My life on the plains

by George A. Custer

Before dark a delegation of chiefs from the village visited camp to likewise urge the release of the three chiefs. My reply to them was the same as that I had given to the captives. I assured them, however, that upon complying with their treaty obligations, and returning to their reservation, the three chiefs would be restored to their people, and we would return to them also the women and children captured at the Washita. Seeing that no modification of these terms could be obtained, they finally promised to accede to them, saying that their ponies, as I knew to be the fact, were in no condition to travel, but as soon as practicable they would surely proceed with their entire village to Camp Supply, and abandon the war path forever; a promise which, as a tribe, they have adhered to, from that day to this, with strict faith, so far as my knowledge extends.

I had not heard from General Sheridan since we separated at Fort Sill; he to set out for Camp Supply, and I with my command to begin my present movement. But when near Camp Supply a courier met me with despatches from General Sheridan—who had been meanwhile summoned to Washington—informing me in regard to the arrangements made for my command upon its arrival at Camp Supply. The Kansas volunteers were to march to Fort Hays, and there be mustered out of the service. The Seventh Cavalry was also to proceed to the same point, and there await further orders, as the General in his note stated that he had concluded to draw in the Seventh, and end the campaign.

In reply to my letter, written subsequently from Camp Supply, giving him a detailed account of our operations, including the release of the two white girls, I received a letter of warm encouragement from the General, written from Chicago, where he had just established his present headquarters. In that letter he wrote: “I am very much rejoiced at the success of your expedition, and feel proud of our winter’s operations and of the officers and men who have borne its privations and hardships so manfully.... Give my kind regards to the officers, and say how happy I should be to see them should any of them come this way on leave.” These words of hearty sympathy and approval, from one who had not only shared but appreciated at their true worth our “privations and hardships,” were far more cheering and valued than the empty honor contained in half a dozen brevets bestowed grudgingly, and recalled in a moment of pique.

Making a brief halt at Camp Supply to rest our animals and replenish our stores, my command continued its march to Fort Hays, crossing the Arkansas river at Fort Dodge, Kansas. Upon our arrival at Fort Hays we were met by the husband of young Brewster’s sister, who had learned of her restoration to liberty from the published despatches which had preceded us to Fort Hays. He was still lame from the effects of the bullet wound received at the time the Indians carried off his bride, whom he had given up as dead or lost to him forever. The joy of their meeting went far to smooth over their late sorrow. They could not find language to express their gratitude to the troops for their efforts in restoring them to each other. As the Indians had robbed them of everything at the time of the attack, a collection was taken up among the troops for their benefit, which resulted in the accumulation of several hundred dollars, to be divided between the two captives. The time came for our guests to leave us, and rejoin their people, or such of them as had survived the attack of the Indians. Good-bys were spoken, and the two girls, so lately victims of the most heartless and cruel captivity, departed, with husband, brother, and friends, for their frontier homes, bearing with them the warm sympathies and cordial good wishes of every soldier in the command.

Mo-nah-see-tah was anxious to visit her friends who were now captives at Fort Hays, and who were kept in a large stockade at the post, our camp being placed some two or three miles below the post. Accordingly she repaired to the stockade, and spent several hours, relating, no doubt, the story of our march since they had separated from each other. She preferred to live in the cavalry camp, where she was allowed to roam without the restraint of a guard; but it was deemed advisable soon after to place her with the other women and children inside the stockade. The three captive chiefs were also transferred to the same place for safe keeping. Here a most unfortunate misunderstanding arose. The chiefs had been confined inside the same enclosure with the women and children, but in separate tents. The commanding officer of the post decided to remove them to rooms in the guard-house, adjoining the stockade. This was decided upon as a measure of security. There was no interpreter kept at the post; consequently there was no way of communicating with the Indians except by rude signs, and even this method was but indifferently understood by the infantry soldiers constituting the garrison of the post. From accounts given me by the Indians afterwards, it seems the men of the guard, in the execution of the order to transfer the three chiefs, entered the stockade muskets in hand, and upon the failure of the chiefs to comprehend what was required of them, the soldiers attempted to push the chiefs from the stockade by force, pointing with their bayonets to the outside. The chiefs, failing to understand a word spoken to them, and with the natural suspicion of their race, imagined that they were being led or driven forth to execution, and determined to die there and then. An attack was at once made upon the guard with knives which they carried beneath their blankets. The sergeant of the guard received a stab in the back which almost proved mortal. This was the signal for a determined fight between the three chiefs and the guard, the latter having the decided advantage in numbers and weapons. The result could not be long doubtful. One of the chiefs, Big Head, the young man who had proposed to proceed to the village and obtain the release of the two white girls, fell dead at the first fire of the guard. The oldest of the three, Dull Knife, received a bayonet wound through the body which proved fatal in a few days. The third, Fat Bear, was felled by a blow from the butt of a musket, but did not receive serious injury.

