It was nervous work, in the thick, dark brush, and amidst the barbed prickly-pears that filled their flesh with sharp needles, all the worse because they struck unexpectedly.

Lieutenant Beale was hoping that now an open way lay before. They had avoided two outposts; were there others, still?

Ah! Kit Carson again flattened, motionless except that he kicked behind him and with touch of his bare foot signaled danger. Lieutenant Beale flattened; the Indian, third in the file, had flattened. The brush cracked; a horseman, dimly seen, was right upon them. He was another of the patrols. His figure towered huge as he halted, at Kit Carson's very head. He got off his horse; and shielding himself from the chill, damp breeze, stood there.

What was the matter? Was he searching? Should he be killed? And what then? Young Lieutenant Scale's heart pounded so that Kit Carson afterward said he had heard it beating "like a maul."

The sentry struck flint and steel. As some tinder in his hands caught, they might see that he was lighting a cigarette. The glow revealed his olive face, his flashing eyes, and the blanket shrouding him to his chin; it momentarily revealed the brush under which the two Americanos and the Indian were lying.

Whether they had been seen, who might tell? The sentry remounted, in careless manner, and slowly rode on—but perhaps to give the alarm and bring reinforcements to beat the brush. Lieutenant Beale broke. He could stand the suspense no longer. He was not used to so many close calls without action. They are the hardest of all to bear. And to crawl on and on, in this way, over rocks and cactus, made his heart sick. He would rather stand up and challenge the enemy.

He crawled ahead to Kit.

"Kit, we're gone. We can't escape. Let's jump and fight it out."

Kit Carson laid hand upon his arm, and steadied him.

"No, no, boy. I've been in worse places before and got through."

Those were good words. Kit Carson knew, if anybody did. It was fortunate that he had come! The Indian might have got through, but Lieutenant Beale, never. Even Alex Godey, who had a great reputation as a scout and path-finder, had been captured.

They kept on, Kit Carson leading; narrowly dodged other patrols—for the outskirts of the hill seemed alive with them. They finally met no more, and Kit announced that they were through, he thought, at last.

But they found disappointment. Their route was cut by a wide, open valley covered only with stones and cactus. They dared not stand up; they might yet be seen. It was two miles across, and they hitched along, on their knees and on hands and knees, every foot of the way, while the rocks and cactus tortured them.

Here, where the brush grew high, Kit stopped and appeared to be relieved.

"Put on yore shoes, boy. We're out of the trap and we can make better time."

Hurrah! Lieutenant Beale laid his hand to his belt. What!

"I've lost my shoes, Kit."

"So've I. That's mean, but we can't help it. Come on. We've a long way yit; we daren't line in direct. Thar'll be more o' those patrols watchin' the trails into San Diego."

They hastened as best they might, on a circuit to avoid the trails. The country was rough and rolling. When day dawned, they left the mesas and kept to the dense brush of the canyons; were almost lost, so crooked their path; but the Indian guided them, and constantly sniffed for the salty air from the ocean. In the middle of the day they rested; their soles, knees, and hands were raw, and body and limb burned with the cactus; their throats were parched for lack of water.

At evening they smelled the ocean. The Indian said that they were within twelve miles of San Diego. From a high point they might have seen the glimmer of the Pacific. Kit Carson spoke.

"We'd better divide up, I think. Then one of us will get through. That's safer than travelin' together. Lieutenant, you head off to southward; amigo (that to the Indian boy, in Spanish), you go on straight; I'll take around north'ard, whar the Mexicanos probably are thickest to close the Los Angeles trail. Whoever gets in fust will report without wastin' any time."

"All right, sir," agreed the lieutenant.

"Bueno (Good)," muttered the Indian, nodding.

It was understood. The lieutenant and Kit shook hands; and they three separated, to steal swiftly away in the waning twilight.

At San Diego, Commodore Stockton had landed sailors and marines to reinforce the American Riflemen in San Diego. He was building Fort Stockton, to command the town. The frigate Congress and the sloop-of-war Portsmouth swung at anchor in the narrow channel of the harbor.

He had learned of the plight of General Kearny, and was just starting a relief column upon a night march for the hill, when at nine o'clock one of his sentries challenged a dark figure laboring in.

"Halt! Who goes there?"

"Amigo, amigo (Friend, friend)!"

'Twas the Indian boy. He had arrived first. The sentry called the sergeant of the guard, the sergeant of the guard took the boy to the officer of the guard, and the officer took him at once to the commodore.

The Indian was still telling his story in breathless Spanish, when another of the couriers arrived—carried by two marines. He was Lieutenant Beale, unable to walk.

Away trudged the relief party; the Indian and the lieutenant were placed in bed and the surgeon was summoned. The lieutenant had grown delirious—babbled and tossed and moaned. His boy lay twitching with pain and weariness, but uttered never a sound.

Where was Kit Carson? He staggered in about three o'clock in the morning. Had been obliged to wander and hide before he struck a way through. He had chosen for himself the longest and the hardest route. That was like him, and that was proper for the oldest and the most experienced. Now he, too, needed a surgeon. The bandy-legged, long-bodied, toughly-sinewed little Kit Carson who had faced many a scrape and "scrimmage" on plains and mountains, was "all in."

After this night we do not know what became of the Indian. His name never was recorded; he has been forgotten; all of which is a pity, because he risked his life to serve a new people and a new flag.

In the morning Lieutenant Beale was transferred aboard the Congress, and placed in the sick-bay. He was invalided for more than a year—did not really recover until after he resigned from the navy in 1852; he rose to be brigadier general in the Civil War, was United States minister to Vienna in 1876, and while ranching on two hundred and seventy-six thousand acres of land in California died, aged seventy-one, in 1893.

Through several days the surgeon thought that he would have to cut off Kit Carson's feet. But he saved them, and the plucky Kit marched north to Los Angeles with the rescued Kearny column.



CHAPTER XVIII

THE HOTTEST CHASE ON RECORD (1864)

TWO IN AN ARMY WAGON

When in the eastern part of the United States the Civil War flamed up, another war broke out in the western part. The Indians of the Plains saw their chance. While the white men, who had been busy forcing peace upon the red men, were foolishly killing each other, the red men saw themselves free to strike, and clean the buffalo country.

So the Sioux, the Cheyennes, the Kiowas and many of the Arapahos arose, to close the wagon trails, plunder the stage stations, drive out the settlers, and save the buffalo.

The result was the great Indian war of 1864. The Government hastily sent what troops it could—mainly Volunteer cavalry and infantry, assigned to fight the Western Indians instead of the Southern soldiers. Thus two wars were being waged at once.

The white Americans had extended their towns and ranches clear across the continent. Through Kansas and Nebraska there were ranches scattered clear to the Colorado mountains. Denver was growing into a city. Beyond the mountains the Mormons had built another city at the Great Salt Lake. The Overland Stage was making daily trips over the trail between the Missouri River and California. Another well-traveled stage and emigrant trail ran from the Missouri River through central Kansas, south of the Overland Trail, to Denver. And the freight wagons for New Mexico plied between Leavenworth and Kansas City, and Santa Fe, over the old Santa Fe Trail.

There were yet no railroads across the plains. But the Union Pacific of the Government's Pacific Railway was surveyed out of Omaha, for Salt Lake City and beyond; and its Kansas Division, known as the Kansas Pacific, was starting up the Kansas River, for Denver. To protect the wagon route through Kansas, and the advance of the railroad (which was following the stage road), the Government located a line of military posts; the same as upon the Overland Trail farther north, in Nebraska and westward.

The first was Fort Riley, just outside of Junction City, where the Republican River joined the Kansas River. Beyond, there was Salina; and Ellsworth on the Smoky Hill River; and southward, to guard the Santa Fe Trail over which huge quantities of Government supplies for the Southwest were being hauled, there were Camp Zarah at Walnut Creek of the Arkansas River, Fort Larned up the Arkansas, and so forth.

Many of the posts were only camps or cantonments, and received their fort name later.

In November, 1864, Captain Henry Booth started from Fort Riley to inspect the posts south to the Arkansas River in Colorado. Lieutenant Hallowell was his companion. They had planned to travel comfortably in Lieutenant Hallowell's light spring wagon instead of in a heavy jouncing army ambulance—a hack arrangement with seats along the sides and a stiff oiled-cloth top.

Lieutenant Hallowell had a canvas or wagon-sheet cover fitted over his wagon: stretched tightly upon bows and puckered to enclose the rear end with the exception of a hole in the middle there about the size of one's head. Now the spring wagon looked like a small prairie-schooner or emigrant outfit.

Captain Booth obtained from the quarter-master department the best span of Missouri mules at the fort. He and the lieutenant would do their own driving, and be independent. Whereupon, provisioned for the trip, they gaily set out, in the frosty morning, escorted by a mounted detachment of Kansas United States Volunteers under Lieutenant Van Antwerp.

This was particularly Kiowa and Cheyenne country, as soon as they left the Kansas River; and if any Indians were more dreaded than the boldly riding, hard fighting Cheyennes, those were the never quitting Kiowas.[1]

They and their allies the Comanches were the guardians of the Santa Fe Trail. The Kiowas ranged the farthest north and fought the soldiers on the Leavenworth cut-off or Government road which entered from the Kansas River.

Going down, on this road, Captain Booth and Lieutenant Hallowell had no trouble at all. They arrived safely at Camp Zarah, without having sighted a sign of Indians. The captain inspected the post. The next morning he directed his escort to ride on; he and Lieutenant Hallowell would catch them in about half an hour.

But it was nearer three hours later when the wagon rattled over the log corduroy bridge across Walnut Creek, on the road for the Arkansas River and Fort Larned, west up-stream.

They had the road all to themselves. The escort were out of sight, but probably would wait for them; and anyway they felt no fear as they jounced over the rutty, frozen road. They rather looked forward to shooting buffalo from the wagon with their revolvers. The mules were lively; Lieutenant Hallowell drove (he was an expert with the "ribbons"); the captain helped him with the whip; and they caroled songs together.

After a time the lieutenant changed his tune, to remark:

"What's the matter with the buffalo? They're grazing wide of the road to-day. That looks as though Injuns were about."

This was Captain Booth's first season on the plains, so he only laughed easily.

"Oh, pshaw! They say back at Zarah that there hasn't been an Injun seen from the trail in ten days. I fancy our escort scared the buffalo. Now like as not we won't get a shot."

"Just the same, it's queer the buffalo are all out yonder in the open instead of grazing on the river bottoms. If any Injuns are at hand, they'd be hiding along the river."

"Oh, pshaw!" laughed the captain. "We're safe enough. I'll get you back to Lizzie. Don't you worry yourself."

