HARNESSED LIGHTNING CARRYING AWFUL TIDINGS—HE “MAKES IT”—A BROKEN FINGER WON’T DISFIGURE A CORPSE.
It is night, and in the solders’ camp a wail of anguish is heard coming from the tent nearest Gen. Canby’s late quarters. Grief weighs down the heart of Orderly Scott, who is giving vent to his anguish in stifled sobs and vows of vengeance on the perpetrators of the foul deed. He rises from his bed, and, with face half buried in his hands, looks again on the mangled form of his benefactor, and, in renewed paroxysms of grief, is borne away by his friends.
The sound of hammer and saw disturbs the midnight hour, while the carpenters are transforming the wooden gun-cases into coffins for the dead. Two are in progress, but the mechanics are economizing the rough boards, for the probabilities are that thethirdwill be needed on the morrow.
The steward is holding a lamp while Drs. Semig and Cabanis are dressing the wounds of the only patient in the hospital tent. He is unconscious, while the ugly, ragged wound in his face is being carefully bound, and the long crooked cut on the left side of the head is being closed with the silver threads, and his ear is being stitched together. He flinches a little when the flexible silver probe is following the trail cut through his right arm made by the pistol ball that struck itoutside of the wrist, and, passing between the bones of the fore arms, came out on the inside, midway between the hand and elbow. The left hand is laid out on a board, and the wounded man is told that “the forefinger must come off.”
“Make out the line of the cut, doctor,” says Meacham.
“There, about this way,” the doctor replies, while with his scalpel he traces a cut nearly to the wrist.
“I can’t hold still while you do that, without chloroform,” says Meacham.
The doctor feels his pulse, and says, “You have lost too much blood to take chloroform.”
“Then let it stay until I am stronger,” rejoins Meacham.
For once doctors agree, one of them saying, “The finger would not disfigure a corpse very much.”
“Please ask Gen. Gilliam to send to Linkville for my wife’s brother, Capt. Ferree,” comes from the bloodless lips of the wounded man.
“My dear fellow,” replies the kind-hearted doctor, “the general sent a courier for him hours ago.”
This thoughtful act of kindness, on the part of Gen. Gilliam, has touched the heart of the sufferer. When he awakes again Capt. Ferree was bending over him and remarking, “He will be blind if he recovers, won’t he, doctor?”
“He won’t be very handsome, that’s a fact,” says the nurse.
In the Modoc camp, when the murderous bands arrive with their scanty plunder, a general quarrel ensues, and bitter reproaches are heard against Hooker Jim for not securing Mr. Dyer, and against CurlyJack and Curly-haired Doctor, for the escape of Maj. Boyle, and on account of the clothing taken from the murdered men. Captain Jack claims the uniform of Gen. Canby. Bogus and Boston divide the clothing taken from Dr. Thomas, and Shacknasty Jim, Hooker Jim and old Schonchin are awarded the clothing and effects of Meacham.
Preparations are making for defence, as the Indians do not doubt that an attack will be made immediately. Many bitter recriminations are uttered; but it is war, war to the last man! They hush all their quarrels in the necessity for united action. They pledge themselves to fight until thelast manis dead. The Curly-haired Doctor calls his assistants around him and begins theGreat Medicine Dance. All night long the sound of drum and song is heard. The Modocs expect every moment to hear the signal of their sentinel on the outposts announcing the “soldiers!” No sleep comes to this camp to-night.
The morning comes, but no blue-coats are seen among the rocks. The army of one thousand menare not ready yet.
The Modocs exult; they are jubilant; they havescaredthe Government. “It is afraid. It will grant us, now, all we ask.” Captain Jack and Scar-face Charley do not assent to this unreasonable view of the situation.
“The soldiers will come. Our victory is not complete. We must fight now until all are dead. The Modoc heart says ‘We must fight!’” Captain Jack affirms.
Saturday morning, April 13th, finds the three camps side by side, and each on the lookout for an attack.
Strong hands are bearing two rough-looking boxes up the steep bluff. In the foremost one is the body of Gen. Canby; in the other, all that is mortal of Dr. Thomas. Slowly they mount the rugged hill. They reach the waiting ambulances. The bodies are each assigned an escort. Sitting beside Gen. Canby’s coffin are his adjutant, Anderson, and the faithful Scott.
How changed the scene! a few hours since all were hopeful. Now, all are in despair, crushed under the affliction of the hour. While they move cautiously under escort, the terrible news is flashing along thousands of miles of telegraph lines, over mountains, under rivers and oceans. Before the sun sets the hearts of millions of people are beating in sympathy with the bereaved. Extras and bulletins are flying from a thousand presses. The newsboys of America are shouting the burden of the terrible telegram. The Indians along a thousand miles of the frontier have already learned that something of dreadful import has happened.
