The Dog Soldiers — Hotamétaneo’o in Cheyenne — were the most feared and most independent of the Cheyenne military societies.

They occupied a specific social and military niche: their warrior members lived somewhat apart from the rest of the Cheyenne bands, more mobile and more exclusively focused on warfare than the family-centered bands of the civil chiefs.

By the 1860s, the Dog Soldiers had become the primary vehicle for armed resistance to American expansion among the Southern Cheyenne.

Their leaders in this period included Tall Bull, White Horse, and Roman Nose — warriors of exceptional ability and fierce commitment to maintaining Cheyenne territorial claims through force.

Roman Nose, who died at the Battle of Beecher Island in 1868, was perhaps the most famous of the Dog Soldier warriors — a man whose reputation for courage in battle was extraordinary even by the demanding standards of plains warrior culture.