Major Lynde, in answer to Canby’s letter indorsing me insisted that I
should undertake to learn and report the exact strength of Colonel
Baylor’s command, promising to fight him if it was not stronger than
represented. I consented to undertake this dangerous service, but before
starting I went to Dr. McKee’s quarters. Several officers were there.
The doctor received me by saying that he had been my friend, but I had
incurred the displeasure of his brother officers and he could be so no
longer. Doctor Alden said I had misrepresented him, that he had never
doubted the loyalty or good faith of any officer. I reminded him of his
letter to Anderson. He replied that it was only a friendly letter,
having no reference to military matters.
A year later, when in the field with Captain Anderson, he referred to
his files and found Alden’s letter to be a warning of treachery and
danger. The gallant Lieutenant McNally was present, but appeared to be
in doubt. I have never seen him since, but subsequent events must have
satisfied him of the truth of my representations to him that night on
the Jornado del Muerto.
But I am running ahead of my story. I procured a horse from my friend,
Dr. Knour, and rode to Paso del Norte (Jaurez, Mexico), fifty miles in
six hours, to watch Colonel Baylor, keeping off the road. While en
route, at Canntilla, I met a deserter from Baylor’s command, Sergeant
Kemp, whom I knew to be a Union man who had been forced by circumstances
to join the Texans. I gave him a letter of credence to Major Lynde, and
he reported the exact strength of Baylor’s command, but Lynde moved not.
Several efforts were made to decoy me off the streets of Juarez, so as
to kidnap me, but I saw through the design and avoided them.
One morning I met three acquaintances near the bridge on the main
street, and as I had a letter for one of them I saluted them with “Good
morning, gentlemen.” One of them, Kelly, secession editor of the Mesilla
newspaper, said: “So you are a spy.” I replied: “No, who says I am?” He
said: “I do.” “Then you are a liar.” He struck at me, but I avoided the
blow and placed a cocked pistol at his breast. He threw up his arms and
said, “Don’t fire,” and I put up my pistol. Kelly was soon after killed
by Colonel Baylor in a street fight at Mesilla. (Kelly was from
Michigan.) There was at that time, at El Paso, a German named Kuhn, whom
I knew, and who had the reputation of being a bad man. He professed to
hate the Texans, and I did not suspect him of any connection with them.
I was ready to return to New Mexico when one day about noon, when
walking on the sidewalk near the corner of the plaza in front of the
store of Mr. Duchene, I saw that Dutchman Kuhn on horseback in front of
me, apparently drunk. I wished to avoid him, but as I neared him he rode
onto the sidewalk and seized me by the shoulder. Half a dozen other
horsemen appeared, as though they had risen out of the ground. One
seized my pistol and ordered me to mount his horse quickly. I did so,
and he vaulted up behind me, and away we all went a clattering gallop
toward the Texas side. When we had crossed the river I asked, “Where do
you intend to take me?” One answered, “To Fort Bliss.” I requested that
they would not take me through El Paso, but they decided to do so. Kuhn
then said to me that it was all right, I would have a fair trial and so
on. I said: “I want no talk with you, sir; you are a scoundrel and a
murderer. These soldiers obey orders. You betray for money.” I said
more, and offered to fight him if they would give me my pistol. As I
expected, this piece of pluck won the chivalrous young Texans. I saw no
possibility of escape, and knowing the bitter feeling against me it
appeared to me the chances were in favor of being hung or shot. Not that
I considered myself a spy, for I had not been in disguise nor in the
enemy’s lines, but I did not suppose those gentlemen would hesitate much
about technicalities.
To a soldier taken in battle imprisonment merely means exchange or
parole, but this was a different matter. It was not probable that the
soil of a neutral republic had been violated merely that the Texan
officers might have the pleasure of my company about their quarters. At
Fort Bliss I was taken before the then post commander, Major Waller, who
said: “You are brought here a prisoner, sir.” I asked why they had taken
me from neutral soil, and he said I would learn in time. He then sent
for the officer of the day, Capt. Ike Stafford, who conducted me to the
guardhouse; it was filled with vermin and bad men. (Captain Stafford
still lives in Texas.)