About the middle of the afternoon of this day a woman sitting in her room on State street, Salem, Oregon, raises her eyes, turning them towards the street. Perhaps the sound of steps on the wooden pavement attracts her attention. She sees two familiar faces turned towards her window. “Oh, see her! How pale she is!” She drops her work, and runs hastily to meet the two gentlemen.
“Is he dead? Is he dead? Tell me! Has my husband been killed by the Modocs?” the woman cries.
The gentlemen are speechless for the moment, while the lady pleads. They dare not speak the truth too plainly, now; she cannot bear it.
Portrait.Doctor Thomas.
One of them replies, “Gen. Canby and Dr. Thomas have been killed by the Modocs, and Mr. Meacham is sli—” “mortally wounded!” shrieks the lady sinking to the floor.
Three young persons are coming home. The eldest is a young lady of eighteen. The lad that walks beside her is her brother of sixteen; and the other is an auburn-haired girl of fourteen. There is something in her appearance that connects our thoughts with the mutilated, almost bloodless man who is lying in the hospital in the Lava Beds.
They turn the corner leading out of the Plaza and in sight of home. They see men and women hurrying across the front yard.
“Has father been killed by the Modocs?” bursts from their lips as they fly.
Dr. Hall meets them and says, “Your father is slightly wounded. He is not dead.”
The three frightened children gather around thetearless, pale-faced mother, who says, “Don’t deceive me. I am strong now. I can bear it. Tell me the worst.”
The friends exchanged glances. Dr. Hall shakes his head, slightly motioning towards the elder girl, whose face is buried in the bosom of Mrs. Dr. Smith.
“George, run to the telegraph office and bring the despatch,” says the mother to her son. “I must know the truth.”
The boy bounds away towards the office, and is met by Prof. Powell, who says, “Come back, George. I will go home with you, and tell your mother all about it.”
The two return, and the professor, with falteringvoice reads the despatch: “Canby and Thomas killed. Meacham mortally wounded.” The marble-faced wife arises, saying, “I am going to my husband.” Her friends remonstrate with her.
“I am going to my husband. Do not hinder me,” she repeats.
“My father! my father!” cries the elder daughter, as she is borne to her room.
“My father will not die. He must not die.My father will live,” the younger daughter insists. Her brother is trying to hide his tears while he talks hopefully.
“Father is a very strong man. He may get well. I think he will,” he says.
It is midnight, and sympathizing friends are in the sitting-room and parlor. The daughters and son have sobbed themselves to sleep. The mother and wife, with bloodless face, is on bended knees, and, with uplifted hands clasped, is whispering a prayer.
At this moment her brother is bending over her husband three hundred miles away, watching his breathing; while thoughts of a widowed sister and her orphan children sadden the heart of the veteran who has passed through the war of the Great Rebellion. A silent tear drops on the mangled face beneath him.
Donald McKay, “the scout,” with seventy-two picked men, is dismounting at Col. Mason’s camp. Leaving them, he is challenged by the picket guard and, passing in, reports himself to the officer of the day.
His men stand waiting his return. Meanwhile we will go close enough to inspect them. They aredressed in the uniform of the soldiers of the United States. Their arms are the same, and in the moonlight they appear to be “Regulars.” If the wounded man in the hospital were here they would salute him with, “Tuts-ka-low-a?” (“How do you do, old man Meacham?”) And he would reply, “Te-me-na, Shix-te-wa-tillicums.” (“My heart is all right.”)
These boys are Warm Spring Indians, and the same men who were in the council tents in 1856, when the Government swindled them and their fathers out of their homes in the beautiful “Valley of the Tygh.” They were also in the revival meeting at the Warm Springs Agency in 1871, when the Superintendent of Indian Affairs, who now lies in yonder hospital, and Agent John Smith, took so many red hands in their own and recognized a brotherhood with them. They are the same men, too, who have for years past, each Sunday morning, joined their beloved agent in prayer and song. They have left behind them humble homes, in a poor country, where the Government placed them, and where it still keeps them by the strong arm of the law, without consulting their wishes,—a home they cannot leave, even for a day, without a “pass.” Their manhood was acknowledged in making a treaty; but denied as soon as the compact was completed, until in 1866, when the Government found it had an expensive war on hand with the Snake Indians, and then it offered these men the privilege of volunteering to whip the Snake Indians. This offer they accepted, and were rewarded for their services with a few greenbacks, worth fifty cents on a dollar, and an invitation to a new treaty council, in which they werecheatedout of a reserved right to the fisherieson the Columbia river, near “The Dalles;” and then they were summoned back to their unsought homes, subject to the whims and caprices of Government officers, who were given positions as a reward for political services. True, they agreed to the terms, and they must be made to stand by them whether their pledges were made freely and voluntarily, or under the shining bayonets of an army, and by reason of the superior diplomatic talent of the Government officials who outwitted them. It makes no difference. They are Indians, and three-fourths of the people of the United Statesbelieveandsaythat “the best Indians are all under ground.”
