Battle of Washita River The Battle of Washita River ( also called Battle of the Washita or Washita Massacre ) occurred on November 27 , 1868 when Lt . Col . George Armstrong Custer ’ s 7th U . S . Cavalry attacked Black Kettle ’ s Southern Cheyenne camp on the Washita River ( near present day Cheyenne , Oklahoma ) , part of a major winter encampment of numerous Native American tribal bands . Background . After the Southern Cheyenne and Arapaho signed the Medicine Lodge Treaty , they were required to move south from present - day Kansas and Colorado to a new reservation in Indian Territory ( modern Oklahoma ) . This forced them to give up their traditional territory for one with little arable land and away from buffalo , their main source of meat and a center of their culture . Months of fragile peace survived raids between warring Kaw Indians and Southern Cheyennes . But in the summer of 1868 , war parties of Southern Cheyenne , and allied Arapaho , Kiowa , Comanche , Northern Cheyenne , Brulé and Oglala Lakota , and Pawnee warriors attacked white settlements in western Kansas , southeast Colorado , and northwest Texas . Among these raids were those along the Solomon and Saline rivers in Kansas , which began August 10 , 1868 . The warriors killed at least 15 white settlers , wounded others , and were reported to have raped some women , as well as taking others captive to be adopted into their tribes . On August 19 , 1868 , Colonel Edward W . Wynkoop , Indian Agent for the Cheyenne and Arapaho at Fort Lyon , Kansas , , who was a chief in Black Kettle ' s Cheyenne village . Little Rock told what he had learned about the raids along the Saline and Solomon rivers . According to Little Rock ' s account , a war party of about 200 Cheyennes from a camp above the forks of Walnut Creek departed camp intending to go out against the Pawnee . Instead they raided white settlements along the Saline and Solomon rivers . Some of the warriors returned to Black Kettle ' s camp . Little Rock learned from them what took place . Little Rock named the warriors most responsible for the raids and agreed to try to have them delivered to white authorities . Indians in November 1868 . Winter camps on the Washita River . By early November 1868 , Black Kettle ' s camp joined other Southern Cheyenne and other tribal bands at the Washita River , which they called Lodgepole River , after local pine trees . Black Kettle ' s village was the westernmost of a series of camps , of Cheyenne , Arapaho , Kiowa , Comanche , and Kiowa - Apache bands , that ran ten to fifteen miles along the Washita River . Black Kettle ' s village was several miles west of the rest of the camps and consisted of around fifty Cheyenne lodges , plus one or two lodges of visiting Arapaho and two of visiting Lakota , for a total of about 250 inhabitants . Little Rock , the only council chief who had remained with Black Kettle since the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864 , lived with his family in the village . It also included the families of Big Man , Wolf Looking Back , Clown , Cranky Man , Scabby Man , Half Leg , Bear Tongue , and Roll Down . Downriver from Black Kettle ' s camp the Washita looped northward in a large oxbow . At its northern portion was the Arapaho camp of Little Raven , Big Mouth , Yellow Bear , and Spotted Wolf , a total of about 180 lodges . At the bottom of the loop was a large Southern Cheyenne camp under Medicine Arrows . Followers of Little Robe , Sand Hill , Stone Calf , Old Little Wolf ( Big Jake ) , and Black White Man made up one large village , and nearby was a smaller Cheyenne village consisting of the followers of Old Whirlwind . These two Cheyenne villages , together comprising about 129 lodges , were situated along the oxbow southeast of Little Raven ' s Arapaho camp and west of a small Kiowa camp headed by Kicking Bird . The Kiowa leaders Satanta , Lone Wolf , and Black Eagle had moved their villages to the Fort Cobb area . Downriver were other camps of Comanches and Kiowa - Apaches . Overall , a total of about 6 , 000 Indians were in winter camp along the upper Washita River . November 20 meeting at Fort Cobb . In mid - November , a party headed by Black Kettle and Little Robe of the Cheyenne and Big Mouth and Spotted Wolf of the Arapaho arrived at Fort Cobb to visit the post trader , William " Dutch Bill " Griffenstein . Griffenstein ' s wife Cheyenne Jennie , a Cheyenne originally of Black Kettle ' s camp , had died around October 10 . Griffenstein had sent runners to inform her parents of her death , perhaps also sending a message to urge Black Kettle to come to talk with Colonel ( Brevet Major General ) William B . Hazen about making peace . The four chiefs met with Hazen on November 20 , with Captain Henry Alvord of the Tenth Cavalry documenting the conversations . Black Kettle began by saying to Hazen , " The Cheyennes , when south of the Arkansas , do