 Word of the attack at Spafford's farm spread quickly to Fort Defiance, about five miles southeast of Mineral Point. A small volunteer force of 13 men was assembled at Fort Defiance and they set off to hunt down the band of Native Americans responsible for the massacre. The group reached Fort Hamilton at around midnight on June 15. On the morning of June 15 survivor, Bennett Million guided the militia volunteers back to the site of the massacre; one of the volunteers was Alexander Higgenbotham, a survivor of the St. Vrain massacre. The bodies of the dead were badly mutilated and Spafford's corpse was headless; his head was found scalped and tossed into the grass along the river bank. The volunteers buried the mangled bodies of the fallen and searched in vain for Spencer, whom they also assumed dead.
