and better guns than the soldiers’ guns. They nearly all have those
guns that shoot sixteen times, and lots of ammunition. The soldiers are
scattered, and before we get together, and the New Mexico soldiers get
together, Geronimo will be into Mexico. What was Nah-che doing on this
side the river? The squaws and children cannot cross, with the horses.
It is too high.”
“I think Nah-che brought a party over to drive me away or kill me. He
had Chato with him, and two others. But he made them quit shooting at
me. We are chi-kis-n.”
“That won’t count again,” warned Micky. “So watch out, next time. This
is war, and long war. Now you’d better get your arm fixed, Cheemie. The
Loco and Geronimo band will have to keep on, up the river, until they
can cross. They will strike south, near New Mexico, until they cross
the border. There are no soldiers, ahead in that country, to stop them;
and they wouldn’t care if there were. But we’re to meet Sibi and follow
and fight as well as we can, under the ugly long-nosed man.”
That was Lieutenant George Gatewood, of the Sixth Cavalry, at Thomas.
He came in a hurry out of the adjutant’s office.
“All ready,” he barked, to the junior lieutenant, his second in
command, and swung into the saddle.
“’Ten-_shun_! Column――march! Trot!”
The bugle sounded briskly, and away they went, in long column, the
red and white guidons flapping, Micky and his scouts galloping to the
advance.
Jimmie proceeded to have his arm bandaged, and to talk with the
operator. Then he reported at headquarters, but he had little to tell
that was not already known. He felt, though, that he had done his duty.
While his shoulder was healing, the troops of Arizona and New Mexico
struck the hostiles several times, down at the border, but did not turn
them.
XX
THE GRAY FOX RETURNS
“Crook is coming back! General Crook is coming back!”
That was the word at Camp Thomas, in this the early summer of 1882, a
couple of months after the Geronimo outbreak.
The Third Cavalry already had arrived from its northern plains
campaigns, and the Sixth was being stationed over in New Mexico. But
the Sixth had done well, and the best news was that which bore the name
of Crook. He had been ordered from the Department of the Platte to the
Department of Arizona, again.
“Now we shall see the Chiricahua grow tired,” laughed Micky Free, when
Jimmie met him. “Sibi is glad; the White Mountains are glad; everybody
will be glad, except Whoa and Geronimo. Are you going to help fight,
Cheemie, instead of riding all the time along the talking wire?”
“You bet I am, Micky,” declared Jimmie. “Hope Tom Moore’s coming, too.
I reckon if my leg won’t let me scout I can join the pack-train.”
General Crook wasted no time. Scarcely had he announced himself at Fort
Whipple, ere he was bound for San Carlos and Fort Apache, to straighten
out these affairs first.
Jimmie rode over to the fort with a party from Thomas, to learn the
latest. The general was there, with Lieutenant Bourke, now a captain.
Wearing an ancient, smoked and scorched corduroy suit he had arrived on
the same “Apache,” his mule. He looked rather older than when he had
left, back in 1875. The campaigning in winter up north had been tough.
But he acted as energetic as ever.
He held a council with the dissatisfied White Mountains.
“I want to have all that you say here go down on paper,” he addressed.
“What goes down on paper never lies. A man’s memory may fail him,
but the paper does not forget. I want to know from you all that has
happened since I went away, to bring about this trouble between you and
the white men. I want you to tell the truth without fear, and in few
words.”
Old Pedro had listened attentively to the general through an
ear-trumpet, for Pedro had grown quite deaf. He answered.
“When you were here, if you said a thing we knew that it was true. We
cannot understand why you left us. The people who have come among us
talk in one way and act in another. And I remember the other officers,
too, who treated us kindly. I used to be happy; now I am all the time
thinking and crying, and I say: ‘Where is old Colonel John Green, and
Randall, and those other good men?’”
Alchisé spoke.
“When you left us, there were no bad Indians out. Everything was peace.
But I think that all the good men must have been taken from us and
only bad ones sent in. We did not mind having no rations, for we had
learned to take care of ourselves. Then one day we were ordered to give
up our fields and go down to the hot land of San Carlos to live. I have
tried hard to help the whites, and they have put me in the guard-house.
Where did you go? Why doesn’t Major Randall come back? Where is my
friend Randall, the captain with the big moustache that he always
pulled?”
The general was very patient with all who wished to talk. Then he took
a pack-train and rode into the depths of the Black Canyon, where a
number of the Apaches lived because they feared arrest.
