And now, April, 1871, we again turned our faces toward our El Paso home,
in the hope of recuperating in other business what we had lost in
politics, for my expenses had been very heavy.
I still held my town lots, and having faith in the future of El Paso I
took out a license as a real estate agent ten years before any one else.
“Seymour” and “Blair” and the ambulance were still on hand, and I
purchased another pair of very large mules (which we named “Insect” and
“Fairy”) and a wagon for our baggage, provision, etc., and employed two
Mexican drivers. “Johnnie” was absent this time, but the _Mozo_, Lorenzo
was still with us. The most important and interesting personage in our
party was Hamilton Mills, aged twelve months, who had joined our family
at Austin.
Governor Davis had given El Paso a new District Judge, S. B. Newcomb,
and a new District Attorney, J. P. Hague, neither of whom had ever been
heard of on the frontier. These and two adventurers asked permission to
join our party, which was granted, and these four “tenderfeet” made the
journey with us in a wagon drawn by two little mules. Our ideas as to
traveling over the plains were so different that we sometimes separated
for a day or night. They fondly believed that a “station” was a place
where warm meals and clean beds and forage for animals were to be had,
and their greatest anxiety was to “get in.” We depended upon our mess
chest for ourselves, and grassy camps for our animals, and fared much
better.
Much depends upon selecting a good camp, and some of ours were very
pleasant, and even beautiful, so that we had the appearance of a picnic
party. I remember that sometimes we have made a long drive in order to
reach some remembered nook where we had spent a night on former
journeys, and we would drive into it with a feeling akin to coming home.
We reached the Pecos river at Horsehead crossing (where I had camped
twelve years earlier with the Boundary Commission) at daybreak one
morning. The river was swollen and the crossing dangerous. I first sent
a man across on horseback, and then placing my wife and child in the
ambulance I mounted the box and drove through the torrent, _leading the
way for the four adult male tenderfeet_. Their cries to us when we had
reached the western bank, “We can make it,” “We can make it,” were
intended to cheer us, but really it was not a matter of the greatest
importance to us whether they “made it” or not; and, could we have
foreseen the future we might have felt still more indifferent. It is but
fair to state that, later on Mr. Hayne forsook my enemies and became my
friend and remained so till his death.
And now, arrived at my home, came the most trying days of my life. Up to
this time the malignity of my enemies could affect only myself, but now
my wife and child must suffer also. There were never more than a dozen
of these enemies. They were composed of men of both political parties,
each of whom aspired to be the political leader of El Paso. They were in
full accord only in one aim—the political and personal ruin of W. W.
Mills. The Republicans reasoned thus: “We cannot _lead_ the Republican
party until we down Mills.” The Democrats reasoned thus: “We cannot
_defeat_ the Republican party until we down Mills!” They called
themselves the “Anti-Mills Party.”
In June, 1871, there appeared in all the Republican (radical) newspapers
of Texas to which these parties could gain access a most slanderous and
libelous publication against myself, purporting to be the resolutions of
a Republican convention of El Paso County, declaring me to be of
infamous character and “capable of all the crimes in the calendar.”
This document was signed by three Americans as “President” and
“Secretary” of the convention, and _purported_ to be signed by fifteen
of the most prominent Mexicans of the county, _all_ of whom were my
friends and _none_ of whom had ever attended any such “convention.”
I received written statements from _all_ of these Mexican gentlemen
declaring their friendship for me and denouncing the forgery of their
names. This crime was severely punishable by the laws of Texas, and the
punishment was double wherever the name of another person was used to
give respectability to the libel, and I could have caused these men to
have been arrested and carried to Austin and punished there, but now
that so many years have elapsed and these vicious and guilty men have
gone to their last account I do not regret that they escaped, and I omit
their names.
Simultaneously with the publication of the libel mentioned above there
appeared in all the accessible Democratic papers in the State a letter
signed “Victor” (B. F. Williams), containing the same slanders but
somewhat changed in form, showing concert of action.
Then Governor Hamilton wrote me a letter cautioning me against any
resort to violence and bidding me bide my time.
Then our little boy sickened and died, and Mrs. Mills’ health began to
fail, and as my enemies, nearly all of whom had received substantial
favors from me, showed no sign of relenting, we went again to Austin,
this time in the mail coach, carrying the remains of our first born in
the “boot,” to be buried at the Capital of Texas, where we hope also to
rest when life’s fitful fever is past.
But neither then nor at any time did we intend to abandon our El Paso
home.
Two years later the beautiful little Mary, our second and last child,
died at Austin, and we laid her beside her brother. Then, indeed, our
skies were gray.
[Illustration]
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