when, at a switch now known as Iowa Park, they met a special, standing
on a sidetrack, waiting for them to pass. It was the sort of train
that is made up for an urgent purpose, consisting only of an engine
and a single car, and McDonald recognized upon it the sheriff of
Wichita Falls, also the marshal and others of a posse, evidently out
for action. Upon inquiry, he learned that the Campbell boys, two
well-known desperadoes of that time, were believed to be somewhere in
the neighborhood, preparing to waylay a train. A good reward had been
offered for the Campbells and the sheriff and his men were considerably
moved. McDonald asked if they would like his assistance, and being
assured that they would, sent word back to his wife by the conductor of
the down train that he was going to catch some bad men, and boarding
the special already impatient to start, took the back track toward
Burke, a small station where the outlaws had been seen. When they
reached there, it was McDonald's wish to procure horses and begin the
search at that point, but the sheriff and his posse thought better to
proceed to Harrold, some twenty miles further along, in which direction
it was supposed the bandits had traveled.
Leaving word at Burke that they were to be notified in case of any
fresh discoveries, the officers again boarded the special, and upon
arriving at Harrold found a telegram that the outlaws had been seen
entering a thicket not far from Burke. Horses, and a freight car
in which to load them, were immediately secured, and the train was
backed to Burke. Here the officials separated, the sheriff directing
McDonald and the guide who had located the burglars, with a man
selected from the posse, to go in one direction, while the sheriff
with the remainder of the posse, took another course; the general plan
being to round in on the thicket where the outlaws were supposed to
be concealed. Arriving near the place, Deputy McDonald and the two
men with him discovered two horses hitched in the brush--undoubtedly
the mounts of the two Campbells. It was certain now that the quarry
was near by, and the three men waited a little for the sheriff and
his party to come up. It became evident, however, that their tactics
were of a different sort. The posse was scattering out as if they were
deer-hunting, taking stands at various distant and semi-distant points,
evidently expecting McDonald and his companions to go in and start up
the game. McDonald noticed now that his guide was not armed, and was
therefore of no further service. Turning to his other companion, he
said:
"I don't like this kind of performance. I'm in favor of charging
straight in on them."
[Illustration: THE CAPTURE OF DAN AND BOB CAMPBELL.
"He charged straight into the thicket, and suddenly found himself
almost on top of them."]
His companion seemed to agree to this plan, and without further word
Deputy Bill put spurs to his horse, charged straight into the thicket,
and suddenly found himself almost on top of Dan and Bob Campbell.
Without a breath of hesitation, he leaped to the ground, leveled at the
former, who was already in the act of shooting, and commanded him to
drop his gun. The order was obeyed; but Bob Campbell, who would seem to
have been asleep, reached for his six-shooter, and though commanded
not to touch it upon penalty of death, paid small attention to that
order. He did not attempt to fire the weapon, but lay there on the
ground with it raised, defying his would-be captor with language that
was both violent and uncomplimentary. McDonald now suddenly realized
that he was alone; that his companion had failed to join in the charge.
Bob Campbell realized this too, and became momentarily more defiant.
Then, all at once, help arrived. A dentist who had joined the sheriff's
posse, had observed Deputy McDonald's single-handed charge, and now
came bravely to his assistance. The Campbells both surrendered, then,
for the posse was not far behind. They were taken to Wichita Falls,
where the sheriff promptly claimed credit for the capture--also,
the reward. Later, the Campbells broke jail, but were eventually
recaptured, and served a long sentence.
Events of this sort kept Bill McDonald's name fresh in the Texas
mind, and made him seem peculiarly eligible for regular service.
The resignation of Captain S.A. McMurray, who had long and bravely
commanded Company B became his opportunity, and he hurried to Austin to
try for that command.
His old friend, James Hogg, was now governor of the State. Since the
settlement of their differences so long before, there had been no
discord of any kind, and each had admired the other's career, proud to
remember the friendship. Arriving at the capital, McDonald was shown
into the governor's room. Greeting him, he said:
"Well, I hardly know what to call you, since you got to be governor. I
don't know whether to call you 'Jim' or 'Mister.' I'll have to call you
'Governor,' I guess, as I want to get a place."