Knowing that I could converse with the Indians, and from my acquaintance with them might be able to quiet the excitement among the remaining prisoners, the commanding officer of the post sent to me for assistance. Upon repairing to the stockade, I found the women and children in a state of great excitement and huddled together inside their tents. Entering the stockade, I soon learned their version of the affair, which did not vary materially from that just given. Mo-nah-see-tah pointed to a bullet-hole in her blanket, the effect of a stray shot fired during the mêlée. The affair was a source of deep regret to all.

The Cheyennes, in accordance with their promise made to me, returned to their reservation; and having thus far complied with the terms of the agreement then made, it devolved upon the military authorities to return to them their people whom we had, up to that time and since the battle of the Washita, retained as prisoners of war. An order was accordingly issued releasing the only surviving chief, Fat Bear, and the women and children then held at Fort Hays. Wagons and subsistence were furnished them from Fort Hays to Camp Supply, and a squadron of the Seventh Cavalry escorted them to the latter point, where they were received by their own people. Mo-nah-see-tah, although gladdened by the prospect of being restored to her people, exhibited marked feelings of regret when the time for her departure arrived. She had grown quite accustomed to the easy, idle life she had led among the troops, as compared with that mere existence of toil and drudgery to which all tribes of Indians consign their squaws.

Romeo, who had accompanied us throughout the events described in these pages as interpreter, took unto himself a wife from the Cheyenne village, and thereafter became a sort of trader between the whites and Indians. I believe he is still acting in that capacity. Lone Wolf is still the leading chief of the Kiowas; but if public and private advices are to be relied upon, he has acted with extremely bad faith toward the Government, and even as these lines are being penned is reported as absent from his reservation, leading a war party of his people in committing depredations upon the people of the Texas frontier. Satanta, since his release from the Texas State prison, has led a comparatively quiet and uneventful life. How much of this is due to his incarceration in prison for a short term of years can only be inferred. Little Raven continues to exercise the powers of head chief of the Arapahoes, although he is too old and infirm to exercise active command. My former friend and companion, Yellow Bear, is the second chief in rank to Little Raven, and probably will succeed to the dignities of the latter ere many years have rolled around. Little Robe, of the Cheyennes, whose acts and words were always on the side of peace, died some three years ago.

A few words in regard to one other character with whom the reader of these sketches has been made acquainted, and I shall have disposed of the principal personages, not included in the military, whom the reader has encountered from time to time. California Joe accompanied my command to Fort Hays, Kansas, on the Kansas Pacific railroad, when the troops were partially disbanded and sent to different stations. California Joe had never seen a railroad nor a locomotive, and here determined to improve his first opportunity in these respects, and to take a trip in the cars to Leavenworth, distant about four hundred miles. A few days afterward an officer of my command, happening to be called to Leavenworth, thought he recognized a familiar form and face in front of the leading hotel of the city. A closer scrutiny showed that the party recognized was none other than California Joe. But how changed! Under the manipulations of the barber, and through the aid of the proprietor of a gentleman’s furnishing store, the long, curly locks and beard of California Joe, both of which had avoided contact with comb, brush, or razor for many years, had undergone a complete metamorphosis. His hair and beard were neatly trimmed and combed, while his figure, a very commanding one, had discarded the rough suit of the frontiersman, and was now adorned by the latest efforts of fashion. If the reader imagines, however, that these changes were in keeping with the taste of California Joe, the impression is wholly incorrect. He had effected them simply for a sensation. The following day he took the cars for the West, satisfied with the faint glimpse of civilization he had had.

As I soon after left that portion of the plains in which these scenes are laid, I saw no more of California Joe; but I often wondered what had become of my loquacious friend, whose droll sayings and quaint remarks had often served to relieve the tedium of the march or to enliven the group about the camp-fire. I had begun, after a few years had passed without trace or tidings from Joe, to fear that he had perhaps gone to that happy hunting ground to which he no doubt had sent more than one dusky enemy, when a few weeks ago I was most agreeably surprised to receive indubitable evidence that California Joe was still in the land of the living, but exactly where I could not determine, as his letter was simply dated “Sierre Nevade Mountains, California.” Now as this range of mountains extends through the entire length and embraces a considerable portion of the State of California, Joe’s address could not be definitely determined. But as his letter is so characteristic of the man, I here introduce it as the valedictory of California Joe: