my quarters with a novice, stating that she had been sent to me by
General Mackenzie, then commanding Fort Robinson. She was on a mission
to procure subscriptions for the erection of a hospital at Kansas City.
Sister Mary remained with us for several days. A very intelligent
and entertaining woman, she was a welcome guest to both Nannie and
me. Expressing a desire to see Spotted Tail, we prepared a little
entertainment and invited him to the house, together with a few
ladies and officers, Lieutenant Schwatka, who afterwards became
famous, being one. The refreshments consisted of cider, cakes and
apples.
Spotted Tail appeared in full Indian dress, accompanied by one of his
wives and his daughter, Shonkoo, an interesting girl of seventeen.
Sister Mary, dressed in the conventional robes of her order, conversed
with Spotted Tail through the interpreter for some time before we
passed the refreshments.
After all present had been provided with a glass of cider, Sister Mary
danced gaily to the center of the room and announced that she would
like to clink glasses with the great chief Spotted Tail. Upon hearing
her request, Spotted Tail, quite as gracefully and gaily, danced up to
her. This wild country could hardly show a stranger spectacle than a
Sister of Charity, in her peaceful robes, and a savage warrior, in his
war-like paraphernalia, clinking glasses!
The conversation lasted for some hours, the squaw and her daughter
saying little. Finally it occurred to me that it might be interesting
to Sister Mary to take this young girl back with her to the convent,
and I made the suggestion to her. Her eyes sparkled with delight as
she said that it would be a feather in her cap. "Is it possible that
we can arrange it?" she asked.
On making the suggestion to Spotted Tail, his face also beamed. He
would like nothing better than that his daughter should live among
the white people and learn their ways and customs, and he had great
confidence in the Sisters of Charity. While the matter was thoroughly
discussed by Sister Mary and Spotted Tail, I watched Shonkoo and her
mother.
The mother appeared delighted, but Shonkoo was expressionless. I
suggested to the interpreter that it might be well to see what the
daughter had to say, but when this was communicated to Spotted Tail,
he said, "That is all right. She will go."
I arranged to furnish the transportation to the railroad, a distance
of about one hundred miles. They would be ready to depart in three
days, Spotted Tail stating that he would bring his daughter then to my
quarters and place her in charge of the sister.
The morning the start was to be made, everything was ready but
Shonkoo. In her place came a message from Spotted Tail to Sister Mary
and me to the effect that Shonkoo had eloped the night before with a
young Indian by the name of Lone Elk, and Sister Mary returned to her
convent despondent, empty handed, and minus the feather in her cap, so
far as her efforts to civilize Shonkoo were concerned.
DETAIL TO PARIS EXPOSITION
In 1876, being senior captain of cavalry and expecting promotion, I
obtained six months' leave of absence, but, on organization of General
Crook's expedition to the Powder River I surrendered my leave until
the Sioux trouble should be ended. When I returned to Camp Sheridan,
the six months' leave was renewed, and we started for Washington. I
met General Crook at Fort Laramie. We stopped a day or two before
proceeding in our ambulance toward the railroad at Cheyenne. We were
twelve miles from Laramie when the Adjutant General, Nickerson,
overtook us, with a message from General Crook, who had not known of
our departure, stating his appreciation of my services during the
campaign, adding that he felt under more obligations to me than to
any other officer in the campaign, and that if there was any official
favor possible for him to obtain, I had only to ask. Sure of my
majority in a short time, I could see nothing to ask that he might
procure for me, but, after Nickerson departed, Nannie assured me that
she could find something, and jokingly referred to her remark while
in Arizona that she was going to Europe with me some day. So, when
we arrived in Washington, she said, "There is to be an international
exposition in Paris next May, 1878. Why don't you ask the General
to recommend you for a detail there?" I took her advice and made
application to be so detailed, to the Secretary of War.
Colonel Reynolds, of my regiment, had been retired, and Colonel Devin,
whom I had never met, joined the headquarters at Fort D. A. Russell.