not wish to return to the north side because they feared trouble there , but were continually told that they had better go there , as they would be rewarded for so doing . " Hardoff notes that by the terms of the Medicine Lodge Treaty , the Cheyenne - Arapaho reservation had the Arkansas River as its northern boundary . In April 1868 the US Army distributed food provisions due the Cheyennes and Arapahoes at Fort Larned and Fort Dodge , both north of the Arkansas . Further , on August 9 , 1868 , they had distributed treaty annuities in the form of arms and ammunition at Fort Larned rather than south of the Arkansas . Black Kettle continued , asking if he might move his people south to Fort Cobb : The Cheyennes do not fight at all this side of the Arkansas ; they do not trouble Texas , but north of the Arkansas they are almost always at war . When lately north of the Arkansas , some young Cheyennes were fired upon and then the fight began . I have always done my best to keep my young men quiet , but some will not listen , and since the fighting began I have not been able to keep them all at home . But we all want peace , and I would be glad to move all my people down this way ; I could then keep them all quietly near camp . My camp is now on the Washita , 40 miles east of the Antelope Hills , and I have there about 180 lodges . I speak only for my own people ; I cannot speak nor control the Cheyennes north of the Arkansas . Big Mouth of the Arapahoes spoke next , saying in part : I never would have gone north of the Arkansas again , but my father there [ the agent ] sent for me time after time , saying it was the place for my people , and finally I went . No sooner had we got there than there was trouble . I do not want war , and my people do not , but although we have come back south of the Arkansas , the soldiers follow us and continue fighting , and we want you to send out and stop these soldiers from coming against us . Hazen ' s October 13 orders from General William Tecumseh Sherman , commander of the Military Division of the Missouri , had charged Hazen with making provision for Indians who wanted to stay out of the war . The orders stated if General Philip Sheridan had to invade the reservation to pursue hostile Indians , he needed to spare the " well - disposed " . Sherman recommended that non - belligerent Indians camp near Fort Cobb . Hazen knew that Sheridan had already declared the Cheyennes and Arapahos to be " hostile " , meaning they were subject to attack by the US Army . Hazen told the four chiefs he could not make peace with them . He recommended against their coming to Fort Cobb , as their presence would jeopardize the peace of the Kiowas and Comanches already camped there . He told them , I am sent here as a peace chief ; all here is to be peace , but north of the Arkansas is General Sheridan , the great war chief , and I do not control him ; and he has all the soldiers who are fighting the Arapahoes and Cheyennes . Therefore , you must go back to your country , and if the soldiers come to fight , you must remember they are not from me , but from that great war chief , and with him you must make peace . Reporting to Sherman on November 22 , Hazen said , " { T ] o have made peace with them would have brought to my camp most of those now on the war path south of the Arkansas ; and as General Sheridan is to punish those at war and might follow them in afterwards , a second Chivington affair might occur , which I could not prevent . " Hazen reported that while the chiefs seemed sincere , the Kiowa and Comanche at Fort Cobb said the young warriors who accompanied the chiefs were pleased that peace had not been made . They boasted that the Lakota and other northern bands would come down the following spring to " clean out the entire country . " Hazen took the young warriors ' boasts so seriously that he requested two more companies of the 10th Cavalry from Fort Arbuckle and two howitzer s to remain for a week or two at Fort Cobb . Black Kettle ' s return to the Washita . Black Kettle and the other chiefs departed Fort Cobb on about November 21 with food supplied by Griffenstein , traveling through storm conditions . They reached their villages on the Washita on the evening of November 26 . The evening before on November 25 , a war party of as many as 150 warriors , which included young men of the camps of Black Kettle , Medicine Arrows , Little Robe , and Old Whirlwind , had returned to the Washita encampments . They had raided white settlements in the Smoky Hill River country with the Dog Soldiers . Major Joel Elliott of the Seventh Cavalry found their trail on November 26 , which drew Custer and his forces to the Washita . On November 26 , the same day that Black Kettle returned to the Washita , a party of Kiowa returning from raiding the Utes passed through Black Kettle ' s camp on their way to their own village . They told the Cheyenne