They were real people, with real inner lives, who made real choices about their situations.

They are invisible in the historical record.

The question of what her military engagements specifically looked like — the specific raids she led, the specific engagements she participated in, the specific decisions she made in the field — is only partially recoverable through the general outline of her war record and the specific incident with the Blackfoot raiders that Denig documented.

These gaps are not failures of this account or of the scholarship that preceded it.

They are the genuine limits of what a thin documentary record can provide.