Kansas, Rice County, near Lyons
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One mile south is the hand-dug wel that served the U.S. Cavalry and Santa Fe Trail travelers in the 1860s.
For five days in July, 1864, 600 Indians besieged a trading post near the well and a wagon train nearby. When the attackers tried to overrun the post, "Buffalo Bill" Mathewson fired a field cannon into the midst of several on horseback and afoot, ending the siege.
A later "Buffalo Bill", William F. Cody, worked at the site briefly before moving in 1867 to Ellsworth, where he gained the cognomen by killing buffalo for railroad workers.
(Native Americans • Settlements & Settlers • Wars, US Indian) Includes location, directions, 2 photos, GPS coordinates, map.
One mile south is the hand-dug wel that served the U.S. Cavalry and Santa Fe Trail travelers in the 1860s.
For five days in July, 1864, 600 Indians besieged a trading post near the well and a wagon train nearby. When the attackers tried to overrun the post, "Buffalo Bill" Mathewson fired a field cannon into the midst of several on horseback and afoot, ending the siege.
A later "Buffalo Bill", William F. Cody, worked at the site briefly before moving in 1867 to Ellsworth, where he gained the cognomen by killing buffalo for railroad workers.
(Native Americans • Settlements & Settlers • Wars, US Indian) Includes location, directions, 2 photos, GPS coordinates, map.