I sent my application to the Secretary of War through the adjutant,
Johnson, who knew my history, supposing that General Crook would
endorse it favorably. But, in spite of the fact that everybody in
the regiment knew I would be promoted before my leave expired,
the papers were endorsed by the Colonel, "Respectfully forwarded
disapproved. This officer's services are needed with his company." It
was successively endorsed by General Crook at Omaha, General Sheridan
at Chicago, and General Sherman at Washington, "Respectfully forwarded
disapproved."
These advices to the Secretary seemed to me unfair. I was introduced
to him, and told him I had been unfairly treated. He encouraged me to
explain, which I did, adding that I had served in my proper command
more constantly since I entered the service than any officer in the
army. I knew little of the record of my colonel, but I asked to
have our records examined, and that if he had not been absent from
his command two days to my one I would withdraw my application; but
that if I were correct I asked to have the colonel's unfavorable
endorsement and those influenced by it ignored. A day or two afterward
the Secretary sent for me. "I am more surprised at the result than
by your statement," he said. "It is short of the facts, and I shall
consider the endorsements valueless; but," he added, "why do you
suppose the President will send an attaché to that exposition?"
"Mr. Secretary," I replied, "because he ought to. The President sent
McClellan and other attachés to previous expositions, such as the
Crystal Palace Exposition in London. Officers who have served in
the Civil and Indian Wars are as much entitled to such benefits as
General McClellan." The next day a note from him stated the President
had decided to appoint three attachés, one from each arm of the
service. This announcement in the press immediately prompted numerous
applications, but Secretary McCrary assured me my appointment would
issue shortly.
Nannie and I sat at a table at the Ebbitt House next to that of
General Sherman. As we went in to dinner that day, General Sherman
stretched out his hand to Nannie, saying, "Mrs. Mills, I want to
congratulate you." Nannie diplomatically replied, "What for?" though
she knew well. "Why, you are going to Paris. The President detailed
your husband as military attaché to the Paris Exposition today."
Nannie replied, "I thank you, General Sherman." General Sherman then
stated in his frank and noble way, "Don't thank me, Mrs. Mills; I had
nothing to do with it."
These details show Nannie was my inspiration. She approved of every
move made in the matter and was more elated than I at the result.
We sailed in March, 1878, on a Cunard steamer. My insurance policy
required that I obtain permission to visit a foreign country, but at
the offices of the Knickerbocker I was told that the company would
issue such a permit only if I agreed to forfeit my policy should I
enter any city in which there was an epidemic. I told them to "go
to," that I would live longer than their company, and surrendered my
policy, on which I had paid eleven assessments.
Within three years their company went into bankruptcy, and I am still
living!
We had an uneventful passage, although very distressing to Nannie on
account of sea-sickness. During a two weeks' stop in London we visited
Nannie's relatives, Mrs. Langworthy, at Guys House, Maidenhead,
near Windsor Castle. The Langworthys were delightful people and our
acquaintance a very agreeable experience, although it began in a
rather embarrassing way.
Neither of us had much experience in "high society," or had the
money to flourish in it. We carried to Guys House no other clothing
than that in our traveling bags. At the depot, a great retinue of
lackeys clad in knee breeches, and coach and baggage wagon apparently
waited for some great personage. But Mr. Edward Langworthy, the
son, introduced himself, and asked for our luggage, when we rather
shamefacedly confessed that we had only our two valises.
We were dressed simply, like most Americans, but we had America's
courage, and met the situation without much chagrin. The Langworthys
dressed for dinner, but we had to make the best of what we had. We had
a bedroom lit by candles and without fire, although it was March and
the weather very cold.
In the ante-room the next morning I saw a large washtub in the middle
of the bare floor, two-thirds full of water, and a chair containing
some towels and soap. I remarked, "Nannie, look at that. Do they
expect us to bathe in that cold room in that cold water? I will not do
it."
Nannie replied, "Well, I am too proud to have them think we do not
wash," and, seizing the soap, she made a lot of lather and sprinkled
water on the floor to leave conclusive evidence that we really were
civilized.
Mrs. Langworthy asked me, "How do you get about in London?" I replied
that we used the omnibus, as Nannie thought the "Hansom cabs" unsafe,
and refused to ride in them. Mrs. Langworthy said, "You shouldn't do
that. Only tradespeople and banker's clerks ride in omnibuses."
