He said, "This beats anything I ever undertook. When we first came to Dallas, the whole town talked as if they were crazy to go, and now I can't get anybody to join me, but I will make the effort with the ten men that will go, and if this is a success and we make fortunes, we will come back and surprise the city."
I said, "Alright, Capt., but if the people of Dallas are ever surprised, it will not be from hearing of the great amount of gold you and your companions took from Cherry creek."
The Capt. now commenced to get ready for the journey to Colorado, the land of reported gold. Each of his men had to have two saddle horses, and one pack horse for every two men, and each man had three months provisions, consisting of flour, coffee, salt and tobacco.
The question of getting meat was never thought of as one could get a plenty of that anywhere on the journey, and the streams were teaming with the most delicious fish.
The evening before we were to set out in the morning the Capt said,
"Which way shall we go?"
I said, "Although it is getting late, and we may have some cold weather to contend with I think our best and most direct route will be by what is called the Panhandle route. There will be no rivers to cross, and there is a plenty of grass for the horses, and also there is nice drinking water in abundance all the way for ourselves as well as the hordes, and there will be days when we will be in sight of Deer and Antelope from morning until night."
There were a few scattering settlements along the trail. The place which is now the city of Childress being the largest, and also the last settlement we passed through, and the last sign of civilization we saw until we struck Bent's Fort which was on the Arkansas river below what is now the city of Pueblo in the state of Colorado which was at that time a territory just a little north of what is now the city of Amarillo.
We killed our first Buffalo on that trip.
It is surprising to the people who saw that country at that early day when they travel through it now and see what civilization has done. There is Amarillo, which has several thousand inhabitants today, and at the time I am speaking of there was not a house or sign of a living person there, and a number of other places I could mention that are thriving cities now were at that time inhabited by wild animals alone.
In the year of forty-eight when Kit Carson and I went across the Rocky mountains with Col. Freemont, we camped three days where the city of Pueblo, Colorado, now stands.