Busby, Montana

Busby is a Census Designated Place located on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation in eastern Big Horn County. Busby is most noted as the place a group of Northern Cheyenne escaped to after breaking out of Fort Robinson, Nebraska in January, 1879. The Northern Cheyenne had been transported south to Indian Territory (Oklahoma) several years earlier but the climate was literally killing them. Two Cheyenne chiefs led a group of their people out of Oklahoma late in 1878 and headed north to their ancestral homelands in Montana. Somewhere along the way the group split up, and Chief Dull Knife took the sick and weak with him toward refuge with the Lakota Sioux. Before they arrived in Lakota country, they were captured by the US Cavalry and taken to Fort Robinson where they were locked in wooden barracks with no food, water or heat. After 5 days, on January 9, 1879, they escaped and literally ran to Busby. Many were killed along the way in a running gun battle with the cavalry but a small group (including Chief Dull Knife) did make it all the way. The tribe commemorates that event each January with some individuals (including elementary school students) making that run again...