Before going to Paris my commission as major in the 10th Cavalry
arrived. A military tailor made me a uniform, which, with the gay
attire Nannie bought in both London and Paris, satisfied Mrs.
Langworthy on our second visit, made after returning from Paris,
that we Americans could do right after all! We enjoyed our visits in
their beautiful house, a fine English estate, and always recalled our
acquaintance with our delightful English relatives with much pleasure.
We were in Paris at the opening of the exposition, where we met the
other attachés. Among the Americans we met Lucien Young, a very
interesting naval officer, in whose carriage Nannie and I rode to
the opening. Our uniforms conformed much with the Prussian style,
especially my helmet. Leaving the exposition immediately behind the
Prince of Wales' entourage, the French took us for Germans, and looked
upon us very coldly. Some bright Frenchman, discovering on my helmet
the words, "E Pluribus Unum," called out to his countrymen that we
were Americans, when we received almost as many cheers as the Prince
of Wales himself.
Invited by President McMahon to a review of thirty thousand cavalry,
I was informed that a French captain would have a mount for me in the
Bois de Boulogne. There were eight American officers in Paris, most
of them in official capacity, and when I arrived they were all there.
As the senior, they insisted I approach the French officer. Speaking
little French, I was somewhat embarrassed. But with the assurance
of an American, I called out to the dapper young French artillery
officer, "Good morning, captain; do you speak English?" "No, I do
not," he replied, "but I speak American, which is much better. I spent
four years as military attaché in Washington, the most beautiful city
in the world."
It is needless to say that his diplomacy made us all his friends.
As Nannie had anticipated, this year's service at the Paris Exposition
was the greatest practical and instructive education of my life. A
practical skilled mechanic, I understood the intricacies of mechanics,
and here in one building was assembled all the latest and most novel
machinery of the world. The sewing machine was then in the height of
its progressive construction. England, hitherto the foremost nation
in machinery construction, was fast losing its place to America and
France. The English machine was distinguished by its clumsy, angular
and heavy parts and the difficulty of keeping it in order. The French
machines were better, but the American machine stood first in all that
made it handy, graceful, symmetrical and useful. And so it was with
all the other machinery. Electric light and power was in its infancy,
but here, as in all else, the best appliances for its use were
American.
I started out in the hope of learning a great deal from the foreign
nations in my conceived invention and construction of a woven
cartridge belt and other web equipment, which I felt sure could be
made as strong and of as firm consistency as leather, and much better
than leather because it was lighter, more flexible, did not require
oiling, and was less likely to break in the process of wetting and
drying when exposed to the weather. However, after visiting factories
in France, England and Germany, I found that they knew less about
weaving such fabrics than we did in America.
Nannie and I traveled much during our stay abroad.
France had been humiliated by Germany's conquest and exaction of the
then unheard of indemnity, but she was not despondent. In the dining
room of our boarding house, 44 Rue de Clichy, were two female figures
on pedestals representing Alsace and Lorraine, tears streaming down
their cheeks; and when the proprietress, Madame Thierry, would speak
of them the tears would roll down her cheeks, too. The sympathy of
Americans was generally with France.
In Germany we found a remarkable condition. In one sense unspoiled by
her great victories, so cheaply bought, and the acquisition of so much
wealth in indemnity, the nation was just starting two propagandas. One
was to organize productive industry and encourage the sciences and
arts, with the object of making their nation foremost as a commercial
producer. At the same time, Germany planned to carry her products to
the four corners of the earth, in which, for forty years, she was
entirely successful.
The second, as unholy and unrighteous as the first, was praiseworthy,
was militarism, in which the rulers of the nation sought to make
the profession of the soldier universal, with the deliberate and
cold-blooded purpose of conquering the rest of the world, as
Alexander, Hannibal, Cæsar and Napoleon had planned before. Germany
had in view also the creation of a navy which could overcome
England's, so she might rule the world on both land and sea. But for
the heroism and self-sacrifice of the little kingdom of Belgium, with
only eight millions of people, they would have succeeded.
