Indian Agent Saville’s efforts to get a count of the Indians receiving supplies at Red Cloud were finally crowned with success on November 30, 1874. Two factors combined to produce this result. First, Saville announced that no more rations would be issued until the Indians submitted to counting. In the face of this threat Old Man Afraid of His Horses changed his mind and counting began. He is also reported to have compelled Red Cloud to withdraw his opposition. The enumeration revealed a total of about 12,000 Indians: 9,339 Sioux, 1202 Cheyenne and 1092 Arapaho.”[17] Events at the agency and the camp still did not go well. Indian leaders were quick to sense the divided opinions of various authorities and would complain to the Army officers about the agent’s handling of their affairs. When officers listened, the agent regarded it as interference on the part of the military. Many soldiers did not agree with the aims and methods of the Grant Peace Policy of agency administration under which various church groups nominated Indian Agents. As one officer put it, the efforts were to “civilize these people immediately whether they are willing or not. This may be good church theory but it is very impractical. These Indians had better by far be left alone at their agency than to be forced into hostilities by being forced to accept civilization and a religion they can’t understand and don’t want to understand.”[18] Another officer assessed the plans to convert the Sioux to peaceful farmers in the following way: “... it is not easy to see how they are to become farmers when they have no good farming land to work on....”[19] Red Cloud Agency had many visitors, including Professor O. C. Marsh whose paleontological expedition into the nearby fossil area was furnished with a military escort. Professor Marsh was instrumental in focusing national attention on Red Cloud Agency. In the course of securing permission of the Indians to excavate fossils in their land Marsh became acquainted with Chief Red Cloud. He was given samples of particularly foul supplies which he was told were normal issue goods. The professor’s evidence of frauds at the agency was given wide publicity, and Red Cloud Agency became a political as well as a military hot-spot. A full scale investigation of agency affairs followed, and newspaper accounts of the hearings were full of possible frauds by the supply and freight contractors. Although Agent Saville was exonerated, he was removed from his post and replaced by J. S. Hastings. Although war with the Sioux had been a latent possibility during some of the more serious difficulties at Red Cloud Agency, it had been avoided. While incidents at the agency failed to spark a general conflict, events not too far off were developing into a situation which led to war with the hostile Indians in 1876.