THE PARTY IN DEAD MAN’S GULCH.
Leaving Lightning Jo and his party riding at a tremendous rate over the
prairie to the rescue of the sorely beleaguered company in Dead Man’s
Gulch, we must precede him for awhile to that terrible spot, where one
of the most dreadful tragedies of the many there enacted was going on.
The party, numbering over thirty, two-thirds of whom were hardened,
bronzed hunters, had been driven tumultuously into the place by the
sudden appearance of the notorious Swico-Cheque and his band, where
they had barely time to throw their men and horses into the roughest
attitude of defense, when they were called upon to fight the screeching
Comanches, in one of the most murderous and desperate hand-to-hand
encounters in which they had ever been engaged.
Our readers have already learned, from the hurried words of Gibbons,
something of the experience of the beleaguered whites during the two
days and nights immediately following the halt, and preceding his own
departure, and it is not our purpose to weary them and harrow their
feelings by a recital of the horrible incidents of that stubborn fight.
When Jim Gibbons, hugging the neck of his mustang, dashed at full speed
through the lines of the Comanches, he left behind him ten able-bodied
men, or, more properly, ten who were still able to load, aim and fire
their rifles. More than that number lay scattered around, among the
wagons, on the ground, in every position, killed by the bullets of the
wonderful red riders and riflemen.
The wagons, as is the practice at such times, had been run together
into an irregular circle, one being placed in the center (as the safest
spot), into which the women and children were tumbled, and where, for
the time, they were safe from the bullets that were rattling like sleet
around them, and striking down their brave defenders upon every hand.
This done, the men devoted themselves to keeping back the swarming
devils, that made a perfect realization of pandemonium as they circled
about the doomed band.
In what way Dead Man’s Gulch gained its name no one can tell with any
certainty, but most probably from the number of massacres and deaths
that had taken place within its horrid precincts. It was simply a
hollow, somewhat resembling the dried-up bed of a small lake, and,
instead of being properly a gulch, was more like a basin, so that to
enter it from any direction, one was compelled to descend quite a slope.
The trail which the party were following led directly through the
center of this place, it being by far the most feasible route, in spite
of the ascent and descent, on account of the broken nature of the
country both to the north and south.
Dead Man’s Gulch, occupying an area of several acres, was strewn and
covered with bones, as if indeed it were the site of some ancient
catacomb, that had been rent in twain by some convulsion of nature.
A slight examination would have shown that these bones were those of
horses and human beings, telling in most eloquent language to the
beleaguered whites that the fate which threatened them was that which
had overtaken many a one before them.
Dead Man’s Gulch indeed was a favorite point of the Comanches, who were
always roving the prairies in search of such bands as these, and it was
consequently well known and dreaded by all who were compelled to make
the journey; and the scene to which we now direct the attention of the
reader was, as we have shown, a repetition of what had been enacted
there time and again without number.
The first day’s fight was especially destructive upon the horses, it
being found almost impossible to shelter them from the aim of the
Comanches. As a consequence, the second morning found but few of these
indispensable requisites in a journey of this kind. Those that had
escaped, however, were secured and sheltered in such a way as to keep
them from the other bullets that endeavored to seek them out.
Captain Shields, a sturdy borderer, and a man who had crossed the
plains a score of times, suspected from the first that the only
possible hope for his company was for some one to get through the
Comanche lines to Fort Adams, and that was the reason why he so
carefully protected the two or three remaining mustangs from death.
This, as a matter of course, was the last desperate resort, and was
only to be attempted when it was absolutely certain that nothing else
could avail.
His first hope was that by a determined and deadly resistance he could
convince the red-skins that it would not pay to keep up the contest,
for the warlike Comanches have the reputation of possessing discretion
as well as bravery; but, in the present case, they certainly were
warranted in concluding they had the game in their own hands, and,
despite the murderous replies of the whites, they refused to be driven
away, and kept up a dropping fire, circling round and round the hills
above, and preventing any attempts of the whites to move out.
For some time Captain Shields and his men fired from behind their
horses and wagons, but they soon improved on this, and taking their
positions in the wagons themselves, found that they were quite well
able to pick off their assailants, while they were tolerably well
protected from the return fire, the red-skins being compelled to fire
more at random.
And lying in this posture, they were compelled to see the remaining
horses shot down, excepting the single one upon which Jim Gibbons made
his escape.
And thus the fight--of itself one of the most bitter and sanguinary
among the thousand and one of the West--raged, and as it raged there
were exhibited some of the most daring performances upon both sides,
and among them all was no loftier nor higher-souled courage than that
of our heroine--the young and beautiful Lizzie Manning of Santa Fe.