Fetterman Massacre

As many as 3,000 Anishinabe warriors took part in the annihilation of Captain J Fetterman’s small force of American soldiers. On December 21, 1866, 81 American soldiers left Fort Phil Kearny, which was constructed in 1866 to protect American citizens trying to make it to the southwestern Montana gold fields by way of the dangerous (the Montana Anishinabe were protecting their kingdom) Bozeman Trail. American travelers came up by way of Wyoming to the Big Horn Mountains, to eventually go to the gold fields in southwestern Montana. In the battle that followed the brave Anishinabe-Assiniboine-Cree warriors killed every American soldier under Fetterman’s command. They also mutilated every American soldiers body, excepting the bugle boys body.