Following the Guidon (Illustrated Edition). Elizabeth Bacon Custer
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Название: Following the Guidon (Illustrated Edition)
Автор: Elizabeth Bacon Custer
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Документальная литература
isbn: 4064066059712
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Two lodges of the Cheyennes have come in, and they say that the Arapahoes and Cheyennes, whose villages were a hundred miles distant when our council took place the other day, are all moving, but owing to the bad roads and high water they travel slowly. I am as impatient as a crazed animal to have them come in, so that I can start on my homeward journey rejoicing.
Tell Eliza I have just the thing for her. One of the squaws among the prisoners had a little pappoose a few nights since, and I intend to bring it home to add to the orphan asylum she always keeps.
The baby referred to was the child of an Indian princess described in a subsequent chapter. Owing to its lineage, the new-comer was treated with every attention by the prisoners, but it was not so with a poor little infant who was not the descendant of royalty. The mother of the little "forlornity" was killed while fighting in the Washita battle, and the captive women were given charge of the baby. They took advantage of every opportunity to drop it in the snow on the march, and our officers had to watch vigilantly to see that the squaws did not accomplish their purpose of leaving it to perish on the way.
IN CAMP, MEDICINE BLUFF CREEK, 11.30 P.M., February 8, '69.
It has been several days since I wrote to you. I have made a long march since. I asked the adjutant to write you during my absence. I did not tell you of my intentions, fearing that you might be anxious; but I am now back safe and well.
We have been to try and bring in the Indian villages, and have had what some people would term a rough time; were gone sixteen days, without wagons or tents. Our provisions became exhausted, there was no game, and officers and men subsisted on parched corn and horse-flesh, the latter not even possessing the merit of having been regularly butchered, but died from exhaustion. Scarcely a morsel of it was left uneaten. You could hardly have helped being amused, even though it was so serious, to have seen the officers sitting around the camp-fire toasting strips of horse-flesh on forked sticks, and then eating it without salt or pepper. I had buffalo robes for my bed, slept soundly and comfortably on the ground, with no shelter except the large rubber blanket spread over me from head to foot, and the rain pouring down. One night my pack-mule did not reach camp, and my robes and overcoat were all with it. I had to sleep all night without either, but I enjoyed it all, and often thought of the song:
"The bold dragoon he has no care
As he rides along with his uncombed hair. "
I write briefly, as it is late, and one of the officers going to Leavenworth to-morrow will tell you all the news.
The Cheyennes have delayed their coming in so long that I cannot get home and take our leave of absence as we hoped.
In returning here from our late march, General Sheridan was anxious to hear the result of our trip as soon as possible. I took half a dozen men, and, mounted on a good mule, I rode eighty miles in sixteen hours, through mountains, and guided alone by the compass, taking the general and every one else by surprise by my sudden arrival in camp.
CHAPTER V.
INDIAN TRAILS, COUNCILS, AND CAPTIVES.
MEDICINE BLUFF CREEK, I. T., February 17, 1868.
Yesterday we made peace with the Kiowas, and released their two head chiefs, Satanta and Lone Wolf. We are now waiting the arrival of the train with supplies from Arbuckle, when we will at once bid a final adieu to this part of the country, and set out in a westerly direction, intending to treat with the Cheyennes at some point west of here, then turn our faces northward to Camp Supply.
MEDICINE BLUFF CREEK, February 20th.
It is a bright and pleasant morning, such as we often had in Texas. The climate here is lovely, seldom a day that even a light coat is uncomfortable. We have mistletoe here as plentifully as in Texas. The scenery is sublime picturesque in the extreme; the climate all that can be desired—not surpassed, I imagine, by Italy; and such lovely sunsets! …I wish you could see with what awe I am held by the Indians. A sound drubbing, you know, always produces this. They have given me a name, Mon-to-e-te, which means Strong Arm.
I cannot write but a few lines this evening, as I am now using the last piece of candle which can be obtained anywhere in camp. So bountifully are we supplied with Government stores that not an officer here, from General Sheridan down, has any light; nor have they had for several nights, nor will we have until the arrival of the train of supplies. How we shall spend the long evenings I do not know—sleep, I presume.
As soon as the train of supplies arrives, I expect to move west about one hundred miles, through the Washita mountains, to see if the Cheyennes are in that vicinity; then I turn northward to Camp Supply. Tell Eliza I am tired of living on roast horse and parched corn, as we have had to, and I will soon be at home, and want soup every day.
General Sheridan hastens to Camp Supply, and will start with a train of supplies to meet me somewhere in the vicinity of the Washita battle-field. You see I am telling you our plans, when not a single officer of this command dreams of our destination, and all are wondering when we are going. I am telling you just as if I were with you. Look on the map and find a point on Cache Creek about one hundred miles due west from Fort Arbuckle. That is where we now are. When we move it will be nearly due south-west, following the Red River. There we expect to accomplish the object of our western detour, and will then be nearly on a line due south from Fort Dodge. I am thus minute in order that you may see what a vast extent of country we will have visited since the beginning of my experience on the plains.
Once back to Camp Supply, nothing further can be accomplished for some time; our horses will be worn out, many of them now being unable to proceed that far.
The horses are being fed on grass alone, running loose night and day. They come in at the sound of water-call as regularly and promptly as if led. The men are living on half rations of bread.
No officers' stores for the coming march. I intend to have driven along with us one hundred and fifty head of Texas cattle, so that we will not be compelled to eat horse-meat again. You know how Texas cattle can travel, equal to any horse. I also have plenty of salt, so my command will not suffer.
General Sheridan has been in on my bed talking over our plans. He said again, for the fiftieth time, that I could go east at the earliest possible moment; but I tell him, as I always have, that I would not go till the work was all done.
Last night, a few moments after I had laid away my unfinished letter and writing materials, and was sitting alone in my Sibley tent, I heard the clatter of several feet coming, as if horsemen were approaching. It was bright moonlight, and I stood peering out of a small opening in the tent trying to divine who it could be entering camp at that hour of the night.
Three muffled figures, human in shape, mounted upon mules and leading two pack-mules, rode up to my tent and dismounted. I could not recognize them, but said, Come in, who is it? Why, СКАЧАТЬ