that as they had passed near the Antelope Hills on the Canadian River , they had seen a large trail leading southward toward the Washita camps . The Cheyenne discounted the information , as they did not believe US soldiers would operate so far south in such wintry conditions . The Kiowa proceeded to their own village further east along the river , but Trails the Enemy decided to stay overnight with friends in Black Kettle ' s camp . Also on November 26 , Crow Neck , a returning warrior , told Bad Man ( also known as Cranky Man ) that he had left an exhausted horse along the trail to rest . When he went back to retrieve the horse that day , he saw moving figures to the north who looked like soldiers . Fearful , he turned back without getting his horse . Bad Man doubted Crow Neck had seen soldiers ; he said perhaps he had a guilty conscience from having gone against the chiefs ' wishes by joining the war party . Crow Neck told no one else what he had seen , fearing that he might be laughed at , or chastised by Black Kettle for having been part of the raid . On the evening of November 26 , Black Kettle held a council in his lodge with the principal men of his village to convey what he had learned at Fort Cobb about Sheridan ' s war plans . Discussion lasted into the early morning hours of November 27 . The council decided that after the foot - deep snow cleared , they would send out runners to talk with the soldiers . They wanted to clear up misunderstandings and make it clear that Black Kettle ' s people wanted peace . Meanwhile , they decided to move camp the next day downriver to be closer to the other Indian camps . According to Moving Behind Woman , who was about 14 at the time of the Washita attack , Black Kettle ' s wife Medicine Woman stood outside the lodge for a long time . She was angry that the camp was not moving that night , saying , " I don ' t like this delay , we could have moved long ago . The Agent sent word for us to leave at once . It seems we are crazy and deaf , and cannot hear . " Black Hawk ' s brother White Shield ( also known as Gentle Horse ) had a vision of a wolf wounded on the right side of its head mourning its little ones which had been scattered and killed by a powerful enemy . He tried to persuade Black Kettle to move camp immediately , but was unsuccessful . But five of Black Kettle ' s children ( four daughters and a son ) moved to the camp of Black Kettle ' s nephew Whirlwind , which was ten miles downriver ( five miles straight line distance ) . Sheridan ' s offensive . General Philip Sheridan , in command of the U . S . Army ' s Department of the Missouri , decided upon a winter campaign against the Cheyenne . While difficult , a winter campaign offered chances for decisive results . If the Indians ’ shelter , food , and livestock could be destroyed or captured , not only the warriors but their women and children were at the mercy of the Army and the elements . They would be forced to surrender . Sheridan planned to have three columns converge on the Indian wintering grounds just east of the Texas Panhandle : one from Fort Lyon in Colorado , one from Fort Bascom in New Mexico , and one from a supply camp to be established ( Camp Supply ) . ( It was later renamed Fort Supply in the Indian Territory ) . Lt . Col . George A . Custer led the 7th Cavalry forces against the various bands on the Washita River . The attack . On November 26 , 1868 , Custer ’ s Osage scouts located the trail of an Indian war party . Custer ' s troops followed this trail all day without a break until nightfall , when they rested briefly until there was sufficient moonlight to continue . When they reached Black Kettle ’ s village , Custer divided his force into four parts , each moving into position so that at first daylight they could simultaneously converge on the village . At daybreak , as the columns attacked , Double Wolf awoke and fired his gun to alert the village ; he was among the first to die in the charge . The Cheyenne warriors hurriedly left their lodges to take cover behind trees and in deep ravines . Custer soon controlled the village , but it took longer to quell all remaining resistance . Black Kettle and his wife , Medicine Woman Later , were shot in the back and killed while fleeing on a pony . Following the capture of Black Kettle ' s village , Custer found himself in a precarious position . As the fighting began to subside , he saw large groups of mounted Indians gathering on nearby hilltops and learned that Black Kettle ' s village was only one of many Indian encampments along the river . Fearing an attack , he ordered some of his men to take defensive positions while the others were to seize the Indians ' belongings and horses . They destroyed what they did not want or could not carry , including about 675 ponies and horses . They spared 200 horses to carry prisoners . Near nightfall , fearing the outlying Indians would find