William "Billy" Dixon was born in Ohio County, West Virginia, on September 25, 1850. Of European and Native American ancestry. William was orphaned when he was just 12 years old and entrusted to live with an uncle, Thomas Dixon, in Ray County, Missouri. At the age of 14, he took a job working as a woodcutter along the Missouri River. He later proceeded to work for a government freight contractor in Kansas as a bullwhacker and muleskinner.
In 1866, he quit working as a bullwhacker and went to work on the McCall family's farm near Leavenworth, Kansas. While working as a ranch hand for about a year, he obtained some formal schooling. He then returned to operating a freight wagon until November 1869. He then joined a hunting and trapping group on the Saline River northwest of Fort Hays, Kansas. During his time hunting for furs, he became a skilled marksman and thriving as a hunter. Dixon discovered that buffalo cowhides were selling for $1 each and bull hides were $2 and became a buffalo hunter while hunting and trapping. From his earnings, he invested in a road-ranch or supply store. This merchandising venture was successful until 1871, when, during Dixon's absence, the store manager, Billy Reynolds, sold out and departed with the proceeds. |
In the fall of 1872 Billy Dixon and Mike McCabe, both buffalo hunters enter a newly established community called Dodge City. The streets were lined with wagons bringing in hides, and getting supplies. The railroad station was not a station at all but a boxcar serving as a temporary depot. The town was swarming with hide buyers and sellers. Workers along the rail line unloaded dozens of railroad cars full of grain, flour, and provisions. Join us now as we take you back into history to a sportsman's paradise.
Billy returned to hunting buffalo, sometimes having 4-5 hunters/skinners working for him. By 1872, Billy had made his way to southwest Kansas when Dodge City was getting its start. With the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad arriving in Dodge City the same year, the town soon became the buffalo capital of the west. When the town was first named Buffalo City, until the founders discovered there was already a town by that name, it was changed to Dodge City, after the adjacent fort.
During the winter and fall of 1872, there were more hunters along the Arkansas River Valley than ever before or afterward. This was the beginning of the high tide of buffalo-hunting, and buffalo fell by thousands. Buffalo hides towered along Front Street of Doge City awaiting shipment, while filthy buffalo hunters and traders filled the town's establishment. It was at this time that the term "stinker" was coined. More buffalo were killed by hunters that season than in all subsequent seasons combined. Dixon estimated that some 75,000 buffaloes were slaughtered within 60 or 75 miles of Dodge City. On one occasion, Dixon and his men loaded up their hides and headed for Dodge City, where they got from $2.50 to $4 apiece, the highest price he had ever received.
With the buffalo already decreasing south of the Arkansas River, Dixon began to scout in Texas, as far south as the Salt Fork of the Red River. In 1874, he and several other buffalo hunters, along with a few business people from Dodge City, Kansas, established a camp and supply post near the South Canadian River about a mile and a half from the remains of the old Adobe Walls trading post. The original trading post had been founded in about 1843 by William Bent, but it was evacuated after numerous Indian raids and the First Battle of Adobe Walls in 1864. By the end of spring 1874, some 200 to 300 buffalo hunters roamed the region, and trade at the "new" Adobe Walls was booming. It was said that after the spring buffalo migrations occurred, Dixon could shoot enough buffalo to keep ten skinners employed. However, the new camp would not prosper for long.
Of those Indians that remained in the area, they correctly perceived the post and the buffalo hunting as a major threat to their existence. In the spring, the Indians held a Sun Dance, where Comanche medicine man, Isa-tai, foretold a victory to the warriors who participated in a battle to rid the buffalo hunters. Early in the morning of June 27, 1874, a combined force of some 700 Comanche, Cheyenne, Kiowa, and Arapaho warriors, led by Comanche Chief Quanah Parker and Isa-tai, attacked the buffalo camp at Adobe Walls.
The hunters took refuge in two stores and a saloon. Dixon was one of 28 men and one woman who participated in the Second Battle of Adobe Walls, fighting from inside James Hanrahan's saloon. The story of how he became a hero two days into the battle when a bullet from his Sharps buffalo rifle knocked an Indian off his horse nearly a mile away is perhaps exaggerated. Dixon himself never claimed credit for his "long shot." Billy Dixon left buffalo hunting after the Adobe Walls battle and became an army scout in August of 1874.
During the winter and fall of 1872, there were more hunters along the Arkansas River Valley than ever before or afterward. This was the beginning of the high tide of buffalo-hunting, and buffalo fell by thousands. Buffalo hides towered along Front Street of Doge City awaiting shipment, while filthy buffalo hunters and traders filled the town's establishment. It was at this time that the term "stinker" was coined. More buffalo were killed by hunters that season than in all subsequent seasons combined. Dixon estimated that some 75,000 buffaloes were slaughtered within 60 or 75 miles of Dodge City. On one occasion, Dixon and his men loaded up their hides and headed for Dodge City, where they got from $2.50 to $4 apiece, the highest price he had ever received.
With the buffalo already decreasing south of the Arkansas River, Dixon began to scout in Texas, as far south as the Salt Fork of the Red River. In 1874, he and several other buffalo hunters, along with a few business people from Dodge City, Kansas, established a camp and supply post near the South Canadian River about a mile and a half from the remains of the old Adobe Walls trading post. The original trading post had been founded in about 1843 by William Bent, but it was evacuated after numerous Indian raids and the First Battle of Adobe Walls in 1864. By the end of spring 1874, some 200 to 300 buffalo hunters roamed the region, and trade at the "new" Adobe Walls was booming. It was said that after the spring buffalo migrations occurred, Dixon could shoot enough buffalo to keep ten skinners employed. However, the new camp would not prosper for long.
Of those Indians that remained in the area, they correctly perceived the post and the buffalo hunting as a major threat to their existence. In the spring, the Indians held a Sun Dance, where Comanche medicine man, Isa-tai, foretold a victory to the warriors who participated in a battle to rid the buffalo hunters. Early in the morning of June 27, 1874, a combined force of some 700 Comanche, Cheyenne, Kiowa, and Arapaho warriors, led by Comanche Chief Quanah Parker and Isa-tai, attacked the buffalo camp at Adobe Walls.
The hunters took refuge in two stores and a saloon. Dixon was one of 28 men and one woman who participated in the Second Battle of Adobe Walls, fighting from inside James Hanrahan's saloon. The story of how he became a hero two days into the battle when a bullet from his Sharps buffalo rifle knocked an Indian off his horse nearly a mile away is perhaps exaggerated. Dixon himself never claimed credit for his "long shot." Billy Dixon left buffalo hunting after the Adobe Walls battle and became an army scout in August of 1874.
Battle of Buffalo Wallow
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In September 1874, just three months after Adobe Walls, an army dispatch detail consisting of Billy Dixon, another scout Amos Chapman, and four troopers from the 6th Cavalry Regiment (United States) were surrounded and besieged by a large combined band of Kiowas and Comanches, in the Battle of Buffalo Wallow. They holed up in a buffalo wallow located in Hemphill County and, with accurate rifle fire, held off the Indians for three days. A freezing rainstorm the last night discouraged the Indians, and they broke off the fight; every man in the detail was wounded and one trooper killed. For this action, Billy Dixon was awarded the Medal of Honor for Gallantry in Battle.
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