STIRRING EVENTS ALONG THE LITTLE BLUE
By Clarendon E. Adams
Painting a Buffalo
The following narrative of Albert Bierstadt's visit to what is now Nuckolls county, Nebraska, was told to me by Mr. E. S. Comstock, a pioneer of the county. Mr. Comstock made his first settlement in this county at Oak Grove, in 1858, and was in charge of the Oak Grove ranch when this incident took place.
In 1863 Mr. Bierstadt returned from the Pacific coast via the Overland stage route, which was then conducted by Russell, Majors & Waddell, the pioneer stage and pony expressmen of the plains. Arriving at Oak Grove ranch, Mr. Bierstadt and his traveling companion, a Mr. Dunlap, correspondent of the New York Post, decided to stop a few days and have a buffalo hunt. In company with E. S. Comstock, his son George, and a neighbor by the name of Eubanks, who was killed by the Indians the next year, they proceeded to the Republican Valley and camped the first night in the grove on Lost creek, now known as Lincoln Park. The following morning the party proceeded up the river to the farm now owned by Frank Schmeling. Here they discovered a large herd of buffalo grazing along the creek to the west and covering the prairies to the north for several miles. Mr. Comstock says that it was one of the largest herds of buffalo he had ever encountered and that Mr. Bierstadt became greatly excited and said, "Now, boys, is our time for fun. I want to see an enraged wounded buffalo. I want to see him so mad that he will bellow and tear up the ground." Mr. Comstock said they arranged for the affray: Mr. Bierstadt was to take his position on a small knoll to the east of the herd, fix himself with his easel so that he could sketch the landscape and the grazing bison, and when this was done the wounding of one of the buffalo bulls was to take place.
Bierstadt was stationed on a small knoll in plain view of the herd; Mr. Eubanks was stationed in a draw near Bierstadt, in order to protect him from the charges of the buffalo, if necessary. George Comstock was to select a buffalo bull from the herd and wound him and then tantalize him by shaking a red blanket at him until he was thoroughly enraged, then he was to give him another wound from his rifle and lead out in the direction of Mr. Bierstadt.
The wounded buffalo became furious and charged Comstock's horse repeatedly, but Comstock, being an expert horseman, evaded the fierce charges and was all the time coming nearer to Bierstadt. When within about three hundred yards Comstock whirled his horse to the side of the maddened monster. As a buffalo does not see well out of the side of his eyes on account of the long shaggy hair about the face, Comstock was lost to his view. The infuriated animal tossed his head high in air and the only thing he saw was Bierstadt. Onward he rushed toward the artist, pawing the ground and bellowing furiously. Bierstadt called for help and took to his heels. The buffalo struck the easel and sent it in splinters through the air. Onward he rushed after the fleeing artist, who was making the best time of his life. Mr. Comstock said he was running so fast that his coat tails stuck so straight out that you could have played a game of euchre on them. The buffalo was gaining at every jump.
At this point in his story Mr. Comstock became greatly excited. He was standing on the identical spot telling me the story, and was living the exciting scene over again. "Why," he said, "I thought Eubanks never would shoot. I was scared. The buffalo nearly had his horns under Bierstadt's coat tail. He was snorting froth and blood all over him, but the gun cracked and the buffalo fell and Bierstadt was so overcome he fell at the same time entirely exhausted, but saved from a fearful death." When he recovered sufficiently to talk, he said, "That's enough; no more wounded buffalo for me." Mr. Bierstadt was several days recovering from his fearful experience, but while he was recovering, he was painting the picture. "Mr. Dunlap, the correspondent, wrote a graphic and vivid pen picture of the exciting scene," said Mr. Comstock; "but when Mr. Bierstadt finished his picture of the infuriated charging buffalo and the chase, the pen picture was not in it."
This was the painting that brought Bierstadt into prominence as an artist. It was exhibited at the first Chicago exhibition and was sold for $75,000. I saw the picture in Chicago before I heard Mr. Comstock's narrative, and as I was one of the owners of El Capitan Rancho, the landscape of the famous painting, I fixed his story vividly upon my memory. Mr. Mike Woerner now owns a portion of El Capitan Rancho, the landscape of this famous painting. A portion of this original painting is embraced in Mr. Bierstadt's masterpiece, "The Last of the Buffalo."
