Powder River courtesy Wikipedia.
The opening battle of the Black Hills War, between the U.S. Army and the Sioux and Cheyenne, the Battle of Powder River, Montana, occurred in March 1876 when Brigadier General George Crook advanced north from Fort Fetterman, Wyoming. The fight is also known as the Reynolds Battle.
Discovering an Indian trail, General Crook sent Colonel Joseph J. Reynolds and six 2d and 3d Cavalry troops to find a village he suspected to be at the end of the trail.
At dawn on March 17, scouts located a village in the Powder River Valley, and Reynolds quickly made plans for an attack. He split his men up into several groups. One group was to ascend the steep bluffs to prevent the Indians from escaping, two to attack the village directly from different directions, and another to capture the Indians’ large horse herd of about 1,000 animals.
However, the village was farther away than he had anticipated, and only one group charged the village while the other battalions were delayed. The surprised Indians fled their lodges to the bluffs above the valley and began to fire on the troops below.
Colonel Joseph Reynolds.
When Reynolds arrived, the soldiers were still under fire, and he ordered everything in the village destroyed, including food, blankets, buffalo robes, and ammunition, even though the dried buffalo meat and buffalo robes would have been invaluable to the freezing and hungry soldiers on half rations. The troops were under fire for five hours in freezing temperatures and howling winds until the village’s destruction was complete at about 2:30 pm, at which time Reynolds ordered his soldiers to withdraw. In his haste, he left behind the bodies of three dead soldiers, as well as a badly wounded private who was subsequently “cut limb to limb” by vengeful Indians.
The battle resulted in four soldiers killed and six wounded, but 66 men suffered from frostbite. The Cheyenne lost only one man killed and another wounded.
The exhausted soldiers marched 20 miles to Lodge Pole Creek before they finally encamped. The following day, the Indians recaptured all but 100 of their horses during another snowstorm. Reynolds did not meet up with General Crook until about noon, when Crook, discouraged by the setback, the shortage of supplies, and the bitter cold and deep snow, led the troops back to Fort Fetterman. Along the way, the column was harassed by the Indians stealing back their ponies, and Crook ordered the remaining horses killed. The troops finally reached Fort Fetterman on March 26.
Although the attack destroyed a large amount of Indian property, it was poorly carried out. It probably solidified the Indians’ resistance to the U.S. attempt to force them to sell the Black Hills and live on a reservation.
Afterward, General George Crook brought charges against Colonel Joseph Reynolds, accusing him of dereliction of duty for failing to properly support the first charge with his entire command, burning captured supplies instead of keeping them for army use and losing hundreds of the captured horses. In January 1877, he was court-martialed at Cheyenne, Wyoming, and found guilty of all three charges. He never served again.
Reynold’s Battlefield Monument.
Today, Reynold’s Battlefield Monument is about 28 miles southwest of Broadus, Montana County Road 391, towards Moorhead Road.
A marker is located near the northern edge of Moorhead, Montana. The battle site is accessible via an unimproved road about four miles northeast of Moorhead.
©Kathy Alexander/Legends of America, updated May 2025.
Also See:
Indian Wars, Battles & Massacres
See Sources.