They shook hands cordially. Governor Hogg said:
"What is it, Bill? What can I do for you?"
"Why," said McDonald, "I came down to get to be Ranger Captain--to take
McMurray's place in Company B."
Hogg looked at him reprovingly.
"Why didn't you let me know sooner?" he said. "There are two other
applications for the place; both from good men, with long petitions and
fine endorsements."
The applicant for position forgot his old friend's title.
"Why, Jim," he said, "I never thought of it until a day or two ago. I
didn't have time to get endorsements, but I can get 'em, if you want
them. I have been working mostly in No-man's Land and the Territory
lately, but have done work in Texas too, and I can get about any kind
of endorsement you want."
Hogg laughed. He had a robust sense of humor.
"By gatlins!" he said, using his favorite expression. "That's all
right, Bill, you have already got the best endorsement I ever saw."
McDonald looked puzzled.
"I don't understand," he said, "I didn't know anybody knew I wanted a
place."
"All the same, you have got the endorsements," insisted Hogg.
He turned to his desk, and got out a bundle of letters.
"Look over these," he said. "You probably know some of the writers."
McDonald took the letters, and read them one after another. They
were from well-known criminals, their lawyers, their friends and
their associates. They had been received by Hogg while he was
attorney-general, and each was a protest and a complaint against
McDonald, declaring him to be a ruthless and tyrannical official, whose
chief recreation was hounding good citizens for the sake of revenge
or glory, enforcing laws that were not on the statute books, adding
that it was not unusual for him to put the said citizen in jail, or in
box-cars, declaring further that he sometimes hitched them to posts
with chains, and that he was a menace to legitimate settlement and
society in general.
McDonald looked over some of these documents, and grinned.
"That's so, Jim," he said, "I do put 'em in box-cars when there ain't
a jail; the way I used to do back in Mineola--you recollect, when the
jail was full--and I lariat 'em out with a chain and a post when there
ain't a box-car handy; but I don't reckon they're innocent."
Hogg nodded.
"By gatlins! Those endorsements are good enough for me," he said. "They
carry the flavor of conviction, I appoint you Ranger Captain on the
strength of them."
McDonald returned to Quanah with his appointment as captain of "Company
B, Frontier Battalion." The headquarters of the company were then at
Amarillo, in the southern part of Potter County, near the Randall
County line. This was almost the exact center of the Pan-handle, and in
a locality sparsely settled, untamed, and lawless.
Since the early days of "Ranging" there had been not much change in
Ranger regulations and equipment. The character of the work, however,
had changed and the force had been reduced in numbers. Company B now
consisted of only eight members all told. These were supposed to range
over all that vast section known as the Pan-handle, and were subject
to orders that might take them to any other portion of the State where
their assistance was needed. The Rangers were peace-officers, their
duty being to assist the local officers, rather than to take the
initiative and predominate.[6] In the Pan-handle, however, and in many
other portions of the State, the Rangers were obliged to lead, for the
reason that the local officers were either incapable, indifferent, or
incriminated, as we have already seen.
The Ranger camp at Amarillo--besides the eight men mentioned--consisted
of tents, furnished by the State, a wagon and mule team, a hack, and
two pack-mules. Each Ranger furnished his own horse and arms; the State
paid for food and ammunition, also for transportation when necessary.
In Company B were enrolled Sergeants J.M. Brittain and W.J. Sullivan;
Privates John and Tom Platt, Jim Green, John Bracken and John Bishop;
also somewhat later, W.J. McCauley--McDonald's nephew--a daring
youth--then about eighteen years old, but a natural plainsman, dashing
and fearless; an ideal Ranger.
