Within a week we learned, much to our disgust, that the two murderers had been liberated and told to vamoose. I doubt whether the warrants were ever sent to the alcalde at Guadalupe. A more cruel murder than that of Morgan and Brown was never committed on the Rio Grande, yet the murderers went scot-free. This miscarriage of justice rankled in my memory and subsequently it was to lead me to take the law into my own hands when dealing with another Mexican murderer.
VICTORIO BECOMES A GOOD INDIAN
As soon as the summer rains had begun in 1880 and green grass and water were plentiful, old Victorio again began his raids. He appeared at Lake Guzman, Old Mexico, then traveled east to Boracho Pass, just south of the Rio Grande. This old chief was then reported making for the Eagle Mountains in Texas. The Mexican Government communicated this information to General Grierson at Fort Davis, Texas, and Lieutenant Baylor was asked to cooperate in the campaign to exterminate the wily old Apache.
General Grierson, on receipt of this information, at once put his cavalry in motion for Eagle Springs, and on August 2, 1880, Baylor left his camp at Ysleta with myself and thirteen rangers equipped for a two weeks' campaign. On August 4th our little band reached old Fort Quitman, eighty miles down the Rio Grande from El Paso, and Lieutenant Baylor reported to General Grierson by telegraph. His message was interrupted, for the Apaches had cut the wires between Bass' Canyon and Van Horn's Well, but the general ordered him by telegram to scout toward Eagle Springs until his command should meet the United States cavalry. We were to keep a sharp lookout for Indian trails, but we saw none until we reached Eighteen Mile water hole, where General Grierson's troops had had an engagement with Victorio. From here the Indians went south and around Eagle Mountains, so we continued down the road beyond Bass' Canyon and found the Apaches had crossed the road, torn down the telegraph wire, carried off a long piece of it, and destroyed the insulators. The Indians also dragged some of the telegraph poles two or three miles and left them on their trail. The signs indicated they had from one hundred and eighty to two hundred animals. After destroying the telegraph the raiders finally moved north toward Carrizo Mountains.
At Van Horn, Lieutenant Baylor could learn nothing of General Grierson or his movements. We thereupon took the general's trail leading north and overtook him in camp at Rattlesnake Springs, about sixty-five miles distant. Here we joined Company "K," Eighth Cavalry, and Captain Nolan's company, the Tenth. The cavalry camped at Carrizo Springs and our scouts found Victorio's trail the next day leading southwest toward the Apache Tanks. We left camp at dusk and rode all night and struck the redskins' trail next morning at the stage road where General Grierson had fought. The Indians crossed the road, but afterwards returned to it and continued toward old Fort Quitman.
The overland stage company kept a station at this abandoned frontier post, situated on the north bank of the Rio Grande, eighty or ninety miles east of El Paso, Texas. On August 9, 1880, Ed Walde, the stage driver, started out on his drive with General Byrnes occupying the rear seat of the stage coach. The stage, drawn by two fast running little Spanish mules, passed down the valley and entered the canyon, a very box-like pass with high mountains on either side,—an ideal place for an Indian ambuscade. Walde had driven partly through this pass when, around a short bend in the road, he came suddenly upon old Victorio and his band of one hundred warriors. The Indian advance guard fired on the coach immediately, and at the first volley General Byrnes was fatally wounded, a large caliber bullet striking him in the breast and a second passing through his thigh. Walde turned his team as quickly as he could and made a lightning run back to the stage stand with the general's body hanging partly out of the stage. The Apaches followed the stage for four or five miles trying to get ahead of it, but the little mules made time and beat them into the shelter of the station's adobe walls.
It was a miracle that Walde, sitting on the front seat, escaped without a scratch and both of the mules unharmed. At old Fort Quitman I examined the little canvas-topped stage and found it literally shot to pieces. I noticed where a bullet had glanced along the white canvas, leaving a blue mark a foot long before it passed through the top. Three of the spokes of the wheels were shot in two and, as well as I remember, there were fifteen or twenty bullet marks on and through the stage. Lieutenant Baylor and his rangers buried General Byrnes near old Fort Quitman and fired a volley over his grave. Subsequently Walde joined Lieutenant Baylor's command and made an excellent ranger. It was from him that I obtained the particulars of the fight that resulted in the general's death.