we are now in, and will make
no important moves except such as I may deem necessary for the
preservation of this command until I receive specific

instructions from you. I send Major Burnett with a small escort to
make his way through to you. He will give you more at length the
position of this command, their condition, &c.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
F. Salomon, _Colonel Ninth Wis. Vols_.,
_Comdg. Indian Expedition_.

Salomon's insubordination brought the Indian Expedition in its
original form to an abrupt end, much to the disgust and righteous
indignation of the Indian service. The arrest of Colonel Weer threw
the whole camp into confusion,[372] and it was some hours before
anything like order could be restored. A retrograde movement of the
white troops had evidently been earlier resolved upon and was at once
undertaken. Of such troops, Salomon assumed personal command and
ordered them to begin a march northward at two o'clock on the morning
of the nineteenth.[373] At the same time, he established the troops,
he was so brutally abandoning, as a corps of observation on or near
the Verdigris and Grand Rivers. They were thus expected to cover his
retreat, while he, unhampered, proceeded to Hudson's Crossing.[374]

With the departure of Salomon and subordinate commanders in sympathy
with his retrograde movement, Robert W. Furnas, colonel of the First
Indian, became the ranking officer in the field. Consequently it was
his duty to direct the movements of the troops that remained. The
troops were those of the three Indian regiments, the third of which
had not yet been formally recognized and accepted by the government.
Not all of these troops were in camp when the arrest of Weer took
place. One of the last official acts of Weer as

[Footnote 372: Carruth and Martin to Blunt, July 19, 1862.]

[Footnote 373: Blocki, by order of Salomon, July 18, 1862, _Official
Records_, vol. xiii, 477.]

[Footnote 374: Carruth and Martin to Coffin, August 2, 1862.]

commander of the Indian Expedition had been to order the First Indian
to proceed to the Verdigris River and to take position "in the
vicinity of Vann's Ford." Only a detachment of about two hundred men
had as yet gone there, however, and they were there in charge of
Lieutenant A.C. Ellithorpe. A like detachment of the Third Indian,
under John A. Foreman, major, had been posted at Fort Gibson.[375]
Salomon's _pronunciamento_ and his order, placing the Indi