Ranald S. Mackenzie - Service in The Indian Wars

Service in The Indian Wars

After the Civil War, Mackenzie stayed in the regular army and reverted to his permanent rank of captain in the Army Corps of Engineers. Appointed colonel of the 41st U.S. Infantry (later 24th U.S. Infantry, one of the Buffalo Soldier regiments) in 1867, Mackenzie spent the rest of his career on the Frontier. Some officers were reluctant to lead African-American regiments, but Mackenzie did well with the 41st. On February 25, 1871, he took command of the 4th U.S. Cavalry at Fort Richardson in Jacksboro, Texas. He led the regiment at the Battle of the North Fork in the Llano Estacado of West Texas. In late 1871, he was wounded a seventh time by an arrow in the leg.

Mackenzie fought in the Red River War, routing a combined Indian force at the Battle of Palo Duro Canyon far to the north from his headquarters at Fort Concho in San Angelo, Texas. In 1876, he defeated the Cheyenne in the Dull Knife Fight, which helped bring about the end of the Black Hills War. This led to his appointment as commander of the District of New Mexico in 1881. In 1882, he was appointed brigadier general and assigned to the Department of Texas (October 30, 1883). He bought a Texas ranch and was engaged to be married; however, he began to demonstrate odd behavior which was attributed to a fall from a wagon at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in which he injured his head. Showing signs of mental instability, he was retired from the Army on March 24, 1884 for "general paresis of the insane".

Mackenzie died at his sister's home in New Brighton, Staten Island, New York, and is buried in West Point National Cemetery. The New York Times, which had once followed and reported on his career so closely over the years, printed but a short notice of his death. However, the Army and Navy Journal carried a lengthy article on his career and personal life, which began, "The sorrow with which the Army will learn of the death of the once brilliant Ranald Slidell MacKenzie derives an additional pang from the recollection of the cloud which overshadowed his later years and consigned him to a living death."