"Lizzie" was the lieutenant's bride, at Fort Riley. He had left her for the first time since they were married.

Drawn by its rapidly trotting mules the wagon trundled about three miles farther—and the captain had a glimpse of something new, moving over the low brush ahead and toward the river. It seemed to be a flock of wild turkeys bobbing along, now above the brush, now settling into it. N-no? What, then? Men on horses.

He clutched the lieutenant's arm.

"Look there, Hallowell. What is it?"

The lieutenant looked only once.

"Injuns, by Jiminy! We're in for it."

He whirled his team around and with voice and shake of lines quickened them to a gallop on the back trail for Zarah, six miles.

The captain objected.

"Wait! Hold on, Hallowell. They may be part of the escort."

Lieutenant Hallowell was wiser. This was his second year in Indian country.

"No, no! I know Injuns when I see 'em. Gid-dap! Yip!"

"Well, by thunder, I'll see for myself."

So the captain clambered from the seat to the side step, and hanging hard to the front wagon-bow, took a good look.

"Indians, aren't they?" asked the lieutenant, braced to the lines.

"Yes; and coming like blazes!"

That they were. The objects that had resembled turkeys were their feathered heads rising from a ravine. They were fully out now; had dropped their buffalo-robes, and all exposed in the open were tearing for the road.

"How many, Cap?"

"About thirty."

"Oh, dear!" sighed young Lieutenant Hallowell, "I'll never see Lizzie again."

"Never mind Lizzie. Let's get ourselves out of here, first."

"All right, Cap," replied Lieutenant Hallowell, briskly. "You do the shooting and I'll do the driving."

He snatched the whip, slipped from his seat to the very front end of the box; and letting the lines lie lax began to lash and yell. The mules bolted free, twitching the wagon over the ruts.

Captain Booth sprawled inside; grabbed the lieutenant's one navy revolver, and with his own two tumbled over the seat and dived to the pucker-hole at the rear end, to fight the Indians off.

There were thirty-four of them, racing on up the road at top speed.

"How far now, Cap?" called the lieutenant, while he yelled and lashed.

"Still coming fast, and getting closer."

"Yip! Yip! Gwan with you!" Pretty soon—

"How far now, Cap?" The lieutenant could see nothing, behind, and the Indians had not uttered a sound.

"Still coming. 'Most within shooting distance."

"Yip! Hi! Yip! Yip!" And—"Whack! Whack!"

The captain, sitting upon a cracker-box and peering out through the hole, was tossed from side to side. He could see the Indians very plainly. They were paint-daubed Kiowas, and well mounted—armed with bows and lances and a couple of guns. Their striped faces grinned gleefully as their quirts rose and fell and their heels hammered their ponies' sides. The captain almost believed that he was dreaming a bad dream. But here they were, and how he and the lieutenant were going to escape he did not yet know.

"What they doing now, Cap?"

"Getting ready—" and he didn't need to report. The two guns of the Indians spoke, the whole band screeched horridly, the bullets passed diagonally through the wagon-cover between the passengers, Lieutenant Hallowell yelled louder and threshed faster, Captain Booth yelled, the mules lengthened a little, the wagon bounced higher, the Indians had reached it, they divided right and left and swooped past on either side while their arrows whisked and thudded, Captain Booth frantically fired his pistol and heard the lieutenant call: "I'm hit, Cap!"

He turned quickly. Horrors! Lieutenant Hallowell had an arrow stuck in his head above his right ear! But he was whipping and yelling, regardless. The captain tumbled forward, to help him; grasped hold of the shaft.

"Hurt much?"

"No. Pull ahead. Hi! Yip! Gwan with you!"

Out came the arrow. Its point had lodged only under the skin.

The Indians had charged beyond the mules, in delivering their arrows. They wheeled, and back they came. The captain fired, but he was being jounced so, that he could not aim. He started rearward, to receive them at that end—

"I'm hit again, Cap!" called Lieutenant Hallowell, a second time.

So he was. This time an arrow had stuck over his left ear and was hanging down his shoulder. Whew! The captain had to pause and pull it out.

"Hurt, Hallowell?"

"No, not much. Hi! Yip! Gwan with you!" And—"Whack! Whack!"

The lieutenant had said: "You do the shooting and I'll do the driving;" and he had not changed his mind about it. But driving was no joke.

The captain hustled to rear. The Indians were about to make a third charge. They appeared to be having great sport, chasing this mule-wagon. There was one withered old warrior close behind now, following in the middle of the road, on a black pony, and shooting arrows at the pucker-hole. The captain ducked from the hole just in time. The arrow whizzed through, struck the walnut back of the seat and split it. The arrow point came out on the other side! That was a powerful bow.

The arrow shaft hummed so, as it quivered, that the captain killed it as he would a wasp; he jumped for a shot at the old warrior—missed him—another arrow, from the left, grazed his pistol-arm crazy-bone and his pistol fell into the road. He grabbed to catch it, the mules lurched and out he pitched, half through the pucker-hole, so that he hung doubled on his stomach, over the end-gate, clutching at nothing.

A fraction more, and he'd have been in the road, too. The Indians whooped gladly, ready to pick him up. He barely managed to reach for the wagon-bow, and haul himself back. Wh-whew!

There was no time for cogitating. He plucked a second revolver from his holsters—

"Right off to the right, Cap! Quick!" called the lieutenant, sharply.

It was an appeal. To the front end scrambled Captain Booth. An Indian was just loosing an arrow at Hallowell; the captain let loose at the Indian; both missed—the arrow stuck in the side of the wagon, and the Indian himself veered away in a hurry, frightened if not hurt.

That was poor shooting, all around. But to shoot from galloping pony or from bouncing wagon is uncertain work.

Back scrambled the captain. He had a great deal to do. He found another warrior—a young fellow—keeping pace with the wagon, in the foot-trail where the wagon teamsters walked when traveling with their freighting outfits.

The pony's head was actually within arm's length from the pucker-hole. The captain struck at it with his revolver; the Indian, hanging low, kept whipping the pony and forcing him in again. The Indian began to notch an arrow upon the bow-string; he was going to shoot. As the captain leaned, to get a shot in first, the arrow point threatened not three feet from his breast!

He could not see the Indian's body; could see only half his leg, hooked over the pony's back. All that he might do was to strike at the arrow; then he dodged back. Up rose the Indian; out popped the captain. Down sank the Indian; back dodged the captain. Up rose the Indian; out popped the captain. Down sank the Indian—up he rose and "Bang!!" spoke the captain's navy six-shooter. It was a chance shot, but the bullet tore through the Indian's heart, and dropping the halter, he toppled, dead.

"I've killed one of 'em, Hallowell!" cheered the captain, excitedly.

"Hurrah! Bully for you! Hi! Yip! Yip!" And—"Whack! Whack!"

He never quit driving, not Lieutenant Hallowell!

The Indians had halted, to examine their dead warrior, and yell over him.

"What they doing now, Cap?"

"Holding a funeral."

"Gwan! Yip! Gwan with you!" urged the lieutenant, trying to squeeze more speed out of the lathered mules.

Captain Booth sat on the cracker-box, watching through the pucker-hole. Had the Indians given up?

"Cap! Quick! Here! Right off to the left!" That was the lieutenant. The captain whirled about; he saw a lone Indian racing close to the fore end of the wagon, aiming an arrow at Lieutenant Hallowell. There was no time to change position for a clear shot.

"Hit him with your whip! Hurry up! Hit him!"

The lieutenant flung the lash sideways, instead of over the mules. The knot of the cracker must have caught the Indian in an eye, for he lost his bow, clapped both hands to his face and scurried away, howling.

"Good shot! Hi! Yip! Betty! Joe! Gwan with you!"

The Indians behind were yelling louder.

"What's the matter, Cap?"

"They're coming again like Sam Hill!"

"All right. Guess we'll make it. Hi! Yip!" And—"Whack! Whack!"

Yes, the Indians were coming. In a minute they had overhauled the wagon, bombarding it with arrows as they passed on both sides. Captain Booth turned around on his box, to watch them through the front end. He did not know that his body bulged the wagon-sheet cover.

"Hit again, Cap!" called the lieutenant.

"Where now?"

"In the back."

The captain started to rise; could not get up. He was pinned fast to the canvas, by an arrow. But he wrenched free—never felt his wound and hurried to the lieutenant.

"Right in the back, Cap."

Sure enough. The feathered tip of an arrow was sticking out from under the slat of the seat-back behind the lieutenant. The captain pulled at it, the lieutenant squirmed.

"Hurt you much, Hallowell?"

"Some. No matter. Pull it out. Hi! Gwan! Yip!"

The arrow was red with blood for six inches, but the lieutenant did not even glance at it. He kept driving.

The captain scuttled for the rear. He did not get far. The lieutenant called.

"Off to the left, Cap! Right off to the left! Quick!"

Another Indian was there in the favorite position, scarcely three yards from the driver, and aiming his arrow. The captain sprang for the front, leveled his revolver—it was empty! So:

"Hey! Bang!" he shouted.

Ha, ha! Down lay the Indian, low upon his pony's neck; he hammered hard with his heels and away he scoured.

The captain sprawled for the rear once more, and tried to load. How those mules ran! How the lieutenant yelled and whipped! How that wagon jolted! And his powder spilled when he poured it into his old-style cap-and-ball pistol.

He had not succeeded in loading a single chamber when the lieutenant again called. He was constantly in trouble, poor Lieutenant Hallowell. The Indians knew that he couldn't shoot.

"Off to the left, Cap! Hurry!"

Still another Indian, making ready; occupying the same old spot. The captain hurried; leveled the revolver; shouted "Bang!"

But the trick did not work. This Indian was wiser. He only grinned and notched his arrow, and took his time for a sure shot. Something had to be done to get rid of him. Angry clear through, the captain leaned as far as he dared and hurled the revolver. Good! The heavy barrel landed full upon the Indian's ribs, cut a long gash—and much astonished the Indian veered off for repairs.

Only one revolver was left, and it had been emptied. But the captain was given no pause, to load.

"I'm hit again, Cap!" the lieutenant called.

"Whereabouts now!"

"In the hand."

An arrow was fastened to the base of the thumb of his whip hand. Its shaft waggled, but its head remained firm.

"Shall I pull it out?"

"No. Can't stop. Hi! Gwan! Yip! Yip with you!"

The lieutenant's hand did not falter, as he plied the whip. Presently the arrow flopped free and was gone, taking some of the flesh with it.

