Dodd's father was killed in the American Civil War in 1865, at the Siege of Petersburg, so he helped raise his younger brothers and sisters with his mother.

In 1872, Dodd passed the entrance exam at West Point and was accepted into the United States Military Academy.

He joined the 3rd Cavalry and was sent to Dakota Territory to fight in the Great Sioux War against various native American tribes of the Northern Plains.

During the war, Dodd led Sioux scouts and fought in the Battle of Bates Creek, in which the Cheyenne leader Dull Knife was killed.

At the Battle of San Juan Hill on July 1, Dodd distinguished himself while fighting alongside Theodore Roosevelt and his Rough Riders.

In 1916, at age sixty-three, Dodd was the colonel of approximately 400 men of the 7th Cavalry, stationed at Camp Harvey J. Jones, Arizona.

However, over the next few months, the Villistas remained dispersed in the hills of the Sierra Madre and were no longer consider a threat to the United States Army.