We saw many idle soldiers lying on the grassy parapets of their
forts smoking, while near them women dressed in rags carried dirt
in wheelbarrows to form additional parapets. Nannie instinctively
foresaw the future. She even then denounced those people as barbarous
and inhuman, and for the rest of her life she hated bitterly German
militarism.
In England we found the people divided into numerous classes, royalty,
nobility, gentlemen, tradespeople, and common people. Many of these
latter, for want of the ambition and self-reliance necessary to bring
about success, had become sordid and drunken.
There were hundreds of street cars in Paris and its environs
broad-mindedly labeled "American Railway," but hardly one in England.
In Manchester (then a larger city than New York), an apparently
intelligent Scotch policeman, recognizing me as an American, proudly
pointed to a brand new street car with one horse, and remarked, "I
suppose you don't have anything like that in America?" When I replied
that every city in the United States having twenty thousand population
had a street car system, he evidently regarded me as a sort of
American Baron Munchausen.
The upper classes relied upon their control of the sea by the largest
navy in the world, indirectly to extort taxes from their millions of
subjects in their vast possessions, governed without their consent.
Suppressing ambition for democracy and restraining maritime commerce
of other nations, is perhaps not as cruel and barbarous as the
intended control of the world by Germany, but is quite as unrighteous
and has been and still is detrimental to the progress and advancement
of weaker peoples.
Of all countries we visited, Switzerland seemed to possess the best
free democratic government and the people were the happiest. They
looked you in the face with a cheerful smile wherever you met them and
were content with their condition, as they have been for over three
hundred years.
The difference between Europeans and Americans we found to be marked.
For instance, on one of the Lake Geneva passenger steamers from Vevey
to Geneva we found a thousand passengers, composed about equally of
Americans, English, French, Germans, Spaniards, and Italians. While
talking to a well-dressed American of perhaps twenty-five years of
age, a band of about thirty Italians appeared on the upper deck,
where most of the passengers were assembled.
Most of the passengers, especially the English, would not speak to
each other without a formal introduction, so social greetings were
few. When the band had played a few minutes, this American took off
his hat and placed a handkerchief over it and carried it through the
crowd, remarking, "Something for the band, please." He approached
every passenger on deck. Europeans stared, astonished at the action of
this man from the "Woolly West," but Americans smiled encouragement.
He obtained probably the largest contribution the leader had ever
received. He proceeded to the band and every man and woman was gazing
at him in perfect silence when he turned over the handkerchief to the
leader, until some American clapped and every American joined in. We
were all proud of our countryman.
At 44 Rue de Clichy our son, Anson Cassel, was born on November 19,
1878. He was our joy for the next fifteen years. His birth delayed
our return until March, 1879, when we took passage on a Cunarder. In
Washington I received orders to proceed to the headquarters of the
10th Cavalry.
[Illustration: INSCRIPTION IN NANNIE'S FAMILY BIBLE, DATED 1614.
INHERITED FROM HANNAH HIPPISLY MARTIN.
TRANSLATED AND IN MODERN HANDWRITING, IT READS AS BELOW:
Ellis Crooker: his book; if
any man chance to find it;
let him restore it home again
and he shall be rewarded for his pains,
God Save the King!
]
OUT WEST AGAIN
We traveled to Fort Concho, Texas, an uncomfortable and
unprepossessing post, by ambulance from San Antonio, arriving
April 11, 1879, and I served with the 10th Cavalry (colored) for
twelve years, and was executive officer for Colonel B. H. Grierson,
commanding the post, regiment and district under General Ord,
department commander.
A big-hearted man, the only experience Grierson had in military
affairs was as a general of volunteers, with which he was successful.
With no experience in the regular army, even the best intentions did
not fit him for the required discipline. He left the details of the
post and regiment entirely to me, signing only papers which went to
his superiors. He was too prone to forgive offenses and trust to
promises for reform, which rendered the discipline and reputation of
the regiment poor.
