“Early on the morning of the third day, one of our company fired at a black-tailed deer, standing midway to the summit of a lofty cliff. The animal rolled down the declivity almost to the water’s edge. The shot was pronounced remarkable. Out of compliment to the skill of the marksman, as well as to appease the cravings of appetite, we immediately landed, built a fire, and proceeded to roast and ‘scoff,’ after the approved manner of hunters, the tender ribs and haunches, furnishing a meal which all agreed surpassed anything known to the modern cuisine. Perhaps this was attributable to the fact that we were hungry, but then the delicious flavor of the venison was not spoiled by villainous cookery. Our dessert consisted of canned fruit and coffee, the whole moistened with a moderate flow of Bourbon drunk from tin cups. After our repast was finished, we resumed our journey in the happiest mood, with the spirit and dash of adventurers who felt themselves equal to any emergency. At noon we came upon the steamboat Luella, which, owing to the falling of the river, had left Fort Benton some weeks before, and was lying below Dauphin’s Rapids, where her passengers, who were coming down in small boats, were to join her for the trip to St. Louis. The river, which owes its spring flood to the early rains and dissolving snows in the mountain ranges, seldom affords sufficient depth later than July for steamboats to pass over Dauphin’s and Dead-Man’s rapids, the two great obstructions to its upper navigation. Indeed it was matter of speculation whether the Luella would be able at this late period in the season to make the trip until after another rise. We remained long enough to exchange compliments with Captain Marsh, and presenting him with a quantity of game for his lady passengers, resumed our voyage.
“While descending the river the forenoon of the next day, we saw on the right bank half a mile ahead, three monster bears. They were taking a social drink from the river. As soon as they had finished, they strolled leisurely up the bank and disappeared in the cottonwoods. Landing at the spot, all hands seized their weapons and started enthusiastically in pursuit of them. We followed their huge tracks in the sand up a low coulee, to the top of the bluff, and there formed in line and proceeded by the flank into the chaparral, their tracks growing larger and fresher as we advanced, until suddenly the huge monsters confronted us at a distance of about thirty paces. Seated on their haunches, their heads towering above the shrubbery, jaws extended, and paws swaying to and fro, they by short and eager snuffs, growls, and snaps, gave us an acute sense of the danger we had mistaken for sport. Our appetite for bear meat weakened much quicker than it came, and old ‘Forty-niner,’ who had served a long apprenticeship in California, coming up at this moment, on seeing the animals, raised and fired his rifle, shouting in a voice of terror, ‘Holy Jupiter! They are grizzlies!’ and turned and ran like a demoralized jack-rabbit in the direction of the boat. Suddenly recollecting that it was the black bear and not the grizzly we were in pursuit of, we all followed his example. Humphrey, slowly bringing up the rear, proposed that we should ‘give them a round.’ To this I assented, but urged as a preliminary that we should get out of the brush and within striking distance of the boat. Before we could do so, however, the foremost bear made a plunge for Humphrey, who, facing him, with his gun at his shoulder, fired with so true an aim, that the great beast with a somersault fell forward at his feet, and with a roar of pain expired. The cub, two-thirds the size of its dam, seeing her fall, turned and fled, leaving the way open for the attack of the sire, a grand old fellow who sounded instantly to the charge, and came crashing through the thicket upon us. It was a moment for action. We opened upon him with a terrible bombardment from our Henry rifles. In less time than a minute we had fired thirty-one balls into him. In his endeavors to reach us, and in his rage and agony, he executed some tremendous feats of ground and lofty tumbling. The woods echoed to his howlings, and in a frantic manner he tore up the earth and broke down the saplings for a considerable space around. The chaparral cracked beneath the strokes of his paws, and large pieces of rotten logs were scattered in all directions. His pluck should have won him a more glorious fate, for with all his efforts to attack us, he died without inflicting any harm, and his death roar, reverberating through the forest, summoned our frightened companions, who, with ‘Forty-niner’ in the van, returned in time to be in at the death. ‘Johnny,’ my faithful henchman, with revolver in hand, reserving fire for a last contingency, had stood near while the fight was progressing. He now came forward and warmly congratulated Humphrey and myself on our victory. We took the hind quarters of our prize on board, and nailed one of the huge paws as a trophy, to the top of our jack-staff, and floated on.