Expeditions were always made with horses. When the distance was far,
the horses and pack-mules were shipped to the nearest railway-point,
sometimes by special train; an engine and car being secured for
such excursions. This train would stop at any point required; the
horses and pack-mules were jumped from the door of the car to the
ground--sometimes a distance of several feet--and when the point of
attack was close by, this wild little army would sweep across the
prairie or through the bushes; the pack-mules, loaded with cooking
utensils and tinware, often clattering ahead--riderless, but seeming to
know by instinct where to go--braying, with tail in air, constituting
an advance guard of reform. It would seem that such a charge might have
given the alarm and frightened every outlaw within a radius of several
miles; but as a matter of fact, these charges were generally planned
and undertaken with great secrecy, and the sudden clamor of such an
approach was likely to create an amazement which did not subside to the
point of action before the time for escape had slipped by. Speaking of
it afterwards, Captain McDonald said:
"That infernal racket seemed to jar the nerve of a criminal, for I
never knew a pack-mule charge where the men we wanted seemed to have
either spunk enough to put up a good fight or sense enough to get
away."
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 6: This came into dispute somewhat later and the
Twenty-seventh Legislature passed an Act confirming what had always
been their custom.]
XVIII
An Exciting Indian Campaign
FIRST SERVICE AS RANGER CAPTAIN. BIGGEST INDIAN SCARE ON RECORD
It was in January, 1891, that Bill McDonald received his appointment
as Ranger Captain, and his first official service was not long
delayed. He arrived at Amarillo about midnight, and was received with
congratulations, for the news had traveled ahead of him. He was tired,
however, and the hour was late, so he presently slipped away to bed.
He had hardly fallen asleep when he was rudely awakened and handed
a telegram which stated that the Indians had made a raid across the
border, and were killing and robbing in Hall County, near Salisbury.
Captain McDonald read the telegram and laughed. There had been no
Indian troubles in Texas for a number of years. White renegades there
were in plenty, but Indian outbreaks had long since ceased.
"I guess the boys are trying to have some fun with me on my first
night," he said, and turned in once more to sleep. But a few minutes
later another telegram came; and another; this time from the
superintendent of the railroad company--a Mr. Good, whom McDonald knew
as a man not given to practical joking.
The Ranger Captain dressed himself, hurried over to the telegraph
office and got the operator there to talk over the wire to the operator
where the scare had originated. He learned that it seemed to be
genuine, and that everybody was leaving the neighborhood. The operator
at Salisbury ended his information with "Good-by, I'm going now myself."
Captain Bill still could not believe it a genuine Indian incursion.
Hall County was in the second tier from the Territory line, and the
Indians would have had to cross Childress County to get to it. He did
not believe that they would undertake to do this, or that they could
have accomplished it without previous alarms. Still, it was his duty
to investigate. He got a special train; loaded in men, horses and
pack-mules, and set out on a hunt for Indians. It was about a hundred
miles to Salisbury, and they reached there early in the day. Not a soul
was in sight anywhere. The inhabitants were hidden, some in dug-outs,
some in haystacks, some in the tall grass. Here and there, as the train
pulled in, McDonald saw a head stick out from a sod house far out on
the prairie, then suddenly disappear, like a prairie-dog dropping into
his hole. He set out to interview some of these wary settlers, and
learned that the Indian alarm had been given by a man--a new settler
just arrived in the country--who had ridden his horse to death and lost
one of his children--having left him far behind somewhere--in his wild
eagerness to escape the savages who, he declared, were burning and
scalping not far away. Captain Bill found this man, and after a little
talk with him was convinced that what he had seen was nothing more nor
less than some cowboys on a round-up, disporting themselves around
their campfire at night, as cowboys will--dancing and capering in the
mad manner of young plainsmen whose ideas of amusement are elemental,
and whose opportunities for social diversions are few. The man and the
neighborhood, however, remained unconvinced, so it was decided to visit
the scene of the disturbance.
Horses, men and pack-mules unloaded themselves from the freight car,
and went racing over the prairie; the pack-mules, as usual, plunging
and braying with tail in air, their tinware clattering in a manner
calculated to put a whole tribe of Indians into a panic and send them
capering across the eastern horizon into their own domain. But there
were no Indians. It was as Captain Bill had thought; a gang of cowboys,
the evening before, had rounded up some cattle; killed a beef; carried
it to their camp near by, where they had built a great fire and roasted
it, doing a wild war-dance of celebration, and shooting off their
six-shooters in their prodigal expression of joy. Viewed from a little
distance, through a sort of mirage condition which had exaggerated the
whole effect, the scene to the newcomers was a horrifying picture of
savages about a burning home, with the inhabitants fleeing for their
lives.
