There was nothing about the agencies up to August 18, 1862, to indicate that the Indians intended, or even thought, of an attack. Everything had an appearance of quiet and security. On the 17th of August, however, a small party of Indians appeared at Acton, Minnesota, and murdered several settlers, but it was not generally thought that they left the agency with this in mind; this killing was an afterthought, a diversion; but, on the news of these murders reaching the Indians at the Upper Agency on the 18th, open hostilities were at once commenced and the whites and traders indiscriminately murdered. George Spencer was the only white man in the stores who escaped with his life. He was twice wounded, however, and running upstairs in the loft hid himself away and remained concealed until the Indians, thinking no more white people remained, left the place, when an old squaw took Spencer to her home and kept him until his fast friend, Chaska, came and took him under his protection. The picture of Spencer is taken from an old-time photograph. [Illustration: George Spencer, Who was Saved by Chaska, August, 1862.] The missionaries residing a short distance above the Yellow Medicine, and their people, with a few others, were notified by friendly disposed Indians, and to the number of about forty made their escape to Hutchinson, Minnesota. Similar events occurred at the Lower Agency on the same day, when nearly all the traders were butchered, and several who got away before the general massacre commenced were killed before reaching Fort Ridgely, thirteen miles below, or the other places of safety to which they were fleeing. All the buildings at both agencies were destroyed, but such property as was valuable to the Indians was carried off.