Fort Larned.—In the fall of 1859 Capt. George H. Steuart, commanding Company K, First United States cavalry, was sent out with his company to establish a mail escort station on the line of the Santa Fe trail. On Oct. 22 he selected a site on the south bank of Pawnee Fork, 8 miles from the mouth, and his camp was known as "Camp on Pawnee Fork" until Feb. 1, 1860, when it was named "Camp Alert." On May 29, 1860, pursuant to General Order No. 14, the post was named Fort Larned, in honor of Col. B. F. Larned, at that time paymaster-general of the United States army. The reservation included a tract of land four miles square, but the extent was not officially declared until the issuing of General Order No. 22, from the headquarters of the Department of Missouri, dated Nov. 25, 1867. The first buildings were of adobe, but in 1867, when the reservation was officially established, sandstone buildings were erected. In the early part of 1870 frame additions to the subalterns' quarters were built, and further improvements were made in 1872, when the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railroad was completed to the fort. The agency for the Arapahoe and Cheyenne Indians was maintained at Fort Larned for several years, but it was discontinued in 1868. Late in the '70s it became apparent that the necessity for a military post at this place no longer existed, and in Jan., 1880, Senator Plumb, from the committee on military affairs, recommended the passage of a bill to provide for the sale of the reservation to actual settlers. The bill did not pass at that time, but by the act of Congress, approved Aug. 4, 1882, the secretary of war was directed "to relinquish and turn over to the department of the interior, to the public domain, the Fort Larned reservation, to be sold to actual settlers at the appraised price, not more than a quarter-section to any one purchaser."