The Indians seemed to have shot most of their arrows, but were not done. Now one of them rode to the head of the left mule and commenced poking with his lance, to force the team into the hedge of tall, stiff sunflowers that lined the trail.

Lieutenant Hallowell hauled with all his might on the rein; Captain Booth climbed forward to the step opposite the Indian and kicked the nearest mule. He threw his revolver. It did not strike the Indian, but it struck the pony, and the pony ran away.

Other Indians promptly came up. The captain threw both sabers, and both scabbards. Wagon and mules were being surrounded, and still more Indians were pursuing and closing in rapidly.

The captain had an idea. He tossed out his suitcase. The Indians behind stopped, to inspect. They slit the suit-case open. In a moment one was wearing the officer's sash tied around his head; another was wearing the captain's dress-coat, another his best shirt, another his undershirt and another his drawers! It was a funny sight. But others came on.

"What they doing?" gasped the lieutenant.

"Wearing the clothes from my valise. Out goes yours, next."

"All right. Anything to gain time."

Camp Zarah was only a mile and a half before.

The clothes delayed the Indians behind; those already here were still prodding at the mules. The lances proved too slow. A warrior fitted an arrow, drew to the point, and let go. He had intended to kill a mule, but he only wounded it in the fore leg. The blood spurted—ah! Look out! Great Caesar! That was a lucky shot, for the wagon. The other mule saw the blood, and smelled it. He bolted at such a gait that he actually out-ran the Indians while he dragged the wagon and the disabled mule!

Camp Zarah was in sight. Would they make it? Alas! The mules were stumbling; were near spent. They had run a great race, but they could not hold to it forever. The Indians were gaining rapidly.

"If we're taken, Cap, we'll fight; we'll kick, scratch, bite, till they kill us. We won't stand for torture," panted the lieutenant.

"I agree."

The lieutenant yelled and whipped; the captain yelled and kicked the wounded mule in the flanks; the Indians arrived, and prodded; the mules dodged the lances—they seemed to know. Only a few yards from the bridge did the last Indian pursuer give up the chase; and as the wagon rattled over the corduroy the carbine of a sentry at the post sounded the alarm.

"No need to drive so fast now, Hallowell," spoke the captain. The jolting was terrific.

"I sha'n't stop till we're clear across," rapped the lieutenant.

The staggering mules white with lather and crimsoned with blood, the wagon as full of holes as a sieve, they pulled in to the commanding officer's tent. They were safe.

Lieutenant Hallowell could not stand up. Was he fatally hurt?

"What is it, Hallowell, old fellow?"

"I dunno. Can't move only so far."

"No wonder! It's your coat-tails, man!"

The tails of his overcoat had worked outside and were pinned fast to the wagon box by four arrows. He could not use his right arm, either. The steady threshing with the whip had almost paralyzed it.

He was helped into the surgeon's office. His right hand was badly torn, and the wound in his back serious. Captain Booth watched the wounds being dressed; didn't feel very comfortable, himself, somehow.

"What makes you shrug your shoulders so, captain?"

"I don't know. There's a curious smarting."

"I should say there was! Why, you're wearing an arrow-head, man!"

So he was. When he had wrenched free from the wagon-sheet cover he had taken an arrow-head with him. It had to be cut out.

They both got well. Twenty-two arrows were found in the wagon box; the whole vehicle was a sight! As for the plucky little mules, they never amounted to much for service, after that, but they managed to hobble around in their pasture and enjoy their reward as veterans, on a pension of the best grass and water.



[1] See "Boys' Book of Indian Warriors."



CHAPTER XIX

RELIEF FOR BEECHER'S ISLAND (1868)

AND A RATTLE-SNAKE IN THE WAY

The Plains Indians—the Sioux, the Cheyennes, the Arapahos, the Kiowas, the Comanches—had fought hard, during the war of the white men in the East, to clear their hunting grounds; but when in 1866 the Civil War had ended they found that the Americans were pressing forward more strongly than ever.

Two iron roads were being surveyed through the buffalo country; new gold fields, in Montana, were being opened and a white man's wagon-road, protected by forts, was being laid out to reach them by a short cut through Wyoming.

With two thousand of his Oglala Sioux, Chief Red Cloud undertook to close this wagon-road; and close it he did. He beleaguered new Fort Phil Kearney in northern Wyoming, wiped out one detachment of eighty-one men, attacked other detachments, cut off the supplies from all the forts, stood firmly in the path; and in 1868 the United States Government agreed to withdraw all soldiers and leave the country to the Sioux.[1]

But the iron trails continued. There were the Union Pacific in the north, the Kansas Pacific on the south. The first drove its stakes and laid its rails along the great white wagon-road of the Oregon Trail and the Overland Trail, which already had split the buffalo herds. The Sioux and the Northern Cheyennes fought it in Nebraska, they fought it in Wyoming; until in 1868 it still had not been stopped, it was lunging on straight for the mountains, and in the treaty that promised him the hunting grounds north of it Chief Red Cloud also promised to let it alone.

The Cheyennes, their allies from the Sioux and the Arapahos, made no such promise regarding the Kansas Pacific. The Union Pacific "thunder wagons" had divided the buffalo into the northern and the southern herds; now the southern herd was to be divided again. A line of forts was creeping on; the soldiers were increasing; and the "thunder wagons" were to travel back and forth between the Missouri River and Denver, frightening the buffalo that grazed in central Kansas, and bringing in hunters to kill them.

"If the road does not stop," said Chief Roman Nose of the Cheyennes, "I shall be the white man's enemy forever."

By the fall of 1868 the rails had reached four hundred and twelve miles, almost clear across northern Kansas, to Fort Wallace near the border of Colorado. Every mile of the last two hundred and more had been a fight; wellnigh every mile of these same had been stained red; all western Kansas was a battle ground, upon which settlers, soldiers, surveyors and track-builders gave up their lives. The Cheyennes lost heavily, but they showed no signs of quitting. They were getting worse.

At the end of August General Phil Sheridan, who commanded the Military Division of the Missouri, directed Major George A. Forsythe of the Ninth Cavalry to enlist fifty scouts and ride against the Indians—fight them in their own way. He left Fort Wallace on the morning of August 29; struck a broad Indian trail leading northward; early in the morning of September 17 was surprised by six hundred Cheyennes, Sioux and Arapahos, and was forced to entrench upon a little island in the Arikaree River of eastern Colorado not far from the Nebraska line; and here he stood off the charges of the Indian horsemen—five hundred at once.

All that day the fight was waged. Major Forsythe was wounded three times; Lieutenant Beecher was killed; Surgeon Mooers was dying; all the horses were dead; horse-flesh was the only food and the enemy had ringed the island with rifle-fire.

This evening volunteers were called for, to steal through the deadly circle and carry messages to Fort Wallace, one hundred miles south. There was no lack of men eager to try; Scouts "Pet" Trudeau and "Mack" Stillwell were chosen.

Scout Trudeau was a grown man, but Jack Stillwell was only nineteen, and boyish looking. Nevertheless, he, too, was a man. He knew Indians and he knew the plains; he was able to give a good account of himself. Scout Trudeau asked no better comrade on the danger trail.

They prepared to leave in the dark. At midnight they shook hands with their officer and their nearest fellows. With a piece of horse-flesh for food, with revolvers at belts and carbines in hand, and their boots slung from their necks, in their stockinged feet they quietly vanished, wrapped in their blankets so as to look as much like Indians as possible.

At first Trudeau led, because he was the older; toward the end Jack Stillwell led, because he proved to be the stronger. As they crossed from the little island to the dry bottom of the river-bed, they turned and walked backward. On the sand their stockinged feet made tracks like moccasin tracks, all pointing for the island. The Indians would not know that anybody had escaped.

Quiet reigned all around, except for the yapping of the coyotes. But they two were well aware that the camps of six hundred warriors were scattered everywhere, resting only until daylight.

Having entered the dry channel of the river, they did another wise thing. They crossed it, instead of keeping on down; and crawling, they stuck to the high ground, even the tops of the bare ridges, instead of taking to the ravines and washes.

"Never do what the enemy expects you to do," is a military maxim, although rather hard to follow in modern fighting. The natural trail for scouts through the lines would be by the river bottom, and by other low ground out of sight. The Indians, Scout Stillwell learned afterward from chiefs themselves, were watching all the river channel and all the ravines, this night. The two scouts fooled them, and found the ridge trails thinly guarded. Those Indians not on guard were sleeping out of the breeze.

Through every yard of their crawl the hearts of the two scouts were in their throats. To creep amidst the dark, this way, with Indians before, behind, on right, on left—who knew where?—was nerve-racking. When the stars began to pale only two miles had been covered. Slow work, careful work, fearful work! Now for a hiding-place. They would be seen instantly by daylight.

They cautiously slipped on, for a little arroyo or dried wash, bordered by brittle weeds. Even this might be occupied ahead of them. If it was, then that meant death or capture—and capture meant death also, by torture in revenge for warriors slain. They had agreed to fight to the last cartridge, and then to use their last cartridge on themselves after destroying their message.

Cautiously, cautiously they harked and peered; they gently parted the weeds and wormed in, closing the weeds behind them again. The arroyo was empty. In the first tinge of gray they crouched under the high bank overhung by the weeds, to wait.

The night had passed, and here they were, abroad in the very thick of the Indians, to face a day of unknown perils. It was to be a long, long day.

The stars faded; the sky brightened; squads of Indians galloped by, to the fight. The sun rose, flooding the world above the arroyo. Gun-shots spatted dully—fast and faster; the fight at the island was on.

From hour to hour they listened, hoping that the shots would not cease. While the firing continued, the island was holding out. The firing did continue, and that nerved their hearts afresh. Their comrades were bravely battling while depending upon them.

The arroyo grew stifling hot. They had no water, and saved their horse-beef for an emergency. They had been tired when they started—already had fought one whole day through, on slim rations. But they dared not move on. When they ventured to peep over the edge of the arroyo, they saw an Indian camp of women and old men in plain view—could catch the voices, now and then. The country was an open country; nothing could stir above its surface without being sighted.

Finally the sun set, the dusk gathered, and in darkness again they crept out. A full day gone, only two miles gained in a day and half a night—two miles in one hundred! But the island was still held by their comrades.

They put on their boots, and to-night they made better headway. Twice they had to flatten and muffle their breathing, for parties of Indians rode almost upon them. The country seemed to be alarmed; Indians were riding back and forth constantly. All the landmarks were shrouded and changed; they headed south and easterly by the stars—and at daybreak were obliged to hide in a hurry, for they somehow were running right into the main village of the Cheyennes!

