It was the 2d of March that I received at Camp Supply Grant’s despatch directing me to report immediately in Washington.  It had been my intention, as I have said, to join Custer on the North Fork of the Red River, but this new order required me to recast my plans, so, after arranging to keep the expedition supplied till the end of the campaign, I started for Washington, accompanied by three of my staff—­Colonels McGonigle and Crosby, and Surgeon Asch, and Mr. Deb.  Randolph Keim, a representative of the press, who went through the whole campaign, and in 1870 published a graphic history of it.  The day we left Supply we, had another dose of sleet and snow, but nevertheless we made good time, and by night-fall reached Bluff Creek.  In twenty-four hours more we made Fort Dodge, and on the 6th of March arrived at Fort Hays.  Just south of the Smoky Hill River, a little before we got to the post, a courier heading for Fort Dodge passed us at a rapid gait.  Suspecting that he had despatches for me, I directed my outrider to overtake him and find out.  The courier soon turned back, and riding up to my ambulance handed me a telegram notifying me that General Grant, on the day of his inauguration, March 4, 1869, had appointed me Lieutenant-General of the Army.  When I reported in Washington, the President desired me to return to New Orleans and resume command of the Fifth Military District, but this was not at all to my liking, so I begged off, and was assigned to take charge of the Division of the Missouri, succeeding General Sherman, who had just been ordered to assume command of the Army.

CHAPTER XV.

Inspecting military posts in Utah and Montana—­desire to witness the
Franco-German war—­on A sand-bar in the Missouri—­A bear hunt—­an
Indian scare—­myriads of mosquitoes—­permission given to visit
Europe—­calling on President grant—­sailing for Liverpool—­arrival in
Berlin.

After I had for a year been commanding the Division of the Missouri, which embraced the entire Rocky Mountain region, I found it necessary to make an inspection of the military posts in northern Utah and Montana, in order by personal observation to inform myself of their location and needs, and at the same time become acquainted with the salient geographical and topographical features of that section of my division.  Therefore in May, 1870, I started west by the Union-Pacific railroad, and on arriving at Corinne’ Station, the next beyond Ogden, took passage by stage-coach for Helena, the capital of Montana Territory.  Helena is nearly five hundred miles north of Corinne, and under ordinary conditions the journey was, in those days, a most tiresome one.  As the stage kept jogging on day and night, there was little chance for sleep, and there being with me a sufficient number of staff-officers to justify the proceeding, we chartered the “outfit,” stipulating that we were to stop over one night on the road to get some rest.  This rendered the journey more tolerable, and we arrived at Helena without extraordinary fatigue.