6 Men in a Buffalo Wallow vs 125 Warriors — Every One of Them Got the Medal of Honor

On September 12, 1874, during the Red River War, six men carrying army dispatches across the Texas Panhandle rode straight into more than a hundred Kiowa and Comanche warriors. Two civilian scouts, Billy Dixon and Amos Chapman, and four troopers of the 6th Cavalry. Their horses stampeded, the prairie had been burned bare, and the only cover in sight was a shallow buffalo wallow about ten feet across. They held it for a day and a night: through the dawn ambush, a run under fire to carry a wounded man to safety, a thunderstorm, a freezing night, and a passing cavalry major who refused to leave them food or men. All six were awarded the Medal of Honor. Four decades later, the army took two of those medals back, and it took until 1989 to return them. This is the Buffalo Wallow Fight, hour by hour, from the reports and memoirs of the men who were there. CHAPTERS 0:00 The medals taken away in 1916 2:15 The Red River War and the six couriers 5:30 Dawn ambush 7:30 The buffalo wallow 9:45 Dixon goes back for Chapman 11:45 The storm 14:45 The night in the wallow 16:15 Major Price rides away 19:15 The medals and the men SOURCES Olive K. Dixon, Life and Adventures of "Billy" Dixon (1914) HistoryNet, "Wallowing in Courage: 6th U.S. Cavalry" #BillyDixon #WildWest #RedRiverWar #MedalOfHonor #TexasHistory