They had come ten miles from their arroyo, and were at the South Republican River in western Kansas. This time they crawled along under the river bank, and into the tall coarse grass of a bayou that bordered the river. They could see the village; they could hear the squaws chanting the mourning songs for dead warriors, and might watch them carrying bodies to the scaffolds.

Had that village known two white scouts were so near—! Why, once during the day a party of warriors watered their horses not thirty feet from where Scouts Trudeau and Stillwell were lying; and time after time other war parties crossed and recrossed the river here. It was a ford.

The second long day passed. In the darkness of the third night out they crossed the river themselves, and side-stepping the village and its wolfish dogs struck south once more. They had to dodge night-roving Indians, as before, but they traveled steadily; there was no sign, by any of the Indians they met, that the island had been taken. This gave hope, still.

"We're getting through, Jack," spoke Scout Trudeau, toward morning. "But we'll have to do better. Will you risk day travel with me, so we can finish up. There are anxious hearts, back yonder; and by this time the boys are suffering something fearful."

"I'm game, 'Pet.'"

So they did not stop, with daylight. Keeping to the coulees or washes, and the draws, and the stream beds, they zigzagged on. They had counted upon the Indians all being attracted in to the island, by this time; but they had counted too soon.

About eight o'clock, while they were crossing a high rolling prairie, Scout Trudeau suddenly dropped. Scout Stillwell imitated—did not hesitate an instant.

"Don't move! Don't breathe! Look yonder!"

A long file of mounted Indians had emerged around the base of a low hill not a mile away, off to the north-west, and were coming on.

"We'll have to cache ourselves in a hurry."

The table-land was bare and level. For a moment their hearts sank. Then they noted a patch of tall, stiff yellowed weeds growing from an old buffalo wallow. In the wet season the buffalo had rolled in the mud here, until they had scooped a little hollow; the hollow had formed a shallow water-hole; the rains had collected and sunk in, and provided moisture for the weeds long after the surrounding soil had dried.

It was the only cover in sight, and for it they crawled.

The Indians came straight on. Had they seen? If so, goodby to life and to the message.

The two scouts had intended to break the weeds and cloak themselves with the stems—a camouflage of old days and new. The screen was very thin, for concealment on all sides. But the Indians granted no time. Trudeau and young Jack might only squirm into the very middle. An old buffalo carcass was here. It had not been disturbed. Scraps of brittle hide still clung to its frame-work of ribs. All that they might do was to crawl close to the frame-work and lie beside it.

The Indians halted before reaching the wallow; they could see that it contained no water. But presently one of their young men rode forward, surveying the landscape; posted himself not one hundred yards from the wallow, and there he sat, on his horse, like a sentry.

The two scouts hugged the ground; it was white with alkali, and as seemed to them they were clearly outlined, through the yellow weeds. Then an alarming thing happened. The buffalo carcass had not been the only occupant of the wallow. Jack nudged Scout Trudeau, and pointed with his thumb. A king rattle-snake, over four feet long and as thick as their arm, was gliding for them, and the carcass.

His head was up, his tongue shot in and out; possibly the carcass was his tipi—at any rate, they had annoyed him, and he was declaring war.

Now what to do? If they waited, he would keep on coming! Horrors! If they moved, he would coil, and rattle. They dared not shoot; they dared not wait—could not stand having him crawl under them or over them, and perhaps strike; they dared not let him rattle.

A rattle-snake does not rattle for nothing. The Indian sentinel would hear, would gaze, would be curious, would suspect, would approach; and then—death to two scouts, despair for the island.

Fascinated, they watched the great, yellowish blotched snake. He loitered, basked, his tongue played, his fangs showed, he came on, little by little. Oh, if he would only veer off! But he was determined. What an ugly, obstinate brute! What an abominable trick! And yonder, still sat the vigilant Indian.

They waited until the snake was within six feet. They could fairly smell his musky odor, and he was growing angrier and angrier—was likely to coil and rattle, any moment. They were at their wits' end, their nerve almost breaking, what with the menace of the snake and the menace of the Indian look-out, at the same time.

Jack Stillwell solved the problem. He was chewing tobacco.

"Sh! I'll fix him," he whispered.

He slightly raised—at the movement the snake coiled, rattle sticking up in the center, head poised, tongue licking wickedly. And aiming his best, Jack spat.

The stream spurted truly. It drenched the beady-eyed, flat-iron head, flooded the swaying neck and spattered the thick scaly coils. With a writhe and a hiss the blinded snake threshed to one side and burrowed for shelter. Jack chuckled and shook. He had cleared the decks of one enemy.

Nearly at the same time the Indian look-out rode away, following the retiring band. That was a great relief. Between the snake and the Indian scout Trudeau and Stillwell had experienced, as the record says, the most terrible half-hour of their lives.

The collapse of the danger left them both weak. They now had found out that it was not yet safe to travel by day; so they stayed here in the wallow, with the buffalo carcass for company, till evening. In this next night's journey poor Trudeau broke. The strain was proving too much. They had eaten nothing since leaving the island, they had crawled for miles, had traveled by night, through the midst of the Indians, for fifty miles; had escaped again and again only by the sheerest good fortune. He broke, and young Jack had all that he could do, for a time, to keep him from seeing imaginary forms and running amuck over the plain, or else killing himself.

Toward morning he succeeded in quieting him, making him drink heartily from a stream and swallow some of the horse-beef. They pushed on. It was a foggy day, and they did not stop. Jack now had to furnish the brains and the strength, and do the bracing. But he was equal to it; he selected the trail and helped his staggering partner. Neither was braver than the other, but one had more reserve power.

At noon they were within twenty miles of Fort Wallace. That fourth evening after dusk they were challenged by the post sentry, and tottered on in with their message from the island in the Arikaree, one hundred miles to the northward.

Jack Stillwell went with the relief column from the fort. Scout Trudeau could not; he was exhausted. He never did recover, and the next spring he died; he had given his life to save the lives of others. Scout Stillwell followed many another danger trail, until the Indian wars upon his plains were over; then he became a lawyer and a judge, and in 1902 answered the last roll-call.



[1] See "Red Cloud Stands in the Way," in "Boys' Book of Indian Warriors."



CHAPTER XX

THE DEFENSE OF THE BUFFALO-HUNTERS (1874)

WHEN THE COMANCHE MEDICINE FAILED

The Plains Indians were losing out. They saw their buffalo grounds growing smaller and smaller. The Sioux and Northern Cheyennes had not stopped the Union Pacific Railroad. It had cut the northern herd in two. The Cheyennes and Arapahos and Dog Soldiers from other tribes had not stopped the Kansas Pacific Railroad. In their last great raid they had been defeated at the battle of Beecher's Island, as the fight by Major Forsythe, at the Arikaree in September, 1868, was known. The Kansas Pacific had cut the southern herd in two. It was bringing swarms of white hunters into the Kansas buffalo range; they were slaughtering the game and wasting the meat.

Then, in 1872, still another iron road, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe, pushed out, south of the Kansas Pacific, and took possession of the old Santa Fe Trail, the wagon-road up the Arkansas River. The wagon-road itself had been bad enough; for the emigrants were gathering all the fuel and killing and frightening the buffalo. The snorting engines and swift trains were worse. The buffalo were again split. From southern Kansas north into central Nebraska there was no place for the buffalo, and the Indian.

This year, 1872, the white hunters commenced to kill for the hides. They skinned the carcasses, and let the meat lie and rot, except the small portion that they ate. Many of the buffalo were only wounded; they staggered away, and died untouched. Many of the hides were spoiled. For each hide sent to market, and sold for maybe only $1.50, four other buffalo were wasted.

In 1873 the slaughter was increased. Regularly organized parties took the field. By trains and wagons the buffalo were easily and quickly found; the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad shipped out over two hundred and fifty thousand hides; the Kansas and Pacific and the Union Pacific twice as many. At the plains stations the bales of hides were piled as high as houses. In order to save time, the hides were yanked off by a rope and tackle and a team of horses. Almost five million pounds of meat were saved, and over three million pounds of bones for fertilizer; but the meat averaged only about seven pounds to each hide taken—and that was trifling. Evidently an enormous quantity of buffalo were still being wasted.

It was considered nothing at all to shoot a buffalo. So-called sportsmen bombarded right and left, and kept tally to see who should kill the most. Passengers and train-crews peppered away from coach, caboose and engine, and the trains did not even halt.

In 1874 there was a great difference to be noted among the herds. They were getting wild; the hunters laid in wait at the water-holes, and killed the buffalo that finally had to come in, to drink. In the three years, 1872-1873-1874, no less than 3,158,730 were killed by the white hunters; all the Indians together killed perhaps 1,215,000—but they used these for food, clothing, and in trade for other goods. A full million more of buffalo were taken out by wagon and pack horse. So this sums up over five million. The plains were white with skeletons; in places the air was foul with the odor of decaying meat.

The buffalo had two refuges from the white killer: one far in the north, in the Sioux country; the other far in the south, in the Comanche and Kiowa country of present Oklahoma and Texas.

By a treaty made in 1867 the United States had promised that white men should not hunt south of the Arkansas River. But in 1874, when the buffalo in Kansas and Nebraska had become scarcer, and the price of hides was so low that long chases and waits did not pay out, the hunters gave no attention to the treaty, and located their camps south of the river, in forbidden territory.

The Indians awakened to the fact that soon there would be no buffalo left for them. For years they had depended upon the buffalo, as food, and glue, and clothing and lodge covers. They had believed that the buffalo were the gift of the Great Spirit, who every spring brought fresh numbers out of holes in the Staked Plain of western Texas, to fill the ranks. Now the bad medicine of the whites was about to close these holes; the buffalo would come north no more.

In the spring of 1874 the Kiowas, Comanches, Cheyennes and Arapahos held a council in Indian Territory, to discuss what was to be done. They decided to make one more stand against the white hunters, especially those south of the Arkansas.

It was arranged. The Comanches had sent a peace pipe to the council; all the chiefs smoked, and agreed to peace among themselves and war against the Americans who were destroying the buffalo reserves. I-sa-tai, a Comanche medicine-man, announced that he had a medicine that would make the guns of the whites useless. Many of the Cheyennes and Apaches and others believed him.

The first point of attack should be the white hunters' camp at Adobe Walls, in the Pan-handle of northern Texas. That was the nearest camp, and was one of the most annoying.

"Those men shall not fire a shot; we shall kill them all," I-sa-tai promised. "We shall ride up to them and knock them on the head. My medicine says so."

A war party of seven hundred Red River Comanches, Southern Cheyennes, Arapahos, Kiowas and Apaches were formed, to wipe out Adobe Walls.