“Toward evening we descried a party of white men on the right bank, hove to, and went ashore. They proved to be a party of seven, engaged in chopping wood for steamboats. They were living in a little shanty, and intended to remain through the winter. When the boats came up, in the early spring, they expected to make a profitable sale of their wood, and go to some less exposed country. During the winter they designed to increase their wealth by hunting and trapping for furs. These men were armed with Hawkins rifles, which, being muzzle-loading, were greatly inferior to the breech-loading cartridge guns then in use. We warned them of their danger, but with the energy and enterprise they possessed also the courage and recklessness of all pioneers. They said they were ready to take the chances. Poor fellows! The chances were too strong for them, for only a few days afterwards a body of Sioux Indians came upon them. They made a desperate defence, but were overpowered and every one of them massacred.
“The eighth day of our voyage was mild and lovely. We had floated seven hundred miles without accident. Each day had been crowded with events of interest, and our adventures had all been crowned with success. These, with our resources for humor, and a general disposition to see only the ludicrous side of passing incidents, made us cheerful and good-humored even to boisterousness. Sometimes, even in the midst of mirth, the thought of our constant exposure to Indian attack would operate as an unpleasant restraint. But we did not shirk the subject, or fail for a moment to look it steadily in the face. Most of our company knew what Indian fighting meant, and some had had experience. Three had followed under the banner of the writer, on the sunny slopes of the distant Pacific, when gallantry and honor had called for volunteers for the defence of firesides against savage forays. In early times upon the Middle Yuba, when Bill Junes the packer and five others were ruthlessly murdered, it was ‘Forty-niner’ who sounded the tocsin of war and led the daylight attack down the winding gorge upon a Digger ranchero, to its total annihilation. Our uniform experience had been that where civilized jarred with savage nature, a conflict was inevitable, and the pioneer had fought his own battles unaided. Government had done little for his protection, and less for the savage.
“Occasionally this subject would obtrude itself upon our thoughts, and we would discuss it in its personal aspects, always resolving to be on our guard against surprise and attack. But the prestige of successful adventure made us careless, and a latent sentiment of pride and confidence in our arms pervaded the entire party. We had been for several days passing through the country of the hostile Sioux, and knew if we should fall in with one of their war parties an attack would surely follow, and he would be a lucky man who escaped a bloody fate. As if, by a presentiment of coming evil, the subject on this day became more than usually exciting. ‘Forty-niner,’ who rather desired a brush with the Indians, had just expressed his willingness and ability to eat any number of Sioux for breakfast, should they attack our party, when our boat rounded a bend in the river, and Humphrey, the first to make the discovery, exclaimed, ‘Well, there they are. You can eat them for dinner if you choose.’