The man who had just moved in had stampeded for his own safety and
started a general alarm, which did not subside even when the cowboys
themselves came in and testified to the truth. The panic spread
throughout that section of the country and other reports of Indian
outbreaks were circulated, becoming magnified until it was believed
that the Indians had broken out, and were making a general raid on the
Pan-handle. The inhabitants of one town, south of Amarillo, threw up
breastworks, got behind them, and put out pickets in preparation for
the arrival of the Indians. Every man seen loping across the prairie
was reported as an Indian; and all this happened as late as 1891,
when there had been no Indian outbreaks for years, and when there was
scarcely a possibility of anything of the sort. It was a big joke, of
course, afterward, but it seemed no joke at the time, and it was Bill
McDonald's initiation as Captain of Company B.
XIX
A Bit of Farming and Politics
CAPTAIN BILL AND HIS GOATS. THE "CAR-SHED" CONVENTION
There were to be plenty of real alarms soon enough, with plenty of
desperately hard work. Before taking up this part of the story,
however, it may not be out of place to dwell briefly on certain other
labors and interests incident to this period in Captain McDonald's
career.
The ranch on Wanderer's Creek, conducted for the most part by his
plucky wife, remained one of his possessions and in time became not
unprofitable. McDonald was one of the first to break land in that
section and when he put in a sowing of wheat it was thought that he had
gone daft. But the following year when the plowed land turned off a
crop of from twenty to thirty bushels to the acre, those who had been
first to scoff were likewise the earliest to imitate.
Captain Bill now became chief promoter in a plan for the irrigation
of this fruitful soil--the water to be obtained by damming Wanderer's
Creek. Several years later, two men of influence and substance, Cecil
Lyon and Joseph Rice, gave able support to this project with the result
that thousands of acres of grazing land became fertile farms--the
cowman's domain passing into the hands of tillers of the soil. The town
of Quanah reflected the steady agricultural increase, and what had been
an antelope range when McDonald and his wife first drove their herds to
that region, became a bustling city--in due time law-abiding--with a
population steadily increasing to this day.
The mention of the McDonald herds opens a way here for recording an
incident connected with the stocking of the Wanderer's Creek range.
McDonald and his wife had decided that they would raise goats as a
sort of by-product and began business in this line by introducing a
flock of considerable size. However, it was a mistake. The goats were
a great nuisance. They would be feeding quietly on the range, when
suddenly, without warning, they would be seized with an impulse for
violent exercise, and would break away and go racing over the prairie
for seven or eight miles, to the brakes of the Pease River, where it
was very mountainous and hilly--altogether in accord with a goat's idea
of landscape. All the horses on the range were in danger of being run
to death chasing goats, getting them together and bringing them back to
the range. Finally it got to be a regular occupation, when there was
nothing else to do, to head for the Pease River and chase goats. One of
the men came in one morning when Captain Bill happened to be at home,
and asked:
"Well, Cap, what shall I do to-day?"
"Oh, I don't know. Go chase goats, I reckon."
"All right; but if you want me to do that, you'll have to get you some
goats. I rode all my horses down a couple o' days ago, hunting for them
in the brakes, and there ain't a goat to be found within forty miles.
"D----n the goats," said Captain Bill, "I don't care much for goats,
anyhow."
There had been about two hundred of them, and for several years
afterward, hunters from other States in these wilds used to bring down
"mountain sheep" and "antelope," which bore strong resemblance to the
flocks which had once been Captain Bill's.