Quana Parker, chief of the Kwahadi band of Comanches, became the leader. The Kwahadi Comanches had not signed the treaty of 1867, by which the other tribes sold their lands and settled upon places assigned them by the Government. They continued to roam freely, and hunt where they chose. They always had been wild, independent Indians of Texas.

Chief Quana Parker himself was a young man of thirty years, but a noted warrior. Like his name, he was half Indian, half white—although all Comanche. In 1835 the Comanches had captured a small settlement in east Texas, known as Parker's Fort; had carried off little John Parker, aged six, and little Cynthia Ann Parker, aged nine. Cynthia grew up with the Comanches, and married Peta Nokoni or Wanderer, a fine young brave who was elected head chief of the Kwahadis. Their baby was named Quana, and now in 1874 was called Quana Parker.

In 1860, or when he was fifteen years old, his mother had been retaken by the Texas Rangers. She lived with her brother, Colonel Dan Parker, four years. Then she died. Boy Quana was Indian; he stayed with the Comanches. He won his chiefship by running away with a girl that he loved, whom a more wealthy warrior tried to take from him. Many young men joined him in the hills, until his rival and the girl's father were afraid of him, and the tribe elected him head chief.

The Texans feared him, if they feared any Indian; all Indians respected him; in June, this 1874, he marshalled his allied chiefs and warriors for the raid upon the buffalo hunters. He had more faith in bullets and arrows than in I-sa-tai's medicine, but I-sa-tai went along.

There were two Adobe Walls, on the south branch of the Canadian River, in Hutchinson County, Texas Pan-handle. The first had been built in 1845 by William Bent and his partners of Bent's Fort, as another trading-post, to deal with the Red River Comanches. William Bent had sent one of his clerks, named by the Cheyennes Wrinkled Neck, to build it.

After it had been abandoned, in 1864 General Kit Carson had attacked the winter villages of three thousand Comanche, Kiowa, Apache and Arapaho warriors and their families, here. He was just able to get his four hundred men safely away.

The second Adobe Walls had been built only a year or two ago. It was down-river from the old Adobe Walls, and formed a small settlement where the buffalo-hunters came in, from their outside camps, to store their hides and get supplies, and so forth. There were Hanrahan's saloon, and Rath's general store, and several sheds and shacks, mainly of adobe or dried clay, and a large horse and mule corral, of adobe and palisades, with a plank gate. Such was Adobe Walls of 1874, squatted amidst the dun bunch-grass landscape broken only by the shallow South Canadian and a rounded hill or two.

The Rath store was the principal building. It was forty feet long, and contained two rooms—the store room, and a room where persons might sleep. It looked not unlike a fort; the thick walls had bastions at the corners, the deep window casings were embrasured or sloped outward, so that guns might be aimed at an angle, from within.

In the night of June 24 twenty-eight men and one woman were at Adobe Walls. Excepting Mrs. Rath, and her husband, and Saloon-keeper Hanrahan, and two or three Mexican clerks and roustabouts, they mainly were buffalo-hunters. Billy Dixon, government scout, was in with his wagon and outfit; he expected to start for his camp, twenty-five miles south, in the morning. The Shadley brothers and their freighter outfit were here. And likewise some twenty others.

It was not to be expected that Indians would attack Adobe Walls itself; they were more likely to raid the camps: but the general store seemed to be a great prize—the Comanches and Kiowas and Apaches and Arapahos and Cheyennes counted upon plunder of clothes and flour and ammunition, and I-sa-tai's medicine had told him to try Adobe Walls first.

The night was warm. Scout Dixon slept out-doors, in his wagon; the Shadley brothers slept in their wagon; several men slept upon buffalo-robes, on the ground; others were in the Rath store and in the saloon.

Shortly after midnight the men in the saloon were awakened by the cracking of the roof ridge-pole. They were afraid that the roof might be falling, so they piled out to fix it. Their noise aroused the men in the wagons and on the ground; and all together they worked. By the time they were done, sunrise was showing in the east, and Billy Dixon thought that it was not worth while to go to bed again.

He prepared to set out for his buffalo-camp. Pretty soon he sent one of his men down to the creek bottoms, to bring in the horses. The man came running back, shouting and pointing.

"Injuns!"

A solid line of feathered heads, sharply sketched against the reddening sky, was charging in across the bottoms, directly for the store and saloon and corral. The drum of galloping hoofs began to beat in a long roll, and a tremendous war-whoop shattered the still air.

"Look out for the horses!" Scout Dixon yelled, He tied his own saddle-horse short to the wagon and grabbed his Sharp's buffalo-gun. He thought that this was a raid for a stampede. But instead of scattering to round up the grazing stock the Indians rode straight on—in all his experience as scout and hunter they were the boldest, best-armed "bunch" that he had ever seen; and they meant business. They were here to wipe out the whole place; had warriors enough to do it, too.

From one hundred yards bullets spattered. Without waiting longer he dived for the saloon and shelter. There were six other men in the saloon, mostly jerked from slumber in all kinds of undress. Firing right and left and whooping, the Indians poured through among the buildings like a torrent; from the saloon windows the white men and Mexicans replied.

Chief Quana Parker's cavalry had high hopes. He led. Last night I-sa-tai's medicine had been strong. This morning a foolish Cheyenne had killed a skunk—a reckless thing to do, for a skunk was a medicine animal. Whether this broke the medicine, I-sa-tai did not say. They were to find out.

Had the ridge-pole not cracked and got the hunters up; or had the Indians arrived only fifteen minutes earlier, while the hunters were busy with the ridge-pole, they truly would have captured Adobe Walls and killed everybody in it. The medicine almost worked, but not quite. Just the killing of the skunk had broken it.

For a brief space the seven men in the saloon were hard beset. They appeared to be the only defenders of the settlement. The heavy sleepers in the store and the house were not yet enough awake to know what had occurred. On their rapid ponies the Indians flashed past between the saloon and Rath's, darted here and there around the corners, flung to earth and ran to pry at windows and doors.

Horses were down and kicking, in the street. An Indian scampered from the Shadley brothers' wagon, his arms full of plunder; but a bullet from the saloon dropped him like a stone. Nothing was heard from the two Shadleys; probably they were dead in their wagon.

The saloon was thick with powder-smoke; the air outside quivered to the whoops and jeers and threats. Would the store hold out? Hurrah! The boys in there were up and shouting, too. Shots spouted from the windows.

The first charge had passed on. Chief Quana reformed his ranks, for another. Abode Walls, now rudely awakened, hastily prepared. There were the seven men in the Hanrahan saloon—a low, box-like affair, sitting by itself at one side of the store; there were Store-keeper Rath and his wife, and a couple of hunters, in the Rath house, on the other side of the store; and in the long store itself there were twelve or fourteen men.

Peeping out, dazed and bootless and coatless just as they had sprung from their blankets, they saw a wonderful sight. Fully six hundred Indians were coming again, in a solid front.

The long feathered war-bonnets of the Comanches and Cheyennes flared upon the breeze; the painted, naked riders lashed and urged—"Yip! Yip! Yip!"; the ponies, of all colors, jostled and plunged, and their hoof-beats drummed; above the tossing crests bare arms upheld a fringe of shaking guns and bows and lances. Unless he had been at Beecher's Island and witnessed the charge of Roman Nose, not a man of Adobe Walls ever had seen so terrible a spectacle as this, under the pink sky of the fresh June morning.

On a hill to the right I-sa-tai the medicine-man stood, all unclothed except for a bonnet of sage twigs. He was making medicine.

The buffalo-hunters and the two or three freighters, the clerks and roustabouts and Saloon-keeper Hanrahan and Store-keeper Rath jammed their guns through every window and cranny fronting the charge, and waited. It seemed as if the red cavalry surely would ride right over the place and flatten it.

Four hundred yards, three hundred yards, two hundred yards—"Yip! Yip! Yip!" "Hi! Hi!"; the hoof-beats were thunderous; it was an avalanche; smoke puffed from the ponies' backs, bullets whined and thudded—and the guns of saloon and store and house burst into action.

They were crack shots, the most of those Adobe Walls men; had the best of rifles, and plenty of cartridges. Down lunged ponies, sending their riders sprawling; the white men's guns spoke rapidly, the noise of shot and shout and yell was deafening; the charging line broke, careering right and left and straight through. On scoured the shrieking squads, but leaving dead and wounded ponies and limping, scurrying warriors.

But this was not the end. Anybody might know that. The Adobe Walls men busied themselves; some stayed on watch, others enlarged their loop-holes or desperately knocked holes through the thick adobe, for better shooting. The windows were too few; the whole rear of the store itself was blank. The door had been battered, and now sacks of flour were piled against it, to strengthen it.

Indians, dismounted, skulked everywhere, taking pot-shots at the loop-holes, and forcing the men to keep close under cover.

Some seventy-five yards behind the store was a large stack of buffalo-hides. From the saloon Scout Billy Dixon saw an Indian pony standing beside it, and might just glimpse a Comanche head-dress, around the corner of the stack.

He aimed at the head-dress and fired. The headdress disappeared, but the Indian must have dodged to the other corner, for Rath's house opened fire on him, and he dodged back again. Scout Dixon met him with another bullet. The Indian found himself in a hot place. His pony was killed. He had to stay or run; so he stayed, and cowered out of sight, waiting for a chance to shoot or to escape.

But that would not do. He was a danger to the premises, and should be routed. Scout Dixon guessed at his location, behind the hides; drew quick bead, and let drive. The heavy ball from the Sharp's buffalo-gun—a fifty-caliber bullet, on top of one hundred and twenty grains of powder—tore clear through the stack. Out dived the Comanche, jumping like a jack-rabbit and yelping like a coyote at every leap, and gained cover in a bunch of grass.

"Bet I scorched him," Billy Dixon chuckled.

Other guns were still cracking, trying to clear the skulkers and to hold off the main body. The warriors were concealed behind buffalo-hide stacks, in sheds, and lying flat upon the prairie. The firing never slackened; there were rushes and retreats. The scene, here on the dry plains of northern Texas, reminded one of the sieges of settlers' forts in Kentucky and West Virginia one hundred years ago. The Indians were outside, the frontiersmen were inside, and no help near.

The sun rose. By this time the Indians hiding close in had been disposed of, in one way or another. They were shooting from two hundred yards—but that was a dead range for the white men's guns. The buffalo-hunters asked nothing better.

Their rifles were sighted to a hair. The hunters were accustomed to lie all day, on the buffalo range, and from their "stand" to leeward plant bullet after bullet of their Sharp's .50-120, Ballard .45-90, and Winchester .44-40 behind the buffalo's shoulders. A circle eight inches in diameter was the fatal spot—and from two hundred yards they rarely varied in their aim.