In May, 1881, Indian troubles took me with a squadron of four
companies to Fort Sill. Nannie accompanied me the 225 miles, and
there, on October 22d, our daughter, Constance Lydia, a joy and
comfort to us both, was born. She was only eight days old when we were
ordered back to Concho, making that trip, as we had the previous one,
by wagon transportation, Nannie with her baby and little Anson riding
in the ambulance.
In July, '82, the headquarters of the regiment was transferred to Fort
Davis, when we again made a 225 miles journey with wagon and ambulance
transportation.
Fort Davis was dry and cool, a most pleasant climate, but as hostile
Indians occasionally made raids on the citizens, as at Fort Concho,
we were kept busy. Fort Davis is near El Paso. My interests took us
frequently to that city. Among other activities, jointly with Judge
Crosby I built the largest hotel then in Texas.
[Illustration: LITTLE ANSON AT FIVE AND ONE-HALF YEARS.]
[Illustration: CONSTANCE AT TWO AND ONE-HALF YEARS.]
[Illustration: STREET IN EL PASO IN ITS DESERTED DAYS, ABOUT
1870.]
April 1, 1885, the regiment exchanged stations with the Third Cavalry
in Arizona. We made that long and distressing march also with wagon
and ambulance transportation. Arriving at El Paso in a terrible
sand-storm, we found the Rio Grande unfordable. The only bridge
crossed into Mexico three miles below the New Mexican line. According
to international law, we could not pass over Mexican territory without
the consent of the two governments, so we were delayed a week most
uncomfortably, awaiting the tedious international interchanges to
enable us to cross. We finally arrived at Deming (in a terrible
sand-storm), meeting most of the troops of the 3d Cavalry there.
I was ordered to Fort Thomas on the Gila River, next to Yuma, the
hottest post in the republic and the most sickly, excepting none. It
was one of the most desolate posts in which we ever served. The valley
was very low and hot. The mountains on each side of the river were
some six or seven thousand feet higher than the valley and only about
six or eight miles apart, so what little rain there was fell on these
mountains.
I have often seen a heavy storm pass across the river from mountain
to mountain, and watched almost a cloudburst of rain falling from the
immense height only to be absorbed by the arid atmosphere before it
reached the valley. Here many of our soldiers died in an epidemic of
a very malignant, burning fever, which the post surgeon, Dr. Edward
Carter, was unable to check. Informed that if we had ice the doctor
could save many lives, I made requisition for an ice machine to cost
three thousand dollars. It was twice returned by the War Department
disapproved, the principal reason being that the Quartermaster General
and the Surgeon General could not agree which department should pay
for the wood to run the engine!
Exasperated, I appealed to General Sheridan personally. General
Sheridan gave the two chieftains his opinion of them in such strong
language that the appropriation for the machine was soon furnished,
the first authorized in the army.
Our little daughter Constance was taken with the disease, and Dr.
Carter told us that she might not recover without ice. I wired Colonel
Shafter, commanding Fort Grant, half way to the railroad seventy miles
away, and he supplied me with two hundred pounds, rolled in blankets,
within twelve hours. The day after the doctor reduced my daughter's
temperature and she recovered.
While at Thomas the Northern Apaches went on the warpath, Geronimo
and his wild followers devastating the settlements and killing many
men, women and children, whom we buried in the post cemetery. This
war lasted two years before our troops drove the Apaches into Mexico
and, by agreement with the Mexican Government, followed them there,
capturing Geronimo.
Contract Surgeon Dr. Leonard Wood, now the senior major general in the
United States Army (who at one time attended my family), volunteered
to act as surgeon in the expedition into Mexico, carrying his kit on
his back while commanding a company of friendly Indians, which he did
excellently. For this General Miles, commanding the department, became
much attached to him.
To carry water into the post I had set the men to work building
ditches, and also planted several hundred trees, which began to grow
well. General Miles, visiting the camp on inspection, told me I
deserved a better post. He relieved General Grierson from Fort Grant
and placed me in command of that seven-company post. General Grierson
recommended its abandonment for want of water, but General Miles said
he knew I could get water from the mountains and make Grant one of the
best posts. He supported me in requisitions for all the material and
money I needed.