Anxious to demonstrate their loyalty to a Government that has been so good to them, and to establish their right to manhood’s privileges, when an opportunity offered, they enlisted by the advice and consent of their agent, and, followed by his prayers, they are here to-night under the famous scout, Donald McKay.
He evidently is not a “Warm Spring Indian,” yet they trust him, knowing, from their experience with him in the Snake campaign of 1866, that he is thoroughly reliable. Donald McKay is half brother to Dr. Wm. C. McKay. His mother was a Cayuse woman. Being a man of extraordinary endowments, which fit him for a leader, he has taken an active part in all recent Indian wars of the Northwest. Hisname alonecarries a warning to refractory “red-skins.”
As Donald approached his men on his return from head-quarters, several voices inquire if “old man Meacham is dead.” Quietly leading their horses inside the picket line, they unpack the kitchen, mule and blanket ponies.
It is now Sunday morning, the 13th of April. The sun finds couriers on the road to Y-re-ka, bearing despatches announcing that “Meacham is sinking. The surgeons have extracted four bullets from his wounds. The Modocs cannot get away.”
A sad, anxious woman is leaving the depot at Salem, Oregon, destined for the Lava Beds. At home her children are in tears, realizing how dark the clouds of sorrow may become.
The childless widow of Gen. Canby sits withbroken heart, in her parlor in Portland, Oregon.
The family of Dr. Thomas, in Petaluma, Cal., are kneeling around the family altar, and a bereaved widow is praying for resignation to this dispensation of Providence,—is praying for strength to say “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
Monday morning, April 14th, opens amid the noises of camp life; the drum and bugle calls, and human voices join in songs of praise. They are strange sounds for a military camp on the eve of battle. There is an uncommon accent to them, but they sound familiar. What! The sounds come from the lips of men who were born in wild camps among the mountains of Eastern Oregon. Can it be that these red men have so far advanced in Christian civilization that they are now doing what not one of the five hundred white men have the courage to do? Yes, my reader,it is truethat the Warm Spring Indians, who have learned from Agent John Smith these songs of praise and the honor that is due to God, are faithful to their pretensions, andare worshippingHim, and seeking strength to sustain them in the coming strife.
Blush, now, will you not, you who prate so loudly of the superiority of the white men! of his sense of right controlling his actions! Here arered men, who are but a few years removed from savage life,livingthe “new religion”—Christians in real earnest, and shaming the hypocritical pretenders whose cant and whine make liberal-minded people turn away in disgust. You Christian Indian-hater, look at these red-skinned people, and learn a lesson in Christian honesty and moral courage!
The shadows of Van Bremers mountain come slowly over the Lava Beds. In the Modoc camp the “medicine-man” is conducting the war-dance and working the blood of Modoc hearts up to fighting heat. He promises his people that he will make a medicine that will turn the soldiers’ bullets away. He points to the great battle of January, and its results, to inspire confidence in him. The chief is saddened, and fully realizes the situation. He is desperate, and is resolved to fight to the bitter end. He has already appointed the places for each of the warriors. He tells his people that the hated Warm Spring Indians are now in the soldiers’ camp. He reminds them that these people are their enemies; that it was the Warm Spring and Tenino Indians who killed his father. He counsels them to remember his father’s death. He knows that a thousand white soldiers are there and that the “big guns” will reach his stronghold.
Some of his followers have superstitious faith enough in the medicine-man to believe that they will outlive the war, and to believe the white men are conquered already. The chief knows better.
In the soldiers’ camp preparations are making forthe assault. The Coehorn shell-guns are made ready for putting on the backs of mules. Food for the soldiers has been prepared. The guard is stationed. The soldiers in either camp well understand that the morrow’s sun will witness another bloody struggle. Those of them who were in former battles shrink from this one, knowing how nearly impregnable the “stronghold” will be.
“I say, old man, there is a little bit of fun going on. I wish you could be up to see it.” Thus spoke Capt. Ferree to Meacham, and continued, “You know Long Jim—a Modoc prisoner—is under guard. Well, the boys are going to give him achanceto run for his life without the knowledge of Gen. Gilliam. They have everything all fixed, and I’ll bet fifty dollars he ‘makes it!’ They have him in the stone corral, and the plan is to station the boys outside next to the Lava Beds and leave one or two men to guard him. They will pretend to sleep, and Jim will jump the wall, and then the boys will let him have it. Two to one he gets away! I thought I would just tell you, so you wouldn’t get scared to death, thinking the Modocs were attacking the camp.”
This man, Long Jim, had pretended to desert the Modoc camp during the peace negotiations. He had a bullet extracted from his back while in the commissioners’ camp, several weeks before. He was afterwards caught while acting as an emissary to other Indians, and, by order of Gen. Canby, was being detained under guard as a prisoner. Hence his presence. He stoutly denied having any desire to return to Captain Jack’s camp.
