We Move.—Acres of Buffalo.—Indian Scare.—Killed Two Bears.—First
Wedding in the Panhandle.—At Last!—Fort Elliott.—Meet Romero and
Son.—The Great Buffalo-slayer.—What Gen. Sheridan Said.—The Great
Slaughter Begun.
We moved that day down the river about ten miles. We camped in a
hackberry and elm grove, at the mouth of a big coulée. This term
is used more in the Dakotas than in Texas, meaning ravine, draw,
cañon, arroyo,—all these terms being nearly synonymous. It was an
ideal camping-ground. Plenty of wood, water, grass, and protection
from storms. I commenced at once to make myself useful. Buck and his
father's family camped separately. Each outfit had a good tent; Buck's
tent was ten by twelve feet, his father's, twelve by fourteen feet.
Simpson lived with Mr. Wood, senior. Buck and his wife lived alone.
Buck invited me to make my home with him, which invitation I gladly
accepted.
The first thing in order was unhitching the team; the harness was hung
over each front wheel, collars hung on the front hounds of the wagon.
Then the grass scalped off where the camp-fire was to be, when not
using the cook-stove. Wood was to be gathered, the camp-fire built,
water brought, the cooking utensils and mess box placed near the
fire, Mrs. Wood getting the meals and Buck and I putting up the tent,
carrying in the bedding, leveling the rough places, and making down the
beds.
This was the universal custom when camping. And the sun had not yet
gone down when supper was eaten. I walked up onto a little hill, just
back of our camp, where I had a good view back up the coulée, to the
north. I was not more than one hundred yards from camp, and after
looking a little bit to make sure, I said in a strong voice that "I
believed I saw five thousand buffalo." Buck, his father, and George,
all came up with their guns; and as they looked and ejaculated I
thought my estimate very considerate. The old gent said there were ten
thousand in sight, this minute, not counting those in the gulches and
ravines that we could not see.
After looking at them a short time we all went down to camp and held a
council. Buck said if I would stay with him he would make a killing as
long as it would pay to stay; said he would give me 30 cents apiece for
all the buffaloes I would skin and peg out. That is to say: after the
hides were brought into camp and little holes cut through them around
the outer edge and pegs about six inches long, sharpened at one end and
driven into the ground through the holes, commencing the work by first
driving three pegs at the neck end of the hide, then going to the tail
end, and pulling on the hide to a proper degree and driving two pegs,
one on each side of the tail, then so on all around it, stretching the
hide in a proper and uniform shape. I told him I would stay with him
indefinitely if I could get to where I could get some clothes, a gun,
and plenty of tobacco.
I omitted, previously, to state that I was an inveterate chewer and
smoker at the time; and what made the last day of my pilgrimage to
the Adobe Walls worse was, that I ran out of both chewing and smoking
tobacco. I told Mr. Wood so the morning that I came to them; told him
"how I had missed my tobacco the day before." He gave me a piece, and
said they nearly all used it, and had plenty of it. But it did not
taste natural to me until this evening.
I now briefly gave the party my antecedents, and when I came to that
part, and had related it, of the last few days' experience, they acted
toward me more like father, mother, brothers and sisters than mere
chance acquaintances.
George Simpson said: "I'll tell you what we will do: let's hunt here a
few days until the bulk of these buffalo pass, then you and I will take
two of the horses, some coffee, salt, and a little flour, and go back
and get your gun and outfit." All of which was agreed to.
That night I slept soundly, and was awakened next morning by the
crowing of the roosters. Each family had a coop of chickens. I got up
feeling well refreshed.
After building the camp-fire, Buck and his wife came out of the tent.
We all helped to get the breakfast, and soon after eating it was
light enough to see the horses, which we soon had the harness on. We
unloaded the wagon and hitched the team to it. Then, with a steel, a
ripping-knife and a skinning-knife, together with an old Enfield rifle,
I drove up the coulée behind Buck, who was on horseback, carrying a
50-caliber Sharp's rifle, a belt buckled around his waist containing
thirty-two cartridges, besides a dozen loose ones in his coat pocket.
After going about a half-mile he rode down from a little rise he had
gone upon, and waited for me to come up to him. When I came up he said:
"Now drive on to yonder plum thicket, and go up on the bench to the
left of it and wait and watch for me." I did so, and when I got there I
saw that the buffaloes were in about the same position as they were the
night before, only there were not so many. What breeze there was came
from the northeast. I afterward learned much more about buffaloes than
I knew then.
I had not waited long until I heard that loud and boom-like report
of the "big fifty," that I was to hear more or less of for the next
three years. Again I heard it; then about two miles west of where this
report came from, pealed out the same deep roar and it came from George
Simpson's big fifty. Then from Buck in front of me I heard again the
loud detonating sound, and I saw the smoke as it floated away in the
air to the southwest, and then for half an hour or more a desultory
firing was kept up by both guns. The sound from Buck's gun was much
more distinct than from George's, the former being much closer, and
more on a line with the air-current.
After about three-quarters of an hour Buck rode up on an eminence in
front of me, and waved his hat. I started toward him, and there was not
a buffalo in sight; they had all hurried back over the divide toward
Wolf creek,—the same creek where seven months after I picked up the
brass kettle that verdigris-poisoned me.
Coming up to where Buck was, he informed me that he had killed sixteen
buffalo. I was thrilled with delight; whereas, in less than four months
I looked upon such things as a matter of course.
Following Buck, and driving nearly half a mile further, we came to the
first carcass. One of the horses in the team was so frightened at sight
and scent of the dead animal that we had much trouble to manage him. He
was flighty and nervous, so much so that we had to unhitch and tie him
to the wagon while I skinned the first buffalo. But before we got them
all skinned we could drive up to the side of a carcass, and he would
pay no attention to it. We thought that the quiet, sedate manner in
which his mate acted had made him ashamed of himself.
Buck had skinned a few buffaloes in Colorado, and to me at that time he
seemed like an expert. But in four months I could double-discount him.
I would not attempt to tell the different positions and attitudes I
placed myself in that day. Suffice to say, I got the hides off from ten
of them, and when we got to camp, about four o'clock in the evening, I
was so stiff and sore I could hardly get out of the wagon. While I was
skinning the first buffalo, Buck rode out in the direction where George
Simpson had been shooting and got back a little after I had started in
on the second one.