The Apaches here, also, claimed that they had been mistreated. They had
set a spy to watch the agent at San Carlos, and had caught him selling
their rations. Then they had sent a man to tell the agent that he must
not do this, and the man had been kept in jail for six months without
any trial. They said that they had been getting only one cup of flour
every seven days. One shoulder of a little cow had to last twenty
persons for a week.
It was another long story, and the general promised that he would help
them.
“I think there will be peace at Fort Apache and at the San Carlos,”
Micky asserted, as he and Jimmie rode back after the council was over.
“And if the Chiricahua will stay in Mexico and kill only Mexicans, you
and I will have no fun, because the Gray Fox cannot make war in Mexico.”
“Maybe the Chiricahua will stay there.”
“No. After a time the young men will get tired of killing and robbing
Mexicans, which is easy. They will want to win honor by robbing the
Americans――and then, we shall see.”
At Camp Thomas Jimmie met the general face to face while crossing the
parade-ground. He had small hopes that the general would remember him
when he saluted――but something in the general’s keen, inquiring eye
made him halt and stand expectantly.
“Well, my man,” blurted the general. “I seem to know your face.”
“Yes, sir. I’m Jimmie Dunn.”
“I remember. You still limp a little, I see. What are you doing now?”
“I’m a telegraph line-man, sir.”
“That’s good. You had a talk with Nah-che, when he was on his way out,
last spring, didn’t you? Do you think he can be persuaded to come in
peaceably?”
“He might if he knew you were back, sir. But he said the Chiricahua
hadn’t been treated well――they were out to stay.”
“The Apaches have grievances. The worst of the outlaws are better than
the whites who have been robbing them.”
The general was about to stride on, when Jimmie hastily spoke.
“But if you go against the Chiricahua, I’d like to go too, sir.”
“That will be a hard and maybe a long chase,” gravely said the general.
“Probably into the Mexican mountains, with picked men. You can help by
sticking to your present business. The telegraph and the railroad are
very necessary.”
Jimmie, thinking it over afterward, almost decided likewise. His leg
bothered him, and his shoulder was still tender. Chasing Geronimo
through the Mexican mountains, with a leader who never rested, required
nerve and strength both.
The general tried to hold a conference with the Geronimo runaways. From
the border he sent a party of Apache scouts under Alchisé across, for a
few miles, but they found no traces of the Chiricahuas.
Two Chiricahua squaws were captured while returning to San Carlos.
They said that the Geronimo band had a strong hiding-place deep in the
Sierra Madre Mountains several days’ travel below the border; were
living off the Mexicans, and knew that the American soldiers could not
come down there.
General Crook assigned Captain Emmet Crawford of the Third Cavalry (a
broad-shouldered six-footer) to the military station at San Carlos,
obtained permission from the Indian Bureau for the White Mountains to
live upon the high, cooler lands near Fort Apache and to plant crops
there, and from headquarters at Fort Whipple issued an order that said:
Officers and soldiers serving in this department are reminded
that one of the fundamental principles of the military
character is justice to all――Indians as well as white men――and
that a disregard of this principle is likely to bring about
hostilities, and cause the death of the very persons they are
sent here to protect. In all their dealings with the Indians,
officers must be careful not only to observe the strictest
fidelity, but to make no promises not in their power to carry
out; ...
As long as the Chiricahuas stayed out of the United States, there
was not much more to be done. The Apaches on the reservations seemed
content again; the border was being patrolled by one hundred and fifty
Apache scouts, in the hope of catching the trail of any outlaws who
might venture up; the telegraph was kept in fine working order, and the
troops at the posts were given constant practice marches.
This fall and winter no word came from Geronimo. But in March (which
was the year 1883) the expected news broke――and bad news it was.
Jimmie chanced to be in the telegraph office at Thomas when the message
came. He took it off the wire as fast as the operator did. It was from
Bowie, in the south.
“Band of hostiles crossed line raiding north through Whetstone
Mountains. Heading west for New Mexico probably. More.”
“Where’s that adjutant?” barked the operator, tearing off his sheet.
“Things are hummin’. Gee whizz, isn’t that man ever around when he’s
needed?”
But the adjutant of course got the message at once.
“More” came thick and fast, from all directions. The Chiricahuas
numbered only twenty-six warriors. They were under Chato, the
Flat-nose. They had dodged the patrol, outwitted all the troops and
volunteers, the telegraph and railroad did not stop them; on a circle
of eight hundred miles, traveling at seventy-five miles a day they
swung through Arizona and southwestern New Mexico, stealing fresh
horses whenever needed, and killing miners and settlers.
