In 1865, after the surrender of Appomattox, my regiment, the 18th U. S. Infantry, was ordered from Fort Leavenworth to Fort McPherson, Nebr. The Union Pacific Railroad was just then being commenced from Omaha, and it was not known then what route we ought to take to the Pacific, so the government ordered Colonel Carrington (in my reference to officers to avoid confusion with higher brevet rank, I will use only their actual rank at the time) to open a road through the Northwestern Territory, and he proceeded to obey that order with his twenty-four company regiment, building the new forts of Fetterman, Reno, Phil. Kearny and C. F. Smith, a march of about fifteen hundred miles through the then State of Nebraska and Territories of Wyoming, Dakota and Montana. Colonel Carrington established these posts with the greatest expense, carrying all kinds of necessary material, saw mills, hardware, and everything essential to building first-class posts. This was done without the consent of the Indians, who then generally occupied the wild country. After the establishment of the posts the Indians immediately began to annoy and harass them, and finally after they had assaulted the forts several times, the largest, Phil. Kearny, was unsuccessfully attacked, and a detachment of over one hundred men under Captain Fetterman was sent out by Colonel Carrington to attack the Indians, who, after their manner ambushed and surrounded them, and killed all the officers and men before any rescue could be made from the post. Finally the Government became alarmed and withdrew the soldiers from these posts so suddenly that they were unable to take with them the valuable stores, munitions, furniture and supplies, leaving everything to be destroyed by the Indians. I was one of the captains of that regiment. The Indians then demanded that all the troops be permanently withdrawn from their country, and a Commission was organized consisting of Generals Harney, Sherman, Terry and others, they formulating a treaty in 1868 by which they gave the Sioux in perpetuity all these lands, and agreed that they would never be dispossessed without the agreement of three-fourths of the Indians. Time passed on. I was transferred to the cavalry, and strangely enough in 1872, I was ordered back to the command of North Platte Station, a sub-post of Fort McPherson, where my regiment, under Carrington, was in '65. The Union Pacific Railroad had then been completed, though the Indians and buffalo were making their annual pilgrimage across the road as before, to the north in the summer, and the south in the winter, accompanied by the nine confederated tribes of the Sioux--Brulés, Ogallalas, Minneconjous, Uncapapas, Two Kettle, San Arcs, Lower Brulés, Yanktons and Gantees, associated with them were also the Northern Cheyennes and Northern Arapahoes.