The first night a blacksmith came and took the measure of my ankle, and
presently returned with a ball and chain which he riveted on my leg. I
soon found that by removing my boot I could slip the iron over my foot,
but the chances for escape were very poor, and I often shuddered when
awakened from troubled sleep by its clanking. The idea of kidnaping me
did not originate with the Texan military, but was instigated by citizen
non-combatants—my own neighbors.
The next day two of the young men who kidnaped me came to see me at the
guard house. Their names were Craig and McGarvey—James McGarvey, now of
Galveston. Before they left they promised to be my friends, and
faithfully kept their words. They told me that Kuhn had offered to
divide with them the reward paid him for my arrest, but they declined
the blood-money.
Colonel Herbert also called to see me, and denounced my arrest and
volunteered to act as my counsel.
The colonel applied for a writ of habeas corpus, but the district judge
refused to grant it.
I asked to see Colonel Baylor, and asked to be tried and hung or shot or
released. He said he had evidence enough to hang me, though he would
dislike to do it. Still, if I insisted, he would give me a court
martial. He recounted very correctly some of the incidents of my journey
to Santa Fe.
The next day Baylor sent his adjutant to inform me that he could not
grant a court martial.
Before my arrest I had written my brother Emmett, who was employed on
the overland stage line west of Mesilla, that there would be fighting
between the Texas and United States troops, and suggested that he come
in and report to the commanding officer at Fort Fillmore. He came, but
received no encouragement at Fillmore, and learning of my arrest and
being in danger of rebels at Mesilla, he attempted to make his way
toward California. He went in the mail coach with a party of six other
young men, all well armed.
At Cook’s canyon, about one hundred miles west of Mesilla, they were
attacked by a large body of Apache Indians under Mangas Coloradas,
“Bloody Sleeves,” and one of the most desperate frontier fights on
record ensued. It appears that our friends had time to gain the top of a
little hill and build a stone breastwork about two feet high, inclosing
a space about twelve feet square. A freighter, Mr. Deguere, who passed
the scene a few days later with his wagons, found and buried the bodies
and found everywhere the evidences of a terrible struggle. Under a
stone, on the top of the wall, he found a pencil note, dated July 23d,
1861, stating that they had been fighting two days; had killed many
Indians; that all were now killed or wounded except two; that they were
out of water and would try to escape that night. I have visited the
scene of this conflict. A tree, not more than ten inches in diameter,
about one hundred yards from the fortification, has many marks of
bullets evidently discharged from inside the wall. I give a list of the
names of these brave men, the extent of whose daring and suffering can
never be known in this strange life of ours. They were: Emmett Mills,
Freeman Thomas, Joe Roacher, M. Champion, John Pontel, Bob Avlin and
John Wilson. _All were killed._ The Indians who sold their arms and
watches in Mexico said that they lost forty warriors in the fight. The
newspaper containing this sad account was thrown to me through the
window of my prison.
It was about this time that I stood at the door of the guard house and
saw Colonel Baylor with less than three hundred poorly armed Texans
start on his march to capture Fort Fillmore, then garrisoned by seven
hundred and fifty regular troops, the flower of the United States army,
and I knew and said that he would succeed. That history is a short one.
Baylor took possession of the town of Mesilla unopposed, Major Lynde
made a show of attempting to dislodge him, and a skirmish ensued in
which Lieutenant McNally, not yet knowing that it was only mimic war,
exposed himself and was wounded.
Lynde retreated in good order(?) and that night abandoned the post and
fled in the direction of Fort Stanton. A show was made of destroying the
stores at the post, but very little damage was done. All was confusion
and demoralization. A patriotic quartermaster, Lieutenant Plummer, left
some government drafts in his pockets at his quarters. These were sent
to Washington indirectly by the rebels, and the money collected.
The command marched, or straggled, to San Augustine Springs, eighteen
miles east of Fillmore, where being overtaken by Colonel Baylor with
about two hundred men, they surrendered unconditionally without firing a
gun. No sooner was the surrender an accomplished fact than the same
subordinate officers who had aided to bring it about, some by
indifference, some by sympathy and some by treachery, united in charging
the whole responsibility upon poor old Lynde.