These carcasses were strung out at even intervals for half a mile,
in the direction that all the others went, viz., northeast. Some had
turned to right and left of the line of travel. Buck skinned two of the
carcasses while I was taking the hide from one. He would ride over the
breaks of the coulée and be gone for an hour or so and come back and
skin two more, then off again in some other direction. And when I was
skinning my tenth carcass he came back and skinned the two remaining
ones.
We took the hump from both sides of the hump ribs, of all the
carcasses. In taking out the hump we inserted the knife at the coupling
of the loin, cutting forward down the lower side, as far forward as
the perpendicular ribs ran; then, starting at the loin again, would
cut down on the upper side; then, taking hold of the end of the piece,
would cut and hold off a little, running the knife as before, down the
upper side,—thus taking out a strip from a full-grown animal about
three feet long and widening and being thicker as it went forward, and
near the front of the hump ribs it would as a rule be ten or twelve
inches wide and four or five inches thick. When first taken out and
when hung up for a couple of days with the big end down, it became
shrunken, or "set," as we termed it. It also became tender and brittle,
with no taint. The front end had a streak of lean and fat alternating,
and when fried in tallow made a feast for the gods.
I had left the camp that morning without taking any drinking-water with
me, and was very thirsty nearly all day, which seemed to contribute
toward weakening me. But by quenching my thirst, lying down a few
minutes, then eating a hearty meal, with strong coffee, and by
stretching and working my arms and lower limbs, I was ready for the
pegging-out of the hides, and before it was too dark to see how to
strike a peg I had the sixteen hides pegged out and three dollars
earned before going to bed, for the ten buffaloes that I had skinned
and pegged out.
We reloaded the empty shells from the day's shooting, fifty-one in all,
or a little over an average of three shots to the animal. Some were
killed with one shot, some two, some three, and one with five shots.
Others went off with the herd, carrying lead in their bodies.
Each hunter carried in his ammunition-box a reloading outfit,
consisting of bullet molds, primer extractor, swedge, tamper,
patch-paper, and lubricator. After reloading the shells we went to bed
and to sleep.
I awoke the next morning rested, and eager for the hunt. I had thought
when coming in with the hides to the camp the evening before that I
would have to give up the job. But if anything I was now more anxious
than ever to go on the hunt. Buck and his father went up on the little
hill to look the country over, while I was hitching up the team. When
they came back they reported that a few buffaloes were, in sight, in
scattering bands, and that a few were close to camp. Buck advised me
to not hitch up at present and said: "I wish you would cut four strong
forks and four cross-arms [giving me the dimensions], drive the forks
into the ground here [indicating the place], and when we come into
camp to-night I'll fasten a hide inside the frame and we will have a
vat to salt the humps in so we can dry them."
Alas! for plans. Before I had gotten quite through the work assigned
me, I heard shooting up the coulée, five or six shots in rapid
succession.
A short interval and boom! boom! again; and when he had fired about
twenty rounds, at longer or shorter intervals, here there came down and
out of the coulée, about thirty head of old stub-horn bulls, going at
their lumbering, nodding gait, passing to within 100 feet of where our
camp was.
I was near the wagon; the Enfield was in the front end of it, and
the cartridge-belt around my waist. I hurried for the gun, put in a
cartridge, and ran out toward them, dropping my right knee on the
ground, took aim at the leader, and gave him a paunch shot ranging
forward. Then I saw the rear of the herd was being followed by one
with its right front leg broken and flapping. I aimed at him at the
regulation place that I had heard Buck, George and the old man Wood say
was the proper place to hit a buffalo with a side shot, which would
be a place anywhere inside of a circle as large as a cowboy's hat,
just back of the shoulderblade. And here was where I plunked him, and
in much less time than it takes to tell it, the pale, frothy blood
blubbered out of his nostrils, he made a few lurches and fell over—dead.
By this time the one I had "paunched" fell out to the left and stopped,
while the rest seemed to increase their speed, with that characteristic
motion, loping and bowing their great foreheads, their chin mops of
long hair fairly sweeping the ground as their heads came down, in their
up-and-down motion. They all passed on out of range of the Enfield,
and the first one I had shot lay down on his hunkers and died in that
position.
Soon Buck came riding out of the coulée and reported that he had killed
four buffaloes and broken one's leg that had got away.
"Not much he didn't," said his wife; "Mr. Cook killed him with the
old needle-gun," which term was used to designate all trap-door
breech-blocks, "and another besides," she added. He had not yet seen
the carcasses, although they were lying in plain sight on the short
grass, the farthest one not more than 200 yards away.
When he saw them and me with the old gun yet in my hands, he said,
"Well, I'll be darned! I've threatened to throw that old gun away
several times, but I'm glad, now, I didn't."
We took the team and drove up the coulée to where the first bull had
been killed, keeping the other three he had killed in sight. As we
passed them Buck remarked that "these old stub-horns are harder to skin
than cows," which we had the day before, "and I thought I'd help you
with them, as I saw that you were pretty near played out yesterday."
Before we got the first hide off, we heard some one calling. Upon
looking up we saw the women and children running toward us. We grabbed
our guns and ran toward them, they still coming on. When we met them
they were badly frightened, and told us that "the camp was full of
Indians."
Buck said to me, "You go with the folks back of the wagon in the rough
ground and I will try to find out what this means."
I said, "No, I will not; these are your own blood relations. You have
the best gun and the most ammunition. You can make a better fight for
them than I can. I'll go and see what this means myself."
Accordingly, I started off in the direction of camp, thinking that the
women were "panicky." I could not bring myself to believe that there
were war parties out at that time of the year.
I had not gone far when I met two soldiers of the Fourth United States
cavalry riding rapidly up the coulée. The first thing one of them said,
was: "Where are those women and children? Did you see them?"
My answer was, "Yes, boys, they are at such a place about now,"
pointing in the direction. One of them dismounted, saying, "Here,—you
get on this horse, and go with this man and bring them to camp, for
there is more danger where they are than in camp."
The other soldier and I hurried on until within about 300 yards of the
broken ground, when I pulled up and said:
"Don't let's rush in there; for there is a man with them and he has
a fifty-caliber Sharp's and lots of ammunition. They are comparative
strangers to me; and if we lope in there one of us might get hurt
before they could take us for friends. You stay where you are; I'll
ride on slowly a little farther, and halloo and try and attract their
attention toward me."
