Robert Goldthwaite Carter and a detail of five men mounted a rear guard action against the Comanches, and the remainder of the unit retreated. This action on 10 October 1871, won Lt. Carter the Medal of Honor. Mackenzie's main column and the Tonkawa scouts, hearing the gunfire, advanced and probably saved the detachment from slaughter, as more Comanche had managed to surround the retreating unit. With the arrival of the main cavalry column, Quanah Parker and his warriors retreated. The Comanches fought their way up the walls of Blanco Canyon, sniping at the oncoming troopers and taunting their Tonkawa enemies before disappearing from the Army's sight as they went over the Caprock Escarpment, and onto the Llano Estacado, Carter lacerating his leg against a boulder in the process. Mackenzie pursued the Indians over the next few days, forcing them to abandon lodge poles, buffalo hides, tools, and most of their possessions as they fled. These were the necessities of life for the Comanche, and meant the coming winter would be unusually bleak, without shelter or accumulated food. The Army was able to catch up with the fleeing warriors, slowed by their families, in the late afternoon of October 12, 1871. Mackenzie was unable to attack them due to the arrival of an unseasonable "blue norther", (a winter storm from the Great Plains). High winds, blinding snow, hail and sleet halted the cavalry advance, and allowed the Comanche to again retreat safely. The cavalry force continued the pursuit the following morning, but the weather and conditions allowed the Comanche to disappear into the storm. Mackenzie ordered his troops to follow what the scouts believed was the Comanche trail for about forty miles, nearly to the vicinity of present-day Plainview, Texas. Given the deteriorating state of his men and horses, and low rations, Mackenzie reluctantly turned back. On October 15, 1871, the cavalry re-entered Blanco Canyon and Army scouts saw two Comanches spying on the troops on the walls of the Canyon. In the brief fight that followed their discovery, the two Comanches were killed, while Mackenzie himself, along with another soldier, were wounded. Despite his wound, Mackenzie and his force continued to the mouth of Blanco Canyon, where they rested for a week, awaiting supplies from Henry Ware Lawton. On October 24, 1871, Mackenzie decided to continue the campaign, and began marching towards the headwaters of the Pease River.