The Cypress Hills Massacre prompted the Canadian government to accelerate the recruitment and deployment of the newly formed North-West Mounted Police.

The incident began in the spring of 1873 when a small party of Canadian Red River Métis and American wolfers, led by Thomas W. Hardwick and John Evans, was returning from their winter hunt.

Presuming that their horses had been stolen by 'Indians', the men travelled on foot to Fort Benton, Montana Territory, about 8 kilometres (5 mi) away, and asked for assistance from the local authorities to retrieve them.

The personal account of Donald Graham, who joined the wolfers at Fort Benton and travelled with them to the Cypress Hills, states that 13 of Little Soldier's men were killed in the exchanges of fire.

[2] Artifacts from the Cypress Hills Massacre have also been preserved at nearby Fort Walsh National Historic Site, along with reconstructions of Farwell's and Solomon's trading posts.

In December 1874, Assistant Commissioner James Macleod was given permission by the U.S. government to enter Helena, Montana Territory, to investigate the Cypress Hills Massacre.

The remaining men were freed because there was not enough clear evidence to prove anything against them, and the American commissioner refused the extradition request as there was far too much conflicting testimony.

In June 1876, shortly after they were released from custody in the United States, two traders and a wolfer crossed the border into Canada and were subsequently arrested and put on trial in Winnipeg.

[9] W. E. Cullen, the American commissioner, said at the extradition hearing at Helena: although the "preponderance of testimony is to the effect that the Indians commenced the firing... they were doubtlessly provoked to this by the apparently hostile attitudes of the whites... An armed party menacing their camp, no matter for what purpose, was by no means slight provocations.

Around this time, the Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba, Alexander Morris, was concerned about perceived threats of violence to uniformed Canadians and Americans conducting geological surveys.

Unable to find a solution, Morris used the reports of the massacre to call on the Prime Minister of Canada, Sir John A. Macdonald, to create a police force.

Already planning to establish a police force in the North-West Territories, Macdonald had envisioned a horse-mounted brigade based on the idea of the Royal Irish Constabulary.

Alexander Campbell, the minister of the interior, did not believe sending an armed police force into the North-West Territories was necessary at this time, causing Morris to fear that any delay in training and deployment could be exacerbated further once winter fell.

To force their creation, Morris claimed that the Métis and white settlers in the area around Portage la Prairie and Fort Qu'Appelle were experiencing fear and unrest due to the massacre.

A fictionalized account of the events of the Cypress Hills Massacre is told in the novel The Englishman's Boy by Canadian author Guy Vanderhaeghe.