The Capt. said, "Well, we will leave enough men to guard the wounded men and the horses, and we will take the others with us and go and search for more Indians."
Capt. McKee left ten men to guard the camp, and the balance of us struck out on a hunt for stray Indians.
We were gone from camp two or three hours, and we only found one Indian, and he was wounded, but we found a number of dead Indians scattered all through the timber where the men had shot them down as they ran, or as they met them in hand-to-hand combat.
After we got back to camp, I asked the Capt. what he was going to do with those horses.
He said he thought it would be the best plan to stay where we were until the men were able to travel and then to go back to the settlement and get our other horses and then pull for Dallas. "For," said he, "I do not believe that the Indians will make any more raids through this part of the country until next spring, and they may never come back, for we have crippled them so that they will shun a place where they have met such disaster. There has never been a company through here that has had the success in killing Indians and capturing their horses as we have had this spring. Just think what we have done, and not one of our men has been killed."
We remained in this camp two weeks, and everyone had a good time with the exception of the wounded men, and even they were more cheerful than one in health could have thought possible.
Game was plentiful and easy to get, and we had all the fresh meat we wanted, and it was an ideal place to lay around and rest when we were tired hunting, and there was a plenty of grass for the horses and a cool spring of water to quench the thirst of man and beast.
After the first week, the wounded men took more or less exercise every day, and so kept their strength, and it was surprising how fast their wounds healed.
The day before the one set to start for the settlement, I asked the man that had the wounded hip if he thought he could ride on horseback. He answered, "Yes, if I had a gentle horse so I could ride sideways, I could stand it to ride a half a day without stopping to rest."
I told him that I had a horse that was very gentle and would just suit his case.