“Picked men for the pursuit,” were the orders from the general at
Whipple. This appeared to leave Jimmie, with his lame leg, out of scout
service. Well, he might do some good in his regular job, anyway. But
the last news was the worst news of all.
Near Silver City, southwestern New Mexico, a horrible act was committed
by the Chato band. They overtook Judge H. C. McComas, driving on the
main road with his wife and little boy, Charley; they tortured and
killed the two grown-ups, and carried off Charley, aged six years.
This made soldiers and settlers alike furious. Jimmie could stand the
strain no longer. He had been captured, once, himself. He threw aside
his line-man position and rode over to Fort Apache, to find Frank
Monach, pack-master.
“I want a job, Frank.”
“Thought you had one.”
“I had, but I’ve left. I’m too lame for scout work; I can pack, though.
How about it?”
“Well,” drawled Frank, sizing him up, “the old man’s partic’lar. The
pack outfits have got to be the kind that’ll keep agoin’. We’re due to
follow those bronc’s till we get that boy back, even if we travel clear
to the City of Mexico.”
“I know. That’s why I’m here,” retorted Jimmie. “I can pack and sit a
mule.”
“All right. Old Jack Long’s watchin’ you, I reckon. He took a lot o’
stock in you. You’re hired. So get your war-bag an’ fall in.”
XXI
TO THE STRONGHOLD OF GERONIMO
“Fight to a finish, or a surrender, b’gosh,” announced Frank, to-day.
“Chiricahuas can take their choice. But the old man’s goin’ after ’em.
We’ll have no murderin’ an’ boy-stealin’ in this department. Everybody,
man an’ mule, is ordered to meet him at Willcox, pronto (quick). So
this outfit’ll hit the high places in the mornin’.”
Jimmie and the other packers at San Carlos, where they had been waiting
prepared, gave a cheer. It was now the first week in April. The killing
of Judge McComas and Mrs. McComas, and the stealing of little Charley,
had occurred on March 28. Chato had escaped into Mexico again, having
lost only one warrior, except――――
“Did you hear tell thar’s a Chiricahua buck been fetched in who claims
he broke from the Chato bunch ’cause he wants peace?” queried Long Jim
Cook.
“No. Where is he?”
“In the guard-house. They got him locked up till the old man talks with
him. His name is ‘Peaches,’ or somethin’ like that.”
“Mebbe he brings some sort o’ word from Geronimo. You know the old man
sent one of those squaws that he captured, back down, last fall, to
tell the Geronimo band they’d better change their minds.”
Jimmie asked Micky Free.
“He is not a Chiricahua,” said Micky. “He is a White Mountain, but he
married two Chiricahua squaws, so he had to live with the Chiricahua.
His name is Pa-na-yo-tish-n (Coyote-saw-him). He does not like the
Chiricahua, now. They are living in the mountains five days’ travel
from Arizona. They have plenty wood, plenty water, plenty grass,
plenty meat, and kill plenty Mexican soldiers with rocks because they
must save cartridges. That is why Chato made his raid up north: to
get cartridges. Pa-na-yo-tish-n ran away. He says he does not want to
fight, and there are others who do not want to fight, but they are
afraid of Geronimo. He knows the trail to Geronimo, and will lead the
general straight. Then maybe we talk, maybe we fight. It will be a good
fight, Cheemie. Geronimo has seventy men, and fifty big boys who can
fight like men. Yes, if they have powder, and do not get starved, and
the talk is bad, we will see much fun. I think that even the packers
will better watch out sharp.”
Micky Free always had hopes. He was a regular fire-eater.
The cavalry from Fort Apache, and the pack-train, and about one hundred
Apache scouts from the San Carlos and the White Mountain reservations
marched across country to Willcox. Pa-na-yo-tish-n (whom the soldiers
and packers called “Peaches”) was taken along, as a prisoner, in
handcuffs.
Willcox, the nearest station on the Southern Pacific Railroad, just
west of Railroad Pass over the Chiricahua Mountains, was overflowing.
The Camp Thomas troops had arrived; so had those from Fort Bowie,
to the southeast. By train other troops, and horses and mules, and
ammunition and supplies of all kinds were pouring in. The general and
his staff were here. So were Charley Hopkins and “Short Jim” Cook and
others of the old-time packers; and Archie MacIntosh and Al Sieber, the
chief scouts; and Antonio Besias the interpreter; yes, and Maria Jilda.
It was a great reunion of Crook men.
