On the morning of the fourteenth, the advance guard started at five o'clock, the idea being to cover the eighteen miles to the meadows near Fort Mitchell for the next camping place. The wagons were strung out for a mile or more, when rapid firing was begun by the Indians upon the rear guard. Captain Fouts had ordered that no ammunition be distributed, fearing that some hair-trigger individual among the soldiers might become excited and shoot, and thus set off an unpremediated battle.

The rear guard started for the front, and the front guard started for the rear, with ammunition. They met about half way, and turned about to fight. Captain Fouts had crossed Horse creek to hurry up the Indians, and had been killed, stripped and mutilated. The Indians then turned and fled two or three miles towards the river, and were making warlike demonstrations while the squaws and papooses were crossing the river on ponies.

Captain Wilcox assumed charge, and the guards charged after the Indians. When near at hand, he sent Elston forward to offer immunity to those who would return peacefully. The Indians shrieked defiance, and charged viciously.

The Indians numbered more than five hundred warriors, and when at a distance of about three hundred yards, firing was begun by them, and answered with telling effect by the military forces. While Indians advancing from the front were checked by the fire from the Gallagher rifles, both flanks advanced as if to hedge in and surround them. Over the hills from the west side of Horse creek poured dozens and hundreds of the shrieking demons, and an orderly retreat was taken to the wagons which in the meantime had been drawn up in a circle, and hastily constructed rifle pits made.