He replied: "All right; that is best."
I rode forward about 100 yards and hallooed, "O, Buck, Buck!"
"You-pee!" came back the response. Then he, the women and children,
filed out of the broken ground and came on. The soldier then rode up,
dismounted, and, walking along beside the whole party, explained the
condition of affairs.
By the time we got to where Buck and I had left the team, the soldier
who gave me his horse was there. We hitched up, all piled into the
wagon, and went to camp. Mr. Wood and Simpson did not get in till near
dark, bringing in twenty-one hides.
Arriving at camp, we met a sergeant and six more soldiers, making nine
soldiers in all. I then learned from the non-commissioned officer that
there had been an order issued from the War Department a few months
before, that military escorts would be furnished to all Indian hunting
parties in the future.
This was for two purposes: one to see that no overt act would be
perpetrated by the Indians against settlers and other hunters, and
_vice versa_; and that this was a "Kiowa hunting party," mostly young
bloods, old men, and the whole squaw outfit. But some of the worst of
the warriors were held as hostages at Fort Sill.
We all knew that the past summer had been a busy one with hunters,
soldiers, and Indians.
It was the Indian war of 1874. It was the year that that Spartan band
of buffalo hunters, at the Adobe Walls, withstood the siege of all the
able-bodied warriors of the Cheyenne, Arapahoe, Kiowa and Comanche
tribes. It was that summer, on the Washita divide, that a mere apology,
in point of numbers, of an escort and train guard resisted, charge
after charge, with blood-curdling yells, more than a thousand of the
best warriors of the southern wild Indians. It was that summer that
the then Captain, Adna R. Chaffee, who had worked his way up from a
private soldier, step by step, for heroic and meritorious conduct, to
the position he then held, made his famous battle-field speech, near
the breaks of the Red river, when he was confronted with a horde of
painted, war-bonneted red-devils under old Nigger Horse. He halted his
company, fronted them, right-dressed them, and said:
"Forward, boys! Charge them, and if any of you are killed I'll promote
you to corporal."
It was in this country that Lieutenant Elliott was killed, and in
whose honor Fort Elliott was named. It was the summer of the first big
general slaughter by an army, as it were, of bold, venturesome hunters,
making buffalo-hides a specialty for commercial purposes.
Was it any wonder that the Indians were mad? And this same ground
that we were camping on was a portion of the Kiowas' favorite
hunting-grounds. Here their ancestors had followed the chase for ages
gone by.
The sergeant informed us that there was a company of the Fourth Cavalry
with these Indians, with two commissioned officers. They had broken
camp that morning very early, as they wished to go down the river to
the mouth of White Deer that day, and not make two camps. They had
crossed the Canadian river that morning about three miles above us,
having come in from the south the day before; and that runners had come
in the night before, who had been out scouting for good hunting, and
had reported that the White Deer country was alive with the game they
were hunting. He also said that it was customary in moving the big camp
from place to place for a detail of soldiers to go ahead and the main
escort to bring up the rear. He and his party had been assigned that
duty for that day.
But Quirt Whip and his band of Indians had got ahead of them while they
were getting a quicksanded horse out of the river, and when Quirt Whip
came along to our camp, so Quirt Whip told him, the women and children
all fled. So he sent an interpreter back hastily to tell what had
happened, and he and his men had hastened on as fast as they could.
I asked the sergeant why the interpreter did not call out to the women
and assure them there was no danger.
"Because," said he, "he was dressed like the rest and is a
quarter-breed, three-quarters of it being on the Indian side; and he is
totally devoid of intuition, and how in h——l he can talk two languages
is beyond my comprehension."
I was silenced. The sergeant sent two men ahead to overtake Quirt
Whip and travel with them to the White Deer camp. All the time our
conversation was being carried on the Indians were passing our camp,
about 100 yards south of it, going in an easterly direction. It was the
first travois[1] (travoy) outfit I had ever seen,—but by no means the
last, as I will relate and describe later on.
[1] TRAVOIS (from the French). A contrivance of two poles lashed at
one end to each side of a pony, the other ends trailing on the ground.
A sort of sack made from skins or canvas, is lashed to the cross-bars
connecting the two poles. On this travois is carried the camp equipage,
and sometimes a sick or wounded person.
Just as the last of the Indians were passing by and the other soldiers
were near, the sergeant and his men started on and were but a little
way off, when suddenly he wheeled around, galloped back to the command,
dismounted, and saluted the officers, who were all quite near us. He
seemed to be making an oral report, adding many gestures to it, and
pointing toward us and in other directions. He then remounted and rode
on in the direction his comrades had taken.
The command turned, left-obliqued, came up to within a few steps of Mr.
Wood senior's tent, and dismounted where we were all at the time. The
first lieutenant was the spokesman. He was as straight as an arrow,
well proportioned, about six feet high, and about forty-five years
old. He commenced by making a courteous bow to the ladies, saying:
"Glad to meet you, ladies, but sorry to find you here. How do you do,
men? You people have had quite a shake-up. Where did you come from and
where are you intending to go?"
Mrs. Wood, Sr., being a ready talker, briefly told him who they were;
where they came from; where they were finally going to; and that the
intention was to secure homes for all of them near Fort Elliott, if
the country there suited them; and wound up by telling him we were
short two men, her husband and her daughter-in-law's brother; that
they had gained one man to their party at the Adobe Walls. He had been
lost several days, with nothing to eat, and was with them temporarily.
She told him that she expected her husband and George any time, and
that for her part buffalo-hunting had lost its charms for her; that
she would not pass through such a mental strain and physical exertion
again, as she had that morning, for all the buffalo-hides on the whole
range.
The officer then said, addressing himself more to Buck and myself:
"This is no place for these women and children. Strong men can
generally come through all right, in an Indian country; and that is
what this is at present. The Cheyennes and Arapahoes hunt north of
here; the Comanches are hunting south of here; they, or these Kiowas,
and a small party of young men, could slip out of their camp, and in
the absence of you men murder these women and children, for it is in
their hearts to do it. They look upon you as trespassers on their
hunting-grounds. I will leave a guard here of five of my troopers; and
when the other two men come in I want you all to come with them to my
camp. Be sure and break this camp by to-morrow morning and follow us."