and attack his supply train , Custer began marching toward the other encampments . The surrounding Indians retreated , at which point Custer turned around and returned to his supply train . In his first report of the battle to Gen . Sheridan on November 28 , 1868 , Custer reported that by " actual and careful examination after the battle , " his men found the bodies of 103 warriors — a figure echoed by Sheridan when he relayed news of the Washita fight to Bvt . Maj . Gen . W . A . Nichols the following day . In fact , no count of the dead had been made . The reported number was based on Custer ' s reports from his officers the day after the attack , during their return to Camp Supply . Cheyenne and other Indian estimates of the Indian casualties at the Washita , as well as estimates by Custer ' s civilian scouts , are much lower . According to a modern account by the United States Army Center of Military History , the 7th Cavalry had 21 officers and men killed and 13 wounded at the Washita . They estimated the Indians had perhaps 50 killed and as many wounded . Twenty of the soldiers killed were part of a small detachment led by Major Joel Elliott , who was among the dead . Elliott had separated from the three companies he led , apparently without Custer ' s approval . Yelling " Here ' s for a brevet or a coffin ! " , Elliott and his small band pursued a group of fleeing Cheyenne . Elliott ' s contingent ran into a mixed party of Cheyenne , Kiowa , and Arapaho warriors who were rushing from villages up the river to aid Black Kettle ' s encampment . The warriors overwhelmed the small troop in a single charge . Custer ' s abrupt withdrawal without determining the fate of Elliott and the missing troopers darkened Custer ' s reputation among his peers . There was deep resentment within the 7th Cavalry that never healed . In particular , Eliott ' s friend and H Company captain Frederick Benteen never forgave Custer for " abandoning " Elliott and his troopers . Eight years later , when Benteen failed to race to Custer ' s aid at the Battle of the Little Bighorn , his actions were closely examined in light of his long - standing anger toward Custer for the events at the Washita River . Aftermath . By early December 1868 , the attack had provoked debate and criticism in the press . In the December 9 " Leavenworth Evening Bulletin " , an article noted : " Gen . S . Sandford and Tappan , and Col . Taylor of the Indian Peace Commission , unite in the opinion that the late battle with the Indians was simply an attack upon peaceful bands , which were on the march to their new reservations " . The December 14 " New York Tribune " reported , " Col . Wynkoop , agent for the Cheyenne and Arapahos Indians , has published his letter of resignation . He regards Gen . Custer ' s late fight as simply a massacre , and says that Black Kettle and his band , friendly Indians , were , when attacked , on their way to their reservation . " The scout James S . Morrison wrote Indian Agent Col . Wynkoop that twice as many women and children as warriors had been killed during the attack . The Fort Cobb Indian trader William Griffenstein told Lt . Col . Custer that the 7th U . S . Cavalry had attacked friendly Indians on the Washita . General Phillip Sheridan ordered Griffenstein out of Indian Territory and threatened to hang him if he returned . The " New York Times " published a letter describing Custer as taking " sadistic pleasure in slaughtering the Indian ponies and dogs . " It alluded to his forces ' having killed innocent women and children . The role of Indian noncombatants in Custer ' s strategy . The Southern Cheyenne encampment on the Washita River comprised a key component in Custer ' s field strategy – Indian noncombatants . Women , children , the elderly or disabled were targeted for capture to serve as hostages and human shields . Custer ' s battalions intended to " ride into the camp and secure noncombatant hostages " and " forc [ e ] the warriors to surrender " . Custer demonstrated the value of a strategy that utilized " capture [ d ] women and children " to " neutralize " the Southern Cheyenne superiority in numbers at the Battle of the Washita . Author James Donovan describes the fifty - three women and children seized at the Washita as " captives " or " prisoners " and they fit the definition of human shields in that they were used to insure the escape of the Custer ' s regiment as Cheyenne forces from nearby villages began " pressing his position " . Historian Jerome Greene spelled out their function : " … fifty - three women and children taken captive at the Washita served as assurance against attack from the downriver [ Indians ] during Custer ' s extrication of his command from the scene late on November 27 . " . As Custer advanced with his regiment in a mock assault – mounted women and children hostages riding among his troops – the warriors dispersed , " afraid