Howard R. Driggs
Ruins of barracks at Camp Floyd, Utah; an army post established by Colonel Albert Sidney Johnston; also a home station for Pony Express and Overland Stage.
After dark, three of us started with four days’ rations. I rode the little pinto pony on this trip, the first I had ridden him for a long time. We traveled all night and reached the first spring just at daybreak. I knew it would be a hard night’s ride to go from here to the lake and then reach Yaiabi’s spring in the mountains before daylight.
About midnight we arrived at the north end of the lake, which was only a mile and a half long and half a mile wide. I had my two scouts stop there while I wrapped a red blanket around me and went on foot to find out what I could about the Indian camp. I had gone only a few steps when I came to a band of horses, and as I was passing around them I heard an Indian speak to a horse he was hobbling. I went up and asked him in Shoshone if he had come with the Pocatello Indians. He said he had, and that seventeen others came with him.
“We will start burning the stations, then, soon,” I said.
“Were you at the council tonight?” he asked. I told him I was not at the council, that I had been following a horse that had started back. He said that at the council it was decided that the Parowans were to go to Ruby Valley and burn and kill everything they came to; and that the Pocatello Indians and Gosiutes were to start at Ibapah and burn towards the east. I asked him when we were to start from there. He said, “In four days.” We were walking towards their camp as we talked, so as soon as I found out all I wanted to know, I said that I had forgotten my rope and would have to go back for it. So I parted company with my Indian friend. He was a Shoshone, and he thought I was another. When I got out of his sight, I wasn’t long getting back to where I had left the boys, and in a very short time one of them was carrying the news to the army.
The other scout and I went to find the spring Yaiabi had told me about. We got well into the mountains before daylight, and when it was light enough to see, we found the spring up a very rough canyon. We staked our horses so they could get plenty to eat and then crawled off into the willows for a good nap.
That afternoon I climbed a high mountain near by to see which would be the best way to go from there to the Indians’ camp in the night. After I had studied the lay of the country pretty well, I went back to the horses, ate a little cold lunch, and when it commenced to get dark, we struck out to meet General Johnston at the appointed place.
We did not travel very fast, for I knew we would reach the place before the soldiers could get there. We were at the spring about two hours before daylight, and had a good nap before General Johnston came. When he got to us he wanted to know if I thought it safe to make a fire to boil some coffee. I told him I thought there was no danger, so we made a small fire, and had a good cup of coffee, then we all lay down for a little nap.
About sundown, the packers began loading the hundred pack mules we had with us, and we got started just about dark for the Yaiabi spring, which was about six miles north of the Indians’ camp. We reached the spring in good time, and were all unpacked before dawn.