When complaints continued to come in the Adjutant General proposed to establish a post on the Red River. As a preliminary movement Brevet Major Samuel Woods, Captain of the Sixth Infantry located at Fort Snelling, was ordered to proceed with Company D of the dragoons to the border and make recommendations to the War Department in regard to a suitable site. On June 6, 1849, the start was made from Fort Snelling, and the weary march directed to the northwest over the swollen rivers and the marshy swamps with the mosquitoes a constant torment, until on August 1st the soldiers reached the collection of Indian lodges and the trading establishment that was known as Pembina. During the twenty-five days spent at this point observations were made of the topographical features of the land, the character of the Indians, and the pursuits of the half-breeds. Major Woods urged the American Indians and half-breeds to prevent by force the invasions, promising that the United States would support them. But it would be useless, he reported, to build a fort at Pembina unless at least two hundred fifty men were stationed there. It would be better to concentrate a large force at Fort Snelling, from whence expeditions could be made into the Indian country in all directions as necessity might arise. The return to the fort occupied twenty-three and a half days, and on September 18th the total journey of almost a thousand miles was completed with the loss of only one horse and one mule.[108] During the next few years conditions remained unchanged, and as the settlement of the Minnesota and Mississippi valleys was pushing the Indian tribes farther to the westward, more and bitter conflicts with the half-breeds would be liable to occur. In order to give a final warning to the foreign hunters and to select a site for a post which could serve the double purpose of protecting the frontier settlements from the Indians and the Indians from the foreigners, Lieutenant Colonel C. F. Smith of the Tenth Infantry was ordered on June 9, 1856, to tour the region with Companies B and F. As far as the Goose River, in the North Dakota country, the route followed from Fort Snelling was practically the same as that of Major Woods; but instead of proceeding by the usual route northward to Pembina, a detour was made to Lake Mini-Waken (Devil's Lake). On the return the less travelled and more difficult road on the east side of the Red River was followed.