A thousand Navajo launch an attack on Fort Defiance in New Mexico

After months of grievances over poor treatment under an existing treaty,  a thousand Navajo warriors attacked Fort Defiance in New Mexico Territory.  In one of the only instances of a sustained Indian attack on a U.S. Army fort, a day-long battle resulted in the Navajo being driven off with around twenty killed.  The three companies of the Third Infantry Regiment defending the fort suffered one man dead and three wounded.  (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
Ron Field and Adam Hook, Forts of the American Frontier: The Southern Plains and Southwest (New York: Osprey Publishing, 2006), 44.
    Date Certainty
    Exact
    Type
    Battles/Soldiers
    How to Cite This Page: "A thousand Navajo launch an attack on Fort Defiance in New Mexico," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/31833.