Wild Cat Ranche,
In Ogden Canyon, Utah,
November 18th, 1876.
Major E. M. Hessler,
Cleveland, Ohio.
Dear Sir and Comrade: I learn through my advance agent Mr. Montgomery, that a letter, manifesting some anxiety for my welfare, was recently addressed to you. I hasten to say that I am again in the saddle, and although for three days the guest of the Arrapahoes, I am still in the best of spirits, and with even more hair than when I left Cleveland. I should be pleased to give you a detailed account of my adventures among the red-skins, but have only time to tell you that I started from Cheyenne, October twenty-eighth, accompanying two herders who were on their way to Salt Lake City with a small drove of mustangs and Indian ponies. We were attacked on the thirty-first of the same month by a straggling band of Arrapahoes, near Skull Rocks, on the Laramie Plains. One Indian was killed, and my companions and myself were made prisoners after using up nearly all our ammunition in the effort to repulse our assailants. The herder whose fire killed the Indian was afterwards tied to a stake and most cruelly tortured to death. Bound to my remaining companion with thongs, we were on the following morning placed upon ponies and marched rapidly to the northward.
Breaking away from our captors on the night of November second by disabling two of our guards, we were followed some miles, firing and receiving the fire of the Indians as we galloped off on two of their ponies which we had appropriated. After being dismounted by a shot, and dismounting the Indian who had killed my horse, I finally eluded my pursuers by leaping into a gulch in the mountains, where I remained until daylight, when, finding no Indians in sight, I pursued my way on foot in a southwesterly direction, which brought me to a cattle-ranche late in the afternoon. Here I secured a fresh mustang, and once more turned my face toward the setting sun.
My money and personal effects were of course promptly taken possession of by the Arrapahoes. I am now moving westward at an average of over sixty miles per day, confidently expecting to reach San Francisco by the twenty-fourth instant. In our encounter on the Laramie Plains, five members of the "Lo!" family were sent to their Happy Hunting Ground, and in the matter of scalps you may score at least two for your humble servant.
With kind regards to friends in Cleveland, I close this letter to mount my horse,
And remain, ever truly yours,