“It was high noon. Just before us at the mouth of a coulee on the south bank of the river, was a large party of Indians. A hasty glance of mutual surprise and an instant seizure of arms by both parties, defined, stronger than language could do, the terms upon which we were to meet. Below the coulee, there rose to the height of fifty feet, a perpendicular bluff around whose base dashed the foaming current. A low open sand-bar disputed our passage on the opposite side. There was no alternative. We must go by the channel, within range of their guns, or not at all. As we steered to a point across the river, the Indians withdrew to the coulee, one alone remaining, who accompanied his friendly salutation of ‘How! How!’ with gestures indicating a desire for us to return to that side, and engage in trade with them. A moment later and our boat was opposite the coulee, within which we could see some of the red devils stripping off their blankets, and others, already denuded, approaching the verge of the bluff, armed with bows and arrows and rifles. It was evident we had come up with a large party of Sioux who were about to attack us, and we must make the best of the situation. Despite our labor at the oars, the current swept us down in direct range of the spot occupied by the Indians, who, before we had finished fastening our boat, opened fire upon us with about fifty shots, which fortunately whistled over our heads. Before they could correct their aim for another fire, we were behind a breastwork hastily extemporized by throwing up our blankets and baggage against the exposed gunwale of the boat. This they pierced with bullets thick as hail, but the protection it afforded us was ample, and we soon got ready to return their leaden compliments. Each of our Henry rifles contained sixteen cartridges when we opened fire, and the distance being about one hundred and fifty yards to the bluff, which was literally swarming with savages, not more than ten minutes elapsed until every one of them had disappeared. The fearful death howl, however, assured us that our fire had not been in vain. With the exception of an occasional head dodging behind the trees, not an Indian could be seen, yet from the coulee, the sage brush, and low shrubbery, an incessant firing was kept up, which we returned as often as an object became visible.
“The effect of our first fire satisfied us that while it would be death to all on board to attempt to run the channel, we could in our present position keep the rascals at bay. We could stand the broiling sun of an August afternoon on a heated sand-bar in the Missouri better than the hotter fire of our savage foes. Early in the action, while rising to fire from the breastwork, a bullet struck Humphrey in the mouth, carrying away with it a piece of the jaw and three teeth, and severely cutting the lips. The wound disabled him, and deprived us of the best marksman in the party. A little later ‘Forty-niner’ was struck by an arrow in the fleshy part of the thigh. I pulled out the shaft, and bound up the wound. Five minutes after, an arrow pierced the calf of his leg, inflicting a painful wound. These arrows came from a squad which was protected from our bullets by a depression in the bluff, oblique to us. So great was their skill with the bow, that while the main party in front could not harm us with bullets, they, by bending their arrows, caused them to describe a curve which would strike their sharp points into the legs of our boots with unerring precision.
“The pride of ‘Forty-niner’ was now fully aroused. Twice wounded, he became enraged, desperate, and unsheathing his bowie-knife, he rose to his feet, and brandished it in the rays of the sun, launching a terrible imprecation upon the liver, hearts, and scalps of the savages. ‘Come on,’ he shouted, ‘you infernal sons of Belial! Alone and single-handed, I will meet any five of the best of you in open fight!’
“The bullets whistled around him from an invisible foe, but to no purpose. Seizing him by the left arm I pulled him down, and warned him of the danger of this personal exposure; but not until he had exhausted his vocabulary of maledictions, would he yield to my entreaties and resume his place behind the breastwork. Deprecating his recklessness, I could not but admire his courage. But as this was no time for sentiment, I was only too happy, when, of his own accord, he stretched himself beside me, and I heard the bullets whistling harmlessly over us. Just at this moment I looked behind me and caught a glance of my little friend Johnny. With nothing but a pistol to engage in the conflict, he had taken no active part in it, but, with the pistol beside him, he was administering every possible relief to poor wounded Humphrey. His coolness was remarkable, and inspired us all with hope.
“The Indians kept up a brisk fire from various places of concealment until after sundown. We only responded when our shots would tell, and finally ceased to fire at all. Our enemies, thinking we were all slain, sent a party to take our scalps and plunder. We lay still, behind our breastwork, so as not to undeceive them. Twenty-seven of their best warriors, led by Ta-Skun-ka-Du-tah (the ‘Red Dog’), swam the river half a mile above, and marched down directly in rear of us. There, at a distance of about three hundred yards, they sat down in a ring, within easy range of our rifles. Sitting Bull, their head chief, meantime made medicine on the south bank for their success, while they, believing that we were fully in their power, commenced smoking and making medicine with the intention of destroying us at leisure. (The names of the chiefs engaged in this attack were learned by the writer several years after its occurrence when he was employed as a government agent for the Teton Sioux, of which tribe Sitting Bull was head chief.)