As we were anxious to learn more of these two noted Indians, especially Geronimo, we determined to make a visit to Fort Sill, which is in Comanche County, Oklahoma Territory, three miles from Lawton. This we did in April of 1905.
The commandant at the fort, Lieut. George A. Purington, extended every courtesy, and among other things gave me this bit of information. Said he: "When Geronimo was about to start to Washington I gave him a check for $171. He took it to Lawton and deposited $170 of it in the bank, and started to Washington with only $1 in his pocket. But wherever the train stopped and people learned that Geronimo was on board they crowded around the car windows and bought his autograph as fast as he could write it at 50 cents each." The interpreter, George M. Wratton, who was with Geronimo, said he had trouble getting him from one depot to another because of the people crowding around, eager for his autograph. He attracted more attention than any one in Washington, the President alone excepted. He soon had his pockets full of money. He bought a trunk and filled it with good clothes, and had money in his pocket when he returned to Fort Sill, ahead of the interpreter, having become separated from him in Washington.
The commandant also informed us that Geronimo's imprisonment was of the mildest form possible. His treatment is kind and humane, and, in fact, he is a well-to-do Indian, with money in the bank at Lawton and the proceeds of a herd of about two hundred cattle, kept on the reservation by his good friend, Uncle Sam. Continuing, the lieutenant said, warming with his theme; "Why, as a matter of fact, Geronimo enjoys comparative freedom. Besides going to Washington City recently and coming all the way back by himself, he is continually going somewhere. Here is a letter which I have just received from one of the Miller Brothers, proprietors of 101 Ranch of Bliss, Oklahoma, asking me to let Geronimo be with them June 11 in their great Wild West Cowboy and Indian outfit, which is being arranged to entertain the National Editorial Association, which will meet at Guthrie about that time. They propose to pay Geronimo his own price, and I am perfectly willing he should go and earn something for himself. Out of the fifty or sixty thousand people expected on the ground that day, it is thought that at least ten thousand will come purposely to see Geronimo, as he is the best advertised Indian in America. Just last night I gave him a permit to visit Quanah Parker, and he will go to-day. Here he enjoys comparative liberty and protection, but should the President pardon him, and he return to his old haunts in Arizona or Texas, there are a number of white men, whose families he and his warriors butchered, have sworn to kill him on sight."
In walking around the grounds of the fort, I went into a sutler's store and purchased a bow and arrow made by Geronimo, but I failed to find the chief, and was passing near the depot, going to the home of Mr. Wratton, the interpreter, to make inquiry, when the station agent called to me and said Geronimo was then in the depot waiting for a train. Hurrying back, I found the noted chief on the platform of the depot; he took my proffered hand with a smile and a hearty "How!" and pulled me up on the platform. I had expected to see a gray-haired, sour-visaged, skinny-looking old Indian, with a scowl on his face and nervous twitching fingers, as if eager to shed more blood. But instead I saw a smiling, well-kept, well-dressed Indian, about five feet nine inches tall, with square shoulders and deep chest, indicating the marvelous power of endurance for which he and his warriors were noted. His actual weight that day was 169 pounds, but an old soldier who had followed him over desert and mountain assured me that his fighting weight used to be about a ton.
He is rather darker than the average of the Apaches, his skin being more of a chocolate than copper color. He has the usual Indian features with broad face and high and prominent cheekbones, each covered at the time with a vermilion spot about the size of a silver dollar. But the most remarkable of all his features are his eyes, which are keen and bright and a decided blue, something very rare among Indians.
He was dressed in a well-fitting blue cloth suit of citizen's clothes, and it was hard to realize that he was the same Indian designated by General Miles as "the tiger of the human race." I found that while he was quick to understand much that was said to him, he spoke but a few words of English, therefore I suggested by signs that we go to the interpreter's house and have him talk for us. Turning to the station agent and looking up the track he asked, "How much?" The agent pulled out Geronimo's open-faced silver watch from his vest pocket and running his finger around the dial, and half around again, he indicated an hour and a half. "Good," he exclaimed, and we started off to the interpreter's house, about one-fourth of a mile across the prairie from the depot. Imagine the writer and Geronimo walking arm in arm across the pasture. Well, that is what happened. There are other things besides politics which make strange companions.
About half way to the house there was a little stream to cross, its width being a good jump for a man. Now I rather excelled in jumping in my college sports and saw a chance to test the old chief's activity, so running forward, I vaulted over the stream, but it required an effort, and to my astonishment Geronimo leaped it with ease and went a foot farther than where I landed.
Near the interpreter's yard was a prairie-dog town, the first I had ever seen. It consisted of a number of little hills with a hole in the side least exposed to rain; on top of some of these hills prairie dogs were to be seen, and heard, barking at us as we approached until we got quite near, when they would dart into their holes. The aged chief noticed them, and throwing an imaginary Winchester to his shoulder and sighting along the barrel, he made his mouth "pop" several times in imitation of a gun. In the distance I noticed three more hills, each with a prairie dog sentinel on top. Calling his attention to them by pointing in that direction, he at once raised the sights on his imaginary gun and again his "pop! pop! pop!" was heard, showing that his eyes are still good.
When we reached the house of the interpreter, George M. Wratton, and I had explained the object of our call, and convinced him that I was a historian searching for facts and information, he was ready to help me. I found him a very intelligent, well informed gentleman, who, as the commandant had assured me, probably knows more about Geronimo than the chief does himself.