The nearest Box Butte county ever came to war was in the winter of 1890-91, when the Sioux Indians on the Pine Ridge Reservation, seve,nty-five miles north became crazed over what the) believed to be the coming of a Messiah, whom they thought would, with their help, drive all the white settlers from the western county, bring back the buffalo and the game, .mil organized for a general massacre of the white settlers in the surrounding country. Fortunately there was a deep snow at this time win.]] delayed their movements until the United States Army, commanded by General Nelson A. Miles, could throw a cordon of
troops around the reservation, and after the battle of Wounded Knee, fought between the Seventh United States Cavalry and a band of Indians commanded by Chief Big Foot, in which one hundred and fifty Indians and about twenty officers and soldiers of the cavalry were killed, the uprising was ended. The Nebraska militia was called to arms and patrolled the state border north of Hay Springs, Rushville and Gordon. At Hemingford a company for protection was organized, armed with Winchester repeating rifles and held themselves in readiness to defend the inhabitants of the county from threatened extermination at the hands of the blood-thirsty Sioux Indians.
Box Butte County's Part in the World War
This county did its full share in furnishing men and the sinews of war for the World War of 1917-18-19. A volunteer company was formed at Alliance, known as Company "G" of the Fourth Nebraska National Guard which entered the federal service and became later Battery "D" of the 127th United States Field Artillery. This organization spent nearly a year at Camp Cody, New Mexico, and was a part of the 34th or Sandstorm Division which reached France in September, 1918, but. as an organization, they did not participate in active fighting.