of the Sacred Chief’s Bundle, Little Wolf bore
the highest responsibility for the survival of
his tribe. For many years he strove for peace-
ful accommodations with the whites, but by
1876 the influx of white miners and prospec-
tors triggered a general uprising under the
noted Sioux leader Sitting Bull. Again, the
Cheyennes threw their full weight behind
their Sioux allies, and Little Wolf was closely
engaged in the decisive Indian victory at Little
Bighorn in June 1876. However, the death of
Gen. George Armstrong Custer only fanned
the flames of white vengeance, and other
forces under Gen. George Crook pursued and
harried the fleeing Indians well into the
depths of winter.
Given their scanty existence, most Indian
tribes avoided winter conflict, and this re-
luctance played directly into Crook’s strat-
egy. In November 1876, the combined vil-
lages of Little Wolf and Dull Knifewere
surprised by a cavalry column under Col.
Randall S. Mackenzie and routed. Around 40
Cheyennes were slain; more significant, the
Indians lost all their supplies and winter
clothing. After months of exposure in the
freezing cold, Little Wolf and Dull Knife had
little choice but to surrender to the Ameri-
cans in order to survive. This they did in the
spring of 1877 on the condition of being re-
turned to their homeland, but they were sub-
sequently relocated to new homes in Okla-
homa Territory.
The Cheyennes failed to adjust to reserva-
tion life, being deprived of promised food and
clothing and beset by outbreaks of malaria.
Little Wolf and Dull Knife repeatedly com-
plained of these conditions to the resident In-
dian agent, John A. Miles, who requested a
year to meet their demands. The chiefs an-
grily responded that by then the Cheyennes
would all be dead and demanded relocation
to their ancestral homelands. When Miles
summarily refused, Little Wolf and Dull Knife
led 350 Cheyennes on a secret exodus from
the hated reservation in September 1878.
What followed was a heroic 1,500-mile epic
journey. Despite the Cheyennes’ head start,
army units quickly tracked the fleeing Indians
and skirmished with them. However, under
Little Wolf’s keen leadership, the tribesmen
were uniformly successful and usually man-
aged to evade large numbers of pursuing cav-
alry. Upon reaching Nebraska, the two bands
split, with Little Wolf wintering along the
Sand Hills of Montana while Dull Knife
sought out the Red Cloud Agency at Fort
Robinson. The latter was imprisoned there
and had to stage a costly breakout to escape.
Meanwhile, Little Wolf’s band of 150 men,
women, and children successfully eluded
pursuers until they reached the mouth of the
Powder River. There a patrol under Lt. W. P.
Clark induced them to surrender to Gen. Nel-
son A. Miles at Fort Keogh. The exhausted
Cheyennes willingly complied in exchange
for food, and Miles also offered Little Wolf
the opportunity to work as an army scout. He
agreed to be so employed for several months
and was rewarded with a new reservation
along the Tongue River in Montana, tradi-
tional Cheyenne country. His sacrifices were
not in vain.
Little Wolf spent the remainder of his life
on reservations, where an unfortunate inci-
dent occurred. In 1880, after a bout of drink-
ing, he killed a rival in anger and was stripped
of his standing as chief. Little Wolf then en-
tered into voluntary exile along the Rosebud
River until his death there in 1904. It was a
sorry ending for one of the most distinguished
leaders of the Cheyenne nation.See also
Crazy Horse; Red Cloud; Sitting BullBibliography
Boyle, Alan. Holding Stone Hands: On the Trail of the
Cherokee Exodus.Lincoln: University of Nebraska
Press, 1999; Hedren, Paul L. First Scalp for Custer:
The Skirmish at Warbonnet Creek, July 17, 1876.
Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1980; Mails,
Thomas E. Dog Soldier Societies of the Plains.New
York: Malone, 1999; McDermott, John D. A Guide to
the Indian Wars of the West.Lincoln: University ofLITTLEWOLF