With that he turned around and said: "Sergeant, detail five men with
their bedding and rations, and instruct them to remain with these
people and bring them to my camp to-morrow."
Mrs. Wood said, "No, you don't need any rations; we will do their
cooking and furnish the provisions ourselves."
The Lieutenant doffed his hat to her, said "Thank you, madam," and was
gone with his men of blue.
Buck and I went out and skinned our buffaloes; brought in and pegged
out the hides. We helped his father and George do the same when they
came in.
The next morning we all pulled out and went to White Deer, stopped our
wagons close to the soldiers' tents, and pitched our tents.
The next morning I went to the officer's tent and told him that the men
wished to go back after the hides.
He said: "I'll tell you; I have been thinking about you people. It is
about eight miles from here to the military trail from Fort Dodge to
Fort Elliott. There is less danger along that trail than where you
were. There were several Kiowas killed and wounded at the old Adobe
Walls last summer. Night before last, where we camped, they held a kind
of mourning powwow, because white hunters had killed their people. Now
you folks unload your wagons and go back after the hides, take them
onto the trail and spread them out; then come back here and get your
outfit. In three more days, I will move down to the Antelope hills,
and camp just over the boundary-line in the Indian Territory, leaving
you people on the military trail, shifting all responsibility for your
welfare."
That being a mandate, we governed ourselves accordingly. After we were
in camp a few days near the government trail, and about three miles
south of the Canadian river, we learned that there was a way-station
about a mile and a half north of the river crossing, and that the
proprietor kept hunters' supplies and bought hides.
Buck and I rode over to the place and found we were at the Springer
ranch. It was built on the block-house, stockade, Indian frontier
plan. It faced south towards the river. A square pit six by six feet
and six feet deep had been dug inside the building. Then from it,
leading south, was a trench running outside fifty feet, where was dug
a circular pit ten feet in diameter and five feet deep. This and the
trench were cribbed over and the dirt tamped down over it. The circular
pit was portholed all around. Also, from the pit inside the block-house
there was a trench running to the corral and stable. The stockade
being loopholed made the whole place so impregnable that a few cool,
determined men could make it impossible for the allied tribes to take
it without artillery.
We traded our hides to Springer for provisions, ammunition, etc. Here I
was fortunate enough to get me two fair suits of underwear, stockings,
boots, and such necessaries as I was in need of.
Springer told us he thought there was no danger of the Indians
bothering us before spring; thought we were perfectly safe to go
anywhere except to cross the one-hundredth meridian, which was the line
between the Indian Territory and the Panhandle of Texas. He said: "If
you are caught over the line you will be arrested by some deputy United
States Marshal and put to lots of trouble." But we had no desire to go
that way at the time.
The next day we hauled over to Springer all the hides we had on hand,
receiving $2.50 for the old bull-hides, $3 for the choice robe
cow-hides, and $1.75 each for all the others.
Buck and I found a place four miles southwest of the Springer ranch,
about two hundred yards from the river, on the south side, and at the
mouth of a dry sand creek, where there was a large grove of cottonwood
timber, and in the sand creek at the south end of the grove were
several holes of fresh water. Here we decided to build a log cabin,
it being the first house built on the South Canadian river, in the
Panhandle of Texas, inhabited by a pale-face family. While cutting
the logs and building this cabin, we occasionally killed a straggling
buffalo, until we had on hand the day we moved into the house (which we
were more than two weeks in building), thirty-one hides.
These we hauled to Springer, and while there we met a party of regular
buffalo-hunters. They informed us that the great mass of the buffaloes
was south of the Red river, and that there would be no profitable
buffalo-hunting here until the next May or June. Here I was fortunate
enough to buy of one of these hunters a Sharp's 44-caliber rifle,
reloading outfit, belt, and 150 shells. The man had used the gun only
a short time, and seventy-five of the shells had never been loaded. I
got the gun and his interest in the entire buffalo range for thirty-six
dollars, he having met with the misfortune of shooting himself
seriously, but not fatally, in the right side with the same gun which
proved a "hoodoo" to me as the hunters afterwards sometimes remarked.
It was an elegant fine-sighted gun, with buckhorn sights.
Wild turkeys were plentiful all about our cabin, and were so tame
that it was no trouble at all to kill them in daytime, and in bright
moonlight nights one could get up close to their roosts, and by getting
them between the hunter and the moon, they were frequently shot from
the trees.
On the north side of the river from the cabin, and a half-mile or so
from the river was quite a grove of persimmon trees, some of them
twenty-five or thirty feet high, and some with trunks eight inches in
diameter. About the time we first commenced the building of the cabin
the fruit must have been in its prime, but when we found them they were
nearly gone.
This particular morning that we found it we had crossed the river on
horseback and were riding north toward the hills to look for chance
buffalo, when Buck's attention was attracted toward the grove, which
was on our left about two hundred yards from us.
"Look! look! See how that tree shakes." We stopped, and presently saw a
violent trembling or shaking of another tree some little distance from
the first. "John," said he, "that's a 'simmon grove and that's a bear
in there."
We had seen bear-tracks along the river-bars several times while
building the cabin. He told me to keep around the right of the grove
between it and the hills.
Said he: "I'll keep to the left between it and the river; we will ride
slow, and if he breaks out you play it to him. You can shoot off Barney
[the horse I was riding] all right. He stands good; I've killed many a
deer off from him up on the Picket Wire."
When we parted he said: "Now, John, let's be careful, and don't let's
shoot one another."
I rode quartering toward the grove, and on my left I caught sight of a
bear with its head from me. I stopped, cocked my gun, had my trigger
finger inside the trigger-guard, and was raising the gun to take aim,
when old Barney gave a snort, whirled so quickly that I and the gun
both went off, the bullet presumably striking the ground just a little
ahead of me, and for the next twenty or more minutes it was the most
exciting, busy and laughable hunts for game I ever experienced.
I had fallen forward on my face. The muzzle of the gun struck the
ground first and got sand in it. I was on my feet instantly, and picked
up the gun; threw down the breech-block, and soon had aim. Then I saw
that Buck was riding up rapidly between myself and the grove, and quite
close to it. I rushed forward, and, crossing Buck's track in behind his
horse, I got a good shot at the bear and broke his back. There was no
underbrush in the grove, and what grass there was was literally tramped
down, and one could see clear through the grove from any direction.
