A BUFFALO HUNT
By W. H. Avery
In the fall of 1866, about the last of October, a party of nine men, myself included, started out from Rose creek for a buffalo hunt. At Whiterock, Kansas, we were joined by another party of four men with "Old Martin Fisher," an early Whiterock settler, as official guide. Our equipment consisted of four wagons, one of which was drawn by a double ox team. There were numerous firearms and plenty of provisions for the trip. The party was much elated over the first day's experiences as night found us in possession of four fine buffalo. That evening while we were riding out after one of the buffalo our ears were greeted by the Indian yell. Looking back up a draw we saw five redmen galloping toward us. At the time we did not know they were friendly, but that was proven later. They came up to us and wanted powder or "bullet" and also wanted to swap guns. All they succeeded in getting was a necktie which one of the men gave them. After a short parley among themselves they left, going back to our camp where we had left one man to guard the camp and prepare supper. There they helped themselves to the loaf of bread the guard had just baked, a $12 coat, a $22 revolver, and one good bridle; away they went and that was the last seen of them. The night was passed in safety and the next day we hunted without any exciting experiences. The following day we met with only fair success so thought we had better start for home. In the morning the party divided, our guide, Fisher, and two men going on and leaving the rest of us to hunt as we went along. We succeeded in getting only one buffalo, but Fisher's men had done better and were ready to make tracks for home. That night they had suspicions that there were Indians near so built no fire and in the morning soon after breaking camp a party of Indians came upon them. There was considerable parleying about a number of things which the Indians wanted but the men were unwilling to make any bargains whatever. All the Indians but one started off and this one still wanted to parley and suddenly drew his revolver and shot Fisher in the shoulder. The Indian then rode off at breakneck speed and that was the last seen of them. Fisher warned the men not to shoot as he was uncertain as to how many redmen might be in their vicinity and he did not want to take any great risk of them all being killed. Our party did not know of the accident until we returned home and we had no encounter with the party of Indians. We were thankful to be safely home after a ten days hunt.