Battle of Powder River

The Battle of Powder River, also known as the Reynolds Battle, occurred on March 17, 1876, in Montana Territory, United States, as part of the Big Horn Expedition. The attack on a Northern Cheyenne and Oglala Lakota Indian encampment by Colonel Joseph J. Reynolds initiated the Great Sioux War of 1876. Although destroying a large amount of Indian property, the attack was poorly carried out and solidified Northern Cheyenne and Lakota Sioux resistance to the U.S. attempt to force them to sell the Black Hills and live on a reservation.

Background

The Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868) granted the Lakota Sioux and their northern Cheyenne allies a reservation, including the Black Hills, in Dakota Territory and a large area of "unceded territory" in what became Montana and Wyoming. Both areas were for the exclusive use of the Indians, and whites, except for government officials, were forbidden to trespass. In 1874, the discovery of gold in the Black Hills caused the United States to attempt to buy the Black Hills from the Sioux. The U.S. ordered all bands of Lakota and Cheyenne to come to the Indian agencies on the reservation by January 31, 1876, to negotiate the sale. Some of the bands did not comply and when the deadline of January 31 passed, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, John Q. Smith, wrote that "without the receipt of any news of Sitting Bull's submission, I see no reason why... military operations against him should not commence at once." On February 8, 1876, General Philip Sheridan telegraphed Generals George R. Crook and Alfred Howe Terry, ordering them to undertake winter campaigns against the "hostiles."

In bitterly cold weather, Brigadier General George Crook, commander of the Department of the Platte, marched north with the Big Horn Expedition from Fort Fetterman near present-day Douglas, Wyoming, on March 1. General Crook's objective was to strike against the Indians while they were at their most vulnerable in winter camps.