At report of the gun Buck turned his horse around, and just as I shot
the second time he shot at another bear that had broken from cover and
was running for the hills. My second shot killed the bear that I was
after. Buck's first shot went wild.
Seeing that the first bear was safe, I ran on north through the
scattering trees; but before I had gotten to the north end of the
persimmon grove, Buck had fired twice more, and when I came in full
view of the bear it was nearly three hundred yards away and going
north, with Buck a close second. He would stop and shoot about every
one hundred yards; but could not get his horse to run onto the bear.
Every time he would get up anywise close to it his horse would shy off.
After running and shooting four or five times this way he flanked his
horse to the right and put him to his full speed. After passing the
bear he circled in toward him. They were then nearly a mile off, and
close to the hills. When he got as close as he thought he could get
the horse to the bear, he checked up and dismounted; dropping one knee
to the ground, he fired, and as he afterwards told me he was not over
eight yards from Bruin.
The moment Buck dismounted his horse bolted, and struck for the cabin.
When the horse passed near me he was straining every muscle to its
fullest tension. The saddle stirrups were flapping and seeming to keep
time to the motion. I only took a hurried glance at "Doc," as the
horse was called, as he passed by, then looking toward the bear and
Buck, saw they were both coming toward me. Just behind in the edge of
the persimmon grove there was a tree that forked. About six feet from
there another one was leaning considerably grown up through the fork. I
retreated to this place and got up in the crotch and by leaning my back
against one of the forks and with both feet on the leaning tree, which
was about five inches in diameter, my weight would press it down solid
in the crotch, which gave me fair footing; then by peering out through
the small limbs and twigs I could observe all that was going on.
The bear was nearly a quarter of a mile ahead of Buck, and was going
along leisurely, and every now and then would look back. Buck was in a
kind of dog-trot, and every few rods would stop, shoot, and come on.
When the bear was about one hundred and fifty yards from the grove he
turned a little to the right, which pleased me, for I had begun to get
uneasy for fear a spent ball from the pursuer's gun might hit me. As
the animal turned I noticed his tongue was lolling, and that he was
badly wounded. I pointed the gun toward him, and, watching to get the
best chance, I shot through twigs and all. At the crack of the gun the
bear turned east and got on a line between Buck and me.
He had now gained on the wounded animal so much that he was not more
than two hundred yards behind it. He called out, "Don't shoot!" I
answered back, "Don't you shoot!" The bear was then going very slowly,
and Buck now coming as fast as he could trot.
By the time he had come up to within a hundred feet of it it had passed
out of line of me, when I said, "Here I am, Buck, in a tree. I think it
safe for you to shoot now. The twigs are so thick I can't get a bead on
him."
As the report of the gun died away the bear lay down and gave up the
struggle. Whether from the last shot or pure exhaustion from loss of
blood from its other wounds, we were not able to say. I got down out of
my perch and we both met by the dead bear.
Buck asked, "Where is Barney?"
I asked, "Where is Doc?"
Here we were, both afoot and the river between us and the cabin. The
sight and scent of the bears had thrown both horses in a panic, and it
was sheer fright that had caused them to bolt. We decided to skin the
bears, hang the hides and meat up in the trees, go down opposite the
cabin, and call for Mrs. Wood to bring the horses over to us.
The bears were the common black species which were frequently found in
that region. South of there, in the Brazos river breaks, they were very
numerous. The two were in fine condition, a male and female, and would
weigh something like six hundred pounds for the male and five hundred
pounds for the female.
After dressing them we started for the river. As we were approaching
and nearly opposite the camp, we saw Mrs. Wood riding up to the bank
from the home side. She was riding the horse we had left in camp. She
crossed over to us, and told us that "Barney" and "Doc" were both
scared, and trembled so that she could not lead them. Said she knew
where we were all the time by the shooting, and thought she would bring
Dave over to us so we could ford the river. Wood and his wife crossed
over; then he came back for me, and soon we were at the cabin.
After washing the blood from our hands we went to the saddle-horses,
and soon calmed their fears. Then, mounting them, we led Dave, took
ropes along to pack with, and went back for our meat and hides. When we
again got near the place Doc and Barney snorted and shied and trembled
from fear,—so much so that we were compelled to go back toward the
river and fasten them to some bushes.
But Dave, good old sensible Dave, had no fear whatever. We led him
right up to the carcasses, and packed the hides and such of the meat as
we cared to take. Then Buck sent me on ahead to loosen and get on one
of the saddle-horses, and to hold the other until he came along.
When I commenced to untie them they snorted, jerked, and trembled
violently; but I finally succeeded in getting them both loose. Mounting
Barney, I held Doc by the bridle-rein. When they saw Buck, Dave and the
pack coming they held their heads high, and stared at the outfit until
they came too close for them to stand it any longer when instantly they
bolted again. Soon I had to let go of Doc's rein, and away he went for
home. I circled Barney around the pack twice, he shying off all the
time.
Finally Buck said: "Let me get on him, John; there is no sense in his
acting that way. When we get to camp I'll teach him and Doc both to
pack bear-hides."
I dismounted and traveled on toward camp with faithful old Dave. Buck
struck out for home, and when I and Dave came to the river I led him
down the bank and started him across. The water was near three feet
deep for about fifty feet; then it shallowed down to a mere nothing on
the south side.
The weather was then, and for the past three weeks had been, bright
and pleasant. But the water was cold. So I sat down on the bank to
wait for Buck to come back. Sensible old Dave went on into camp. The
river-bottom from the river to within about five rods of camp was
covered with thick buck-brush, plum, and scattering cottonwood. Just as
Dave was coming out of this thicket Wood was starting in, and when the
horses saw him and the pack they flew the track as usual, and he let
them shy off and around, being in a hurry to get me across the river,
which was soon done.
I have dwelt at some length on this incident, for two reasons: one is
to dispose of the idea that bears hibernate, or go into their holes
and cave up in winter and never come out until spring; the other, as
I had been told in boyhood, that all horses would tremble and run at
sight or scent of bear. We talked of this a good deal at the time. It
surprised me when Buck intimated that those trees were being shaken by
bears, the time then being after mid-December. Buck informed me that in
that climate it was so near spring and the weather being fine, it was
only natural for them to be out if they had "holed up" at all; and he
doubted that they had done so, saying that "in Arkansas he had known
them to be out every month of the year."
