On Oct. 31, 1855, Capt. Andrew Jackson Smith led a force of Army regulars and local volunteers against the Takelma and other bands into the Grave Creek Hills. Smith sent one column down Lower Wolf Creek and another down Grave Creek in an attempt to surround a smaller force of natives. But when the two columns converged in the morning, they found themselves in the wrong position and the Indians taunting them from a hilltop across a deep valley. Eager for a fight, the volunteers rushed pell mell down one steep slope and up another in an undisciplined attack that the Indians easily repelled. They then pinned down the volunteers and regulars until the next morning, when they rushed the camp but were beaten back after four hours of fighting. Capt. Smith and his men, exhausted and short of food and water, withdrew to bury their dead and care for the wounded.