Little Missouri River

Best way to do this was to destroy their villages.

They had already done it once back at White Stone Hill back in September 1863, and now they had their sights set on a new target, an even larger Sioux encampment near the Little Missouri River in present-day Dunn County, North Dakota.

On the other side were around 1,600 warriors, most of them belonging to various Lakota tribes.

Sitting Bull was there as the leader of the Hunkpapa alongside another famed warrior named Gall.

But the most famous one happened in March 1886.

What happened? The Little Missouri River was flooded with massive chunks of freezing ice.

Teddy went to check his only rowboat and discovered three armed thieves had stolen it.

Hey, you can't just steal a cowboy's boat.

He was a hunter named Fred Herring, an Alsatian by birth.

A dozen years before he and I had hunted mountain sheep and deer when laying in the winter stock of meat for my ranch on the Little Missouri, sometimes in the bright fall weather, sometimes in the arctic bitterness of the early northern winter.

He was the most loyal and simple-hearted of men, and he had come to join his old boss and comrade in the bigger hunting which we were to carry on through the tropic midsummer.

The temptation is great to go on enumerating man after man who stood pre-eminent, whether as a killer of game, a tamer of horses, or a queller of disorder among his people, or who, mayhap, stood out with a more evil prominence as himself a dangerous man, one given to the taking of life on small provocation, or one who was ready to earn his living outside the law if the occasion demanded it.

But I could not begin to name all the troopers who so eagerly craved a chance to win honor out of hazard and danger.

Among them was good, solemn Fred Herrig, the Alsatian.

I knew Fred's patience and skill as a hunter from the trips we had taken together after deer and mountain sheep through the badlands of the Little Missouri.

He still spoke English with what might be called Alsatian variations.

He was a hunter named Fred Herring, an Alsatian by birth.

A dozen years before he and I had hunted mountain sheep and deer when laying in the winter stock of meat for my ranch on the Little Missouri, sometimes in the bright fall weather, sometimes in the arctic bitterness of the early northern winter.

He was the most loyal and simple-hearted of men, and he had come to join his old boss and comrade in the bigger hunting which we were to carry on through the tropic midsummer.

The temptation is great to go on enumerating man after man who stood preeminent, whether as a killer of game, a tamer of horses, or a queller of disorder among his people, or who, mayhap, stood out with a more evil prominence as himself a dangerous man, one given to the taking of life on small provocation, or one who was ready to earn his living outside the law if the occasion demanded it.

But I could not begin to name all the troopers who so eagerly craved a chance to win honor out of hazard and danger.

Among them was good, solemn Fred Herrig, the Alsatian.

I knew Fred's patience and skill as a hunter from the trips we had taken together after deer and mountain sheep through the badlands of the Little Missouri.

He still spoke English with what might be called Alsatian variations.

He was a hunter named Fred Herring, an Alsatian by birth.

A dozen years before he and I had hunted mountain sheep and deer when laying in the winter stock of meat for my ranch on the Little Missouri, sometimes in the bright fall weather, sometimes in the arctic bitterness of the early northern winter.

He was the most loyal and simple-hearted of men, and he had come to join his old boss and comrade in the bigger hunting which we were to carry on through the tropic midsummer.

The temptation is great to go on enumerating man after man who stood preeminent, whether as a killer of game, a tamer of horses, or a queller of disorder among his people, or who, mayhap, stood out with a more evil prominence as himself a dangerous man, one given to the taking of life on small provocation, or one who was ready to earn his living outside the law if the occasion demanded it.

But I could not begin to name all the troopers who so eagerly craved a chance to win honor out of hazard and danger.

Among them was good, solemn Fred Herrig, the Alsatian.

I knew Fred's patience and skill as a hunter from the trips we had taken together after deer and mountain sheep through the badlands of the Little Missouri.

He still spoke English with what might be called Alsatian variations.