With this they made merry, tying one end of a bolt to a pony's tail, one would ride out across the prairie with a hundred yards of brilliant calico streamers trailing in the wind.

At another time "Dutch Frank" saw the Indians on the track ahead of him, and feeling sure that it meant death to stop, he opened the throttle, plowing through them throwing them into the air and killing many. He arrived safely into town. This, we believe was the origin of "tank fighting."

The Union Pacific, during the year 1867, built on through Sidney and Cheyenne, and Mr. Tracy, who later became another of the cattle kings, was at Pine Bluffs, took a contract for getting out wood and ties for the railroad. At this point he received his inspiration for ranching, and was long known in that business by the early settlers.

The Fifth United States Cavalry under General Carr arrived in the spring of 1S69, and eight companies were left at North Platte and McPherson, while four were sent to Sidney and

HISTORY OF WESTERN NEBRASKA

four to Cheyenne. Their orders were to "clear the country of Indians from the Union Pacific to the Kansas Line."

It was at this time that Tall Bull, one of the most bestial and brutal, although brave Indians, obtained the title of the "scourge of Kansas," because of his numerous raids, culminating in the massacre of the "German Settlement," and taking away two of the young women. General Carr had at hand the strategy, of maneuvering of the best known of all the old scouts on the pursuit of this band, none other than Colonel W. F. Cody. The final battle occurred "at the springs in the sand hills," a few miles south of the old Valley station on the South Platte.