Julia and Addie were with Chief Gray Beard's band of Cheyennes. General Miles was pressing the Indians upon all sides. His command was superior to the combined forces of all the hostiles in the southwest and the latter could have been annihilated in a single engagement had it been possible to attack them in a position where their only alternative would have been to fight their way out. But the Indians were too shrewd to be caught in a trap, and were running and dodging in every direction--their trails crossed and re-crossed and doubled back and turned aside until they were a confused jumble. The Indians knew the country as accurately as a stream follows its own windings. The only fact plain to the scouts was that the hostiles were trying to escape to the Staked Plains. In this uninhabited and practically waterless region a large body of troops would have been badly handicapped in its pursuit of small bands of the enemy, as the latter could move more rapidly and with greater comfort, and in time exhaust the endurance of troops traveling in more or less compact formation. General Miles embraced every opportunity to employ the tactics of the Indians, and it was the result of this kind of strategy that brought Lieutenant Baldwin and his scouts within striking distance of Gray Bear's band on McClellan Creek. The Indians were so hard-pressed that they were forced to abandon Julia and Adelaide and much camp equipment. I remember vividly the appearance of the deserted camp. We had ridden almost past it when somebody noticed that a pile of buffalo hides seemed to be moving up and down. Pulling the hides aside, we were astonished at finding two little white girls, who proved to be Julia and Adelaide. They were pitiable objects. Hunger and privation had reduced them to mere skeletons, and their little hands and fingers were so thin that they resembled bird's claws. The children were trembling with fright, but upon seeing that we were white men their terror changed to a frenzy of joy, and their sobs and tears made hardened frontiersmen turn away to hide their own emotion. The children said that they had not been mis-treated by the men. The squaws, however, had forced them to work beyond their strength. The little girls were sent to Fort Leavenworth. Their rescue took place November 8, 1874.