The officers are assembled in Col. Green’s quarters.They are celebrating a half-solemn, half-sentimental ceremony that is sometimes indulged in before an engagement. To a listener who lies in a hospital it sounds somewhat as does the medicine war-dance in the middle camp. Indeed, its results are the same, although the design is different. In the Modoc camp, the dance and medicine are for the purpose of invoking spiritual aid and stimulating the nerves of the braves to heroic deeds. In the soldier camp the intention is to celebrate the stirring scenes passed, to exchange friendship, to blot out all the personal differences that exist, and pledge fidelity for the future.
They tell stories and pass jokes and witticisms until a late hour. Before adjournment they join in singing a song that is sung nowhere else and by no other voices. The wounded man in the hospital tent hears only the refrain. It sounds melancholy, and has a saddening effect.
“Then stand by your glasses steady,This world’s a round of lies—Three cheers for the dead already,And hurrah for the next who dies”—
“Then stand by your glasses steady,This world’s a round of lies—Three cheers for the dead already,And hurrah for the next who dies”—
rings out from the lips of brave men who dread not the strife of battle under ordinary circumstances; but to meet an enemy who is so thoroughly protected by chasms and caverns of rock does not promise glory that inflates men’s courage previous to battle.
Col. Tom Wright and Lieut. Eagan drop into the hospital, and, sitting down beside the wounded commissioner, assure him that they will remember Canby and Thomas, and will avenge his own sufferings. They retire with expressions of hope for his recovery. They meet Maj. Thomas and Lieut. Cranston comingto pay a visit. Exchanges of sympathy and friendship follow, and they return to quarters to sleep before the battle, leaving behind them but one wounded man. He is peering into the future, wonderingwhoof all the five hundred men and officers will be hisfirst neighbor.
The camp is quiet. Midnight has passed. The relief guard has been stationed. In the corral Long Jim issleeping. He shows no sign of any intention to escape. The guardis discouraged. The boys outside are impatient. What if Jim should not make the attempt? It would be a huge joke on the boys who planned this little side scene. Truth is, nearly everybody who is in the secret is cursing Jim for a fool that he don’t try to escape. A consultation is held. Something must be done. “I’ll fix it,” says a “little corporal.” Going to the corral he says, “Don’t go to sleep and let the prisoner get away.” Everything becomes quiet and the two guards sit down, one at each side of the corral.
“I’m so d—d sleepy I can’t keep awake,” says one to the other.
“Sleep, then. I won’t say a word,” rejoins his companion. “He can’t get away from me. He’s sleeping himself.”
The first speaker soon hangs his head andsleeps. Soon the other’s chin rests on his breast and he begins tosnore. Long Jim slowly raiseshishead. All is quiet. There sit the two guards, sleeping. One is snoring. Jim listens. His love for his own people and for liberty burns in his heart. He has picked up many items that would be valuable. He knows that the attack will be made on the morrow. His friendsmust be notified. He listens a moment, and then, cautiously laying aside his blanket, he stands erect. One of the guards sits in the gateway of the corral. The wall around him is higher than his head. He cannot see over it. Laying his hands on the stone and summoning all his strength hesprings. A blaze at either end of the corral, then bang! bang! go the guns outside like the firing, of a string of China crackers, only louder. Twenty shots are fired, and still Jim does not fall. He reaches the outer picket line.Two more guns are fired off, lighting up the track for the runaway, and still he flies. The boys reload and send a parting volley in the direction Jim went.
“He ‘made it’; and a madder set of fellows you never saw.I knew they couldn’t hit him. I’ve tried that thing, and it can’t be done.” I need not tell my readers who uttered this remark.
You may suppose that this little episode, “just before the battle,” roused the camp. No such thing occurred. Gen. Gilliam, it is true, jumped to his feet, but was reassured when he was told that it was nothing—only Long Jim escaping.
Before daylight this distinguished individual was “a-tellin’ the Modocs the news,” as one of the sleeping guard declared. So he was, with his clothing pierced by half-a-dozen bullets, but “with nary a wound.”
HORIZONTAL PYROTECHNICS—THE SCALP MIRACLE—KILLED IN PETTICOATS—THE PRESENTIMENT.
It is four o’clock on the morning of Tuesday, the 14th of April. The men are silently falling into line. The mules are groaning under the heavy weight of “mounted pieces,” or loaded with stretchers and other contrivances for carrying the dead and wounded. The soldiers do not seem to realize that some of their number willreturn on these mules, wounded and helpless, or dead. Perhaps each one thinks and hopes that it will be some one other than himself. From the immense preparations for war it would seem that Captain Jack and his followers must be taken in a few minutes. One thousand men and seventy-two Warm Spring Indians are taking position around the ill-starred chieftain’s fortress. He is not ignorant of their presence. His old women and children are hidden away in the caves of the Lava Beds. The young women are detailed to attend the warriors with water and ammunition. The Modocs are better armed than during the last battle. Some of their guns were captured from fallen soldiers on the 17th of January. A large quantity of ammunition that was taken has been changed to suit the old rifles.
