Daily journals recount a scientific expedition's five-month trek into the Black Hills of the Dakotas to determine if rumors of gold were true, which the author describes as the most delightful summer of my life. He describes the natural landscape and its wildlife, eccentric characters, and politic

Lt. Col. Richard Irving Dodge’s journals, written with utter candor for his eyes only, are the fullest firsthand account we possess of Gen. George Crook’s Powder River Expedition against the Sioux and Cheyenne Indians, which culminated in Col. Ranald S. Mackenzie’s resounding destruction of Dull Knife’s forces on November 25, 1876. Editor Wayne R. Kime, with his customary flair, has transcribed the journals from Dodge’s pocket-size notebooks and has provided a pertinent introduction and well-crafted, thoroughly illuminating annotations. Dodge’s journals will clearly prove useful to specialists in U.S. -Indian relations and the Great Sioux War, but they will also appeal to a variety of readers because of Dodge’s lively style and his range of subject matter. With vigorous intelligence, he describes such topics as General Crook as a military leader and strategist, the merits of infantry versus cavalry against the Plains Indians, the effects of subzero weather in Wyoming on a large army far from its sources of supply, and of course, the elusiveness of military glory.

Beginning with the earliest prospectors, Gold Rush explores the impact of gold discovery in the Black Hills. While the United States Army struggled to deal with those trepassing on Indian lands, reporters dispatched colorful stories to eastern newspapers and entrepreneurs founded towns, freighted in goods, and developed related enterprises. Gold Rush also photographically retraces a portion of Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer's 1874 Black Hills Expedition route.