An Indian who exposed himself two hundred or three hundred yards away stood a poor show of escape.

The Chief Quana men soon learned this. They already knew it, from other fights, upon the buffalo range itself. They had grown to respect a buffalo-hunter at bay.

Now they withdrew, by squads, to six hundred, seven hundred, eight hundred yards; and firing wildly they sought to cover the retreat of their wounded and their warriors afoot. The Indians between the main party and the fort would spring up, run a few steps, and drop again before a bullet caught them.

Thus the fight lasted until the middle of the afternoon. The hunters inside the walls had no rest, but they ventured to move about a little. The men in the saloon bolted out, and ran into the store. From here Scout Dixon, scanning the country, saw a moving object at the base of the hill, eight hundred yards distant. The Indians now were mostly out of sight, beyond. He commenced shooting at the tiny mark, correcting his aim by the dust thrown up when the bullets landed. The old single-shot Sharp's, either fifty caliber or the forty-four sharp-shooter Creedmore pattern fitted with special sights, was the favorite gun of the buffalo-hunters. Scout Dixon kept elevating his rear sight, and pumping away. Finally he thought that he had hit the mark; it did not move. After the battle and siege he rode over there, to see. He had shot an Indian through the breast, with a fifty-caliber ball at eight hundred yards.

Toward evening the Indians stopped fighting. I-sa-tai's medicine had proved weak, for the hunters' guns seemed to be as bad as ever. But the battle was not yet ended, as Adobe Walls found out, the next morning. There were charges again; guns grew hot, the smoke thickened, the Indians were everywhere around, determined to force the doors and windows. The hearts and hands of the twenty-five able-bodied men never faltered.

On the evening of the third day the siege was lifted; for with the fourth morning no Indians were to be seen. All about, on the grassy plain between the town and the hills, dead ponies were scattered; the walls of the buildings were furrowed by bullets; rude loopholes gaped; and in the little street the dust was dyed red.

The two Shadley brothers had been killed, in their wagon; William Tyler, a camp hand, had been killed before he reached shelter. But the twenty-five others, and the brave woman, had stood off the flower of the allied Comanche, Kiowa, Arapaho, Apache and Southern Cheyenne nations.

How many Indians had been killed nobody knew. Nine were found among the buildings and within one hundred yards; four more were discovered, at longer range; in the hills the signs showed that the loss had been at least thirty or thirty-five.

Early in the morning, while Adobe Walls was busy looking about, a lone buffalo-hunter ambled in. He was George Bellman, a German whose camp lay only eight miles up the Canadian; here he lived alone—he had not heard the shooting nor seen a single Indian, and the ponies strewn over the prairie much astonished him.

"Vat kind a disease iss der matter mit de hosses, hey?" he asked, curiously.

"Died of lead poison," answered Cranky McCabe.

The heads of twelve of the Indians were cut off and stuck up on the pickets and posts of the corral; were left there, to dry in the sun, for a hideous warning. But the buffalo-hunters decided to hunt no more, this season. The Pan-handle country was getting "unhealthy!"

So much had Chief Quana and his brother chiefs and warriors achieved. They had spoiled the buffalo hunting. After a short time many of the Arapahos and Kiowas and Apaches hurried back to their reservation in Indian Territory. The Cheyennes and others raided north, through western Kansas and eastern Colorado. The Chief Quana Comanches went south, to their own range. He and his Kwahadis or Antelope Eaters stayed out on their Staked Plain for two years; they were the last to quit. Then he accepted peace; he saw that it was no use to fight longer. Moreover, he became one of the best, most civilized Indians in all the West.

For his Comanches he chose lands at the base of the Wichita Mountains near Fort Sill in southwestern Oklahoma. He built himself a large two-story house, well painted and furnished; he lived like a rich rancher, and owned thousands of acres of farm and thousands of cattle; he wore the finest of white-man's clothes, or the finest of chief's clothes as suited him; he was still living there, in 1910, and no man was more highly respected. He rode in the parade at Washington when Theodore Roosevelt was inaugurated President. President Roosevelt paid him a return visit, for a wolf hunt.

But the old-time buffalo-hunters who were in Adobe Walls on June 24, 1874, never have forgotten that charge by the Quana Parker fierce cavalry.



CHAPTER XXI

WHITE MEN AT BAY AGAIN (1874)

THE "FIGHT OF THE PRIVATES"

When the news of the attack upon Adobe Walls had gone forth, and reports of other raids followed thick and fast, the army in Texas, Kansas and Indian Territory were ordered out. Plainly enough, there was a great Indian uprising. The reservation peace had been broken.

Colonel Nelson A. Miles of the Fifth United States Infantry was directed to march from Fort Dodge on the Arkansas River just below Dodge City in south-western Kansas, and strike the Indians in Texas. He took eight troops of the Sixth Cavalry, four companies of the Fifth Infantry, a section of artillery, twenty-five white scouts and a party of Delaware Indian scouts who were led by their gray-haired old chief, Fall Leaf.

Three other army columns, one from Texas in the south, one from New Mexico in the southwest, one from Indian Territory in the northeast, also were starting from the same place: the Staked Plain region of western and northwestern Texas.

Colonel Miles refitted at Camp Supply, one hundred miles south of Fort Dodge, and pushed on toward Adobe Walls.

His advance of scouts and one troop of cavalry were just in time to help save Adobe Walls from yet another attack by Comanches and Kiowas. But the little garrison of buffalo-hunters were still full of fight, and the heads of the twelve Indians still grinned down from the pickets of the corral.

The Indians fled southwest, for the Staked Plain. Colonel Miles pursued and had a brush or two. The marches were long and hard, through a very hot, dry country where the only water was bad. Soldiers suffered so from thirst that some of them opened veins in their own arms and sucked the blood.

The Staked Plain country is a desert except after the rains or where irrigated by ditches. It forms a high flat table-land whose edges drop sharply off in curiously pillared cliffs. Therefore the early Spanish called it El Llano Estacado—the Palisaded Plain; but the Americans believed that the name was given because the only trails across it were marked by stakes.

In later days it proved to be a vast range for cattle and horses; in the older days it was the stronghold of the Comanches, who knew every water-hole and every cave.

Drawing near to the Staked Plain, southwest of Adobe Walls, Colonel Miles decided that he must have more supplies. The trains were far in the rear, and may have been cut off. On the afternoon of September 10 he directed that dispatches be sent back, for the trains or else for Camp Supply on the North Canadian River in northwestern Oklahoma which at that time was Indian Territory.

The men selected were Sergeant Z. T. Woodall of I troop, Sixth Cavalry; Private John Harrington of H troop, Private Peter Roth of A troop, Private George W. Smith of M troop; and Citizen Scouts Amos Chapman and Billy Dixon—the same Billy Dixon of Adobe Walls. After the Quana Parker fight he had joined the army service. Scout Chapman had been stationed at Fort Sill, on the reservation in Indian Territory.

The four soldiers wore the regulation summer campaign uniform of Plains days. Their shirts were dark blue flannel. The light blue cavalry trousers were reinforced at the seats with white canvas. Upon their heads were high-crowned black felt hats. Upon their feet were the high cavalry boots. Scouts Chapman and Dixon wore buckskin trousers edged with long fringes, Indian style. Their blue flannel shirts had rolling sailor collars. Upon their heads were white wool hats. Upon their feet were moccasins.

Those were the army and scout uniforms in 1874.

They were armed with the stubby Springfield carbines, caliber forty-five, and Colt's six-shooter revolvers taking the same cartridge. In their belts were hunting-knives and two hundred rounds, each, of ammunition. They rode light—their only extra covering was their coats tied behind their saddles. They did not take blankets nor shelter-tents; for they had more than a hundred miles to go, every mile of it, to the North Canadian, through roving Indians, and might have to race for their lives.

Of course their horses were the best in the whole column, and they themselves were accounted as among the bravest of the men. They well knew, like everybody else, that it would be nip and tuck to get through; but they felt that they had been honored by the orders.

So they rode out, in the evening of September 10. They trotted for the northeast, this night made a short camp, set on at daylight, covered fifty more miles before night, camped again, and at sunrise the next morning were approaching the Wichita River in what then was northern Texas but now is southwestern Oklahoma. From a prairie swell Amos Chapman pointed ahead.

"We're in luck, boys. There's the advance guard of the wagon train."

That was cheering news. They had done famously. The supplies were coming and possibly their dangerous trip had ended. They rode on, to meet the cavalry guard of the train. Scout Dixon suddenly spoke:

"Those aren't white soldiers! They're Injuns! They've seen us, too. We've got to run or fight."

"Yep; Injuns and heap Injuns," rapped Scout Chapman. "But we can't run. They'd catch us in a hurry and there's no timber to stand 'em off from. We'll have to face 'em and do the best we can."

When first sighted, the horsemen had been a mile distant, slowly riding among the grassy billows, and appearing and disappearing. They had dipped into a draw, had come out less than a half a mile away; a second, much larger party had galloped into view; all were spreading into a broad front and were tearing forward. The sun shone on their red blankets, their painted feathers and their tufted lances.

"Look to your guns and cinches, boys," ordered Sergeant Woodall, his weathered face grimly set. "We're good for 'em. We've seen their kind before. Shall we make a running fight, Chapman?"

"No. There's too much cover for 'em. They'd lie in this grass like snakes and cut us off. Head into that first ravine, yonder. Maybe we can stand 'em off from there till help comes."

They six had only a moment for tightening their girths and unbuttoning their holster flaps.

"For'd! Gallop!" barked the sergeant. They galloped. They and the foremost Indians reached the ravine, on opposite sides, at the same time. They plunged in, could go no farther. It was the work of only an instant to vault from the saddles, leave the six horses to be held by Private Smith, and level their carbines from the brush of the rim.

The Indians volleyed from the ravine edge.

"They've got me," Private Smith called. He came running and dodging, his right arm dangling and bloody. "I had to leave the horses—couldn't hold 'em."

A moment more, and twenty-five of the Indians charged straight through the ravine, below, and up again; they were waving their blankets and yelling, and took five of the horses with them. It was done in a jiffy. Lead rained in, searching the ravine slope where the six white men were lying.

"This is no place," panted Scout Chapman. "We'll all be dead, without a chance. The open is better, where we can see around. Come on, everybody."

"As skirmishers, men. Keep together and keep low," Sergeant Woodall ordered.

Out they lunged, into the very face of the enemy. The Indians gave way before but closed in behind.

