Ten years in the ranks, U.S. Army

by Augustus Meyers

Appearances were sometimes deceptive and caused the pilot to run the boat up on the wrong side of a long island, only to find that the channel was too narrow to get through or too much obstructed by snags. He would then have to back out and run back for miles in order to try the other side of the island. Many times each day we heard the pilot's single toll of the bell on the forward deck. This was the signal to take soundings on the starboard side, and was usually followed by his ring to the engine room to slacken speed. A man would commence to "heave-the-lead" attached to a line, that had marks in various colors at intervals, to indicate the depth of water. He would cry out measurements, such as "No bottom, mark-twain, half-twain, quarterless-twain, six feet, five feet," then perhaps suddenly "Nine feet," or "Three feet," when we could feel the boat slide onto a sand bar, if the pilot had not reversed the engines in time. Soundings were sometimes taken in a row boat at some distance away.

We frequently ran onto sand bars lightly, and managed to get off by reversing the paddle-wheels, but often it took many hours or several days to float the boat again. When it was found that the steamer was hard and fast, the great spars carried forward were brought into use. The butt end of one of the spars was lowered over the side into the water well forward. It sunk firmly into the sandy bottom by its own weight. A double set of strong pulley blocks, attached to the top of the spar, were connected by a cable which wound around the drum of a powerful capstan on the forward deck. The capstan bars were manned by as many of the deck hands as could find room. Then they began turning, very slowly after the strain was on, going around in a circle and keeping up a kind of a chant, such as sailors often sing on ships when raising the anchor by hand. It was exhausting labor, but the soldiers often volunteered to help.

By this operation a part of the boat was practically lifted, and by placing the spar at the proper inclination, it was also sheered away from the bar at the same time. Progress seemed to be made by inches. Many times the spar had to be lifted and reset in a new position, and often a portion of the deck freight had to be shifted before the boat could be freed. During all this time the sand in the river kept on drifting against the boat and added to the difficulty. If the boat ran into a bar near the shore, where a cable could be fastened to trees, we could get off again with much less trouble, and without the use of the spars.

We proceeded in this laborious way, until we were fifty miles or more north of where Sioux City is now located. There a series of very bad turns in the river made Captain Throckmorton decide that the Genoa was too heavily laden to pass, and that at least one-half of her freight must be put on shore. A place deemed suitable was selected on the east bank of the river, and the unloading was commenced. The freight consisting of all manner of commissary, quartermaster and sutler's stores. It was put ashore on skids by the deck hands and piled up under tarpaulins.

The company went on shore, including the citizen doctor, and put up so-called "A" tents, which we found among the quartermaster's stores. Thus we established a camp, where extra ammunition and other necessaries were provided. A guard of a half a dozen men under a corporal remained on board, and the Genoa resumed her journey towards Fort Pierre, a few hundred miles away. But, when something more than half way there, and just below the upper "Big Bend," the captain unloaded another part of his freight and left it on shore without any guards.

Along the entire distance from St. Joseph to "Camp Gardner," our destination, which the soldiers named after our captain, we saw no indications of white settlements, except at the mouth of the Big Sioux River, a few miles north of the site where Sioux City was founded the following year. There, as we passed, we noticed some white men erecting a saw-mill. They ran down to the river bank and motioned to us to stop, but we kept on our course. We saw no Indians, for, according to their custom, they had departed in the spring to hunt buffalo and other game on the plains and would not return to the river until late in the fall.

We saw a few herds of buffalo grazing on the prairies some miles away from the river. But when they became aware of the steamer, they rushed away, and soon disappeared from sight.

We were greatly annoyed by mosquitoes at night. So persistent were these pests on a few occasions that men from the company were detailed to remain on shore all night and tend small fires whose smoke enveloped the boat.

One night there was an alarm of Indians. The sentinel on shore reported to the corporal of the guard that he had seen moving lights some distance away, that appeared to be signals. The company was quietly called under arms, and the lights on the boat extinguished. We remained on the alert until daylight, but nothing happened. It seemed to have been a false alarm.

While at Leavenworth, a married soldier had joined our company, and he and his wife went up the river with us. She was the only woman on board. A girl baby was born to her before we reached Camp Gardner, and it was named Genoa Harrison, after the steamer.