Battle of Stony Lake
North Dakota
Two days after the skirmish at Dead Buffalo Lake, General Sibley's column of two thousand soldiers broke camp before dawn and marched hard across the Dakota plains. On July twenty-eighth, eighteen sixty-three, a large mounted Sioux force came riding out to meet them near Stony Lake, in present-day Burleigh County. The warriors struck at gaps in the column, probing for a weak point.
Sibley's artillery answered, firing into the horsemen and scattering them across the grass. It was the third and final pitched battle of Sibley's summer campaign. The Sioux then fought a disciplined retreat, trading small actions for time while their families crossed the Missouri River to safety.
When the women and children were across, the warriors crossed too. Sibley's men stood on the eastern bank and turned back. The Dakota had not been destroyed.
They had simply moved west.
