Second Cavalry units under Major Earl Van Dorn defeat hostile Comanche in the northern Indian Territory

Major Earl Van Dorn, with six companies of the Second Cavalry, trekked two hundred miles north from Texas and engaged a large force of Comanche Indians near the abandoned Fort Atkinson in eastern Nebraska.  The cavalrymen fought largely dismounted.  Fifty-five hostiles were killed and over a hundred horses captured.  One private was killed and Lieutenant Fitzhugh Lee was wounded through the lung with an arrow.  Captain Kirby Smith, also wounded, and Lieutenant John Bell Hood participated in this action.  All these officers joined the South in 1861. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
William S. Brackett, "Fitzhugh Lee, Beau Sabreur," Frank Leslie's Popular Monthly, May 1899, 102-103.
"The Army and the Indians," New York Times, November 18, 1859, p. 3.
    Date Certainty
    Exact
    Type
    Battles/Soldiers
    How to Cite This Page: "Second Cavalry units under Major Earl Van Dorn defeat hostile Comanche in the northern Indian Territory," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/23592.