An Indian Raid
The settlement of the section now included in Nuckolls county was attended with more privation and suffering from Indian raids and depredations than any other county in the state of Nebraska. The great Indian raids of August 7, 1864, extended from Denver, Colorado, to Gage county, Nebraska, at which time every stage station and settlement along the entire line of the Overland trail was included in that skilfully planned attack. A certain number of warriors were assigned to each place and the attack was simultaneous along the line for four hundred miles in extent.
The Oak Grove ranch was among the most formidable in fortifications and a band of forty well-armed braves was sent to capture and destroy it. On the day of the attack G. S. Comstock, owner of Oak Grove ranch, was away from home; but besides his family there were five men at the stockade. The Indians came to the ranch about mid-day in a friendly attitude. They had left their ponies about a quarter of a mile away. They asked for something to eat and were permitted to come into the house with their guns and bows and arrows on their persons. They finished their dinner and each received a portion of tobacco and some matches. Then without any warning they turned upon the inmates of the ranch yelling and shooting like demons, and only for the quickness and great presence of mind of one of the Comstock boys the whites would all have been killed or taken away captives to submit to the cruelty of the savage foe.
A Mr. Kelly, from Beatrice, was there and was the first to fall pierced with an arrow. He had a navy revolver in his belt. The Indians rushed for it but young Comstock was too quick for them and seized the revolver first and shot down the leader of the braves. Seeing the fate of their leader, the Indians rushed to the door in great fright. The revolver was in skilful hands and three more of the braves went down under the unerring aim of young Comstock. Kelly and Butler were both killed outright. Two men by the name of Ostrander and a boy were wounded. All the other occupants of the ranch had their clothes pierced with arrows or bullets.
The Indians ran to their ponies, and while they were away planning another attack, the wounded were cared for as best they could. The doors were securely barred and the living were stationed in the most advantageous places for defense. The friendly game of the Indians had not worked as they expected, but they were not daunted and soon they encircled the house, riding, shooting, and yelling. This fiendish warfare they kept up all the afternoon. They tried several times to set the buildings on fire but shots from experienced marksmen, both men and women, kept them at bay.
The new leader of the Indians rode a white pony and seemed at times to work his warriors up to great desperation, and young Comstock made up his mind to shoot him the next time that he appeared. It was now too dark to distinguish one man from another. Mr. Comstock, senior, was mounted on a white horse and he was enroute home about the time the Indians were expected to return. The vigilant son raised his gun, took aim, and was about to shoot, when one of the girls, remembering that her father rode a white horse, called out, "Father, is it you?" An affirmative answer came back just in time to prevent the fatal shot which would have followed in an instant more. Mr. Comstock had ridden through the Indian lines, while returning to his ranch, unmolested. He said to me he believed the Indians spared his life that evening on account of favors he had always granted them.
Five miles east of the Comstock ranch that day a boy eighteen years old by the name of Ulig was met by two Indians. One of them shook hands with him while the other pierced his body with a spear and then scalped him and left him writhing in the broiling sun to die on the prairie. This savage and brutal act was followed by others unparalleled even in savage warfare. Four miles above Oak Grove at a place called the Narrows on the Little Blue river, lived a family of ten persons by the name of Eubanks. They were from the East and knew nothing of Indians' cruel warfare and when they were attacked they left their cabin and ran for the trees and brush along the river banks. Nine of them were murdered in the most brutal manner: scalped and stripped of their clothing. Two of the women, Mrs. Eubanks, with a young babe in her arms, and Laura Roper, a school teacher who was there on a visit, were the only ones who arrived at a place of concealment and would have escaped had not the babe from heat and fright cried out. The practiced ear of the Indians caught the sound and they were made captives and subjected to the most inhuman and beastly treatment by the horrible savages. After the mother was made a captive the baby cried from hunger. The mother was so famished she could not nourish the babe but held it fondly in her arms trying to soothe it; and one of the merciless savages stepped up and brained it with his tomahawk. No pen or brush can tell the horrors of this diabolical deed.
The two women were subjected to six months of bondage impossible to describe. I was telling this story one day to the late Captain Henry E. Palmer of Omaha, and learned from him that he and his command of soldiers and Pawnee scouts followed these inhuman wretches over the plains trying to bring them to bay, and finally down on the Solomon river in Kansas captured some of the Indian chiefs and succeeded in exchanging them for the two women captives.
This is one of the terrible chapters in the early settlement of Nuckolls county and was graphically detailed to me by Mr. Comstock soon after I settled in the county.