were won in this brief engagement than in any other incident in Nebraska's military history.