Since I wrote my last Letter from this place, I have been detained here
with the rest of the cavalcade from the extraordinary sickness which
is afflicting the regiment, and actually threatening to arrest its
progress.
It was, as I wrote the other day, the expectation of the commanding
officer that we should have been by this time recruited and recovered
from sickness, and ready to start again on our march; but since I wrote
nearly one half of the command, and included amongst them, several
officers, with General Leavenworth, have been thrown upon their backs,
with the prevailing epidemic, a slow and distressing bilious fever. The
horses of the regiment are also sick, about an equal proportion, and
seemingly suffering with the same disease. They are daily dying, and
men are calling sick, and General Leavenworth has ordered Col. Dodge to
select all the men, and all the horses that are able to proceed, and be
off to-morrow at nine o’clock upon the march towards the Camanchees,
in hopes thereby to preserve the health of the men, and make the most
rapid advance towards the extreme point of destination.
General Leavenworth has reserved Col. Kearney to take command of the
remaining troops and the little encampment; and promises Colonel Dodge
that he will himself be well enough in a few days to proceed with a
party on his trail and overtake him at the Cross Timbers.
I should here remark, that when we started from Fort Gibson, the
regiment of dragoons, instead of the eight hundred which it was
supposed it would contain, had only organized to the amount of 400
men, which was the number that started from that place; and being at
this time half disabled, furnishes but 200 effective men to penetrate
the wild and untried regions of the hostile Camanchees. All has been
bustle and confusion this day, packing up and preparing for the start
to-morrow morning. My canvass and painting apparatus are prepared and
ready for the packhorse, which carries the goods and chattels of my
esteemed companion Joseph Chadwick and myself, and we shall be the two
only guests of the procession, and consequently the only two who will
be at liberty to gallop about where we please, despite military rules
and regulations, chasing the wild herds, or seeking our own amusements
in any such modes as we choose. Mr. Chadwick is a young man from St.
Louis, with whom I have been long acquainted, and for whom I have the
highest esteem. He has so far stood by me as a faithful friend, and
I rely implicitly on his society during this campaign for much good
company and amusement. Though I have an order from the Secretary at War
to the commanding officer, to protect and supply me, I shall ask but
for their protection; as I have, with my friend Joe, laid in our own
supplies for the campaign, not putting the Government to any expense on
my account, in pursuit of my own private objects.
I am writing this under General Leavenworth’s tent, where he has
generously invited me to take up my quarters during our encampment
here, and he promises to send it by his express, which starts to-morrow
with a mail from this to Fort Towson on the frontier, some hundreds of
miles below this. At the time I am writing, the General lies pallid
and emaciated before me, on his couch, with a dragoon fanning him,
whilst he breathes forty or fifty breaths a minute, and writhes under
a burning fever, although he is yet unwilling even to admit that he is
sick.
In my last Letter I gave a brief account of a buffalo chase, where
General Leavenworth and Col. Dodge took parts, and met with pleasing
success. The next day, while on the march, and a mile or so in advance
of the regiment, and two days before we reached this place, General
Leavenworth, Col. Dodge, Lieut. Wheelock and myself were jogging along,
and all in turn complaining of the lameness of our bones, from the
chase on the former day, when the General, who had long ago had his
surfeit of pleasure of this kind on the Upper Missouri, remonstrated
against further indulgence, in the following manner: “Well, Colonel,
this running for buffaloes is bad business for us—we are getting too
old, and should leave such amusements to the young men; I have had
enough of this fun in my life, and I am determined not to hazard my
limbs or weary my horse any more with it—it is the height of folly for
us, but will do well enough for boys.” Col. Dodge assented at once to
his resolves, and approved them; whilst I, who had tried it in every
form (and I had thought, to my heart’s content), on the Upper Missouri,
joined my assent to the folly of our destroying our horses, which had
a long journey to perform, and agreed that I would join no more in the
buffalo chase, however near and inviting they might come to me.
In the midst of this conversation, and these mutual declarations (or
rather just at the end of them), as we were jogging along in “_Indian
file_,” and General Leavenworth taking the lead, and just rising to the
top of a little hill over which it seems he had had an instant peep, he
dropped himself suddenly upon the side of his horse and wheeled back!
and rapidly informed us with an agitated whisper, and an exceeding
game contraction of the eye, that a snug little band of buffaloes were
quietly grazing just over the knoll in a beautiful meadow for running,
and that if I would take to the left! and Lieut. Wheelock to the right!
and let him and the Colonel dash right into the midst of them! we could
play the devil with them!! one half of this at least was said after
he had got upon his feet and taken off his portmanteau and valise, in
which we had all followed suit, and were mounting for the start! and I
am almost sure nothing else was said, and if it had been I should not
have heard it, for I was too far off! and too rapidly dashed over the
waving grass! and too eagerly gazing and plying the whip, to hear or to
see, anything but the trampling hoofs! and the blackened throng! and
the dancing steeds! and the flashing of guns! until I had crossed the
beautiful lawn! and the limb of a tree, as my horse was darting into
the timber, had crossed my horse’s back, and had scraped me into the
grass, from which I soon raised my head! and all was silent! and all
out of sight! save the dragoon regiment, which I could see in distance
creeping along on the top of a high hill. I found my legs under me in a
few moments, and put them in their accustomed positions, none of which
would for some time, answer the usual purpose; but I at last got them
to work, and brought “Charley” out of the bushes, where he had “brought
up” in the top of a fallen tree, without damage.
No buffalo was harmed in this furious assault, nor horse nor rider.
Col. Dodge and Lieut. Wheelock had joined the regiment, and General
Leavenworth joined me, with too much game expression _yet_ in his eye
to allow him more time than to say, “I’ll have that calf before I
quit!” and away he sailed, “up hill and down dale,” in pursuit of a
fine calf that had been hidden on the ground during the chase, and was
now making its way over the prairies in pursuit of the herd. I rode
to the top of a little hill to witness the success of the General’s
second effort, and after he had come close upon the little affrighted
animal, it dodged about in such a manner as evidently to baffle his
skill, and perplex his horse, which at last fell in a hole, and both
were instantly out of my sight. I ran my horse with all possible speed
to the spot, and found him on his hands and knees, endeavouring to get
up. I dismounted and raised him on to his feet, when I asked him if
he was hurt, to which he replied “no, but I might have been,” when he
instantly fainted, and I laid him on the grass. I had left my canteen
with my portmanteau, and had nothing to administer to him, nor was
there water near us. I took my lancet from my pocket and was tying his
arm to open a vein, when he recovered, and objected to the operation,
assuring me that he was not in the least injured. I caught his horse
and soon got him mounted again, when we rode on together, and after two
or three hours were enabled to join the regiment.
From that hour to the present, I think I have seen a decided change in
the General’s face; he has looked pale and feeble, and been continually
troubled with a violent cough. I have rode by the side of him from day
to day, and he several times told me that he was fearful he was badly
hurt. He looks very feeble now, and I very much fear the result of the
fever that has set in upon him.
We take up the line of march at bugle-call in the morning, and it
may be a long time before I can send a Letter again, as there are no
post-offices nor mail carriers in the country where we are now going.
It will take a great deal to stop me from writing, however, and as I
am now to enter upon one of the most interesting parts of the Indian
country, inasmuch as it is one of the wildest and most hostile, I shall
surely scribble an occasional Letter, if I have to carry them in my own
pocket, and bring them in with me on my return.
LETTER—No. 41.