that shots directed against the column might hit the prisoners " . Larry Sklenar , in his narrative of the Washita battle , describes the role of " hostages " as human shields : Custer probably could not have pulled off this tactical coup [ at the Washita ] had he not had in his possession the fifty - some women and children captives . Although not hostages in the narrowest meaning of the word , doubtlessly it occurred to Custer that the family - oriented [ Cheyenne ] warriors would not attack the Seventh [ Cavalry ] with the women and children marching in [ the middle of his column ] . Custer provided the military logic for tactical use of human shields in his book " My Life on the Plains " , published just two years before the Battle of the Little Big Horn : Indians contemplating a battle , either offensive or defensive , are always anxious to have their women and children removed from all danger … For this reason I decided to locate our [ military ] camp as close as convenient to [ Chief Black Kettle ' s Cheyenne ] village , knowing that the close proximity of their women and children , and their necessary exposure in case of conflict , would operate as a powerful argument in favor of peace , when the question of peace or war came to be discussed . General Phil Sheridan , commander of the Department of the Missouri , issued orders for the Washita River expedition , including the following : " … to destroy [ Indian ] villages and ponies , to kill or hang all warriors , and to bring back all woman and children [ survivors ] . " The purpose of this " total war " strategy , envisioned by Sheridan , was to make " all segments of Indian society experience the horrors of war as fully as the warriors " . Benjamin " Ben " Clark , the highly regarded scout and guide attached to the Seventh Cavalry , recalled the execution of these orders at the Washita : " [ T ] he regiment galloped through the tepees … firing indiscriminately and killing men and women alike . " One cavalry unit was seen pursuing " a group of women and children " shooting at them and " killing them without mercy " . Lieutenant Edward Godfrey observed that soldiers made no effort " to prevent hitting women " during the attack . Ben Clark reported " the loss of seventy - five [ Cheyenne ] warriors dead , and fully as many women and children killed " . Greene noted " … all warriors who lay wounded in the village – presumably no matter the extent of their injuries " were ( according Clark ' s testimony ) " promptly shot to death " . This was consistent with Sheridan ' s orders to kill or summarily hang all [ captured ] warriors . The Seventh Cavalry ' s application of a strategy that included tactical engagement of noncombatants contributed to the effective " destruction " of Black Kettle ' s village – it " ceased to exist " . Colonel Ranald Mackenzie , with elements of the Fourth Cavalry , emulated the success – and methods – of the Battle of the Washita in the lead up to the Red River War at the battle of North Fork , near McClellan Creek , Texas , in 1872 . Applying tactics similar to Custer ' s at the Washita , Mackenzie ' s command of 284 men attacked a Comanche village of 262 lodges and 500 warriors , capturing 130 women and children . The captives served both as human shields , as Mackenzie withdrew to his supply base , and as hostages , offered as a " bargaining tool to force the off - reservation Indians back to reservation , and to force them to free white captives " . Controversies . Indian casualties at the Washita . The number of Indian casualties at the Washita reported by Custer has been controversial . In his first report of the battle to Gen . Sheridan on November 28 , 1868 , Custer reported that by " actual and careful examination after the battle , " the bodies of 103 warriors were found — a figure echoed by Sheridan when from Camp Supply he relayed news of the Washita fight to Bvt . Maj . Gen . W . A . Nichols the following day . In fact , no battlefield count of the dead was made . According to Lt . Edward S . Godfrey , no estimate of Indian warrior fatalities was made until the evening of the day following the battle , after the soldiers made camp during their march back to Camp Supply . " On [ the ] second night [ after the battle ] , " Godfrey told interviewer Walter M . Camp in 1917 , " Custer interrogated the officers as to what Indians they had seen dead in the village , and it was from these reports that the official report of Indians killed was made up . The dead Indians on the field were not counted by the troops then , but guessed at later , as explained . " In his 1928 memoir , Godfrey related , " After supper in the evening , the officers were called together and each one questioned as to the casualties of enemy warriors , locations , etc . Every effort was made to avoid duplications . The total was found to be one hundred and three . " Captain Frederick W . Benteen