We both felt sorry for Barney and Doc, they were so badly frightened
and could not help it.
Wood had been feeding his horses a quart of oats apiece every night, as
he claimed that would accustom them to camp, so that no matter where
he roamed, the horses would always feel at home where the camp was.
We spread a bear-hide down on the ground, where we fed the horses and
poured out their feed as usual that evening, on a tarpaulin close by
the hide; but the two would not come to it. Dave walked up and helped
himself to his share. We then took up the rest of the oats and repeated
this until the fourth evening, when the other two ventured up and ate
their grain. In a few days' time they would both allow us to place the
hides on their backs. Seemingly all fear had gone.
At the time we decided to build our cabin Mr. Wood, senior, and Simpson
decided that they would pull on to Fort Elliott and get all the
information they could about the country in general and the Sweet Water
country in particular; and if they could find what they wanted near the
garrison they would locate, and consider hunting afterward. We all bade
each other a hearty good-by, they taking the trail for the fort.
We heard nothing of or from them until a few days after we killed the
bears. The day we heard of them we had all been away from the cabin.
All had gone on horseback, and we had ridden south from camp and gone
up on the divide between the Canadian and Washita rivers.
We had killed and skinned the only two buffaloes we had seen. I made
the remark, as we were on our road home, that I thought that we were
"in a poor locality for even stragglers."
Buck said: "Yes; and if fair hunting doesn't show up pretty soon, I'll
begin to think that there will be no hunting here until June, as we
were told at Springer's; and maybe we'd better put south."
As we came in sight of the cabin, we saw a covered wagon drawn up in
front of the door. We were all delighted, excited, and speculated as to
whom it could be, and what it meant. We were soon enlightened, for on
coming up to the cabin, we were met by George Simpson and Virginia, she
that was formerly Virginia Wood, but now Mrs. Simpson.
This couple the day before had been married at Fort Elliott, by the
post adjutant. They had taken their wedding tour in a two-horse Bain
wagon, over the virgin soil of the Panhandle of Texas, to our humble
but hospitable abode, to spend their honeymoon. So I was in the
presence of the first couple that was married in the Panhandle.
That evening, around our fireside, I began to get some idea of the
magnitude of the slaughter of poor Lo's commissary. George told us
of having been at the fort, where there was a large, well-stocked
sutler's store, and that at a place called Sweet Water, on the Sweet
Water creek, three miles below the fort, Charles Roth and Bob Wright
had a large store, carrying all kinds of hunters' supplies, and they
had acres of high piles of hides; that it was a wild and woolly place,
having a large dance-hall, two restaurants, three saloons, small and
large hunting outfits coming and going; generally, from ten to fifteen
outfits there nearly every day; that the great masses of buffalo were
south of the Red river, fifty miles south of there, and still moving
south; that they would keep going gradually south, until by ancient
custom they turned north; that they were expected to be back there in
May on their way north; that all the hunters were going to follow the
herds to Red, Pease, and Brazos rivers.
He said that the story of my being lost was a general subject of talk
among the hunters and soldiers, and that it had been exaggerated and
told in different versions so that he could hardly get them to accept
the facts as I had told them in detail to the Wood family. One story
was, that I had been gone twenty days, with nothing to eat. He informed
us that old man Wood had located a place near the head of Gageby creek,
ten miles northeast of Fort Elliott, and was cutting logs to build a
house; and that he wanted Buck and me to come and get land by him, help
build his house, and start the building-up of a community.
So we talked the matter over for two days, and then pulled out for
Gageby, in due time arriving there and looking the country over for a
few days.
George Simpson and myself fitted out to go and find the Mexican camp,
and the people I had come from New Mexico with. I was anxious to get a
War Department map before going back to the Owa Sula or Blue Water. So
Buck and I rode to the fort. As is a rule at military frontier posts,
we reported at the adjutant's office and registered our names, whence
we came, and whither destined. When I asked for the map the commanding
officer, who was present, asked what I wanted it for. I told him "I had
made the mistake of being lost between the Blue Water and the Adobe
Walls;" and before I could proceed with the reason why I wanted the map
he called me inside the railing that partitioned off the office from
the waiting-room, and said:
"Be seated. Now tell us all about that affair. We have heard different
stories. Now I want it at first hand."
After commencing at the time I left my father's house in Johnson
county, Kansas, I detailed my movements up to the time I was in his
presence. I finished by telling him that so far as the gun, bedding
and clothing that I had at the Mexican camp were concerned, I was
not particular about them. But I had some papers in the outfit that
were valuable. He asked me the nature of them. I told him that my
grandfather, Jacob Cook, was a soldier in the Mexican War, and for his
services was awarded one-third of a league of land; that he had located
it in Nueces county, Texas; that he died at Matagorda Bay, of yellow
fever, while on his way home after the war with Mexico; that all the
papers pertaining to the land belonging to him, consisting of 1496
acres, fell to my father; that he had placed those papers in my hands
for my own use.
The commander arose, and stretching himself, said: "A straightforward
story, sir; sounds like a book. Adjutant, furnish this man with a map,
with instructions to return it as soon as he makes his trip, and to
report any water he may find not marked on the map."
Before we left the office an undersized Mexican came in, and in broken
English engaged the adjutant in conversation.
The adjutant said: "Oh, by the way, Theodosia [the Mexican's name],
your home is at La Glorieta; do you know Anton Romero?"
"Yes, his son Manuel is here now, at the sutler's store."
I stepped up to the Mexican, who was a government scout and guide, and
I said: "Come and show him to me."
Theodosia, Buck and I went to the store. At sight of me the young
fellow stood for a moment in doubt and amazement; then hurried up to me
and gave me the Mexican hug; and how he did unravel his lingo, laughing
and crying both at once.
Theodosia interpreted his words to me in this wise: "I am so glad. My
father is in distress about you. He would never have let you leave our
camp alone. We hunted you for three days; father will be so glad now."
I asked the scout to find out where the camp was now: "En donde es el
campo?" (Where is your camp?)