The men are at the stations assigned them. They are divested of all unnecessary clothing, and their limbs are bandaged by folds of rawhide. They areawaiting the attack. Each warrior holds a position made impregnable by the formation of the rocks, or the condition in which the great convulsions of nature which produced this indescribable country, left them.
The sun is driving away the darkness, and soon the battle must begin.
In the hospital a veteran of the Second Iowa Cavalry is sitting beside the wounded man, and preparing him for the shock that his nerves will feel.
“Don’t get scared, old man! It will begin very soon, and you will presently have company enough,” he says.
The hospital attendants are making ready to care for the wounded. Mattresses are placed in rows on either side. In a small tent, near by, a surgeon is laying out lint and bandages.
The Iowa veteran is standing at the door, saying to Meacham, “I will tell you when it opens. I can see the fire before you will hear the sound and feel the jar. Don’t get frightened, and think that the mountain is coming down on you, old man. There goes the signal rocket. Now look out!”
An instant more and the shells and howitzers join in a simultaneous demand for the Modoc chief to surrender. The earth trembles while the reports are reverberating around and through the chasms and caverns of the Lava Beds, and before they have finally died away, or the trembling has ceased, another sound comes in a continuous roar, proceeding from the left, and by the time the belt of fire has made the circuit, it repeats itself again and again. But no smoke of rifles is seen coming from the stronghold. “Charge!” rings out by human voice and bugle blast, and a returningseries of bayonets converge. On they go, nearing a common centre. No Modocs are yet in sight. The soldiers, now upright, are hurrying forward, when suddenly, from a covert chasm and cavern, a circle of smoke bursts forth. The Modocs have opened fire. The men fall on the right and left, around the circle. “Onward!” shout the officers. “Onward!” But the men are falling fast. The charge must be abandoned. The bugle sounds “Retreat!” The line widens again, the soldiers bearing back the dead and wounded. They now seek cover among the rocks. The wounded are sent to the hospital, by way of the lake, in boats or on the mule-stretchers. The battle goes on. The wounded continue to arrive. The shadows of the mountains from the west cover the Lava Beds, and still the fight goes on. A volley is heard near the hospital.
“What’s that?” asked the startled patient.
“Burying the dead,” quietly responds the veteran nurse.
A few minutes pass, and another volley is fired, and another soldier is being laid away to rest forever. Still another, and another yet; until five volleys announce that five of the boys who started out with United States rifles in the morning are occupying the narrow homes that must be theirs forever.
At irregular intervals during the night the fight is continued. The Modocs are constantly on duty. The soldiers relieve each other, and are in fighting condition when Tuesday morning comes. No cessation of firing through the day. No rest for the Modocs.
One of the camp sutlers, well known all over theWest as a game fellow, unable to restrain his love for sport, and beingPat-riotic, goes to quartermaster Grier and demands abreech-loader, and also achargerto ride, saying he wanted to do something to help whip the Modocs. Mr. Grier informedPatthat he couldnotissue arms without an order. Pat was indignant, and made application successfully to a citizen for the necessary outfit for war. He mounted Col. Wright’s mule and repaired to the scene of action.
On reaching the line of battle he looked around a few minutes, and, to a word of caution given him by an officer, replied, “Divil an Indian do I see. I came out to git a scalp, and I’m not goin’ home without it.”
The officer who had given him the friendly advice watched the bold sutler as he kept on his way with his “Henry,” ready to pick off any Modoc who might be imprudent enough to show his head. The soldiers shout, “Come back! come back!” but on goes the fearless sutler, carefully picking his way. Look very closely, now, and we can see what appears to be amoving sage-bush. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, it creeps over the ledges. If Pat would only look in the right direction he could see it and have a chance at the travelling bush; and as he is a good shot, hemightscatter the leaves, besides boring a hole throughSteamboat Frank’shead. A puff of smoke comes out of the now immovable bush, and the report mingles with the roar of battle. Pat’s muledropsunder him, and he slips off and takes cover behind a low rock. The mule recovers its feet, and, with almost human sense, makes its way back to the soldiers’ line. Pat, anxious to discover his man, raises his head above the rocks. Whiz! comes another bullet, soclose that Pat drops back quietly,—indeed, so very quietly that the soldiers report him dead; and noble-hearted Pat is named among the slain. But let us see how he really is. After lying contented awhile, he again slowly lifts his head, and another shot comes so close that Pat again drops behind the rock, and a second time the soldiers shout, “They’ve got him this time, sure!”
