Dakota Datebook: Palmer's Spring in N.D.

It was on April 23 in 1868 that six soldiers escorting mail from Fort Totten were ambushed by Yankton and Blackfeet Indians in present-day Benson County.

The group had just begun their midday meal when the Indians, seeing that the soldiers had left their weapons in the mail-wagon, launched their attack from behind a limestone boulder; killing three soldiers in the initial two volleys. As the survi...