The lawmen brought the wounded Isbell to Tahlequah, where Thomas telegraphed Marshal Yoes about the fight. Thomas soon returned to Rabbit Trap, where he learned that Christie had been wounded but escaped the burning building. Many in the community resented Thomas and the other lawmen because of their actions against Christie and his family.

Dr. Bitting considered Christie’s injury a serious one but not critical. The bullet had smashed Christie’s nose, ruining his good looks, and left him blind in his left eye. A vindictive hatred now burned in Christie’s heart. Along with Ned’s own wounds, his son had been shot and his home destroyed — all for a crime he had not committed. Christie swore he would never surrender or be taken alive. He said he bore no officer enmity personally but would shoot whenever they came within range of his gun. Christie said there was only one man whom he would like to shoot, Bub Trainor, who was doing all he could to assist the officers. But Trainor never came within range of Christie’s Winchester.

Christie’s friends and relatives installed him in a rock fort on a hilltop less than a mile west of Ned’s burned cabin. They stocked the fort with food, water and ammunition and also cleared the trees from the top of the hill, making Ned’s Mountain virtually impregnable. Feeling secure in the rock fort with his guards, Christie sent word to Heck Thomas where he could be found, telling the deputy marshal to come on up if he thought he could capture him, and they would shoot it out.

On November 12, Heck Thomas returned to Rabbit Trap with a posse that included Bub Trainor. After seeing Christie’s rock fort and hearing Christie’s challenges to them, the deputies determined it would take a large regiment of U.S. militia to stand up to Christie and the powerful defense surrounding him. Thomas did not want to expose his men needlessly to danger, so he called off the assault.

Thomas would not attempt to capture the outlaw again. For a time, Christie enjoyed comparative peace as he and James recovered from their wounds. Their friends and relatives helped Christie build a new home just east of the burned one, across Bitting Creek. It was a special two-story house, double-walled with sand poured between the walls, some said. It had a root cellar, just one door and no regular windows, but the upper story of the house did have portholes through which Ned could fire when deputy marshals threatened. He stocked his fortified house well with food and ammunition.

Christie’s eldest daughter, Mary Gritts, and her year-old daughter, Charlotte, moved in with the family. Ned’s nephew, 14-year-old Arch Wolf, sometimes known as Little Arch, spent much of his time there, too. Christie delighted in having his family about, and many young people in the neighborhood regarded him as a hero.

During the summer of 1890, though, Ned Christie’s reputation as an outlaw continued to grow. Store robberies and other depredations in the area were blamed on him. The support of many former friends dropped away, because they felt his criminal activities were becoming too violent to condone.

In Fort Smith, the reward for the arrest and delivery of one Ned Christie at the Jail in Fort Smith was increased to $1,000. Marshal Yoes and Judge Parker sat back, confident that it would only be a matter of time before someone brought in the wily Cherokee outlaw.

Lawmen roamed the woods in the Going Snake District, hunting Christie like a rabbit, in 1891 and ‘92. More than a few times, he shot at his pursuers. A legend began to build among the Cherokees that Christie was invincible, and as the outlaw’s reputation grew, Yoes became more irritable. It had been 5 1/2 years since the murder of Maples. Yoes determined to make an all-out effort to capture the slippery outlaw. He summoned Deputy Marshal Dave Rusk, who had been with Heck Thomas in the failed 1889 attempt to land Christie, and told him to get Christie at any cost.

Rusk and five other deputies approached Ned’s fortified house at dawn on October 12, 1892. The dogs barked, alerting Christie. In the ensuing fight, two of the deputies were wounded. Rusk set fire to an outbuilding, hoping the flames would ignite the house as had happened at Christie’s old home. But the outbuilding was not close enough this time. Next, the deputies tried dynamite, but the fuse refused to burn. Rusk then sent word to Marshal Yoes, saying they needed more help. Yoes replied that help was on the way and that Rusk and his posse should hold the fort by all means and get them this time.

The deputies continued their assault upon the cabin throughout the day and night, but they finally gave up because all their efforts had little effect. Marshal Yoes was undaunted, however. He now authorized a posse under the management of Gus York, who was not an officer but was said to be well posted in the locality where Christie lived. York designated Deputy Marshal Cap White as head of the posse.

Armed with a borrowed cannon that fired a 3-pound, bullet-shaped ball, York and White gathered a posse and set out from Fayetteville, Ark., toward Rabbit Trap. Along the way, they gathered more men. Among the posse were George Jefferson, Mack Peel and Dan Maples’ son Sam who had all been at the wagon camp at Big Spring the night Deputy Marshal Maples was shot down.

The posse reached the Cherokee Nation border shortly after sunset on November 2. After a short rest, they set off again. At 4 a.m. on November 3, under cover of darkness, the men surrounded the outlaw’s home and concealed themselves in the underbrush. York and White both knew that Christie kept a pack of dogs to warn him when intruders were near. Earlier, the deputies had heard dogs barking down in the hollow, but now the dogs were strangely silent.

Since the October 12 raid, Christie had stayed close to his fortified house. Inside that morning with Ned were his wife Nancy; daughter Mary; granddaughter Charlotte; Little Arch; Charles Hare, a young full-blood Cherokee who had recently joined the gang; and Charles Grease, a 7-year-old nephew of Nancy’s. James Christie was not at home. He may have been hunting overnight in the hollow and probably had taken the dogs with him.

Shortly after daylight on the 3rd, Nancy and Mary came out of the house briefly and then went back inside. Little Arch came out soon after, and when he refused to surrender, the battle was on.

Following Little Arch’s wounding, Gus York called for Ned Christie to surrender. To be sure the outlaw understood, York had Sheriff Ben Knight, a full-blood Cherokee, repeat the order in Cherokee. Christie responded with a hail of bullets. White told him to at least send out the women and children. Christie called Nancy and the others up from the root cellar and told them to leave. All of them did, except, for some unknown reason, young Charley Grease. About this time, according to the Oklahoma City Evening Gazette, James was intercepted while he was trying to take to his father two boxes of cartridges. The newspaper added that the outlaws inside the house kept up a perfect fusillade of bullets all during the day.

A crowd of Christie’s friends and relatives gathered below the wagon ford. They watched the house in silence as heavy smoke from the black powder drifted their way and stung their nostrils.

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