Not so, however. Pat is not hurt yet. Again and again he attempts to move from behind the rock, scarcely large enough to protect him, and each time Steamboat fires. No one who knows Pat McManus ever doubted his courage, but he deserves credit, also, for remembering that “Discretion is the better part of valor.” He finally arranges himself for a “quiet snooze behind the rock,” as he expressed it, and awaited the welcome shades of evening. He then crawls out to the soldier line. It is said that he stood the fire of the soldiers who mistook him for an Indian, until he shouted to them, “Dry up, there! It’s me! Don’t you know a white man on his knees from an Injun on his belly?”
Directly west of Captain Jack’s stronghold is a flat an almost level plain of lava rocks of six hundred yards in width, but commanded by the stronghold, while it does not offer protection to those who attempt to hold it. To complete the investment it is necessary to take this “flat.” Lieut. Eagan is ordered to the execution of this enterprise. He is a daring leader, and, calling to his men to follow, moves forward. It is known to be a hazardous undertaking, but Eagan is just the man. Away he goes, jumping from one rock to another, calling to his men: “Come, myboys! come!” he cries. But suddenly the Lava Rocks in front belch forth Modoc bullets, and the gallant lieutenantdrops. Then a soldier, and then another. Eagan shouts, “Fall back!” Pell-mell they go, stooping, jumping and shouting, leaving the brave fellow alone, while his men take a position where they can prevent the Modocs from capturing their leader.
Dr. Cabanis,—who seems to bear a charmed life, hearing of Eagan’s fall, goes to him. The Modocs open fire on him. Steadily the gallant doctor moves forward, sometimes taking cover as best he can, again moving, half bent, from rock to rock, and when he reaches the wounded man a shout goes up from the soldiers. The wound is dressed, and the doctor, unable tocarryhis patient, leaves him and returns again to the line.
While this battle is going on, two coaches of the Northwest Stage Company meet, one going north and the other south. Observing a custom common among western stage people, they halt and exchange news items. In the stage going north is the body of Gen. Canby, in charge of his adjutant, Anderson, and Orderly Scott. In the other stage is Mrs. Meacham, accompanied by a stranger. Indeed, she has found a new escort at almost every station, who would announce himself as “your husband’s brother.” Members of this brotherhood have been informed by telegraph all along the road that “A Brother’s Wife isen routefor the Lava Beds. Look out for her wants. See that she is escorted and send the bills to No. 50,F. A. M., Salem.”
Anderson goes to the other coach. Mrs. Meachamanxiously inquires, “Did you see my husband after he was wounded?”
“I sat beside him half an hour,” he replies. “He is doing well.”
“Will he recover?” questions Mrs. Meacham. “Is he mortally wounded?”
“We hope he will get well. His wounds are not necessarily fatal,” replies the adjutant. “A great deal,” he continues, “depends on good treatment.Your brotheris with him. Everything that can be done is being done.”
Anderson walks sadly back to his charge of the lamented general.
The driver of the other stage dismounts and accosts Mr. Anderson as he resumes his seat.
“Is there any hope for Mr. Meacham?” he asks.
“Not the least in the world; but his wife must not know it now,” replies Anderson, in a low voice; but O my God!loud enough for the quickears of Mrs. Meacham to catch the words.
The drivers take up the lines. The stages pass. In one Gen. Canby’s body is being borne to his heart-broken wife. In the other a heart-broken wife is going to her husband, with the thought that she would be northward borne in a few days, with her husband confined in a dark coffin. The southern-bound stage reaches Jacksonville. The strange gentleman assists Mrs. Meacham to alight, and attends to her baggage while the change of coaches is being made. He then introduces another stranger to Mrs. Meacham as “your husband’s brother, who will go to Y-re-ka with you.”
It is Wednesday evening when the stage is slowlyclimbing Siskiyou mountain. The occupants are but two, one a lady. She does not speak.She has no hope now.The gentleman is silent. He, too, has lost hope in the recovery of the lady’s husband.
Wounded soldier lies on wood-frame litter which is strapped atop a mule led by another.Bringing in the Wounded.
Lieut. Eagan is being carried to his tent. The hospital is full of patients groaning with pain. Near the door lies a Warm Springs Indian scout. The surgeons are probing his wound, while he laughs and talks to the attendants, making sarcastic remarks about “the Modocs using powder that couldn’t shoot through his leg.”
The Iowa veteran announces to his brother-in-law that his wife will be in Y-re-ka that night.
The Modocs are out of water. The ice they had stored in the caves is exhausted. They determine to cut their way to the lake, but a few hundred yards distant. They concentrate their forces, and, enveloped in sage brush, they crawl up near the line of soldiers and open fire in terrible earnest. Soldiers fall on right and left. The Modocs yell and push their line. The white soldiers are massing to resist. The fire is awful. Peal after peal, volley after volley, and still the Modocs hold their ground. All night long the Modoc yell mingles with the rattle of musketry, and the shouts of defiance from the soldiers. One party is fighting in desperation; the other from duty.
