On the Border with Crook

by John Gregory Bourke

Cushing thought that, under all the circumstances, it would be good policy to move over to some eligible position where we could hold our own against any concentration the enemy might be tempted to make against us, and there stay until the excitement occasioned by our presence in the country had abated.

The spring near the eastern base of the Pinal Mountains, where the “killing” of the early spring had taken place, suggested itself, and thither we marched as fast as our animals could make the trip. But we had counted without our host; the waters were so polluted with dead bodies, there were so many skulls in the spring itself, that no animal, much less man, would imbibe of the fluid. The ground was strewn with bones—ribs and arms and vertebræ—dragged about by the coyotes, and the smell was so vile that, tired as all were, no one felt any emotion but one of delight when Cushing gave the order to move on.

The Apaches had been there to bury their kinsfolk and bewail their loss, and in token of grief and rage had set fire to all the grass for several miles, and consequently it was to the direct benefit of all our command, two-footed or four-footed, to keep moving until we might find a better site for a bivouac.

We did not halt until we had struck the San Carlos, some thirty-five miles to the east, and about twelve or fourteen miles above its junction with the Gila. Here we made camp, intending to remain several days. A rope was stretched from one to the other of two stout sycamores, and to this each horse and mule was attached by its halter. Pickets were thrown out upon the neighboring eminences, and a detail from the old guard was promptly working at bringing in water and wood for the camp-fires. The grooming began, and ended almost as soon as the welcome cry of “Supper!” resounded. The coffee was boiling hot; the same could be said of the bacon; the hard tack had mildewed a little during the wet weather to which it had been exposed, but there was enough roasted mescal from the Indian villages to eke out our supplies.

The hoofs and back of every animal had been examined and cared for, and then blankets were spread out and all hands made ready to turn in. There were no tents, as no shelter was needed, but each veteran was wise enough to scratch a little semicircle in the ground around his head, to turn the rain should any fall during the night, and to erect a wind-brake to screen him from the chill breezes which sometimes blew about midnight.

Although there was not much danger of a night-attack from the Apaches, who almost invariably made their onset with the first twinkle of the coming dawn in the east, yet a careful watch was always kept, to frustrate their favorite game of crawling on hands and feet up to the horses, and sending an arrow into the herd or the sentinel, as might happen to be most convenient.

Not far from this camp I saw, for the first time, a fight between a tarantula and a “tarantula hawk.” Manuel Duran had always insisted that the gray tarantula could whip the black one, and that there was something that flew about in the evening that could and would make the quarrelsome gray tarantula seek safety in abject flight. It was what we used to call in my school-boy days “the devil’s darning-needle” which made its appearance, and seemed to worry the great spider very much. The tarantula stood up on its hind legs, and did its best to ward off impending fate, but it was no use. The “hawk” hit the tarantula in the back and apparently paralyzed him, and then seemed to be pulling at one of the hind legs. I have since been informed that there is some kind of a fluid injected into the back of the tarantula which acts as a stupefier, and at the same time the “hawk” deposits its eggs there, which, hatching, feed upon the spider. For all this I cannot vouch, as I did not care to venture too near those venomous reptiles and insects of that region, at least not until after I had acquired more confidence from greater familiarity with them.

We saw no more Indian “sign” on that trip, which had not been, however, devoid of all incident.

And no sooner had we arrived at Camp Grant than we were out again, this time guided by an Apache squaw, who had come into the post during our absence, and given to the commanding officer a very consistent story of ill-treatment at the hands of her people. She said that her husband was dead, killed in a fight with the troops, and that she and her baby had not been treated with the kindness which they had a right to expect. I do not remember in what this ill-treatment consisted, but most likely none of the brothers of the deceased had offered to marry the widow and care for her and her little one, as is the general custom, in which the Apaches resemble the Hebrews of ancient times. If the troops would follow her, she would guide them into a very bad country, where there was a “rancheria” which could be attacked and destroyed very readily.

So back we went, this time on foot, carrying our rations on our backs, crossing the Piñaleno to the south of the Aravaypa, and ascending until we reached the pine forest upon its summit; then down into the valley at the extreme head of the Aravaypa, and over into the broken country on the other side of the Gabilan, or Hawk Cañon.