Capt. Burgess, Old-Time Scout
An interesting old-time scout is Captain John D. Burgess, who came to Arizona in 1873 to look after some mining interests for General Kautz and Colonel Biddle of the army, subsequently becoming a guide and scout for the government, and in 1882 was chief of Indian police at San Carlos. At the time the Kid started out on his career, Captain Burgess was working some mines of his own at Table Mountain, in the Galiura mountains. The officer in command of the troops sent out from San Carlos in pursuit of the Kid and his followers, knowing Burgess, immediately secured his services as guide and trailer. Following the Kid and his band, they trailed them through to Pantano, where they had crossed the railroad, and going up Davidson’s canyon, and passing E. L. Vail’s ranch had accommodated themselves to a bunch of his horses. Passing down the east side of the Santa Ritas, they killed Mike Grace, an old miner, near old Camp Crittenden. Here Captain Lawton, with a troop of the 4th Cavalry, heading them off and forcing them to turn back, they passed by Mountain Springs, near the present Vail station, and were run over the Rincon mountains, where they were so closely pursued that while in camp they lost all the horses they had stolen. They now headed for the reservation, which they succeeded in reaching before Lieutenant Carter Johnson, who was immediately behind, could overtake them, and here they surrendered, and in due course were tried and sent first to San Diego barracks, passing through Tucson on September 3rd, and subsequently, in February, 1888, were transferred to Fort Alcatraz, in the bay of San Francisco. Subsequently, the United States Supreme Court, having decided that the trial of an Indian devolved on the county in which the crime was committed, ordered that all Indians sentenced by other than the territorial courts should be returned to the Territory and tried by such courts. Under this order the Kid and several others were returned and tried by Judge Kibbey, at Globe, and on October 30, 1889, sentenced to imprisonment at Yuma, and were being taken there by Sheriff Reynolds and his Deputy, “Hunky-Dory” Holmes. They were being conveyed by stage over the Pinal mountains, via Riverside and Florence. In the stage were Reynolds, Holmes, a Mexican who was also being taken to Yuma, the Kid and seven other Indians, and Eugene Middleton the driver of the stage, making twelve in all.