While this battle is raging, the stage-coach from the North arrives at Y-re-ka, and stops at the hotel. A gentleman says a few words to the driver. The street-lamp before Judge Roseborough’s door throws its light on the faces of several ladies and gentlemen who stand waiting to receive the lady passenger. Sheis met with warm-hearted kindness, although every face is new. Supper is waiting. Every effort is made for the lady’s comfort. She weeps now, although this great sorrow of her life had seemed to dry up the fountain of tears until the warm hearts and kind words of strange voices had touched, with melting power, her inner soul. A short sleep, and she arises, to find a four-horse carriage awaiting to bear her to the Lava Beds. A new escort takes his place beside her.
Just after daylight, and while leaving the Shasta valley, a few miles out of Y-re-ka, the driver announces a courier coming from the Lava Beds. As he approaches, he draws from his “cantena”—a leather pocket carried on the saddle-front—a paper, and, waving it while he checks his panting horse, says, “For Mrs. Meacham.” Oh, the power of a few words! How they can change darkness into light! The letter read as follows:—
Lava Beds, Tuesday Eve., April 15.Dear Sister: Your husband will recover. His wounds are doing well, but he will never be very handsome any more.Your brother,D. J. FERREE.
Lava Beds, Tuesday Eve., April 15.
Dear Sister: Your husband will recover. His wounds are doing well, but he will never be very handsome any more.
Your brother,D. J. FERREE.
This inveterate joker cannot resist the temptation to mix the colors of the rainbow in all he does. But we forgive him.
This morning, as the sun dispels the darkness, the Modocs abandon the attempt to reach the lake. For two days and nights they have fought without sleep. They are suffering from thirst and long-continued fighting; butno signs of surrender are anywhere visible.The chief has called a council. It is decided to evacuate on the approach of night, and the braves are ordered to hold their fire unless to resist a charge.
A few of the Modocs have passed outside the lines by way of the “open flat,” and are crawling towards the soldiers’ camp at the foot of the bluff. Gen. Gilliam, Dr. McEldry and others have passed over the route unharmed. The horse-stretchers have passed and repassed with their mangled freight. The pack-ponies are all busily engaged, and the team horses, that were ordered by the quartermaster into service, are employed in carrying the dead. The pack-trains and teams belong to private citizens, and have been employed by the Government in carrying and hauling supplies. It was not expected, however, that they would be required to carry bleeding and mangled human freight.
“Necessity knows no law.” In the beginning of the battle, the citizen teamsters were ordered to this place for duty. Among them was a fair-haired boy of nineteen years of age, who had trained his team horses, on the first and second days of the battle, to walk between the poles that made the mule-stretchers. The poles were about twenty feet long, and at either end a stout strap was attached to each. These straps were thrown across the saddles on the horses, one being immediately in front of the other, and between them canvas was secured to the poles, thus constituting a “horse-stretcher.” This boy had proved himself very efficient, and had won the commendation of the officers, and the gratitude of the wounded men. Dr. McEldry had requested the quartermaster to continue young Hovey in the service,because in managing the stretchers he was careful and trustworthy.
A presentiment had this morning filled the mind of this noble young fellow with dread. He made application to Quartermaster Grier to be excused from further duty with the stretchers, stating his reasons. Mr. Grier expressed his sympathy with him and endeavored to allay his fears, remarking that Dr. McEldry had paid him a high compliment for his efficiency and requested him—Mr. Grier—to send him out again this morning.
The boy—too brave to refuse, although no law could have compelled him to go, though his horses might have been pressed into service—assented, remarking that, notwithstanding he had madeseveral trips safely, he shouldnot get back from this one.
After preparing his horses for this unpleasant labor he goes to a citizen friend, and gives him his watch and other valuables, saying that hedid not expect to return, as he had had a presentiment that he would not; and he gave to this friend a message to his father, another for his mother, and mentioning the names of hisbrothers and sisters, left afew words of love for each. The grandeur of character and heroism exhibited by this boy stand out among the few instances that are given to mankind in proof of the divinity that controls human action. Nothing but godlike attributes could have sustained young Hovey when calmly performing those manly actions which entitle his name to be enrolled among the heroes of the age. So let it be recorded, and let it stand with the nineteen summers he had lived,accusingandcondemningthose who sowildly howledfor blood whenthe Peace Commissioners were laboring to prevent what might have been only a terrible phantasmagoria, but which has become an awful reality.