stated , in annotations to his personal copy of W . L . Holloway ' s " Wild Life on the Plains and Horrors of Indian Warfare " , that " Custer assembled the officers to inquire of each how many dead Indians " each " had seen ; then what each had seen were added . " They had all seen the same dead Indians " . " [ emphasis in original ] . John Poisal and Jack Fitzpatrick , mixed - blood scouts attached to the Seventh Cavalry , reported a different number of Indian casualties to scout J . S . Morrison when they arrived at Fort Dodge with the Cheyenne prisoners . In a letter to Indian Agent Col . Edward W . Wynkoop on December 14 , 1868 , Morrison wrote , John Smith , John Poysell [ Poisal ] , and Jack Fitzpatrick have got in today . John S . was not in the [ Washita ] fight , but John P . and Jack were . They all agree in stating that the official reports of the fight were very much exaggerated ; that there were not over twenty bucks killed ; the rest , about forty , were women and children . The Cheyenne prisoners , interviewed by Gen . Sheridan at Camp Supply , reported thirteen Cheyenne men , two Sioux , and one Arapaho killed at the Washita , a figure which Sheridan subsequently reported to Bvt . Maj . Gen . Nichols . The journalist DeB . Randolph Keim interviewed the women prisoners with the help of interpreter Richard Curtis . He obtained the names of those killed and arrived at the same figure of thirteen Cheyenne , two Sioux , and one Arapaho killed . Later information from various Cheyenne sources , most of them independent of each other , tended to confirm the figures given by the Cheyenne women prisoners . Few of the military reports noted casualties among the women and children . Custer acknowledged in his report , " In the excitement of the fight , as well as in self - defence , it so happened that some of the squaws and a few of the children were killed and wounded . . . " After Custer and Sheridan visited the battlefield in December , Custer revised his initial estimate of 103 warriors killed upward . He wrote from Fort Cobb , The Indians admit a loss of 140 killed , besides a heavy loss of wounded . This , with the Indian prisoners we have in our possession , makes the entire loss of the Indian in killed , wounded , and missing not far from 300 . Hoig points out that if true , the number would mean that virtually everyone in Black Kettle ' s village was killed or captured . Greene states , " Custer ' s figures were inflated , and the specific sources of his information remain unknown . " Hardorff notes Custer ' s revised total with skepticism . This new number was based on information obtained from two imprisoned Kiowa chiefs at Fort Cobb who faced death by hanging . In view of their predicament , it seems likely that these men would have said anything to avoid the gallows . But such skepticism is not warranted in the case of the Washita prisoners . The Cheyenne women were allowed to mingle freely with the officers and knew many of them on an intimate basis . They were assured good treatment and had no apparent reason to distort their statements about dead kinsmen . Greene finds the Cheyenne and other Indian estimates most reliable . He writes , " As might be expected , the best estimates must come from the people who suffered the losses , " though noting , " even these do not agree . " Utley , however , writes , " Indian calculations — a dozen warriors and twice as many women and children killed – are as improbably low as Custer ' s are high . " Hoig writes , " Even though the number 103 was not arrived at by a precise battlefield count , it is a definite figure which has already been placed on historical markers of the battlefield . Since it will likely never be proved absolutely incorrect , the figure will undoubtedly remain accepted as the number of Indians killed by Custer at the Washita . History should make it clear , however , that the dead were by no means all warriors who were met in open battle and defeated . " Several of the Cheyenne accounts provide names of men killed at the Washita . In his book on the Washita , Greene provides an appendix of " Known Village Fatalities at the Washita . " He compiled a list of all unique names , for a total of 40 men , 12 women ( of whom 11 are unidentified ) , and six unidentified children . Greene notes that some individuals might have more than one name , so some entries might be duplicates . Using the same sources , Richard G . Hardorff has compiled a " Composite List of Names . " It partially reconciles multiple names ( or multiple translations of the same name ) among the different sources ; for example , the Mexican " Pilan " , with Indian names White Bear and Tall White Man ; or Bitter Man / Cranky Man , also known as Bad Man . Writes Hardorff , " Some of the dead may have been identified by their birth name by one informant and by their nickname by another . Variations in the