Major Lynde was dismissed from the service, but was reinstated after the
war. He was not treacherous, he was weak, and he was deceived to his
ruin and the disgrace of his flag. I have never doubted but that had he
been properly supported and encouraged the result would have been
different. Of his subalterns some resigned, some joined the enemy and
some went into the recruiting and quartermaster’s service, none, so far
as I know, except McNally ever did much fighting. I do not censure all
of them, but I thought, and still think, that there should have been one
among them who would have assumed command, arrested Lynde, and won a
colonel’s eagles.
When Colonel Baylor returned to Fort Bliss he sent to me and proposed to
release me on parole. I refused to give my parole, and he informed me
that I was released from close confinement and given the limits of the
post. “But,” said he, “if you attempt to escape to the enemy’s lines I
will capture and hang you.”
The secret of my release was that General Canby had arrested at Santa Fe
a prominent secessionist, General Pelham, and, placing him in prison,
threatened him with the same treatment that I should receive, and Canby
was a man of his word.
At the request of my friends, McGarvey, Craig and others, the “limits of
the post” were enlarged as to me, so that finally I drifted to the
Mexican side of the river. I had been confined about thirty days, in
July and August, 1861.
The nearest United States troops were at Fort Craig, one hundred and
seventy-five miles north of El Paso, but I determined to make the
journey. I obtained a horse from Craig and bought another, and secured
the services of a Mexican who claimed to be a guide.
We started at 11 p. m. from Juarez. We crossed the river below Concordia
and traveled north on the east side of the Organ Mountains, avoiding all
roads. When we thought we had reached a point nearly east of Fort Craig,
we rode west across the mountains. The journey was not so easy as I
supposed. The guide did not know the country, and, the weather being
cloudy, we were lost in the mountains. When the sun came out we traveled
west, knowing that we must strike the river somewhere. The fifth morning
out from El Paso we heard the band play guard mount at Fort Craig, and
rising a little hill my heart was gladdened by the sight of the flag of
my country.
This post, Fort Craig, was then commanded by Col. B. S. Roberts, of the
regular army, a brave and true soldier, who was concentrating a force to
resist General Sibley, who was then (December, 1861) en route from San
Antonio with a force of thirty-five hundred Texans to capture and hold
New Mexico. Colonel Roberts received me very kindly, and after I had
made a written report of what I had seen and learned, offered to procure
me a captain’s commission in the New Mexican volunteers (Kit Carson’s
regiment) or to get me a commission as first lieutenant and place me on
his staff as aide-de-camp. I chose the latter.
Early in February, 1862, General Sibley arrived before Fort Craig with
his whole force and a battery of six guns, Major Teel’s. Roberts had
collected, to oppose him, one thousand regulars, two regiments of
Mexican volunteers (natives), under Colonels Carson and Peno, and two
companies of Colorado volunteers. Two companies of our infantry had been
detached and trained to a battery of six guns, under the brave,
unfortunate Captain McRae. On a Sunday evening the Texans appeared in
force in front of the post, and we marched out to fight them in the
plain, but they retired.
That night they crossed to the east bank of the Rio Grande, below Fort
Craig, and next morning commenced to pass round the post by a road which
our engineers had declared impassable. Their advance reached the river
five miles above the post at 9 o’clock a. m. at Valverde, since changed
to San Marcial. General Canby, who had arrived at Fort Craig, ordered
Colonel Roberts to check them with the cavalry, and I went with him. We
drove their advance back from the water, and Roberts sent me back to
report to General Canby that the enemy’s whole force would reach the
river before noon, and to ask for re-enforcements. Canby sent Major
Selden’s column of infantry, six hundred strong, McRae’s battery,
Carson’s New Mexico volunteers and the two Colorado companies.
When we reached the scene of action the enemy had arrived at the foot of
the hills, about a mile east of the river, there being between them and
the river a level plain studded here and there with cottonwood trees,
but in places the ground was open. Our right and their left rested on a
round mountain on the east bank of the river. This was February 21st,
1862.
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Footnote 1:
“All of which I saw and a part of which I was.”
Footnote 2:
Did Arnold experience similar regrets and wishes?
[Illustration]
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