United States or Kuwait ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The appearance of the breech-loading rifle in the hands of the United States dragoons on the frontier just fifteen years ago let in new light upon the Camanche and Apache mind. Up to that period the badgering of a detachment of "heavies" was a favorite pastime with these gentry.
He had served in General Miles's inconceivably harassing campaigns against the Apaches, where he had displayed such courage that he won that most coveted of distinctions the Medal of Honor; such extraordinary physical strength and endurance that he grew to be recognized as one of the two or three white men who could stand fatigue and hardship as well as an Apache; and such judgment that toward the close of the campaigns he was given, though a surgeon, the actual command of more than one expedition against the bands of renegade Indians.
"But his attack on us at Montpellier, and later on you here, coming at about the same time as their visit " "Coincidence, if you ask me. The weight of probability is against any collusion between the two parties." "Please explain..." "Dupont is an Apache of Paris.
Along in the middle seventies I think it was '74, I was partner with a man named George Stevens at Eureka Springs, west of Fort Thomas in the Apache country, a trading station for freighters. We were owners of the trading station, which was some distance south of where the copper cities of Globe and Miami are now situated.
The mountaineer stated that he and his friends were simply travellers through the Apache country; while they were prepared for war, they desired peace, and as their animals were tired out they wished to exchange them for fresh ones. The Apaches expressed themselves satisfied with the proposal, and Carson carefully chose a camping site, where they could best protect themselves against treachery.
He turned to Johnson who, sitting astride a flea-bitten gray mare that seemed to be in a perpetual doze, looked more like an Apache squaw than a boss cowboy.
In the meantime Major James Guilford, somewhile president of the Apache National Bank of Gaston, and antecedent to that the frowning autocrat of a twenty-five-mile logging road in the North Carolina mountains, had given bond in some sort and had taken possession of the company's property and of the offices in the Quintard Building.
The rancheros fed the horses on corn which they had brought in small sacks. Texas Smith kept watch, suffered no Apache to touch him, had his pistols always cocked, and stood ready to sell life at the highest price. Coronado walked deliberately to a retired spot with Manga Colorada, Delgadito, and two other chiefs, and made known his propositions.
Men, mounts, scouts, mules and packers, all, were there at his behest; but, with Wren in arrest, Sanders and Lynn back but a week from a long prod through the Black Mesa country far as Fort Apache, Blakely invalided and Duane a boy second lieutenant, his choice of cavalry officers was limited. It never occurred to him to look beyond. "What's the immediate need of a scout?" said he.
Travis was not certain, though he guessed that the drummer was either medicine man or shaman, and so of some power in this company. Such men were credited with the ability to prophesy and also endowed with mediumship between man and spirit in the old days of the great Hordes. The Apache evaluated the rest of the company.
Word Of The Day