The lone woman who was at Adobe Walls, Mrs. Olds, was as brave as the bravest. She knew only too well how horrible her fate would be if she should fall into the hands of the Indians, and under such circumstances it would have caused no surprise had she gone into the wildest hysterics. But all that first day, when the hand of death seemed to be reaching from every direction, this pioneer woman was cool and composed and lent a helping hand in every emergency.
By the fifth day enough hunters had arrived to make us feel comparatively safe, yet it was expedient that we should protect ourselves as fully as possible, so the men began fortifying the buildings. None of them had been finished, nor had any port-holes been cut in the walls. Our shooting was done from the windows and transoms. With port-holes we could have killed many more Indians. A little inclosure with sod walls was now built on top of Rath's store, and another on top of Myer's for lookouts. A ladder led from the inside to these lookouts.
On the fifth day William Olds was stationed in the lookout on Rath's store, to watch for Indians while the other men were at work. The lookout on the other buildings shouted that Indians were coming, and all of us ran for our guns and for shelter inside the buildings. Just as I entered Rath's store I saw Olds coming down the ladder with his gun in his hand. A moment later his gun went off accidentally, tearing off the top of Old's head. At the same instant Mrs. Olds rushed from an adjoining room—in time to see the body of her husband roll from the ladder and crumple at her feet, a torrent of blood gushing from the terrible wound. Olds died instantly. Gladly would I have faced all the Indians from the Cimarron to Red River, rather than have witnessed this terrible scene. It seemed to me that it would have been better for any other man there to have been taken than the husband of the only woman among us. Her grief was intense and pitiable. A rough lot of men, such as we were, did not know how to comfort a woman in such distress. We did the best we could, and if we did it awkwardly, it should not be set down against us. Had we been called upon to fight for her, we would not have asked about the odds, but would have sailed in, tooth and toe-nail. When we tried to speak to her we just choked up and stood still. We buried Olds that same evening, about sixty feet from the spot where he was killed, just southeast of Rath's store.
The Indians that had caused the alarm numbered between twenty-five and thirty, and were up the valley of Adobe Walls Creek headed east. Finally, they disappeared, and we did not see them again. They may not have belonged to the attacking party, and were merely passing through the country.
I always regretted that I did not keep the relics I picked up at Adobe Walls. Mrs. Olds asked me for the lance when I returned to the building, and I gave it to her. The other relics I took to Dodge City, and gave them away to first one person and then another.
CHAPTER X.
The warriors that attacked Adobe Walls made an extensive raid. Writing from Cheyenne Agency, at Darlington, in September, 1874, a Government employee gave this information to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs:
"We are informed by Little Robe, White Shield, and other Cheyennes that Lone Wolf, a Kiowa chief, was the first to commence the present Indian trouble, by going with a band of his warriors on a raid into Texas. Big Bow, a Comanche, soon followed. After these parties returned the Kiowas, Comanches, and Cheyennes made the attack upon Adobe Walls. After that fight the combined forces separated into a number of war parties; some went into Texas, others into New Mexico and Colorado, and still others along the Fort Sill and Wichita Railroad and the Kansas border. We have had well-authenticated accounts from Indians and from other sources that the number of individuals killed in New Mexico amounted to 40; Colorado, 60; Lone Wolf's first raid into Texas, 7; Big Bow's first raid into Texas, 4; the Adobe Walls fight, 3; southwest from Camp Supply, buffalo-hunters, 3; between Camp Supply and Dodge, buffalo-hunters, 5; in the vicinity of Medicine Lodge and Sun City, 12; on Crooked Creek, 2; on the trail north from Cheyenne Agency, 5; on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, 4; Washita and Fort Sill agencies and vicinity, 14; Dr. Holloway's son, Cheyenne Agency, 1; Mr. Dougherty, beef contractor for these three agencies reports at least thirty persons recently killed in Texas, 30; total, 190.
"White Shield this day informed me that the Kiowa chief, White Horse, on his last raid into Texas killed eleven persons and captured three children. The children, he states, are now in the Kiowa camps. White Shield says he has heard of several other captives with the Comanches and Kiowas, but these three mentioned are all he has seen."
It has been said that the Indians abandoned the fight because of the wounding of Quanah Parker, the Comanche chief, and again because the "medicine" man found that his "medicine" was bad. To be more exact, the Indians probably came to the conclusion that if they remained long enough, charged often enough and got close enough, all of them would be killed, as they were unable to dislodge us from the buildings.