"Fall back, fall back! Steady, now. Hold your intervals," Sergeant Woodall warned. "We'll try for shelter beyond. Mebbe we can make Gageby Creek. Don't waste a shot, but shoot to kill."

The sixth horse had followed them. Good old Baldy! An Indian dashed for him—Sergeant Woodall took quick aim and the pony scoured off, its saddle-pad empty. But Baldy whirled and was lost.

The short, thin line—four soldiers, two scouts—knelt, fired, ducked and ran a few steps, knelt and fired again. The Indians (there were one hundred and fifty) formed their circle; skimming around and around, shooting and whooping. Wherever the squad looked, they saw Indians. And they saw never a token of shelter: all the vast prairie was a sea of grass, unbroken by a tree. In spots the grass grew saddle high, but that was covert for the enemy too. When the squad halted, to rest, the Indians dismounted and commenced to crawl closer, through the grass. Then the six men had to jump up, and run on, shouting and firing. The Indians before leaped upon their horses again, and opened out; the Indians behind were afraid to shoot, for fear of killing their comrades opposite; but the Indians on either side pelted with bullets and arrows.

"None of us ever expected to get out alive," says Private Harrington. "We all determined to die hard and make the best fight possible."

The circling Indians charged to within twenty-five yards. Hanging almost under their ponies' bellies they shot from there, while those farther out daringly stood erect upon their saddles like circus riders and also fired at full speed; then racing in closer they swung low and fired again. Wherever the six men faced, before, behind, right, left, there the scurrying riders were.

They were Comanches and Kiowas. The Comanches were noted as the most skillful horsemen of the plains. They all were having fun. A medicine-man appeared to be their leader. He wore a head-dress of buffalo-horns and an eagle-feather trail streaming to his pony's tail. Time after time he charged to within twenty-five yards, at the head of his warriors, firing with a pistol and urging the braves to ride over the white men.

"Never mind him," Scout Chapman said. "He's harmless; he can't hit anything. Tend to the others."

The fight had begun at six in the morning. The long, long day slipped slowly by; the sun had changed from east to west, and the hour was four o'clock. By this time the six men were pretty well worn out. Private Smith's right arm was useless, but he shot left-handed with his revolver. Of the two hundred cartridges apiece, only a few were left. The Indians knew; they were growing even bolder. They all had dismounted, except the medicine-man, and were skulking through the grass. They had no fear that the white men could get away.

The medicine-man rode up once more, this time to within twenty yards. As he passed he taunted and fired his pistol. That was his last challenge, for Scout Dixon answered with a sudden bullet. Reeling, the medicine-man galloped away and they never saw him again.

But the end seemed near. No help had signaled. The Colonel Miles column was thirty-six hours' distant. Something had to be done before dark.

"You see that little knoll yonder?" gasped Amos Chapman. "We've got to make it. If we're caught here in this grass we're dead before morning. Now, all together, and don't stop. There we'll stay."

They advanced by steady rushes. The Indians knew. One by one they vaulted upon their ponies and dashed across the route. The six shot briskly and carefully, to clear the way. Fully twenty of the saddle-pads were emptied by the time the riders had reached a patch of tall grass which commanded the trail to the knoll. The ponies raced on and were rounded up by the squaws who followed the fight.

That was good shooting, and seemed to discourage the other Indians from trying for the grass, but they pressed hard behind, driving the white men on. Rear as well as front had to be protected, and an hour was consumed in approaching the knoll.

Then, with the knoll almost within grasp, up from the tall grass leaped the twenty or more Indians supposed to be dead. From fifty yards they poured in a smashing volley. Down crumpled Private Smith, in a heap. Sergeant Woodall was shot through the side, John Harrington through the hip, Peter Roth through the shoulder. It had been an Indian trick. The warriors had purposely tumbled from their ponies, here; the warriors behind had purposely driven the white men within short range.

But the five gained the knoll; they had to leave Private Smith for dead.

On the top of the knoll there was an old buffalo wallow—a shallow cup like a small circus ring. The cup was only a foot or two deep, but the grassy rim helped. The Indians veered from the black muzzles resting upon the ring, and drew off, to wait and jeer, and form another circle.

"We mustn't show we're wounded, boys," Sergeant Woodall ordered, sick with his own pain. "Move about, act lively; we'll lick 'em yet. And save your lead for close quarters."

"Smith's not dead! I see him stirring!" cried somebody. "There he is! But he can't make in."

"They'll get him after dark, then," groaned Private Roth. "That's tough, fellows. I'd rather he was dead."

Amos Chapman laid down his carbine.

"They sha'n't get him. You boys keep those infernal redskins off me and I'll run down and pick him up and fetch him back before they can stop me."

Without waiting for answer, he dashed out, and down the little slope. He and Scout Dixon were the only two not disabled.

George Smith was lying seventy or seventy-five yards out. It was a long way to go, and a longer way back under a load. But Amos reached him, before the Indians knew what was up. Then—

"He wasn't a large man, one hundred and sixty or seventy pounds," said Scout Amos, afterward, "but I declare he seemed to weigh a ton. Finally I lay down and got his chest across my back, and his arms around my neck, and then got up with him. It was as much as I could do to stagger under him, for he couldn't help himself a bit. By the time I'd made twenty or thirty yards, about fifteen Indians came for me at full speed on their ponies. They all knew me [he had been on their reservation], and yelled, 'Amos! Amos! We got you now, Amos!' I pulled my pistol, but I couldn't hold Smith on my back with one hand, so I let him drop. The boys in the buffalo wallow opened up just at the right time, and I opened too, with my pistol. There was a tumbling of ponies and a scattering of Indians, and in a minute they were gone. I got Smith again and made my best time in, but before I could reach the wallow another gang came for me. I had only one or two ca'tridges left in my pistol, so I didn't stop to fight, but ran for it. When I was in about twenty yards of the wallow a little old scoundrel that I'd fed fifty times rode almost on to me and fired. I fell, with Smith on top of me; thought I'd stepped into a hole. The Indians didn't stay around there a minute; the boys kept it red-hot; so I jumped up, picked up Smith, and got safe into the wallow."

There—

"You're hurt, Amos! You're hurt bad, man!"

That was Billy Dixon.

"No, I'm not. Why?" panted Amos.

"You aren't? Why, look at your leg!"

Sure enough! One leg was shot in two at the ankle joint, and Scout Chapman had run twenty yards, with Private Smith pick-a-back—dragging his loosened foot and stepping at every stride on the end of the leg-bone!

"I never knew it," he said. And strange to add, from that day onward he never felt any pain.

The six were together again. Private Smith was conscious, but couldn't handle himself. He was fatally wounded. That didn't daunt his courage.

"Prop me sitting, boys," he begged. "Put me up where I'll do some good. You can shoot from behind me and I'll stop a few bullets, anyway."

"We'll not use you like a dead horse."

But he insisted on sitting with a pistol in his lap. He would have sat on top of the wallow, if they had let him. Amos Chapman tried to conceal his broken ankle; not a man there gave out a sign of wounds, to the enemy. While Billy Dixon dug with his knife and tin cup, the four others hastened hither-thither, serving the carbines. The Indians circled closer, swerving in and out, firing. It looked like a combat to the death. But the earth had been dug out and piled up, and just before sunset the Indians suddenly wheeled and raced away.

Pretty soon distant shooting was heard. Troops were coming? Rescue was due! No; for the darkness gathered, and although the Indians did not appear, no soldiers appeared, either.

This night a cold rain drenched the wallow and all the country around. The six had no food; their rations had been in the saddle-pockets of the horses. They would have had no water, except for the rain. They drank and washed in the puddles that collected; but they all, save Billy Dixon, were wounded, and the puddles colored red.

They did their best for George, who lay dying. For the rest there was nothing but watching and waiting, and wondering what would happen in the morning. They had scarcely two dozen cartridges.

At last the day dawned, lowering and dark and wet. No Indians were in sight; nothing was in sight but the sodden grass and the equally cheerless sky. George was dead; four out of their remaining five were so sore and stiffened that they could barely move.

"I'm going to leave you, boys," spoke Billy Dixon. "I'm not hurt yet, and it's up to me to take the back trail and find Miles. If I get through I'll find him within thirty-six hours. If you don't hear from him with relief soon after that, you'll know I didn't get through. But there's a chance."

They agreed. Scout Dixon refused to take more than four cartridges. That gave them five or six apiece, for the defence of the wallow. As he explained, if once he was surrounded fifty cartridges would be the same as four. He could shoot only one at a time, and the Indians would kill him.

So he strode bravely away, in a drizzle, and presently vanished. Sergeant Woodall, shot in the side; Private Harrington, shot in the hip; Private Roth, shot in the shoulder; and Scout Chapman, his ankle shot off, peered and listened and waited.

They had waited about an hour when through the mist they saw an Indian cautiously riding in. He was reconnoitering the wallow. Their hearts sank. They kept quiet until he was within point-blank range—they could see his red blanket, rolled beneath his saddle.

"I'll get him," Sergeant Woodall uttered; took good, long aim, and fired. But he was shaky, the light was poor, and he killed only the horse.

"No matter. An Injun afoot is an Injun out of business and needs another Injun to give him a lift," Scout Chapman consoled.

Listen! Scarcely had the crashing report of the carbine rolled across the prairie and the horse fallen kicking, when from the spot where the rider had been pitched there welled the clear notes of a cavalry trumpet: "Officers' Call!"

What? Private Roth scrambled to his feet.

"That man was no Indian, sergeant! He's a trumpeter—he's a cavalry trumpeter—he's signaling us! Thank God you didn't hit him."

"I see others," Amos cried, craning and squinting. "Yonder; out beyond. Coming at a trot—one man ahead—another man holding his stirrups. It's Billy Dixon! Billy's back, with a troop of cavalry, and they sent that trumpeter on before to find us."

"Give 'em a round in the air, boys, and a cheer, to let 'em know we're all right," ordered Sergeant Woodall. "I can hear the bridles jingle. All together, make ready, fire!"

"Bang-g-g-g! Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!"

The trumpet gaily pealed. Answering the cheer, three troops of the Eighth Cavalry led by Major W. H. Price and the puffing Billy Dixon surged in.

The "Fight of the Privates," or "Twenty-five to One," as it is known in army annals, had gloriously ended.



CHAPTER XXII

BUFFALO BILL AND YELLOW HAND (1876)

A PLAINS-DAY DUEL

The war parties of Kiowas, Comanches and Southern Cheyennes from the Indian Territory reservation rode about for a year, plundering settlers, fighting the soldiers, and trying to drive the buffalo-hunters off the range. Colonel Miles had charge of the campaign against them, which extended through the summer of 1874, and the winter, and well into the spring of 1875. Many brave deeds were done.