Young Hovey, accompanied by one assistant only, started on his way to the battle-field with four horses and two stretchers. No guard was deemed necessary, because it was understood that the Modocs were surrounded and “could not escape,” and it was so reported, by the general commanding, to his superiors. Hovey and his companion had passed by the scene of the tragedy of the Peace Commissioners but a few rods, and but a few hundred yards behind Gen. Gilliam, when, from the cover of the rocks, a Modoc bullet, shot by Hooker Jim, went with a death-dealing power through his head. The monsters, not content with his death and the capture of his horses, rush upon him, and while he is yet alive, scalp him, strip him of his clothing, and then, with inhuman ferocity, the red fiends crush his head to a shapeless mass with huge stones. His companion escapes unhurt.
This outrage was committed almost within sight of the army, which was investing the stronghold, and the camp at the bluff.
Having despatched young Hovey, the Modocs then turned towards the latter camp. Lieut. Grier, who was in command, immediately telegraphed to Col. Greene, in command at the Lava Beds, that “The Modocs were out of the stronghold and had attacked the camp.” He, also, called together the citizens and his own forces, as Assistant Acting Quartermaster, and, arming them, prepared to resist. But a few shots were fired by the Indians; however, oneor two balls landed among the tents near the hospital. The Modocs presently withdrew.
The day is passing away with the almost useless expenditure of powder and shells. However, there was ashell sentin yesterday that did not explode when delivered, and the Modocs are anxious to see what is inside of it. How to do so is a question in the Modoc mind. Several plans are tried unsuccessfully, until an old Cum-ba-twas, with jaws like a cougar, taking it in his hands and clinching the plug with his teeth, produces a combustion thathe does not anticipate.That shell does execution. In fact,it is worth about five hundred thousand dollars to the Government, rating its services pro rata with the total cost of killing Modoc Indians. When the plug starts, the head of the old fellow who is holding it goes off his body in a damaged condition. Another younger man, who stands by waiting the result of the experiment, is blown all to pieces, cutting his scalp into convenient sizes for the soldiers to divide to advantage.
Two or three old Indian women pass through the lines to the water. A young brave dons woman’s clothes and comes to the line. After slaking his thirst he starts to return. Something in his walk creates a suspicion.
“That’s a man,” says a soldier.
The Indian runs.A dozen rifles command, “Halt!” The Indian halts.The soldierstake five or six scalps off that fellow’s head, and would have taken more, had the first ones been less avaricious. However, soldiers are kind-hearted and unselfish fellows, and the scalps areagain divided, so that, at last, ten or twelve are happy in the possession of a scalp.
It is now five P.M. Let us see how the several parties are situated at this time. Couriers areen routeto Y-re-ka with despatches, telling the world about the terrible slaughter, and,by the authorityof the general in command, assuring the powers that be, in Washington, “The Modocs cannot escape. They are in our power. It is only a question of time. We have them ‘corralled.’”
In Portland, Oregon, an immense concourse of citizens are awaiting the arrival of the train bearing the remains of Gen. Canby. The streets are hushed. The doors of business houses are closed. A general feeling of sorrow is everywhere manifest. Officers of the army and a delegation from a Great Brotherhood are there. On every hand flags are at half mast. Emblems of sorrow meet the eye. The grief-stricken widow sits in her room, cold, comfortless, inconsolable.
The Fraternal and Church Brotherhoods and thousands of mourning friends crowd the wharf in San Francisco, eagerly watching the coming of a steamer from Vallejo with flags at half mast. This boat is bringing home for interment the body of another great man, whose spirit went to its Maker in company with the Christian General, for whom the city of Portland, Oregon, mourns. Nearest to the dark tabernacle two young men are standing. They are the sons of Dr. Thomas.
While the two cities of the western coast are exchanging telegraphic words of sympathy, kind-hearted friends are filling a parlor where three sorrowing children are weeping without the presence of parents. The friends are repeating the hopeful telegramsof the Iowa veteran, and assuring them that their mother is with their father by that time as she left Y-re-ka the previous morning.
At this hour a young physician is hurrying to the bedside of an aged man, who has passed threescore years and ten, near Solon, Iowa. A glance at his face and we are reminded of the wounded Peace Commissioner in the Lava Beds, three thousand miles away. Five days ago he had read the telegram that said, “Meacham mortally wounded.” He threw himself on his bed then, saying, “If my son dies I never can rise again,—my first-born soil who went with me through all my dark hours on the frontier, twenty-five years ago. Must he die? Can I bear it? Thy will be done, O Lord!”
For five days has he laid hanging between life and death. His physician has watched the telegraph, and now, with the words of the Iowa veteran, he is hurrying to the bedside of his patient.
“Your son will recover!” the doctor exclaims before reaching him.
The white-haired man rises on his elbow, saying, “Do I dream? Is it true, doctor? Will my son live?”
About this hour, away up on Wild Horse Creek, Umatilla County, Oregon, a young man is writing a letter that seems to come from an overcharged heart submerged in grief. The letter runs as follows:—