translation of personal names add to the confusion in the identification . . . " Battle or massacre ? Following the event , a controversy arose as to whether the event was best described as a military victory or as a massacre . This discussion endures among historians to this day . Custer did not consider Washita a massacre . He said that some women took up weapons and were subsequently killed and that he took women and children prisoners . He stated that he did not kill every Indian in the village , though he said his forces could not avoid killing a few women in the middle of the hard fight . The Indian Bureau described the event as a " massacre of innocent Indians " , and humanitarian groups denounced it as " cold blooded butchery " . The Cheyenne survivors considered it a horrifying event that gravely impacted their lives and community ; the loss of many tribal elders , in particular , was profoundly damaging to Cheyenne families and society . Modern Cheyenne consider the event a massacre and are campaigning to change the name of the historical site to reflect that view . Historian Jerome Greene wrote a book about the encounter in 2004 , for the National Park Service . He concluded that " Soldiers evidently took measures to protect the women and children . " Historian Paul Andrew Hutton wrote , " Although the fight on the Washita was most assuredly one - sided , it was not a massacre . Black Kettle ' s Cheyennes were not unarmed innocents living under the impression that they were not at war . Several of Black Kettle ' s warriors had recently fought the soldiers , and the chief had been informed by Hazen that there could be no peace until he surrendered to Sheridan . The soldiers were not under orders to kill everyone , for Custer personally stopped the slaying of noncombatants , and fifty - three prisoners were taken by the troops . " Historian Joseph B . Thoburn considers the destruction of Black Kettle ' s village too one - sided to be called a battle . He reasons that had a superior force of Indians attacked a white settlement containing no more people than were in Black Kettle ' s camp , with like results , the incident would doubtless have been heralded as " a massacre " . Historian Stan Hoig argues that the conflict fit the definition of a massacre because a group of people , even one in possession of weapons as the Cheyenne were , were killed " indiscriminately , mercilessly and in large numbers " . In Custer ' s direct frontal assault on an armed and ostensibly hostile encampment , the only fatality in the 7th Cavalry in the fighting in the village itself was squadron commander Capt . Louis Hamilton ; the rest of the dead were with the detached command of Maj . Joel Elliott , who ( as noted above ) were killed more than a mile from the fighting in the village . Companies A and D , composed of 120 officers and men , suffered only four wounded in the assault , and attacking Companies C and K , also totaling 120 officers and men , suffered no casualties . Depictions in film and television . During the late 20th century , a time of activism for Native American and minority civil rights , and protests about the Vietnam War , film and other media reflected changes in historians ' perspective on the Battle of Washita River . They also used the event to reflect on contemporary issues . In the 1970 film " Little Big Man " , based on the 1964 novel by Thomas Berger , director Arthur Penn depicted the Seventh Cavalry ' s attack on Black Kettle ' s village on the Washita as a massacre resembling the 1968 My Lai massacre by U . S . troops during the Vietnam War . The 1991 TV movie " Son of the Morning Star " , based on Evan S . Connell ' s book of the same name , presented the battle from the points of view of Kate Bighead ( Cheyenne ) and Elizabeth Custer . It depicted Chief Black Kettle as being killed by Custer ' s troopers , and Custer ' s not waiting for word of Major Elliott . The television series " Dr . Quinn , Medicine Woman " aired a special double - episode entitled " Washita " on April 29 , 1995 . The episode set the scene of the Washita attack in Colorado instead of Oklahoma , the site of the actual battle . It fictionalized Custer as deliberately misleading Colorado settlers about the difference between Black Kettle and his band , depicted as peaceful , and the Dog Soldiers , who were attacking farms and railroad crews . Lead character Dr . Michaela " Mike " Quinn made futile attempts to argue with Custer and to warn Black Kettle of impending massacre . In the 2003 film " The Last Samurai " , Tom Cruise plays Captain Nathan Algren , a veteran of the Seventh Cavalry of the 1860s . His participation in the Washita action , depicted as a massacre , leaves him haunted by nightmares . Episode 4 of the 2005 TV miniseries " Into the West " briefly depicts a scene showing actors portraying Custer ' s attacking and Black Kettle ' s fleeing the village .