Battle of Bear Paw - The Battle

The Battle

Miles hurried his attack on the Nez Perce camp for fear that the Indians would escape. At 9:15 a.m, while still about six miles from the camp, he deployed his cavalry at a trot, organized as follows: the 30 Cheyenne and Lakota scouts led the way, followed by the 2nd cavalry battalion consisting of about 160 soldiers. The 2nd Cavalry was ordered to charge into the Nez Perce camp. The 7th cavalry battalion of 110 soldiers followed the 2nd as support and to follow the 2nd on the charge into the camp. The 5th Infantry (mounted on horses) of about 145 soldiers followed as a reserve with a Hotchkiss gun and the pack train. Miles rode with the 7th cavalry.

Miles was following a tried and true tactic of the U.S. army in fighting Plains Indians: attack a village suddenly and “shock and demoralize all the camp occupants – men, women, and children, both young and old – before they could respond effectively to counter the blow.” However, the Nez Perce were warned by scouts of the approach of the soldiers a few minutes in advance. They were scattered, some gathering up the horse herd, west of the encampment, others packing to leave. Some men quickly gathered to defend the encampment while 50 to 60 warriors and many women and children rushed out of the village to attempt an escape to the north and Canada.

Miles’ plan fell apart quickly. Rather than attacking the camp, the Cheyenne scouts veered to the left toward the horse herd and the 2nd Cavalry, commanded by Captain George L. Tyler, followed them. The Cheyenne and Tyler captured most of the horse herd of the Nez Perce and cut off from the village about seventy men, including Chief Joseph, plus women and children. Joseph told his 14-year-old daughter to catch a horse and join the others in a flight toward Canada. Joseph, unarmed, then mounted a horse and rode through a ring of soldiers back into the camp, several bullets cutting his clothing and wounding his horse.

Tyler’s detour to the horse herd eliminated him from the van of the advancing soldiers and the main battle. He detached one company to chase the Nez Perce heading toward Canada. The company pursued the Nez Perce about five miles and then retreated as the Nez Perce organized a counter-attack. Once the women and children were safely out of reach of the soldiers, some of the Nez Perce warriors came back to join their main force.

While the Cheyenne, Tyler, and the 2nd Cavalry were chasing horses, the 7th Cavalry, under Captain Owen Hale, followed Miles’ plan by continuing a rapid advance on the village. As they approached, a group of Nez Perce rose up from a coulee and opened fire, killing and wounding several soldiers. The soldiers fell back. Miles ordered two of the three companies in the 7th cavalry to dismount and quickly brought up the mounted infantry, the 5th, to join them in the firing line. Company K meanwhile had become separated from the main force and was also taking casualties. By 3 p.m., Miles had his entire force organized and on the battlefield and he occupied the higher ground. The Nez Perce were surrounded and had lost all their horses. Miles ordered a charge on the Nez Perce positions with the 7th Cavalry and one company of the infantry, but it was beaten back with heavy casualties.

At nightfall on September 30, Miles’ casualties amounted to 18 dead and 48 wounded, including two wounded Indian scouts. The 7th Cavalry took the heaviest losses. Its 110 men suffered 16 dead and 29 wounded, two of them mortally. The Nez Perce had 22 men killed, including three leaders: Joseph’s brother Ollokot, Toohoolhoolzote, and Poker Joe – the last killed by a Nez Perce sharpshooter who mistook him for a Cheyenne. Several Nez Perce women and children had also been killed.

Miles said of the battle that "The fight was the most fierce of any Indian engagement I have ever been in....The whole Nez Perce movement is unequalled in the history of Indian warfare."