Reports said that the United States and Mexico had arranged to
pursue Indians into each other’s territory, but the United States
troops were not to cross the boundary before May 1. In order to make
certain that this was understood, the general traveled by the Mexican
Central Railroad into the northern Mexican States and talked with the
commanding officers there.
When he returned he talked again with “Peaches.” “Peaches” stuck to his
story, and when the general directed that the irons be removed from
him, “Peaches” said that he was willing to wear them until it was shown
that he had spoken only the truth. But the irons were taken off anyway,
because Alchisé and other scouts engaged to watch him very closely.
On April 22 there was a parade, and inspection of the whole outfit.
That night the Apache scouts held a big war-dance which lasted until
morning. They and Micky (who had danced as hard as anybody) were still
hot and excited when the column was formed for the advance.
The scouts, and pack-mules, and a line of rumbling army wagons, and
portions of seven companies of the Third and Sixth Cavalry, marched
from the railroad to the boundary at San Bernardino Springs in
southeastern Arizona, one hundred miles by the wagon trail.
Stalwart Captain Emmet Crawford brought in one hundred more Apache
scouts from San Carlos. There were war-dances and medicine ceremonies
each night. Alchisé and others told the general that their medicine
was showing up very strong; the Chiricahuas would surely be found and
killed or captured.
“That is so,” asserted Micky, who believed in the medicine.
Six of the cavalry troops were to be left here at the border, to guard
it and the wagons with the extra supplies.
“Adios, amigo,” bade Maria, to Jimmie. “You will have good luck. The
medicine says so, and Pa-na-yo-tish-n will lead Crook straight. But it
will be a long march, maybe two hundred miles.”
“Aren’t you going, Maria?”
“No. I stay, because I know all this country.”
It did not look like a very great force, after all, which at sunrise
of May 1, this 1883, crossed the border to find Geronimo. There were
more Indians than soldiers――one hundred and ninety-three of them, White
Mountains, Tontos, Yavapais, Apache-Yumas and some of the Taza friendly
Chiricahuas.
Captain Crawford, of the Third Cavalry, commanded them. He had as his
assistants Lieutenant George Gatewood and Lieutenant W. W. Forsythe, of
the Sixth, and Lieutenant James O. Mackay, of the Third.
The forty cavalrymen of the Sixth (less than half a company) were
commanded by Major Adna R. Chaffee and Lieutenant Frank West.
The general’s staff was Captain Bourke, and Lieutenant G. J. Febiger
of the Engineers. Doctor Andrews was surgeon. Archie MacIntosh and Al
Sieber were chief scouts. Micky, and old Severiano the Mexican who had
been brought up by the Apaches, and Packer Sam Bowman were interpreters.
The pack-masters of the five pack-trains were Frank Monach, Charley
Hopkins, of Tucson, “Long Jim” Cook and “Short Jim” Cook, and George
Stanfield.
“One blanket and forty rounds of ammunition to each man,” were the
orders. The mules carried additional ammunition and sixty days’ rations
of hard-tack, coffee and bacon. Everybody was well armed with the
Springfield forty-fives, and Colt’s revolvers; even the packers had
carbines and pistols.
Plainly enough, the general was outward bound on business!
“U-ga-shé (U-gah-shay)!” barked Lieutenant Gatewood, at the scouts.
And away they went, afoot, in their red head-bands and flapping shirts
and leggin-moccasins, across the boundary, with Alchisé and “Peaches”
in the lead, as guides. They all spread out in a broad front, to cover
the country. Their officers rode just behind, with Archie MacIntosh and
Sieber the Iron Man.
The general and aides and cavalry escort followed. Then there ambled
the long files of pack-trains――Frank Monach’s first. A guard of the
cavalry closed the rear.
The “good-by” and “good luck” cheers of the border guard died in
the distance. The march to “get” Geronimo, Nah-che and the other
Chiricahuas had actually begun.
At first about twenty-five miles a day were covered. But the country
grew rougher and hotter. Only two or three of the Mexican villages were
inhabited; many others were deserted and in ruins, on account of the
Chiricahuas. The brush along the streams was thick, the flowers were
large and bright. High, bluish mountains loomed on right and left and
before.
It was fine Apache country, all right――and “Peaches” was leading
straight into it, for within a few days fresh moccasin tracks might be
seen frequently.
“To-morrow for the Sierra Madre,” said Frank Monach, in camp on the
night of May 7. “Then we’ll be hangin’ on by our toe-nails. What I’d
like to know is, whether Geronimo’ll wait for us or whether he’ll keep
a-goin’ himself.”
The huge jumble of the Sierra Madre range frowned directly before.