He said it was on the Palo Juan; that we could go and come in two days;
that the hunting gave out on the Blue Water; and that they had come on
toward the fort, hoping to find better hunting; and also that he had
come in the night before to get some ammunition, and to find out if
anyone had seen the Americano who left their camp.
To make a long story short, I made arrangements with Manuel to go back
and report that he had found me, and for him and his father to come the
next day and bring my outfit.
Buck went back to his camp on the Gageby. I rode Doc to the
quartermaster's corral; and as I dismounted I recognized the familiar
face of Jack Callahan, who had been a six-mule-team wagonmaster during
the rebellion, whom I well remembered in Arkansas. It took but a few
words for him to remember me. But as I had grown to full manhood, with
beard on my face, he did not at first recognize me. I was made welcome
and at home.
The next evening after dark, Theodosia came and told me that Romero and
son were there, and were going into camp back of the sutler's store. I
at once hastened to them, and the joy that Romero expressed at sight
of me was genuine. For he had not only been very friendly with me, but
he was troubled in mind for my safety. He had my gun, my wardrobe and
bedding, and I was missing. He did not know what might have happened.
But the saints had been good to him, and the Virgin Mary was smiling.
He did not want to be suspected of having murdered me, such an act
having been done for less value than a Winchester gun and a few duds.
The next morning I had Theodosia go with me to Romero and his son's
camp. And after they got my roll of bedding, war-bag and gun out of
their wagon, I asked them what I owed them, from the time I came to
their place at La Glorieta until this time.
Romero said: "No! No! hombre-man; you owe me nothing. You all the
time helped in camp; here are all your things. I shot away all your
cartridges but two; how much shall I pay you for them?"
I picked up my Winchester and belt and placed them in his hands,
saying, "Romero, these are yours."
"No, no," he said; but when I insisted and told him about my other gun,
before spoken of, he thanked me, saying, as he patted the stock of the
Winchester, "I'll keep it as long as I live, and it shall never go out
of my family." Then, after a general talk of half an hour or so, we
each went his way.
I had heard of the professed friendship, the insincerity, the
treachery, the thieving propensities of the New-Mexican, until, if
I had allowed my prejudices to govern me, as some did, I should be
calling them a race of blanketed thieves. Of course there were, and
are yet, many of that class among the New-Mexicans, but it was not the
rule, according to my experience.
Farewell, Romero! Although your color is cinnamon, and you may have
Spanish, Navajo, or even Apache blood in your veins, you treated me
white all the same.
After reporting to the post adjutant and handing him the map, I left
for Sweet Water, and there I met the real genuine hide-hunters, who
followed this as an exclusive business. Several outfits were camped on
the creek, and with them I put in the remainder of the day and evening,
picking up information, taking items, and asking some questions. Every
hunter kept open camp. Hospitality was unbounded. Every man seemed to
carry his heart upon his sleeve. It was here this day that I met the
greatest of all buffalo-slayers. He was fitting out to make the first
southern hunt that had yet been made by the so-called northern hunters
in the Pease and Brazos rivers country; and he offered me twenty-five
cents per hide for skinning buffaloes. Another man, from northern
Kansas, had engaged to go with him. They intended to start in four or
five days. I told him I would like to go back to Gageby and talk with
the Wood outfit before agreeing to engage with him. Thereupon it was
agreed that I would let him know in two or three days what answer to
make him.
The next morning I rode over to Gageby, reaching there before noon. I
had thought the matter all out, and felt that I was to be a member of
that army of hunters that were to exterminate within the next three
years the countless herds of the American bison.
We were all camped together at this time, and that night I stated the
case something like this: "Now you people are all different from me.
You have more of a community interest; mine is a range interest. It is
immediate funds that I need, and to get the quickest results it is to
my interest to follow the buffaloes." They all agreed with me, but said
if I would stay with them till spring I would get all the hunting I
wanted, but that I must decide for myself.
So, early the next morning, Buchanan Wood made me a tender of the money
for the number of the hides I had skinned, and some I had not, while I
had been with him. I told him that I hoped I could not be so ungrateful
for the many favors I had received from their hands, and insisted that
it was I who owed them money; to which they nearly all in a chorus
said: "Oh, no! not to the Woods."
I felt that they were my benefactors. They had treated me just as a
member of their family from start to finish. Their hospitality was as
broad as the prairies we traveled over; they were kind to one another,
and considerate of the stranger within their gates.
They were a common people, of rather rough exterior, but imbued with
Christian principles. They were a strong type of the backwoodsman, and
had not one personal trait of selfishness among them.
I had arranged with Buck, the night before, to take me to Sweet Water.
When we were ready to start I parted from these Good Samaritans of
the wilderness with no little reluctance. There were no limpy dishrag
handshakes. It was a cordial grasp of the hand and looking me straight
in the eyes; from the old man to the least child, it was "Good-by,
John."
Mrs. Wood said: "Now, John, if you come back with the buffaloes next
summer, you must come and see us; for right here is where we will be if
the Indians don't scare us away."
Buck and I went to Elliott first, to get my bedding and clothes to take
to Sweet Water. While there I went to the sutler's store and bought a
useful present for each member of each family, and sent them back by
Buck, as tokens of my regard for them.
Arriving at Sweet Water, James Buchanan Wood and I parted, and I never
saw him again. Good-by, Buck; you were one of Nature's noblemen.
I reported to the famous hunter before alluded to. He was a six-footer,
built like a greyhound, supple as a cat, a man of unusual vitality,
long-winded in the chase, and an unerring shot at game. His name
was Charles Hart. He was a Union ex-soldier, captured at the battle
of Shiloh, and lived through the horrors of Andersonville prison. He
was in the habit of getting on periodical sprees, at which time his
imagination would run riot.
The man from northern Kansas was also a Union ex-soldier, named Warren
Dockum. If the reader will look on the map of Texas, made some few
years after this time, he will see marked on a tributary of White
Cañon, Dockum's Ranch, where he located in 1877, two years after I
first met him.
A man named Hadley was to accompany us with a freight team. He had six
yoke of oxen and a heavy freight wagon.
