The Wagon Box Fight was an engagement which occurred on August 2, 1867, in the vicinity of Fort Phil Kearny during Red Cloud's War.

Unable to agree where to attack first, the Sioux and Cheyenne force — variously estimated at between 300 and 1,000 men — split into two large bodies, moving against Fort C.F.

Smith, and a similar number, mostly Sioux and possibly including Red Cloud, headed toward Fort Phil Kearny.

The hay cutters and wood gatherers had been a favorite target of the local Indian warriors since Fort Phil Kearny was established one year earlier.

[4] The soldiers were on the defensive, suffering a lack of horses and trained cavalrymen, and limited by their muzzle-loading Springfield Model 1861 muskets, which were essentially obsolete by this time.

But the soldiers had recently been issued breech-loading rifles that could fire about three times faster than muzzle-loaders and could be more easily re-loaded from a prone position.

While the Indians used these effectively at short range in a fight against a mobile opponent, whether on horseback or on foot, they were ineffective weapons against a well entrenched or fortified enemy.

On July 31, Captain James Powell and his command of 51 troops departed the walls of Fort Phil Kearny on a 30-day assignment to guard the wood cutters.

The pursuing force halted at the woodcutter's camp to loot and seize the large number of horses and mules there, which gave the soldiers taking refuge in the corral time to prepare for the attack.

The first assault on the wagon box corral came from mounted warriors from the southwest, but the raiders encountered heavy fire from the soldiers using the new breech-loaders.

[1]: 20–22 The Wagon Box Fight is prominent in the folklore and literature of the Wild West as an example of a small group of well-equipped professionals holding off a much larger but poorly equipped force.