It certainly appeared mighty rough. No white men had yet ventured to
penetrate far into the Sierra Madre; but the general was determined, as
Al Sieber said, “to open it up.”
He was so anxious, that this night the march had continued until after
eleven o’clock, and camp had been made without fires, in the bottom of
a deep canyon. So dark it was that even the mules lost their places.
The climb of the first flanks of the Sierra Madre was begun at
daylight. The trail that led out of the canyon was littered with
plunder――torn letters, Mexican dresses, scattered flour, and beef
carcasses. It was so steep that several of the mules fell off, and
landed one hundred feet below, in a canyon. But they were not hurt.
The Chiricahua sign became more plentiful. “Peaches” said that
Geronimo’s real stronghold was still several days’ march before,
but that this was as far as the Mexican soldiers ever had got. The
Chiricahuas had ambushed them and driven them back.
To-night everybody except the scouts was very tired. Jimmie ached from
head to foot; the job of forcing the mules on was the hardest work of
all.
“Come, Cheemie,” invited Micky. “You come with me and you will see big
medicine made.”
Jimmie groaned, and hobbled after Micky Free.
What with chasing deer and turkeys and rabbits, to eat, and hunting the
Chiricahuas, the scouts had been having a great time. They had never
been too tired to dance and yarn; to-night their medicine-men were to
find the Chiricahuas for them.
The officers messed with the packers and scouts; it was all one family.
The general and Captain Bourke had joined the Monach mess, where
Alchisé and other principal scouts ate, too. So the general and the
captain were admitted to the circle of the medicine-making.
The chief medicine-man lay in a trance while the lesser medicine-men
squatted around him and sang. Soon he thumped his chest and spoke,
telling his dream.
“Keet,” the Apache boy who carried the medicine things and was in
training for a medicine-man, himself, translated for the general and
Captain Bourke.
“What did he say?” asked the captain. “The general wishes to know.”
“He say: ‘Me can’t see ’um Chilicahua yet. Bimeby me see ’um. Me ketch
’um, me kill ’um. Me no ketch ’um, me no kill ’um. Chilicahua see me,
me no get ’um. No see me, me ketch ’um. Me see ’um little bit now.
Mebbe so six day me ketch ’um; mebbe so two day. Tomollow me send
twenty-fibe men to hunt ’um tlail. Mebbe so tomollow see ’um more. Me
ketch ’um hoss, me ketch ’um mool, me ketch ’um cow. Ketch Chilicahua
pretty soon, bimeby. Kill ’um heap, an’ ketch ’um squaw.’”
That impressed the scouts. They were sure of success.
The signs grew fresher and fresher, and the trail worse and worse.
But abandoned rancherias were found――and they had not been abandoned
long, either! The eager scouts fairly ran hither-thither, searching
and signaling; the cavalry-men toiled afoot, leading their horses; and
the pack-mules, urged on by Jimmie and the other packers, coughed and
slipped and sweat, and six of them rolled a thousand feet and were
dashed to pieces.
But the general showed no token of quitting. He was after Geronimo.
Now it was the night of May 10. In the morning Captain Crawford and his
scouts were going ahead, by themselves. Alchisé had insisted that this
was the only way to do. He complained to the general that the soldiers
and the pack-trains were too slow, to catch the Chiricahuas.
Frank Monach came into camp from a reconnoiter with a few of the
soldiers and the huskier packers. Jimmie could not go. His leg was
rather bad.
“B’gosh, we found where a passel o’ Mexicans had been wiped out with
rocks an’ arrows an’ lances,” announced Frank. “Over yonder in the
foothills. They must have come in from the other side.”
This night the scouts were very busy, making medicine and mending
moccasins and preparing meat and bread.
“Medicine man say ‘Kill ’um heap Chilicahua, three day from tomollow,’”
declared young “Keet,” proud of his English words.
Early in the morning one hundred and fifty of the scouts, with Captain
Crawford and Lieutenant Gatewood and Lieutenant Mackay, Archie
MacIntosh, Al Sieber, and Micky and Severiano and Sam Bowman, hastened
ahead.
They were to fight and to surround, and try to hold the Chiricahuas
until the soldiers arrived. The dismounted cavalry and the pack-trains
followed at best speed, again into the heart of the high country.
XXII
WAR OR PEACE?
During the next few days Captain Crawford sent back several notes, to
say that by the signs he was likely to strike the Chiricahuas at any
moment. The pursuit was closing in. Maybe the medicine-men were right.
They had prophesied “Three days from to-morrow,” which would be May 14.