Then there was Cyrus Reed, and his brother-in-law, Frank Williamson, a
green, gawky boy, seventeen years old. These, with myself, completed
the number in our outfit. We had two two-horse teams hitched to light
wagons, on starting out. One of these teams hauled the provisions and
camp outfit, which consisted of one medium and one large-sized Dutch
oven, three large frying-pans, two coffee-pots, two camp-kettles,
bread-pans, coffee-mill, tin cups, plates, knives, forks, spoons,
pot-hooks, a meat-broiler, shovel, spades, axes, mess-box, etc. The
other one hauled our bedding, ammunition, two extra guns, grindstone,
war sacks, and what reading-matter we had and could get.
Before leaving, I went to the fort and made the rounds of the garrison,
with a sack, and begged and received nearly all the sack would hold of
newspapers and magazines. The soldiers' and officers' wives seemed glad
to get rid of them, and we were only too glad to get them.
We left the Sweet Water with enough provisions to last us three
months. We had 250 pounds of St. Louis shot-tower lead in bars done
up in 25-pound sacks; 4000 primers, three 25-pound cans of Dupont
powder, and one 6-pound can. This description would be the basis for
all hunting outfits complete, which would vary in the size of the crew,
larger or smaller, and the length of time they expected to be away from
supplies.
We left the Sweet Water a few days after New Year's Day, 1875, starting
up Graham creek; when at its head, we veered a little southwest until
we crossed the north fork of Red river. Here we took and kept as near
a due south course as we could get our wagons over. We traveled five
days continuously, now and then killing and skinning a few straggling
buffaloes that were handy on our route. These hides we put in the
freight wagon and every night we spread them on the ground.
The sixth day we lay over in camp, to rest the stock; and the next day
we pulled up onto the Pease river divide, and got a view of the rear of
the great countless mass of buffaloes.
That night we camped on a tributary of Pease river, where there were
five other hunting outfits, which had come from Sweet Water ahead of
us, but had kept a few miles east of our route. These outfits can
be named in this order, and like our own followed these animals to
the last: "Carr & Causey," "Joe Freed's," "John Godey's," "Uncle Joe
Horde," "Hiram Bickerdyke." "Hi," as we always afterward called him,
was a son of Mother Bickerdyke, the famous army nurse, during the Civil
War, and who was looked upon by the soldiers she campaigned with as a
ministering angel.
That evening there was a general discussion in regard to the main
subject in hunters' minds. Colorado had passed stringent laws that
were practically prohibitory against buffalo-killing; the Legislature
of Kansas did the same; the Indian Territory was patrolled by United
States marshals. And all the venturesome hunters from eastern Colorado,
western Kansas, the Platte, Solomon and Republican rivers country came
to Texas to follow the chase for buffalo-hides.
The Texas Legislature, while we were here among the herds, to destroy
them, was in session at Austin, with a bill drawn up for their
protection. General Phil. Sheridan was then in command of the military
department of the Southwest, with headquarters at San Antonio. When
he heard of the nature of the Texas bill for the protection of the
buffaloes, he went to Austin, and, appearing before the joint assembly
of the House and Senate, so the story goes, told them that they were
making a sentimental mistake by legislating in the interest of the
buffalo. He told them that instead of stopping the hunters they ought
to give them a hearty, unanimous vote of thanks, and appropriate a
sufficient sum of money to strike and present to each one a medal of
bronze, with a dead buffalo on one side and a discouraged Indian on the
other.
He said: "These men have done in the last two years and will do more
in the next year, to settle the vexed Indian question, than the entire
regular army has done in the last thirty years. They are destroying the
Indians' commissary; and it is a well-known fact that an army losing
its base of supplies is placed at a great disadvantage. Send them
powder and lead, if you will; but, for the sake of a lasting peace,
let them kill, skin, and sell until the buffaloes are exterminated.
Then your prairies can be covered with speckled cattle, and the festive
cowboy, who follows the hunter as a second forerunner of an advanced
civilization."
His words had the desired effect, and for the next three years the
American bison traveled through a hail of lead.
The next morning our outfit pulled out south, and that day we caught up
with and passed through many straggling bands of these solemn-looking
but doomed animals. And thus we traveled by easy stages four days more.
Arriving on the breaks of the Salt fork of the Brazos river, we
realized that we were in the midst of that vast sea of animals
that caused us gladness and sorrow, joy, trouble and anxiety, but
independence, for the succeeding three years. We drove down from the
divide, and, finding a fresh spring of water, went into camp at this
place. We decided to scout the country around for a suitable place for
a permanent camp.
About four miles to the west and south we found an ideal hunters' camp:
plenty of fresh water, good grass, and wood in abundance. Here we
made headquarters until April. This was a broken decomposed "mica" or
"isinglass" (gypsum) region, along the breaks of the streams. We were
twenty-five miles west of the one-hundredth meridian, in plain view of
the Kiowa peak to our east and the Double Mountain to our south. We
were in a veritable hunters' paradise. There were buffalo, antelope,
deer, and as one of the party remarked, "turkey until further orders."
I had killed wild turkeys in southwest Missouri, also in southeastern
Kansas, and had always looked upon them as a wary game bird. But
here, turkey, turkey! Manifesting at all times and places a total
indifference to our presence. At first we killed some of them, but
after cooking and attempting to eat them we gave it up. Their meat was
bitter and sickening, from eating china-berries (the fruit of _Sapindus
marginatus_, or soapberry trees). So we passed and repassed them; and
they did the same, and paid no attention whatever to us.
Just below our camp there was a large turkey-roost, where they gathered
in at night by thousands. They came in droves from all points of the
compass.
Deer were simply too easy to find; for they were ever present. The
same with antelope, bear, panther, mountain lion or cougar, raccoon,
polecat, swift coyotes and wolves—they were all here.
And at times I asked myself: "What would you do, John R. Cook, if
you had been a child of this wonderfully prolific game region, your
ancestors, back through countless ages, according to traditional
history, having roamed these vast solitudes as free as the air they
breathed? What would you do if some outside interloper should come in
and start a ruthless slaughter upon the very soil you had grown from
childhood upon, and that you believed you alone had all the rights by
occupancy that could possibly be given one? Yes, what would you do?"
But there are two sides to the question. It is simply a case of the
survival of the fittest. Too late to stop and moralize now. And
sentiment must have no part in our thoughts from this time on. We must
have these 3361 hides that this region is to and did furnish us inside
of three months, within a radius of eight miles from this main camp. So
at it we went. And Hart, whom we will hereafter call Charlie, started
out, and in two hours had killed sixty-three bison.