Every engagement in the 1877 flight carried its human costs.

Big Hole was different in kind, not just in degree.

The difference was the nature of the assault.

The other battles — White Bird Canyon, the Clearwater, Canyon Creek — were engagements between warriors and soldiers in which the non-combatant members of the nimíipuu community were not the primary targets.

The outcomes were terrible in various ways, but they were military engagements in the conventional sense.

Big Hole was an assault on a sleeping camp.