It was not long after McDonald's appointment as Ranger Captain that
the State political campaign came on. He had never lost his interest
in politics since the first awakening in the old Mineola days, when
he and Jim Hogg had been ranged against each other, ready to shed
blood for their candidates. Now, Hogg was governor and a candidate
for reëlection, with Bill McDonald ready to show what he could do in
the way of gratitude for favors past and present. The convention for
the nomination of the State officials was to be held at Houston, and
there was a good deal of excitement, as the opposition was likely
to be strong, with nominations closely contested. McDonald resolved
to be on hand and ready for any condition or emergency. Arriving in
Houston he learned upon investigation that the supporters of Hogg's
opponent, George Clark of Waco, had laid a plan to pack the convention
with Clark's friends; to occupy it so fully in fact, that it would be
impossible for the regular delegates to get seats. This would make
it necessary for them to meet elsewhere, and would cause them to be
regarded as bolters from the regular convention. Upon satisfying
himself that this was to be the program, Captain McDonald promptly went
to his old friend and other leaders, and proposed to take charge of
matters. As Captain of the Rangers, he was under the Governor's orders,
and with Hogg's sanction he could use his own methods for preserving
the peace and for the prevention of scrambling and riot.
The convention was to be held in the "car-shed," a very large building,
which had been seated for the purpose. It had a wide entrance to
admit cars, and it could easily have been filled and crowded by a
mob. Captain Bill's plan was to put a good capable fence across this
wide opening, leaving a narrow passageway for a gate, which would be
completely guarded. No one unable to show credentials as a delegate
would be permitted to enter until the delegates were in and seated.
Governor Hogg approved of the idea and issued an order accordingly.
There was no delay in carrying it out. Captain Bill got some men
together, worked all night, and by sunrise the wide gateway of the
car-shed had been narrowed down to the little wicket-gate of official
admission. It was a complete surprise to the opposition. The gang that
had arranged to rush and pack the convention, regarded the barrier
and the men delegated to defend it, with amazement and profanity.
They began with epithets, and these they followed with more tangible
missiles, such as umbrellas, old shoes, and handbags. In another part
of the State they might have attempted the use of more effective
ammunition. As it was, they were obliged to confine themselves to
protests more spectacular than effectual. The regular delegates filed
in and were seated. Then the crowds were permitted to enter in the
usual way, whereupon another convention was immediately organized in
the same hall, with another chairman on the same platform, and for a
time two conventions were running side by side.
Captain McDonald was finally called to the platform to preserve order.
There was a lively scene. The Ranger was kept busy keeping the two
factions separate, taking away their knives, a few pistols, canes,
umbrellas and such other weapons and missiles as they attempted to
bring into action. The final result was that both Clark and Hogg
were nominated, at the same time, in the same convention, and by
the same political party, though the Clark followers were styled
"Anti-Democrats" and bolters.
Hogg was re-elected in due time, by a good majority. The episode passed
into history as the "Car-shed" Convention.
XX
Taming the Pan-handle
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN COWBOYS AND "BAD MEN." HOW CAPTAIN BILL MADE
COW-STEALING UNPOPULAR
The Texas Pan-handle is that portion of the State which lies directly
south of what was No-man's Land, extending from parallels 100 to 103,
east and west. Its shape suggests its name, and its name suggests
limitless areas of waving grass; vast roving herds; cowboys and
ponies--both of the unbridled variety; bad men whose chief business was
to start graveyards, and the glad primeval lawlessness that prevails
when worlds are new.
Not so many years ago the Pan-handle was distinctly a world apart, and
a new one. With No-man's Land on the north, Indian Territory on the
east and New Mexico on the west, civilization could come only from the
south, and it did not come very fast. Indeed there was still plenty
of territory to the southward to be subdued--two or three tiers of
counties in fact--before the Pan-handle would be reached. So, it was a
place apart--an isolated fertile land, justifying the assertion of a
tramp that he had lost a hundred thousand dollars there in one year by
not having cattle to eat up the grass.
The cattle came in due time, fighting back the Apache and the
Comanche, protected by Rangers from Ft. Griffin, accompanied by
stockmen of every nation, cowboys of every grade and criminals of
every breed. That was a wild epoch--chaotic and picturesque--a time of
individual administration and untempered justice.