The Southern Cheyennes surrendered first, in March. Then the Kiowas and Comanches began to appear at Fort Sill, Indian Territory, and give themselves up. Chief Quana's Antelope Eaters were the last. They surrendered in June.

So the Military Department of the Missouri seemed a little more quiet; a few bands of outlaw Indians still roved in southwestern Kansas, southern Colorado, New Mexico and northern Texas, but the buffalo-hunters again established their camps as they pleased. General Sheridan, the commander of the whole western country to the Rocky Mountains, had said that the only way to bring real peace was to kill off the buffalo; then the Indians would have to stay on the reservations, or starve.

Trouble now thickened in the north, especially in the Department of Dakota and in Wyoming of the Department of the Platte. Forts had been planned in Chief Red Cloud's Powder River country of Wyoming, and miners were entering the Sioux and Northern Cheyennes' hunting reserve of the famous Black Hills of South Dakota. Another railroad, the Northern Pacific, was about to cross the northern buffalo range.

On their reservations in South Dakota the Sioux and Cheyennes were getting restless. Chief Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull the medicine worker stayed far outside, to hunt and fight as free men. They refused to lead their bands in, and warriors on the Dakota reservations kept slipping away, to join them.

In the spring of 1876 General George Crook, the Gray Fox, commanding the Department of the Platte, at Omaha, and General Alfred H. Terry, commanding the Department of Dakota, at St. Paul, started out to round up the Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull bands, in the Powder River and Big Horn Valley country of northern Wyoming and southeastern Montana. General John Gibbon was to close in, with another column, from Fort Ellis, Montana, on the west.[1]

Among the troops ordered to unite with General Crook's main column on the march, were the fighting Fifth Cavalry, with headquarters at Fort Hays, Hays City, Kansas, on the Kansas Pacific Railway half way between Fort Leavenworth and Denver. Their commander was Lieutenant-Colonel (brevet Major-General) Eugene A. Carr.

The Fifth were glad to go. They already had made a great record on the plains, protecting the Union Pacific and the Kansas Pacific railroads; were just back from scouting against the Apaches in Arizona; and now they eagerly unpacked their campaign kits for another round. "Buffalo Bill" Cody, their old chief-of-scouts, was sent for, in the East where he had been acting on the stage with Texas Jack. He came in a hurry, and was given three cheers.

The Fifth Cavalry were to rendezvous at Cheyenne. The four companies at Fort Hays went by railroad, first to Denver and then north to Cheyenne. On the seventh of June there they were. They marched north to old Fort Laramie. Here the regiment was ordered to guard the great Sioux and Cheyenne trail that crossed country from the South Dakota reservations to the hostile Powder River and Big Horn villages.

There were several skirmishes, but the traveling Indians got away. On July 1 the new colonel joined the regiment. He was Brevet Major-General Wesley Merritt, from General Sheridan's staff at Chicago division headquarters. As he was a full colonel, he outranked Lieutenant-Colonel Carr, and became commander.

On July 6 terrible word was received from Fort Laramie. Buffalo Bill first announced it, as he came out of General Merritt's tent.

"Custer and five companies of the Seventh have been wiped out of existence, on the Little Big Horn, by the Sioux. It's no rumor; General Merritt's got the official dispatch."

"What! When?"

"June 25. It's awful, boys."

Sunday, of last week! Twelve days ago, and they only just now heard! And while they had been longing for Indians, and envying other columns that might be having fights,—even a little jealous of the dashing Custer's rival Seventh, who were hunting Indians instead of watching a trail—this same Seventh had been battling for their lives.

Of course, reinforcements would be rushed in at once. The Fifth would have their chance. And sure enough, the order came for the Fifth Cavalry to march north in earnest and find the General Crook column in the Big Horn country.

The route lay from southeastern Wyoming north-west through Fort Laramie and Fort Fetterman (which was farther up the North Platte River), and on to the Big Horn. But suddenly the march was stopped. A dispatch from the Red Cloud agency of the Sioux and Cheyenne reservation said that eight hundred Cheyennes had prepared to leave on the next day, Sunday, July 16, to join Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull.

There was only one thing for General Merritt to do: throw his troops across the-war-trail between the reservation and the wagon-road of the white settlers to the Black Hills, and turn the runaways back. War Bonnet Creek of extreme southwestern South Dakota, west of the Red Cloud reservation, was the place where the red trail struck the white trail; Chief-of-Scouts Buffalo Bill knew it well. The troops must be there by Sunday night. It now was Saturday noon; the distance, by round-about route, was eighty-five miles; the Cheyennes had only twenty-eight to come. General Merritt resolved to get there first.



So he did. With his seven companies of cavalry, about four hundred men, he swung back, leaving his wagon-train and a small escort to follow after. From one o'clock noon until ten o'clock at night he rode; at the end of thirty-five miles camped until three o'clock in the morning; led again by Buffalo Bill rode all day Sunday, and at nine o'clock unsaddled, in the star-light, at the war-trail crossing of War Bonnet Creek, twenty-eight miles from the reservation. The seven companies had traveled their eighty-five miles over hill and plain in thirty-one hours, and had won the race. The Cheyennes had not yet passed here.

This night Lieutenant Charles King of K troop was in charge of the outposts stationed toward the south-east, and covering the trail from the reservation. At dawn he moved his posts farther on, to a steep little hill, from which the view was better. Much farther, two miles in the south and southeast, there was a high ridge, breaking the trail from the reservation. The Cheyennes would cross it. In the southwest, or to the right from the outpost hill, there was the Black Hills wagon-road, from which the cavalry had ridden to the War Bonnet here.

Lieutenant King and Corporal Wilkinson of the guard lay upon the hill slope, watching the morning brighten upon the war-trail ridge. It was nearing five o'clock, of July 17. The Cheyennes would be coming soon.

"Look, lieutenant! There they are! The Indians!"

Yes, at last! Five or six mounted figures had appeared atop the distant ridge. The number increased rapidly. But they did not come on. They galloped wildly back and forth, dodging the slopes that opened to the west, and seeming to care not at all that they might be seen from the north.

Evidently they knew nothing of the cavalry camp. It was concealed from them, by the outpost hill and by the bluffs along the War Bonnet. Then why didn't they hasten on, if they were in a hurry to join Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull, and share in the plunder to be gained from the fights?

At five o'clock they dotted the ridge on a front of three miles. They were fascinated by something in the west. What? Colonel Merritt and Lieutenant-Colonel Carr had been notified. They arrived at the hill, and they also scanned with their field-glasses. And still—

"What ails the rascals?" That was the question.

It took half an hour of waiting and wondering, to solve the problem. Then—the wagon train! The wagon train under Lieutenant and Quartermaster William P. Hall had trundled into sight, coming in to camp by the Black Hills road toward the right, in the southwest, opposite the ridge.

There it was, a white-topped line, apparently guarded by only a few cavalry troopers; but two hundred infantry were with it and Lieutenant Hall had stowed them in the wagons. The Cheyennes were waiting, their mouths watering; it looked like a rich plum; they could not see inside the wagons; they would meet a double surprise—one from the cavalry gathered at the War Bonnet, the other from the infantry riding in the wagons.

"Have the men had their coffee?" General Merritt asked, not a whit excited.

"Yes, sir," replied Lieutenant and Adjutant William Forbush.

"Then let them saddle up and close in mass under the bluffs."

Buffalo Bill Cody had arrived on the hill, with two other scouts: Tait, and "Chips" whose real name was Charley White. "Chips" imitated Buffalo Bill in every way; seemed to think that Bill made the world. He was Buffalo Bill's understudy.

Scout Cody did not wear buckskin, to-day. He wore one of his stage costumes—a Mexican suit of short black velvet jacket trimmed with silver buttons and silver lace, and black velvet trousers also with silver buttons down the sides, and slashed from the knee down with bright red. His brown hair was long and curling.

"What in thunder are those vagabonds down yonder fooling about?" he growled, on a sudden.

What, indeed? Something new had cropped out. From the ridge in the southeast a long ravine ran down, crossed in front of the hill and met the wagon-road trail at the right of the hill. It and the road formed a V; the two arms of the V were separated by a stretch of high ground, and the hill was at the point of the V.

Where the ravine headed at the base of the ridge a mile and a half southeast, thirty or forty Indians had collected, all ready to dash on. But why? Ah, see! Lieutenant Hall had sent two cavalry couriers forward, with dispatches for General Merritt. Two miles distant they were galloping hard, up the road, bent upon reaching the War Bonnet. The Indians knew. The warriors in the ravine were about to follow it down to the trail and kill the couriers.

The couriers could not see the Indians, on account of the high ground between. The Indians could not now see the couriers, for the same reason. But the Lieutenant King party on the hill could see everything, on both sides. The couriers, unconscious of their danger, could not possibly escape. They were far ahead of the wagon train, they were loping steadily on—were now within a mile of the War Bonnet camp, and as if at a signal the Indians in the ravine started, pellmell, to cut them off on their way.

The two parties, couriers and warriors, were converging for the west side of the hill. It might have been a pretty race to watch, had life not been the stake. But what to do? The couriers should not be sacrificed, of course; yet to send the cavalry forward now would spoil the bigger game.

Buffalo Bill exclaimed, his eyes bright, his face aglow.

"General! Now's our chance! Why not let our party mount here out of sight, and we'll tend to those fellows, ourselves!"

"Good! Up with you, then. King, you stay here and watch until they're close under the hill; then give the word. Come down, every other man of you, where you won't be seen."

Besides the general and Lieutenant King, the party on the hill numbered Adjutant Forbush, Lieutenant Pardee, old Sergeant Schreiber, Corporal Wilkinson, the four privates of the picket, the general's orderly private, Scouts Buffalo Bill, Tait and "Chips": twelve in all. They will charge the thirty Cheyennes; or some of them will.

Alone, Lieutenant King watched, careful to lie flat and poke only his head over the brow of the hill. Much depended upon him. If he signaled too soon, the Cheyennes would wheel and escape. If he signaled too late, they would have passed in front of the hill and attacked the two couriers.

He waited. On the farther side of the slope Buffalo Bill, Scouts Tait and "Chips" and the five privates were mounted and set for a charge. Eight, to turn the Cheyennes! Just behind Lieutenant King were the general and the two lieutenants of his staff, crouching, ready to repeat the signal. And behind them were Sergeant Schrieber and Corporal Wilkinson, on hands and knees, to pass the signal back to Buffalo Bill, at the base of the hill, and then join the fight or their company.